A report from the Office of the Inspector General questions more than $200 million spent by the U.S. Forest Service on hazardous fuels management.
The report states:
“Forest Service (FS) manages more than 193 million acres
of public land, and more than 66.9 million acres are at
high or very high-risk for wildfires that would be difficult
to contain. Land managers can increase forest resilience
and minimize wildfire impacts through fuels treatment
projects. FS conducts hazardous fuels treatments or fuels
and forest health treatments to reduce dangerous fuel
levels and restore forest health and resilience. In support
of wildfire risk reduction, FS received $205.6 million from
the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) for fiscal
years (FYs) 2022 and 2023 to conduct hazardous fuels
management activities.
We determined that FS did not separately track FYs 2022
and 2023 IIJA, Division J Hazardous Fuels Management
funds. As a result, FS could not accurately report how
much it spent for FYs 2022 and 2023 hazardous fuels
management, resulting in $205.6 million in questioned costs.
Additionally, we found that FS did not fully document its
rationale for prioritizing and selecting projects. As such,
FS’ decision-making process is not transparent, resulting
in reduced assurance that the most critical projects were
selected. FS generally agreed with our findings and
recommendations, and we accepted management decisions
for the two recommendations.”
Read the full report here.
