Who has said, “we can’t fight fires on the cheap”?

Gov. Gavin Newsom and Secretary Tom Vilsack
Gov. Gavin Newsom and Secretary Tom Vilsack tour the site of the 2020 August Complex of fires, August 4, 2021.

When Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack said August 4 we can’t manage forests and suppress fires “on the cheap” it was not the first time that concept has been stated. Here is part of what the Secretary said when he was meeting with California Governor Gavin Newsom to discuss state and federal collaboration on ​wildfire response and fuels management across the West:

We are prepared to do a better job [of forest management] if we have the resources to be able to do this… Candidly, I think it’s fair to say over the generations and decades, we have tried to do this job on the cheap. We have tried to get by, a little here, a little there, with a little forest management here, a little fire suppression over here, but the reality is this has caught up to us.

We have to significantly beef up our capacity. We have to have more boots on the ground… And we have to make sure our firefighters are better compensated. Governor, that will happen.

We need to do a better job, and more, forest management to reduce the risk of catastrophic fire.

Looking back at the Wildfire Today archives, here is where we’ve seen that phrase before — excerpts from the articles:


William Scott, September 8, 2012: 

Stop narrowly thinking of fires as a land management issue, and begin treating them as a national security issue. Finally it’s time. We have to develop and field a robust large air tanker fleet of firefighting aircraft. The Forest Service has made a good start, but it still suffers from a culture and attitude of what firefighters call ‘cheapism’, the idea that we can fight wildland fire on the cheap. And that’s no longer acceptable.


Senator Harry Reid, July 19, 2013, from the Las Vegas Review-Journal:

As firefighters head home from Southern Nevada, U.S. Sen. Harry Reid on Wednesday blamed “climate change” for the intense blaze that consumed nearly 28,000 acres and drove hundreds of residents from their homes around Mount Charleston this month.

Reid said the government should be spending “a lot more” on fire prevention, echoing elected officials who say the Forest Service should move more aggressively to remove brush and undergrowth that turn small fires into huge ones.

“The West is burning,” the Nevada Democrat told reporters in a meeting. “I could be wrong, but I don’t think we’ve ever had a fire in the Spring Mountains, Charleston range like we just had.

“Why are we having them? Because we have climate change. Things are different. The forests are drier, the winters are shorter, and we have these terrible fires all over the West.”

“This is terribly concerning,” Reid said. Dealing with fire “is something we can’t do on the cheap.”

“We have climate change. It’s here. You can’t deny it,” Reid went on. “Why do you think we are having all these fires?”


Bill Gabbert, February 25, 2018:

The federal government is reducing the numbers of large air tankers and helicopters on exclusive use contracts. Air tankers are being cut from 20 to 13, and Type 1 helicopters over the last year have been reduced from 34 to 28. Cutting back on these firefighting resources is not going to enhance our ability to suppress new fires before they become large, dangerous, and expensive.


Bill Gabbert, March 16, 2018:

OpEd: I am tired of complaints about the cost of fighting wildfires

(This was first published on Fire Aviation)

The large air tankers on exclusive use contracts have been cut this year from 20 to 13. In 2002 there were 44. This is a 73 percent reduction in the last 16 years.

No scooping air tankers are on exclusive use contracts this year.

The large Type 1 helicopters were cut last year from 34 to 28 and that reduction remains in effect this year.

Some say we need to reduce the cost of fighting wildfires. At first glance the above cuts may seem to accomplish that. But failing to engage in a quick, aggressive initial attack on small fires by using overwhelming force from both the air and the ground, can allow a 10-acre fire to become a megafire, ultimately costing many millions of dollars. CAL FIRE gets this. The federal government does not.

Meanwhile the United States spends trillions of dollars on adventures on the other side of the world while the defense of our homeland against the increasing number of acres burned in wildfires is being virtually ignored by the Administration and Congress. A former military pilot told me this week that just one sortie by a military plane on the other side of the world can cost millions of dollars when the cost of the weapons used is included. The military industrial complex has hundreds of dedicated, aggressive, well-funded lobbyists giving millions to our elected officials. Any pressure on politicians to better defend our country from wildfires on our own soil is very small by comparison.

