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Show New Management Direction For Fire Adopted By The National Forest Service New management direction regarding re-garding fire has been approved for the six national forests in Utah (Ashley, Dixie, Fishlake, Manti-LaSal, Manti-LaSal, Uinta, Wasatch-Cache). The decision, which amends the six forest for-est plans, identifies areas within the national forests where wildland fire - use and prescribed fire are authorized to help reduce the hazardous fuels and improve resource conditions. The amendment also updates direction direc-tion for fire suppression. The six forest supervisors based their decision on an environmental analysis and review of public comments. com-ments. They concluded new direction direc-tion was needed because existing forest plans do not adequately provide pro-vide for the use of prescribed (agency ignited) and natural (wild-land) (wild-land) fire and do not reflect current national policies. "Last year's fires demonstrated how dangerous and destructive wild-land wild-land fire can be to people, homes and ecosystems. As we enter another an-other fire season in the West, we're pleased to establish new direction that will help land managers move toward desired future conditions described de-scribed in the forest plans, reduce the buildup of hazardous fuels and reduce hazards in the wildlandurban interface where people live and work," says Pam Gardimer, Acting Forest Supervisor of the Wasatch-Cache Wasatch-Cache National Forest. Gardiner continued,"If we do nothing, potential puture impacts of uncharacteristically large wild-land wild-land fires and smoke generated by these events could be much worse compared to deliberately and carefully care-fully reducing hazardous fuels across our National Forests. We believe our decision offers a reasonable reason-able and responsible approzch to address ad-dress these important potential consequences." con-sequences." The decision of each forest supervisor su-pervisor is subject to a 45-day appeal ap-peal period that will begin when a legal notice is published for each forest (expected May 22 or 23). The decision can be viewed on the Internet at httpLAvww.fs.fed.us dxnfufmpindex.html, or a copy can be obtained by calling the supervisor's su-pervisor's office of any National Forest in Utah. David Hatfield, who led the project, pro-ject, can answer questions at 435-637-2617. |