Utah Division of Forestry, Fire and State Lands Strategic Plan for Forestry SFY 2020-2025 Introduction The Forestry program area of the Utah Department of Natural Resources (DNR), Division of Forestry, Fire and State Lands (FFSL) has prepared a five-year Strategic Plan for State Fiscal Years (SFY) 2020-2025. As one of three program areas within FFSL, Forestry is developing its plan in coordination with Fire and State Lands. Over time, as the broad social, economic, and environmental context for natural resource management changes within the State, policy priorities shift and programs may need to change in response. The purpose of this Strategic Plan for Forestry is to review changes that have occurred in recent years in Utah’s broad policy context, as well as the organizational context of the DNR and FFSL, and to clarify a vision, goals and strategies for Forestry that reflect FFSL’s mission.
Broad Context National Concerns about Forests
Over the last two decades, concerns about the health of our nation’s forests have been growing among scientists, resource managers, and policymakers, as trends show rising levels of forest disturbance from insects, diseases, and wildfire. The natural disturbances affecting forest ecosystems are attributable to climate-related factors, such as drought, warmer temperatures, and longer summers, and have significant consequences for watersheds, landscapes, and human communities. All of these disturbances are expected to intensify in the future. Forest health and wildfire have huge implications for future efforts to protect and care for forests, as well as for the benefits forests provide. These issues are complex and far-reaching. They challenge everyone—researchers, resource managers, landowners, communities, and policymakers—to work together toward understanding what is happening to forests and how best to respond. Across the nation, forest health and wildfire concerns vary significantly by region and locality. Many western states and communities, including those in Utah, face high and increasing risks, particularly from large and intense wildfires. Another major concern that will continue to threaten the integrity of forests and natural ecosystems across the U.S. is urban development and related shifts in land-use patterns.1 Population growth and urban development in the West have been strong in recent years, and threats of forest land conversion and fragmentation are expected to continue. ¹ Future of America’s Forests and Rangelands: Update to the Forest Service 2010 Resources Planning Act Assessment.
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Forests and Forestry in Utah
Throughout Utah’s history, residents have cherished the state’s natural resources—its iconic and diverse landscapes featuring dramatic elevation changes, extraordinary geologic formations, and a wide range of vegetation and forest types. These landscapes are admired not only by Utahns, but by people around the U.S. and the world. Forests in Utah cover 18.2 million acres, about one-third of the State’s land area. Federal agencies manage much of the forest area.2 The Bureau of Land Management oversees 7.2 million acres of forest, but only 115,000 acres are classified as productive forest. The Forest Service manages 6.3 million acres of forest, of which 2.8 million acres are classified as productive forest. About one-quarter of Utah’s forests are on non-federal lands. Private landowners and Tribes manage 2.9 million acres, of which 594,000 acres are productive forest. The State oversees 1.4 million acres of forest, more than half of which are managed by the School and Institutional Trust Lands Administration (SITLA). The distribution and dominance of various tree species mirror the elevation range in Utah, from high, denselyforested mountains to low-elevation woodlands and deserts. In the heavily forested Rocky Mountains of northern Utah, the most common tree species is lodgepole pine, although Douglas-fir, quaking aspen, and Engelmann spruce are also common. Quaking aspen and
² Forests of Utah, 2015, USDA Forest Service, Forest Inventory and Analysis. https://usfs.maps.arcgis.com/apps/MapJournal/index.html?appid=9bb22eed68944e1e89cca9e5eea8339d
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Douglas-fir are also abundant in the mountains of central Utah, although pinyon/juniper forests dominate this region. In the less mountainous portions of the State, pinyon and juniper are dominant, along with some Gambel oak. The low-elevation deserts and steppes across southern Utah are mostly classified as nonforest. These areas may not provide opportunity for timber production, but they can be very important for wildlife habitat and non-traditional forest values. In addition to these forests, Utah has 1.8 million acres of urban and community land with 16.6 percent tree cover, or 300,000 acres of urban and community forests.3 Urban and community forests are expanding with urban and community development, and they provide significant ecosystem services to the people of Utah. FFSL Forestry programs partner with the Forest Service and other federal, state and local agencies to address issues and care for all forests in the State, but the programs primarily engage private landowners and communities to promote healthy and resilient forests.