I am tired of people wringing their hands about the cost of wildfires.

You can’t fight fire on the cheap — firefighting and warfighting are both expensive. What we’re spending in the United States on the defense of our homeland is a very small fraction of what it costs to blow up stuff in countries that many Americans can’t find on a map.

Government officials and politicians who complain about the cost need to stop talking and fix the problem. The primary issue that leads to the whining is that in busy years we rob Peter to pay Paul — taking money from unrelated accounts to pay for emergency fire suppression. This can create chaos in those other functions such as fire prevention and reducing fuels that make fires difficult to control. Congress needs to create the “fire funding fix” that has been talked about for many years — a completely separate account for fires. Adequately funding fire suppression and rebuilding the aerial firefighting fleet should be high priorities for the Administration and Congress.

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Author: Bill Gabbert

After working full time in wildland fire for 33 years, he continues to learn, and strives to be a Student of Fire.

19 thoughts on “Who has said, “we can’t fight fires on the cheap”?”

  1. The blame game needs to end. We must finance frankly at what ever it takes do the necessary research and prevention. There will be nothing left to protect soon enough. Stop the whining, tax us if need be, and start to try to mend the disastrous damage done to our forests. I am a tax payer who wants my children to do more than “read about” old growth forests.

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  2. I’m pretty sure the federal government spends more money on fires because the FS/BLM is so cheap. Municipal departments have turned federal wildfire into a “for profit” business. For a cooperator firefighter feds typically pay their salary + benefits, their backfill at home (all OT- 24hrs/day) and their high vehicle cost.

    So municipal departments are off the hook for salary, benefits and the backfill coverage making their home costs lower and they also get their expensive vehicles paid off rather quickly.

    A structure firefighter typically works 7/ 8 days per month, so on 14 days plus a travel day on each end they are getting more than 2 months pay out on the fire.

    Often these “firefighters” only fill secondary roles and lack experience and knowledge of wildfire tactics and strategies, making fire suppression less effective and costlier.

    It doesn’t stop there, state fire (Cal Fire, Wa DNR, ODF, etc…) all get 75% off through FEMA grants.

    Emergency funding is unlimited without any accountability, yet FS/BLM fire positions and budgets are cut so that fire staff and forest supervisors can get bonuses.

    So they cut their line item costs, but overall cost to taxpayers increases. It’s costing a lot of money to be cheap, and it’s getting where there needs to be an audit of the waste, fraud and abuse.

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    1. Spot On Bro!

      When will anyone be brave enough in DC to challenge this? Fleecing of the government – no doubt.

      Nobody in FS leadership willing to challenged the status quo. Afraid to lose their job?

      Sad state of affairs for those who know what is really happening in the rising cost of fires.

      Let’s go OMB get an investigation going.

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    2. It is also sad to think about all these rural departments bringing less than full time folks to the line. The city of Prescott got out of the industry because their insurance didn’t cover the majority of the lost crew. How can so many municipalities continue to expand their fire departments into areas that are not real functions of the department?

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  3. Most experienced fire FS employees who hold a leadership position are tired of the Forest Service – they see the ship sinking. No support.

    Hello DC wake up.

    Time for a change.

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  4. The Forest Service has essentially become the Missing Persons Bureau. Buildings shutdown, no-one in them; no answer to emails; no answer or return phone calls; no personnel on the ground in the Forests. This is a totally disfunctional agency! Not only can they not effectively mount a wildfire campaign, they even destroy prevention and mitigation measures through their incompetence! See: https://www.paysonroundup.com/catastrophe_a_forest_in_flames/effort-to-save-the-forest-collapses/article_068be94a-fb3d-534d-a7db-ace15c6a42a0.html

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  5. The only reason fires are fought in the current manner regardless of label is due to poor leadership and politics. Some of that poor leadership is due to folks in lower positions being hamstrung by those above. While we may not be able to fight fire “on the cheap” throwing infinite money at this problem will not fix it now or ever. The sooner this is run as a business and not a government entity with ZERO accountability it may become sustainable. Once it is sustainable then we taxpayers can support this. Until the leadership and management decisions are fixed there should be no money spent to fix this problem. Everyone in place has proven inept at managing resources and time.

