Fire Facts

Floor Speech

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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Westerman) for hosting this Special Order on wildfire.

Mr. Speaker, over the past decade, there has been an average of 64,100 wildfires and 6.8 million acres burned every year.

With over 10 million acres burned, we saw the highest number of Federal acres burned in 2015--and nearly that amount in 2017.

But this year, it has been even worse. 2020 has been an extremely difficult wildfire year for our firefighters, our responders, and many rural communities in and near the forests.

As of today, October 1, over 44,000 wildfires have burned nearly 7.7 million acres this year alone.

In addition to the destruction of these forests, homes, and property, we sadly continue to see lost lives.

Over the past 25 years, active management has plummeted across the national forest system; consequently, it is no coincidence that the larger, more intense fires are happening on Federal lands, where there is less management, versus State and private lands.

More individual fires occur in the East, but the wildfires in the West are larger and burn more acres. Wildfires also have significant impacts on eastern forests because of the budgetary effects on the Forest Service's ability to manage and personnel.

We must be encouraging more active forest management across the National Forest system. This includes thinning, prescribed fires, and hazardous fuels reduction, especially in the roughly 19 million acres of Federal lands that are already known to be at high risk.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague, Mr. Westerman, for his great work during the last farm bill and his leadership with the Resilient Federal Forests Act and the Trillion Trees Act.

Through the next farm bill, I am hopeful that we can continue to build on those commonsense reforms, and we will provide more authorities to help the Forest Service better manage and encourage more partnerships.

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