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March 1, 2012CAL FIRE / FRAP

FRASC Kickoff Meeting Summary

Agenda1. Introductions 2. Overview of 2010 Assessment

" History of Assessment and FRAP" Themes and Topics" Methods" Discussion

3. Introduction to forest health criteria and indicators for California" Relationship to assessment process" Role of FRASC in development of indicators" Discussion

4. Survey5. Indicators of forest health6. Wrap Up

" Review of meeting discussion" Where do we go from here" FRASC Survey

1. Introductions

FRASC is a joint effort between CALFIRE Fire and Resource Assessment Program, USFS State and Private Forestry, and the NRCS. Representatives of each of these agencies were in attendance.

A variety of state agencies as well as a number of NGO also had representatives at the meeting.

FRASC welcomes all participants, agency and other.

2. Overview of 2010 Assessment

FRAP Mandate: " State legislative mandate in the 70’s created FRAP " Reports to legislature and state Board of Forestry on status of forest / rangelands " Board of Forestry uses reports to inform their policies and rule making " Thus while not directly regulatory, strongly influential on policy and regs

The Fire and Resource Assessment Program (FRAP) came into existence due to a mandate from the California State legislature back in the 1970s. FRAP was charged with producing reports on the status and trends affecting the state’s private (and state-owned) forest and rangelands, which total about 37 million acres. Also by mandate, the state Board of Forestry digests FRAP’s reports and uses them to inform policy and decision making, in, for example, putting forth rules governing forest practices on private lands. Although the reports do not have direct bearing on regulations, they serve to inform those

FRASC Kickoff Meeting Minutes of 17March 1, 2012

who craft and put forth rules and regulations affecting forest and rangelands. Thus we’ve been at this for a while. Historically, FRAP pretty much has done this without a lot of input from outside the state government. But for this last go-round – the 2010 report – we formed a closer partnership with our federal equivalents in the Forest Service, and this was unprecedented. And we are striving to make the Forest Action Plan a broader resource to support activities of other groups and agencies. In fact, the NRCS used the 2010 Assessment to support applications for funding activities in the state, and were quite successful in this venture!

The Forest Action Plan (Assessment + Strategy)" California’s Statewide Assessment and Resource Strategy (SWARS) rebranded " Coordinated with USFS State and Private Forestry “Redesign” " Required under the Cooperative Forestry Assistance Act, as amended by the 2008

Farm Bill. " Completed by FRAP in June, 2010.

Part of the 2008 Federal Farm bill played a key role in fostering this new partnership. Language in the Bill directed and provided funding to states to produce reports very similar to what FRAP has been publishing for state lands (without the rangeland focus), and to complete them by 2010. These Statewide Assessments and Resource Strategy reports (dubbed SWARS) had the goal of unified reporting across all forest and rangelands lands, in keeping with the so-called “all lands approach”. SWARS hatched a framework to structure reporting across all 50 states, called “Redesign”, and coordinated to states through the USFS State and Private Forestry Program. I’ll talk more about Redesign and how we used it in California in a moment.

FRAP took the opportunity to meet its established state mandate while at the same stroke expanding its purview to include federal lands in keeping with the new SWARS initiative. Also specified in the Farm Bill was that states were to do systematic outreach to stakeholder and interest groups. This we did with some limited success.

And our meeting here today, while not part of the 2010 reporting cycle, seeks to foster stronger outreach, participation and input by stakeholders and other (non-CAL FIRE) land management agencies for the next round of reporting.

The 2010 Assessment " Integrate existing state plans" Partner and stakeholder outreach " Identify key resources (assets) " Threats to assets " Priority Landscapes " All Lands Approach

The Redesign guidance stemming from the Farm Bill was quite specific in the requirements from participating states, with one major exception: states were to incorporate existing statewide plans, such as Wildlife Action Plans, and others with bearing on forest lands. States were to conduct outreach to stakeholders, and these were to include established committees such as the State Technical Advisory Committee of NRCS.


Within the context of the given framework we were to step through a set of themes and subthemes, and identify key resources. FRAP devised a methodology whereby we identified and mapped those resources (or assets as we called them), as well as significant threats to those assets.

