Transcripts For CSPAN 2017 Western Governors Assocation Winter Meeting - U.S. Forest Service... 20171227

Thank you, jim. Thank you, christine. Christine, you have a good voice. Lets move on. [laughter] let me join jim in welcoming you all to phoenix. I am pleased to see some any western governors here. We have a Great Program planned, and im delighted we can share this time together. Over the next two days we will have visits with Top Administration officials including the secretary of labor , the secretary of u. S. Foreston, service chief who will be visiting with us momentarily. And although he was not able to stay for todays activities, we visited with the secretary of agriculture. We will hear to other keynote speakers. The president of the arizona cardinals, and john ratzenberger. Most of you know john as the clavin from the tv show, cheers. Johnnk we will all enjoy speak about that. Johns comments will touch on one of the greatest challenges our nation faces which is vital to expanding our Economic Vitality in coming years. That is workforce of element. My initiative as chair is focused on Workforce Development , how we prepare students of today for the job market of tomorrow, and how we ease the worker transition to employment opportunities. I have been pleased to see the bipartisan engagement with my fellow governors on this issue. Workshops in colorado, oklahoma, in washington state, and my home state south dakota. I am looking forward to additional efforts supporting the initiative leading up to the annual meeting in south dakota next june. Our meeting today and tomorrow will conduct Panel Discussions on infrastructure challenges, Autonomous Vehicles the changing and spendr country, time examining how the state federal relationship has changed over time. We will also announce some adoptive policy resolutions. Im hoping we can have a little fun as well. Im going to turn it over to our does you have a many talents. Christine certainly didnt marry him for your course. For our first speaker, it is my sincere and true pleasure to introduce tony tooke. Tony was introduced as the chief are in august of this year. Response tod in literally wildfires, days after he was announced as the chief, there he was in like or in silly on the lake. I appreciate that sort of beginning. From the i also look forward to welcoming you back to big sky country. The chief has been working for the Forest Service for most of his adult life, having started 18. Ge he brings leadership and accomplishments that will no doubt serve us and him and that role. Certainly, plenty of challenges agency. His in montana, we had one of the most expensive in this agencys history. It will also be one of the most expensive than our nations history. House of federal Government Funds wildfire suppression is a impression. Knowingf is certainly better than i do how this cripples teamwork that can mitigate wildfire danger in the first place. And i, and im sure the of others look forward to working with him and to move washington forward to in steps with the washingtons governor ball. Last year, i began the management and initiative in my role as chair of wga. That Initiative Came up by recommendation to improve forest land practices. I know you are familiar with the work. We were pleased to see the Forest Service take an active and engaged role in our efforts. I hope the g4 continued that and work with governors to enforce the recommendations. For making time. We look forward to hearing you and working with you about the opportunities of public land space. Please join me in welcoming chief tony tooke. [applause] at good afternoon. I was scrambling trying to make my talk into a song but i think im going to stick with it as i had it. It is honored to be here. An honor to be her. I look forward to the time we will spend together this morning. The Forest Service has a long withry and relationship the western states and western governors and states across the country. We hold in very high regard the relationships we have with the states, in particular the association. Nors our relationships and partnership go back to the fires of 1910 in the northern rockies. After those fires, we informed cooperative agreements. Since then, we have expanded the partnerships, for example like the 2014 farm bill and the Good Neighborhood party. We have signed dozens of agreements since the Good Neighbor authority was expanded nationwide. Western states are tremendous partners. About 84 of the western forest system lies in the western states. The National Force and grasslands make up large proportions of the western states and has about 112 Million People who live in the west. Those 112 Million People depend mightily on the values and benefits they get from the National Forest and National Grasslands. Things like lame water, forest manyange products and other things. In the west, their economic livelihood and west wellbeing depend on these arrangements. We share the responsibility to manage these landscapes with the people of the west and we share responsibility for taking on the threats and the risk and as many of you know, these landscapes are at risk. I want to Work Together. I want to roll up my sleeves and work with the states, the local communities, the nongovernmental organizations, to take on some of these problems on a larger scale. A top priority for us is to improve the condition of forest and range lands. As i say that come about 80 million acres, i will take the National Forest system for example, 80 million acres are at risk of to high catastrophic fire, insect, and disease. One third of that is extreme risk, very high risk. What is at stake when we look at these acres and lands at risk . Drinking water. Environmental security. Communities. Homes adjacent to these lands that are at risk. Sacred sites. His start places. Wildlife habitat. Recreation opportunity. There is a lot riding on that. Arey commitment is, for we going to step up our game, and we are stepping up our game to increase results and up comes the ground, were going to use every tool, every authority, and every resource we have available to us to work with the states, work the local communities, work with our other federal partners, work with tribes, and work with nongovernmental organizations. When i look at western governors National Forest and range management initiative, icy immediately and i read it through three times and i really appreciate that our employees be engagedrtunity to early on. It, theook at opportunities does meld perfectly with the way we see things. For example, we see an urgent need to improve these conditions. We see an urgent need to forge agreements with stakeholders across the