A Congressman from Texas, Republican Kevin Brady, has introduced a bill that would consolidate the fire management programs in the Departments of Interior and Agriculture and reduce their total funding by 10 percent. The bill is H.R.235 and is titled Cut Unsustainable and Top-Heavy Spending Act of 2011, or CUTS Act.
Here is Rep. Brady’s fire management proposal:
Consolidate Federal Fire Management Programs, Reduce Funding by 10%
This amendment would consolidate federal fire management program and reduce overall federal funding for these efforts by 10 percent, as called for in the President’s Fiscal Commission report.
According to the Commission, “There are numerous firefighting programs within the Department of the Interior (DOI) and the USDA Forest Service (FS). Since FY2001, funding for these activities has nearly doubled according to the Congressional Research Service. Despite this increase in funding, three of the past four years have seen a record amount of federal acreage burned. Within DOI and USDA there are almost identical accounts for how funds are intended to be spent – the only difference is that these funds are spent on lands managed by different federal agencies. There are even duplicative research accounts on wildfire research. Specifically, both agencies have the following accounts: Preparedness, Fire suppression operations, Hazardous fuels reduction, Burned area rehabilitation, and Joint fire science. In FY2010, $975 million was appropriated for DOI firefighting activities and $2.592 billion for FS wildfire activities. Total funding between the two was $3.567 billion in FY2010, not including emergency appropriations. Since 1999, GAO has repeatedly found that these activities should be more cohesive and cost-effective. In 2009, GAO noted that Forest Service and Interior agencies had not defined firefighting cost-containment goals or developed a strategy to achieve such goals, despite GAO recommendations in 2007 to do so. Instead, costs have continued to rise.”
Rep. Brady’s proposal implies that the Presidents National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform recommended that the fire management agencies be consolidated. However, the Commission’s report did not make that recommendation. The title of item #38 in the report is “Create a more cohesive and cost-effective fire management service”, which is a little vague, but Rep. Brady’s quote from the Commission’s report stops just before item #38 says:
This option would require the agencies to follow GAO recommendations, and develop clear cost containment plans, in order to reduce the yearly spending between the programs by 10 percent, or just under $400 million annually.
The above portion that Rep. Brady left out clarifies that the Commission did not recommend consolidation of the fire management agencies, but only to improve their fiscal management.
Consolidation of the five federal wildland fire management programs has been bandied about for decades. The agencies affected would include the National Park Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Bureau of Land Management, Bureau of Indian Affairs, and the Forest Service. There have also been proposals over the years to not only consolidate the fire management programs, but to merge these agencies into one agency, or to put them all into a new Department of Natural Resources.
In the current cost-cutting environment, if a monetary savings can be projected, then the chances for major changes along these lines are higher than they have been for a long time.
Rep. Brady’s bill proposes cuts in dozens of other areas also, including:
- Freeze the pay of federal employees for 3 years
- Reduce the federal workforce by 10 percent
- Cap federal travel costs
- Reduce federal vehicle costs by 20 percent
- Eliminate federal funding for National Public Radio
- Eliminate resource conservation and development programs
- Eliminate emergency operations center grant program at DHS
- Eliminate Save America’s Treasures and Preserve America at NPS
- Eliminate challenge cost share grants at DOI
You can follow the progress of H.R.235 Cut Unsustainable and Top-Heavy Spending Act of 2011 at OpenCongress.org.
Thanks Greg
I agree one agency would be great. But that would be hard to do. One agency would save tons of money just by getting rid of paper work. But look back at the South Canyon fire.
For many years there has been talk of moving The Forest Service into the Department of Interior.
Department of Argiculture was orginaly given the Forest Service since trees were considered a growing cash crop.
Given turf/political battles in congress these days I do not see this happening. It would consolidate a number of things including firefighting and save money. Gone would be multiple, at times conflicting forms, standards, policy and arguments over who is in charge of what. Perhaps it could be called The U.S.Wild Fire Agency, USWFA.
Of course it would require more over paid bureaucrats in Washington who as political appointees would be clueless to the agency goals, but heck that’s going on now and is SOP there.
It does seem to make sense to have one national wildfire agency but common sense seems in short supply these days.
You know we should cut back on spending. But there are places to besides firefighting. The southwest is predicted to have a busy fire season. we don’t need less money or man power. how about cutting off funds to illegals. That would save us billions.
So would continuing tax cuts to the wealthiest 2% of income earners. But illegal aliens and rich fat cats don’t put up a column of smoke at 15,000 feet for the 5 PM News, so we’ll likely fund most of what we have for the past 10 years, and knee-jerk when a big fire busts.