[House Hearing, 106 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
FOREST SERVICE BUDGET FOR FISCAL YEAR 2000
=======================================================================
OVERSIGHT HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON FOREST AND FOREST HEALTH
of the
COMMITTEE ON RESOURCES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SIXTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
FEBRUARY 23, 1999, WASHINGTON, DC
__________
Serial No. 106-7
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Resources
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress/
house
or
Committee address: http://www.house.gov/resources
55-182 U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
WASHINGTON : 1999
COMMITTEE ON RESOURCES
DON YOUNG, Alaska, Chairman
W.J. (BILLY) TAUZIN, Louisiana GEORGE MILLER, California
JAMES V. HANSEN, Utah NICK J. RAHALL II, West Virginia
JIM SAXTON, New Jersey BRUCE F. VENTO, Minnesota
ELTON GALLEGLY, California DALE E. KILDEE, Michigan
JOHN J. DUNCAN, Jr., Tennessee PETER A. DeFAZIO, Oregon
JOEL HEFLEY, Colorado ENI F.H. FALEOMAVAEGA, American
JOHN T. DOOLITTLE, California Samoa
WAYNE T. GILCHREST, Maryland NEIL ABERCROMBIE, Hawaii
KEN CALVERT, California SOLOMON P. ORTIZ, Texas
RICHARD W. POMBO, California OWEN B. PICKETT, Virginia
BARBARA CUBIN, Wyoming FRANK PALLONE, Jr., New Jersey
HELEN CHENOWETH, Idaho CALVIN M. DOOLEY, California
GEORGE P. RADANOVICH, California CARLOS A. ROMERO-BARCELO, Puerto
WALTER B. JONES, Jr., North Rico
Carolina ROBERT A. UNDERWOOD, Guam
WILLIAM M. (MAC) THORNBERRY, Texas PATRICK J. KENNEDY, Rhode Island
CHRIS CANNON, Utah ADAM SMITH, Washington
KEVIN BRADY, Texas WILLIAM D. DELAHUNT, Massachusetts
JOHN PETERSON, Pennsylvania CHRIS JOHN, Louisiana
RICK HILL, Montana DONNA CHRISTIAN-CHRISTENSEN,
BOB SCHAFFER, Colorado Virgin Islands
JIM GIBBONS, Nevada RON KIND, Wisconsin
MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana JAY INSLEE, Washington
GREG WALDEN, Oregon GRACE F. NAPOLITANO, California
DON SHERWOOD, Pennsylvania TOM UDALL, New Mexico
ROBIN HAYES, North Carolina MARK UDALL, Colorado
MIKE SIMPSON, Idaho JOSEPH CROWLEY, New York
THOMAS G. TANCREDO, Colorado
Lloyd A. Jones, Chief of Staff
Elizabeth Megginson, Chief Counsel
Christine Kennedy, Chief Clerk/Administrator
John Lawrence, Democratic Staff Director
------
Subcommittee on Forest and Forest Health
HELEN CHENOWETH, Idaho, Chairman
JOHN J. DUNCAN, Jr., Tennessee ADAM SMITH, Washington
JOHN T. DOOLITTLE, California DALE E. KILDEE, Michigan
WAYNE T. GILCHREST, Maryland OWEN B. PICKETT, Virginia
JOHN PETERSON, Pennsylvania RON KIND, Wisconsin
RICK HILL, Montana GRACE F. NAPOLITANO, California
BOB SCHAFFER, Colorado TOM UDALL, New Mexico
DON SHERWOOD, Pennsylvania MARK UDALL, Colorado
ROBIN HAYES, North Carolina JOSEPH CROWLEY, New York
---------- ----------
---------- ----------
Doug Crandall, Staff Director
Anne Heissenbuttel, Legislative Staff
Jeff Petrich, Minority Chief Counsel
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Hearing held February 23, 1999................................... 1
Statements of Members:
Chenoweth, Hon. Helen, a Representative in Congress from the
State of Idaho............................................. 1
Prepared statement of.................................... 2
Smith, Hon. Adam, a Representative in Congress from the State
of Washington.............................................. 2
Statements of witnesses:
Dombeck, Mike, Chief, U.S. Forest Service.................... 7
Prepared statement of.................................... 30
Lyons, James R., Under Secretary, Natural Resources and
Environment, Department of Agriculture; accompanied by
Francis P. Pandolfi, Chief Operating Officer, Forest
Service; Vincette L. Goerl, Deputy Chief, Forest Service;
Robert Lewis, Jr., Deputy Chief, Forest Service; Gloria
Manning, Deputy Chief, Forest Service; Ronald E. Stewart,
Deputy Chief, Forest Service; Clyde Thompson, Deputy Chief,
Forest Service, and Larry Payne, Associate Deputy Chief,
Forest Service............................................. 3
Prepared statement of.................................... 28
OVERSIGHT HEARING ON FOREST SERVICE BUDGET FOR FISCAL YEAR 2000
----------
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 23, 1999
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Forests
and Forest Health,
Committee on Resources,
Washington, DC.
The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 1:05 p.m., in
Room 1334, Longworth House Office Building, Hon. Helen
Chenoweth [chairwoman of the Subcommittee] presiding.
STATEMENT OF HON. HELEN CHENOWETH, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS
FROM THE STATE OF IDAHO
Mrs. Chenoweth. The Committee will come to order.
The Subcommittee is meeting today to hear testimony on the
Forest Service budget for Fiscal Year 2000.
Under rule 4(g) of the Committee rules, any oral opening
statements at hearings are limited to the chairman and the
Ranking Minority Member. This will allow us to hear from our
witnesses sooner and help members keep to their schedule.
Therefore, if the other members do have statements they will be
included in the hearing record under Unanimous Consent.
Today, we convene to discuss the President's Fiscal Year
2000 budget request for the Forest Service. To paraphrase an
old saying, ``Same old tax-and-spend, different Fiscal Year.''
It is obvious from the President's budget request that the era
of big government is back with a vengeance, and nowhere in the
budget is this more apparent than the request for the Forest
Service which includes a laundry list of new spending
initiatives.
What is even more mind-boggling is that the GAO and the IG
have specified time and time again that the Forest Service is
incapable of managing their fiscal and administrative affairs
and, yet, the administration wants to increase their budget,
their staff, and their responsibility. Where is the sense in
that?
The administration has proposed a program, The Lands Legacy
Initiative, to add tremendous amounts of land to the national
forest system at a time when there is a huge backlog of
infrastructure and maintenance needs on currently-owned lands.
Where is the sense in that? The administration is attempting to
deprive the Forest Service of a valuable forest health
management tool that is timber sales. At a time when one third
of the Nation's Federal forests are at a high risk of
catastrophic wildfire, the administration is proposing to
dramatically decrease the budget for the timber sales program.
Where is the sense in that?
I cannot, in good faith, support budgetary increases for an
agency that has, according to the GAO, an accountability
crisis, or that is concerned more with political correctness
than with correct management. Nevertheless, I am willing to try
to continue to work with the Forest Service and the
Appropriations Committee to craft a common sense budget for the
agency that responds aggressively to current forest management
and agency management needs.
In light of the changes from previous years' budget
requests, I have asked Under Secretary Lyons and Chief Dombeck
to come before the Subcommittee to explain the Administration's
proposals and to answer questions, and I hope that by the
conclusion of this hearing we will have a better understanding
of these proposals and the agency's funding needs.
Now I am very happy to recognize the Ranking Minority
Member for any statement that he may have. I am very pleased at
the fact that Mr. Adam Smith, the gentleman from Washington,
will be our Ranking Minority Member. Mr. Smith.
[The prepared statement of Mrs. Chenoweth follows:]
Statement of Hon. Helen Chenoweth, a Representative in Congress from
the State of Idaho
Today we convene to discuss the President's Fiscal Year
2000 budget request for the Forest Service. To paraphrase an
old saying, ``same old tax and spend--different fiscal year.''
It is obvious from the President's budget request that the Era
of Big Government is back with a vengeance! And nowhere in the
budget is this more apparent than the request for the Forest
Service which includes a laundry list of new spending
initiatives.
What's even more mind-boggling is that the GAO and the IG
have testified, time and time again, that the Forest Service is
incapable of managing their fiscal and administrative affairs.
And, yet, the Administration wants to increase their budget,
their staff, and their responsibilities. Where's the sense in
that?
The Administration has proposed a program, the Lands Legacy
Initiative, to add tremendous amounts of land to the national
forest system at a time when there is a huge backlog of
infrastructure and maintenance needs on currently owned lands.
Where's the sense in that?
The Administration is attempting to deprive the Forest
Service of a valuable forest health management tool--timber
sales. At a time when 1/3rd of the nation's Federal forests are
at a high risk of catastrophic wildfire, the Administration is
proposing to dramatically decrease the budget for the timber
sales program. Where's the sense in that?
I cannot, in good faith, support budgetary increases for an
agency that has, according to the GAO, an accountability crisis
or that is concerned more with political correctness than with
correct management. Nevertheless, I am willing to work with the
Forest Service and the Appropriations Committee to craft a
common sense budget for the agency that responds aggressively
to current forest management--and agency management--needs.
In light of the changes from previous year's budget
requests, I have asked Undersecretary Lyons and Chief Dombeck
to come before the Subcommittee to explain the Administration's
proposals and to answer questions. I hope that by the
conclusion of this hearing, we will have a better understanding
of these proposals and the Agency's funding needs.
STATEMENT OF HON. ADAM SMITH, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM
THE STATE OF WASHINGTON
Mr. Adam Smith. Thank you, I am happy to be here.
Obviously, I have not previously served in this
Subcommittee, so I am new to the Subcommittee. I have worked on
some of the issues relating to forest health and other issues,
most notably, the roads program and other things that affect my
home State in Washington. So I have some background, but mostly
I am here to learn this morning and I want to thank Mr. Lyons
and Mr. Dombeck for coming by this morning. It sounds like you
have your work cut out for you.
It ought to be an interesting afternoon and I look forward
to hearing your testimony and learning more about the Forest
Service: what it does, its budget, and also some of the new
proposals that the administration has put forward, to get a
chance to judge them on their merits and see whether or not
they will help our country and the Forest Service in general.
But mostly I just want to learn what is going on with the
Forest Service and fill in some of the gaps. So, I look forward
to hearing your testimony and will probably have some questions
later. Thank you.
Mrs. Chenoweth. I will now introduce our first panel. Mr.
James Lyons, Under Secretary, Natural Resources and
Environment, Department of Agriculture, and Mr. Mike Dombeck,
the Chief of the United States Forest Service. They will be
accompanied by Mr. Francis Pandolfi, Chief Operating Officer;
Vincette Goerl, Deputy Chief; Robert Lewis, Jr., Deputy Chief;
Gloria Manning, Deputy Chief; Mr. Ron Stewart, Deputy Chief;
Clyde Thompson, Deputy Chief, and Larry Payne, Associate Deputy
Chief.
Now, since they all from time to time may be giving
testimony that will become part of the record, I wonder if they
could all proceed to the front and take the oath.
[Witnesses sworn.]
Mrs. Chenoweth. Thank you very much. As we have explained
before, it is the intention of the chairman to place all
outside witnesses under the oath, and I know that you have all
received your copies of the rules and with all of you this is a
pretty familiar formality here. So, we will open now with
testimony from Mr. Lyons.
STATEMENT OF JAMES R. LYONS, UNDER SECRETARY, NATURAL RESOURCES
AND ENVIRONMENT, DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE ACCOMPANIED BY
FRANCIS P. PANDOLFI, CHIEF OPERATING OFFICER, FOREST SERVICE;
VINCETTE L. GOERL, DEPUTY CHIEF, FOREST SERVICE; ROBERT LEWIS,
JR., DEPUTY CHIEF, FOREST SERVICE; GLORIA MANNING, DEPUTY
CHIEF, FOREST SERVICE; RONALD E. STEWART, DEPUTY CHIEF, FOREST
SERVICE; CLYDE THOMPSON, DEPUTY CHIEF, FOREST SERVICE, AND
LARRY PAYNE, ASSOCIATE DEPUTY CHIEF, FOREST SERVICE
Mr. Lyons. Well, thank you very much, Madam Chairman. Thank
you for introducing the entire team that we brought up with us
today. I also want to introduce a member of my staff, Meline
Stanley, who was up here on Capitol Hill, and now serves as my
confidential assistant, and has been very able help in my
office. It is also a pleasure to get an opportunity to meet
Congressman Smith and Congressman Udall and Congressman Udall,
and have a chance to work with them in these next two years.
