Please ensure Javascript is enabled for purposes of website accessibility
Reps. Valadao and Costa Praise Passage of Fix Our Forests Act
Bill McEwen updated website photo 2024
By Bill McEwen, News Director
Published 2 weeks ago on
January 24, 2025

A helicopter drops water while fighting the Auto Fire in Ventura County, Calif., on Monday, Jan. 13, 2025. (AP File)

Share

Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

With wildfires ravaging Southern California, the Fix Our Forests Act, a bipartisan bill supported by the Central Valley’s congressional delegation, passed the House of Representatives on Thursday.

Sixty-four Democrats joined 215 Republicans to pass the bill, 279-141. View the roll call vote at this link.

The legislation aims to restore forest health, increase resiliency to catastrophic wildfires, and protect communities by expanding environmental analyses, reducing frivolous lawsuits, and increasing the pace and scale of forest restoration projects.

“Over 117 million acres of our nation’s forests are dangerously overgrown and fire-prone, putting lives and communities at risk,” said Rep. David Valadao (R-Kings County) in a statement. “The Fix Our Forests Act takes critical steps to address the growing wildfire crisis by streamlining forest management, prioritizing prevention, and adopting new technologies to fight forest health threats.”

Act Includes Costa’s Headwaters Protection Legislation

Notably, the act includes Rep. Jim Costa’s Headwaters Protection Act, which reforms the Water Source Protection Program by boosting authorized funding, expanding eligibility for public entities like local water districts, and increasing the federal cost share to increase interest and participation in the program.

“The Headwaters Protection Act supports public-private partnership-driven restoration projects like the Olam Project in the San Joaquin Valley,” said the Fresno Democrat in a news release. “The Olam Project is a series of restoration projects within the Pine Flat watershed between the USDA Forest Service, the National Forest Foundation, and Unilever. These investments would reduce wildfire risk, improve watershed health, and benefit downstream communities.”

A Look at the Act

According to Valadao, the Fix Our Forests Act will:

  • Simplify and expedite environmental reviews to reduce costs and planning times for critical forest management projects while maintaining rigorous environmental standards.
  • Makes communities more resilient to wildfire by coordinating existing grant programs and furthering new research.
  • Stop frivolous litigation and endless agency consultations that delay needed forest management activities.
  • Give agencies new emergency tools to restore watersheds, protect communities in the wildland-urban interface, and prevent forest conversion.
  • Utilize state-of-the-art science to prioritize the treatment of forests at the highest risk of wildfires.
  • Incentivize forest management projects of up to 10,000 acres to increase the pace and scale of addressing wildfire, drought, insects, and disease.
  • Adopt new and innovative technologies to address forest health threats and suppress wildfires quickly and more efficiently.

RELATED TOPICS:

DON'T MISS

Here’s What We Know About a Commuter Plane Crash in Alaska That Killed 10 People

DON'T MISS

Trump’s 3rd Week: More Executive Orders, a Trade War That Wasn’t, and a Mideast Jolt

DON'T MISS

UMass Will Pay Student Who Made Half-Court Shot $10,000 Even Though His Foot Was on Line

DON'T MISS

Trump Is Signing Up Local Law Officers to Help With Immigration Enforcement

DON'T MISS

Judge Blocks Trump From Placing Thousands of USAID Workers on Leave

DON'T MISS

Federal Judge Blocks Musk’s DOGE From Accessing Sensitive Treasury Department Data

DON'T MISS

Rookies for Eagles and Chiefs Could Play a Key Role in the Super Bowl

DON'T MISS

Sony PlayStation Network Outage Enrages Gamers Around the World

DON'T MISS

Trump Says He’s Firing Kennedy Center Board Members, Naming Himself Chairman

DON'T MISS

PJ Pickles, the Pajama-Clad Pup, Want to Join Your Loving Home

UP NEXT

Trump’s 3rd Week: More Executive Orders, a Trade War That Wasn’t, and a Mideast Jolt

UP NEXT

UMass Will Pay Student Who Made Half-Court Shot $10,000 Even Though His Foot Was on Line

UP NEXT

Trump Is Signing Up Local Law Officers to Help With Immigration Enforcement

UP NEXT

Judge Blocks Trump From Placing Thousands of USAID Workers on Leave

UP NEXT

Federal Judge Blocks Musk’s DOGE From Accessing Sensitive Treasury Department Data

UP NEXT

Rookies for Eagles and Chiefs Could Play a Key Role in the Super Bowl

UP NEXT

Sony PlayStation Network Outage Enrages Gamers Around the World

UP NEXT

Trump Says He’s Firing Kennedy Center Board Members, Naming Himself Chairman

UP NEXT

PJ Pickles, the Pajama-Clad Pup, Want to Join Your Loving Home

UP NEXT

Newsom Signs $50M Plan to Battle Trump Policies, Support Immigrants

Bill McEwen,
News Director
Bill McEwen is news director and columnist for GV Wire. He joined GV Wire in August 2017 after 37 years at The Fresno Bee. With The Bee, he served as Opinion Editor, City Hall reporter, Metro columnist, sports columnist and sports editor through the years. His work has been frequently honored by the California Newspapers Publishers Association, including authoring first-place editorials in 2015 and 2016. Bill and his wife, Karen, are proud parents of two adult sons, and they have two grandsons. You can contact Bill at 559-492-4031 or at Send an Email

Trump Is Signing Up Local Law Officers to Help With Immigration Enforcement

6 hours ago

Judge Blocks Trump From Placing Thousands of USAID Workers on Leave

6 hours ago

Federal Judge Blocks Musk’s DOGE From Accessing Sensitive Treasury Department Data

6 hours ago

Rookies for Eagles and Chiefs Could Play a Key Role in the Super Bowl

6 hours ago

Sony PlayStation Network Outage Enrages Gamers Around the World

6 hours ago

Trump Says He’s Firing Kennedy Center Board Members, Naming Himself Chairman

6 hours ago

PJ Pickles, the Pajama-Clad Pup, Want to Join Your Loving Home

7 hours ago

Newsom Signs $50M Plan to Battle Trump Policies, Support Immigrants

22 hours ago

Fresno Students Entering the Work World Need Your Help to ‘Dress the Part’

22 hours ago

Hanford Shooting Leaves One Dead, Another in Critical Condition

22 hours ago

Here’s What We Know About a Commuter Plane Crash in Alaska That Killed 10 People

JUNEAU, Alaska — Authorities are working to recover the wreckage of a plane crash in western Alaska that killed 10 people while investigator...

3 hours ago

3 hours ago

Here’s What We Know About a Commuter Plane Crash in Alaska That Killed 10 People

4 hours ago

Trump’s 3rd Week: More Executive Orders, a Trade War That Wasn’t, and a Mideast Jolt

5 hours ago

UMass Will Pay Student Who Made Half-Court Shot $10,000 Even Though His Foot Was on Line

6 hours ago

Trump Is Signing Up Local Law Officers to Help With Immigration Enforcement

6 hours ago

Judge Blocks Trump From Placing Thousands of USAID Workers on Leave

6 hours ago

Federal Judge Blocks Musk’s DOGE From Accessing Sensitive Treasury Department Data

6 hours ago

Rookies for Eagles and Chiefs Could Play a Key Role in the Super Bowl

6 hours ago

Sony PlayStation Network Outage Enrages Gamers Around the World

Help continue the work that gets you the news that matters most.

Search

Send this to a friend