[Congressional Bills 118th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[S. 4424 Introduced in Senate (IS)]
<DOC>
118th CONGRESS
2d Session
S. 4424
To direct the Secretary of the Interior and the Secretary of
Agriculture to encourage and expand the use of prescribed fire on land
managed by the Department of the Interior or the Forest Service, with
an emphasis on units of the National Forest System in the western
United States, to acknowledge and support the long-standing use of
cultural burning by Tribes and Indigenous practitioners, and for other
purposes.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES
May 23, 2024
Mr. Wyden (for himself and Mr. Padilla) introduced the following bill;
which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Energy and
Natural Resources
_______________________________________________________________________
A BILL
To direct the Secretary of the Interior and the Secretary of
Agriculture to encourage and expand the use of prescribed fire on land
managed by the Department of the Interior or the Forest Service, with
an emphasis on units of the National Forest System in the western
United States, to acknowledge and support the long-standing use of
cultural burning by Tribes and Indigenous practitioners, and for other
purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the
United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE; TABLE OF CONTENTS.
(a) Short Title.--This Act may be cited as the ``National
Prescribed Fire Act of 2024''.
(b) Table of Contents.--The table of contents for this Act is as
follows:
Sec. 1. Short title; table of contents.
Sec. 2. Findings.
Sec. 3. Definitions.
TITLE I--USE OF FUNDS
Sec. 101. Prescribed fire accounts.
Sec. 102. Policies and practices.
Sec. 103. Collaborative prescribed fire program.
TITLE II--FACILITATING IMPLEMENTATION AND OUTREACH
Sec. 201. Cooperative agreements and contracts.
Sec. 202. Human resources.
Sec. 203. Liability of certified prescribed fire managers.
Sec. 204. Prescribed fire claims fund study.
Sec. 205. Environmental review.
Sec. 206. Prescribed fire education program.
TITLE III--REPORTING
Sec. 301. Annual reports to the National Fire Planning and Operations
Database.
Sec. 302. Annual implementation report.
SEC. 2. FINDINGS.
Congress finds that--
(1) in 2018, the Forest Service Fire Modeling Institute
determined that 63,070,000 acres of National Forest System land
and 171,200,000 acres of other forest land were at high or very
high risk of experiencing a wildfire that would be difficult to
suppress;
(2) according to the National Interagency Coordination
Center, between 2010 and 2019, in the United States, on
average--
(A) 64,000 wildfires burned 6,847,000 acres
annually; and
(B) 100,000 prescribed fires burned only 3,672,000
acres annually;
(3) indigenous communities have used cultural burning to
manage landscapes since time immemorial;
(4) according to the National Interagency Coordination
Center, the annual cost of suppressing wildfires in a State
with an active prescribed burning program is less than 1
percent of the annual cost of suppressing wildfires in a State
without an active prescribed burning program, despite each
State having the same number of wildfires;
(5) according to a 2021 Environmental Protection Agency
report assessing the air quality and health impacts of
prescribed fire compared to wildfire, smoke impacts from
prescribed fire were found to be smaller in magnitude and
shorter in duration;
(6) according to a 2019 study conducted by Stanford
University, smoke from prescribed fires exposes children to
fewer negative health effects than the detrimental smoke
generated by wildfires;
(7) according to a 2015 study published in Ecology, trees
that have not been burnt by a low-intensity fire are unusually
prone to bark beetle attacks, and between 2000 and 2010, bark
beetles killed the majority of trees on 32,000,000 acres of the
193,000,000 acres of National Forest System land;
(8) as of March 1, 2023, there were--
(A) 38 prescribed fire councils in 34 States; and
(B) 113 prescribed burn associations in 19 States;
(9) according to the 2021 National Prescribed Fire Use
Survey Report--
(A) 41 States regulate prescribed fires by issuing
burn permits;
(B) 23 States offer prescribed burn manager
certification courses to facilitate responsible burning
on private land;
(C) only 5 States (Vermont, Massachusetts,
Missouri, Connecticut, and Rhode Island) lack laws to
reduce liability associated with the responsible use of
prescribed fire; and
(D) only 8 States (Florida, Montana, Nevada,
Colorado, Michigan, Georgia, South Carolina, and
Washington) have laws that use a standard of gross
negligence for determining liabilities for the
responsible use of prescribed fire; and
(10) as of September 30, 2019, 31 States have a formal
process to track the number of acres treated for forestry
purposes using prescribed fire.