Madam Chairman, I would like to present a brief overview of
our budget and want to simply highlight a few areas of interest
and concern that I know we will have an opportunity to discuss
in greater detail. In particular, what I want to do is focus on
the President's and the department's priorities in management
of our rich natural resources, and also on the priorities that
have been set out by Chief Dombeck through the natural
resources agenda and explain ways in which ways this budget, I
think, helps to bolster and amplify our efforts to focus on
those elements of the agenda.
Despite differences regarding budget priorities and several
environmental riders which are part of the Fiscal Year 1999
Appropriations debate, we worked hard with the Congress to
develop a bill which helped the Forest Service move forward
towards improved forest and ecological health and
sustainability in Fiscal Year 1999. I want to thank you for
your leadership in helping to bring that bill to rapid closure
last year.
This year, I expect that many of the same issues that we
discussed and debated will arise again. Nevertheless, I think
that we are making substantive progress in moving both the
Nation's forests, and the Forest Service in a direction that
will help ensure our ability to be good land stewards and
provide a legacy of which you and I are both going to be very
proud.
First, for a brief overview, this budget proposes an
overall increase in discretionary appropriations of about 6.5
percent for the Forest Service. The budget includes a healthy
emphasis on basic programs necessary for managing the agency's
192 million acres of national forest land. In addition, the
budget proposes a substantial increase in the research arena,
$37.2 million, to enhance our ability to do the research
necessary to guide us in being good land stewards and provide a
scientific basis for the management decisions we make.
Finally, the budget proposes major increases in the state
and private forestry programs, programs that are geared towards
working cooperatively with state forestry agencies and other
cooperators in areas such as fire and forest health and
cooperative land stewardship.
Let me turn to the important priorities in the budget as
far as the administration is concerned. As you know, the
President has proposed several initiatives in the Fiscal Year
2000 budget, including a number that were first initiated as a
part of our efforts in Fiscal Year 1999. The President has
proposed this year a Lands Legacy Initiative which you alluded
to. The largest one-year investment ever in preservation of
America's lands, and the continuation in terms of priority of
the Clean Water Action plan to continue to focus on priority
watersheds where protection and improvement programs are so
desperately needed.
The Lands Legacy Initiative, in my mind, Madam Chairman, is
a bold initiative, and essential for America as we enter into
the next millennium. This $1 billion program includes $217.6
million in Forest Service funding which will focus on working
with states, tribes, local governments, enrolling private
partners to protect great places, and serve open space for
recreation and wildlife, and to preserve forest, farmlands, and
coastal resources.
As the President noted in his State of the Union address,
7,000 acres of farmland and open space are lost every day. The
number of tracts of forest land of 50 acres or less doubled
from 1978 to 1994 as our landscape was carved into smaller and
smaller pieces. Access to and the health of these lands is
diminishing as a result of this fragmentation. To address these
serious concerns, the President's budget proposes to
significantly increase funding of the agency's state and
private forestry programs, with an increase of $80 million, or
almost 50 percent over the Fiscal Year 1999 budget.
I should point out, Madam Chairman, that, in a meeting that
Secretary Glickman and I had with the Natural Resources
Committee of the National Governor's Association, just this
past Sunday, there was remarkably strong support from all
corners for efforts to protect open space and initiatives to
preserve America's great places. In fact, one of the
individuals who spoke at the NGA meeting was Governor Christine
Todd Whitman of New Jersey, in whose State a billion dollar
bond issue was passed this past election to provide the
resources, tax payer financed projects, to protect open space
in the most densely populated State, New Jersey.
Other governors spoke up as well as to the initiatives that
have been taken by their own citizens to try and achieve
similar goals. Our hope is to be able to work closely with
states and local entities to help them realize their goals for
protecting and preserving open space with the Lands Legacy
Initiatives.
The Fiscal Year 2000 budget contains several additional
initiatives and, as we proposed last year, the administration
again intends to forge legislation that will stabilize payments
to States, and to correct, I think, some problems we have with
the 25 percent payments which now of course are linked to
timber sale levels, as timber sale levels have changed over
time.
Unfortunately, we have put ourselves in a situation where
our children's education, and improvements in roads and rural
counties are dependent upon timber sale levels. I think it is
more appropriate and more beneficial for those communities to
stabilize those payments by decoupling their linkage to timber
sales. I think in that way we can provide predictability of
payments in the States and counties can be assured of a stable
base for long term funding.
The President's initiatives are fully compatible with the
Chief's natural resource agenda as I mentioned, Madam Chairman.
Wildlife, grazing, fire, fisheries, and other programs
increased by $48.6 million to support watershed health and
restoration efforts. Increased funding contained in this budget
is essential to restoring and protecting watershed health. The
second element of the agenda promotes sustainable forest
management, proposed budget increases of over $100 million in
both the research and state and private areas to support this
important initiative.
Management of the national forest road system is a third
component of the natural resources agenda, and with a funding
increase of $22.6 million, what we hope to begin to do is
better manage the expansive road system that we inherited, like
INR roles in the Department and the Fire Service, so we can
begin to manage that capital asset in a way that reduces
impacts on the environment and continues to provide access
needed for rural communities.
As you know, Secretary Glickman recently announced a new
rule for road management. While this issue is very contentious,
and I expect we will get a chance to talk a little bit about
that today, we think it is important to reduce new road
building until we are better able to manage the road system
that we presently have, a system that is large enough, I would
remind you, to circle the globe 15 times.
Lastly, as a part of the natural resources agenda, the
President's budget continues to provide emphasis on recreation.
We are pleased with the emphasis Congress has also placed
there. I know that you are very familiar with the Recreation
Fee Demonstration program which has provided a needed source of
funds to make investments in infrastructure. I should point
out, however, that 95 percent of the recreational experiences
that occur in the national forests involve use of non-fee
disbursed sites, so it is equally important that we continue to
get appropriated funds to provide support for the recreation
program.
Let me close, Madam Chairman, by highlighting one other
initiative underway which we will soon be reporting to the
Subcommittee on, and that is the work that is being conducted
by the committee of scientists who review the Forest Service's
forest planning efforts. As you are aware, a year ago this past
fall, Secretary Glickman appointed a committee of scientists.
Dr. Norman Johnson of Oregon State University has headed that
committee. They are close to completing the report and we have
been in communication with staff of the Subcommittee to plan,
at an appropriate time, hearings to highlight the outcome of
their report which will serve as a basis for proposed revisions
to our forest planning rules.
We think the committee's efforts will help not only to
document changes in policy over time but help to amplify the
need to make changes in the forest planning process, and bring
more focus to efforts to ensure the ecological sustainability
of the Nation's forests and rangelands.
With that, Madam Chairman, let me end my testimony. I would
point out one other thing, since you mentioned in your opening
statement that you thought that this was another one of those
big government tax-and-spend budgets. I just want to point out
that, and this has occurred, I can assure you, with quite a bit
of pain, over the last six years, since I took office, the
Forest Service has cut its staffing levels by nearly 20
percent. We have gone from 35,000 full-time staff down to a
total work force of full-time employees of 28,000. That is a
significant cut in the size of our organization and what it
really means is that those who remain in the organization, who
are constantly presented with new tasks and new challenges,
have to work that much harder to get the job done.
So, I don't really think that it is fair to characterize
this as a bloated budget, nor as an effort to expand the size
and scope of the Forest Service. We have become a fairly lean
and mean organization and, I think to Mike's credit, we are
refocusing our efforts on the priorities that we think will
make a huge difference in terms of the natural resource legacy
that we are going to leave for future generations. So, thank
you, Madam Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Lyons may be found at the
end of the hearing.]
Mrs. Chenoweth. Thank you, Mr. Secretary.
Now the Chair is pleased to recognize the Chief, Mr.
Dombeck.
STATEMENT OF MIKE DOMBECK, CHIEF, U.S. FOREST SERVICE
Mr. Dombeck. Thank you, Madam Chairman. Mr. Smith,
Committee members, I am pleased to be here. I would ask that my
entire statement be entered into the record and I will just
give a brief statement to allow more time for dialogue here,
this afternoon.
I have been in this job now about two years and I have got
to say that it has been both a pleasure and challenge being
part of the controversies, the continuing evolution in the
direction of the Forest Service, and say that I appreciate some
of the challenges more than ever and relate to nearly one
hundred years ago with Gifford Pinchot's values and the
conservation values of the Forest Service and like now, at that
time, there were controversies, but the Forest Service has
always stood for the long-term interests of the land and I
believe that is a very important concept and I also believe
that our budget focuses on the long-term health of the land for
future generations.
Over the last decade, and beyond that even, there has been
a significant change in how society views conservation values.
Many people have ceased viewing the forest and land as a
warehouse of outputs to be brought to market but are focussed
on other values, values such as water, values such as outcomes
on the land, and the result of the changes that we have all
been part of, we often find ourselves caught in the middle of
competing interests. And there are those that look to the
Congress, look to you, to fix legislation to what they perceive
as negatively affecting interests.
Others push to the limit the number of appeals so that the
agency can get on with producing timber, or to stop producing
timber, as the case may be, and depending upon their point of
view, and still others ask for the Courts to resolve land use
policies. But the central premise of our approach is that, by
restoring and maintaining a healthy land base on public and
private lands, we can assure that our children and their
children's children will enjoy the benefits of land and water.
You talked about accountability and the business management
side of the Forest Service, and I believe that I have had more
hearings on that issue, I am sure, than any other Chief, and I
want to tell you, Madam Chairman, and all the Committee
members, that we have got the message. In fact, I have made it
clear, through organizational changes, through personal
statements, that business and financial management functions of
the Forest Service are equally important to managing resources,
and we are proud of the framework that has been put together,
and I want to publicly acknowledge Francis Pandolfi, our Chief
Operating Officer. Francis is, as you know, going home on
Friday to be with his family, and Francis has really gone
through significant personal sacrifice, just like all of you do
with your travel schedules, to get back to your friends and
family, and I am delighted with the architecture that Francis
has put in place and the team that he has assembled.
I would also like to highlight the need to reform our
budget structure. I want to work with Congress, with the
administration, to design a budget structure that reflects the
work we do in a more meaningful way, and reflects the
requirements of the Results Acts Strategic Plan, and how it is
tied to our natural resources agenda.
I hope that our resource policy debate does not detract
from the need to streamline and modernize the Forest Service
with regard to accountability and business management. I think
it has in the past, because I believe what we all want is a
smoothly running operation in the Forest Service, regardless of
our views on business management operations. I think we owe
that to the public, to the taxpayers, to those that depend upon
us, because the Forest Service is an important organization
that serves many people. One hundred and ninety-one million
acres of national forest system lands, nearly 400,000 miles of
roads, $30 billion of infrastructure, 74,000 authorized land
uses, 23,000 developed recreation sites, tens of thousands of
dispersed recreation sites, 35 million acres of wilderness, a
world class research program, a state and private forestry
program that provides assistance to private landowners, to
States, and a world class wildland firefighting organization, I
believe remain vitally important to the American people.
I would like to close there, Madam Chairman, and Jim and I
and Ron and rest of the staff here would be happy to discuss
any aspects of our program that you wish. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Dombeck may be found at the
end of the hearing.]
Mrs. Chenoweth. Thank you very much, Chief. I appreciate
your testimony.
Before I go into the questions, I do want to state, in
response to a comment made by Mr. Lyons that, yes, the staff
was cut by almost 20 percent, but the problem is that the new
tasks and many of the new challenges are those that are coming
from outside the statutory authority, and we are saddened by
the fact that many of the staff that have been cut have been
the foresters who really are the kind of people who manage the
forest on the ground, and it is a trend that, although the
numbers look good, is alarming. So, Mr. Lyons, in all fairness,
would you like to respond to that?
Mr. Lyons. Well, I appreciate that, Madam Chairman. I want
to point out that, and please, we have not had to fire anyone
or lay anyone off. Through voluntary retirements and early-
outs, we have been able to achieve the reductions we seek. I,
too, am concerned about the institutional memory and the
expertise in some of the program areas of the Forest Service,
and something that Mike and I spent some time talking about in
terms of developing the next tier of leadership, the people who
will not only succeed us, but succeed the Deputy Chiefs and the
Associate Deputy Chiefs and Regional Foresters and Forest
Supervisors. So, we are aware of that concern. I think it is
across the board, it is not just in any particular area, and we
need to work hard to be able to invest in our people, which is
really the key to the organization and its longstanding
success.
