Interior Secretary Sally Jewell talks about recovery at the Soda Fire

Secretary Jewell discusses the rehab of the Soda Fire and the illegal occupation of a National Wildlife Refuge.

In an interview with Rocky Barker of the Idaho Statesman, Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell talked about the rehabilitation of the Soda Fire that burned 279,000 acres in Oregon and Idaho southwest of Boise last August. She addressed some of the criticism about the rehab strategy and also talked about the illegal occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon and its effect on the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service employees.

Map Soda Fire
Map of the Soda Fire (red line) at 9 p.m. MT, August 14, 2015. The brown and red dots represent heat detected by a satellite as late as 10:05 p.m. MT, August 14, 2015. The fire was actively spreading near the location of the red dots at that time — the red dots were the most current. (click to enlarge)

Secretaries Vilsack and Jewell discuss wildfire preparedness

Agriculture Secretary Vilsack
Agriculture Secretary Vilsack meets USFS firefighters in Boise, May 13. USDA photo.

During a visit to the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC) in Boise, Idaho today, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and Interior Secretary Sally Jewell (just 34 days into her new job) discussed the state of wildfire preparedness.

Secretary Vilsack said there will be 500 fewer firefighters and 50 fewer engines this year as a result of the budget cuts required by the sequester process adopted by Congress and signed by the President. Vilsack said the overall reduction is more than seven percent.

The Chief of the U.S. Forest Service, Tom Tidwell, testified before a congressional committee April 16, saying:

We will have the resources we need.

Several news organizations reported on today’s visit. The Salt Lake Tribune wrote, in part:

In answering a question about whether firefighters would make it a priority to protect watersheds in Utah, [Secretary] Jewell said the cuts also are reducing what the federal land agencies spend on preventing fires and rehabilitating lands after a fire.

“You can’t do as much as that advance work as you would like or the post-fire remediation to maintain the integrity of those ecosystems,” Jewell said.

The Idaho Statesman:

Idaho Republican Jim Risch, who joined the two cabinet secretaries on the tour praised the firefighting agencies for doing as well as they can with less. But Risch, who voted for the cuts, offered little hope the secretaries will be able to avoid the robbing-Peter-to-pay-Paul tradeoffs they face.

“”We got to accept the fact there is not going to be federal funding like there was before,” Risch said.

But in August, if all of the firefighting resources are already in place and more are needed to meet the threat Risch said he and other western lawmakers will put together a coalition to get the emergency funding that is necessary.

Jewell joined smokejumpers Sunday on a training flight five weeks into her tenure as Interior secretary. She also led the entourage over to the Boise Fire Dispatch outside of NIFC to see how the firefighters from federal, state and local governments work together on the ground.

The press release issued by the DOI and DOA included this passage:

Federal assets include more than 13,000 firefighters, including permanent and seasonal federal employees; more than 1,600 engines; up to 26 multiengine air tankers and two water scooper aircrafts; approximately 27 single engine air tankers; and hundreds of helicopters.

Note the “up to 26 multiengine air tankers”. The reality is, there are eight large air tankers on contract — seven 50+ year-old P2Vs, and one BAe-146. In addition to those, six of the seven “next generation” 3,000+ gallon air tankers that were just notified they would be receiving contracts are months or more away from being certified by the FAA and the Interagency AirTanker Board. Some of them may not be seen dropping on a fire until late this summer or even next year, if they are certified at all. The two scoopers mentioned carry less than 1,500 gallons. In addition, the USFS may again borrow some 2,000-gallon, 50-year old Convair 580s from Canada if they are available and not tied up on fires.

 

Thanks go out to Kelly

Senate confirms Jewell as Secretary of Interior

Sally JewellThe Senate voted on Wednesday 87 to 11 to confirm the nomination of Sally Jewell as the new Secretary of Interior, replacing Ken Salazar. After being sworn in she will oversee 500,000,000 acres of public land, including the wildland fire management activities of the National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management, Fish and Wildlife Service, and Bureau of Indian Affairs.

Ms. Jewell, 56, will resign from her job as the chief executive officer of Recreational Equipment Inc. (REI), a company that sells outdoor clothing and equipment. Born in England as Sally Roffey, Ms. Jewell moved to the United States in 1959 when her father, an anesthesiologist, took up a fellowship at the University of Washington. After she graduated from the University of Washington with a degree in mechanical engineering she worked for Mobile Oil in the oil fields of Oklahoma for three years. After that she became a petroleum engineer for Rainier Bank during a time when banks began to hire engineers to understand the value of collateral under the ground so that they could make intelligent loans. Rainier Bank was acquired by Security Pacific, and Ms. Jewell ran their business banking activities.

After 20 years in the banking industry she became a board member of REI, and in 2000 was hired as their chief operating officer. In 2010 the company had 118 stores and $1.7 billion in sales. She represents a break from the past Secretaries of Interior, who have primarily been career politicians from the western United States.

Ms. Jewell sits on the board of the National Park Conservation Association, an organization that is not officially connected with the government or the National Park Service.

