Greater budget flexibility will allow the Forest Service to cut more trees, restore more streams and create more rural jobs, agency chief Tom Tidwell will likely argue Wednesday before Senate appropriators.

Tidwell has lobbied House and Senate lawmakers to allow the Forest Service to combine several budget items into an integrated resource restoration fund, which he argues will allow the agency to do more with less.

Lawmakers so far have been hesitant to approve the fund until a pilot program Congress authorized last December in three regions bears fruit (Greenwire, Feb. 17). If history is any indication, members of the Senate Interior, Environment and Related Agencies Appropriations Subcommittee this week will seek assurances that the new fund will be spent wisely.

"I'm looking for every way I can to create some additional efficiencies," Tidwell told the House Interior, Environment and Related Agencies Appropriations Subcommittee, noting the challenges budget officials face in finding timely funding for a variety of watershed restoration activities.

The agency's fiscal 2013 integrated resources proposal would allow it to treat 2.6 million acres, provide 2.8 billion board feet of timber, decommission 2,028 miles of road, and restore or enhance 2,750 miles of stream habitat, Tidwell said.

The agency is requesting a total of $4.86 billion in fiscal 2013 -- a $16 million increase over current levels.

In previous hearings, Tidwell has warned it is critical for Congress to extend his authority to pursue stewardship contracts, which allow the agency to use revenue from timber sales to fund restoration projects such as culvert removals or campground improvements.

Authority for the contracts, which represent a small but growing portion of Forest Service timber sales, is set to expire at the end of fiscal 2013 (Greenwire, March 21).

While the agency's restoration focus has earned praise from conservationists and some local governments, it has drawn scrutiny from lawmakers including Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), who has criticized the agency for reducing timber sales in her state.

"In Ketchikan, they're calling it a restoration to poverty," she told Tidwell at a recent Energy and Natural Resources Committee hearing. "They are not optimistic that the approach that has been taken is one that will allow them to sustain."

Murkowski, who is the ranking member on the Senate Appropriations panel, and other Western lawmakers have also pressed Tidwell for more details on the agency's plan to use $24 million to begin replacing its aging fleet of air tankers that it uses to stall the spread of severe wildfires, a perennial concern in the West. The agency in February released a long-awaited strategy to update its fleet but did not provide a cost estimate (E&ENews PM, Feb. 10).

Wildland fire management accounts for roughly half of the agency's budget. Hazardous fuels removal, which the agency uses to reduce the spread and intensity of wildfires, has been an annual focus for Western lawmakers.

Lawmakers may also discuss the fate of Secure Rural Schools, which for the past decade has provided hundreds of millions of dollars annually to rural counties to compensate for the loss of timber revenues. The program expired last October, and its reauthorization is fraught with political challenges (E&E Daily, Feb. 17).

The Senate in March passed a one-year extension of the program as part of its two-year surface transportation bill, but House leaders have been hesitant to take up the measure.

Schedule: The hearing is Wednesday, April 18, at 9:30 a.m. in 124 Dirksen.

Witnesses: Forest Service Chief Tom Tidwell and Forest Service acting Director for Budget Susan Spear.