State fire officials said widespread federal funding cuts have not impacted mitigation efforts ahead of what is expected to be a very active wildfire season in Arizona.
Leaders with the Department of Forestry and Fire Management joined Gov. Katie Hobbs to urge Arizonans to take common-sense precautionary measures, such as cleaning up dead vegetation around their homes and properly securing chains on their vehicles.
“Most fires are human caused, not maliciously, but just by taking these actions, we can all do our part to prevent them,” Hobbs said.
According to the Western Fire Chiefs Association, around 90% of wildfires in the U.S. are caused by people due to discarded cigarettes, unattended campfires, electrical equipment malfunctions and other human activity.
Hobbs said the department has already treated 23,000 acres of land at risk for wildfires since last July, which includes removing dry grasses and other fuels. The department expects to treat a total of 30,000 acres by the end of June.
Arizona State Forrester Tom Torres said the Department of Forestry and Fire Management is nearly fully staffed, but Arizona Fire Management Officer John Truett said there are real concerns that fires throughout the region and country draw resources away from Arizona this year.
“National resources are at a draw down right now, so we have to be very cautious on how we're going to aid our partners out west,” he said. “We need to maintain our staffing here at home.”
Fire officials in other states have said they are worried that mass federal worker firings will make it harder for states across the country to fight wildfires.
The Associated Press reported that the most recent federal funding package included a permanent pay raise for federal wildland firefighters, building off of a temporary raise first included in the bipartisan infrastructure law signed by former President Joe Biden in 2021. But fire officials were worried that cuts to other jobs, like workers who thin forests, will make it harder to fight fires in the future.
“I don’t think there is a desire to reduce the number of firefighters with the Forest Service,” Washington State Forester George Geissler told the Associated Press. “But I do think there is a clear lack of understanding about how the inter-agency wildland fire system is set up, how it works, and how people that don’t have ‘firefighter’ listed as their job are still a massive part of the response system in the country.”
But both Truett and Torres said they have not seen a drop in federal support since the Trump Administration began making broad cuts across the federal government.
“I'm happy to say that we have not experienced any cuts to already awarded grants, whether they're for making resources available to our partners that include local fire districts, or monies that we use to work with our federal partners to address wildfires,” Torres, the Arizona state forester, said.
Truett said fire risk in Arizona this year was exacerbated by a dry winter.
“I’ve been in the state for a long time,” Truett said. “This is one of the most critical years that we've seen in our careers.”
And he didn’t rule out the possibility that Arizona could face a significant wildfire near an urban area like the devastating Los Angeles fires that destroyed tens of thousands of homes and businesses this year.
“We've all been involved in our careers with those Santa Ana type winds. … We can have that here,” he said. “It may not be as frequent as they do in California, but we do have that potential.
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