Historic LA wildfires are still smoldering, the Oregon legislature is back in session, a massively controversial plan to drastically amend the northwest forest plan governing management policies on over 20 million acres of our most precious forests barrels forward, and that little matter of he who shall not be named returning to power and confirming that, like most sequels, this one will be worse, and yes, we are in the darkest and dumbest timeline.

With so much to cover, why am I putting out a rerun?

Well, I was all set to put out a brand new episode featuring speakers from a recent University or Oregon Symposium on the hugely consequential topic of Tribal Sovereignty and tribal inclusion in the Northwest forest plan.  But we had some last minute scheduling issues and I didn’t have time to arrange a backup interview.  

However, the event was amazing and explored some incredibly important, thorny, and inspiring issues, and I hope to bring you a conversation with some of those Tribal voices next episode.

While I work to put together a new set of interviews on the good, the bad, and the ugly of the Northwest Forest Plan draft amendment, including how you can help protect our most treasured forests, I think this is actually a great time to revisit an episode from last year on wildfire myths, facts, and misinformation.  

Even if you already listened to this conversation when it came out, it is really worth a second listen.  I spend a lot of my time immersed in wildfire research, and I still got so much out of listening back to this interview.  

I think you will too, so let’s get to my interview from last year with Ralph Bloemers.  And I will note real quick that we discuss some proposed legislation from LAST year, which I think is still very relevant as we are dealing with all the same issues coming into the 2025 legislative session.

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