S.Amdt. 5890

The amendment proposes adding the Fix Our Forests Act (Division E) to bill S. 4784. Its primary purpose is to reduce wildfire risk and improve forest health using a landscape-scale approach focused on firesheds.

Wildfire and Forest Management

• It establishes fireshed management areas based on risk to watersheds and communities, supported by a public Fireshed Registry.
• It creates a Wildland Fire Intelligence Center and at least 8 Regional Wildland Fire Research Centers at land-grant colleges or higher education institutions to improve fire science and prediction.
• It sets up a framework for prescribed fire, including training, grants, and priority criteria, while providing liability protections for Federal, Tribal, and certain non-Federal employees.
• It introduces strike teams to accelerate environmental reviews and interagency consultations, and uses livestock grazing as a tool to reduce hazardous fuels.
• It launches a white oak restoration initiative and the Seeds of Success strategy for priority reforestation.
• It modifies vegetation management rules for electric power lines, including a 120-day automatic approval process for certain plans and a categorical exclusion for removing high-priority hazard trees.

Community Protection and Support

• It establishes the Community Wildfire Risk Reduction Program and the Community Wildfire Defense Research Program to improve fire-resistant building standards.
• It updates the definition of at-risk communities and improves grant programs for wildfire defense.
• It creates the Wildland Fire Management Casualty Assistance Program for the next-of-kin of killed or injured firefighters.
• It establishes an Emergency Forest Watershed Program to handle erosion and runoff after natural disasters.

Partnerships, Funding, and Administration

• It expands good neighbor agreements and shared stewardship to include special districts and Indian Tribes, while updating programs for Tribal forest protection and water source protection.
• It provides a contract preference for local contractors on hazardous fuel reduction projects and increases acreage limits for certain resilience projects.
• It limits the need to restart Endangered Species Act consultations for certain land use plans.
• It introduces litigation reform to limit how courts handle judicial reviews and injunctions for fireshed projects, including shorter filing timeframes.

Accountability and Disaster Assistance

• It mandates a GAO study on budget transparency and firefighting operations for the Forest Service and requires transparent reporting on hazardous fuels reduction.
• It creates a unified intake process and system for disaster assistance. This allows survivors to use a consolidated application for various federal agencies, provides status updates, and streamlines information sharing among certified agencies to speed up aid and detect fraud.
• It requires participating agencies to sign data protection agreements and mandates that those opting out certify their reasons every four years.
• It requires the system to meet data security standards and undergo privacy impact assessments.
• It allows the Administrator to waive certain Paperwork Reduction Act requirements during major disasters.
• It requires regular briefings to Congress and reports from the GAO and the Administrator to evaluate the system's efficiency and the survivor experience.