>> coming up here on c-span 2, a hearing on management and preventing wildfires >> the insurance industry estimates the wildfires in colorado have cost more than $450 million worth of damage. the subcommittee vote on management. the three bills focused on forest health and the role of local communities on federal land. the hearing is a little over two hours.

[inaudible conversations] >> this hearing will come to order. the subcommittee on national parks for some public plans on three bills in our jurisdiction until the significant issue for national forest and catastrophic wildfires from happening in the future. since were not doing a good job or present methods of stopping them in the present time. under the rules of this committee, the remarks and limits of the ranking member and

chairman, i ask unanimous consent to include members of brainstem into the record if they are submitted to the clerk by the end of today. hearing no objections i ask unanimous consent for any member who wishes to join a and participate in our meeting today. once again, without hearing. i realize we are in a situation as far as time is concerned. some of you have flights they junichi make this morning. i also recognize that we have brought people and from across the country, so i appreciate them coming in to witness. therefore my opening comments of a segment on the record. we can move forward to say ranking member has an opening comment. >> i want to say good morning and thank you all for joining us today and welcome our witnesses. especially those who have been wildlife filed lowers. we respect and thank your

dedication. to be brief i yield back my time. >> we will start with our first group of witnesses who will talk and we'll talk about the first three bills here and it will be the sponsors on this. representative goes sour -- gosar. and mr. markey will talk about 5960. mr. tape dan, if you go through 5069. five minutes. representative gosar, go for it. >> thank you for holding a hearing in cosponsoring the bill for the prevention act of 2012. h.r. 44. thoughts and prayers continue to go out to her constituents from the catastrophic wildfire. other to express my appreciation to other men and women working to protect the lives and property of our neighbors. as a slideshow on the screen now to show some of the devastating impacts of these fires. the district i represent, arizona's first congressional district is the largest

districts in the country, encompassing eight of arizona's 13 rural counties. it contains over 37 million acres of land administered by the federal government, including over 9 million make is that the states service. that acreage includes much of the coconino, press kit, tonto national forest. last year communities for big bands to the largest forest fires in recorded history. it grew to over 800 square miles of are just few weeks, trying to make some of the largest ponderosa country. the murphy complex, stanley fired monument higher with the 200,000 acres. this year's season has not been much better. over 900 fires have charred nearly 6000 square miles in arizona, california, nevada company mac sukkot in utah and over 50,000 of those acres are in arizona alone. it is clear the process of

planning in the study and, consulting, killing and collaborating are fooling in our forests. the frequency and magnitude of the acreage are increased markedly since 1990. the five largest wildfires in my state's history, radio in 2002, cave creek in 2005 in berlin 2004 in aspen in 2003 and now the wall of fire have occurred in the last 10 years. prior to 1990, the largest was the careers of fire in 1970, which burned 57,000 acres. our ecosystems are suffocating graeber once had hundreds. 80 millions across our overgrown for catastrophic wildfire according to the lan fire multiagency database. our forests have been mismanaged for a long time and it's way past due to change our strategy. the system prioritizes fighting

fires so that we need to suppress fires its never going to go away, but we might shift priorities through the proactive management. we simply cannot afford to do otherwise. catastrophic wildfires are difficult to control and cost the federal government millions of dollars in immediate fire response and many millions more in restoration and rehabilitation or the western forestry leadership coalition, state and federal government partnership estimate the cost or two to three times the reported suppression costs. last year they spent a record total of $48 million on burned area recovery work. $25 million has been spent to prepare for the wildfires but in the u.s. service on track for another record year of spending on burned area recovery efforts. what is standing in the way of the days management? bureaucratic red tape is preventing us from participating in the environmental groups have devastated the timber industry

and placed likelihood of risk. that is why introduce a catastrophic while prevention act of 2012. my bill authorizes wildfire prevention on -- at risk forest and endangered specie habitat to focus on canopy fuels reduction activities. in other words, it streamlines the review process that improves local coordination, eliminates duplication and sends timeframe to bring more accountability to the process. forest thinning works. in eastern arizona, areas treated as part of the white balance stewardship project to thin the white mountain apache tribal lands, to areas managed locally by the apache tribe in arizona were cleared. today whether still healthy trees with burned underbrush and lands untouched by thinning practices, the majority of the land in the state only scorched

earth behind. we simply need to make ecological restoration easier. this commonsense approach is garnered strong bipartisan support of legislation is 32 cosponsors from 23 different states. additional utah senator mike leigh has introduced legislation in the senate. many supporters represent states and congressional districts with large land and bureau of land management administrative land, not massachusetts. in short, they are people directly in harms way, not safely typed in a concrete jungle. thank you am a german bishop for your leadership on this issue. i look at other proposals that will improve safety and save the taxpayer dollars and put people back to work. i yield back. >> thank you, representative gosar. we will let representative markey speak when he appears. mr. tipton for house bill 6089.

