Thanks for that kind introduction. It’s a real pleasure to be here!
Common Values
We in this room share a set of common values. We share a reverence for America’s Great Outdoors … for America’s wildlife … for America’s great traditions of hunting, part of our national heritage … for conserving the habitat that America’s wildlife needs to survive and to thrive.
America is an exceptional place. In the 1830s, Alexis de Tocqueville first coined the term American exceptionalism. He meant it in a political sense, but I think it applies to our cultural values and experiences as well, particularly with respect to the Great Outdoors.
Other cultures have their great castles and cathedrals, their Great Walls, their great works of art and architecture, sometimes thousands of years old. We have our great works of nature, our mountains and plains, our great forest cathedrals, our native wildlife riches. We are still close to pioneer traditions only a few centuries old, including the great American traditions of hunting and fishing.
Those traditions come with certain obligations that we inherit as Americans, including the obligation to conserve our native wildlife by caring for the land. The values we at the Forest Service share with you here today give us common grounds for working together to care for the land.
And we already do work together. We work together through wildlife conservation partnerships that the Forest Service has with many of your member organizations. For years, we have been working together to protect, improve, and restore habitat for a wide range of wildlife on the national forests and grasslands, including elk, deer, wild turkey, ruffed grouse, and more.
Challenges to Forest Health
And it is vitally important that we do, because many of America’s ecosystems are too often in poor or declining health. Today, the challenges to conservation are some of the greatest our nation has ever known.
As you know, much of our country has been in prolonged drought. Severe drought has resulted in extreme fire weather and very large fires and fire seasons. Since 2000, at least ten states have had record fires; nationwide, we’ve had some of our largest fire seasons and most severe fires since the 1950s.
Growing fire seasons are partly due to warmer and drier conditions associated with a changing climate. Warming temperatures mean more energy in the atmosphere, which is consistent with severe fire seasons—and with severe weather events, such as tornadoes and hurricanes.
Other challenges are associated with invasive species and with population growth and urban expansion. Growing drought and wildfires … growing land use conversion … the spread of invasive species … the spread of native forest pests and disease … how will all this affect natural resources in the United States?
Take the impacts on wildlife alone. Twenty-seven percent of all forest-associated plants and animals in the United States, a total of 4,005 species, are at risk of extinction. In some areas, the threats extend to wildlife species that Americans like to hunt. Loss of open space means habitat loss and fragmentation, as do climate-related stresses and disturbances.
In fact, urbanization and fragmentation or parcelization are some of the most serious threats, partly because we lose access to lands traditionally open to recreational use. Of course, the national forests and grasslands will always be open to hunting, fishing, and other forms of recreational use. That is a birthright belonging to every American. But as homes and communities spread right up to the green line around America’s public lands, access for hunting and other recreational uses has too often become more difficult.
Working through Partnerships
So we have our work cut out for us. The Forest Service is working with partners, including many of you in this room based on the values we all share. We are working together to protect and restore habitat for game and other wildlife.
We do that partly by working together to restore healthy, resilient forest and grassland ecosystems—ecosystems that can resist climate-related stresses such as drought … ecosystems that can recover from disturbances such as fires, floods, and insect attack.
Healthy forests and grasslands are key. Healthy lands provide high-quality habitat for wildlife and reduce the threat of habitat loss to wildfires and to major outbreaks of insects and disease. The Forest Service has joined partners in launching dozens of large-scale restoration projects around the country. Our projects are designed in part to restore fire-adapted forest types across large landscapes. As part of that, we reintroduce periodic wildland fire where safe and effective.
Some of you here might be involved. Through the stewardship programs of the National Wild Turkey Federation and the Mule Deer Foundation, for example, we are accomplishing our joint restoration objectives.
And let’s not forget all the other benefits that people get from healthy forests and grasslands. Active forest management supports thriving communities all across our nation. Active forest management helps people reconnect with the outdoors by expanding all the benefits that both rural and urban residents get from hunting and other forms of outdoor recreation.
