Ground Truth Blog
Congresswoman Calls for Investigation of Toxic Metals in Fire Retardant
U.S. Rep. Teresa Leger Fernández, a Democrat representing New Mexico's 3rd Congressional District, recently issued a press release announcing that she and other members of Congress are seeking an investigation into the prevalence and impacts of toxic heavy metals in...
Data Shows Federal Wildland Fire Staffing Shortages
Forest Service Chief Tom Schultz told a House subcommittee in July that the agency's firefighting workforce is "stronger than at any point in recent years" and "fully staffed and equipped to respond aggressively to every unplanned ignition," but a survey of the...
Cheatgrass Implicated in Hawk Fire Near Reno
The human-caused Hawk Fire in Nevada made headlines after it grew to 15,000 acres from Saturday, Aug. 22, to Sunday, Aug. 23. as winds pushed the flames into parts of northwest Reno. Like a majority of fast-growing fires, the Hawk Fire burned mainly in brush and grass...
Michigan Conservation Easement Supports Old Growth
Typically, when conservationists talk about old-growth forests, they focus on protecting forests that have already reached that stage. In Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, a new conservation easement takes a different approach by protecting a forest so it can naturally...
Science Backs Prescribed Burning as the Federal Government Backs Away
A study published June 11 in Science by Stanford researchers Iván Higuera-Mendieta and Marshall Burke and covered last week by The Washington Post confirms what fire ecologists and Indigenous communities have advocated for generations: low-severity, controlled burning...
Fast Fire
As Westerners cope with the smoke and flames of another record-setting fire season, the media serves up dramatic videos of various active wildfires. Much of this footage focuses on dramatic images of crown fires burning through forest canopies, suggesting these fires...
Forest Service Reorganization Threatens Public Lands
Kirsten Stade, reporting for Steady State Herald, recently spoke with FSEEE Executive Director Kevin Hood about the reorganization taking place within the U.S. Forest Service. The interview was part of a larger piece examining the Trump Administration's restructuring...
A Conversation With Jack Cohen
Dr. Jack Cohen delivered a keynote presentation at the 2026 Colorado Wildland Fire Conference in Fort Collins entitled “Community Wildfire Risk and Fire Resilient Landscapes.” Just prior to his keynote, we had the opportunity to have a conversation about his work as a...
Tell the Senate Agriculture Committee to Remove Destructive Forestry Provisions from the 2026 Farm Bill
The Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry is shaping Title VIII (Forestry) of the 2026 Farm Bill (Agricultural Act of 2026). The Committee failed to move the 2026 Farm Bill on 8/6/26 - but Senate Ag Committee Chairman Senator John Boozman has vowed...
Grounds for Hope
A longtime FSEEE supporter recently confided to me that the countless assaults on our public lands and endless stories of environmental degradation were getting to him. He asked for a reason to hope. The truth is, I do feel hopeful. There is a clear and prolonged arc...
U.S. Wildland Fire Service
‘Like Trying to Fly a Plane While You’re Building It’ by Timothy Ingalsbee The airplane metaphor has become a common theme in conversations among wildland firefighters discussing the U.S. Wildland Fire Service (WFS). President Trump issued Executive Order 14308...
Courthouse News Covers FSEEE’s Fight Over Toxic Fire Retardant
Courthouse News Service reported on oral arguments in FSEEE's federal lawsuit challenging the Forest Service's use of aerial fire retardant, which the agency sprays across millions of acres of public land every fire season without ever having formally analyzed the...