>> thank you, chairman bishop for putting my legislation, h.r. 6089, active 2012 and for your support of this bill. i like to thank my fellow members of the colorado delegation. congressman lamb board and congressman gardner as well as congressman greg walden and congressman gosar for the contribution to this effort. the epidemic, drought and deteriorating for as conditions have increased propensity for devastating while fighters already seen in colorado and throughout the western united states this season. while the state and private lands, damages often times were heavily concentrated in federal lands, where lack of active forest management has allowed the epidemic to the level. but the 6.6 million acres in colorado, over 4 million are on federal lands. federal efforts to responsibly manage and prevent conditions to

the degree have ravaged colorado and other western states have been hampered by inadvertently regulatory framework that systematically prevents progress was healthy for us. h.r. 6089, healthy forest management act of 2012 gives greater control to states and communities most directly affected by these conditions and provides the pathway for comprehensive landscape planning and local in-process. this legislation will come bipartisan restoration act of 2003 empowering states, counties and tribes to be more active in addressing emergency circumstances we can proactively manage and reduce distraction from wildfires, safeguard while supplies, and promote a healthy natural environment. utilizing tools and the restoration act have proven to be effective in the management that can reduce the cost imposed on taxpayers due to litigation can expedite emergency mitigation procedures and

restore our forests before they go up in flames. h.r. 6089 prioritizes conservation that will help reduce investment required taxpayers by making public private partnerships more feasible. this bill as a result of more than a year of committee work him in meetings with the bureau of land management, county and state officials with constituents as well as management. everyone we talked to agrees more needs to be done and this legislation is the outgrowth of the stakeholder engagement. this is further paired up by the groundswell of support we've received this legislation from colorado and from a local state and national groups and organizations on both sides of the political spectrum for those introduce this last week. healthy forest management act allows county commissioners, tried to identify the most problematic areas. the most imminent risk of

feeling the wildfires take action to be able to manage the risk by removing hazardous fuels but you don't kill timber. this allows those most radically impacted by wildfires to take proactive measures to address the problem and mitigate the root cause of the catastrophic wildfire. this bill is in a talker. it is a doer. the management act has received support of the timber association and conservation districts and commissioners throughout rose come archuleta, moffat, jefferson have also given endorsements. so how'd in crockett club and the farm bureau federal forest resource coalition national cattlemen's beef association counties in the national association retirees, shooting source foundation conservation districts, publicly and counsel, society for range management. i'd like to reach my colleagues to join us in a strong coalition of support for a commonsense

bill that takes action to fix the problem and seriously address the western force. thank you, mr. chaiman and i yield back. >> thank you, mr. tipton. we have several witnesses who have traveled great distances and i'm aware of your travel plans going back home, so i'm going to get you done in time. some of the witnesses are addressing all three bills and some only one bill. i'm going to make sure we do those who want to address all three bills at the same time. let me invite mary binder from the florida surveys, add robber san fran blm and department of carrier addressing all three bills. can i also invite. this is wearing make the change here. this is my second panel. commissioner gives from summit county colorado, joseph -- about

my classes here. romm, from the center of american progress, you all speak in three bills. and also let me invite hank kashdan from the national association of service retirees. and tom jankovsky from commission in colorado. you're the first panel. i was excited when i saw garfield in summit county. then i realized this was in colorado, not in utah. disappointment reigned again. all right. if i could ask you -- am i missing somebody there? good for you. if i could ask you once again if you would address the first for witnesses, all three bills. in the last two minutes says, mr. -- the commissioner and mr. cached and from the retirees come if you would then talk

