Providing for Consideration of H.R. 4200, Forest Emergency Recovery and Research Act
PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.R. 4200, FOREST EMERGENCY RECOVERY AND RESEARCH ACT
Mr. BISHOP of Utah. Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Matsui), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.
Mr. Speaker, H. Res. 816 provides for a structured rule and allows for 1 hour of general debate with 20 minutes equally divided and controlled by each of the chairman and ranking minority members of the Committee on Resources, the Committee on Agriculture and the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.
There also are four amendments, Democrat amendments, that have been filed with the bill made in order. Each of these amendments was considered in the committee markup and was defeated in those markups, but we have decided in the rule of fairness to allow them all to have a chance of debating those amendments on the floor, giving them another chance to convince a majority of the House Members that their approach to forest management is better than the bill before us.
In testimony received in the Rules Committee, it was mentioned that this particular bill has had, approximately 50 times, a redrafting to make sure the needs of individuals were met; it was passed by strong bipartisan support in both the Rules Committee and the Agriculture Committee; it has 147 bipartisan sponsors; it has had nine hearings; the sponsors have traveled to forests from Oregon to Georgia; they have had input from Fish and Wildlife, from Tribal land managers; it has been endorsed by the 25,000-member National Federation of Federal Employees Union, by the 15,000 members of the Society of American Foresters and by the 12,000-member Coalition of Professional Firefighters.
This bill has gone through regular order. It is as regular, it is so regular you would think it was sponsored by Metamucil.
I am also very grateful to the chairman of the subcommittee who is the sponsor, Mr. Walden, for his work on this, as well as Mr. Goodlatte, Mr. Gilchrest, Mr. Baird, Ms. Herseth, who presented this bill to us, and also to the gentleman from Washington, Mr. Hastings, who told me everything I need to know about forests, and if this bill is good with him, it obviously has to be a good bill.
Those of us who live in the western States realize that we have enormous tracts of land, both in Forest Service land and in BLM lands, and the forest in those areas has been under tremendous stress in the past two decades. We estimate there are at least 190 million acres of land at risk, over 1 million acres that is currently in a restoration backlog. It has taken us about 2 years to begin the restoration process. If there is any kind of regulatory process, the average is 3 1/2 years.
Yet, in those same areas, non-Federal lands, whether it is private or governmental, can begin their restoration process in weeks using best practices that have been tried and true.
At the Rules Committee it was mentioned after the Mt. St. Helens eruption, if you now go to Washington State, you can clearly see where the private forest management, which included selective and partial harvesting of dead timber, has resulted in a quicker and better recovery than adjacent Federal lands where the actions have been hindered oftentimes by litigation.
In my own State of Utah, the Dixie National Forest in southern Utah over a decade ago was infested by pine beetles, originally committed to only 6 acres of infestation above the Cedar Breaks National Monument, an area that was filled with beautiful and very tall Englemann spruce trees.
The best available science protocols and the Forest Service's preferred alternative was a remediation plan that called for harvesting of a certain size of tree in the infested area. Apparently these pine beetles only like a certain age of trees; kind of like a fine wine of only a certain year is what they would consume. The forestry experts said that by harvesting selectively in this contained 6-acre area, they could contain the insects' further spread.
Unfortunately their plan was subject to intense litigation which lasted for over 2 years. In that 2-year period of time, the Forest Service was precluded by injunction from proceeding with their remediation plan. The beetle, unfortunately, did not wait for those 2 years, for the lawyers and the judges in a typical slow, deliberative judicial pace to solve their differences.
Instead of 6 acres being impacted, thousands of acres were killed in this particular forest. Today, if you visit this area, the sad legacy of this litigation was that under the guise of protecting our forest, it was actually very extremely detrimental to our forest. What was once a pristine and amazingly beautiful forest is now acre after acre after acre of dead trees. Habitat has been lost, vegetation was lost, mud slides have increased, water and air quality has decreased, and soil erosion has increased. This area is now an extremely high risk of devastating fire.
There are events that take place in our life that disrupt our forest system. Last year we passed the Healthy Forest Restoration Act to give tools of management to our forest experts for forest health, for community protection, fuel reduction and fire prevention.
This year we are now bringing before you the Forest Emergency Recovery and Research Act, a commonsense recovery plan that would follow natural disasters affecting our forest land. This gives tools of rehabilitation. It is not a plantation forest which environmentalists do not like. There is heavy emphasis on alternative energy that can be used for some of the materials that will be recovered.
You may hear some opponents of this particular bill talking the same old talking points of yesteryear. The important thing to remember is in H.R. 4200 there are three specific elements to it.
Number one, it pursues scientific research in conjunction with land grant universities to improve our knowledge about postcatastrophe treatment. Secondly, it mandates preapproved action, subject to peer review, without blatant proscriptions of actions that will give best science efforts in controlling and preserving our forest land. Number three, it provides firefighter protection.
The most treacherous and dangerous situation for a firefighter is always the second fire in the same area. The passage of this bill would eliminate the potential harm and risk not only to species, but also would potentially save the lives of many of our firefighters.
This bill is such a good bill that it actually should be on the suspension calendar, but we are here today to consider this legislation on the floor under a rule. Once again, Mr. Speaker, this rule provided under H. Res. 816 is fair by any standard of judgment.
I am proud to be a cosponsor of this underlying legislation, the Forest Emergency Recovery and Research Act. I believe it represents a model for how Congress can act in a methodical, reasonable and bipartisan manner to address vital concerns on this emotional environmental issue.
Mr. Speaker, I urge the adoption of the resolution and the underlying legislation in H.R. 4200.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
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Mr. BISHOP of Utah. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to close what I consider to be about 50 minutes of bipartisan support for this particular rule and the underlying bill.
This bill, indeed, would give us the rehabilitation tools to combine science and research, preapproved action, and protection of our firefighters, which is why the professionals who know and work and run our forests are all in support of this particular bill and this action. And knowing our goal is to get green and not black forests, and healthy trees not dead stumps, I urge all my colleagues to support this rule and the underlying bill.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.
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