Improve Forest Health and Biomass Utilization

Why is this Important?

Oregon should be treating 500, 000 acres of federal forests per year over the next 20 years to improve forest health, increase fire resiliency, and help prevent catastrophic fires.  This would create thousands of jobs by supplying a reliable source of raw material for Oregon’s remaining saw mills and the fledgling biomass industry.

Key Initiatives

Manage Oregon’s public forests to restore ecosystem health, protect society from wildfire, improve rural economic vitality, and increase utilization of biomass energy.

• Accelerate the scale and pace of NEPA planning in dry national forests in eastern and southern Oregon so that forest management activity can occur to restore ecosystem health, protect from wildfire, and revitalize rural economies
• Support state and federal leaders’ efforts to resolve the Oregon & California Lands issue to increase active management, restore sustainable timber harvest, and revitalize rural economies
• Protect rural jobs and communities by increasing the state’s wildfire initial attack capacity, addressing the affordability of protecting lower-productivity eastside lands; and phasing in a public-private funding partnership for large fires
• Engage with state agencies identified in the Governor’s Executive Order No. 12-16 to promote wood products as a green building material, encourage innovative use of wood products and increase markets for Oregon wood products
• Implement the recommendations of the state’s new Forest Biomass Strategy and continue state and federal support to develop Oregon’s biomass industry
• Promote sustainable harvests from state forests, especially in depressed coastal communities