landscape to restore Forest Health. Like you, we recognize the need to overcome obstacles, obstacles that exist to collaboration, obstacles to insufficient funding, and obstacles like insufficient markings and a diameter for small products. We also see that there is a lack of sufficient coordination across landscapes and we see excessive cost and delays associated with planning and going through our environmental analysis and decisionmaking process. So come the question is, how do rise tothe needs and these challenges we face together and how can we work Better Together to improve the conditions of forest and rage lands, particularly in the west. One way the forest land can do that is by being Good Neighbors and excelling at customer service. The landnd caring for then serving the people have been at the center and core of our culture for a long time in as chief, what to reemphasize that part of who we are. I want to ensure we are connect did in communities and that we are listening to people and listening to their ideas and that their ideas are contributing to what we are doing. As chief of the Forest Service, as an agencye sure we work with efficiency at integrity when it comes to focusing on the people that we serve. You know, i envision a diverse, Broad Coalition for conservation where were all working together and using every tool, every authority, everything we have available to us. With plenty to do. There is a backlog of allotment andeferred maintenance certainly a backlog of Forest Management. Addressing those needs, we can positively affect jobs and economic opportunities, particularly like in rural communities. Every american citizens that we serve deserves our very best and deserves us to excel. If its not affect matter is a contractor, permit or, every forest and grassland user, every citizen. We have to better understand what the requirements are to each one of those customers as we expanded the use of our best practices and we will apply those innovative tools to overcome barriers that given the way of us doing that. Having sustainable, healthy forest and grassland is going to depend upon our ability to increase results and get that are outcomes on the landscape. And so we are using the Good Neighbor authority, for example, to expand our ability to do that. Im really proud of how the Good Neighbor authority has really achieved some deep roots and really expanded. We now have over 130 agreement signed with 32 states and most of the states are in the west. A lot of the Good Neighbor authority agreements, about half of them, are for Forest Health and Forest Management is the main objective. The other half is managing hazardous fuel, maintaining habitat, and understanding improvement work. So i am very proud of the work we are getting done under this authority. A couple of examples, last year in idaho that Idaho Department of land had the first Good Neighbor authority timbers center in the clearwater National Forest. Billion ofted 4. 5 timber and another 1. 2 million of revenue for restoration projects. That is one example. For ways tolooking improve and strengthen it. In nevada, we are developing a master agreement and involving three state agencies, to Forest Service regencies, and the bureau of land management. We are looking at the barriers they get in the way of it ending the Good Neighbor authority. For example, some of the restrictions on road construction. Are designing webpages where people can interface on the web, do training around Good Neighbor authority had look at policy in lessons learned. Another way to address the challenges that we face is through stewardship. Increasing partnerships and volunteerism. The Forest Service cannot do its alone and we cannot do by just looking at the National Forest system. With a look across the landscape beyond the National Forest system. We want to work with everybody, every citizen. Anybody from all walks of life, whether from a rural area out or urban community. Bringing people together where we have a diverse come a Strong Coalition is the way that we will get things done, increased the scale and the impact of our to deliver conservation to the american people. The other thing to take this on, whipped use every tool in the box and i will give me some example. Timber harvesting, wildfire, prescribed burning, we have to use noncommercial hazardous reduction projects. With use herbicides. Sometimes refuse a combination of these. We have to use every tool available to us. When we get burning in the west, we can have fire on those terms or our terms. We have to ramp up prescribed burning. In doing this, using every tool of the box, we will make sure we Stay Grounded in science, solid, sound science. Good data, working collaboratively and using good maps. Another commitment and another thing were looking at is how we improve our environmental analysis and decisionmaking processes. The bottom line is it costs too much and takes too long and we think we can improve and and we can improve a without sacrificing quality. Using mean by that is by sound science, good data, and working collaboratively with different groups we put personnel already in place to do this. We started last september with a meeting of our National Leadership and a crosssection of our workforce and now we are taking some of our ideas to our external partners and stakeholders. Firefighting. I certainly want to thank the western governors who have continued to support us over and over. We have climbed this mountain many times. We have climbed back up again and we are very close. Im optimistic this is going to happen. Getting a fire funding fix that would increase resources we have in increase our ability and capacity to take on these conditions and improve the conditions of our forest and range lands is a good way that we can prevent wildfires because i think one of the longterm answers is upstream in how we manage the land. This past fire season illustrates the challenges we face. You alluded to that earlier. This is the fire season. In theber 2016 and summer and appellations, the southeast extended to the south west, the northern rockies, california, the northwest. At the same time we had major hurricanes strike the mainland, u. S. , while we were dealing with fire suppression. Some of them you mentioned. Over 9 million acres burned. This is much higher than the 10year average. We had a recordbreaking year in many ways. For example, the fire levels four and five, which are our highest, we stayed at those two levels for over 70 consecutive days. At one time, we had over 80 large fires. When i stepped into this position, there were fires in over 300 acres at a time of year when we usually have 25 fires. So you can see the challenges we have. I do not know how many structures have burned. Our best estimate is 11,500, almost four times the average 20002015. Years our fire personnel were stretched thin but i am really proud of the way the fire community, the federal agencies, the states come the local governments and counties and others came together. We maxed out and we had 28,000 people for several weeks at one time supporting the fire season in the west at its peak. You mentioned how much of our budget is going to fire, it was over 2. 4 billion this past year. 57 of our agency budget. It is predicted by the year 2021 and is going to be 67 of nothing does not change. The way that fire is funded has been around. It is funded at the 10year average that has been around for well over two decades. This is not a scientific finding mechanism, it is a mathematical funding mechanism. We are jumping off in that 10year average some of those low fire years and these recent years are adding to that cost. So we need a firefighting fix that this couple things. Stops the growth of that 10 year average against a flat edge and or it increases our resources that we have to manage the forest. Secondly, treats disaster fires, these large megafires and national disasters, has them funded out of emergency funding and not out of our normal appropriations. I will open it up for questions but in the last two decades we have also seen our number of nonfire employees declined from because we have had to increase our workforce to take on the fire challenge. So this is simply not sustainable. I am very optimistic. Members of congress are considering different legislative proposals right now. The administration is working really hard and we are working really hard to find a solution. So, those are some of the priorities i see for the fourth service. Forest service. Improving the land, being Good Neighbors, providing excellent customer service, promoting shared partnerships, and finding a solution and ask to the way wildfire suppression is funded. I think all of those dovetail really well with the concerns and opportunities that the western governors see. I think we have an anonymous opportunity right now to roll up our sleeves, Work Together, and pray together this Diverse Coalition that can really move the needle and changed the water level on delivering conservation across the landscape, particularly in the west and im excited to be able to do that with you guys so thank you. [applause] thank you. For many of is, the farm bill really open possibilities and things were now saying on the ground. We have a lot more work to do even using those tools. I know that you were at the helm leading Forest Service implementation of the 2014 farm bill. As we start looking toward the are your sort of aspirations for that farm bill as a relates to four street . Anything that can strengthen the i think, like the Good Neighbor of authority and give maybe a little bit or flexibility. There may be some ways that we can strengthen efficiencies that we have in the insect and disease at designation. I know there is a roads issue with the Good Neighbor authority. Those are some of the things i see that we can work on. Next is anybody have questions for the chief . Have questions for the chief . Chief, thank you for being here. I want to pass on that thanks for all those who do the dangers business. You talked about tools in the box in terms of maintaining. Ealthy forests one of the things that is certainly important in the west is the opportunity for grazing permits. I would ask you to address, because i think there is some perspective that grazing is inherently harmful to the forest. Address that in terms of how the forest and as a way of proactively reducing the fuel of the ground as a way of impacting some of the fires, if you would. Orso, i think the second third week in this job very early on i had the opportunity to go to a Public Land Council meeting. I changed my schedule to do that. In my view, grazing is very much a legitimate and needed management tool and one that we recognize and we want to do what we can to increase the use and i know if we have issues, that i know we have the issues we can work through and address. We also have a backlog of range. Llotment work we have, you know, many vacant allotments that i asked the Public Land Council, you know, that they give us what some of their top arguments are for some of those we might open up and might move some things around so it is very much a recognized, legitimate use and one that we look forward to working on to try and improve. Chief for being here and thank you for your comments on that. Please, go ahead. No chief, we had some good discussions is morning and i very much appreciate those because a lot of the genesis of what weve done in idaho is a result of the Great Company in idaho, the idaho forest group. One of the things we discussed was years ago when i first became governor and 2007, we had one of the largest wildfires in the desert. 700,000 acres mark and less than two weeks. We lost a a lot of habitat, that sort of thing. So what we did was we found out when that fire started at 5000 acres there was actually a cap on a lowboy that couldve been unloaded the end couldve fire liesth the first and probably held that fire to considerably less than what it was. So we created a Rural Volunteer Fire Association oppresses others date of idaho and that is where the interior department came in and trained the farmers and ranchers on safety to lower theliability and prevent accidents that were going to happen, because they lived in the resource and when they see a lightning strike, a puff of smoke, they can be right up there on it with their own equipment and are willing to do it. Question, because we have been very successful with them and we have stopped a lot of fires in their infancy. Would it be possible for us to work up a protocol for the Forest Service to train our loggers and our folks who actually live in and adjacent to the forest to actually do the same thing . Rx i think that is something we can definitely look at. There might be a little bit of Something Like that in the 14 farm bill around stewardship. Im trying to remember. It is definitely something we can go back and look at and we can talk to the other agencies, the other cooperators as well as the state force trees for example to see if we have the ability to do it now. If we dont have the authority to do it now we can look at what it would take but you know, i am for any ideas on the table that can help us manage to restore healthy resilient forest like well want to. I think we need to look at everything. Chief, when i was first