Assessing Colorado Wildfire Risks as Federal Funding Wanes, Part Two

This story by Lindsey Toomer appeared on Colorado Newsline on June 9, 2025. We are sharing it in two parts.

Read Part One

A spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Interior, which oversees the BLM, cited a “joint fire memo” signed by Rollins and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum to ensure wildland firefighting in the U.S. is “highly coordinated and focused on fighting wildfires quickly and effectively.” That order allows an exemption from the federal hiring freeze for certain positions.

“The Department is working to hire key positions that will continue to protect public and tribal lands, infrastructure, and communities from the impacts of wildfires through hazardous fuels management, wildfire preparedness, and close collaboration with interagency partners,” the spokesperson said in a statement.
Dependent on federal funding

McCombs said Trump’s budget proposes a wholesale elimination of an arm of the U.S. Forest Service that provides support on non-federal lands and is a core component of the state forest service’s funding. He said Colorado State Forest Service is proud of how it uses the resources it receives from the federal government, which it and other state forestry services have done for decades.

In the 2024 fiscal year, running through the end of June 2024, the CSFS spent about $11.1 million from federal grants, which is just under 36% of the state forest service’s budget.

Samulski said many wildfire prevention organizations do their work with the support of federal funding, with several becoming reliant on those federal funds to continue operating. Some groups have reduced their work or shut down entirely because of the fear that they will lose funding, or because there aren’t projects being funded right now, she said.

Many long-standing grant programs shifted to receive funding from the Inflation Reduction Act under the Biden administration, even though they were previously funded from other sources, and were frozen by the Trump administration, Samulski said. While some grant programs have been unfrozen, others haven’t, and the uncertainty has led some groups to search for other revenue sources.

“Many of the organizations are trying to figure out how to pivot and be less reliant on federal funding, and I’ve already had to pause … projects on the ground or cancel projects because they don’t know if they’ll get the reimbursement,” Samulski said.

Those projects include removal of hazardous fuels on the ground or vegetation surrounding state, federal or private lands near communities, homes or watersheds, Samulski said. She said organizations focused on wildfire prevention have been growing in recent years as they realized they need to be more proactive.

“No amount of firefighting is actually going to change the outcomes that are happening on the ground that much,” Samulski said. “We need to do more in advance of the fires, and so there’s kind of been this recognition and a shift in terms of trying to build up that capacity.”
Dissolving partnership agreements

On top of its primary responsibilities of overseeing state and private forestry projects in Colorado, the CSFS has agreements with the federal Forest Service and the BLM under the Good Neighbor Authority, a concept McCombs said started in Colorado. The Good Neighbor Authority allows federal agencies to establish agreements with state agencies to conduct forest management activities such as fuels reduction, forest health improvement and habitat improvement on federal lands.

The CSFS has about 25 active projects under the Good Neighbor Authority, with 15 full-time employees staffed through funding from the GNA. The state forest service has completed over 15,000 acres of forest treatment through the GNA on federal, state and private land.

“I don’t think there’s a national forest in the state where we are not under agreement to do some work to support and build capacity for the (U.S. Forest Service) so they can accelerate the critical forest health wildfire mitigation work that needs to be done,” McCombs said. “Our people know each other, they trust each other. Sometimes it’s not easy for federal and state entities to work well together. We do this really well in Colorado.”

As agencies potentially affected by financial cuts at the federal level wait to see the final outcomes, McCombs said CSFS leaders remain in consistent communication with their USFS counterparts to determine how state foresters can best help and continue working together.

“That’s a really positive thing that even amidst all of this rapid and in some instances, unwanted or unwelcome change, we’re still striving to try to stay in communication and keep moving things forward, because the wildfire is not going to wait,” McCombs said. “We’ve got to keep driving forward under whatever context we’re operating in.”

Coalitions and Collaboratives, a Colorado-based nonprofit that advocates for resilient ecosystems, also works under a cooperative agreement with the Forest Service to help with wildfire resilience and mitigation. Jonathan Bruno, CEO of COCO, said the group helps local programs working on resilience and mitigation efforts ensure they have long-term sustainability. The nonprofit also distributes grants funded by the Forest Service.

After the Trump administration took over, Bruno said all of his organization’s grant agreements with the Forest Service were put under review and frozen. He said about 90% of the funding his organization works with comes from the federal government.

“That delay thankfully was short-lived, thanks to the courts, but I’m scared because it feels as though maybe those court rulings may not hold up,” Bruno said. “How do you budget if you don’t know that you’re going to even have a dollar?”

Bruno said his organization is “being really cautious” about entering into any new agreements since he’s unsure they will get all the funding they have been promised. While COCO already selected recipients for their spring grant cycle this year, they haven’t executed any contracts yet.

Under the five-year agreements COCO historically enters with the Forest Service, Bruno said it makes adjustments every year depending on actual funding needs and developments in its projects. As he is planning adjustments to those agreements with his federal partners this year, both parties are unsure what to expect.

“The challenge is that the internal people that I’ve worked with for years and the people that I’ve trusted, they don’t know either,” Bruno said. “There’s a lot of uncertainty in the system, which makes everyone really nervous and uncomfortable.”

Bruno said the mitigation work of many people in the Forest Service is already thankless, and they do it simply because they care about protecting their communities. He’s had to pivot from working with those local, on-the-ground Forest Service staff to working with the higher-ups now making the decisions.

“It’s never what we wanted, because those that have the most to lose and gain are those people in a community, not the politicians,” Bruno said. “We need to make sure that those that are in these powerful, decision-making positions have the information they need to make well-defined, well-reasoned sort of judgments on who’s going to live and who’s going to die.”

Historically, Vail Fire has collaborated with the Forest Service to get federal approval for fuels reduction projects, and the two entities split the costs for the review process as well as the actual fuels management once projects are approved. Recently, it’s become unclear whether funding previously guaranteed to projects with Vail will come through.

“Pretty much every kind of landscape-level project we’ve done has been on Forest Service land,” Novak said.

The process can take years and can cost millions. One project Vail Fire is currently working on with the Forest Service took about three and a half years to plan and get approval, Novak said, and Vail paid about $300,000 throughout that process with the understanding that the Forest Service would pay for the actual treatment. They’ve received “some direct funding,” but not nearly all of the funding needed to fully implement the $3 to $5 million project, he said.

While apprehension around federal fire mitigation, prevention and suppression capabilities continues, local government firefighters will still be there to protect their communities, Novak said. For about 80% of all fires, the initial response comes solely or partially from local firefighters and responders — though prevention should be prioritized, he said.

McCombs said he views the success of the Forest Service and the BLM’s work in Colorado as Colorado’s success, and less funding and staff for those agencies is “an explicit translation to less work.”

“The alternative is uncharacteristic wildfires that have damaging, just wildly disruptive impacts and long-term impacts to things that are really important to Coloradans,” McCombs said. “We’re communicating through our partners and engaging with those that have a vested interest to make sure that folks are aware of some of the trade-offs that exist when funding is reduced and when staffing in particular is reduced.”