A key Senate committee voted Tuesday to pass the Fix Our Forests Act, a crucial, NRECA-backed bill to help electric cooperatives reduce the growing threat of devastating wildfires.
The Senate Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Committee—which has jurisdiction over forest reserves and wilderness areas—voted 18-5 to advance the bill, which now moves to the full Senate for consideration. The House passed its own version of the bipartisan legislation by a vote of 279-141 in January.
NRECA lobbyists and electric co-op leaders—especially in the wildfire-plagued West—have been pushing hard for Congress to pass the bill.
“The Fix Our Forests Act offers smart, bipartisan reforms to outdated forest management policies, giving electric co-ops the tools they need to protect their infrastructure and the communities they serve from the escalating threat of wildfires,” said Hannah Scott, NRECA legislative affairs director.
The legislation would expedite federal approvals to allow co-ops to strengthen their systems against wildfires and remove the trees and brush that fuel blazes.
It would greatly expand the ability of co-ops to remove “hazard trees” that are in danger of sparking fires by falling from federal land onto power lines. Currently, co-ops can only remove trees and other vegetation within 10 feet of their lines and rights of way. The Fix Our Forests Act would allow co-ops to remove trees within 150 feet.
Co-ops are often prohibited from removing felled timber and slash from national forest rights of way without going through burdensome timber sale procedures, Scott said. The bill would remove these regulatory barriers, reducing hazardous fuel buildup and allowing more timely vegetation management.
Sens. Tim Sheehy, R-Mont., John Curtis, R-Utah, John Hickenlooper, D-Colo., and Alex Padilla, D-Calif., introduced the Fix Our Forests Act in April, warning of an escalating crisis.
They cited figures from the National Interagency Fire Center showing that the number of acres destroyed by wildfire across the nation jumped 231% from 2023 to 2024.
From Oct. 17, 2024, to Oct. 17 of this year, there have been more than 54,600 wildfires that have burned more than 4.7 million acres, according to the center’s latest figures.
“In Utah and across the West, we face a growing crisis of overgrown, unhealthy forests,” Curtis said. “Thanks to the cooperation of both parties, we are confronting the challenge head on and now one step closer to passing legislation that will deliver essential tools to combat wildfires, restore forest ecosystems, and make federal forest management more efficient and responsive. I commend the committee’s action and look forward to the bill’s swift passage by the full Senate.”
Erin Kelly is a staff writer for NRECA.