Idaho Department of Lands is working with partner agencies and groups to develop a Statewide Assessment of Forest Resources. This assessment is a key element in the redesign of the USDA Forest Service’s State and Private Forestry that was enacted in the 2008 Farm Bill.  Its purpose is to ensure that federal and state resources are focused on landscape areas with the greatest opportunity to address shared priorities and achieve measurable outcomes.

The Statewide Assessment will provide an analysis of conditions and trends for all forested lands in Idaho. It will delineate rural and urban forest areas that are the highest priority for projects and investments administered through the State and Private Forestry program. Threats to and benefits from forest resources will be identified and form the foundation of the analysis. Following completion of the Statewide Assessment, a Statewide Resource Strategy will be developed.  The Resource Strategy will identify activities and approaches for protection, restoration and enhancement of forest resources in priority landscapes.

For more information on the Statewide Assessment of Forest Resources and the Resource Strategy, see the national guidance from the Forest Service: http://www.fs.fed.us/spf/redesign/state_assess_strategies.pdf

Who is working on the Idaho Statewide Assessment?

Idaho Department of Lands is the Lead Agency. A diverse group of partners is participating, including:

Timeline:

Issues

The issues identified by the Stakeholders and the Core Guidance Team are broken into to two broad categories: Those issues that threaten forests, and those for which forests provide benefit. These are listed below. As a map for each issue is developed, the issue title will be hyperlinked to an issue page, which will have a PDF of the map, and an explanation of the data and process used to develop the map. We need your input! Please call or e-mail the project leaders (contact information below) with your comments.

Current Status

The Core Guidance Team has met three times and refined the issues, suggested, considered and recommended datasets that best informed these issues, and provided guidance as we developed models to blend these data for each of the issues. For some of the issues, smaller “expert” groups provided additional input and guidance. This process resulted in the first draft of the State Assessment of Forest Resources for Idaho.

On July 14, 2009, the Stakeholder Group was reconvened to review and discuss this initial draft of the assessment. From this meeting, a number of suggestions were made to improve the assessment for four of the issues—Forest Health, Wildfire, Wildlife/Biodiversity and Water Quality and Quantity. These changes have been made and are incorporated into Draft Two of the assessment.

On August 26, 2009, the Stakeholder Group convened again to review and discuss the second draft of the assessment. Comments received in the interim were discussed. Some additional changes were suggested to the Wildfire, Development/Recreation and the Forest Markets issues. These changes were incorporated and a third draft produced. Comments are welcome through October 9th, at which time we hope to either keep Draft three as the final, or if there are critical changes still needed, another draft will be developed.

The effort now will transition to development of the Idaho Forest Resource Strategy. The first meeting of the Core Strategy Team is October 29—information on this meeting including an agenda will be posted to this site when available.

You can download the entire assessment document, which includes descriptions of each issue, data used, models used for each issue, issue maps, a description of the final methodology used and the assessment maps, and the maps developed for each of the sub-issues. You may also download each of the issues independently and a PDF of each issue and final map. These individual PDF maps will be a bit higher resolution than what will be in the full package.

Threats to Forests

1. Declining Forest Health
• Declining Forest Health Issue Map
2. Risk to Communities and Ecosystems from Uncharacteristic Wildland Fire
• Wildfire Impacts Issue Map
3. Potential Forest / Canopy Loss to Development and Recreation Pressure
• Development/Recreation Pressure Issue Map

Benefits from Forests and Trees

1. Potential Benefit to Wildlife and Biodiversity
• Wildlife and Biodiversity Issue Map
2. Potential Benefit to Water Quality and Quantity
• Water Quality and Quantity Issue Map
3. Potential Benefit to Air Quality
• Air Quality Issue Map
4. Potential Benefit to Sustainable Forest-Based Markets
• Forest-Based Markets Issue Map
5. Connecting People with Forests (will be discussed in Response Strategy but not mapped due to difficulty in portraying this issue geospatially)

Draft Final Maps

• Methodology
• Flow Chart of the Issues and Sub-issues
• Composite Threats Map
• Composite Benefits Map
• Draft Final ID State Assessment of Forest Resources Map

SAFR Response to Comments - posted October 20, 2009

FULL DRAFT THREE ASSESSMENT DOCUMENT (Issues, Discussion, Data, Models, Methodologies, Issue, Sub-Issue and Draft Final Maps) can be downloaded by clicking on this link (16 MB). This includes everything above plus sub-issue maps.

For More Information please contact the project leaders:

• Dave Stephenson: dstephenson@idl.idaho.gov - (208) 666-8621
• Steve Kimball: skimball@idl.idaho.gov - (208) 666-8646

Information and Notes from Meetings: