The Whoofoo Conspiracy

A week ago SOS Forests reported (here) on the Wildland Fire Leadership Council, the Federal advisory committee that oversees the National Fire Plan. The following was extracted from various WFLC documents:

The Wildland Fire Leadership Council (WFLC) was established in April 2002 to implement and coordinate the National Fire Plan and the Federal Wildland Fire Management Policy. WFLC consists of senior level department officials, federal, state, tribal and county representatives, including all five federal wildland firefighting agency heads. WFLC was established to address interagency, interdepartmental differences to ensure seamless delivery of a coordinated fire protection program. The Council brings together wildland firefighting organizations to implement the 10-Year Comprehensive Strategy and Implementation Plan, a component of the National Fire Plan. WFLC meets regularly to monitor progress of the Ten-Year Strategy, to discuss current issues, and to resolve differences among wildland firefighting agencies.

Authority.  The Departments of Agriculture and the Interior are authorized to enter into cooperative agreements by the Protection Act of 1922 (42 Stat 857; 16 U.S.C. 594) and the Public Land Administration Act of 1960 (74 Stat 506; 43 U.S.C. 1361-1364). 

In addition, the Secretaries entered into a Memorandum of Understanding dated January 28, 1943, and  February 21, 1963, to provide adequate wildfire management and protection to the lands under their respective jurisdictions.  State representation is authorized by the Clarke-McNary Act of June 7, 1924, Sec. 1 (43 Stat 653, 16 U.S.C. 564).

The following people are current voting members:

Mark Rey, Under Secretary of Agriculture for Natural Resources and the Environment
David Tenny, Dep.  Under Secretary of Agriculture for Natural Resources and the Environment
Gail Kimbell, Chief of the USDA Forest Service
Tom Weimer, Asst. Sec. Dept. of the Interior
Arch Wells, Dep. Director Indian Affairs, DOI
Jim Hughes, Director Bureau of land Management
Mary Bornar, Director National Park Service
H. Dale Hall, Director US Fish and Wildlife Service
Bob Doyle, US Geological Services Rep.
Charlie Dickinson, US Fire Administration Chief, Dept. Homeland Security
Jim Caswell, Western Governors Assoc.
Jim Erickson, Intertribal Timber Council
Gary Gilbert, National Assoc. of Counties
Kip Howlett, National Assoc. of State Foresters

The current chair is Nina Hatfield, Asst. Sec. Dept. of the Interior.

Staffing is provided by the DOI Office of Wildland Fire Coordination, Mark Beighley, Director.

In our stunning exposé, Cranking Up the Whoofoo Propaganda Machine, we reported that the WFLC has initiated a “Blacken, Burned Forests Are Beautiful” campaign in association with BINGO’s (Big International Non-Governmental Organizations) including the Nature Conservancy, the Wilderness Society, and others.

We documented our report with the minutes of the WFLC meeting of February 22, 2007, and cited this passage:

Revise MOU language for NGO participation consistent with WFLC goals. WFLC should not become a Federal Advisory Committee. Consider addition of a fire chief’s representative as WFLC member, in a manner consistent with FACA. Confer with legal counsel. Draft business rules for review.

As is clear from the minutes, the WFLC know they are violating FACA, the Federal Advisory Committee Act (Public Law 92-463, 5 U.S.C., App). They express an unwillingness to comply by “not becoming” something that they are and have been since inception. Further, they know they must comply with FACA, at least in regards to a proposed “fire chief’s representative” addition to the Council. (Note, we think they meant chiefs’, as in more than one.)

But they have already seated BINGO’s, in clear violation of FACA. The past actions of the WFLC have been illegal. And they intend to continue to break the law.

As a direct result of our exposé posted Tuesday, on Thursday the WFLC removed the evidence of their crimes from the National Fire Plan web site. Not only were the Feb. 22 minutes removed, but the entire directory, http://fireplan.gov/leadership was removed.

The light of day burned the WFLC like acid. They found that they could not operate in an open and transparent fashion, due to their criminality, and so they have chosen to veil themselves from the public. We suspect the veiling is temporary, since they can’t hide for long. They aren’t the CIA, for goodness sakes.

And what is it really that they are up to that requires secrecy? It isn’t national defense or homeland security. No, it is whoofoos.

The WFLC wishes to incinerate America’s forests in catastrophic fires we call whoofoos (wildland fire use fires or WFU’s). They seek desperately any excuse for forest mega-holocaust. To that end they have crippled Federal firefighting capabilities and initiated their Orwellian “Black, Burned, Dead Forests Are Beautiful” propaganda campaign.

And when SOS Forests turned the bright light of public scrutiny on their crimes and evil ways, they scuttled into the shadows like cockroaches.

They have forgotten that America’s public forests and America’s Federal government do not belong to bureaucrats and their political cronies. They have forgotten that our forests and our government belong to you and me.

Those are our forests the WFLC is burning down. Those are our laws the WFLC is breaking. It is our right (and duty) as American citizens to be informed about the machinations of our land management agencies; the WFLC is violating our rights.

This is no small matter. Another fire season is already upon us. The WFLC response to last year, the worst fire season in 50 years and third record-breaker under this Administration, has been to criminally indict fire managers, dismantle fire teams, and drive off experienced firefighters. The WFLC has illegally seated radical holocauster lobbyists at their decision table, and are secretly planning the most horrific forest fires imaginable.

Our Federal land management agencies have not merely abandoned our public forests, they are actively destroying them with catastrophic fire, at an annually increasing rate, and at the very real risk of a regional firestorm unprecedented in US history.

It looks like a criminal terrorist conspiracy at the Cabinet level, at least. The leadership of the USDA, USFS, USDOI, BLM, NPS, USFWS, and USGS have apparently been infiltrated and subverted by radical, anti-American, anti-forest, anti-human being, pseudo-environmental fanatics hellbent on forest holocaust.

SOS Forests broke this awful news and revealed the WFLC conspiracy last week. You heard it here first. And second, in this post.

And you will hear it here again. We are doing what we can to prevent wholesale forest destruction, and fingering the conspirators of that destruction is part of our mission.

Postbar to Gail: I expected better than this from you. I am extremely disappointed. Talk about getting off on the wrong foot; you are jumping off a cliff! You are not allowed to destroy America’s forests. Find a better way to manage your agency, and do it quick.