SEC. 3. DEFINITIONS.
In this Act:
(1) Federal land.--The term ``Federal land'' means--
(A) public lands (as defined in section 103 of the
Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976 (43
U.S.C. 1702));
(B) units of the National Park System;
(C) units of the National Wildlife Refuge System;
(D) land held in trust by the United States for the
benefit of Indian Tribes or members of an Indian Tribe;
and
(E) National Forest System land.
(2) Landscape-scale prescribed fire plan.--The term
``landscape-scale prescribed fire plan'' means a decision
document prepared pursuant to the National Environmental Policy
Act of 1969 (42 U.S.C. 4321 et seq.) that--
(A) covers a unit of the National Forest System, a
Bureau of Land Management district, or a subunit
thereof;
(B) analyzes the site-specific environmental
consequences of prescribed fire on the land described
in subparagraph (A); and
(C) obviates the need for subsequent decisions
pursuant to the National Environmental Policy Act of
1969 (42 U.S.C. 4321 et seq.) with respect to the unit,
district, or subunit described in subparagraph (A).
(3) National forest system.--
(A) In general.--The term ``National Forest
System'' has the meaning given the term in section
11(a) of the Forest and Rangeland Renewable Resources
Planning Act of 1974 (16 U.S.C. 1609(a)).
(B) Exclusion.--The term ``National Forest System''
does not include the national grasslands and land
utilization projects administered under title III of
the Bankhead-Jones Farm Tenant Act (7 U.S.C. 1010 et
seq.).
(4) Prescribed fire.--The term ``prescribed fire'' means a
fire deliberately ignited to burn wildland fuels in a natural
or modified state--
(A) under specified environmental conditions that
are intended to allow the fire to be confined to a
predetermined area and produce the fireline intensity
and rate of spread required to attain planned resource
management objectives;
(B) that does not include pile burning; and
(C) in accordance with applicable law, including
applicable regulations.
(5) Secretaries.--The term ``Secretaries'' means--
(A) the Secretary; and
(B) the Secretary of Agriculture.
(6) Secretary.--The term ``Secretary'' means the Secretary
of the Interior.
TITLE I--USE OF FUNDS
SEC. 101. PRESCRIBED FIRE ACCOUNTS.
(a) Definition of Secretary Concerned.--In this section, the term
``Secretary concerned'' means--
(1) the Secretary of Agriculture, with respect to an
account established by this section for the Department of
Agriculture; and
(2) the Secretary, with respect to an account established
by this section for the Department of the Interior.
(b) Establishment of Accounts.--There are established in the
Treasury of the United States the following accounts:
(1) The Prescribed Fire account for the Department of
Agriculture.
(2) The Prescribed Fire account for the Department of the
Interior.
(c) Authorization of Appropriations.--There is authorized to be
appropriated to the accounts established by subsection (b) a total of
$300,000,000 for fiscal year 2024 and each fiscal year thereafter.
(d) Presidential Budget Requests.--For fiscal year 2024 and each
fiscal year thereafter, each Secretary concerned shall submit, in the
budget justification materials submitted to Congress in support of the
budget of the relevant Department for each fiscal year (as submitted
with the budget of the President under section 1105(a) of title 31,
United States Code)--
(1) a request for amounts in the Wildland Fire Management
appropriation account of the Secretary concerned to carry out
the activities described in subsection (e); and
(2) an accounting of costs with respect to prescribed fire,
by region of the National Forest System or the Department of
the Interior, as applicable, for the previous 3 years,
including--
(A) the amount spent on prescribed fire;
(B) the number of acres treated with prescribed
fire; and
(C) the number of personnel dedicated to carrying
out prescribed fire.
