Emergency Wildfire and Forest Management Act of 2016
Latest action · Jun 22, 2016 Read twice and referred to the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry.
Progress
Where this bill reached, and when. A stage with no date was not reached; one that failed a vote and later carried shows the date it carried.
- IntroducedJun 22, 2016
- Passed SenateNot reached
- Passed HouseNot reached
- To the PresidentNot reached
- Became lawNot reached
Summary
Emergency Wildfire and Forest Management Act of 2016
This bill sets forth a procedure for the Department of the Interior and the Department of Agriculture (USDA) to request declarations for major wildfire disasters on federal land.
This bill shall apply whenever the appropriate department prepares an environmental assessment (EA) or an environmental impact statement (EIS) under the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA) for a forest management activity whose primary purpose is to:
- reduce hazardous fuel loads,
- reduce fuel connectivity through the installation of fuel and fire breaks,
- restore forest health and resilience,
- protect a municipal water supply, or
- perform a combination of two or more such activities.
In an EA or EIS, the department concerned shall develop only these two alternatives:
- the forest management activity proposed, or
- the alternative of no action.
A categorical exclusion shall be available to the department concerned to: (1) expedite specified critical response actions, (2) expedite salvage operations in response to catastrophic events, (3) meet forest plan goals for early successional forests, and (4) improve and restore forest health and reduce the risk of wildfire.
(A "categorical exclusion" under NEPA is a category of actions which do not individually or cumulatively have a significant effect on the human environment and which have been found to have no such effect in procedures adopted by a federal agency in implementing environmental regulations and for which, therefore, neither an Environmental Assessment nor an Environmental Impact Statement is required.)
The bill establishes the State-Supported Forest Management Fund to cover the cost of certain forest management activities on National Forest System (NFS) or public land.
The Tribal Forest Protection Act of 2004 is amended regarding protection of tribal forest assets and management of Indian forest land authorized to include NFS and public land.
USDA shall issue grants for a state and private forest landscape-scale restoration program.
USDA shall establish an NFS:
- pilot arbitration program to designate projects for an alternative dispute resolution process replacing judicial review, and
- accelerated landscape restoration pilot program for the restoration or maintenance of designated landscapes.
Cosponsors
Members who signed on, in the order they did.
Actions 2
Everything that happened, newest first.
- Jun 22, 2016Introduced in Senate
- Jun 22, 2016Read twice and referred to the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry.
Related bills 1
Companion bills and other measures the record links to this one.
| Bill | Title | Relationship | Latest action |
|---|---|---|---|
| HR 2647 | Emergency Wildfire and Forest Management Act of 2016 | Related bill | Sep 19, 2016 |
Subjects
Assigned by the Library of Congress. Policy area: Public Lands and Natural Resources.
- Alternative dispute resolution, mediation, arbitration
- Civil actions and liability
- Congressional oversight
- Disaster relief and insurance
- Ecology
- Environmental assessment, monitoring, research
- Fires
- Forests, forestry, trees
- Government information and archives
- Indian lands and resources rights
- Insects
- Judicial review and appeals
- Land use and conservation
- Pest management
- Public Lands and Natural Resources
- Water use and supply
- Wildlife conservation and habitat protection
Text 1
Each version as it was printed, newest first.
- Jun 22, 2016Introduced in Senate
Everything here is as published by Congress: the summary is the Congressional Research Service's, the action wording is the clerks', and the subjects are the Library of Congress's. How far it got is read from the actions themselves, taking the most recent one of each kind, so a bill that failed a vote and later passed is shown as having passed. Records come from this bill on Congress.gov and govinfo.gov.