Mrs. Chenoweth. With regard to the questions that I want to
ask, as you know, or may have been advised, I held some
hearings last week in Idaho on the Targhee National Forest and
the building of tank traps out there. It became a part of the
record that $600,000 were spent to build these tank traps. That
is very, very alarming. That, predicated on the fact that there
were ten violations in the whole forest all of last year, that
prompted this change in forest road policy. I say ``change''
because the building of tank traps is pretty dramatic, and as
both of you have testified, you are concerned about the--
especially Mr. Lyons--the fact that you want a $22.6 million
increase in roads. You want to make sure that your policy
reduces the impacts on the environment and provides access.
Well, this does exactly the opposite.
Tank traps are something that are used in war, to stop
tanks. The next day, after the hearing, we took snowmobiles and
went up to the tank traps. There is not one sign warning
individuals who are on snowmobiles that the benign little jump
that they see on one side has a 15-foot drop on the other side.
We have a county commissioner that broke his back, not
realizing there was a tank trap there. I mean, the liability
for individuals and for the agency, is tremendous.
Now, I am angered and upset about the tank traps, and I
want to find out a little bit more about it. But I am really
alarmed that there are no warning signs up there. And Chief,
Mr. Lyons I hope today, you will take care of that and make
sure that warning signs are posted very clearly, and that
doesn't mean that half of the country is off limits for
snowmobilers. That is not where I want to go. I simply want
snowmobilers to be aware that this is a very dangerous
situation.
Also, the $600,000 that it cost to do the tank traps,
nobody knew about it. There was no EIS. While the county
commissioners were being assured that this was not happening,
huge equipment was being hauled up and tank traps were being
built.
I want to know, at this level, where does the buck stop?
Who authorized that? Did you, Mr. Lyons? Who authorized the
tank traps?
Mr. Lyons. Well, let me answer this for you, Madam
Chairman. First of all, we don't build tank traps.
Mrs. Chenoweth. Pardon me?
Mr. Lyons. We don't build tank traps.
Mrs. Chenoweth. Well, then, you haven't been to the
Targhee. There are tank traps built there.
Mr. Lyons. Well, Madam Chairman, the first time we met, you
accused us of having black helicopters, and I haven't found any
of those yet. If we have tank traps, I would be glad to go out
and look at them with you.
But let me point out that we do, in certain cases, need to
restrict access to roads, and we do that in a judicious way. I
know there have been some issues associated with the way in
which we build impediments to access, and I think Gloria can
address that in a second.
But I want to make this point: we are attempting to manage
the road system in a way to protect public safety and health,
not to cause injury and harm. We are also trying manage the
road system in a way that is going to protect those natural
resources that you and I have responsibility to protect, and I
believe we are doing so in the most efficient and effective
way, and where issues have been raised we are attempting to
address them. Perhaps, I could ask our Associate Deputy Chief
for the National Forest System to explain specifically how we
are dealing with the issue that you are----
Mrs. Chenoweth. I am not asking how we are dealing with the
issue. Let me repeat my question. It was very straightforward
and very simple. I want to know where the buck stops. Who
authorized the tank traps being built in the Targhee National
Forest? Did you, Mr. Lyons? It is a simple ``yes,'' or ``no''
question.
Mr. Lyons. Well, the simple answer is that there are no
tank traps in the Targhee National Forest.
Mrs. Chenoweth. Then you tell the commissioner who broke
his back.
Mr. Lyons. Why don't we talk about the details, Madam
Chairman?
Mrs. Chenoweth. Now, listen, Mr. Lyons, we are not going to
get together on the budget or anything else unless we face the
facts. The facts are that tank traps have been built in the
Targhee National Forest, no matter how you try to spin this. We
have a dangerous situation there, and I don't want you to try
to redefine yourself out of it. Who was responsible? Who gave
the final okay on the tank traps?
Mr. Lyons. Well, I certainly didn't give any okay on any
theoretical tank traps.
Mrs. Chenoweth. Who gave the final authority on the kind of
project that cost $600,000 that was constructed up there in the
Targhee? Most people refer to it as tank traps. If you want to
redefine it, that is fine. Who authorized that project? Did
you, Mr. Lyons? Yes or no?
Mr. Lyons. I am not familiar with any authorized tank
traps, Madam Chairman, so I----
Mrs. Chenoweth. Who authorized that $600,000 expenditure--
--
Mr. Lyons. Six hundred thousand dollars.
Mrs. Chenoweth. [continuing] that built deep holes in the
roads in the Targhee National Forest? Did you, Mr. Lyons?
Mr. Lyons. I'm going to let Chief Dombeck----
Mrs. Chenoweth. The answer, yes or no?
Mr. Lyons. No.
Mrs. Chenoweth. You did not authorize it?
Mr. Lyons. No tank traps on my watch.
Mrs. Chenoweth. Did you--who authorized the $600,000
project in the Targhee National Forest? Whatever you may want
to call it, Mr. Lyons, did you authorize it?
Mr. Dombeck. Madam Chairman, I would assume that----
Mrs. Chenoweth. Chief, I asked Mr. Lyons a question. I
would--
Mr. Dombeck. Okay, I'm sorry.
Mrs. Chenoweth. [continuing] appreciate his answering it.
Mr. Lyons. Well, I would say my answer is that I certainly
authorized road closures.
Mrs. Chenoweth. You authorized the $600,000 expenditure for
roads to be closed in that manner?
Mr. Lyons. I didn't deal with that specific issue, Madam
Chairman.
Mrs. Chenoweth. Chief, who did?
Mr. Dombeck. I'm assuming that decisions of that magnitude
would typically be made at the forest level or the regional
level. I had discussed the issue of the closures on the Targhee
when I met with Senator Craig some time ago and expressed some
of the concerns. In fact, at that time, I think Jack Blackwell
put a team together, and I believe we had a Washington
representative that I had asked to be part of that.
But I do want to say that I do share your concern about
safety. I think that safety is of the utmost importance, and
what I will pledge to you is, as soon as I get back to my
office, after this hearing, I will be on the phone to the
regional forester and make sure that the public has a safe
experience out there and the appropriate precautions are taken.
Mrs. Chenoweth. Thank you, Chief, and again, I do want to
reiterate safety does not equate to having whole regions off
limits to snowmobilers, but I am as concerned about where that
decision came from as I am sure you are. Mr. Lyons.
Mr. Lyons. I don't mean to interrupt, but you are probably
aware of this, or at least your staff would be, that there was
a law suit filed with regard to the depth of some of the
impediments that were put in roads on the Targhee and a
settlement agreement was reached to resolve this issue and as a
part of the settlement agreement, I believe a commitment was
made to bring the public out and look at these to make sure
that there was a clear understanding what they were, and also
to reach agreement on what would constitute a safe size hole, I
guess is the only way to characterize it, to deal with this, so
I think in some respects this issue has been addressed, though
I certainly support Mike's commitment to sit down with your
staff and look at it further.
Mrs. Chenoweth. The issue has not been addressed to our
satisfaction: especially when we don't see signs up there;
especially when the tank traps are still in existence; and
especially when there are piles of loose dirt that will create
tremendous environmental hazards in the springtime. And I,
without objection, would like to enter these pictures in the
record. Also, I will send them around for the other Committee
members to view.
[The information may be found at the end of the hearing.]
Mrs. Chenoweth. So, this issue will remain an issue with me
and the Appropriations Committee chairman because $600,000
could have gone a long way to helping to maintain roads instead
of tearing them up.
Mr. Lyons. Perhaps, Madam Chairman, just to help clarify, I
could also ask to submit, for the record, a copy of the
settlement agreement which explains and does include signage as
part of the commitment that was made to address these issues.
[The information may be found at the end of the hearing.]
Mrs. Chenoweth. Thank you, Mr. Lyons, and for the record I
also want to say the settlement agreement was only a small part
of the suit. The suit is still going on. I am hoping that we
will be able to help settle that in a short while with a
reasonable road policy.
The Chair now recognizes the new Ranking Member, Mr. Adam
Smith.
Mr. Adam Smith. Thank you. I just wanted to ask about three
areas. One has to do with roads which is actually one area that
I have worked on before. There is a lot of controversy
surrounding how the roads are paid for. Leave that aside for
the moment. Just kind of interested in the progress we are
making in dealing with the problem.
As you mentioned, there are some 383,000 miles of these
roads twisting and turning throughout the public forests and
they are definitely an environmental problem. As they
deteriorate, lack of maintenance and/or closure is a major
problem. I guess the question I have is, one, what sort of
progress are we making on that problem? And, two, as we are
looking to build new roads, which we are still doing in some
portions of the forests, are we looking for ways to build them
so that they do not become as big of an environmental problem
or is that just not possible? Is it just the nature of roads
that once they are abandoned, they become a difficulty, or is
there some way to build them in a more environmentally friendly
way?
Mr. Dombeck. With regard to your first question, roads I
believe are one of the more daunting challenges that I faced as
I came into this job a couple of years ago with the nearly
400,000 miles of roads in the national forest system, and yet
very little support to maintain roads. Hence, we find ourselves
almost having a circular problem that there are pressures to
build more roads; there are pressures, tremendous pressures,
opposed to roads, because of the environmental degradation, as
a result of lack of support to maintain what we have.
And as I crafted--I shouldn't give myself credit for this--
as the Forest Service crafted, the natural resources agenda,
one of the four items of the regional foresters, the leadership
of the Forest Service, indicated was important to focus on, was
this issue of roads. In fact, the whole issue of Forest Service
roads has been fairly intensely debated, both in the House of
Representatives as well as in the Senate, for probably nearly
20 years, perhaps more than that.
So, the other question that I ask myself is, as a steward
with responsibilities for these lands, is it appropriate to
continue to build roads when we have 383,000 miles of roads and
yet only the funding to maintain about 18 percent of these
roads to the environmental and safety standards for which they
were designed?
We basically have to redefine the issue and help people
understand that roads are an important part of the
transportation infrastructure of rural America that have to be
maintained. We just shouldn't be going in and putting new roads
in and sort of ignoring some of these environmental problems.
Mr. Adam Smith. Of course, the problem, and I understand,
it is a matter of money, you can only do so many things, and
the backlog on road maintenance or reconstruction is daunting--
--
Mr. Dombeck. Yes.
Mr. Adam Smith. [continuing] to say the least, but the
other priority, you want to build new roads so you can get to
places so you can cut down more trees, which is part of what
happens on the public lands, and presumably where the roads
already are, most of the forest in many cases is already cut
down. So that if we accept for the moment that logging on
public lands should happen, then you have to have roads of some
sort. I understand the first part of my statement is also a
matter of great debate, but balancing those two things is going
to be a challenge. Mr. Lyons, did you have----
Mr. Lyons. I just want to point out, Congressman Smith,
that we have cut back severely in how much road building we do
over the last six years, and, in fact, we have built a very
small amount of road for timber access. What road we build,
actually, is some multi-purpose value and, in fact, recreation
use of roads has sky-rocketed. But, that doesn't dismiss the
fact that we have a tremendous amount of road system which we
can't maintain, as the Chief indicated, only 18 percent in
Fiscal Year 1999. We will only get that up to 22 percent with
our budget request for Fiscal Year 2000.
So, we are trying to do the prudent thing. We are trying to
stop future construction. We are trying to work with
communities to decommission those roads we don't need, and we
are trying to secure the resources to maintain those portions
of the road system that we do need and, in fact, most of the
construction or reconstruction that occurs is actually done by
timber purchasers now, in entering areas where they are going
to harvest.
Mr. Adam Smith. There is no fee structure to fund the
maintenance, although there is, of course, the sale of the
land, theoretically, factors in the cost of building the road,
which is a matter of debate as well, but there is no fee
structure whatsoever for maintenance. It just has to, sort of,
come out of the general budget, is that correct?
Mr. Lyons That's correct.
Mr. Adam Smith. On land exchanges, we just had a major one,
not far from my district with Plum Creek and land exchanges
make a great deal of sense when you look at the checkerboard
pattern, at least in the Pacific Northwest, between public and
private ownership. To unify certain areas can, you know, make
better use of the land both for the timber companies and for
the public, for that matter.
A question I have: how do we figure out how much this land
is worth? Because I went back and forth in the Plum Creek
thing, trying to work both sides of it. There was the constant
argument from the environmental community that the land that we
were getting wasn't worth what we were giving up, and back and
forth. I was very frustrated because, normally, when you are
sitting down and doing a business deal, there is a way to sort
of calculate the value of whatever you are giving up versus
whatever you are getting. I think in the area of timber, it is
a lot more difficult because if you are using it for
preservation or public recreation, it has a different value,
than if you are using it just to basically cut down and sell.
How do you go about trying to reconcile that problem?
Mr. Dombeck. I might ask Gloria to elaborate on the
appraisal process, but there is a formal appraisal process that
is used that we would be happy to provide you with the details
of how that is handled. Is there anything you can add, Gloria?
