bloodfist t1_it3497b wrote on October 20, 2022 at 4:14 PM

Reply to comment by wolf1moon in YOU SHOULD KNOW: While the smoke has been very bad, Washington’s 2022 fire season has been the mildest in a decade by ClimateChangeC

>we learned and fixed it.

No, we really didn't. We still don't do controlled burns, and we barely do any fuel reduction compared to what we should. You're absolutely right about those other factors, and climate change being the root of them. But we haven't fixed shit.

wolf1moon t1_it4o1uu wrote on October 20, 2022 at 10:19 PM

Ah, my bad, California has been doing them but we only restarted recently (there's a website with the burns listed https://www.dnr.wa.gov/prescribedfire). For California, article https://arstechnica.com/science/2020/01/why-isnt-california-using-more-prescribed-burns-to-reduce-fire-risk/

bloodfist t1_it4vho1 wrote on October 20, 2022 at 11:15 PM

Thanks for that link. I knew we'd restarted it, but hadn't seen that list of upcoming burns.

FYI that's for state-managed lands, federal is it's own program, and private is anyone's guess but the state assists usually.

The thing I've seen from CA and federal is that while there's a lot of good intentions at first, they often get canceled, cut short, underfunded, and/or underplanned. It ends up barely making a dent, and as soon as one gets out control - something we have to assume will happen sometimes, especially with poor planning and staffing - the next several get delayed indefinitely. It looks really bad for politicians to have a fire they "started" get out of control.

I don't want to badmouth WA's program because I don't know and it's still relatively young. It's a step in the right direction at least. But until I see some real successes I still hesitate to say we fixed anything. We're starting to try, but we probably need at least a decade of good successful prescribed burning to even come close to "fixed".

wolf1moon t1_it4ye8m wrote on October 20, 2022 at 11:37 PM

If there's one thing I agree with local conservatives on, it's that the feds have no clue when it comes to our lands. I don't want them to stop being reserves, but man I wish they were under western control. I don't trust a New Yorker or Floridian to govern our land.

bloodfist t1_it50h4o wrote on October 20, 2022 at 11:53 PM

Eh, it doesn't really work that way. My dad worked for the BLM for almost 30 years and I was on a wildland crew for them for a few years too. There are definitely high-level decisions coming from Washington but most of the people making day-to-day decisions are locals who really love that land.

It made me a big believer in our public lands, and I just don't know that I trust most states to do much better. Here, probably and a few others, but state land where I worked was a mess.

Not to say that federal agencies are doing a good job, but change happens slower at that level so it's a lot harder for a few corrupt individuals to open up mining, allow ATV use, sell off parcels, etc. The last administration did a lot of damage but it could be so much worse.

But it's definitely an interesting thing to consider. I'm happy with whoever makes sure we have trees in 100 years.