A8
OREGON
East Oregonian
Saturday, June 18, 2022
Critics fear restrictions with new wildfi re map
By MATEUSZ
PERKOWSKI
Capital Press
SA LEM — Oregon
forestry offi cials are bracing
for controversy after approv-
ing statewide hazard ratings
that encompass up to 300,000
properties with elevated risk
of wildfi res.
Many of those tracts are
expected to face new defen-
sible space and building code
requirements under “wild-
land-urban interface” crite-
ria recently enacted by the
Oregon Board of Forestry.
Critics anticipate the two
regulatory actions will result
in sweeping and unworkable
restrictions for rural commu-
nities when a map of aff ected
areas is released later this
month.
Blowback from rural
residents against the new
requirements is expected by
the state forestry offi cials due
to objections they’ve encoun-
tered during the rule-making
process.
“We have to recognize
there will be people and orga-
nizations that will continue to
push against this and attempt
to embarrass the department
and related agencies,” said
Jim Kelly, the board’s chair,
during a recent meeting. “It
will enter into the governor’s
race and all that. I think we
all need to be prepared.”
The Oregon Department
of Forestry received roughly
twice as many comments
opposed to the mapping
regime than in favor of
it, mostly because people
thought the wildland-urban
interface was too expansive,
said Tim Holschbach, the
agency’s fi re prevention and
policy manager.
The agency will send out
written notices to 250,000-
300,000 landowners aff ected
by the rules. They can appeal
their classifi cations if they’re
subject to regulation, he said.
Periodic audits will review
the eff ectiveness of the rules,
which can continue to be
modifi ed.
As the rollout of the wild-
fi re map gets underway, ODF
realizes it will be in a “fi sh
bowl” of public scrutiny
and it expects that revisions
will be necessary, said Mike
Shaw, the agency’s fi re chief.
“The agency’s work is
“national best practices.”
However, the Far m
Bureau and other critics
believe the board’s WUI
criteria are nonetheless
overly broad. The vast acre-
age likely included in the
designation will leave people
“shocked,” said Lauren
Smith, the group’s director
of government and national
aff airs.
“Our legislators will be
very surprised when they
start getting constituent
calls,” she said. “When you
get a WUI that is nearly the
size of the State of Oregon, it
sort of defeats the purpose.”
Properties will be subject
to regulation only if they’re
both within the WUI and
have a hazard rating of
“high” or “extreme” wildfi re
risk.
Roughly 250,000-300,000
properties fall into the “high”
and “extreme” risk catego-
ries, but ODF doesn’t yet
have an estimate of how
many are also in the WUI.
The Farm Bureau expects
a great deal of overlap, which
will have a drastic eff ect on
rural areas, Smith said.
“You’ll see large swaths
Stayton Fire District/Contributed Photo, File
The Oregon Department of Forestry has approved map-
ping rules that critics fear will cause over-regulation of
rural properties.
not done. The work will
continue through this year.
We know we’re not going
to be perfect,” Shaw said.
“There will be adjustments
in the future. This is a great
fi rst step.”
The Oregon Farm Bureau
has worried about adverse
impacts to agriculture since
lawmakers began negotiat-
ing comprehensive wildfi re
legislation last year.
The Legislature ended
up passing Senate Bill 762,
which the Farm Bureau crit-
icized for its “top-down”
approach to wildfire miti-
gation. The group favored
a “bottom-up” strategy
of consulting with rural
communities proposed in
another bill.
To get the bill over the
fi nish line, lawmakers elim-
inated SB 762’s defi nition of
wildland-urban interface, or
WUI, and instead directed
the Board of Forestry to set
the parameters based on
of entire communities pulled
into high or extreme risk
WUI,” she said. “There’s
a lot of regulation going on
focused on this map and all
these rural communities, and
not a lot of representation by
them.”
The defensible space
regulations require fi re-prone
fuels to be cleared from
50-100 feet around certain
structures, depending on the
hazard rating.
It’s not yet clear that
cultivated cropland will be
excluded from that require-
ment, with the matter
currently being considered
by Gov. Kate Brown’s Wild-
fi re Council, Smith said. It’s
also unknown whether the
requirement will apply to
rural facilities, such as small
hydroelectric plants.
“Nobody has been able to
answer those questions,” she
said.
The State Fire Marshal’s
Offi ce has exempted agricul-
tural buildings uninhabited
by people from the defensi-
ble space rules for vegeta-
tive fuels, though the Farm
Bureau fears that could
change under new leadership.
May unemployment dropped to 3.6%
By PETER WONG
Oregon Capital Bureau
SALEM — The addition
of 6,200 jobs in May drove
Oregon’s unemployment rate
down a notch from 3.7% to
3.6%, matching the national
average.
The Oregon Employ-
ment Department, which
released its monthly report
on Wednesday, also said that
Oregon’s labor force partic-
ipation during May grew to
63.5%. The national aver-
age was 62.3%. Oregon has
climbed back from a low
of 59.2% in April 2020.
The participation rate is a
measure of how many people
are working or looking for
work.
Anna Johnson, a senior
economic analyst for the
department, said Oregon
has regained 90% of the jobs
lost during the pandemic,
compared with 96% nation-
wide.
“Oregon had another
month of solid job gains in
May,” she said in a video
announcement. “The labor
market is still going really
strong in Oregon.”