Ms. Manning. Basically, what we do is we have an appraisal
and it has to meet appraisal standards, and the person that is
dealing with us can select from a list of approved appraisers,
anyone to go out and do the appraisal, and the appraisal that
is selected by the person that is willing to sell the land,
comes up with an appraisal that is different from the appraisal
that we do, then a third party can be called in to reconcile
the appraisal rate, but it is based on fair market value.
Mr. Adam Smith Okay. Does anyone outside of the Forest
Service, you guys, and the private landowner making the sale,
have a right to get an appraisal, to get a process, I mean do
the third parties have any access to that or do you basically
have to represent those third parties?
Ms. Manning. Are you talking about the person that has the
land up for sale, or just the public in general?
Mr. Adam Smith. Public in general.
Ms. Manning. They can look at our process, but there are
certain things that are in violation of private individual,
private property owner's rights, so we can't display those
things, but once the appraisal, once the land deal is over,
then most of the records are open to public scrutiny. To
protect the business, we can't indulge in letting other people
know something about a private individual's----
Mr. Adam Smith. Are there any other big land swaps in the
works right now that you are aware of?
Mr. Lyons. We constantly have land exchanges in play and
the Cutwrench is one that we have been working on, just north
of Yellowstone. But, the size and magnitude of the Plum Creek
exchange, or the Weyerhauser exchange immediately before that,
I'm not aware of anything of that size that is currently being
considered. I want to point out one thing, Congressman, and
that is our appraisers are all certified and we have a chief
appraiser here in Washington who goes out and checks basically
his field appraisers on an annual basis, so they are all kept
up to speed, they have a requirement for continuing education,
so that they keep their skills to a point where----
Mr. Adam Smith. I would be interested in getting more
information----
Mr. Lyons. Be glad to provide it.
Mr. Adam Smith. [continuing] about how, back to the
original question, I mean, what are you appraising based on?
Mr. Lyons. My staff can get that from--my people can talk
to your people, basically, and we can work it out.
[The information may be found at the end of the hearing.]
Mr. Adam Smith. Thank you for your time.
Mr. Lyons. Thank you.
Mrs. Chenoweth. The Chair now recognizes Mr. Hayes for
questioning.
Mr. Hayes. Thank you, Madam Chairman. I apologize for not
being totally and completely up to speed at my first hearing on
these matters. Anyway, I am concerned with a number of things,
the relationship between the private sector and the Forest
Service.
To start off on a positive note, we have a national forest
in the eighth district of North Carolina that is called the
Yuwaura National Forest. Tom Horner is in charge there and he
is doing a great job. We have a good relationship with him.
Some of the western issues I don't understand.
Just a general question, Mr. Dombeck or Mr. Lyons, how do
you, in your opinion, see the relationship developing on an
ongoing basis between the private sector and the Forest Service
in terms of cooperation, joint use of lands? The clear choice
in my mind is projects, and you have looked at something we are
working with down there, and that is a partnership between
existing Federal lands and private ownership which will make
more land available for public use, versus what appears to me
to be in the testimony today, another massive lock-up of
Federal lands.
I have the pictures in my hand. I will let you answer that
question, but how are you going to get firefighting equipment
in when you have destroyed the roads? I have just been to Fort
Bragg and they drop bombs and they don't make holes this big. I
know you are trying to keep people out, but what if you have to
get in yourself?
Mr. Dombeck. Mr. Hayes, you have about three or four
questions, I think, in sequence there. Let me start by saying,
I was in the Yuwaura National Forest, and I know you pronounced
it better than I do, the national forest last year, and I
believe, they told me I was the first Chief, or at least the
first Chief in a long time, that had been there and----
Mr. Hayes. Good, they are older than the Rockies; these
guys from Colorado don't realize that.
[Laughter.]
Mr. Dombeck. I had a wonderful field tour, and met with the
staff. It is beautiful country. In fact, Randy Phillips, who is
sitting right behind me, was the forest supervisor in North
Carolina for a time and now he is doing a wonderful job as our
National Forest System Budget Director.
With regard to the public/private partnership concept, my
experience in the more than two decades doing this kind of work
is that the government process is more open today than it has
ever been. In fact, there are more people interested in what we
do and, as a result, we have more appeals, so the whole process
is a very open, public process, which I believe is appropriate
in a democracy.
The thing that we continue to work on is, I am calling it
collaborative stewardship, but call it cooperation,
participation, whatever, the planning processes are all very,
very open, public processes and if we look at watershed
management and we look at ecosystems. Somebody said, ``You
don't manage a stream on 40 acres; look at what happens
upstream, impacts downstream.'' So the whole concept of
ecosystem management has revolved around, I think, improving
partnerships and improving working relationships with those
that are interested to work with us.
Now let me just, as a caveat, say that I do not, nor does
the Forest Service, have any interest at all in regulating
private lands. We function for technical assistance through our
state and private forestry programs, application of research
and things like that, but it has to be a partnership.
Mr. Hayes. I think I hear you saying this is a good
approach, a joint use, a combination approach. Madam Chairman,
I don't know enough about this to ask but I am alarmed when I
see--but we'll talk about that later. I will try to get better
educated and come back for another question. Thank you.
Mrs. Chenoweth. Thank you, Mr. Hayes. The Chair will
recognize the members as they arrived at the Committee. So, Mr.
Tom Udall, welcome to the Committee and you are recognized for
questioning.
Mr. Udall of New Mexico. Madam Chairman, thank you very
much for that nice welcome, and I am very appreciative of being
here at your Subcommittee hearing.
Mr. Lyons and Mr. Dombeck, welcome and we look forward to
working with you in the years to come. I wanted to ask a
question about outdoor recreation. The Forest Service is the
largest single supplier of outdoor recreation in the Nation,
with over 900 million visitors annually, and yet you also have
a backlog estimated at $1 billion to repair and maintain
existing recreation facilities.
As demand for outdoor recreation is growing, is the Fiscal
Year 2000 budget request, which provides, my understanding of
it is, it provides for an increase of only 1.5 percent over
Fiscal Year 1999. Is that adequate to address this backlog?
Mr. Lyons. Well, that is a good question, Congressman, and
I will give you an honest answer. We have tremendous growth in
outdoor recreation demand, as you indicated. We have attempted
to develop new tools in working in partnership with the
Congress to help supplant funds for recreation. The rec. fee
demo. program has helped to some degree. We are looking at
other tools such as concession reform, and the like, to help
provide additional resources.
But, I was personally disappointed in the mark we got from
OMB on recreation-use funding, to be candid, and tell you that
is an area where we could use an additional investment,
although we had to make tradeoffs, that is how they came out.
Mr. Udall of New Mexico. Thank you.
Mrs. Chenoweth. Thank you very much, Mr. Udall. The Chair
now recognizes another Udall, who brings in an institutional
history to this Committee and we are very pleased that you are
serving on the Committee. Mr. Mark Udall.
Mr. Udall of Colorado. Thank you, Madam Chairman. I also
appreciate the opportunity to be here today and hear the
testimony from the Forest Service. Secretary, Chief, it is good
to see you here.
I had a couple of questions. I wanted to start with one
about the Lands Legacy Initiative. As I understand that
situation, the monies have been authorized since the Act was
passed, but have not been fully appropriated, and my thinking
on this is that it wouldn't actually result in an increase in
your budget. I would like you to speak to that. Secondly, there
is concern that this would add a lot of land to the Forest
Service. I would like some clarification there. And then, using
the Land Legacy monies, what kinds of lands would you add to
the system, and in the long run do you think that saves you,
and saves us taxpayers' money, or does it add costs to your
budget?
Mr. Lyons. I'll start out, Congressman, and I think Mike
will focus in on the specific acquisitions to the national
forest. You are correct, in that what the administration has
proposed is a commitment of funds from land and water
conservation funds that are in the Treasury that would provide
permanent funding for several programs: for land acquisition in
the Forest Service; for the forest legacy program, which is a
conservation easement program providing long-term protection
for forested lands--again, on a willing seller basis--and the
person whose conservation easements funds for the urban and
community forestry program, to increase funding for that
program, as well as some additional funds for community
outreach and to help communities in planning growth and
development.
I think what is significant about this initiative is,
similar discussions are already occurring on Capitol Hill.
Chairman Young and Chairman Dingell on the House side, as well
as the Louisiana colleagues on the Senate side, have initiated
dialogues with regard to somewhat similar efforts, so that we
have structured our proposal somewhat differently.
I think what is valuable and important about this is, as we
deal with another initiative that I mentioned in my opening
statement, the Livability Initiative, we can help communities
plan for an orderly expansion and growth so as to ensure the
protection of open space, the protection of naturalresources.
In essence, the key elements, quality of life, that your
constituents and others have come to appreciate, the reason
they live where they live.
Without those resources, we are going to see continued
fragmentation of forest resources, continued loss of open
space, of farmland. It is a significant issue which, as I
mentioned in my opening statement, we addressed, Secretary
Glickman and I, before the National Governors' Association
meeting just the other day, and there was tremendous bipartisan
interest in this. So I think this is an extremely valuable
tool.
The funds overall come, in part, from appropriations but
mostly from land and water conservation funds, so it does not
really result in an increase in our budget. Mike might want to
talk a little bit about the specific land acquisition
priorities that we have identified as a part of this.
Mr. Dombeck. Thank you, Jim. What I would be happy to
provide you with is a list of the land acquisition priorities
for the Fiscal Year 2000 budget that amount to $118 million.
There are 36 projects that are prioritized based upon a variety
of criteria that we can also provide you, and would be happy to
provide that for the record.
[The information may be found at the end of the hearing.]
Mr. Dombeck. I would also like to mention two other
important parts of the Land Legacy program. One is urban and
community forestry, with 60 million acres of urban forest in
the United States. That is where about 80 percent of the people
in the country live and it is important that we care for
forests in these urban settings because the beauty of the trees
provide the savings in storm water or runoff treatment costs,
the savings in energy costs and things like that. For example,
I read not long ago where the city of Atlanta, if you plant
three trees around a single family home, of the right species
and in the right location, you cut your air-conditioning costs
by 40 percent if this is done, on a broader scale.
Also, the stewardship incentive program is a program for
providing assistance to private landowners, technical
assistance, scientific information, so they can have a
professionally developed plan for their wood lot, for whatever
purpose they have, whether it is timber production, growing
Christmas trees, wildlife habitat, whatever, and out of the 9.9
million private landowners in the United States, less than 20
percent have professionally based plans, that are important to
the health of the forest.
The Forest Legacy Program is another program that seems to
be cranking up more in the southeast. For example, and it
basically involves easements, the State of Tennessee is doing
an assessment now and will be making determinations and
recommendations for the year 2000, as to what areas they want
to protect from encroachment of development where they feel
maintaining intact forests for whatever purpose, recreation,
wildlife habitat, forest production, are important. So there
are several important parts to that Land Legacy Initiative.
Mr. Udall of Colorado. Thank you. Madam Chairman, I think
my time is about up, but I did want to acknowledge Congressman
Hayes, and I do know the Appalachians are older than the
Colorado Rockies. I also know that I have never been colder
than when I was crawling through the rhododendron in North
Carolina, but our mountains are taller than your mountains, and
at one point yours were taller. That was then; this is now.
[Laughter.]
Mrs. Chenoweth. Thank you, Mr. Udall. The Chair now
recognizes the distinguished new Congressman from California
who comes with an impressive record in governmental affairs,
Mrs. Napolitano.
Mrs. Napolitano. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. It is very
nice of you, and thank you for the opportunity to be here.
I have no forests in my district, but it is one of the most
important aspects of my State, so it is really incumbent upon
me to listen first, and then ask questions. I have two
questions, Madam Chairman, the first one is more of a comment,
that has to do with the millions of miles of roads that you
have to upkeep. Regarding those roads that are no longer
serviceable or, as you say, you are putting out of service, are
you looking at reforestation to close them, so that people
don't utilize them for their own recreational purpose, and thus
also prevent them from becoming hazards during rains by turning
into mudslides? Is there a program that you are putting in
place to be able to allow it to revert into its original state,
such as it is?
You can answer that later, but the other question has to
do, actually, with the fact that the GAO reported in 1995 and
then again in Fiscal Year 1997 that you collected, $1.85
billion in sales receipts from timber, and 92 percent went to
special off-budget accounts, returning only $125 million to the
Treasury. This coming Fiscal Year 2000 budget proposes to
reform that and use these accounts to fund the Forest Service
operations through the regular appropriations process itself.
What are the pros and cons? It is easy to say, well, you
have done this with these funds but we want to do this with
money. What is the effect this is going to have on the Forest
Service and the job that you have to do?