about 6089. once again, we are in a short time limit. try and make sure everything gets available time. you have five minutes. you know the drill. most of you have been here before. you have written testimony that will appear as written in the record. this is an oral testimony come is only at the highlights and make sure comes up the five minutes. when the green knight is in front of you, that means you are free to go. when the yellow light has to have less than a minute to sum up. i apologize to you now than when i had five minutes i'm going to cut you off, even if it's in midsentence. i want all the testimony and though it can be heard and we can get through these issues and get people to meet their deadlines they have been here. i appreciate that. everyone is now situated and settled. we realize you're happy to be here and you'll thank us. don't do that. you write your message. your five minutes. ms. wagner, will serve at the

appeared to be met mr. chairman, members of the committee. a few remarks this morning. i know more details in the written testimony submitted. lots of open space, severe wildfires, devastating out rakes, all the stresses and disturbances are affecting america's voice on an unprecedented scale to 65 to 82 million acres are in need of restoration on national forests alone. 65 million acres are at high or very high risk of large wildfire. increasing the pace of restoration of the nation's forest is critically needed to address the health of our forest ecosystem, watershed and community. in fiscal year zero by then, we accomplish 3.7 million acres of restoration. in fiscal year 12 were on track to accomplish 4 million acres. we have made strides in our efforts to increase the pace of restoration, working with community organizations, forest industry, local government and communities, state tribes and other agencies. we've demonstrated forest thinning and hazardous fuel

treatments reduce the impact of fire. clearly we have more to do. i want to offer my appreciation to members of the subcommittee and other members of congress to your interest and action on this issue and i also want to express condolences to communities impacted by wildfires today. this is the reason this work means the very best. before i address the bills i want to tell you about the work were implemented to increase restoration in many cases new authorities and tools from congress has made the work possible. we've invested in projects with partners to the landscape restoration program. these projects have demonstrated collaboration among stakeholders can facilitate large landscape scale restoration. the landscape strategies developed by these collaborative efforts alone exceed 60 million acres in their footprints and the strategic placement of fields in the treatments will help build more resort landscapes. states are featured partners in many of these projects. under the 2008 farmville, state

action plans were required update to lending a priority areas through forest restoration. we partner with the state across boundaries for many of the state action plans are in the process of implementing them. we focus on priority treatment areas to ensure human health and safety and reduce hazardous fuel conditions. reviews tools available to agencies such as stewardship contracts and good neighbor authority to develop a more holistic treatment that accomplish multiple resource object does come in many times across jurisdictional boundaries. what the passage of the 2012 interior appropriations bill, congress provided resource authorization to implement restoration for three pilot regions in the interior wipes that the united states. irr will bring resources necessary for maintaining story under one budget i met him to do necessary work on the land. we've worked hard on improving efficiency for restoration.

a couple of examples were close to issuing two new categorical exclusions for us well in water restoration activities and increasing use of landscape scale needs for a larger acreage covered in one analysis. two examples of that are arizona's forests initiatives, where a document covering the restoration plan for that is 750,000 acres. recently in the black hills they issued an adaptive environmental impact statement, covering over 250,000 acres of not in pine beetles that risk or impacted by an escape. lastly we are working as a partner in all than cohesive strategy through the flame at, the agency to put together a strategy that would focus on restoring and maintaining fire adaptive landscapes, including communities announced amazing coordinated response to wildfire. we are working with a host of local, municipal states, other

federal agency players to respond to that strategy. a critical part of efforts is building public support for forest restoration and management committees. while the department opposes h.r. 5744 and h.r. 6089 is drafted, the elements that we support and would like to work with the subcommittee and sponsors in developing the language that needs restoration object is. what we support h.r. 1560, would like to further discussion on elements. reduce support good neighbor authority and reauthorizing contracting authority. as wildfires have impacted lands across the west we recognize the interest, urgency and willingness of members of congress to provide tools for the service and other agencies to apply restoration principle. we look forward to working with you on this issue. thank you. >> thank you, ms. wagner for

watching the clock. >> thank you, mr. chairman. and ranking members for testifying this morning. department of interior and cohesive wetland fires that e.g. common management strategy working towards maintaining brilliant landscapes, creating adapted communities and managing wildfire response and a complex environment. an agency of the department of the interior, bureau of land management is the productivity of the forest and wetlands, which together comprise 58 million acres of the public lands, which we manage for the american people. the mounting effects as infestation can disease outbreaks, prolonged drought, climate change, emissions of harmful non-native species and accumulation of fuels generate increased risk of catastrophic process, including risk to life and property that may result

from wildfire. the blm works with partners across landownership to protect property, wildlife habitat and other resources from wildfire. towards this goal, the blm last year treated 400 last year. cutting out the blm actions including forrester and fuel management is the agency's land-use planning process. the blm uses an open public land-use process to an good public input and analyze the effects of the post actions. we value this process in the information it provides for us. two of the tools we have used effect only in our fields management program are stewardship contracting in the good neighbor authority. today, blm has successfully as stewardship contracting in over 100,000 acres were reducing filson restoring habitat in protecting communities from wild land fire.

