Wildfire Bill Moves to Senate Pt 1

I'm Bob Larson. 'Active management leads to healthier forests. It's that simple!' That's the message from Representative Dan Newhouse last week before passage of the 'Resilient Federal Forests Act of 2017.' The bipartisan bill he cosponsored addresses making the process of fighting the catastrophic wildfires experienced in recent years more efficient ...

DAN NEWHOUSE ... "It includes things like expediting the process to get permits to do management projects on National Forest lands, which will be a big help because we have a backlog, a tremendous backlog, of work that needs to be done all over the west."

The Sunnyside Republican says it would eliminate or lessen a lot of legal barriers ...

DAN NEWHOUSE ... "It also changes some of the, some of the things as it relates to challenges, legal challenges to these projects. It puts in place an arbitration process where challenging parties can't just say no, they don't want a project to move forward or they don't want a tree to be cut. They actually have to come forward with an alternative proposal. So, we don't just stop these things dead in their tracks, that we can actually get some of this needed management work done."

Newhouse says the growing wildfire problem we've experienced in recent years needs to be addressed and this bill would a step in the right direction.

Listen tomorrow for more on House Resolution 2936 and how it could free up more federal dollars to help improve forest management projects to make them less susceptible, and for firefighting efforts.