Federal and State Partnerships
Utah FFSL and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Forest Service have a strong partnership in protecting, restoring, and managing forests across Utah’s landscapes. This is because the two agencies have similar missions at different scales. The Forest Service mission focuses on forests across the nation and FFSL’s mission focuses on forests across Utah. The two agencies work very closely, sharing resources and capacities through Cooperative Forestry and Cooperative Fire programs that are part of the State and Private Forestry (S&PF) branch of the Forest Service. These cooperative forestry and fire programs focus on non-federal lands throughout the State, providing assistance and resources to private landowners and communities. FFSL also partners with the Forest Service’s National Forest System (NFS) branch with respect to the five National Forests in Utah,4 but because NFS has direct management responsibility for the National Forests, the role of FFSL, historically, has been limited to planning and coordination efforts. Recent landscape-scale initiatives and authorities allowing States to provide restoration services on National Forests are creating greater opportunities for FFSL to partner with NFS. In addition, FFSL partners with other federal agencies involved in forestry activities in Utah, especially the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), which provides technical and financial assistance to private ³ US Urban Forest Statistics, Values, and Projections. Nowak, D. and Greenfield, E. Journal of Forestry, March 2018, pp. 164-177. Five National Forests have headquarters in Utah (i.e., the Uinta-Wasatch-Cache, Ashley, Manti-La Sal, Fishlake and Dixie). Two other National Forests—the Sawtooth and Caribou-Targhee—have lands in northern Utah, but are headquartered in Idaho. 4
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landowners for forest planning and management, and the U.S. Department of Interior’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM). Finally, FFSL partners with other DNR divisions, other state agencies, such as SITLA and Utah Department of Agriculture and Food (UDAF), and universities, such as Utah State University, to provide assistance and address issues related to State and private lands.
Federal and State Policy Changes
Over the last few decades, Federal and State policies guiding forest management have begun to focus on protecting, restoring, and managing forests at larger scales, such as ecosystems, watersheds, and landscapes, in order to protect the values and services provided by these natural systems. Landscape-scale efforts have necessitated greater collaboration among Federal, State, and local agencies, as well as private landowners, as they cross property lines and administrative boundaries to address management priorities.
https://www.fs.fed.us/spf/redesign/ index.shtml
In addition, the major forest issues of recent decades— forest health and wildfire—know no boundaries, so recent national policies such as the National Fire Plan, the Healthy Forests Restoration Act, and the National Cohesive Strategy for Wildland Fire Management all call for collaborative landscape-scale efforts that engage Federal, State, and local agencies as well as local communities. Utah developed its own state policies and initiatives to respond to these major issues, such as the Catastrophic Wildfire Reduction Strategy (CatFire), the Cooperative Wildfire System (CWS) and the Watershed Restoration Initiative (WRI).
In response to these policy and management changes, S&PF worked with state forestry agencies to complete a major “Redesign” of its cooperative programs in 2008. Key Redesign elements include three broad goals to be applied consistently across all states, State Forest Action Plans to assess and prioritize forest landscapes, and a competitive grants program (i.e., Landscape Scale Restoration) to help states develop innovative projects focused on restoring landscapes in diverse forest contexts. FFSL developed its initial Utah Forest Action Plan in 2010, completed an update in 2016 and is preparing another update for 2020. Released in August 2018, the most recent USDA Forest Service policy initiative is “Toward Shared Stewardship Across Landscapes: An Outcome-Based Investment Strategy.” Its primary issues and concerns are “catastrophic wildfires, invasive species, drought, and epidemics of forest insects and disease.” The Forest Service is partnering with States to design their own approaches to Shared Stewardship. In Utah, FFSL and the Forest Service, Region 4, are working on mutual commitments through which they will identify priority landscapes and invest in activities to reduce wildfire risks, protect communities and water sources, and seek to build greater local capacity for forestry work.
Organizational Context FFSL is one of seven divisions within Utah DNR, which has broad responsibility for managing and protecting the state’s natural resources and helping to ensure the quality of life for its residents. DNR does this through active management of natural resources, which includes engaging state, 4
county, and local officials; collaborating with community members, organizations, and groups; and coordinating with state and Federal partners. FFSL is responsible for protecting and sustaining healthy forests across Utah, particularly on non-federal forest lands; preventing, responding to, and mitigating the effects of wildfires in Utah, particularly on state and private lands; and managing Utah’s “sovereign lands” which are the beds of Utah’s navigable rivers and lakes. These include the Jordan and Bear Rivers, portions of the Colorado and Green Rivers, Great Salt Lake, Utah Lake, and Bear Lake.
