Watersheds for Firesheds
Welcome!
New! Community Navigators - The federal land agencies (e.g., USFS, BLM, NPS, etc.) are doing their darndest (not their forte) to link underserved communities with IRA and Infrastructure Act grants. Fortunately, two well-known NGOs have stepped up to help: Coalitions and Collaboratives (aka CoCo) and the Watershed Center have launched the USFS’s Community Navigator program. In a nutshell: The Navigator Program supports leaders in finding and accessing funding to build climate resilience (e.g., preventing and mitigating catastrophic wildfires.) First step? “Request a Navigator” – a staffer will be in touch.
Manna for us map geeks - and western water managers and watershed advocates - At long last it’s been released: the USFS map that overlays muni source water with the designated ‘firesheds.’ This means you can now look at a critical western watershed and determine if it’s in a ‘fireshed.’ If so, you can advocate with your DS/RF for inclusion in restoration funds in upcoming fireshed allocations ($591M spent so far out of $3.5B.) The map also includes overlays for biodiversity and at-risk species, carbon, reforestation, old growth and mature forests.
How did they do it? Getting NEPA funded and completed is one of the biggest obstacles local forest and watershed advocates face - how did this coalition raise the $1.3M planning money?
Welcome to Watersheds for Firesheds, our new project helping western community-based watershed and listed species advocates, tribes, and water supply utilities tap into the Forest Service's new $3.5 billion 'Fireshed' funding. We want Forest Service 'Fireshed' investments in watersheds, wildlife habitat, and climate resilience projects to be on par with the current funding focus on community hardening and thinning.
Our job is to help you figure out how at least some of that funding can be directed towards source water, listed species, watershed restoration, and climate resilience projects.
Currently, the USFS's $3.5B strategy does not prioritize critical watersheds, listed species habitat, or climate resilience projects. The Forest Service has adopted this focus even though in the American West, the source of over half of the downstream water supply is on National Forest lands, and listed species' habitat continues to degrade rapidly. Thousands of acres of Forest Service lands are burning catastrophically, severely impacting water quality, quantity, air quality, local economies, and human health.
The US Forest Service is at a historic and challenging time. Billions of new dollars are being squeezed into an agency that has seen its annual operating budgets slashed for the past two decades, and Congressional members already want detailed update reports.
All of this makes the job for watershed and source water protection NGOs and water providers doubly challenging - we have to make sure that at least some of the funding goes to ensuring healthy watersheds and supply and, at the same time, navigate a crippled agency.
How to use this site
Roadmap for NGOs and water providers - start here
FAQ (coming soon!)
Brief Summary of the Forest Services’ 10-Year Fireshed Strategy
First Round of Fireshed Funding (NEPA-ready, $131.6M funding) - May 2022
Second Round of Fireshed Funding (NEPA-ready $460M funding) - January 2023
USFS Scenario Planning Platform the Forest Service’s analysis process for determining ‘fireshed’s - a bit dense)
Maps
Forest Service Fireshed Map (doesn’t show current investments in the May 2022 and January 2023 projects)
Runoff from National Forests Lands (you can drill down to specific watersheds)
Stories from the field - More coming soon!
Ten-year stewardship contracts awarded - how did they do it?
Coalitions approved (and funding) to carry out EIS on NFS lands - how did they do it?
Successful coalitions - how they did it/are doing it?
Questions? Stuck on next steps for your watershed? All of us at Confluence West and the Healthy Headwaters Alliance - team members will do our best to answer your question. email