Opinion
4A
Tuesday, Aug. 11, 2020
Our View
More
imaginary
transparency
from state
government
S
everal dozen legislators and the governor’s
staff meet routinely by phone to discuss
policy about COVID-19. On Tuesday, Aug.
4, they apparently discussed a policy with serious
consequences for Oregonians: travel restrictions.
We’d like to tell you more.
How would it work?
Who could not go where?
Would it just be tourist travel to Oregon from
some parts of the country?
How would those areas be decided?
How would it be enforced?
Will state police be rounding tourists up
and dumping them off at Oregon’s border or
insisting on quarantine for two weeks?
We’d like to know more. We are sure Ore-
gonians would like to know more. The Ore-
gonian tried to figure it out. But these reg-
ular meetings about COVID-19 policy are held
behind closed doors. The public is not able to
hear what is being discussed. And that means
Gov. Kate Brown and legislators are working
together to remove the public from deci-
sion-making about COVID-19.
OK, this is an extraordinary time. Brown has
astonishingly difficult emergency choices to
make about public health, schools, the economy
and more. The governor and lawmakers need to
be able to hold such discussions.
But the pandemic has been going on for
months. All signs indicate it is going to con-
tinue to go on for many more. And is state
government going to continue making these
important policy decisions without allowing
the public to hear these discussions, even when
several dozen legislators gather? Is your leg-
islator doing a good job of representing your
interests in these discussions? Are they asking
good questions? Is your legislator even showing
up?
There is no easy way to know.
No one tracks attendance at the meetings.
The governor’s office told the EO Media Group
it does not keep minutes. Charles Boyle, a
spokesman for the governor’s office, wrote
there is generally no agenda or written meeting
materials because these are on a conference
call. Sometimes the governor’s office sends
emails to legislators about the meetings to flag
topics for discussion.
The Observer’s related newspaper, The Bul-
letin, made a public records request for the doc-
uments associated with the meetings. Will the
state keep those details from the public?
The public can’t effectively participate in
its own government if that government is not
allowing the public to hear discussions about
policy matters.
Government transparency and accountability
is imaginary without it.
Write us a letter to the editor telling Brown
what you think. Letters can be up to 350 words.
Send them to pwright@lagrandeobserver.com.
Maybe Gov. Brown’s office will stop providing
excuses and start providing the public with
answers about what our government is doing.
Other Views
Low fuel levels key to wildfi re management
WES MELO
COMMUNITIES FOR
HEALTHY FORESTS
ire is the rapid oxidation of
burnable materials in a chem-
ical process requiring oxygen,
heat, fuel, and a source of ignition.
Fuels are the only practical com-
ponent that can be controlled in wild-
lands since oxygen and heat are
uncontrollable in open settings. In
order to minimize the negative envi-
ronmental effects of wildfi re, avail-
able fuels must be kept to a reason-
able level so that when fi re occurs, the
intensity and potential destruction of
fi re is minimized.
Major factors infl uencing fi re
behavior include weather condi-
tions, such as temperature, wind and
humidity, and the volume, dryness
and combustibility of fuels and the
terrain. Once a fi re has ignited, dan-
gerous fi re behavior can result from
excessive fuel loads and weather
conditions, making fi re suppression
extremely treacherous and in some
situations impossible.
While humans cause most wild-
fi res, the vast majority of wildfi re
acres burned are because of light-
ning striking combustible material.
Once fi re ignites it will continue to
burn as long as fuel, oxygen and heat
are suffi cient to continue the com-
bustion process. A fi re can quickly
be spread by wind and thermals car-
rying burning embers to other com-
bustible sources far beyond the
fl ames.
In natural settings, fi res continue
F
to burn until they reach areas where
there are insuffi cient fuels for them to
continue. Rain and/or cold tempera-
tures also reduce the heat necessary
to continue combustion.
Native tribes used fi re extensively
to maintain open lands for access,
hunting and rejuvenation of plants.
Their actions augmented natural
fi re’s cleansing so when early set-
tlers arrived, the forests were gener-
ally open and healthy. Fire’s action in
reducing fuel loads was interrupted
by human fi re suppression many
years ago, resulting in a buildup of
fuels and more severe fi res.
Since human action interrupted
fi re’s natural action of reducing fuel
loads, we as a society have an obli-
gation to manage our lands and the
fuels that create catastrophic fi re in
order to minimize potential severe
fi re damage.
With the huge buildup of fuels in
our forests today there is great con-
cern regarding the destruction of lives
and property, as evidenced by recent
severe fi res throughout our western
states. Wildfi res kill wildlife, harm
fi sh and water quality and, in some
cases, actually can change the ecology
of the burned area. Wildfi res endanger
the safety and lives of fi refi ghters and
civilians. Smoke especially is an issue
for those with respiratory problems.
Effective forest management
should focus on maintaining low
levels of fuels so that once a wildfi re
has ignited, it can be controlled and
damage minimized. A major obstacle
to effective forest management is the
multitude of complex and sometimes
confl icting regulations that must be
followed.
Federal land management agen-
cies are especially hindered with
the complex requirements of var-
ious laws and regulations, which in
many cases require multiple years to
complete prior to any actual on-the-
ground activity.
The result of requiring months
and even years of offi ce work ends
up limiting signifi cant on-the-ground
activity.
Addressing the excessive fuels
problem and allowing for proactive
forest management will require con-
gressional representatives making
essential changes to the current reg-
ulatory situation and land man-
agers effectively managing for fuels
control.
Costs for wildland fi re suppres-
sion continue to escalate each year
while there is little, if any, effort to
control the excessive fuels situa-
tion. Until Congress takes effective
action to enable proactive manage-
ment of federal lands, the current sit-
uation in wildlands will continue to
deteriorate, further enabling severe
wildfi res that will damage air, water,
wildlife and ecosystems and escalate
the costs for fi re suppression.
About the author
Wes Melo is the vice chairman
of Communities for Healthy For-
ests, a nonprofi t founded in Rose-
burg to inform the public and policy
makers with facts supporting the
need to restore forest lands after cat-
astrophic fi res. Melo spent much of
his life fi refi ghting both wildland and
structural fi res. He is a 1966 for-
estry graduate of the University of
California-Berkeley.
Write to us
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