While You Were Distracted, They Came For The Forest Service
Godspeed: good fortune; success (used as a wish to a person starting on a journey, a new venture, etc.)
If you think you smell something burning in advance of this year’s wildfire season, it might just be Smokey the Bear’s fur.
You may not have noticed the news earlier this month about a major reorganization of the U.S. Forest Service.
Understandable given the chaos created by the Trump Administration, a distraction umbrella by design, I think: the Middle East, Cabinet firings and resignations, gas prices, measles vaccinations, ICE (ice, baby), insider trading, the East Wing, UFC cage-match fighting, rigged this, rigged that, grift here, grift there, well – you name it.
Oh, and while we’re naming it: the Epstein files.
(Whoops. Went down the Trump hole there. Now I feel like a shower.)
Okay, back to the reorg, which definitely ain't a reorg: It’s a purposeful dismantling of this country’s guardians of the forest.
The guise is efficiency through better federal-state coordination. You can read the official news release here.
The Low Lights
I’ve put the ol’ yellow highlighter to work on three of the low lights:
The agency will be relocated from the political power base of Washington D.C. to Utah, a state where anti-public lands sentiment runs high.
Ten of the agency’s regional offices will be closed.
Fifty-seven of 77 research stations will be shuttered, with research initiatives consolidated in Colorado.
The potential negatives are many and include a range from being shut out of D.C. decision making to prompting a brain drain from the agency when seasoned professionals are asked to relocate across country.
It's a slow death through the suffocation of diminishment.
For an experienced take on the practical ramifications, you can read this essay by Tracy Stone-Manning, former head of the Bureau of Land Management.
So, what to do?
If you haven’t heard about this, that’s part of the problem – there’s a vacuum for news about this – and many of the major companies with a stake in the public lands game haven’t said much of anything.
As they say, nature – and this is fundamentally about nature – abhors a vacuum.
So, apparently, does creativity.
Worth Fighting For
Into this vacant space comes a creative campaign from SAVEUSFS.ORG. Its approach: Turn up the heat on the Trump Administration by cranking up the burners on outdoor brands that have remained silent in the face of this destruction of our public lands.
And the way they gained the attention of outdoor brands was to enlist customers – like you and me.
They quickly created an educational website that’s action-oriented – giving you a comprehensive understanding of the issue at hand and the tools to do something about it by very publicly calling upon your favorite outdoor brands to SAY SOMETHING.
Because, for the most part, outdoor brands weren’t saying ANYTHING, following suit with other private companies on other issues who chose to keep their heads buried in the sand rather than risk the wrath of the raging combover in the Oval Office.
Since the campaign began, a host of large outdoor brands have responded to this influence with public proclamations in support of public lands and vital importance of the U.S. Forest Service as their steward.
And while it might not be openly attributable to this effort, it certainly had to play a part.
Creativity for the win.
Born With A Rebellious Spirit
SAVEUSFS.org is an initiative of Our Parks, which aims to inspire and educate visitors about the beauty and significance of our national treasures while advocating for responsible exploration and active conservation.
Our Parks, in turn, is an outgrowth of one of my favorite social media accounts, Alt National Park Service. It was born with a rag-tag, rebellious spirit in the aftershock of President Trump’s first inauguration in 2017, created as a response to restrictions placed on the official National Park Service social media accounts
Alt National Park Service retains that same grassroots ethos today as it’s grown to become a powerful voice on social media for the “resistance” effort to protect our national parks and other public lands. If you’re on Bluesky, you should give them a follow – more than 893,000 others have. (They’re also on Threads, Facebook, and Instagram.)
There’s Still Work To Be Done
There are still a few outdoor brand laggards, and if you’d like to compel them to take a public stand, you can do that here. Plus, if you’re interested in this battle, it’s far from won. It would be good to connect with SAVEUSFS.org, Our Parks, and Alt National Park Service so that when the next call to action comes, you can answer.
Because, as Smokey the Bear has been saying for decades: Only You Can.
Godspeed, friends.
Russ
🤔 Think About It
“The clearest way into the Universe is through a forest wilderness.” John Muir
💥 Quick Hits
- Here's what a real impact report looks like – Cotopaxi is at the head of the pack when it comes to reporting impact, and this year's impact report is no exception. Nice job to Annie Angle and team!
- Could TSA be improved by becoming a purpose trust? – An interesting think piece by Corey Rosen in The Stakehold on how purpose might improve air travel.
- Here's what awesome typography looks like – Barbara Galińska shows us all how it's done in this poster design. ⬇️
So Long To National Poetry Month
As April concludes, and with it National Poetry Month, I'm gifting you one last ode to the art form with a poem that's accessible to all. Enjoy.
Love Poem to Taco Bell
Full-on, no bullshit, no irony, yes Taco Bell
where I can almost always pull together the
cash to get dinner, at my brokest
scrounging up enough change
for the pillowy warmth of a bean burrito,
extra red sauce, meant to be eaten
behind the steering wheel in a parking lot
or while driving, the wrapper crumpled up
and thrown on the passenger side floor,
leftover napkins stashed in the glovebox.
In high school we’d ditch seventh period
and drive 10 miles down I-5 to the closest town
big enough to have a Taco Bell,
where we’d house as much food as we could
pay for, lounging in the pinkpurplegreen vinyl
or the metal swivel chairs we’d knock knees under,
giving each other dares around fire sauce,
hoarding packets of mild sauce to douse everything.
And forever, my love to the Taco Bell employees,
who took my order when I was drunk or high or crying,
who listened and fed me without too much judgment
through high school and college and my thirties,
and a special love for the two who pushed my car
through the drive-thru, once, when it broke down
mid-order. I couldn’t afford a tow until payday.
They let me leave it in the lot.
This is how I know labor is entitled to all it creates,
and that given a chance most of us are helpers,
we want to help people and to be helped
by people, amidst the absolute and delicious
loveliness of ordinary things.