the blm has used the neighbor authority in colorado to partner with the state and gain some efficiencies in achieving restoration goals there. with regard to congressman gosar spill, each or 5744, it requires the blm to authorize wildfire prevention projects, which are defined to include timber harvest and livestock grazing under a reduced level of public comment and environmental analysis. the bill would allow timber harvesting of wilderness study areas that would impose strict timelines for public review and analysis. it deems the project has kind client is timelines are not met. the bill also requires fire in field research prior to endangered species act listings, critical habitat determinations in recovery plans for the department is committed to using fuels reduction treatments to maintain whistling at landscapes and protect life and property

from wildfire. however we do not believe h.r. 5744 will achieve the goal of mitigating risk of damage. the bill were curtailed the use of some of the most valuable assessments and analysis. the timelines for public review coupled with the fact that the legislation deems compliant if we don't meet the timeline and what not to enable sufficient analysis. therefore the department opposes the bills with the provision that changes esa. with regard to 5960, congressman markey's bill amends the healthy forests restoration act to provide for enhanced restoration and research and authorizes stewardship contracting a good neighbor authority. the blm supports the authorization stewardship contract and expansion of good neighbor authority in this legislation. these authorities will enable blm to better achieve land and

forest health goals in cooperation with partners. the department supports h.r. 5960 and would appreciate the opportunity to work with the sponsor of certain tech goal improvements. we defer to the florida service on this portions of the bill to relate solely to the national forest. with regard to 6089, congressman tipton's bill authorizes the state governor or secretary to designate areas of public lands that is high risk of current and future damage for areas designated as high-risk, the bill requires blm to implement projects in those areas under a reduced environmental analysis. the bill also extends stewardship contract tina good neighbor authority. the department opposes 6089. the definition of high-risk areas outside of the normal planning process, particularly by governors without consultation of land managers prevents public involvement,

environmental analysis in making most of the nation and further the time frames for designating areas and those projects are not sufficient for analysis of those decisions. under the bill -- >> mr. robberson, please. >> commissioner gibbs, five minutes and i'm going to impose a deadline very strictly. >> all the members of the committee i am dan gibbs from summit county, colorado, former state senator -- [inaudible] over the last 10 years i've witnessed the transformation of our forests resulting 10,046,000 acres, which were killed by them not in pine needle epidemic. as a result we now have a major challenge to respond to these conditions. we appreciate congress enacted the healthy forests restoration act, which is help expedite the

acts. however, much more can be done. as can be seen from the fire that destroyed 143 homes and costs 49 and suppression costs in 2002, and many like it, the cost to suppress fires vastly exceeds the cost to treat forests. in some accounting over 80% of bush's national forest land, 146,000 acres of dead trees near communities need to be thinned. the challenge in finding the resources for projects and work with existing and regulatory systems is in summit county retreated acres in the interface and currently under habre an additional 13,200 acres have been approved for future work. however, we saw tens of thousands of acres to need urgent treatment within the wild urban interface. summit county has had to find additional resources. 2008 summit county offered the property tax levy for wildfire

protection, which could generate up to 500,000 per year. in 2012 the county was able to apply $300,000 from the stunning source for 12 projects a 120 acres up in the wild urban interface. in addition to florida restoration act, a bill i pass establish a grant program made available $1 annually in state revenue for local navigation and watershed protection. these funds available for needs a wider grant applications far exceed their needs. a town located within some accounting was the recipient of some of these grants used to treat forested areas along street creek, a major drinking water supply for the town. the town was rightly concerned that a fire in this area would greatly impact its watershed. grant funds used to treat 64 acres are at all i would have brought, the tax levy in a statewide grant program, we have been able to get it projects