By overlaying the two using GIS we created a set of priority landscapes – essentially those regions and areas with highs in both asset values and threats to those assets. And instead of the historic 37 million acres, this time we were working with more like 90 million acres statewide.

The 2010 Strategy Report

" Companion Assessment" Cross-cutting issues" Existing programs and plans" Constraints, key partners" Core: Lists of Strategies and supporting actions" Strategy matrices (tables)

SWARS also specified a companion volume to lay out strategies to address issues related to resource assets, threats, and priority landscapes identified in the Assessment. It follows the same framework as the Assessment in stepping through the Redesign themes and subthemes, but also highlights cross-cutting issues covering more than one priority landscape, existing programs already dealing with identified issues, and constraints on actions. The core of the report is rather exhaustive lists of recommended strategies (and accompanying matrix tables) that could help ameliorate the issues identified.

The Redesign framework put forth 3 overarching themes to guide the reports:1. Conserving working forest landscapes

Working forests are those from which material goods are harvested (excludes National and States Parks and some other designations)

2. Protect those forest ecosystems from harmful agents and threats3. Enhance public benefits from trees and forests

Redesign Themes:

Theme 1 – Conserving Working Forest Landscapes – broken into two subthemes:

1.1) Population Growth and Development ImpactsWhere we looked at and mapped areas of forested and rangeland ecosystems most at risk to development across the state

1.2) Sustainable Forests and RangelandsExamined status and trends on private forest and rangelands, changes (fore example) in standing timber volume ownership types and patterns, current markets for their main merchantable goods, local economies


Theme 2: Protect forests from harm – broken into two subthemes:

2.1) Wildfire Threat to Ecosystem Health and Community Safety

2.2) Insect, Disease and Other Threats to Ecosystem Health and Community Safety

Take measures necessary to ensure that working forests their ecosystems and surrounding communities are not compromised by threats from high impact wildfires, insects, or disease. Broken into two sub-themes:

Theme 3: Enhance public benefits from trees and forests – broken into seven subthemes:

3.1) Water Quality and Quantity Protection and EnhancementWe mapped areas where water quality and quantity are especially important resources.

3.2) Urban Forestry for Energy Conservation and Air QualityUrban areas that could particularly benefit from increased tree planting and maintenance for air quality improvement and high temperature mitigation

3.3) Planning for and Reducing Wildfire Risks to Communities and ServicesCommunities at high risk of wildfire and where efforts could be improved (e.g. formation of Fire Safe councils) were mapped

3.4) Emerging Markets for Forest Products and ServicesEmerging markets that could benefit forest-dependent communities, given changing economics and the stimulation of sectors such as renewable energy from biofuels.

3.5) Plant, Wildlife and Fish Habitat Protection, Conservation and Enhancement Wildlife issues and strategies were covered at great length in the Wildlife Action Plan, but here we summarized information about species of concern and highlighted recent work done on mapping important wildlife corridors across the state

3.6) Green Infrastructure for Connecting People to the Natural EnvironmentA look at the level of access of the general population to what we now call green infrastructure

3.7) Climate Change: Threats and OpportunitiesAnd the brave new world we’re moving into as a result of observed and projected future climatic changes

GIS-based Risk Assessment


I won’t get into the details of the 2010 Forest Action Plan in this talk. Indeed, one central reason for starting this group is to go through these same topics in depth in subsequent FRASC meetings.

But here is a quick overview at the methodology used in the Assessment, in this example showing that of an analysis for Subtheme 2.2: “Community Safety from Wildfire”. Keep in mind that this methodology was applied across all analyses in the assessment.

On the left in light yellow is the Assessment portion, and the blue box on the right shows elements relates to strategy to help it move to a desired future condition.

Just looking at the Assessment side, going from left to right, the diagram shows the set of 3 assets identified, along with the wildfire threat. The composite assets and threat were overlaid to create priority landscape (high, medium, low).

This illustrates the simple spatial risk assessment framework developed by FRAP within the Redesign framework

Here is a portion of the statewide data resulting from the analysis in the previous slide, for the region just west and south of Lake Tahoe.Being spatially explicit was a large challenge in this whole Assessment endeavor, and all resultant GIS layers have 30m cell size.


