Restoration Opportunities & the Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration (CFLR) Act

Introduction
By now many people are aware of the Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration (CFLR) Act and the new opportunities it offers for funding Forest Service restoration projects. Indeed, while CFLR proposals feature vegetation management (e.g. logging, prescribed fire, weed treatments), the possibility exists for including watershed restoration treatments such as road decommissioning or activities to improve aquatic organism passage. While some conservationists have concerns about components of the CFLR, this article does not address those concerns, but provides an overview of the enabling legislation, proposal selection process, and watershed restoration opportunities.

The CFLR Act – An Overview
The CFLR Act, passed under Title IV of the 2009 Omnibus Public Land Management Act, continues the growing Forest Service trend to work with local interests and stakeholders to restore our natural landscapes. The act relies on collaborative, science-based ecological restoration to, among other things, reduce uncharacteristic wildfire risk, reestablish natural fire regimes and demonstrate the effectiveness of restoration techniques in achieving ecological and watershed health objectives.1

Towards these ends, the act created a new program within the Forest Service to select and fund restoration proposals in priority landscapes. In order to qualify for selection and receive CFLR funding, collaborative restoration landscape proposals must meet the eligibility criteria set forth in the act. This means that selections and funding will favor a project that:

• identifies and prioritizes treatments over a 10 year period across a landscape that is at least 50,000 acres located primarily on Forest Service lands;
• relies on the best available science;
• maintains or restores old growth stands to pre-fire suppression conditions;
• includes treatments to reduce hazardous fuels; and
• ensures no new permanent road construction and the decommissioning of any needed temporary roads.2

The CLFR Act also requires these proposals be developed through a collaborative process that includes diverse interests and is both “transparent and non-exclusive,” or meets the requirements for Resource Advisory Committees3. It is unclear what exactly this means about opportunities to become involved in proposal development if you are not one of the committee members, but we encourage individuals to investigate whether there are opportunities to engage early in local CLFR efforts.

The result of this collaboration requirement is that for each proposal there is a diverse group in charge of helping implement and monitor restoration treatments. CLFR proposals must  describe how they will improve ecological and watershed conditions. Interestingly, proposals must also analyze the cost savings that result from restoration activities, and they must provide local employment or training opportunities that support nearby economies.4 This requirement provides a chance to show how local economies benefit from restoration treatments, and how activities, such as road decommissioning, can save taxpayer dollars in the long term.

The CFLR creates incentives for groups to collaborate on restoration projects. Wildlands CPR photo.

Once a collaborative group drafts a proposal they send it to their Regional Forester, who may nominate it for selection by the Chief of the Forest Service (acting for the Secretary of Agriculture). An advisory panel then reviews each proposal and makes recommendations to the Chief. This panel plays a crucial role, since its members carefully study each proposal to determine how well it meets the eligibility criteria. The Chief may only select 10 proposals each fiscal year and no more than two from a specific Forest Service region; 31 proposals were submitted in 2010 and 26 in 2011.

Once chosen, proposals are eligible to receive funding from the new CFLR budget established by the act to pay for up to 50% of the total costs to implement and monitor restoration treatments. The other half may come from a variety of sources such as a “combination of appropriated, permanent and trust, or partnership funds, in-kind contributions, and forest product value exchanged for restoration treatments (in stewardship contracts).”5 For selected proposals, the act requires collaborative groups to develop a work plan and budget that describes how it will implement the proposal to achieve ecological as well as community benefits. Also included is a business plan that must show cost savings over the life of the proposal.

The CFLR Act requires annual reporting and multiparty monitoring for all selected proposals. Those reports have several requirements, including a progress evaluation, for which the Forest Service provided additional direction by listing 26 performance measures that collaborative groups can use to help report yearly accomplishments.6 Not all of these performance measures are applicable to all projects. For instance, if a project does not include road treatments, those performance measures are not applied. Unfortunately, not all the 2010 selected proposals included a wide range of restoration treatments; some focused almost exclusively on vegetative treatments.