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  6. We need to get you speaking on these issues on a wider scale. I think your perspective and ability to capture the big picture is top notch. Getting you involved with other public media sources, in my opinion, would carry far in spreading the word. If this is something you’re interested, how can we help outside of sharing these posts?

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    1. Ben, forwarding and sharing is productive. Emailing the link and the text itself directly to elected officials and print media reporters can also be productive. Advocates in Congress are most easily able to make legal change, which is real change. Focus on them.

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  7. Unfortunately the Forest Service quit managing the National Forests due to well intended but destructive environmentalists. Over the last two decades there have been many changes affecting the Forest Service that have greatly contributed to the present situation. In no particular order there was the spotted owl that virtually shut down managing the forest timber resources, followed by numerous lengthy law suits to try to prevent any tree removal, the following reduction in Forest Service personnel able and willing to suppress fires or work on controlled burns, (at least locally for me) the sectioning off of the fire forces from the traditional district configuration, the F.S. Chief decision to limit or stop fire fighting at night, the advocacy of using distantly indirect fire lines to encourage more acres getting burned without use of costly prescribed fire. Using fire alone to manage a forest is really a bad idea. The trees in a forest continue to grow adding tons of material either useable or burnable. We have gotten to the point where to many people think only of the material being burnable. In reality we need growing healthy forests for the one thing that we need every day–oxygen. Burned trees don’t produce that.

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  8. The cost of fighting Wildfires can be dramatically reduced in the future if we spend the money needed upfront in the coming years for fire education and prevention measures. The FS still does not use prescribed fire to its potential and from personal experience I blame that on the lack of fuel reduction funding as well as the lack of full time year around firefighter employment. The natural landscape can sustain fire the way it needs to if we reintroduce fire to the landscape properly. Seasonal fire employment is a misguided attempt to save money when a dedicated workforce can reduce the cost in the long run. The largest national wildland firefighter workforce needs to be moved to its own department and not be managed by an agency that is more concerned about timber targets than it is about managing the resource. Let fires that are a non threat burn and do the work that they have needed to do. Smokey needs to teach that fire can be a good thing and not that all fire must be put out as soon as it is reported.

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    1. Smokey’s message has changed over the years, but it has always been Preventing fires, not Extinguishing fires.

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    2. Your comments are spot-on but miss one important point; The USFS was decapitated by the Spotted Owl fiasco twenty years ago. There is no longer the desire, ability, knowledge or funding within that outfit to “properly” manage our National Forests. Even if there were, the green groups challenge even the best intended management plans such that they can take decades to work though the planning process. It will take Congress and a better educated workforce to change that. How long would that take?

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      1. Last time I looked, “best intended management plans” still have to follow the Law. and Court decisions consistently have shown that they don’t. Sounds like Montana Senator Steve Daines, always ready to blame “radical out-of-State enviros” rather than face the reality of Climate change and sometimes Resource shortages.

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  9. If you live in the WUI, the responsibility is yours to have a defensible space. It’s not the tax payers responsibility. We have enabled folks to do nothing about their situation in regards to their homes and wildfire.

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  10. Cheap? Talk is cheap.
    The same people repeating the rhetoric, which will be followed by the same people repeating the failed budget process when the fire season winds down.

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  11. Hi Bill,

    Isn’t it amazing how many people ignores your wisdom and the wisdom of those who have the EXPERIENCE!!!

    A quote of Einstein (who considered what others and he simply observed) is: “THE ONLY SOURCE OF KNOWLEDGE IS EXPERIENCE.”

    But we (you) need to keep writing what we know (OBSERVE)!!!

    Have a good day, Jerry

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