“Come back to work.” That’s the message from the U.S. Forest Service’s new chief, Tom Schultz, to recently-retired workers. The call comes just ahead of the busy summer rush, when visitors typically flood national forests and the risks of wildfires escalate significantly.
During a creek-side chat at Fishlake National Forest in Utah this month, Schultz said employees who took deferred resignation, offered by President Trump’s administration amid a flurry of federal cost cutting, should consider returning to help the service.
“We have seen some states step up and bring on employees – seasonals that work for us and work with us,” Schultz said. “So, I think those are the opportunities we need to look at – so, ‘What partners exist?’ and we can leverage their interest and use funding that’s in the system.”
He said safety and fire response are top priorities for the Forest Service.
More than 4,000 of the agency’s employees accepted Trump administration early resignation offers earlier this year and another roughly 3,000 were fired.
Asked about the deferred resignation program, Schultz said it “did have some impacts, though.”
“I guess my encouragement at this point is to reach out to those folks and assess their interest and availability, and then encourage them to come back and be available for this season,” he said.
The agency manages 193 million acres of national forests and grasslands.
While wildfire suppression efforts are a top priority, Schultz also said ongoing efforts to maintain the health of forests are also important to the agency.
“As we look at the forest conditions that are out there, we have many forests that are much more dense,” he said. “We’ve had catastrophic wildfire. So, we need to actively manage our forests to protect communities, to manage the forest health. And also deal with insect and disease issues.”