FFSL Structure
State program leaders and administrators for FFSL are located together in the Salt Lake City Office, providing opportunity for coordination and integration among the three program areas—Forestry, Fire and State Lands. FFSL has six Area Offices across the State that coordinate and deliver program activities at the local level (see map). Area Managers supervise program staff, providing flexibility for Area Offices to respond to local contexts, needs and priorities.
Cooperative Forestry and Cooperative Fire programs
FFSL programs are planned and implemented in partnership with the USDA Forest Service through the Cooperative Forestry Programs and Cooperative Fire Programs. Forestry and fire programs have worked closely together for years, sharing resources and staff capacities to meet FFSL’s overall priorities. With Federal and State policy priorities increasingly focused on forest health and wildfire concerns, coordination between forestry and fire programs is essential. This Strategic Plan for Forestry presents a summary of the current programs within Cooperative Forestry and Cooperative Fire to reflect the need and opportunity for strong coordination and integration among these programs. Map of six FFSL Area Boundaries
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Cooperative Forestry Programs include:
• The Forest Stewardship Program encourages the long-term stewardship of important State and private forest landscapes by assisting landowners to more actively manage their forests and related resources. The program provides assistance to owners of forest land in the form of technical assistance, forest management plans and education. In addition, FFSL’s foresters monitor forestry activities on private forests to encourage the use of best management practices for water quality concerns.5 • The Forest Health Program provides information to federal and state land managers, as well as private forest landowners, on current and past insect and disease conditions in the state through annual detection and monitoring. It also provides training, education and assistance to help people understand forest health issues, potential effects, and opportunities for prevention and mitigation. • The Forest Legacy Program conserves and retains private forestlands of regional or national significance that are threatened with conversion to non-forest uses. The program uses conservation easements or fee acquisition to prevent forest fragmentation and conversion, maintain traditional land uses, and protect significant environmental values on private lands for future generations.
• The Urban and Community Forestry Program provides financial and technical assistance to Utah communities to conduct inventories and manage trees and forests to maximize social, environmental and economic benefits. The program provides competitive grants and engages volunteers in a wide range of projects, such as tree planting, education, and training; encourages communities to participate in Tree City USA, a national program of the Arbor Day Foundation; and works with many local agencies, nonprofit groups and private businesses to advance urban and community forestry. • The Conservation Education Program complements existing local, state and federal natural resource education programs and encourages education partnerships by increasing awareness, knowledge and appreciation of natural resources and ecosystems, connecting children to nature, and helping people to better understand natural resource issues.
FFSL is responsible for administering Utah’s Forest Practices Act and Forestry Water Quality Guidelines.
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Cooperative Fire Programs include:
• The State Fire Assistance Program provides financial and technical support directly to the states, to enhance firefighting capacity, support community-based hazard mitigation, and expand outreach and education to homeowners and communities concerning fire prevention and hazard mitigation. Reducing hazardous fuels and the risk to communities from wildfire is a major component of the program. Utah delivers the State Fire Assistance Program through several key initiatives: ›› The Wildland Urban Interface Program assists communities in preparing Community Wildfire Preparedness Plans (CWPPs), participating in Firewise USA, and collaborating with state and federal programs such as CatFire, National Cohesive Strategy, and the National Fire Plan. This program also provides competitive grants for implementing hazardous fuels reduction projects. ›› The Utah Cooperative Wildfire System (CWS) is a new policy through which the State pays for suppression efforts for large and extended wildland fires while local governments pay for initial suppression efforts, prevention, preparedness and mitigation actions proven to reduce risk and costs of wildland fire in the long run. ›› The Utah Wildfire Risk Assessment Portal (UWRAP) assists all stakeholders in wildfire mitigation planning and fire policy implementation by displaying geospatial wildfire risk assessment data and tools through an easily accessible web portal. ›› The Wildfire Prevention Coordinator develops educational materials on wildfire risks and prevention activities for outreach to communities, schools and other groups. ›› The Wood Utilization Coordinator develops and implements strategies for facilitating publicprivate coordination to use woody biomass from wildfire mitigation and hazardous fuels reduction activities for potential economic development purposes. • The Volunteer Fire Assistance Program provides financial, technical and other assistance to volunteer fire departments in rural communities in order to better suppress wildfires.
