According to a press release from the Grant County Sheriff’s Office, a controlled burn “escaped” Malheur National Forest lands north of Seneca, Oregon, before burning about 20 acres of a nearby ranch. Officers arrested the burn boss, the person in charge of planning, organizing and executing the operation, for what they deemed “reckless burning.”
The Grassroots Wildland Firefighters, a nonprofit supporting federal wildland firefighters, wrote on Twitter the reported arrest had “enormous” implications. Some fear it might scare people away from seeking out the qualifications necessary to becoming a burn boss, or from putting those qualifications to use — resulting in less prescribed fire.
Others say the incident shouldn’t hurt burning regionally. “It’s an isolated example, and I would not anticipate that it would have a big impact on work that’s going on across the West,” said Lenya Quinn-Davidson, a fire advisor with the University of California Cooperative Extension and the director of the Northern California Prescribed Fire Council.
And let's not forget the 2 members of the Hammond family went to prison for their own prescribed burn.
3 comments:
Some of us have not forgotten the treatment of the Hammond family by the US Department of Interior.
Maybe this FS character will be allowed to upgrade to the Hammond cell.
Interesting case here but silly to bring the Hammonds into it, the situations are not remotely similar.
" the situations are not remotely similar."
its the principle of the thing
A rancher starts a burn on private property which ends up on federal property, and goes tp prison. Even tried as a terrorist to get the mandatory minimum.
The feds start a burn on federal property which escapes to private property. And then? I don't believe it is "silly" to compare the two events in the sense that I have described it.
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