Here’s a graphic of a second priority landscapes analysis of 2.1 – Fire Threat to Ecosystem Health High, medium and low priority areas mapped in red, orange and yellow


Uncharacteristically dense stands with high fuel loads are more susceptible to high severity fire. Over 20 million acres in the State deviate from historic conditions (condition class 3) and are high priority areas. Forest and other vegetation types most at risk include Ponderosa Pine, Sierra Mixed Conifer, Douglas-fir and Mixed Chaparral.

The Strategy Counterpart to the GIS Assessment:

The long-term strategy is to reduce the occurrence of damaging wildfires and reduce life, property and natural resource losses through the implementation of effective and efficient fire prevention programs and activities.

Here’s a view of a typical strategy matrix, in this case showing information related to Strategy 2.2.1 – Reducing Damaging Wildfires. You see the 8 column headings and the content related to 2.2.1 summarized underneath. Again, we won’t dwell on the details presented here. This is simply to show the content of the Strategy document and how it is organized in the main tables.

Chapter 3.2, “Urban Forestry Planting” gives a different example of the GIS based assessment. One analysis used to derive priority landscapes for this topic was Forest Pest Impacted Ecosystems. The resultant priority landscapes were more spotty the other analyses. For this particular analysis, we distinguished between stand level damage and ecosystem-level damage. Stand level is location specific and ecosystem level has to do with spatially generalizing over a given “ecosystem” – WHR vegetation types divided up statewide into Tree Seed Zones.


Forest Pest Impacted Ecosystems Priority Landscapes

On-Line Viewer for Priority Landscapes

FRAP hosts an online web mapping application called the Priority Landscapes Viewer. Once you have installed Microsoft Silverlight, you can bring up a window to show maps of a whole suite of Priority Landscape input layers (assets and threats) and results, coded red orange yellow (high to low).

Zooming in to show high detail is possible, and all GIS layers can be viewed on top of several background datasets, including high resolution imagery, 1:24000 topographic maps, etc.

All data layers displayable in this map application are also available from FRAP on our website.


As is now standard practice, FRAP hosts in-depth web-based information on the 2010 Forest Action Plan. You can get complete methodologies used, comprehensive results tables and GIS layers, and other gory details as desired.

http://frap.cdf.ca.gov/priorityls/default.html

http://frap.cdf.ca.gov/assessment2010/chapters.html

Our partners on the federal side also host pages for each state’s Forest Action Plan

The main links here are to PDF versions of the two published documents

http://www.forestactionplans.org/states/california

4. Survey

Before we break for a few minutes, please take a moment and look at the survey we’d like to get from you.

• At the top is your contact information, and we are asking you to rate from low to high the various subthemes from the 2010 Forest Action Plan.

• Also, feel free to add a category and/or comments in the lines below the list of subthemes.

• If you have any questions don’t hesitate to ask.

• Thanks! Let’s have the break, fill in the forms, and Chris will be up next to talk about C&I for California forests and rangelands.

To take the survey on-line, go to this url: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/9fy9vvh

5. Indicators of Forest Health

Chris Keithley, Research Manager for CALFIRE’s Fire and Resource Assessment Program is going to talk about our efforts to develop indicators of forest health and sustainability as a supplement to the Assessment.

Defining Sustainable

The first task in developing indicators of sustainability is to define “sustainable”. There are quite a few interpretations:


http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/9fy9vvh

http://www.forestactionplans.org/states/california

http://frap.cdf.ca.gov/assessment2010/chapters.html

http://frap.cdf.ca.gov/priorityls/default.html

Defined by the World Commission on Environment and Development, this is “sustainability:”

“Balancing environmental, social, and economic factors to meet the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs. “

The USFS in their 2010 National Report on Sustainable Forests emphasized the definition of “Strong Sustainability”:

“The core concept of strong sustainability is that the benefits of nature are irreplaceable and that the entire economy is reliant on society, which in turn is entirely dependent on the environment. This emphasizes the interdependencies between our society, our economy, and the natural environment.”

Different Viewpoints

Sustainability includes a broad range of perspectives – from commodities to aesthetics – and applies to a wide range of temporal and spatial scales.

In the development of our indicators of sustainability, we want to keep in mind the many different views of sustainability that exist.

