Wildland firefighters and EPA’s scientists are thrown together in the same bill. Wildland fires disrupt budget

What would Smokey Bear make of Washington’s budget rules about fire?

Tornadoes and floods qualify as natural disasters. Wildfires less so — especially on the vast federal lands in the West.


Indeed, Smokey’s Forest Service ends up competing for dollars with the Environmental Protection Agency, which is charged with addressing what many believe is the biggest disaster of all and a new catalyst for wildland fire: climate change.

California Gov. Jerry Brown, battling fire in his drought-stricken state, is raising the alarm. “Humanity is on a collision course with nature,” the Democratic governor warned on network television Sunday, then returned to the subject the next day at U.C. Davis. “We are going to have to adapt because the climate is changing,” Brown said.

All this comes into play in Congress as wildland firefighters and EPA’s scientists are thrown together in the same $30 billion-something bill that funds the natural resources side of the federal budget.

Since Republicans took over the House in 2010, this bill has been reduced by 14 percent in real dollars, adjusted for inflation. EPA has borne the brunt of those cuts. But as fire costs continue to grow, Republicans have had to scramble to preserve some balance for popular lands and wildlife programs in the West.

It took a last-minute deal on the farm bill in February to save $425 million in promised aid this year for counties and towns surrounded by tax-exempt federal lands. And Idaho Republicans — hit hard by fire — have taken the lead for their party now in proposing that some portion of the firefighting costs be treated as natural disasters, outside the traditional appropriations process.

An annual contingency fund — about $12.1 billion this year — already exists to cover disasters like floods and tornadoes through the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Legislation introduced last December in the Senate and in February in the House would require that base funding for wildland fire management continue to come from regular appropriations. But about 30 percent — or the equivalent of $420 million this year — would be judged catastrophic enough to be funded from the disaster reserve.

“Wildfires to me are the same as any natural disaster: a hurricane, a tornado or something else,” said Rep. Mike Simpson (R-Idaho), a lead sponsor. “When you have 1 percent of the fires account for 30 percent of the costs, those are the catastrophic fires, and that’s what we’re trying to get at.”

“Under this bill, you would budget for the normal firefighting costs, which are about 70 percent of the 10-year average. And once it reached above that, it would go into the disaster fund.”

President Barack Obama embraced this concept in his March budget for the coming 2015 fiscal year that begins Oct. 1. But the administration then went a big step further by proposing an almost $1.2 billion contingency for firefighting on top of $975 million in base funding for the fire suppression accounts at the Forest Service and Interior Department.

That adds up to $2.16 billion — a better than 50 percent increase over current appropriations of $1.37 billion for fire suppression in 2014. But the White House believes it’s a prudent step given the heightened level of fires predicted in the next few years. And the promise is made that whatever fire money comes out of the disaster funds, it will not increase the long-term deficit-reduction goals set in the 2011 Budget Control Act.

Having just negotiated changes in BCA last December, House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) is leery and suspects an end run around the spending caps.

“Preventing and fighting wildfires are national priorities, and the president should budget accordingly. But the president is asking for $1.2 billion less than what he believes is necessary,” said Ryan spokesman William Allison. “Congress just agreed to caps on discretionary spending, which will reach over $1 trillion in the coming year. The fact that the president refused to use one-tenth of 1 percent of that money to fully fund wildfire prevention and suppression speaks to his real priorities.”

Mindful of Ryan’s concerns, House Appropriations Committee Chairman Hal Rogers (R-Ky.) has assumed no changes will be made in current law. But in allocating money for the natural resources bill this month, Rogers provided only $30.2 billion, just $162 million over current funding.

That leaves little room for added firefighting dollars, unless EPA is cut again. Moreover, the farm bill fix for payments to local Western governments is good only for 2014. And Rogers must somehow find $425 million in loose change to meet these commitments going into November’s elections.

The West is not without clout.

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), newly empowered as chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, is a major advocate for the change in funding fire costs. “I am pulling out all the stops for doing it,” Wyden said. “The worst of the fires you would take care of with the disaster fund. You would no longer continue this practice where, when you have an inferno, you rob the prevention fund and then the problem gets worse.”

In the House, no one matches Simpson, given his position on Appropriations and the chits he holds with both Ryan and Rogers.

