It is imperative that land managers involved in the post-fire treatment of these forests be enabled to take both an immediate and a long-term view in developing and implementing post-fire treatments. A catastrophic fire isn’t the end, but a new stage of fire risk. The buildup of fuels adjacent to our communities will remain for decades and the next fire will undoubtedly be worse in all respects. The Fire Safe Council’s resolve is to protect our volunteer firefighters, our communities and our valuable natural resources.

The Fire Safe Council wants to ensure that the vitally needed salvage and non-merchantable fuel removals in the areas of these previous major wildland fires be implemented quickly. If we, and the federal agencies responsible for these lands, are not successful in removing the threats posed by the extremely heavy dead and downed fuels left in the aftermath of these fires, the residents of Trinity County face a much greater threat for decades to come. Residential subdivisions affected by fire have been rebuilt in the past and will be rebuilt in the future. Unfortunately, people believe that since these areas have suffered a wildfire already, they are “fire proofed”. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, without substantive action to salvage fire-damaged timber and subsidize the removal of non-merchantable, fire-damaged materials, these areas will be facing much greater fire danger in the future.

Salvage and restoration activities must begin as soon as possible to ensure the useable material is utilized and not wasted. The value of the material could substantially offset the cost of restoration activities and provide a valuable and much needed resource to local, wood-product businesses. However, rehabilitation costs are often far more than are available through salvage receipts or appropriated funding. If these burned areas are to be cleaned up and then maintained in a fire safe condition, more funding must be provided that gets to the ground and on a consistent long-term basis.

The Trinity County Fire Safe Council recently sent a letter to several elected representatives in Washington to ask for their help. This letter pointed out that four years of National Fire Plan funding has made it clear that the available funds getting to the ground after filtering through the bureaucratic process are woefully inadequate to address the needs in these fire prone forests.

This letter stated that we need their assistance to require the responsible agencies to work together immediately after a fire to develop salvage and rehabilitation plans consistent with applicable laws, regulations and plan guidelines. This will allow more of the value in the salvage to be captured before the trees begin to rot.

The Fire Safe Council requested our representatives help to achieve the following:

• Enable agencies to take an immediate and a long-term view in developing and implementing post-fire treatments.
   
• Ensure that vitally needed salvage and non-merchantable fuel removals in the areas of major wildland fires be implemented quickly.
   
• Re-forestation programs need to provide management that includes fuel reduction and maintenance until we have fire-resistant forests.
   
• All salvage needs to be linked to the best possible level of rehabilitation of the landscape.
   
• More funding must be provided and it must get to the projects on the ground consistently and on over the long-term.
   
• Agencies must be adequately staffed with qualified people to accomplish the goal of implementing post-fire salvage and comprehensive, long-term forest and watershed rehabilitation.