Jay Inslee: “America deserves a fuels reduction program in our forests that protects two American icons: first, small towns; and…”

“America deserves a fuels reduction program in our forests that protects two American icons: first, small towns; and second, big trees. This bill does neither. This bill is doomed to failure in not protecting either small towns or big trees, for three reasons. The first reason is, it does not provide the money that is necessary to do the job. If we take a look at this map, the Forest Service suggests there are 190 million acres needing treatment. They propose to do about 2.8 million in the next year, this tiny little red dot. They want to propose to do a tiny little red dot, and they do not authorize a dollar for the fuels reduction program. They are so fixated on red tape they forget green money. They cannot do the job without it. Our bill does that job. Second, the bill does not target our precious resources to protect human property and life first as a priority, unlike our bill, which does.”