Forest Service will close 57 of 77 research facilities. Critics warn closures threaten wildfire research.

Many of the research facilities slated for closure conducted
wildfire research. (Photo via Rocky Mountain Research Station)

As part of its ongoing restructuring plan, the U.S. Forest Service announced it's "closing 57 of its 77 research facilities in 31 states," reports Eric Niiler of The New York Times. Critics say the shake-up threatens wildfire and climate research on forests, just as wildfires are becoming more common and more severe in several parts of the United States.

USFS leadership said the consolidation will streamline research facilities into a main hub in Fort Collins, Colorado, and relocate staff to nearby states. Niiler writes, "But employees said they feared the move would lead many scientists to leave instead." The USDA already announced plans in late March to relocate USFS headquarters and 260 agency employees from Washington to Salt Lake City.

The closures include "six research and development facilities in California, five in Mississippi, four in Michigan and three in Utah," Niiler reports. The agency will also shutter all nine of its regional offices, which "currently manage 154 national forests," Niiler explains. "Some states will have their own offices, and others will be consolidated."

USFS oversees a massive amount of land -- some 193 million acres -- that includes several laboratories and "experimental forests where scientists can monitor the effects of environmental changes over long periods of time," Niiler writes. They also investigate wildfire risks, prevention and how forests recover after a severe wildfire.

Thomas M. Schultz, Jr., the Forest Service chief, told the Times, "Forest Service R&D has produced world-class science for over a century, and that will continue. The consolidation is about organizing the research enterprise more efficiently, not diminishing it."