CRS Report: 'Wildfire Management Funding - FY2021 Appropriations'

Nice CRS InFocus two-pager (29 October 2020) by Katie Hoover: Wildfire Management Funding - FY2021 Appropriations'.

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Introduction
The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Forest Service (FS) and the Department of the Interior (DOI) are responsible for wildfire response and management across the federal lands within their respective jurisdictions. Both FS and DOI generally receive annual discretionary appropriations for wildfire management activities through the Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies appropriations bills. Wildfire management funding for DOI is provided to the department-level Office of Wildland Fire.

Wildfire management appropriations fluctuate annually but began to increase in the late 1990s and rose markedly after FY2000 (see Figure 1). A significant portion of the annual fluctuations and overall increase in funding is related to fire suppression costs, which vary considerably and may be high even during years of relatively mild wildfire activity. For more information, see CRS Report R46583, Federal Wildfire Management: Ten-Year Funding Trends and Issues (FY2011-FY2020).

For FY2020, Congress appropriated a total of $6.105 billion in discretionary appropriations for wildfire purposes for FS and DOI (see Table 1). This amount included $3.848 billion in regular funding (P.L. 116-94); $7.0 million in emergency supplemental funding to address issues related to the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic (P.L. 116-136); and $2.250 billion pursuant to the wildfire adjustment (P.L. 116-94), discussed below.

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Comments

[EJ Hanford]

Escalating fire suppression costs may just be part of the problem....rather than a "solution" to wildfires.
Many areas, especially in California, that used to burn naturally about every decade prior to human intervention, now become raging infernos about once a century.