Merkley, Wyden Call For Grazing Flexibility

On Tuesday, Oregon senators Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley urged the Department of the Interior to support Governor Tina Kotek’s request for emergency authorizations to allow flexibility in grazing schedules.  Kotek’s request would also use alternative grazing areas in response to the current wildfire disaster in Oregon. 

“The grazing flexibility requested by Governor Kotek will be an incredibly important lifeline to our rural communities that have been devastated by these wildfire disasters,” Wyden and Merkley wrote to Interior Secretary Deb Haaland. “Together, we can ensure that these rural communities receive the federal support they need to recover and continue to play a critical role as important partners for natural resource management.” 

Wyden and Merkley’s letter to Secretary Haaland comes shortly after the senators expressed their support for Governor Kotek’s request to the Department of Agriculture for a Secretarial Disaster Designation that would authorize emergency haying and grazing.

This marks a very challenging year for Oregon’s farming community, as over a million acres of public and private lands have burned.  Wyden and Merkley stressed that support from both the Interior and Agriculture departments is urgently needed.

You can read the entire letter from Merkley and Wyden Here.

Wyden and Merkley said they have worked with Oregon communities and Senate colleagues to address the catastrophic wildfires raging across the state and the entire West.  Most recently, Wyden introduced the Grid Resilience Improvement through Dedicated Assistance Act, a bill Oregon's senor senator says would adequately fund public utilities to make energy grids more resilient against climate disasters, such as megafires.  Congress passed a robust FY24 funding package, which included roughly $4 billion in wildfire suppression, $7 million in wildfire smoke mitigation, and $31 million in forest restoration for Oregon and nationwide, and continued the pay raise for the federal firefighting workforce provided by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.

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