DENVER - Acting Deputy Secretary of the Interior Laura Daniel-Davis visited Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge today where a new $6.5 million in funding from President Biden's Investing in America agenda will support wildland fire management in Colorado. The investment will help reduce risk from wildfires, support improved wildland firefighter training, expand efforts to rehabilitate burned areas in collaboration with partners and advance wildfire science. With today's funding, the Department has invested more than $31.6 million to advance wildfire resilience in Colorado since the enactment of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law in fiscal year 2022.
The announcement follows last month's announcement of a $236 million investment from the Investing in America agenda to support wildland fire management in fiscal year 2025 across the nation.
"The Biden-Harris administration is making transformational investments in wildland fire management across the nation - from preparing communities to better withstand future fires to supporting our brave firefighters with better training," said Acting Deputy Secretary Daniel-Davis. "In Colorado and across the West, we're seeing the impacts of investments from the Investing in America agenda through efforts that are making lands more climate resilient which will safeguard people and property long into the future."
In fiscal year 2024 alone, the Interior Department completed hazardous fuels management projects on over 100,000 acres in Colorado. At Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge, Acting Deputy Secretary Daniel-Davis visited one of those projects where resources from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law are helping manage fuels to slow the spread of wildfires and reduce the chances that lives or property will be lost. Projects like these are being funded in public lands across Colorado and will help urban communities and economies be better prepared for future fires.
Acting Deputy Secretary Daniel-Davis also saw a large collaborative project with the City of Denver, Mile High Flood District, where funding from the Inflation Reduction Act is restoring portions of the 5.3-mile First Creek drainage located within the Refuge. This work, approximately 40% complete now, will restore the natural hydrology of this riparian system and has included numerous volunteer events and work with local youth corps to plant hundreds of native cottonwood trees and shrubs.
The Inflation Reduction Act also helped the Refuge install new fencing to allow the Refuge's bison herd to graze on an additional 4,500 acres, improve the quality of over 2,000 acres of grasslands and ensure consistent access to water for the herd in the face of worsening drought conditions.
Yesterday, Acting Deputy Secretary Daniel-Davis visited the Truckee River near Reno, Nevada, with officials from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to tour collaborative ecosystem restoration projects supporting the recovery of two federally listed fish species, the Lahontan cutthroat trout and the Cui-ui sucker. Both fish are central to the Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe's culture and have been negatively impacted by water infrastructure and land use changes over the last century, including the installation of dams.
At the Numana Dam, Acting Deputy Secretary Daniel-Davis toured an $8.3 million National Fish Passage project funded by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law to support the Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe's vision of addressing a 100-year-old barrier to fish migration. Retrofitting the dam with a roughened 1,000-foot ramp structure across the width of the river will open an additional 65 miles of habitat along the Truckee River for the endangered Cui-ui sucker and for the newly established migration of the threatened Lahontan cutthroat trout from Pyramid Lake. Access to this habitat is essential for the recovery of the species in the wild.
The National Fish Passage Program is a national leader connecting watersheds and people. The program has decades of experience implementing projects in collaboration with federal agencies, Tribes, states and non-profit partners. Through the program, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service works with communities to remove obsolete and dangerous barriers, permanently eliminating public safety hazards and restoring river ecosystems. The resulting infrastructure benefits communities by reconnecting aquatic habitat, increasing flood resilience, and saving money in long-term repair and replacement costs. Since 1999, the program has worked with over 2,000 local communities, Tribes and private landowners to remove or bypass over 3,500 barriers to fish passage and reopen access to over 64,000 miles of upstream habitat for fish and other animals.
