WASHINGTON, D.C. (July 13, 2021)—The American Forest Foundation (AFF), a national conservation organization that works to deliver conservation impact through the empowerment of family forest owners, releases the following statement in response to the California State Assembly’s passage of Assembly Concurrent Resolution 33.

“Wildfires do no respect ownership boundaries. That’s why addressing the wildfire crisis in California will require work to increase resiliency across both publicly and privately-owned lands,” said Rita Hite, Executive Vice President for Policy and External Relations at AFF. “With another potentially catastrophic fire season already at our doorstep, the need for a new approach has never been clearer. The passage of ACR 33 is an important step to achieving cross-boundary wildfire risk reduction across a patchwork of California lands. ACR 33 sends the signal that California is ready to fight for the health of all of its forests and communities.”

Family forest owners are critical to several sectors of California’s economy, from forest products, like paper and timber, to outdoor recreation. These landowners manage over seven million acres of the state’s woodlands and want to implement risk reduction projects on their lands, but often face barriers to action, such as  high costs and trouble accessing technical assistance. According to California’s Wildfire and Forest Resilience Action Plan, “Significantly increasing the pace and scale of forest management across the state can only be achieved through significant contributions from small private landowners.”

ACR 33 affirms the support of the California State Assembly for finding science-based, collaborative solutions to the state’s wildfire crisis, representing a step forward for California family forest owners that have been impacted by increasingly catastrophic wildfires in recent years.

Learn more about the resolution with this Fact Sheet on ACR 33 and the Text of the Resolution.

About the American Forest Foundation

The American Forest Foundation (AFF), a forest conservation organization, works exclusively to empower family forest owners to make a meaningful conservation impact around wildlife habitat, clean water, carbon sequestration and storage and sustainable wood supplies. We work across a broad coalition of conservation partners, corporations, and policymakers to empower family forest landowners and make sure everybody understands, supports and values the work of these landowners. Learn more: forestfoundation.org.