Mr. Dombeck. The last topic you mentioned was the trust
fund issue, and this has been a tough issue for the Forest
Service for some time and just to sort of put it in a larger
perspective----
Before you go any further, you did not comment on my first
question.
Mr. Dombeck. Okay.
Mrs. Napolitano. First things first.
Mr. Dombeck. Okay. First thing is first. The roads issue, a
part of it that we didn't talk about earlier was the
development of a long-term policy, which is really the most
important aspect, I believe of what is going on with roads, and
it is that the best science and technologies available be used
to determine if and where roads are built. If roads are located
in the wrong places where there are----
Mrs. Napolitano. I am not talking about future roads. I am
talking about roads that are no longer in service, and those
that you are obsoleting, for whatever reason, and then
reverting to forestry regeneration. That is to say, instead of
putting in these tank traps--reforest roads, so that they
become part of the Forest again. The reason I say that is
because in my area we were working towards the conservation of
the San Bernardino mountains in Whittier, of which Chevron
owned a big parcel, and they deforested it. In other words,
they made roads to seal some of their oil wells, and yet it is
again becoming a pristine area, because it is back in
conservancy. Trees that have been planted are beginning to make
it look like mountainside again, like it was in the beginning.
Mr. Dombeck. In Fiscal Year 1999, we decommissioned about
3,000 miles of roads and we are proposing doing 3,300 miles in
Fiscal Year 2000. Many of these, where obliteration of the road
occurs, they are put back to their original contour, they are
replanted, and the most important thing is that we use the best
science and technologies to do that.
Mrs. Napolitano. Okay, now the second one.
Mr. Dombeck. Okay. The second question really has to do
with long-term trends and this is the Knutson-Vandenberg fund,
the salvage fund, and others, and we are coming off of an era
where we were able to fund the management of watersheds and the
management of national forests on the back of timber sales.
What has happened over the course of the last 10 years is
that the timber harvest has declined by about 70 percent. I am
sure you are familiar with issues like the Pacific Northwest
has all issues and some fairly tough debates that have occurred
over the course of the last 10 years, and what has happened as
a result of that, I believe now, somewhere in the neighborhood
of 80 percent of our sales have other objectives beyond the
production of commercial timber.
Mrs. Napolitano. Pardon me, Madam Chairman, but didn't that
Act specifically state that that was to be used for a specific
purpose, not for putting into your budget, for administration
purposes?
Mr. Dombeck. Specific to the Knutson-Vandenberg Act, there
are a variety of issues, of reforestation, watershed work,
those kinds of things, that occurred in the sale area. Yes.
What we have seen happen over time is we have seen the overhead
increase but there is also an other issue that I want to point
out and that is that part of the accountability issue that the
Forest Service is grappling with now, and for the first time,
we are using a consistent standard of direct and indirect
costs, that is the standard established by the Federal
Accounting Standards Board, so we have consistent accounting,
and consistent definitions applied across the country for this.
That has been a significant issue for it, and I am proud of the
progress we have made on that.
Mrs. Napolitano. When did you start that?
Mr. Dombeck. In fact, we have just completed the first
assessment of that within the last few months.
Mrs. Napolitano. Thank you.
Mr. Dombeck. It is displayed in the budget also, Ron
reminds me.
Mrs. Chenoweth. I thank the gentle lady for her questions.
We will go another round of questioning. I have advised my
Ranking Minority Member, and so if you have the time, we do
need to ask more questions. As you know, we always have other
questions that we will be submitting in writing.
[The information may be found at the end of the hearing.]
Mrs. Chenoweth. I did want to ask you, Chief Dombeck, and
you can refer the answer to whomever you want, with regards to
the program that has involved the construction of tank traps, I
want to know how widespread is that, is it being instituted in
other forests, and what can we expect in the near future?
Mr. Dombeck. The real answer is that I don't know. It is
the only one I have heard of. Let me ask Gloria if there are
other programs like that around the country.
Ms. Manning. Madam Chairman, when we look at the closures
of roads, we have allowed the district manager to decide the
best way to close the roads, and there are some that use rocks
to put in the road, and some have used ditches, but to the
extent that is out there, I couldn't tell you. I would have to
go back and get that answer for you. However, they have had the
option of selecting the best method for closures of the roads.
We have also encouraged that they put signs on those roads, but
I couldn't tell you at the moment how many of them have
actually done that. We do reviews, but I would have to get back
with you regarding the numbers that have not adhered to it or
the number of forests that really have used the ditches, and
how deep they are. I don't know that at the moment, but that is
an allowable practice.
Mrs. Chenoweth. It is an allowable practice?
Ms. Manning. To use ditches. Not to the--I don't know the
extent of what that is, but we have allowed them to use a ditch
to indicate that you cannot go any further. We don't advocate a
really deep one. But, we have not put a limit on how deep it
can be, so I don't know how many of them were the same depth as
the Targhee.
Mrs. Chenoweth. Mr. Lyons, do you have knowledge with
regards to the extent that this type of road closure is being
used?
Mr. Lyons. No, Madam Chairman, I don't.
Mrs. Chenoweth. Okay. I wonder, Chief Dombeck, if you could
advise the Committee by checking with your supervisors,
regional supervisors, and forest supervisors with regards to
any plans on any forest involving this kind of road closure.
[The information may be found at the end of the hearing.]
Mrs. Chenoweth. I know, and I do want to say for the
record, Senator Larry Craig, took part in the hearing with me
and I had worked with him since last summer when he first
viewed the tank traps. He was as shocked and disappointed as I
have been. As far as this Committee is concerned, the use of
tank traps should not be an option. It is so utterly
destructive. Let me ask you, Mr. Dombeck, have you viewed the
road closures in the Targhee where we had the hearings on tank
traps?
Mr. Dombeck. No, I have not personally been on the Targhee
to see those, and will be happy to provide you with areas where
closures are occurring, using this type of method. Typically,
those decisions are made at the field level.
Ron, did you have a comment?
Mrs. Chenoweth. All right, so you will provide for the
Committee exactly what your supervisors are planning to do, and
you are hearing from me, and I think it carries the weight of
the Committee, that we do not believe that this kind of
destruction should be an option in road closure.
Sometimes, it is employed on private lands. But, if a
private landowner constructed this kind of a tank trap, and
there had been a broken back, as there was when one of the
county commissioners broke his back, when he went into one,
there would have been far-reaching legal ramifications. These
are not benign ditches, and I am bringing it to your level. It
is a serious, serious concern and it affects how we view the
entire road maintenance program.
Chief, I want to say that I read the statements you made in
Missoula, Montana. You stated, ``Who would have thought that
timber harvests across the national forest systems would
decline by 70 percent in less than a decade?'' And then you
went on to say that, ``The recreation industry needs to take
note. They need to look at some of the issues the timber
industry ran up against 20 years ago. The sideboards for
recreation are no different than those for timber or grazing,
or any other use of the national forest. They must work within
the limits of the land.''
Are you suggesting that under present policies we will also
see recreation decreased by 70 percent, as happened with the
timber industry?
Mr. Dombeck. No, I am not. Not at all. What I am suggesting
is that I think the most important thing we can do is let the
land tell us what it can, that we work within the limits of the
land. With whatever practice, or use, of the land occurs, I
think that we all want to maintain forest health, we all want
to maintain watershed function, and all those kinds of things.
It is important that there are appropriate places for
recreation, and the kinds of recreation, and we also have to be
respectful of the land, so we don't degrade the soils, degrade
water quality, with any practice, no matter what it is.
Mrs. Chenoweth. In your view, if it is not 70 percent, what
do you see the percentage of decrease may be, in recreational,
outdoor activities?
Mr. Dombeck. I, in fact, wouldn't even pretend to be able
to make a projection, because I believe that has to be done on
a watershed by watershed, community by community, basis,
depending upon what that practice would be. It is not a
decision that ought to be made at the national level.
Mrs. Chenoweth. But would you, in your view, say there
would have to be a substantial reduction of recreational
activity?
Mr. Dombeck. Possibly in some areas. I also believe there
are other areas where we can channel various kinds of activity
to take pressure off of areas that are more sensitive. In fact,
we talked about land acquisition earlier. One of the focuses of
land acquisition is to provide access, to protect habitats, and
those kinds of things. It is a matter of management, really,
making the determination as to what are the appropriate uses
and where and at what levels, and those decisions, hopefully,
are made at the local level.
Mrs. Chenoweth. And you are speaking of multiple use land?
Mr. Dombeck. Yes.
Mrs. Chenoweth. Okay. I want to ask the Committee's
indulgence for just one more question.
The fir beetle outbreak in the Panhandle forest in Idaho
will require a really aggressive management program to reduce
future impacts and, as you know, your own maps show that this
is a catastrophic area, the biggest, actually, concentration of
catastrophic forest situations of any place in the United
States. But apparently, the roads moratorium will severely
reduce the Forest Service's own ability to treat these lands.
Is this what you intended by the moratorium, and how will you
manage both the roadless moratorium and taking care of these
outbreaks?
Mr. Dombeck. I am not familiar with the map, and the lay of
the land, and I know that Dave Wright has been in here, and I
presume that he briefed either you or your staff, as he briefed
us. It is my understanding that the immediate concern is near
private lands and already roaded areas, is the immediate
concern.
I want to also point out that the temporary suspension of
road building does have an emergency provision in it where
there are safety issues, things like that, we are very, very
concerned about private property, homes, those kinds of things,
then we have to look at that on a case by case basis.
Mrs. Chenoweth. I want you to know, Chief Dombeck, that the
explosion of the fir beetle outbreak is more than just next to
the roads. I wanted you, personally, to know that it is going
to take intensive management to take care of that very sad
situation. Thank you very much. And I thank the Committee for
its indulgence, and I recognize Mr. Adam Smith for questions.
Mr. Adam Smith. Actually, I think I asked what I needed to
ask in the first round, so I'm good, thanks.
Mrs. Chenoweth. Mr. Tom Udall.
Mr. Udall of New Mexico. Thank you, Madam Chairman. I
wanted to ask the panel a question with regard to recreation
users, because it seems to me from my experience in the
outdoors, is that you have a lot of conflicts going on out
there. The snowmobilers clearly want to use your lands, and yet
you are getting complaints, I am sure, from people about the
amount of pollution that is put out by snowmobiles, the amount
of noise. I think compared to on-road vehicles, these are the
most polluting vehicles in America today. I think, probably,
there are agencies moving to do something about that right now.
Then, clearly, your other users, cross country skiers,
snowshoers, other users, want to have a measure of solitude.
And so, it would seem to me that you as a land use agency are
always trying to balance those needs, aren't you, and make sure
that each of those users is getting a good experience out of
public use of the lands?
Mr. Dombeck. Yes, in fact, and that is a significant
challenge. As various uses compete with one another and there
really is a limit to the space we have. In fact, I was one that
used to be very reluctant to talk about limits, it was almost
un-American, but yet to talk about limits, as we think about
the oceans and the open space that we have, the fact is that
there are limits, and I think if we work within the limits of
the land, the land will take care of us, generation after
generation, but we have to keep in mind the fact that there is
not enough to go around for everyone to have all of what they
want, so we have to have to share and balance these uses, and
that is what the local planning processes are about, to get
public input to make those decisions. Jim, do you want to----
Mr. Lyons. The only thing I would add, Congressman, as Mike
points out, these are the kinds of decisions that really need
to be made on a local basis, but I think the challenge of
recreation management which really is growing in the national
forests, comes of trying not only to manage natural resources,
but people. As a result, we have got to develop new tools, new
ways to better manage use of the national forests, to ensure,
for example, that we can maintain the wilderness experience
that people seek, when they enter a wilderness area, so that we
can minimize impacts for natural resources.
So, our budget reflects an attempt to secure additional
resources, for example, to increase trail maintenance, where we
face severe impacts because of excessive use. We have gone to
evaluating carry capacity as a way to determine how many people
to allow in a wilderness area, and in places where there is
extreme impact, we have actually had to go to a permit system,
to address that.
Mike and I have been recently trying to deal with issues
associated with wilderness management, and wilderness use, and
last year we had quite a debate over the use of fixed anchors
in wilderness areas, an issue that is being decided through a
negotiated rule-making process now.
So, we recognize those challenges and we are trying,
through the development of a new recreation strategy, to
develop a capacity to better manage recreation resources by not
only managing the natural resources, but better working with
recreation users in a partnership, so as to provide the kinds
of experiences people have come to expect from national
forests.
Mr. Dombeck. Another area I would just like to highlight is
the need to make additional investments in recreational
research. That is an area that has been, over the course of the
last few decades, that really not very much attention has been
paid to it and we, Robert Lewis, our Deputy Chief for research
and technology development is putting a focus on that, because
it will be very, very important over the next few decades that
we do it right.
