WASHINGTON, DC—The Forest Service is hosting three internal webinars and soliciting employee feedback via a survey to inform the development of a National Sustainable Operations Strategic Plan.

The Forest Service has a long history of working to reduce the environmental impacts of our operations and business activities. Improving the sustainability of our operations is also required by various laws, regulations and executive orders. Sustainable operations, as defined in Forest Service Manual 1313.2, is “an institutional business model that minimizes adverse impacts to the environment resulting from agency operations and individual employee actions and facilitates an expanded and integrated systems approach to operations and asset management.”

In short, it is seeking to implement best practices around energy, water, purchasing, fleet, waste and leadership that reduce our environmental footprint and associated emissions and costs. Executive Order 14057 and other federal laws and regulations articulate specific targets and policies for “net zero” environmental impact.

A cross-deputy team is developing a National Sustainable Operations Strategic Plan. This effort builds on the lessons learned and successes of the past as well as looking to the future to understand how we can mitigate our contributions to climate change, reduce our costs and help accomplish our sustainability mission. As the agency continues on this sustainability journey, we seek the engagement of all interested employees in finding the most effective path(s) forward.

Employee engagement and feedback is critical to the formation of the plan and to its successful implementation. This strategic plan will be complemented by an implementation plan, which will be developed in 2024. To solicit employee feedback on the strategic plan, employees have the option to participate in one of three webinars and/or provide feedback through a Sustainable Operations Strategic Plan survey. We need input from all types of positions to ensure efforts are relevant and grounded. Participation in this survey and webinars is optional.

Webinar information (all three webinars will provide the same information and follow the same format; employees only need to participate in one). Webinars will last 60 minutes.

• Oct. 31, 4:00-5:00 p.m. EDT: Join Engagement One with this Teams link
• Nov. 1, 4:00-5:00 p.m. EDT: Join Engagement Two with this Teams link
• Nov. 6, 2:00-3:00 p.m. EST: Join Engagement Three with this Teams link

You can also take the National Sustainable Operations Strategic Plan Survey here. The survey is open until Nov. 7, 2023.

To learn more about Sustainable Operations in the Forest Service, please visit the Office of Sustainability and Climate’s Sustainable Operations SharePoint site (internal link).

Thank you for taking the time to engage in this process.