done, but again we saw thousands of acres to address in areas like street creek and homes. that's why were interested in what more assistance congress can provide in the bills before this committee today have provisions that would help in this regard. generally speaking the projects i mentioned to be enhanced by these provisions. let me highlight these concepts. first, we need more funding, plain and simple. the task of removing hazard trees is daunting and states can only make a dent in this effort. i understand the bills you consider in this committee are not primarily about funding, the urge each to make this a priority. second, designate areas in our national forests impacted by insect and disease would allow the service to focus on this area. we've all come designated areas has emergency or critical need and apply the provisions to these areas and appreciate being consulted in the designation

process. .. to mitigate the threat of limited resources to a number of unique collaboration is this wednesday and local governments, private industry, and landowners. still, we are not able to address the interstitial without further assistance. rears the bill's sponsors to come up with a single bill that includes these concepts to negotiate a compromise resulting in a bill that could garner wide support and get past with a

single signed into law. the dow condition of our forest, the threat to our communities and resources, especially water and extreme terrain and the federal treasury due to the ever-increasing wildfires demands that congress come together for our nation's well-being. thank you. >> thank you, commissioner. i appreciate that. mr. romm? i set it right this time, and i? >> is, you did. >> for five minutes but mr. chairman, members of the committee, thank you for inviting me to testify. i am possessed, former acting secretary of energy and climate expert. fourscore and seven years ago our grandfathers and grandmothers were enjoying life in the roaring '20s. now, imagine you're a car respect and and imagine that the nation's leading scientists are warning that human activity and years of that land management practices have left are topsoil of our will to the sources of the wind and the next time a major drought hits much of our

farm land will turn to dust, dust and the wind. you would take action. over the past two decades the nation's leading scientists have issued strong brands from warnings that human activity, burning fossil fuels and deforestation, will lead to longer and stronger droughts that dry out topsoil and timber creating the conditions ripe for multiple multi decade decibels -- dust bowls and wild fires. in fact all we're already topping dust bowl temperatures at many places, and the earth has warmed only about 1 degree fahrenheit since the 1930's dust bowl. yet, we are poised to warm some of 10 degrees fahrenheit this century alone if we stay on our current path of unrestricted carbon pollution emissions. i repeat, several studies now project the world may warm 10 degrees fahrenheit the century if we do not act, and that is the average warming of the globe. much of our country would see far higher temperatures. the reason he would be considered a pleasantly cool summer.

another study looked at midcentury warming of just 2 degrees fahrenheit. it found that while fire damage in many of your own states, utah, colorado, idaho, south dakota, nevada, and washington would double, triple, even quadruple from current levels. imagine how big the government would have to be to deal with the rampant wild fires and with the dust bowl soaking the breadbasket of the world. a lot bigger government and today, for short. of course, this great deliberative body is debating various bills to avoid catastrophe by slashing carbon pollution. except, it isn't. we are here discussing bills and that fuel treatments, a euphemism for cutting down trees and controlled burns. ignoring carbon pollution and focusing solely on the fuel treatment to address the have to have an epidemic of bark beetles, drought, wild fires is like rearranging deck chairs on the titanic or more precisely, it is like burning some of the deck chairs and removing some of

the umbrellas. same outcome, more time wasted. as i explained in the journal nature last year, all we are discussing here today is the single most important question facing the nation. can we prevent the extreme drought and wildfires ravaging the country today from becoming the normal? the real question, and i am addressing myself to the members of the majority now, is how you want to be remembered. do you want to be remembered as a herbert hoover sat by and did nothing in the face of obvious calamity? or abraham lincoln who took every measure to save the union? lincoln said at gettysburg, the world will little note nor long remember what we say year, but it can never forget what they did here. that, of course, was not true of his speech. after testifying to congress nearly one dozen times since 1995 when i was principal deputy assistant secretary of energy, i'm quite convinced that nobody

remembers what we say here and in the case of these bills come everyone will forget what you did hear. are you neville chamberlain or winston churchill who worked tirelessly to warn a prepare bid to tie britain for will was coming until the house of commons and 19 and. ♪ the error of procrastination, half measures, sitting in a baffling experience of the leas is coming to a close. in its place we're entering a time of consequences. the consequences are here now, just as climate scientists predicted. if we fail to take action, many scientists predict run for large parts of this country. run for large parts of your districts, jen that lasts 50 generations. american set off for generations to defend government of the people, by the people, and for the people in the hour of crisis when the that government to do its job. now is that our. thank you very much. [applause] >> commissioner tom jankovsky.

