Ron: Bill ending fire borrowing "an uncommon triumph for common sense”

Ron recently received a pair of briefings in Bend and Boise about the upcoming wildfire season and heard from the U.S. Forest Service how his recently passed bipartisan bill to end “fire borrowing” will help.

“The passage of our bill to end fire borrowing means today Westerners can celebrate an uncommon triumph for common sense,” Ron said at a post-briefing news conference in Boise.

“What we are now doing is liberating scarce funds to focus on fire prevention,” he said at the news conference with Acting U.S. Forest Service Chief Vicki Christiansen, Idaho Sens. Mike Crapo and Jim Risch, and Idaho Rep. Mike Simpson

Kicking off Wildfire Awareness Month, Ron said the bipartisan Wildfire Disaster Funding Act will spell the end of shortchanging fire prevention work in which federal agencies “borrowed” money from essential wildfire prevention work to fill budgets for battling the big blazes.

Ron’s bill lets federal agencies, such as the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management, better plan for wildland fires and devote the resources necessary to fight them.

In between the Bend briefing about wildfire season in central Oregon and the Boise briefing about wildfire season in eastern Oregon, Ron held town halls in Washington, Marion, Malheur, Harney, Baker and Grant counties