elected we had quite a bit of pine needle problems in black hills National Forest and we ended up allocating a fair beunt of state versus is to spent on private state resources to be spent on private land. As you probably know, the black hills is quite checkered with private andholdings and to the extent that we could not spend dollars on federal land at that time, maybe it is easier to do now, but to the extent we could not then we tried to do what we could on private land and stateowned land. One of the things that struck me was the time that passed between when a timbering company wanted do some timbering on federal land and the process they had to go through was quite a few years. As i recall, five years before they could actually get into the land and do some timbering. To the extent we wanted to use slowingg as a means of the spread of the pine needles, by the time we got permits for a contract, the beatles had already been through that land and were moving on. What opportunities do you see in the future for streamlining and to what extent is that already occurred . Can you talk about that a little bit . Yes. And one the black hills of my prior jobs in washington, d. C. , with the adaptive Environmental Impact statement. You know, took some time to get that done that once we got it done they had the decision to really get after treatment in the forest. And now we have provisions with the insect and disease designations. I think we have somewhere between 5060,000,000 acres that are designated under the insect and disease designations from the 2014 farm bill so there are efficiencies with categorical exclusions as well as assessments and those that if it were facing that situation again, we are using those. We have used it multiple times. I just left the Southern Region to go back to washington, d. C. , and i will use mississippi for example. They had the largest southern. Ine beetle outbreak we are using the provisions from the farm bill to keep the Southern Pine beetle off the private lands because all of those forests are heavily surrounded by private lands. Those of the things were looking to use in the black hills or any other forest. We are in a position to get the treatments faster than we were then. Thank you. Thank you for sharing your time with us, chief. We really appreciate your taking the time out and coming here. Our forests are really in transition and we have done such a good job of preventing fires as you describe. We have more intense fires then the pine beetle. Infestationrest points to that. The rest of this dates have had to adjust to this new reality and have been under resourced. Has the Forest Service thought about the shared assets . We had a couple large tankers this last year. Montana, washington, we shared it with several states that allowing the states a larger may be shared assets and helping, the states would group together and may be put up some of the money and the federal government would put up some of the money and allow there to be an objective prioritization, i think we could agree that as governors being so good working together across partisan lines. The second thing that i think most of us have grappled with is the there are more and more People Living in the wild land urban interface. We have taken a couple runs at this to try to figure out how to get insurance companies, how to convince people to do a better job of imaging the fire risk around their homes. Im sure california has by far the greatest vulnerability here but we have a lot of her risk. , aty governor of the state this table, probably has a similar thing. If you are to work with the federal government to try to find a way to incentivize and or aate, not a heavy hand big stick, but a way to motivate. Right now people who have no risk or pain for all of the consequence of people not taking basic procedures to protect their assets. We will start with the second part first. We have a program and i am trying to sit here and think, i know we have some Great Western examples of that where i come from, southern appellation for example, the state of arkansas has been very successful implementing firewise communities. An idea like that is something we can work on. In your first question, what idea that we have and every piece of the landscape is an important part. It is not just the National Forest system but across those boundaries. Taking the science we have, the data we have, looking at probability of success, and where do we see the biggest priorities. We have to look at infrastructure. We have to look at the infrastructure that exist and whether we need to improve that or where, if we really made some huge investments with infrastructure, is there way to get it, that is something we need to sit down and work with you on and let you see what some of our ideas are and let you give us feedback on that and bring back other governmental organizations as well and to that discussion. There is only one way i see we will get anything done that impactes the scale and is by scaling and resources. We have the most of authority, the most support, the most ability to do that and the most 38my career which is almost years and i think that is a big thing. The fire funding the way it is, we have a really Good Opportunity on the other side of the coin with everything we have to really bring to bear a Diverse Coalition to take these challenges on more than we are. Last question. Thank you for being here today. We did talk about this earlier but we have designations of forests. Those designations and tell us what we can and cannot do. And, the challenge we face is sometimes i think roles get in the ways of common sense. We talk about best actresses, management, having healthy Forest Services. One will told we could use his prescribed burns to take care of some excess of fuels that are hurting animals that have access, to forge, it creates a fire hazard. We do not have the flexibility to go out and use best practices. What are we going to do to change that so you have better flexibility to bring common sense to bear to better manage the forest for a better outcome. Right. Are certain designations, there are limitations to what we can do. We can use certain tools and certain actresses under certain conditions. We actually can and do prescribed burns in the wilderness. There has to be a plan and at has to fit certain conditions uncertain situations. We have for example put prescribed burns and some of our wilderness areas so there are some things we can do with an current law. One last question governor burgum. Gov. Burgum in our meeting this morning, it was briefly mentioned there was an effort to both streamline and synchronize between the