How Trump cuts may have hindered a key way of preventing future wildfires

For more than 15 years, Scott Fitzwilliams led what he affectionately calls the “crown jewel” of U.S. federal land - a swath of more than 2.2 million acres in Colorado that includes world class ski resorts such as Vail and Aspen, and sees a lot of wildfire.

So when he was told in February to fire more than a dozen U.S. Forest Service employees from White River National Forest, one of his main concerns was: Will enough people be around to make sure the next big blaze doesn’t get out of control?

One of the people eliminated from Fitzwilliams’s team was involved in fuels reduction - ensuring that future wildfires will have fewer trees and less debris to consume as they tear through the forest. Fitzwilliams resigned in protest over the nature of the cuts, part of the Trump administration’s efforts to reduce the federal workforce by eliminating tens of thousands of government jobs.

Eight months later, a new report confirms some of Fitzwilliams’s fears.

A data analysis shared with The Washington Post found that as of the end of September, Forest Service work to reduce fire-fueling debris was down nearly 40 percent on this date compared with where it has been on average over the previous four years, according to Grassroots Wildland Firefighters.

The group, which advocates for active and retired federal wildland firefighters, found that 1.7 million acres had been treated this year, compared with an average of 3.6 million acres annually from 2021 to 2024.

The head of the Forest Service has said that some of the decrease in addressing fire fuel has been a result of more logistical and operational challenges, rather than workforce cuts. Still, even as the Trump administration said wildland firefighters were exempt from federal job cuts, it eliminated hundreds of Forest Service positions, roles that support firefighters by planning fuel reduction, analyzing forest health and even cleaning toilets on National Forest land. The government shutdown may only further hinder these efforts, federal employees said, as prescribed burns are canceled and uncertainty grows over funding and personnel.

“Communities across the West should be absolutely concerned,” Fitzwilliams said.

Hazardous-fuels reduction involves a lot more than raking dried leaves off trails or trimming grass. When wildfires tend to be quieter, in early spring or late fall, forest officials focus on lowering major risks. That can include thinning the forest by cutting down trees so future fires can’t jump from one crown to the next, or carrying out prescribed burns - intentional fires ignited under safe conditions to prevent more out-of-control burns in the future.

The group’s findings come late in a fire season that has seen less land burned, providing windows of opportunity for states to treat forests with fire on their own terms. But, in a state like Oregon, for example, which saw markedly fewer acres of fire this year than last, fuel reduction is at just 32 percent of its recent annual average, according to the data.

The figures could be skewed because of a lag in recordkeeping, given the shutdown and the busy time of year, said Camille Stevens-Rumann, an associate professor of forest and rangeland stewardship at Colorado State University.

“It probably wouldn’t change the trend,” she added. “But it might change the hard numbers.”

In a statement, the U.S. Forest Service said the Trump administration has “focused on eliminating waste, fraud and abuse from government programs.”

“Putting America first required detailed review of all agency actions to be sure they provided the best value for the American people,” the agency said. “Emergency wildfire response and preventative wildfire risk reduction remains a top priority for the Forest Service.”

The Forest Service has seen significant losses to its workforce throughout the year.

In a September public letter to Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Oregon), Forest Service Chief Tom Schultz said 1,400 employees who were qualified to fight fires left the agency through the Deferred Resignation Program.

Schultz added that more than 100 of those employees returned for this fire season.

The chief attributed the recent reduction in prescribed fire across the country to “operational challenges.” Major blazes nationwide and dry conditions limited controlled burns, he said - as did the need to send resources to Canada in the late spring and early summer. Canada saw its second-biggest fire season on record this year.

“The continued high level of fire activity and extreme conditions in the West are requiring significant resources and personnel,” said Schultz, “which has constrained our capacity to treat additional acres.”

Wyden pushed back on Schultz’s claims in a statement to The Post, saying “the Trump administration is dragging its feet on proven wildfire prevention tools like hazardous fuels reduction.”

“From funding cuts to staffing shortages and now a lengthy government shutdown he created, Donald Trump is going out of his way to put western communities in the literal line of fire and undermine fire prevention efforts,” Wyden said.

Some experts argue the country already doesn’t do enough prescribed burning, making this year even more of a setback.

“We know we need to treat a lot more of the area than we already are,” Stevens-Rumann said. “When we have years like this when we are treating even less, we are just adding to the potential burnable landscapes in the future,” adding that she was impressed with how much work had gotten done, given the constraints workers in the Forest Service faced.

The government shutdown also could further limit fuel-reduction efforts, according to federal employees.

Some prescribed burns were canceled or postponed at the start of the shutdown amid confusion over funding and personnel, according to a federal firefighter with the Forest Service, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.

“Prescribed burning operations have continued during the government shutdown as they are critical work to reduce wildfire risk and to protect communities, infrastructure, and natural resources,” the Forest Service said. “All prescribed burns are evaluated and only conducted under suitable conditions, and in coordination with communities and stakeholders.”

Prescribed burning requires near-perfect weather conditions, long-term planning, equipment and manpower. Foresters measure factors including wind speed and humidity to ensure a safe and effective controlled burn zone.

“Losing a week of burn window is a big deal, because people share resources across forests to get their work done, and creating a logjam has downstream effects so that some just won’t get done,” the Forest Service employee said.

These practices have become more important over the last few decades, as people build homes closer to forests.

In 2018, the Buffalo Wildfire tore through Fitzwilliams’s White River National Forest, near Breckenridge. Dozens of firefighters were battling the blazes on the ground. Helicopters supported them overhead. The flames spread, until suddenly, they stopped short - saving nearly $1 billion worth of homes.

The reason for their abrupt halt? Multiple wide-open spaces of about 300 to 500 feet that foresters developed as a fuel break between the woods and the nearly 1,400 houses.

“We can’t reduce all the risk,” said Fitzwilliams, 61. “But we were trying. And I’m really worried about the future.”