did i say that directly? >> that's correct. >> welcome. five minutes. >> i am tom jankovsky. >> can you make sure that is on and buy your mouth? >> okay. did you hear me now? >> has better. >> i'm tom jankovsky. i have of vote -- worked in this key industry for 40 years. general manager of sunlight down resort which is a local ski area in glenwood springs colorado. those four years have been on deforesting colorado. i traveled here to speak in support of h.r. 6089. this bill addresses the deteriorating health of colorado force and has a strategy to improve safety in strength and stewardship and provides benefits for our local communities. first of all, the health of our forest is a risk. forests are deteriorating. colorado forests are extremely dense because of what i believe is misguided management practices. currently 30% of our --

currently our forests are 82100 percent canopy, which help the forest as a 30% can be. also, the bark beetle epidemic has deteriorated our forest and drought conditions have impacted our aspen forest. the nation has watched the recent tragedies in colorado, the canyon and hyde park fires, the dollar amount on that, i saw in the denver post today, was $450 million in private property loss as well as loss of lives. current federal regulation fail to recognize the importance of our forest regarding water conservation, water supply, wildlife habitat, recreation, economic benefit, and the multiple use and in our mental health. h.r. 6089 improve the safety and strength and storage ships. this bill extends storage shed beyond the current healthy forest restoration act. it has a 20-year life. it gives us the ability to

expedite and prove hazardous fuel reduction and also acts -- it also gives us the ability to manage and restore our forest. this bill empowers the governor, state and local communities to designate and cooperate with federal land managers tough emergency hazardous to your reduction projects and also gives a benefit to our federal land managers and another tool for them to work with our local communities. the bill supports an emerging forest restoration industry, which is -- we are starting to see an industry which provides tools and manpower for forest restoration. this bill -- and through this we are also seeing an increased our natural -- from our natural resources for lumber mills, blog furniture making, firewood sales , biomass energy and would palace.

and so this bill, although it does not say that directly, does provide some economic impact as well to our communities. h.r. 6089 allows for creating funding as well, private partners, a private public partnerships to reduce hazardous fumigation. also i would just like to -- federal land managers know the high-risk. it gives them another tool in working with local communities to address and address those risks. continue to educate the public indefensible space. we have all lot of communities and homeowners, homeowner associations their up into the forest. right now in colorado citizens can be reimbursed up to 50 percent of the cost for improvement of the defense will space local documents regarding

public land use is extremely important. nearly 70 percent of our landing garfield county colorado are owned by the federal government. it really helps for us to have the ability to talk to and be empowered to work with the federal government. the vitality is closely tied to the health of our public land. >> we appreciate being here. our comments are specific to age -- h.r. 6089, the healthy forest management act of 2012, but we do want to acknowledge the attention given to all three bills is important in bringing

attention to the continued degradation of america's forest and range lands. the cause by insect infestation, john, and other factors. this is a serious set to america's public lands, communities on an adjacent to those lands in the infrastructure. as retirees we clearly feel that action is needed, action that is rapid, efficient, collaborative, and which pushes the envelope in terms of procedures and authorities. we all know that increasing budgets is not a fix, and we also accept the potential for budgets to be decreasing. in the legislative approach there has to be a focus on public-private partnerships, reduced process, and much greater recognition of this crisis. we think that's h.r. 6089 supports this approach. i do want to announce the excellent work of the agency so far in addressing this, the forest service approached with bark peels strategy, collaborative forest land restoration program and group --

use of the innovative restoration but the pilot should go a long way toward increasing a compliment. the forest service and blm joint work in the use of storage of contacting, the release of the national cohesive of fire strategy are all important. these are steps in the right direction, but we do think more is needed, and we think h.r. 6089 will really help moving that process forward. with the exception of a minor reservations we support this legislation. for the storage of contacting extension, let me to say thank you. that rule is an essential part of future accomplishment and working with communities. the contract term extension to 20 years we think is helpful in the incentivizing of investment and business capitol and in building long-term community participation in decisions about the adjacent watersheds. the good neighbor authority being made permanent is a critical need.

the inclusion of categorical exclusions for projects with an 500 feet of the upper structure is important, and we like the governor's authority to designate high risk areas. now, we understand there is some reservation on that part. i remember distinctly when the good neighbor authority was implemented back in the late 1990's there was some concern about what i would call a shared authority, if you will. well, that concerns about that have not come to pass as an excellent authority, and as we look at the expedited procedures that are called for in this bill under the healthy forest restoration act regarding analysis of judicial review, we think that the governor's high risk designation making those procedures applicable is a good part of this legislation. we also very much appreciate the application of those same procedures to non wild and urban interface landscape that are also very important to addressing the degradation.

i mentioned one reservation. let me just say that the provision calling for a project implementation within 60 days of the governors as a nation even in the case where the secretary may not have designated areas high risk, we were concerned that might raise a false expectation that national resources in terms of money and budget will be shifted to those projects. across all public land there is very good work being done by the agencies and being done with a very limited funding level. so, to think that there will be a ship like that is probably not realistic and where it has been attempted in the past it has been met with very little success. we do think that retaining the federal agencies authorities of the program is important. i might also note, one technical correction dealing with this section six prohibition on clearcuts relative to hazardous

fuels action, a species that requires openings in order to effectively regenerate. we think that that might be something that should be considered in the -- in the final bill. with that, mr. chairman, let me conclude my up for march and i will force any questions. >> i think all the witnesses for having come here and giving testimony and staying within the five men level. i am aware the plans people have out here and he will get it done in time. representative, i realize you have the first plane out, so i'm going to yield my time. as the panelists said they would refrain -- limit their questions the 5960 and 69. once we have around of those questions i have two other witnesses that are talking about 574 pork 255744. so, representative, if you would like to take my time first. >> questions. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i have plenty of time for this. i thank you for yielding to me

and allowing me the opportunity to ask you questions and to make up a misstatement. my questions would be for ms. wagner. remind me again how many acres specifically have the bark beetles impacted since the epidemic has begun? >> i know that i think the number in your testimony was around 18 million. >> i've got corrected and permission for that. across the nation, and pack some bark beetle on all jurisdictions is over 43 million acres. national forest system alone over 30 million acres. >> and then you also discussed in your testimony and 65 million acres are at high risk for wild fires. that is the number that not necessarily all those acres are impacted bye-bye kneele epidemic. that is a high number. even if he took the 18 million-member. i was running some numbers while i was sitting. it appears to me than what has been treated and addressed is less than 2% of the land they

you have jurisdiction over and have actually gone in been dealt with and been treated for fiscal year 2011. is that accurate? >> the bark beetle strategy that we created and began to implement in fiscal year 2011, retreated over 300,000 acres to increase resiliency, reduce public safety issues. relative to the size of the impact of the pine needle, i agree, that is a small amount of acreage. overall, we're trying to of scale are treatment on the landscape, the disparity areas, and that is where the acres restored in fiscal year 11. >> okay. well, for me that is a very disappointing percentage. we have, obviously, the testimony that we have a critical situation on our hands. when the federal government has jurisdiction over lands, it is my anticipation that they be responsible for maintaining in taking care of those lands, especially when private lives are at risk and in jeopardy.

this is a very timely in incredibly important issue for states across the west, including south dakota. i know you've have had conversations with me in my office regarding this and house of the cut is impacted. this is one of the hottest summers on record. trott said been declared in several different states. forests turned into tinderboxes, as we heard testimony. one fire in the black hills vandalize of four national guardsmen from north carolina. so my heart has been going out to those families as well and fighting these fires that have been going on. the outbreak of the beetle has changed our landscape. i have some photos that i will pass around to the members on the committee if they can look at what is going on. what is so interesting is when you look at this picture, and will let everyone look at it as well, you can see the vast difference between what has been treated by the state and what the state has stepped up and taking care of and the difference of the u.s. forest service land and how the pineville is out of control on that land, right next to land

that the state has taken the opportunity to go in and address so i would like to thank my colleagues for introducing this legislation. i would also like to thank everyone for being willing to tackle this issue. it underlines the importance of this issue that we have people on both sides of the aisle looking to find solution that it is not a republican, democrat issue that impacts all americans who care about our forest and the livelihoods of thousands of people across the nation. so, one other question per ms. wagner as well. have you been out to the colorado or to the black hills to visit, to see this with your own eyes it? >> i have not. >> of cape. >> personally. another chief asman time in the field. our regional forest service has made time. >> i would like to personally invite you to a come to south dakota and bring the chief with me. >> there is an urgency on the ground, and i would love to bring you out to south dakota and show you around and post you

doing that. if they say something about, you know, we certainly have the cooperation that is potential there and so i certainly would love to have you envision that and see that together warehouses could work and how these bills could work on the ground for the benefit of people living there. with that, i will yield back. >> thank you, representative. blue wood is very pretty, isn't it? yes. that me turn to the ranking member. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman. let me start with ms. wagner. almost 50 years ago the forest service began the process of reviewing the management of pristine forests. in 2001 the chief issued regulations to protect. it recognizes one of the most far-reaching conservation by federal government since the wilderness act was passed in