Forest Service and the blm roles and regulations. Those people involved in agriculture and Energy Development across such an award our state which includes the National Grasslands and tribal lands, we mentioned this group might be very interested in hearing closing comments from you about that effort to synchronize with blm and whatever efforts are being made. I didnt quite hear your question, im sorry. The synchronization between the element the ruling we shared this morning. Maybe share some thoughts. Yes, were been working very hard to do that. Sage grass would be one example. Blm put out a notice of intent. We pull one out behind them. We are going to be working very hard together to be at lockstep and i know both agencies are going to work really hard to hear from the states. For example, in our notice of intent we called out about six or seven things that we want to comment on. Soon in thevery near future we going to be looking for additional opportunities to where we overlap and can work more closely together to get increased results and outcomes, big problem be a for us. Please join me in thanking e. Ief took [applause] we have a pact program so im going to join our next analyst for the next program to join us immediately at the deus. I am going to recognize the next moderator of the panel, the fromable butch otter idaho. Thank you jim. I welcome the premier of saskatchewan to join us for this panel. It is a pleasure having you here for. I understand the genesis of my joining this panel was rumored by the neighboring state of montana. Fire, earthquakes, everything else, a disaster. It takes a natural one to lead this panel. [laughter] but this is at the frontline of every governor at this table. Our constituents, communities, we see a whole host of natural disasters of the last few months that weve seen their impact on energy and water structure. We have three panelists today that will speak from the federal, state, and utility perspective on how to best prepare these infrastructure assets for a variety of natural disasters that are common to the west. We have the federal administrative regional administrator to discuss preparedness, response, Mitigation Programs including impacts on infrastructure and world communities. And, the director for Energy Assurance programs at the National Association of state energy officials. Statesll speak to what are doing today and what official action states can take to improve their Energy Security in the wake of natural disasters as well as address the importance of considering the intersection between water and energy. Finally, bruce is the director of water rights and contracts arizona. Project in he will address the water supply and quality of fax from wildfires, droughts, floods and what utilities can best do to better prepare themselves for these impacts. I want to thank you all for being here and we are looking forward to your remarks. Thank you. What the governor did not mention as ive been the admin administrative director for fema for two weeks. So is really a good idea that i sit in the panel to talk to everybody since i was on in town for the western regional partnership. So i have some folks to talk to when i get back. With that said, i am the first region eight fema administrator and five years and weve had a administrators, which gives it a problem with the continuity it needs. I come from region eight. I started as a federal coordinating officer, was a Response Division coordinator, for the last five months i have been acting deputy and now on the regional administrator. It shows the direction fema is taking, putting emergency directors in charge of these areas where we have political appointees and moving forward from there so i look forward to establishing relations with all of the governors and region eight which is what i focus on, but it is an honor to be here and talk to all today. Well have a couple minutes remarks but i wanted to focus on fire, as we have been talking about that. Fema does not have a role in fighting fires but we do have a role in a Grant Program called the Fire Management Assistance Grant. It is a Simple Program as the governor will probably tell you. No, he wont. Part of the frustration and it is my frustration as well. The grants are designed to prevent a major disaster declaration and everything that goes and with that. So that is pretty narrow four of you when you look at things, especially when there is one fires burning across the state of montana, in this case that was the most recent. Supportingnt about montana this fire season, we had to open the aperture a little feman that traditional management assistant grant and say, this is not just about preventing a disaster, but that could be a megafire if you do not take things in hand soon enough. So we looked more closely, which leads to, what are the impacts on the Frontier Community like montana . Our folks may look at it and structuresare 25 threatened, this many people evacuated, whatever, in the grand schema does not look like a large number but it is a Significant Impact on that portion of the population and we have to factor that into the Grant Program. Bus yesterday not just about this, he wanted out oneonone session. He told me wanting that brock said, he said challenge the status quo. I think on this Fire Management Assistance Grant we can challenge that says go and make that program smoother, easier, and more effective for the states. It is not going to cover everything. Fire suppression classis it is written right now, i did offer eightck long that region would like to lead the way on that as we get into the National Dialogue and do what we can to. Upport you all on that end for the sake of time as well, i by ad to kind of skipped little bit of some of the things i was going to talk about and kind of folk that they come up in questions and talk about a fema and initiative called the regional integration teams. It is an initiative to try to get working ability and support to the states. We went out and we pulled the six region eight states and to see ifon did this there would be interest in femaadded, federally funded positions that work within the state to do things such as planning. To worker programs, public assistance, that sort of thing. Every state comes back with a little bit of a different take on that but if the interest is there, brock long is committed providing better support closer to the state and sin of being back at the region headquarters to make sure we are providing more capability and enhancing that partnership we have today and finally to close, another thing just to think about, obviously we have been through a time that is incredibly busy. I dont want