And think of all the economic benefits people get from sustainably managed forests and grasslands—not least from people who might drive from many miles away to hunt or fish. They might stop to eat and get gas … they might stay overnight … inevitably, they spend money in our gateway communities, boosting rural economies all across America.
In fact, spending by visitors supports more jobs and economic output than any other activities on the National Forest System. In 2012, outdoor recreation on the national forests and grasslands alone supported around 190,000 jobs and contributed roughly $13 billion to the nation’s gross domestic product. That’s billion, with a “b”! In rural areas where other forms of income might be in short supply, recreational spending is truly a godsend.
I mentioned access to public lands, and I know this is a critical issue for all of you here. It is yet another area of common ground, because we at the Forest Service believe that public access to lands owned by all Americans is a national birthright. Sadly, your birthright and mine is too often violated when private or corporate landowners are unwilling to grant easements across their lands so that you can access yours.
That is in good part why we have a Land Acquisition Program through the Land and Water Conservation Fund. Our program is designed to do three things: give people access; protect critical ecosystems; and prevent habitat fragmentation. I think we can all agree on the importance of those three things, and we collaborate with hunting organizations and other partners to achieve them. Our partners in land acquisitions include state game and fish agencies and some of you in this room, such as the National Wild Turkey Federation and the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation.
So we are working together right now to address some of the challenges we face to conserving America’s wildlife. But now is not enough. We must also invest in the future. I can’t think of a better way of investing in the future of conservation than by engaging more of America’s youth in healthy outdoor activities such as hunting and fishing. Make a kid a hunter and he or she will become a conservation steward for life.
That is yet another of our shared values and goals. We all understand that participation rates in hunting and fishing are declining. We want to work with you to turn that around. We want to work together to recruit new sportsmen and new sportswomen from every community and from all walks of life. We want to introduce young people across America to the joys of hunting and fishing and other forms of outdoor recreation on lands that belong to them as American citizens.
To that end, the Forest Service invests over $28 million in conservation education every year. I believe that is money well spent. Each year, we reach more than 4 million people through our education and outreach efforts.
I’ll give you a few examples. You might have heard of the 21st-Century Conservation Service Corps. This is a federal initiative to get young people up close and personal with nature by giving them opportunities to work outdoors on conservation projects on public land. In 2014, the federal agencies involved over 10,000 young people and that is our goal again in 2015. We are in the final stages of selecting projects in partnership with National Fish and Wildlife Foundation.
Other examples include initiatives with a variety of partners, such as the JAKES program with the National Wild Turkey Federation. For years, we’ve cosponsored National Fishing Day with many states and local partners. We also have International Migratory Bird Day events in collaboration with the states and many other partners.
The latest initiative is called Every Kid in the Park. This is a government initiative to get every fourth-grader in the country out onto their public lands and waters. Kids that age have a natural wonder about nature and a natural knack for having outdoor fun—I’m sure we all remember. And it will be an experience that kids will never forget, especially if they come from urban environments, as 83 percent of us do. The program will begin in the 2015-2016 school year.
Partnerships: The Future of Conservation
But we want to do more! We want to be even more inclusive and more strategic, and we need your help.
At the outset of my remarks, I mentioned Alexis de Tocqueville and American exceptionalism. America is exceptional because of folks like you. You are the keepers of the flame, the repositories of our national memory, the ones who remember the roots of our pioneer traditions in outdoor activities—in hunting and fishing and living off the land.
So, in closing, I would like to salute you and all your member organizations for your conservation leadership. My heartfelt thanks go out to you and your member organizations for working in partnership with us for a healthier, more sustainable future for your public lands.
Through partnerships like this, based on common values and traditions that are part of our heritage as Americans, I am confident that healthy habitat for thriving populations of America’s wildlife will endure for generations to come ...
… and, as we all know, this is a precious heritage that our nation cannot afford to lose.