Without Simpson’s vote, Ryan would never have gotten his budget out of his committee in the spring of 2012 — a victory that helped Ryan secure the vice presidential nomination months later. And on Appropriations, Simpson has worked closely with Rogers, who badly wants some fix himself if his spending bills are to become law.

In an interview, Simpson said he had the votes to win in April in the Budget Committee but opted not to force an immediate fight with Ryan on the budget resolution. Going forward now, he is ready to sit down with Ryan but answers firmly — “Oh yeah” — when asked if he will bring the debate to a head this summer.

If anything, Obama’s budget has raised the stakes. Simpson said it is “vital” now that some understanding be reached before the Appropriations committees act this summer. “If we fund it as the administration requested, at 70 percent of the normal firefighting costs, and then we don’t get this bill, then they’re really in trouble.”

“I understand their concerns,” he said of Ryan and his staff. “I disagree with them, frankly. We’re not trying to raise the caps or anything else. We’re not trying to spend more on wildfires. We’re trying to spend less on wildfires in the long run.”

“What happens is every year they borrow out of every other account in the Forest Service, since [fires] exceed everything we appropriate every year,” Simpson said. “I don’t know how the chiefs can do a budget when half your budget is indeterminable because it depends on factors outside your control.”

This borrowing from Peter to pay Paul means draining money from other functions that could serve to reduce future fires. That includes dollars to remove hazardous materials and thin the forests through timber sales — a major sore point for Westerners like Simpson.

“What we’re ultimately trying to do is manage the accounts better,” he said. “People who are opposed to this will say, ‘Well, you just need to prioritize fires.’ That’s what we’re doing. … But those fires keep growing and growing, and the costs keep going up, and there are a lot of things associated with it.”

Breaking down all the numbers is never easy, this being Washington. But the whole debate has a touch of what former Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) called the “Reverse Houdini” concept: Lawmakers tie themselves in knots with rules and then claim they are unable to solve problems.

Fire’s impact is very real. Forest Service and Interior data show that the number of acres burned in the past decade has averaged about 7.2 million annually, compared to 4.3 million for the 10 years before.

In the current 2014 fiscal year, total appropriations related to wildland fire management reached $3.94 billion — up $567 million over 2010’s enacted levels. But already a May government report warned that the level of funding for fire suppression is about $470 million short of what the Forest Service and Interior will need to get through this summer.

Ryan’s office argues that some disaster aid is already available in the case of the worst fires. But the record shows that this assistance typically comes after the fact to help communities recover and is less about fighting the fires themselves.

For example, while states like California can get some FEMA aid to cope with fire emergencies, administration officials say this does not apply to Forest Service and Interior crews fighting fire on federal lands. And the FEMA “fire management” expenditures are a relatively small part of the agency’s portfolio.

Based on its 10-year average, for example FEMA asked for just $72 million for fiscal 2015. In fiscal 2013 it spent more — $109 million — but that was still a small fraction of its budget. And thus far in 2014, $46 million has been obligated.

The much larger budget problem is on the federal side given the size of the government’s holdings in the West. Any reset of policy requires some better understanding first of what is being obligated each year.

The administration estimates that in 11 of the last 14 budget cycles, Congress provided either emergency supplemental or other additional funding to cover excess fire costs. But often these dollars are to replenish accounts drained in the prior fiscal year.

For example, appropriations for all wildland fire management accounts in the Forest Service and Interior total $3.94 billion for the 2014 fiscal year. But that includes about $628 million added last fall after the government shutdown — and much of that money could be attributed to costs from the 2013 fiscal year.

Thus it can be argued that the true 2014 appropriations to meet 2014 costs are closer to $3.31 billion — and that makes for a better comparison with Obama’s 2015 budget.

Altogether, counting his $1.2 billion disaster reserve, the president is seeking $4.25 billion for all wildland fire management accounts in 2015. The Forest Service would get about $3.22 billion, and Interior, an additional $1.03 billion.

That’s an increase of $940 million, or about 28 percent, in the space of one year — a lot for Congress to swallow.

Then again, bitter experience shows the gap could look a lot narrower if predictions of higher costs prove true by the end of this summer’s firefighting season.

“With the fire season already underway, this is just going to increase the pressure on the budget,” said Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.), who chairs the natural resources panel in the Senate Appropriations Committee. “I think it is necessary to have some of the money declared as emergency to have room in the budget for their worthwhile programs.”

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