to stand apparent but in thehurricanes end, i think we can have some pride in the fact that there was collaboration that came together pretty effectively in support of those four hurricanes and subsequently the california wildfires. Having sat through all the daily briefings we had a hand watching everything from the state perspective to the federal reporting officer through the support functions across the board. In a half hour, go around raymond talk about what we need survivors. Pport it was a pretty overall effective effort end up was proud of that agency and proud to be part of the effort to move things forward and support all of you appear as best i can. I will close on that note in i appreciate the time. Thank you. Thank you administrator. Thank you very much. Appreciate this opportunity to share with you some thoughts on the infrastructure. The blinged gauge and supporting states on working on the infrastructure is a car mission for over 30 years. The risk to the nation ever structure, electricity, National Huge when wem, is consider the economic consequences and understand existing vulnerabilities and threats. Last year alone, Power Outages cuss the United States 150 man dollars. One hundred 50 million. So far weve seen 16 weather events that have exceeded 161 million in damages and resulted over 100 deaths. 218 similar disasters have been at a cost exceeding 2. 1 train dollars and that does not yet include the cost of hurricanes most recent. 2017 report card, energy d . Etary got a 177 billion dollars is needed compared to the estimated plans of 757 million. Investments,e important to understand and her this example maps out intricacies. Lack of water for hydroelectric generation increases stress on the grid and a considerable amount of energy is needed to supply irrigation. This is one of the linkages we see when we look at interdependencies under different scenarios. During the two thousand three blackout, was emergency manager in michigan and sought the Immediate Impact of outages on the water system. Sewage plants were not fully operational. They were discharging partially and twod sewage systems. It affected fire hydrants which might not have adequate pressure for fire suppression. Even though the power was restored within 72 hours, the detroit refinery was down for 10 days and that lost a supply resulted in fuel shortages that took one month to clear up. The Public Sector in the private sector or are investment in Energy Infrastructure is needed to mitigate risk. We need to replace aging Infrastructure Project failure, i just supply and demand, and employed new technologies that mitigate far abilities particularly in the cyber field. The state capacity to quickly and efficiently respond can improve the recipient of the response and collaborate with the private sector. Facetse in multistate are key. Last year we sponsored a multistate exercise in the northwest to explore the impact earthquake sound that would have catastrophic impact on the Energy Structure in the northwest. California hosted a regional workshop to look at the impact in response of the San Andreas Fault earthquake which would have similar devastating impact. Leadso had a cyber exercise in new england to look impact if awould major shortage were to occur. Your is how we can improve the resiliency initiatives. Micro grants combined with enough power, hospitals, transit, improve their reliability and resiliency. Storage, wind, solar, other diversification actions offer additional resilience. Like smart meters can identify the number of customers that have lost power which allows for faster recovery, improved physical and Cyber Security is needed. Florida was able to restore service relatively quickly and art because of almost 3 billion that have been spent over the last decade on smart grid and infrastructure hardening. Energy related roman codes, options, robust fueling helped reduce the impact and increase the speed of recovery. Resiliency as a result of a sustained commitment to four factors. Robust, resourceful, rapid recovery, lessons learned. Conclusion, i would like to point out earlier this year the u. S. Passed with overwhelming bipartisan support hr 350 titled enhancing state Emergency Preparedness actions 2017. The commissioners support this bill. It passed by the senate. If passed by the senate it to therovide help formula grants to the states to implement, review, revise security plans including a greater emphasis on Cyber Security and mitigation action such as fuel diversification. It allows states to leveraged resources and build stronger partnerships with public and private sectors. Improve working to help the court nation between state energy offices, public utility commissions, and Emergency Management agency. The interdependencies of regulated and unregulated feels requires a holistic approach to resilience. That concludes. Thank you very much, rector. Doctor. Governors, welcome to arizona all. N behalf of if i lose my voice, it was because of belting out those christmas carols. [laughter] i do not know, how familiar you are with the salt River Project at it was created before statehood here in arizona. I am very appreciative of the opportunity to talk to about Water Management here in the desert southwest. It is all about drought. Much of what i talk about today and much of what you hear the same issues but when it comes to drought it require significant investment, partnership, ensure you have certainty because as you know what her supply is fundamental andconomic development growth. A new issue we have been involved in his wildfire. I will give us some overview of understanding to what it means to our water supply. Project. Lt river variability in water supply, this is about 25 years of information. Its in flow into our system, you can see how variable that water supply is. We are looking at 100 days here in phoenix without rain. It is not rain in the desert we are talking about but it is snowfall and precipitation in those upper and central high lands and mountains that fill our reservoirs. It is said variability of inflow we want to control because we want certainty when it comes to water supply. Settlers control that variability through partnerships with the federal with thet, investments federal government to provide infrastructure at dams and canals and groundwater pods. Here is our reservoir system. Reservoirs within the 13,000 square mile watershed. Three watersheds. Creek watershed we are particularly concerned about when it comes to these catastrophic wildfires. It is about a 60,000 acre watershed. The entire watershed is at high risk of catastrophic fire. We know some of the issues colorado has dealt with in the cost dealing with the mitigation cleaning up that reservoir following that catastrophic wildfire. When we are talking about infrastructure, what is very important within the desert infrastructure is resiliency. We need a diverse portfolio of Water Supplies to ensure we have a longterm water supply during the stroke times. Water planning in a desert environment is focused on drought. What this shows you right here is the various mechanisms we employ in the phoenix metropolitan area and many of the areas of arizona when it comes to managing for drought and waters apply. One is we charge. We have a couple recharge facilities where the set of stormwater above ground we are storing water below ground to bank it for future use during times and in addition to that, you need additional infrastructure in order to extract that water. 