News Release

May 20, 2003

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Administration's Forest Plan Doomed to Fail
"Forests Initiative" Will Leave 90 Percent of Acres Vulnerable to Fires

WASHINGTON -- Jerry Taylor, director of natural resource studies with the Cato Institute, issued the following statement in response to President Bush's "Healthy Forests Initiative:"

"The Bush administration's 'Healthy Forests Initiative,' while well intentioned, is doomed to failure. The administration has drawn the wrong conclusion from last years' fire season. Consider: President Bush announced his initiative last summer at the site of the Squires Peak fire near Medford, Ore. The government had previously thinned 400 acres in that area, but environmental delays forced them to leave 80 acres untreated. A fire entered those 80 acres and burned uncontrollably, eventually spreading to 2,800 acres and costing $2.2 million to suppress. The lesson the administration learned from Squires Peak is that environmental delays are bad. That's the wrong lesson. The real lesson is: Unless you thin every acre, you might as well not thin any at all.

"The federal government reports that 70 million acres of federal lands need immediate thinning and another 140 million acres must be thinned soon. The president's plan to thin 25 million acres in the next 10 years will cost as much as $4 billion yet leave nearly 90 percent of those acres untreated. That will leave forest homes almost as defenseless as they are today.

"There is a better way. Forest Service researchers have shown that homes and other structures are safe from wildfire if their roofs are non-flammable and the landscaping within 150 feet of the buildings is made relatively fireproof. A recent Forest Service report estimates there are just 1.9 million high-risk acres with homes and other structures near federal lands. To defend homes and communities, we should treat those acres and fireproof the homes. That could be done in just one or two years at a tiny fraction of the cost of the president's plan.

"Once homes and communities are protected, the Forest Service and other federal agencies should leave most fires alone, as fire ecologists have long recommended. Fire crews should make sure blazes do not cross onto private lands but otherwise let nature take its course. That would save taxpayers billions of dollars, protect firefighters' lives, and improve forest health."