Wednesday, November 15, 2017 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon 5
Anthony urges more prescribed fire
By Sue Stafford
Correspondent
Former Sisters District
Ranger Bill Anthony, act-
ing as a representative of
the Deschutes Collaborative
Forest Project (DCFP) (see
sidebar), asked the City
Council to consider provid-
ing a letter to the Oregon
Smoke Management Review
Committee urging them to
agree to changes suggested
by DCFP to the current
Oregon Smoke Policy.
The changes, which would
encourage more use of pre-
scribed fire, while still work-
ing to protect the air quality
and health of our communi-
ties, include:
• Incorporate language
that reflects differences
between dry and wet for-
est and their respective fire
regimes;
• Align Oregon’s smoke
policy with EPA’s empiri-
cally based 24-hour air qual-
ity standard;
• Prioritize high-risk/high-
value treatment areas, such
as Wildland Urban Interface
zones, with maximum flex-
ibility and opportunity to
implement prescribed fire;
and
• Develop and implement
a public health strategy to
protect people from short-
duration prescribed fire
smoke.
The DCFP contends that,
“Although well-intentioned,
current regulations restrict
prescribed fires and inhibit
our opportunity to fight wild-
fires before they happen.”
They are asking the
Oregon Department of
Forestry and the Oregon
Department of Environmental
Quality to carefully consider
the four changes they are
proposing as work is done
to update Oregon’s Smoke
Management Plan.
“Changes to the Smoke
Management Plan are neces-
sary for a meaningful increase
to prescribed fire treatment.
And while we recognize
that increased prescribed
fires will have short-term
increased health impacts, we
believe that these will be less
than the impacts of wildfire,”
asserts the DCFP Steering
Committee.
Anthony told the Council,
“We can do more in our
forests to reduce the threat
of forest fires.” That more
would include mowing, small
tree thinning, and more use of
prescribed burns in the spring
and fall.
As witnessed with this
year’s Milli Fire, wildfires are
growing larger, more destruc-
tive, and increasingly impact-
ing the health and safety of
our communities. This is a
result of unnaturally dense
forest conditions created by
100 years of fire suppression
filling the forests with ready-
to-burn fuels. Coupled with
a warming, drying climate,
these are perfect conditions
for extreme wildfires and
dangerous smoke that threat-
ens residents’ well-being,
way of life, and future.
“This was the most
depressive smoke conditions
I’ve experienced,” Anthony
said of the Milli Fire. “I felt
like a prisoner in my home.”
Anthony would prefer to
see “the intrusion of smoke
at lower intensity for three
or four days” with prescribed
fire as opposed to weeks of
intense smoke conditions
from a significant wildfire.
Compared to the ramifica-
tions of wildfire, according
to DCFP, prescribed burning
is a smarter, safer, and more
affordable way to reintroduce
the kind of “good fire” to the
forests that will keep them
healthy and reduce the risk
of wildfire to surrounding
communities.
Collaborative group
seeks forest restoration
By Sue Stafford
Correspondent
T h e D e s c h u t e s
Collaborative Forest Project
(DCFP) is a Central Oregon
community organiza-
tion established in 2010 to
restore the local forests to
a healthier, more resilient
condition through balanced,
science-driven restoration
projects.
This volunteer stake-
holder group represents a
wide set of views and values
and is one of 23 landscape
restoration demonstration
projects established by
Congress.
The DCFP committee
includes experts on for-
ests, watersheds, wildlife,
fire safety, timber, natural
resource policy, recreation
and tourism, local govern-
ment, and conservation.
They are environmental-
ists, businesspeople, pro-
fessional foresters, research
scientists, loggers, outdoors
lovers, private landown-
ers, elected officials, tribal
members, and governmental
policymakers.
Fires are a natural
part of the eastside forest
ecosystem. Prior to the years
of intensive fire suppression,
natural, low-intensity fires
burning every five to 25
years kept mid- and lower-
elevation forests healthy for
millennia.
Research has shown that
thinning, followed by con-
trolled burns, is the most
effective tool available to
reduce the intensity and
severity of future wildfires.
Without changes to the
Oregon Smoke Management
Plan, at the current pace, it
will take more than 25 years
of prescribed fires just to
catch up.
Prescribed burns, con-
ducted mainly in the spring
and fall, are carefully
planned and implemented
under prescribed conditions
of temperature, wind, and
humidity. They are managed
to be safely controlled and to
minimize the likelihood that
smoke will blow into nearby
communities. Wildfires can
be catastrophic and release
large amounts of smoke
and particulates into the air.
Smoke from wildfires has
the potential to be exponen-
tially worse than from pre-
scribed burns.