The 2003 Forest and Range Assessment

Before adopting the USFS assessment redesign in 2008, FRAP produced the Forest and Range assessment primarily for the California Board of Forestry under California Legislative mandate.

In the 2003 assessment (the assessment before the current, 2010 assessment) rather than deriving priority landscapes we assessed the state of the forest through indicators. We used the Montreal Process (MP) system of criteria and indicators.

We used all seven MP criteria and 66 of the possible 67 MP indicators.

The 2010 Assessment adopted the “redesign” themes suggested by the USFS and used a threat and asset GIS risk assessment to derive priority landscapes.

Indicators were not directly used in the 2010 Assessment, but were referenced in the strategies report.

Purpose and Use of the Indicators:


The Board of Forestry is concerned with sustainable forests, and has requested the use of indicators to measure trends in forest sustainability.

The use of indicators also allows us to evaluate trends in sustainability for future forest and rangelands assessments.

With indicators we can measure and evaluate progress towards forest sustainability in California. We can also provide and objective measure that can be reported on with each update of the Forest and Rangelands Assessment.

The Montreal Process

The Montreal Process is the Working Group on Criteria and Indicators for the Conservation and Sustainable Management of Temperate and Boreal Forests. Formed in 1994, member nations represent approximately 60% of world’s temperate and boreal forests.

The Montreal Process identified a framework of criteria and indicators that provide a common definition of what characterizes sustainable management of forests. It is widely recognized as a criteria and indicator system for sustainable forests.

For more detail, go here: http://www.rinya.maff.go.jp/mpci/criteria_e.html

Adapting the Montreal Process to an individual State

The Montreal Process was developed as a cooperative effort between member nations throughout the world. Thus, the indicators identified by the MP represent a wide variety of natural processes throughout the globe.

The use of all 67 indicators can be overwhelming, and just not work for all locations. Several US states have adapted the MP indicators to fit their particular geographic location as well as their political and social climates.

o Oregon: The Oregon Department of Forestry initiated and effort to adapt the MP to Oregon and pared down the 67 indicators to 19 indicators specific to Oregon. This not only makes the MP more applicable to Oregon specifically, but it makes the indicator use and measurement more achievable.

The process also resulted in the Oregon Roundtable on Sustainable Forestry, Oregon’s working group on Criteria and Indicators.

For more information: http://www.oregon.gov/ODF/indicators/index.shtml


o Wisconsin: The Wisconsin Council on Forestry adapted the MP indicators for use in Wisconsin to create the Wisconsin Forest Sustainability Framework. Wisconsin also reduced the number of indicators from 67 to 19.

For more information: http://council.wisconsinforestry.org/framework

Local and regional indicators.

Indicators are also developed locally to better represent social and physical environments.

o The Sacramento River Watershed Program developed a system of indicators to measure the health of the Sacramento River.

The process involved a group of stakeholders in the Sacremento River Basin who offered input and expertise in the development of the indicators. Establishing stakeholder involvement is a crucial step in indicator development.

For more information: http://sacriver.org/aboutwatershed/roadmap/measuring-health

o The Sierra Nevada Conservancy has been developing a set of System Indicators for the Sierra Nevada region of California. This process has also involved stakeholders throughout the Sierra Nevada. The indicators cover five major themes:1) demographics and economy, 2) water quality, air quality, and climate, 3) land conservation and habitat connectivity, 4) rangeland, including related habitat, 5) forest health, including fire and forest habitat.

For more information: www.sierranevada.ca.gov

Organization of the MP Criteria and Indicators:

o Criteria: A category of conditions or processes by which sustainable forest management may be assessed.

Characterized by a set of related indicators which are monitored periodically to assess change

(http://www.rinya.maff.go.jp/mpci/criteria_e.html)

o There are seven MP Critieria:

1. Conservation of biological diversity

2. Maintenance of productive capacity of forest ecosystems


http://www.rinya.maff.go.jp/mpci/criteria_e.html

http://sacriver.org/aboutwatershed/roadmap/measuring-health

http://sacriver.org/aboutwatershed/roadmap/measuring-health

http://council.wisconsinforestry.org/framework

3. Maintenance of forest ecosystem health and vitality

4. Conservation and maintenance of soil and water resources

5. Maintenance of forest contribution to global carbon cycles

6. Maintenance and enhancement of long-term multiple socio-economic benefits to meet the needs of societies

7. Legal, institutional and economic framework for forest conservation and sustainable management

o Indicator: A measure (measurement) of an aspect of the criterion. A quantitative or qualitative variable which can be measured or described and which, when observed periodically, demonstrates trends. MP identifies 67 possible indicators.

o Metric: the metric is the measurement of the indicator. It can be quantitative, as with turbidity, or qualitative, as with well-being, or spatial, as with invasive species distribution.