Mr. Udall of New Mexico. Thank you, and I appreciate very
much the way you have enunciated the wise stewardship approach
that you are trying to take to many of these resource use
matters. Thank you, Madam Chairman.
Mrs. Chenoweth. Thank you, Mr. Udall. The Chair now
recognizes Mr. Mark Udall.
Mr. Udall of Colorado. Thank you, Madam Chairman. I had a
comment, then I had a question.
I wanted to extend my thanks to you for putting a
negotiated rule-making process in place in regards to fixed
anchors. I think that situation has the potential to become
very adversarial. I have wasted, some people would say, a lot
of days rock-climbing and enjoying the great outdoors in the
West, but I know that it is not as simple a situation as it was
made out to be by either side in this, so I will watch what
transpires with great interest.
Let me refer back to my colleague. Mrs. Napolitano talked
about special funds. In my district, which is one of the more
suburban western districts, but also includes a big chunk of
the Arapaho forest to the west, some of the counties there are
curious about the timber receipts replacement program that you
have proposed. Can you explain how that would work, Chief
Dombeck or Secretary Lyons, I don't know who----
Mr. Dombeck. Yes, the initial request for us to take a look
at this came from some of the counties in the Northwest, that
had experienced significant downturns in timber harvest, as a
result of the issues in those areas. In fact, part of the
Northwest Forest Plan, a program to place the basically
stabilized payments to counties, and then there was a sliding
scale that, I believe, in 1997 they received 76 percent of,
what level was it, of the maybe the 1989 or 1990 level, Ron?
And then, now for the year 2000, I believe, that will drop to
67 percent. So that is one aspect of it.
Another aspect of it is, is where we have controversial
timber sales--I can think of an example that describes this. A
couple of years ago in Texas, there were $26 million worth of
timber sales enjoined for a time, and had that gone on for,
say, two or three years like often times they do, that would
mean that those five counties wouldn't get 25 percent of that
$26 million and have significant difficulty in meeting their
budget, so you get this unpredictability associated with it.
The objective there is to provide some long-term predictability
for counties, for school systems, is one aspect of it.
The other aspect of the question that I think we probably
need dialogue on, and that is: is it for the richest country in
the world, is it appropriate for us to depend upon receipts
from controversial timber programs that are often appealed or
enjoined, to pay for services like this? Is there a better way
to do it?
Mr. Udall of Colorado. This would not affect the so-called
Pilt, or payment in lieu of taxes, programs that also exist?
Mr. Dombeck. I believe that is correct, but then, more
specifically, our proposal would be to stabilize this at a
particular level and, in fact, Ron Stewart has been leading
that effort, and a dialogue with the National Association of
Counties, and others, to take a look at what options are out
there to deal with that, and what might work, and what might
not, and why.
Mr. Udall of Colorado. Would this involve any cuts, Chief,
or, what you are saying is there is going to be more
predictability here, which in the long run is better for
everybody involved?
Mr. Dombeck. The proposal, I believe, although it is not
final would hold that no county would get less money than it
received in 1998, and I believe what we are working toward is
they would have a choice of receiving the 1998 level or a level
that represents an average over time of something like, maybe,
a ten-year average, and they would have that choice.
Mr. Udall of Colorado. When do you think you will get this
over here for us to take a look at it?
Mr. Dombeck. What is the status of that now, Ron? It is in
the clearance process now, within the administration.
Mr. Udall of Colorado. So in fairly short order?
Mr. Dombeck. Shortly is the answer.
Mr. Udall of Colorado. I see I still have the green light.
Another quick question: the BLM, your friends in Interior
Department, and you, of course, are working on this trading
post concept, I believe, in Colorado, where it is a one-shop-
shopping for people. Can you talk a little bit about that, and
do you have plans further down the road for it?
Mr. Dombeck. Yes, in fact we will be meeting with the
leadership of the BLM, as a matter of fact, Madam Chairman, we
will be meeting in Boise, Idaho, at the end of March with the
leadership of the BLM. This will be one of the issues we will
talk about.
The whole objective is to try to provide one-stop shopping
for local communities and our most aggressive approach a few
years ago was in the State of Colorado, where we basically
shared expertise in a case where the Bureau of Land Management
had more range management expertise, while the Forest Service
had more forest management expertise.
We shared that, we saved money, we saved positions, and
when we talk about this to members of local communities, they
sort of say, ``Well, you know, you should have been doing this
all along, because it makes sense.''
In the State of Oregon, the regional forester and the BLM
state director will be moving into the same building, in fact,
I hope they will have a common reception area, so people would
go for permits, for services, for information, would have it
right there at their fingertips, without having to go to one
building and one agency, then another building, and another
agency.
Another program that is similar to that is in recreation
where there is now a website. It is called recreation.gov, and
you can sign onto that website and get information on any
campground, on any facility, whether it is the Corps of
Engineers' Bureau of Land Management, National Park Service,
Fish and Wildlife Service, Forest Service, BLM, and it just
makes a lot of sense to the public and delivery of services and
information to them.
Mr. Udall of Colorado. Thank you, Madam Chairman. That
makes sense, particularly in Colorado where we have, in some
cases, 14,000 mountains that are on BLM lands and we have
grasslands that are administered by the Forest Service. So , I
think it is a great step forward.
Mrs. Chenoweth. Thank you, Mr. Udall. Mrs. Napolitano.
Mrs. Napolitano. Thank you, Madam Chairman. I have no
further questions, but I thank you for the opportunity to be
able to listen to more of the areas that are important to my
State. I look forward to having your card so I can call you
when I have a problem. Thank you.
Mr. Lyons. Congresswoman, if I could just make one comment.
You opened today by saying you don't have any forests in your
district, and I just want to point out, though this is often
overlooked, Mike mentioned the urban and community forestry
program that we have ongoing. We do a lot of work in Los
Angeles, in that regard and, in fact, we have a program called
the Urban Resources Partnership which is active in working
throughout the city in helping community groups and
neighborhood groups protect open space, do tree planting work.
We have an initiative this year, that I thought I would
just bring to your attention, to create what we are calling a
children's forest in Los Angeles, which is really intended to
try and help children understand land stewardship, their goals,
and we are working with a whole host of private partners, the
city, LA tree people, Audubon Society, Mothers of East LA, to
try and put in place a program that will allow children to
understand the wonders of the great outdoors, even if they
never get the chance to go beyond their own backyard, or
neighborhood.
Mrs. Napolitano. Will you add the Whittier Conservancy to
that?
Mr. Lyons. We would be glad to.
Mrs. Napolitano. They have just taken on probably about
3,000 acres and set it into conservancy. I have been working
with them for the last five years and we are moving into the
Brea and Coal Canyons to be able to conserve those areas for
our children and grandchildren. So, I am very interested.
As for the tree people, we would love to have reforestation
happen in those hills, because one of the gasoline companies
that owned a parcel of almost 1,000 acres, like I said, built
roads and really denuded, if you will, what was there, and it
is now being reforested with the help of community groups, the
tree people, scouting groups, etc., so I would love to have you
step in and give us a hand on that.
Mr. Lyons. We will see to it.
Mr. Dombeck. What I will do is, I would like to have our
state and private forestry staff contact your office and
provide you with additional information.
Mrs. Napolitano. Call Mike Torra.
Mr. Dombeck. Thank you.
Mrs. Napolitano. Thank you, sir. Thank you, Madam Chairman.
Mrs. Chenoweth. Thank you, Mrs. Napolitano. I do want to
bring this portion of our hearings to a close now, and I thank
the members for being here.
I also want to say, for the record, that I brought up
concerns based on my last hearing in Idaho, the Committee's
last hearing in Idaho. I also want to say, for the record, that
the regional forest supervisor down there has indicated in
writing that the construction that went on those roads were
tank traps. I bring that up because this is a serious problem,
and I don't want us to get off on a bunny trail as to
definitions. I bring the problem to you in this hearing because
it is a serious safety and environmental problem. I also think
that it is a huge overreach in terms of the road closures and I
don't understand exactly. I don't want to ascribe a statement
to it. I just don't want to do that. I don't want to go there,
because it is tremendously overreaching.
Also, in closing, I want to say, on behalf of the
Committee, how much we have enjoyed working with Mr. Francis
Pandolfi. I think he was a good choice, and we will all miss
him.
I want to say that the GAO says that the Forest Service's
books are still in disarray. That the person who was in the
process of correcting this problem is now leaving, and I wanted
to ask you again, for the record, when do you believe that we
will see a clean set of books?
Mr. Dombeck. We hope to have our real property inventories
complete by late summer and the thing that you will see in my
written testimony where I ask for both your support and
patience, as we move through fixing the accountability and the
books of the Forest Service. This is an issue that evolved over
a decade or more in a large decentralized organization, and the
challenge of getting our data systems in place where we have an
organization that does 75 million transactions a month, and I
want to point out that, even though Francis is leaving, we have
an excellent staff, some of whom have been in the Forest
Service, and some who are new to the Forest Service, like
Vincette Goerl, who comes to us from the Customs Service. She
helped get a clean financial audit for the Customs Service,
manages a large organization.
When I was at BLM, as acting director, we had a clean
financial audit. We know what have got to do. The Forest
Service is a much larger organization and it took Jack Wells 10
years to get GE where it needed to be, so it is going to take
us time. Certainly we are hopeful that we will have at least a
qualified opinion. Vincette? Let us go straight to the source.
Ms. Goerl. Madam Chairman, we have efforts underway to
clear up our material weaknesses in 1999 and 2000, and hope
that we can achieve a clean opinion in 2000. It will be a
challenge, but we are certainly putting in all the efforts
along with a new financial system, to do that.
Mrs. Chenoweth. Thank you very much. I want to thank the
panel for their testimony, and we will be, as you know, back in
touch with you with further questions. As you also are very
familiar with the fact that the record remains open for a
limited period of time for you to amend any statements that you
may wish to make. Thank you very much. And this panel is
excused.
[Whereupon, at 2:40 p.m., the Subcommittee adjourned
subject to the call of the Chair.]
[Additional material submitted for the record follows.]
Statement of James R. Lyons, Under Secretary, Natural Resources and
Environment, U.S. Department of Agriculture
Madam Chairman, Congressman Smith, Members of the
Committee, thank you for the opportunity to appear before you
today to discuss the Forest Service's proposed budget for
Fiscal Year 2000.
I would like to present a brief overview of our budget
request and highlight some of the priorities we've identified
in terms of three broad areas. Chief Dombeck will address these
and other areas in greater detail. The three areas I want to
highlight are; (1) the priorities of the President and the
Department of Agriculture in managing the rich natural
resources of this nation's forest and range lands; (2) the
Forest Service priorities under the leadership of Chief Dombeck
to implement the service's Natural Resource Agenda; and (3) the
emphasis being placed on the Forest Service to be accountable
to Congress and the American people for its performance and use
of Federal funds.
Last year when I testified before several committees,
including this one, I stated that despite the contentious
debates on several Forest Service management issues, Congress
and the Administration have more agreement than we do
disagreement. Despite the differences regarding budget
priorities and several environmental riders which were part of
the fiscal year 1999 appropriations debate, we worked together
and developed a bill which helped the Forest Service move
forward towards improved forest and ecological health and
sustainability. I continue to believe we have common interests,
and greater agreement than disagreement, although I'm sure we
will be involved in tough debate again over this year's budget.
First, a brief overview. This budget proposes an overall
increase in discretionary appropriations of 6.5 percent. The
budget includes a healthy emphasis on the basic programs
necessary for managing the agency's 192 million acres, which
include a $30 billion infrastructure, 383,000 miles of road,
74,000 authorized land uses, 23,000 developed recreation sites,
and uncounted dispersed recreation sites. In addition, the
budget proposes a substantial increase of $37.2 million to
enhance the agency's leading role in forest and rangeland
research. Finally, the budget proposes major increases in State
and Private Forestry programs, which is a key element of the
President's initiatives.
President and Department Priorities
Let me turn now to the important priorities of this
Administration. As you know, the President has proposed several
initiatives in the fiscal year 2000 budget including two that
were first initiated as part of the fiscal year 1999 budget.
Principally, the President's goal in fiscal year 2000 is to
develop Forest Service programs that help assure that all the
nation's lands, not just National Forest lands, provide clean
water for the taps of faucets, open spaces and expanded
recreation opportunities for rural and urban residents alike,
and improved sustainability of products, wildlife, and
biodiversity on healthy public and private lands.