(e) Use of Funds.--
(1) Mandatory activities.--The Secretary concerned shall
use amounts in the accounts established by subsection (b)--
(A) to develop, in coordination with State, local,
and Tribal governments, a prescribed fire operational
strategy for each region of the National Forest System
or the Department of the Interior, as applicable,
specifically for using funding provided through the
Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (Public Law 117-
58; 135 Stat. 429) and other additional sources of
funding, that describes--
(i) the fire deficit by region;
(ii) staffing and funding needs;
(iii) plans to apply prescribed fire; and
(iv) regional targets to demonstrate an
increase in prescribed fire with respect to--
(I) existing programs; and
(II) activities carried out using
additional funding sources;
(B) with respect to prescribed fires--
(i) to carry out necessary environmental
reviews;
(ii) to conduct outreach to the public,
Indian Tribes and beneficiaries, and adjacent
landowners;
(iii) to conduct any required pre-ignition
cultural and environmental surveys; and
(iv) to implement prescribed fires on
Federal land;
(C) to hire additional, dedicated personnel and
procure additional equipment, including unmanned aerial
systems equipped with an aerial ignition system, to
implement a greater number of prescribed fires;
(D) to fund an increase in staffing (including in-
person and hybrid staff) in order to provide training
for the implementation of prescribed fire and
management of smoke;
(E) to conduct post-prescribed fire activities,
such as--
(i) reseeding to prevent the spread of
invasive species; and
(ii) recurring application of fire to
maintain desired conditions;
(F) to conduct monitoring for safety and fire
effects on ecosystem resilience and risk mitigation;
and
(G) to use key performance indicators, including--
(i) the annual number of acres of National
Forest System land or public lands, as
applicable, where completed treatment
effectively mitigates wildfire risk or
maintains or restores ecological integrity with
respect to--
(I) land in the wildland-urban
interface; and
(II) land not in the wildland-urban
interface;
(ii) the number of acres in a desired
condition as a result of fire management
objectives, as determined by the Secretary
concerned;
(iii) the number of acres treated with
prescribed fire and the quantity of emissions
from prescribed fires;
(iv) the number of acres where treatment
results in changes in fire regime condition
class; and
(v) the number of burns conducted by Indian
Tribes or Indigenous-led organizations or
pursuant to an agreement with an Indian Tribe
or Indigenous-led organization.
(2) Joint coordination.--The Secretaries shall coordinate
to jointly develop a common data management and analysis system
for planning and post-treatment accountability.
(3) Authorized activities.--The Secretary concerned may--
(A) assist State, Tribal, local government, or
private prescribed fire programs--
(i) to establish a training or
certification program for teams comprised of
citizens or local fire services to conduct
prescribed fires on private land, consistent
with any standards developed by the National
Wildfire Coordinating Group or State prescribed
fire standards;
(ii) to enable additional fire managers and
apparatus, whether provided by the local
resources of an agency, private contractors,
nongovernmental organizations, Indian Tribes,
local fire services, or qualified individuals,
to assist in implementing a prescribed fire;
(iii) in funding the completion of the
claims funds study under section 204; or
(iv) to finance the implementation of a
prescribed fire on State, Tribal, or private
land and any post-prescribed fire activities as
are determined to be necessary by the Secretary
concerned;
(B) provide technical or financial assistance to a
prescribed fire council or prescribed burn association
for the establishment or operation of the council or
association; and
(C) provide funding for the collaborative
prescribed fire program established under section 103.
(f) Prioritization of Funding.--
(1) In general.--Subject to paragraph (2), the Secretary
concerned shall coordinate with Federal, State, and local
agencies, Indian Tribes, and nongovernmental organizations,
including through the Wildland Fire Leadership Council, to
establish prioritization criteria for expending funds under
this section for each activity described in subsection (e).
(2) Requirement.--In establishing criteria under paragraph
(1), the Secretary concerned shall give priority to a project
that is--
(A) implemented across a large contiguous area;
(B) cross-boundary in nature;
(C) in an area that is--
(i) threatening to, or located in, the
wildland-urban interface and identified as a
priority area in a statewide forest resource
assessment or Community Wildfire Protection
Plan; or
(ii) identified as important to the
protection of a Tribal trust resource or the
reserved or treaty rights of an Indian Tribe;
(D) on acres at high or very high risk of
experiencing a wildfire that would be difficult to
suppress;
(E) in an area that is designated as critical
habitat and in need of ecological restoration or
enhancement that can be achieved with the aid of
prescribed fire; or
(F) supportive of potential operational
delineations or a strategic response zone.
SEC. 102. POLICIES AND PRACTICES.
Beginning with the first fiscal year that begins after the date of
enactment of this Act, and for each of the 9 fiscal years thereafter,
the Secretaries shall conduct prescribed fires on Federal land such
that the total number and combined size of all prescribed fires on
Federal land is 10 percent greater than the total number and combined
size of all prescribed fires on Federal land in the preceding fiscal
year.
SEC. 103. COLLABORATIVE PRESCRIBED FIRE PROGRAM.
(a) In General.--The Secretary shall establish within the
De