Zinke takes forestry fight to fire-ravaged California
Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke is seizing on California’s wildfires to promote a policy long-supported by Republicans — that fires could be stopped if forests were logged.
The former Montana congressman is poised to push the benefits of what’s known as forest management at an event with Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue in California on Monday next to the state's largest forest fire in history.
Yet it's not just the blaze that makes the trip important for Zinke and Perdue.
Galvanized by President Trump's recent tweets on the issue and a looming farm bill vote in the House that carries a number of amendments that could open up logging, the new push is also a golden political opportunity, one that environmentalists are calling foul on.
Interior representatives said Zinke’s recent tweets and planned visit to Redding, Calif., do not mark a new effort by the agency to preach forest management, saying it’s a message Zinke has been promoting for years.
“It's really not a ‘renewed’ push,” said Interior spokeswoman Heather Swift. “He is constantly thinking about wildfire and the next wildfire season and what we can do to prevent loss of life, property and resources.”
Zinke signed a secretarial order in September 2017 “to adopt more aggressive practices, using the full authority of the Department, to prevent and combat the spread of catastrophic wildfires through robust fuels reduction and pre-suppression techniques.”
More recently, in May, Zinke released a joint memorandum with Perdue, whose agency oversees the U.S. Forest Service, promoting increased collaboration between the two departments.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/401355-zinke-takes-forest-fight-to-fire-ravaged-california?userid=229233
So if there were any forests they wouldn't burn down. That boy's a fucking genius.
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