Thus, the President has proposed the Lands Legacy
Initiative, the largest one year investment ever in the
preservation of America's lands, and the continuation of the
Clean Water Action plan to continue to focus on priority
watersheds where protection and improvement programs are so
desperately needed.
Madam Chairman, I believe the Lands Legacy Initiative is
bold and essential for America as we enter the new millennium.
This $1 billion program, which includes $217.6 million in
Forest Service funding, will focus on working with states,
tribes, local governments, and willing private partners to
protect great places, conserve open space for recreation and
wildlife, and to preserve forests, farmlands, and coastal
areas. Currently, 30 million people live within an hour drive
of national forest land. As the President noted in his State of
the Union address, 7,000 acres of farmland and open space are
lost every day. The number of tracts of forestland of 50 acres
or less doubled from 1978 to 1994 as our landscape was carved
into smaller pieces. Access to, and the health of, these lands
is diminishing as a result of this fragmentation. To address
these serious concerns, the President's budget proposes to
significantly increase funding of the agency's State and
Private Forestry Programs, with an increase of $80 million or
48 percent over fiscal year 1999. With this increase we will
focus on promoting the retention of open space and smart growth
that will provide conservation opportunities and experiences
for many additional millions of Americans.
The Forest Service is the national expert at providing
recreation to the public through family oriented recreation
such the Sunday drive, weekend camping trip, short family hike,
or week long backpack or rafting trips. The Lands Legacy
initiative, through emphasis on State and Private Programs and
increased Land Acquisitions promotes this type of recreational
access as well promoting the availability of clean water,
healthy watersheds, and open space. The national forests are
the watersheds for more than 902 communities in 33 states. Many
millions of additional people depend on water provided from
other forested lands. Through emphasis on state and private
partnerships, which promote smart growth acquisitions and
easements, more Americans will be assured of long term access
to public land and the clean water it provides.
The fiscal year 2000 budget contains several additional
initiatives that are important to note.
As was proposed last year, the Administration again intends
to forward legislation that will stabilize payments to states.
I believe it is essential to provide these payments through a
process that does not link the output of forest products to the
education of our rural school children or the quality of the
roads used by their parents. If enacted, the legislation will
result in long term predictability of payments that the states
and counties of America need.
Other legislative initiatives are important aspects of this
budget, including proposals to maximize return to the
government for authorized uses of national forest land to
improve forest visitor experiences. The President also will
propose legislation which requires purchasers who harvest
timber and special forest products from national forests, pay
fair market value for these products and a greater share of the
costs of managing these programs, thus reducing the use of
appropriations.
Natural Resource Agenda
The President's initiatives are fully compatible with the
aggressive program initiated by Chief Dombeck last March which
established the Natural Resource Agenda. I am proud to support
this four point program which focuses agency attention on
watershed protection and restoration, sustainable forest
management, the forest service road system, and the critical
recreation program.
This budget strongly supports the Natural Resource Agenda
with significant funding increases. Wildlife, grazing, fire,
fisheries, and other programs increase by $48.6 million to
support watershed health and restoration. Increased funding
contained in this budget is essential for restoring and
protecting watershed health.
A second element of the agenda promotes sustainable forest
management. With proposed budget increases of $113.2 million,
programs such as Forest and Rangeland Research, in addition to
the State and Private programs I have already mentioned, will
engage coalitions among communities, conservationists,
industry, and all levels of government to collaborate and
integrate management of national forest lands with those
practices on state, tribal, local and non-industrial private
lands in order to promote long term land health.
Management of the national forest road system is a third
component of the Natural Resource Agenda. With a funding
increase of $22.6 million, this road system, which is expansive
enough to circle the globe more than 15 times, will receive
critically needed funds for maintenance.
As you know, Secretary Glickman recently announced a new
interim rule for road management. While this issue is very
contentious, all of us can agree that the national forest road
system is critical to land health and is essential to meet the
recreation and livelihood of millions of Americans. Simply put,
I strongly support Chief Dombeck in his effort to significantly
reduce new road building until we are better able to manage the
road system we presently have. The President's budget will
provide increased funds for road maintenance and allow the
Forest Service to implement road management plans for America's
long term access and land health needs.
Lastly, as part of the Natural Resource Agenda, the
President's budget continues to provide strong emphasis on
recreation. The Forest Service is the largest supplier of
recreation in the United States. We are pleased with the
emphasis Congress has also shown in promoting recreation. The
Recreation Fee Demonstration Program is one such example, and a
resounding success. Through this program, we have improved
facilities and the visitor's experiences at fee sites. However,
I want to emphasize that 95 percent of recreational experiences
on the national forests involve use of non-fee dispersed sites.
The President's budget continues to emphasize this area of
recreational use through appropriated funds. I strongly
encourage your continued support of these appropriations in
order to continue quality experiences for those who use the
forests for highly dispersed activities, and who are either
unable to pay for use of these sites, are not close to fee
sites, or who desire to recreate in the undeveloped non-fee
areas of the national forests.
Also in support of the Natural Resource Agenda, I want to
note that the Committee of Scientists, commissioned by the
Secretary to review land and resource management planning
processes, are soon to release their landmark report. Shortly
thereafter the Forest Service will complete preparation of
proposed land management planning regulations which will guide
future revisions to land management plans. These regulations
are long overdue. I am confident when implemented these
regulations will result in a long-range planning framework
suited to accomplish sound resource management in accordance
with environmental laws and the mission of the Forest Service.
Forest Service Accountability
The success of the Natural Resource Agenda and the
initiatives proposed by the President are critical to long term
health and conservation of the national forests and the
nation's state, local, and non-industrial private lands.
Effective Forest Service leadership is what will facilitate
these long term successes. However, leadership will not be
successful if the Forest Service does not aggressively address
what can only be described as severe lapses in its financial
management and overall performance accountability. As you know,
the agency's financial health, decision making, and overall
accountability has been scrutinized and extensively criticized
in more than 20 studies initiated by Congress, the Department,
and internally.
Let me say, I have no doubt the Forest Service has got the
message! Through reorganization and placement of professionals
in top leadership positions, the agency has placed the
financial management role in a position that assures attention
and oversight in equal stature and priority to its natural
resources management agenda. While I believe it is important
for Congress to actively perform its oversight of the agency's
financial condition, I believe it is also important to ask for
some degree of patience. The agency's books and records took a
decade or more to turn sour. It will take at least the rest of
fiscal year 1999 to implement a new general ledger and at least
through fiscal year 2000 to receive a clean financial opinion.
Meanwhile, it is clear the Forest Service is taking action
to improve. This includes paying detailed attention to
management of indirect costs, restructuring the process for
charging overhead to permanent and trust funds, and actively
working on implementing performance measures consistent with
the Results Act, which should ultimately lead to proposals for
a revised budget structure that reflects the integrated nature
of work it accomplishes on the ground.
Madam Chairman, in my testimony today I have discussed
important Presidential initiatives, the Natural Resource
Agenda, and progress being made to improve agency
accountability in relation to the fiscal year 2000 budget.
These three areas represent important areas of change for the
Forest Service as we approach the next century. I am confident
that with your support we can work together to build a Forest
Service program that accomplishes long term land health
objectives, delivers clean water, provides quality access,
assures diverse recreational opportunities for greater numbers
of Americans, and continues providing strong livelihoods for
communities for generations to come.
Thank you for the opportunity to address you to answer any
questions you may have.
------
Statement of Mike Dombeck, Chief, USDA Forest Service
Madam Chairman, Congressman Smith, Members of the
Committee, thank you for the opportunity to appear before you
this morning to discuss the Forest Service's proposed budget
for fiscal year 2000.
Only three weeks ago, I addressed our employees in
Missoula, Montana about the state of the Forest Service. I
would like to review some ofthose remarks today as I discuss
the proposed budget for the Forest Service.
I am honored to have served as Chief of the Forest Service
for over two years. During this time, I have had the pleasure
to be a part of the continuing evolution in the direction of
the Forest Service. I have come to appreciate that many of the
conflicts we face today over management of natural resources
are very similar to the conflicts faced by the agency's first
Chief, Gifford Pinchot. What made the Forest Service unique
under his leadership was a set of conservation values that were
not always popular, but which reflected the long term interest
of land health. Madam Chairman, as in the days of Gifford
Pinchot, the values put forth in the President's fiscal year
2000 budget emphasize long term health of the land.
In my testimony today I want to concentrate on the values
of healthy land by elaborating on three key areas set forth by
Undersecretary Lyons; (1) the major changes reflected in the
President's budget that set a new leadership direction for the
Forest Service; (2) how the Forest Service Natural Resource
Agenda reflects these values; and (3) how we are addressing
important accountability issues. Let me first address some
overall perspectives about where the Forest Service has been
and where the Secretary and I want to take it in the future.
Over the last decade there has been a significant change in
how society views conservation values. Many people have ceased
viewing publicly owned resources as a warehouse of outputs to
be brought to market and instead have begun assigning greater
value to the positive outcomes of forest management.
The result of such change is that we often find ourselves
caught in the middle between competing interests. Some look to
you, the Congress to ``fix'' the legislation that they perceive
has negatively affected their interests. Others push to limit
the number of appeals, so the agency can get on with producing
timber or stopping timber production, as the case may be. Still
others ask courts to resolve land use policies through
litigation.
Too often we find ourselves waiting for someone else to
resolve our issues for us. I think that must end. The budget we
are going to talk about today sets the framework for the
Congress, the Administration, the States, local governments,
and private parties to begin working together in a new way to
collaboratively resolve conservation conflicts. The central
premise of our approach is that by restoring and maintaining a
healthy land base on public and private lands alike, we can
ensure that our children, and their children's children enjoy
the benefits of land and water.
Madam Chairman, with healthy watersheds as a foundation,
there is room for a reasonable flow of outputs; timber and
livestock specifically, but many other products also. There is
and will be the ability to produce cleaner water. There is a
land base which will allow us to set aside additional places
untrammeled by human beings, and there is an ability and a
necessity to preserve now and for generations to come,
additional open spaces before such spaces are fragmented or
degraded due to private land development, urban sprawl, and
other such issues.
For those who advocate a return to timber outputs of 10
years ago, or those who advocate a ``zero cut'' philosophy, I
say it is time to inject realism into the debate. The
President's budget provides funding for outputs which are
consistent with land health. I can not visualize a circumstance
when such outputs will ever be at the level of 10 years ago,
but I say to the other side of the spectrum, timber harvest
will, and should continue. The President's budget contains
innovations that recognize the ability of people to restore
ecosystems from those already degraded, using modern science
and technology, where people have either contributed to poor
land health by over using the land, built roads in unstable or
overly steep terrain, or prevented natural processes such as
fire. We can improve the health of these areas, and do so by
not only allowing the removal of forest products but by
demonstrating in some cases such activities can contribute to
forest health. The more timber harvest contributes to
ecological sustainability, the more predictable timber outputs
will be. This budget presents a solid balance that if enacted
will help accomplish these goals.
The Forest Service serves many people. With our 192 million
acres, 383,000 miles of roads, $30 billion infrastructure,
74,000 authorized land uses, 23,000 developed recreation sites,
tens of thousands of dispersed recreation sites, and 35 million
acres of wilderness, the national forests are many things to
many people. Forest Service has the premier Forest and
Rangeland Research organization in the world which is involved
in research to improve land health and to improve the
experiences enjoyed on the land by Americans.
Specifics of the President's Budget
The President's budget creates a new focus on State and
Private Forestry programs. Over time, our leadership capacity
to assist those who manage the more than 500 million acres of
forests outside of the national forest system has diminished.
One of our greatest contributions to society will be our
ability to bring people together to provide technical
assistance and scientific information to states, private
landowners, and other nations of the world. The fiscal year
2000 proposed budget contains an increase of $80 million in
State and Private Forestry, and $37 million in Forest and
Rangeland Research to increase our involvement in this critical
collaborative role. Consider that we have been spending about
$2 billion annually to manage the 192 million acres of national
forest land, yet spend less than $200 million in support of the
500 million acres of state managed and privately owned lands.
With this budget, support to state and locally managed
lands and non-industrial private lands dramatically increases.
The budget proposes $218 million for the Lands Legacy
Initiative, which will make new tools available to work with
states, tribes, local governments, and private partners to
protect great places, to conserve open space for recreation,
and wildlife habitat; and to preserve forest, farmlands, and
coastal areas. This $218 million is part of the President's
bold government wide initiative to provide $1 billion for the
Lands Legacy Initiative.