21 70have over highcapacity groundwater wells we utilized to extract out water when we do needed during those times we do not have the surface water supply to satisfy the needs and our territory. We also have interconnect territories. Not only are we delivering supplies of instate water but we also have access to Colorado River water. A trading service, opportunity to further solidify water supply. Then reclaimed water within the area. Olitan phoenix we use almost all of our reclaimed water, storing it underground, using it for irrigation, using it for power generation. I would like to point out we had some recent modifications to roosevelt dam. 2151, we had to increase the height of that dam due to some safety and Flood Control issues. We now have enough space behind that dam where it essentially doubles the capacity. We would like to utilize some of that capacity so it can be more flexible when we get large and close where potentially we can store more water behind that dam. We proposed some legislation within the drought bill last year to try to get around the water control manual so we can store some additional water within that reservoir to improve the resilience but that is aimed at maximizing the use of our existing infrastructure. Next, wildfire. All of your familiar with wildfire. If you look at our watershed, that is a 13,000 what are serve a four square mile territory. Over 95 of the salt river watershed is forced landing and over 75 of the verde watershed land. Ional forest srp petitioned the federal government in the late 1890s to check that watershed. They created these forest reserves that ultimately ended up becoming those National Forest lands. The original intent of those lands was to protect the water supply. We are actively engage now with the four service for them to move forward with that mission to protect that watershed and that what her supply that is the primary water resource for the fifth largest city in the United States, the city of phoenix. As you know, for south management projects and our Management System today, fortunately our unhealthy. , tents per acre, if you look to the voters to the left, that is what a healthy forest should look like. To the right or what our forests look like today. Essentially, the only way you can control the water fire is that fire is when it runs out of fuel. I would like to show you the extent of impact that is sad. In the 1980s and 1990s, when we did have Green Infrastructure and place it was working in that first. Today since the 2000s, where currently at about 2. 4 million acres that have been impacted within our watershed and we do not want to see the entire watershed go up in smoke. In the late 1900s, srp entered into a relationship with the bureau of reclamation. The care operation meant maintenance of the salt River Project. That is 100your Publicprivate Partnership with the federal government and private landowners to develop water supply. We believe that same commitment could occur with forced service when it comes to the care, ofration, and maintenance that watershed. The same level of partnership at our struggle today is developing a Forest Products industry. A forest by next and a street does not exist in this state today and the current challenges, how do we assist the Forest Service, how do we make sure they have the same two they need to invest the capital that is necessary within the state so we can create jobs, economy, remove a lot of those trees. This is a perfect example of what a federal investment created. In 1911, theater roosevelt desiccated dedicated roosevelt dam and contributed 10 million in the investment to that amp. Today the and a foundational aspect associated with that Economic Investment in that water supply. Theodore roosevelt mentioned we will see up to 75,000 to 100,000 people in the valley. Today we have over 4. 2 Million People. With that, i very much look forward to questions and comments and appreciate the opportunity to speak today. Thank you, director. Thank you all for your comments. We will open it up for the governors. I would like to start by asking each of you we each have our emergency manager and disaster agencies within our state. And the kindning of support that would be available so that we have the best practices and best stateoftheart in preparing for the disaster as well as defending the disaster . Thanks, governor. I will take the initial side on that one. Yes, to answer your question, there is. Staffs together once a year. We talked through what training they desire and how we can best support you with that training. I will include exercises as well. We are going to do that in january. We will have representatives from all the states and we will outline and look forward with the plan as we need to based on the states desires. Thank you. Director . From a state perspective, most of your experts reside within your public utility commissions. What we have been working to do is make certain they are integrated well and with the state Emergency Management agencies that have a challenge at being experts at the different infrastructure. I think if we can bring that to the table, it can help with enhanced response. One of the challenges we have seen in turnover in states that and there is a need to refresh that capability and to assure that preparedness capacity is there. We have been doing exercises and training and providing technical support, and hope to continue to do that with the support of the department of energy. Director . In many ways, it requires significant planning when it comes to water supply and Water Supply Development. It is forward thinking planning. The need to collaborate and partner together with a variety of organizations, whether it is the federal government, local, state, utilities. The governor has brought together a diverse set of stakeholders that are