MP Criteria in the 2010 Strategies Report

Although we did not include criteria and indicators per se in the 2010 report, the Strategies document did reference the 7 MP criteria. This table is the matrix developed to crosswalk the 2010 Assessment with MP criteria

Montreal Process Criteria

Forest and Rangelands Assessment Chapter Topics

Conservation of Biological Diversity

Maintenance of Productive Capacity

Maintenance of Forest Ecosystems Health

Conservation & Maintenance of Soil and Water Quality

Forests and Climate

Socio - Economic Well Being Governance

1.1 - Population Growth and Development X X x x

1.2 Sustainable Forests X X X X

2.1 Wildfire Threat X X


2.2 Forest Pests X X

3.1 Water Quality and Quantity X X

3.2 Urban Forests X X

3.3 Community Wildfire Planning X

3.4 Emerging Markets - Biomass X X X X

3.5 Wildlife X

3.6 Green Infrastructure X

3.7 Climate Change X X

Example of MP Criteria and Indicator structure: Conservation of Biological Diversity

Criterion = Conservation of Biological Diversity

Indicator A = Ecosystem Diversity

Metric 1 = Fragmentation of Forests

Metric 2 = Forest area; percent of forest by ecosystem type, successional stage, age class, and forest ownership

Metric 3 = Area and percent of forest in protected areas by forest ecosystem type, and by age class or successional stage


Metric: Ecosystem Type

Metric: Forest AreaASSESSMENT (YEAR) 2003 2012

Conifer Forest 19,004 19,335

Conifer Woodland 2,363 2,399

Hardwood Woodland 5,188 5,292Hardwood Forest 4,690 4,594Shrub 14,565 14,522Grassland 10,919 11,407Source: 2003 and 2010 Forest and Range Assessment

o TREND: Estimated 64,000 acres converted annually, predominately Ag lands, between 1986 and 2000 (Sleeter et al, 2010)


Example of MP Criteria and Indicator structure: Forests and Climate

Criterion = Forests and ClimateIndicator A = Net Carbon Sequestration

Metric 1 = Carbon Sequestration in live treesMetric 2 = Emissions from Natural Processes (mortality, wildfire…) and HarvestingMetric 3 = Storage in wood products and landfill

Metric: Net Carbon Sequestration

Source Type C (tonnes) CO2e (tonnes)Growth Storage -16,367,285 -60,067,936Model Mortality Emission 5,455,351 20,021,137Wildfire Emission 1,719,915 6,312,087Harvest (merch) Emission 565,315 2,074,706Harvest (non-merch) Emission 791,776 2,905,819Wood Products (in-use) Pool -389,436 -1,429,231Wood Products (landfill) Pool -48,796 -179,081Net -8,273,161 -30,362,499Source: 2010 Forest and Range Assessment; FIA data (2001 – 2007)

Discussion

We are currently working on a process for developing indicators. As a part of the process, we would like to coordinate with existing indicator projects or projects in development.

FRASC will hopefully serve as a means to identify priority indicators, and as a means to solicit stakeholder involvement into the process.

6. Wrap Up

Today we’ve tried to brief you on who we are, what we do and how we’d like your help.To set the context of FRASC and why we need your help, a brief overview of:

• FRAP’s mandate, changes in 2010 and beyond• Overview of the 2010 Forest Action Plan• A look at criteria and indicators for California


We need your help in planning our next assessment. We plan a series of meetings covering the assessment topics – as per the Redesign themes. We would also ask for your help in identifying data sources and data gaps.

FRASC will host ongoing and future discussions of:

Assessment topics and issues of concern (a.ka. Redesign Themes) Data sources and gaps Methodology

Thank you and we will see you next time!


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