Lawmakers vent to feds, assert forest fire inaction

Dozens of Utah communities and thousands of state residents are a "spark away" from the danger of catastrophic wildfires, restrained in reducing their risk by federal agencies that aren't managing forests. That charge — repeated multiple times in a legislative committee discussion Wednesday — underscored the plea made by lawmakers that the Bureau of Land Management and the U.S. Forest Service step up oversight of the land the entities control in Utah. "If you are going to be the landowner, the landlord, we look to you to for the responsibility in taking the lead," said Rep. Roger Barrus, R-Centerville. On wildfires, the tone was one of frustration, especially from lawmakers such as Rep. Mike Noel, R-Kanab, who said entire landscapes are devastated because local entities are barred from responding. "It is stupidity," Noel said, describing a decision that kept bulldozers in Iron and Kane counties at bay from extinguishing a wildfire over fear of the machines' impacts to the watershed. "You burn a whole stinking forest down, you are not going to have a watershed," he said. Rep. Jerry Anderson, R-Price, described impacts that continue to unfold from the 2012 Seeley that took out a blue ribbon fishery in Emery County's Huntington Creek and vanquished in an entire watershed. Flooding last month helped along from the wildfire's burn scar displaced 45 families, he added. "There were resources available in the air less than 15 minutes away that could have put that (wildfire) out immediately," Anderson said. "Instead, we went on and caused millions of dollars of damage and even some deaths. … That is what happens when things like that go on and we don’t get the cooperation and the response that is needed."...more