During the confirmation process, Ms. Jewell mentioned the word “fire” once in her written statement prepared for the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee:

The President has made clear that climate change is an important issue for our nation, especially as we face more frequent and intense droughts, wildfires and floods. I commit to tapping into the vast scientific and land management resources at Interior – from USGS to the Fish and Wildlife Service to the Bureau of Reclamation and beyond – to better understand and prepare for the challenges that our cities, coastlines, river basins and – ultimately – our economies face.

A video recording of her 2 hour and 43 minute Senate confirmation hearing is on the C-SPAN web site.

As Wildfire Today told you on February 8, Timothy Egan wrote a noteworthy article about the nomination of Ms. Jewell for the New York Times. Here is how it begins:
Continue reading “Senate confirms Jewell as Secretary of Interior”

Timothy Egan, on Sally Jewell, the nominee for Secretary of Interior

DOI logoTimothy Egan has written for the New York Times a very thoughtful essay about President Obama’s nominee for Secretary of Interior. If confirmed, Sally Jewell will oversee 500,000,000 acres of public land, including those managed by the National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management, Fish and Wildlife Service, Bureau of Indian Affairs, and many other agencies within the department. At first glance, a former petroleum engineer and banker may seem like just the same old crap in Washington, but she is defined by much more than that, including being the CEO of Recreational Equipment Inc. (REI). Mr. Egan points out that “the outdoor recreational industry directly supports three times more jobs than the oil and gas sector. People who play in the American outdoors spend $646 billion a year, responsible for 6.1 million jobs.”

The well-funded lobbyists for Exxon and British Petroleum tend to out-shout the silent majority of the citizens who enjoy using our public lands and want their grandchildren to also have that opportunity.

If Mr. Egan’s name is familiar, you may remember that he is the author of “The Big Burn: Teddy Roosevelt and the Fire That Saved America”, a book that tells the stories of the huge fires that burned across the northwest in 1910 — fires that killed 100 firefighters.

You should read the entire article in the New York Times, but here is how it begins:

The emperor of the American outdoors usually wears a cowboy hat, for the lashing dust and searing sun in the domain of the Interior Department, one-fifth of the United States. James Watt, the most small-minded head of that agency in modern times, wore one. So did Ken Salazar, the outgoing secretary.

Don’t expect to see Sally Jewell, who is President Obama’s nominee for Interior secretary, in a showy Stetson. Running shoes, yes. Climbing helmet, of course. Cycling tights, no doubt. If confirmed, Jewell would be one of the few directors of that vast department to actually share the passions of the majority of people who use the 500 million acres of public land under Interior’s control.

It’s not just that Jewell has climbed Mount Rainier, kayaked innumerable frothy waterways, skied and snowboarded double-diamond runs. Nor that, as chief executive of the nation’s largest consumer cooperative — Recreational Equipment Inc., the retailer known as REI — she knows that Americans spend more money on outdoor equipment than they do on pharmaceuticals or gasoline.

More information about Ms. Jewell was on Wildfire Today February, 6, 2013.

Obama nominates petroleum engineer/REI CEO to lead Interior Department

Updated at 12:09 p.m. MT, February 6, 2013

Sally Jewel
Sally Jewel, after being introduced by President Obama in the White House, Feb. 6, 2013

President Obama nominated Sally Jewell today to be the next Secretary of Interior. If confirmed by the Senate, she will oversee 500,000,000 acres of public land, including the National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management, Fish and Wildlife Service, Bureau of Indian Affairs, and many other agencies within the department. She will replace Ken Salazar, a former senator from Colorado, who has led the department since the beginning of the Obama administration.

Presently Ms. Jewell, 56, is the chief executive officer of Recreational Equipment Inc. (REI), a company that sells outdoor clothing and equipment. Born in England as Sally Roffey, Ms. Jewell moved to the United States in 1959 when her father, an anesthesiologist, took up a fellowship at the University of Washington. After she graduated from the University of Washington with a degree in mechanical engineering she worked for Mobile Oil in the oil fields of Oklahoma for three years. After that she became a petroleum engineer for Rainier Bank during a time when banks began to hire engineers to understand the value of collateral under the ground so that they could make intelligent loans. Rainier Bank was acquired by Security Pacific, and Ms. Jewell ran their business banking activities.

After 20 years in the banking industry she became a board member of REI, and in 2000 was hired as their chief operating officer. If confirmed by the Senate as Secretary of Interior, she will leave REI as their president and chief executive officer. In 2010 the company had 118 stores and $1.7 billion in sales. She represents a break from the past Secretaries of Interior, who have primarily been career politicians from the western United States.

Ms. Jewell sits on the board of the National Park Conservation Association, an organization that is not officially connected with the government or the National Park Service.

According to the Washington Post:

Jewell has pushed for land conservation in Washington state, where she lives, as well as nationally. She is a founding board member of the Mountains to Sound Greenway Trust, which focuses on a stretch of land from Puget Sound across the Cascades, and helped lay out a plan for the National Park Service as a commissioner on the “National Parks Second Century Commission.”