For your public safety, your firefighters and your communities, that your capital investment fund is the same as your personnel fund, so we are going to cut personnel every time we get a new firetruck.

it would be great if maybe you could provide the Committee a list of those partners and communities where you think we identified those best practices

the status quo about how we are funding both prevention and fighting forest fires is not working.

The current cycle of fire borrowing is not working, and contributes to more fires.

Clearly protecting and improving the management of our forests are top priorities for me and many of the communities in my district.

I hope this hearing will help identify ways that Congress can help prevent wildfires, improve the way we respond to fires, and assist communities with post-fire recovery.

I am pleased to be here for the second Subcommittee on Forestry and Conservation hearing for this Congress.

opening statement

The legislation before this committee today, developed by Senators Tom Udall and David Vitter, represents a critical step forward.

If everything in government worked as well as LWCF we would have a lot of time on our hands.

there is a Sportsmen's Act that Senator Murkowski and I are working on.

I have run out of time, if you could very briefly, Carolyn.

I really respect the team that you brought in, and this more business like approach to what is an incredibly important issue for veterans in my State and across the country.

Given the unacceptable nature of recent VA problems, I'm glad we have new leadership at the VA, both in Washington and in New Mexico.

Thank you very much. Dr. Arroyo, he is pretty amazing.

We appreciate that.

Too often veterans are prevented from receiving the care they deserve because of barriers to access.

In New Mexico, the aviation industry, like the rest of the economy, is working to recover and is in a struggling phase in many cases.