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Vision, Goals and Strategies for Forestry A major purpose of this Strategic Plan is to clarify a vision, goals and strategies for the Forestry program area that reflect FFSL’s mission and are consistent with strategic planning for the Fire and State Lands program areas.
Vision for Forests and Forestry in Utah
Utah’s trees and forests are healthy and provide valuable resources and services for communities. Natural forest landscapes and human communities are resilient and able to adapt to disturbances and the increasing effects of climate change, such as drought, insects and disease, and wildfire. Utah’s communities, forest landowners, and other stakeholders understand and value trees and forests. They engage in activities to promote healthy and resilient trees and forests. Public agencies, private organizations, and individuals work together to protect, sustain, and manage trees and forests.
Goals and Strategies for Forestry 1. Promote Healthy and Resilient Trees and Forests Goal: To promote healthy and resilient trees and forests across Utah. Strategies
a. Encourage and assist private landowners and communities to engage in active stewardship of trees and forests. b. Provide leadership and expertise with Federal, State and local partners to strengthen and deliver forestry programs.
c. Increase targeted outreach and assistance to private landowners and communities in priority landscapes.
d. Encourage and stimulate forestry and forest-products activities and enterprises. 2. Advance Partnerships for Landscape Initiatives Goal: To advance partnerships for cross-boundary, landscape-scale initiatives on Federal, State and private lands. Strategies
a. Seek and encourage partnership opportunities with Federal, State and local agencies and with private landowners, businesses and communities to develop cross-boundary, landscape-scale initiatives.
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i. Actively pursue partnerships with programs and initiatives such as: (1) Shared Stewardship Across Landscapes (USFS)
(2) Environmental Quality Incentives Program (NRCS) (3) Landscape-Scale Restoration Program (USFS)
(4) Forest restoration and management programs (BLM) (5) Invasive Species Mitigation Fund (UDAF)
b. Focus initiatives on Utah’s priority landscapes and issues, across all lands.
i. Current priority issues include: wildfire-risk and hazardous fuels reduction, landscape and watershed restoration, community and water source protection, and economic development.
3. Integrate Programs Goal: To integrate Forestry programs with other FFSL and DNR programs for increased effectiveness. Strategies
a. Seek and encourage opportunities to integrate Forestry expertise and capacity across Forestry programs and with other FFSL and DNR programs and initiatives. i. Actively pursue efforts to integrate with programs and initiatives such as: (1) Watershed Restoration Initiative (DNR);
(2) Catastrophic WildFire Reduction Strategy (CatFire) and Cooperative Wildfire System (CWS);
(3) Cooperative Fire programs (e.g., Wildland Urban Interface, Hazardous Fuels Reduction, Wood Products & Biomass Utilization). 4. Heighten Visibility Goal: To heighten visibility of Forestry programs and services for greater public awareness, knowledge, and involvement in active stewardship of trees and forests. Strategies
a. Create targeted outreach plans and actions for Federal, State, and local agency partners. b. Develop and implement communication activities focused on key Forestry program audiences, such as private landowners, private businesses, non-profit groups, and local communities.
i. Use innovative communication technologies and tools, such as GIS mapping and mobile applications, website, videos, success stories, and story maps.
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5. Build a Respected and Responsive Organization Goal: To build a respected, responsive, capable, and enduring organization where people want to work. Strategies
a. Strengthen internal communication
i. Between State Forestry Program leadership and Area Foresters. ii. Among Area Foresters.
iii. Between Forestry staff and other FFSL program staff at the State office and in the Areas.
b. Create an inclusive and supportive work environment where employees are respected and trusted and work together in teams.
c. Offer competitive salaries and promote retention and longevity. d. Empower employees with clear guidance and incentives to pursue priorities and overcome challenges with creative approaches.
i. Provide recognition and rewards for strong performance.
e. Develop Forestry Program training/educational materials and opportunities for new and current employees.
f. Build expectations for engaged, transparent leadership that provides clear direction and advocates for Forestry programs. g. Seek stable, diverse, and sustainable sources of funding for Forestry Programs.
Acknowledgements Gerry Gray, FFSL Forestry Program Administrator, and Laura Vernon, FFSL Division Planner, for their leadership in developing the Strategic Plan for Forestry, and Jennifer Biggs, FFSL Information Technology Coordinator, for the Plan’s layout and design. Thanks to everyone who participated in interviews and meetings for the Strategic Plan, FFSL staff and external partners, and to those who provided comments on various drafts.
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