The President's budget also continues support for key
programs initiated with the fiscal year 1999 budget by
targeting an increase of $89.4 million for the Clean Water
Action Plan to maintain priority attention to the health of
watersheds on Federal, state, and private lands. The budget
also proposes $6 million to support the Climate Change
Technology Initiative and an increase of $6 million for the
Global Change Initiative, both of which are aimed at improving
the long term health of the climate that supports life on this
planet.
Forest and Rangeland Research programs are an important
aspect of emphasis in the President's budget. In addition to
funds to support global climate issues, an additional $14
million is proposed for the Integrated Science for Ecosystem
Challenges project which addresses science and technology needs
related to ecological systems.
The President is also proposing as part of this budget
several new legislative initiatives. Most notably, a proposal
similar to one put forward last year, to stabilize payments to
states and counties by separating payments to counties from a
reliance on receipts generated by commodity production. At the
beginning of my testimony, I noted the need to manage outputs
from the national forests in a manner consistent with land
health. In doing so, emphasis for producing those outputs has
changed. For example, today a significant number of timber
sales are sold for stewardship purposes rather than pure
commodity objectives. There is an increase in the sale of dead
or dying timber. In these cases receipts are less than were
experienced several years ago. I expect this trend to continue
particularly in the west. What we are asking is, why should the
richest country in the nation finance the education of rural
schoolchildren on the back of a controversial Federal timber
program? The Forest Service has a stewardship responsibility to
collaborate with citizens to promote land health. Collaborative
stewardship implies an obligation to help provide communities
with economic diversity and resiliency so they are not
dependent on the results of litigation, the whims of nature or
unrelated social values to educate their children and pave
their roads. We need to work together so states and counties
can anticipate predictable payments on which to base education
and road management decisions.
Several other legislative proposals are also soon to be
submitted including proposals to transfer timber sale
preparation costs to timber purchasers through user fees, a
proposal to reform concession management, increased emphasis on
obtaining fair market value for land uses and timber, and
establishing a fund to manage the sale of special forest
products.
Natural Resource Agenda
The President's budget contains many important initiatives.
It also contains a broad program of funding for management of
national forest lands. Just one year ago I announced the
Natural Resource Agenda, which is a comprehensive science based
agenda that will lead management of the agency into the 21st
century. As an integral partner with the Government Performance
and Results Act, this agenda focus on four areas; (1) watershed
health and restoration, (2) sustainable forest and grassland
ecosystem management, (3) the national forest road system, and
(4) recreation.
I want to highlight briefly our emphasis in each of these
areas. A retired Forest Service employee offered me some advice
a while back. He said, ``if you just take care of soil and
water and everything else will be OK.''Multiple use does not
mean we should do everything on every acre simply because we
can. We must protect the last best places and restore the rest.
Forest Service lands are truly the headwaters of America,
supplying river systems and recharging aquifers. They contain
riparian, wetland, and coastal areas that are essential for the
nation's water supply and prosperity. The President's budget
provides an increase of $48.6 million included in programs such
as wildlife habitat management, watershed improvements,
fisheries habitat management, rangeland vegetation management,
threatened and endangered species habitat management, and state
and private forest health programs. These increases will allow
the Forest Service to make important watershed restoration and
protection efforts.
Restoration and maintenance of watershed health is
contingent on quality land management planning. As you know,
the Committee of Scientists will issue their final
recommendations on forest planning soon. I expect they will
suggest that we focus planning efforts on long-term
sustainability, more effectively link forest planning to budget
and funding priorities, practice collaborative stewardship
through use of diverse and balanced advisory groups, and allow
for adaptive management through monitoring. I look forward to
issuance of the Committee of Scientists Report from which
revised forest planning regulations will be developed in late
Spring. I believe new planning regulations will be invaluable
in breaking the forest planning gridlock that is hampering
national forest management in so many areas.
A second area of the Natural Resource Agenda is sustainable
forest and grassland management. The President is proposing a
billion dollar initiative to protect open space, benefit urban
forests, and improve the quality of life for the 80 percent of
Americans living in urban and suburban areas. Through
sustainable forest and grassland management, the Forest Service
will play an essential role in accomplishment of this
initiative. The President's budget provides an increase of $113
million in State and Private and Research programs which are
integral to protecting and restoring the lands and waters that
sustain us. We will collaborate with state fish and wildlife
agencies, state foresters, tribes, and others to develop
conservation and stewardship plans for an additional 740,000
acres of non-industrial private forestland. We will help states
protect an estimated 135,000 additional acres of forestland
through acquisitions and conservation easements. We will
acquire environmentally sensitive lands through the Land and
Water Conservation Fund, and we will include nearly 800 more
communities in efforts to conserve urban and community forests.
In addition, 300,000 more hours of conservation training will
be provided to local communities.
Madam Chairman, I am truly excited about budgetary emphasis
in sustainable forest and grassland management through
cooperation and collaboration. This emphasis will carry into
many programs including fire management where we will employ
fire as a tool to meet integrated resource and societal
objectives across landscapes. We will give priority to high-
risk wildland/urban interface areas where people, homes and
personal property are at risk. We will employ fire as a tool to
aid threatened and endangered species conservation and
recovery, to reduce accumulated fuels within and adjacent to
wilderness and reduce fuels to help lower long term costs of
suppressing wildfires.
Now I would like to turn to one of the more challenging
aspects of the Natural Resource Agenda. That involves
management of the National Forest Road System. As you know, on
February 11, I announced an interim suspension of road
construction in most roadless areas of the national forest
system. We offer this timeout to reduce the controversy of
roadless area entries in order to reduce damage to a road
system which is already in disrepair.
A personal source of frustration is that few people or
interest groups are focussed on the issue of our existing road
system as opposed to the roadless area issue. Yet if we care
about restoring the ecological fabric of the landscape and the
health of our watersheds, we must concentrate on areas that are
roaded in addition to those that are not.
The President's budget proposes a $22.6 million increase in
the road budget, primarily for maintenance. The agency has an
estimated road maintenance backlog of over $8 billion.
Meanwhile we are only maintaining 18 percent of our roads to
the safety and environmental standards to which they were
built. With the proposed funding level in the fiscal year 2000
budget, we will increase by 50 percent from 199.8, the miles of
road to be decommissioned or stabilized. We will increase the
percentage of forest roads maintained to standard from 18
percent to 24 percent.
With roads that could encircle the globe many times, our
road system is largely complete. Our challenge is to shrink the
system to a size we can afford to maintain while still
providing for efficient and safe public access in a manner that
protects land health.
Over the next 18 months, we will develop a long term road
policy with three primary objectives: (1) develop new
analytical tools to help managers determine where, when or if
to build new roads, (2) decommission old, unneeded,
unauthorized, and other roads that degrade the environment, and
(3) selectively upgrade certain roads to help meet changing use
patterns on forests and grasslands.
Management of roads is very important to local communities
that rely heavily on these roads for livelihoods and rural
transportation. I expect decisions about local roads to be made
by local managers working with local people and others who use
or care about our road system. We will obviously continue to
provide access to and through forests. However, it is clear
that we simply cannot afford our existing road system.
The fourth element of the Natural Resource Agenda involves
recreation. The President's budget provides strong support to
the recreation program. With appropriated funds totalling $288
million, and additional funds provided from the recreation fee
demonstration project receipts and the ten percent road and
trail fund, this program will continue to provide strong
support to the 800 million annual visitors which we expect to
increase to 1.2 billion over the next 50 years.
The Forest Service recreation strategy focuses on providing
customer service and opportunities for all people. The
successful recreation fee demonstration program has served many
people at the sites operated under the program through improved
visitor experiences and repair and upgrade facilities which
were badly in need of attention. I strongly support
continuation of this program. I do want to pass on one caution
lest this program is viewed as an answer for reducing future
recreation discretionary funds. The recreation fee
demonstration program serves many people in a limited number of
recreation sites. The Forest Service recreation program is
highly dispersed. It is the place for a family drive or hike on
a Sunday afternoon, a weekend camping trip, or a week long
grueling hike in the rugged backcountry. Many of these
experiences do not lend themselves to a recreation fee
demonstration type program. In fact, less than 10 percent of
forest recreation visits occur at fee demonstration sites. As
the backyard playground for many Americans, it is essential we
maintain a recreation program that allows enjoyment of the
national forests without charge in addition to fee programs in
limited areas.
A key part of enhancing this dispersed recreation is
through our wilderness management program. The President's
budget includes an increase of $7 million for protection and
restoration of natural conditions in wilderness and to mitigate
the impacts of high use areas adjacent to large population
centers. The wilderness legacy is a crown jewel. I am committed
to increasing the Forest Service commitment to the Wilderness
Act and intend to give more emphasis through increased land
management planning and re-establishment of a national
wilderness field advisory group.
Each of the four emphasis areas of the Natural Resource
Agenda links directly to one or more of the goals of the
Results Act Strategic Plan. I am pleased that the President's
budget supports this plan for moving forward.
Forest Service Accountability
Successful implementation of the President's initiatives
and the Natural Resource Agenda is dependent on having the
trust of Congress and the American people. To be trusted, we
have to be accountable for our performance. We have to be able
to identify where our funds are being spent, and what America
is receiving in return. We have to do this as efficiently as
possible in order to assure that a maximum amount of funds are
spent on the ground for intended purposes without being
diverted for unnecessary overhead.
Madam Chairman, as you know, the Forest Service has had
problems with accountability in the past. We have been the
subject of more than 20 oversight reports and internal studies.
we have been resoundingly criticized for having poor decision
making, either bloated or inaccurate overhead costs, and non-
responsive accounting systems. While some of this may be
exaggerated, I fully acknowledge that some is true. We've got
the message. We will improve dramatically. Let me highlight
several initiatives that are now underway.
First and most importantly, I have made it clear through
organization changes and personal statements that the business
and financial management functions of this agency are equally
as important as attention to managing the resources. I have
placed business management professionals in operations and
financial management positions. We have established a Chief
operating officer at the Associate Chief level which reports
directly to me, thus placing our business management functions
on an operating level equal to that of our natural resource
functions. We have brought in a new Chief Financial Officer at
the Deputy Chief level to implement the Foundation Financial
Information System. This is her top priority, with a goal of
achieving a clean financial opinion from the General Accounting
office as soon as possible.
It is also time to reform our budget structure. I want to
work with the Congress and the Administration to design a
budget structure that reflects the work we do and the Results
Act Strategic plan on which the Natural Resource Agenda is
based. The current budget structure does not support the
integrated work necessary to restore and maintain land health
while promoting ecological sustainability. In order to ensure
accountability while implementing a new budget structure, we
will employ land health performance measures to demonstrate
that we can have a simplified budget and improve water quality,
protect and restore more habitat, and improve forest ecosystem
health.
In fiscal year 2000 we will begin to implement reforms to
our trust funds. We will examine alternatives for trust fund
management in the future to avoid unintended incentives to
pursue forest management activities that are not consistent
with land health objectives.
For the first time, at the direction of Congress, we have
developed and implemented standard definitions for indirect
costs which are in full compliance with the Federal Accounting
Standards Advisory Board. These definitions have been reviewed
by several oversight groups. Based on these definitions, for
the first time we have accurately determined indirect expenses
for the agency, which during fiscal year 2000 we project to be
18.9 percent.
As you know, the issue of indirect costs, often referred to
as overhead, received extensive attention during the 105th
Congress, as did the poor quality of our financial system and
records. I want to make a specific request as your Committee
examines our budget in the coming year. I ask for your patience
and support in rectifying much of our accountability problems.
The Forest Service's financial management and reporting of
overhead took a decade or more to fall into disrepair. It will
take more than a year to fix the problem. Let me emphasize that
we are devoting extensive resources to implementing new
financial systems, improving our audit processes, and improving
decision making. The resources we devote to make these fixes
involves expenditures of an overhead type nature. As we
concentrate on cleaning up our problems, we need to have
flexibility without legislated limitations which could prevent
us from being successful.
In my testimony today, I have reviewed the President's
initiatives, discussed the Natural Resource Agenda, and
described our intent to improve agency accountability. In
conclusion, I want to say that a Forest Service that meets the
needs of the American people and restores and preserves the
health of the nations forests and rangelands, is a goal we all
strive for. I'll leave you with some thoughts based on Aldo
Leopold's Sand County Almanac; the same words I left with our
employees in Missoula during my state of the Forest Service
speech.
Let us recommit ourselves to an invigorated nation and land
ethic. An ethic that recognized that we cannot meet the needs
of people without first securing the health, diversity, and
productivity of our lands and waters. An ethic that understands
the need to reconnect our communities--both urban and rural--to
the lands and waters that sustain them. An ethic that respects
that the choices we make today influence the legacy that we
bequeath to our children and their children's children.
That concludes my remarks. I would be pleased to answer any
questions you may have.