Annual reports must also include monitoring results. Some collaborative groups have established specific monitoring committees with clear methodology to evaluate proposals’ success for 15 years after projects get started. For example, the Southwest Crown of the Continent Collaborative in Montana established a separate monitoring committee to develop scientifically valid protocols for numerous restoration objectives in order to assess project effectiveness. Participating in such committees may provide an opportunity to promote and fund monitoring that can demonstrate, for instance, how road decommissioning can improve water quality by reducing related sedimentation. Effectiveness monitoring has a long history of being underfunded or excluded altogether, and the CFLR fund provides an opportunity to help answer many long-standing questions about specific restoration approaches.

CFLR Proposals & Watershed Restoration
Undoubtedly, the CLFR Act focuses a great deal on reducing the potential for wildfires and related costs, as well as directing the utilization of restoration byproducts (e.g. small diameter  trees and woody biomass). Proposals that do not incorporate these components do not meet the eligibility criteria, so in essence, the act primarily focuses on restoring large landscapes through vegetative treatments.

However, as mentioned above, the act allows for a range of other restoration treatments including road maintenance and decommissioning, repairing stream crossings, and improving aquatic organism passage. Proposals must show the cost savings expected from these restoration treatments, and they must demonstrate that treatments will “improve fish and wildlife habitat; maintain or improve water quality and watershed function; and maintain, decommission, and rehabilitate roads and trails.”7 Special consideration is given to the strength of proposed restoration strategies, so it makes good sense to include road decommissioning and maintenance along with improving stream crossings and aquatic organism passage.

Finally, the act’s eligibility criteria preclude the construction of any new permanent roads, and commit funding for decommissioning any needed temporary roads (though there is no direction on when roads must be decommissioned or if they must be fully recontoured).

A review of the 2010 selected proposals reveals that some  proposals focused almost exclusively on reducing fuels through vegetative treatments, whereas others included a full suite of activities to improve ecological and watershed integrity.8 For  example, the Southwest Crown of the Continent proposal will maintain to Best Management Practice standards 650 miles of road, decommission or store 400 miles of road, and upgrade 149 stream crossing structures.9 While these numbers could be higher, this is in stark contrast to Arizona’s Four Forests Restoration Initiative that provides no estimates for road work and instead defers to individual forest travel plans for possible decommissioning opportunities. Unfortunately, the travel plans in Arizona thus far completed have failed to include much  decommissioning, and instead increase overall system road mileage.

While selected collaborative proposals vary widely in watershed restoration treatments, the opportunity certainly exists to focus on road reclamation and maintenance, as well as other activities that can improve fish passage and increase water quality. However the CFLR advisory panel can only recommend the proposals it receives, so collaborative groups need to include a broad range of restoration treatments, and stress their importance to the Regional Forester. Therefore, it may be advantageous for those of us who promote watershed restoration to get involved with future collaboration efforts to promote road and other comprehensive restoration treatments.

The CFLR act provides an opportunity to promote watershed restoration within the context of landscape scale approaches that utilize vegetative treatments to reduce wildfire risk, among  ther benefits. However, some are dubious of this approach and collaboration in general; but multi-party, science-based monitoring may help prove or negate concerns. Ultimately, one must answer whether or not it is better to sit at the table and improve CFLR proposals, or to rely on traditional public involvement opportunities provided by other laws and regulations.

Flowchart adapted from the USDA Forest Service. 2011. Overview of CFLR Program Proposal Development and Selection Process.

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1 PL 11-111 Sec. 4001. Purpose
2 PL 11-111 Sec. 4003(b)
3 This comes from the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act of 2000, Sec. 205 of PL 106-393 under subsections c-f.
4 PL 11-111 Sec. 4003(b)(4)(B) & (7)
5 http://www.fs.fed.us/restoration/CFLR/questions/answers/qa001_funding.shtml. This link also shows all the different codes from the Forest Service budget that can be used to match CFLR funding.
6 http://www.fs.fed.us/restoration/CFLR/documents/Annual-ReportWorkPlan/Annual_Report_Template_Instructions.docx
7 PL 11-111 Sec. 4003(b)(3)(B),(C) & (E)
8 http://www.fs.fed.us/restoration/CFLR/selections.shtml
9 See the Southwestern Crown of the Continent Landscape Restoration Strategy, p 24. http://www.fs.fed.us/restoration/CFLR/documents/2010Proposals/Region1/SWCrown/Southern_Crown_2010_CFLRP_Proposal_FINAL.pdf