beginning to look at those issues. From a Water Supply Development perspective, it takes decades in order for you to develop those supplies, funding, and find the appropriate resources. In arizona, the low hanging fruit had been picked so it will be more expensive, there will be significantin arizona, the lowg development. But, we are going to have to be innovative, Work Together and look for opportunities in which we can develop additional Water Supplies. Thank you. Thank you all for being here. The topics you are speaking of are top of mind for all of us. Isnk you and i know it before you took over, talk about the creativity that you are used, but also from a process standpoint as this is actually bringing up members of the staff to sit directly with our folks. Unfortunately, i think that when we look at all of us end up with drought and floods and challenges, but what we are seeing more and more in the west is fire seasons are longer, hotter and more damaging. As you view that and recognizing that it is a different kind of disaster that hurricane or other guidance or sort of thoughts do you have as we look for how we can make, overall fire zone landscapes the authority and resources in 132,000 square miles state, what should we be aggregating for how the federal government starts looking at overall fires and in view of more disasters that other natural disasters might be . Thank you, governor. We are coming back in december. We will do an after action review based on the fire season. To be able to carry over some of the lessons learned. I agree the liaison was an important position. We do liaison for our disasters all the time. It is a great tool to use in the fire situation as well. Perspective, i think the best thing we can look at right here and now is mediation and look at ways that we can provide grants and mitigation. Whether that is in the event of more concrete poles, getting rid of the fuel. I know the pot of money for preDisaster Mitigation is limited, but you have to look at if there is a disaster that you can look at the Mitigation Program as another alternative for fire mitigation. That we would like to see us move more Disaster Mitigation money up front whether we can do that or not, it will be a longterm issue. I think that is a great thing whether it is her fires or any other disaster. We can do things in front instead of being reactive and be more proactive will go a long way in building resilient communities. Chairman . Thank you. I dont have so much a question the director. Or i want to say as a new governor in 2010, brandnew elected in 2010, one of the things that more experienced governors told the newcomers was be ready for a disaster just because you never know when it will hit, you never know when a fire, flood, tornado or hurricane will occur. One of the best things you can do is get to know your regional fema director because you will want them to be your best friend because they will help you a lot and know the ropes better than you will. I made it a point to become acquainted with the regional director trying to think of her name. Finnigan was her last name. She moved on not long after but coincidentally then i was not in office but about five months when we had historic flooding on the Missouri River which affected north dakota, south dakota and many parts downstream, Mississippi River too. I just want to say fema was a tremendous resource for us. Robin was a great help. Everyone from region eight stepped up to help. I want to thank you for your service and whatever part you may have played back that. I really appreciate that. That support will continue forward, no doubt. Stability. As a regional administrator. You dont have to see a new face every six months. I think that will build relationships and those things we have to do. From a staff perspective, relationships are solid and work well. From a state directors region eight perspective because i was here already. We have that relationship and now it is time to build on that and enhance those partnerships. Questions . Mment or just a quick question on the issue of agricultural drainage and how it may exacerbate flooding events that may have it. Im not sure with the challenge is in the u. S. We have 44 in canada. We have tried to come to terms with this. The big issue farmers are great stewards, environmental stewards. Drainage issues can have adverse and and invert consequences. Not just in terms of getting along with neighbors. They say whiskey is for drinking and water is for fighting. But also in terms of when flooding events happen, it can be exacerbated by a lot of agricultural drainage. I wonder if that is on any radars screens or that is not the concern it is in other places. Any comments on that . Gentlemen, please help me in thinking this great panel for their discussions and thank you so much for being here. [applause] cspans washington journal live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. Coming up this morning, American University was talking about race and criminal justice reform. A discussion on politics and the media with the washington examiner. Be sure to watch cspans washington journal live at 7 00 eastern this morning. Join the discussion. 11the second session of the 5th Congress Starts next week. The house returns on the eighth. Some of the issues on hand in the new year government funding is a temporary Spending Authority runs out january 19. Next on the calendar, the state of the union address. House speaker invited President Trump to address a joint session of congress on the 30th. You can watch the house live on cspan and the senate live on cspan2. I have been attacked by everybody. My have been attacked by the rightwing, the russians, the trump campaign. I have been attacked by the sanders campaign. Now i can add to that list the clinton campaign. , sunday on cspans q a former Democratic National Committee Chair donna brazil talks about her life in politics. I was here in washington, d. C. Hillary was very excited. She had met this young state senator who was running. She has roots in illinois. She told my good friend. My friend, we were on the third floor and she said that she knew barack obama. I did not know barack obama. Harolddanny davis and emanuel. N, rahm i knew a lot of people in chicago politics but i had not heard of barack obama. We met him that spring of 2003. Let me say this the rest is history. Night and 8 00 on cspan. Earlier this month, the House Administration committee met to consider new guidelines which considered each member and officer to complete a harassment Prevention Training Program every session of congress. Members of both sides of the aisle spoke in support of the measure