The May unemployment
rate is close to Oregon’s
modern record low of 3.4%,
which prevailed in each of the
four months from November
2019 through February 2020.
The rate shot up to a record
adjusted high of 13.2% at
the onset of the coronavirus
pandemic in April 2020 but
has since dropped.
Oregon recorded 2.13
million people in the labor
force in May. The gain of
6,200 from April was in line
with the average overall gain
of 6,000 during the previous
six months.
Gains during May were
recorded in leisure and hospi-
tality, 3,200 jobs; transpor-
tation, warehousing and
utilities, 1,300; wholesale
trade, 900; and manufactur-
ing, 800. Construction lost
1,000 jobs.
According to the report,
Oregon’s economy added
82,700 nonfarm jobs in the
past 12 months, a gain of
4.4%. The leisure and hospi-
tality sector grew by 17.2%
with 29,400 jobs, and private
educational services by 9.3%
with 3,000 jobs. Construc-
tion, wholesale trade, profes-
sional and business services
and manufacturing each saw
job growth around 5%.
Josh O’Connor/U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Sen. Ron Wyden asked the leaders of several federal agencies for more information on how
each will spend money on prevention and growing the wildland fi refi ghter workforce.
Firefi ghter shortage raises concerns
Offi cials say 1 in 5
wildland fi refi ghter
jobs are unfi lled
By ALEX BAUMHARDT
Oregon Capital Chronicle
WA SH I N GT ON —
Oregon faces a shortage of
wildland firefighters that
could be “a recipe for trou-
ble,” according to U.S. Sen.
Ron Wyden.
Wyden wrote to U.S.
Secretary of the Interior Deb
Haaland and U.S. Secretary
of Agriculture Tom Vilsack
recently with concerns
that their agencies weren’t
prepared to handle another
catastrophic fi re season such
as that of 2020 and 2021.
He said one out of five
wildland fi refi ghter jobs in
Oregon and Washington
stand empty, depleting the
ranks of those tasked with
containing and quelling wild-
fi res. The wildland fi refi ght-
ing program for the region is
currently staff ed at 1,840 fi re-
fi ghters, according to the U.S.
Forest Service. The agency
considers 2,281 to be fully
staff ed.
“Oregon is still struggling
to build after two back-to-
back horrifi c fi re seasons,”
Wyden wrote. He said the
federal agencies have access
to more money for wildfi re
prevention and fi ghting than
ever before with the passage
of the Infrastructure Invest-
ment and Jobs Act in Novem-
ber, which included $600
million to boost fi refi ghter
wages nationwide and $8
billion for states to mitigate
wildfi re risk.
“ You r de p a r t me nt s
received this much needed
support. Now, more than six
months after being given this
new fl exibility, we are past
time for action,” Wyden said.
He asked for an update on
how funds had been distrib-
uted so far, how funding
amounts to each region of
the country were determined
and how many acres the U.S.
Forest Service would treat
in Oregon, such as getting
rid of dead and dying debris
in federal forests. Repre-
sentatives from Wyden’s
offi ce said he has not had a
response from either Haaland
or Vilsack to his June 7 letter.
At a June 9 meeting with
“THEY DO
DESERVE
BETTER PAY,
THEY DESERVE
BETTER
BENEFITS,
THEY DESERVE
BETTER CARE
IN TERMS OF
MENTAL AND
PHYSICAL
HEALTH
CONDITIONS
OUT THERE.”
— Randy Moore, U.S. Forest
Service Chief
the U.S. Forest Service
Chief Randy Moore, Wyden
further pressed for informa-
tion on where federal money
was going, and when Oregon
would be receiving greater
federal help with wildfire
prevention, management and
fi refi ghter shortages.
About half of Oregon
belongs to the federal govern-
ment, which has so far allo-
cated $39 million to the state
to spend over fi ve years for
wildfi re prevention under the
infrastructure bill.
For wildfire preven-
tion, Moore said the Forest
Service will treat vegeta-
tion on 20 million acres of
national forests over the next
10 years, and collaborate with
other local and state agencies
and tribes to treat 30 million
more.
“Our plan is to look at
50 million acres within this
time frame in order to make a
diff erence on how that fi re is
behaving across, particularly,
the West,” he told Wyden.
On workforce shortages,
Wyden laid out the extent of
the need.
“Western states are actu-
ally trying to borrow fire-
fighters from each other,”
Wyden said to Moore. Wyden
said that fi refi ghters he spoke
with in Oregon universally
wanted better pay.
“We already see these
‘help wanted’ signs off ering
much better pay in various
other positions,” Wyden said.
“Given the billions of dollars
Congress provided in the
Bipartisan Infrastructure Act,
particularly for forestry, the
question from Oregonians is
obvious — how is the depart-
ment going to use that money
to fi x this shortage of perma-
nent wildland fi re positions?”
Since the federal infra-
structure bill was passed,
firefighters have not seen
promised wage increases,
Wyden said.
Jaelith Hall-R ivera,
deputy Forest Service chief
of state and private forestry,
said in a June 7 note updat-
ing federal fi refi ghters that
increased pay is coming in
the next few weeks. The fi re-
fi ghters will receive retroac-
tive payments for pay raises
dating to last October.
Last summer, President
Joe Biden raised entry-level
wages for federal fi refi ghters
from $13 to $15 an hour.
“They do deserve better
pay, they deserve better
benefi ts, they deserve better
care in terms of mental and
physical health conditions out
there,” Moore said.
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