1964. after a decade of litigation 60 million aircraft provide a protection from harm. hr -- h.r. 6089 declares an entire national forest system in imminent danger. the declaration lays the area for protection in color and every other state? >> the position of the administration is, we support the area conservation role as enacted and reviewed by a the courts. so there are 58 million acres under that management strategy identified across the nation and then specific conservation problem in the state of idaho and one under way for the state of colorado. in the case of high priority, need for fuel treatment, and fire risk, the majority of those acres are outside of areas

adjacent to wild and urban interface. so we think we can abide by the provisions of the area conservation rules and work on forest restoration where it's needed in prairie landscapes. >> but let me get back to my question. >> sorry. >> if the declaration, section three of h.r. 6089 declares the entire national forest system in imminent threat. thus this declaration, section three ways the protections in colorado and every other state? >> i believe it will. >> this? >> i believe it would. >> it does. thank you. mr. roberson, your testimony points out, the important environmental and make it difficult for the public to engage the federal land managers can you give us an idea, make a charge, how many hazardous

projects the bureau of land management implements every year and how many of these projects are appealed to back. >> we have treated in the last ten years 23 million acres with hazardous feel reduction project to mustard subcontracting and could never authority. >> i can't hear you. >> okay. over the last ten years we have treated 23 million acres of land. we restored forrestal's in those acres is using fuel projects, phil reduction projects, and other treatments if. we have also come in the last year, as an average, treated 400,000 acres. and we have less than 1% half of 1% actually protista that appeals. these are projects that the committee supports the we have worked on with the community, and they have not been a pillar

protested. >> thank you. let me ask you this. see you think of 193 million acres of the national forest system lands are in imminent threat to health and safety so that area protections should be suspended? >> well, let me address that this way. i am more speaking on my own behalf because we have not -- we have not taken a position as a retiree group. the concern is is that roadless lands are essentially lands in limbo, and we need to ultimately make some determination as to how to the properly assign those to some type of either management or non management status. that would be as far as i would go on that. >> all right. and so in your testimony on h.r. six -- h.r. 6089, you risk

requirements for agencies to implement projects by governors within 60 days. do you were -- do you or why don't you have the same concerns of the requirement to implement projects by the agency within 60 days? quickly please. >> if i'm following your question correctly let me just say that i think that that provision, although it has -- tends to get a lot of attention, although it tends to get a lot of attention and is presidential, 99 percent of the benefits derived from this bill is not germane to that issue. >> thank you. i appreciate that. mr. tipton. >> thank you, mr. chairman. taking the time to be here out of my home district. can you give us a little bit of scott tipton, a county

commissioner, how much time is spent dealing with issues related to land management? >> well, land management in general, i am a new county commissioner. i have been in office for two years. i thought i had a pretty idea of what i was going to be doing is a cut to commissioner, but fans been evicted percent of my time more on federal issues concerning our county. there are numerous. this is one of them, but -- >> should the federal agencies in dade county commissioners a little more in terms -- >> there is no doubt. i think the benefits of this bill is that it creates a -- a working relationship batman local communities and federal land managers, and i think that is very important add the highest regard for our federal land managers in our area, but i think that there could be great improvement. >> thank you. >> ms. roberson, i would like to ask you, help the forest

restoration act of 2003 require public input with respect to projects carried out under the terms of the act? >> yes, sir. >> they do? those are authorities we are using here. you don't need worry about the public input. it provides the public input. i really want to be able to visit with you if i may for just a moment. i appreciate your candor with respect to section 6e -- 6089. i recognize some of the fiscal constraints faced by the agency. with that said, with your extensive experience in forest service to you believe that there are efficiencies within the agency that could be pursued that would help prioritize the approval of hazardous fuel reduction projects and to be able to actually help meet this fiscal unease? >> yes, sir. i do. i also think the provisions in

the 6089 specific to help the forest restoration act of 2003 regarding appeals analysis and judicial review will greatly enhance that. so you combine those deficiencies. you apply them to non while an urban interface and use some of the existing tools with stewardship contacting and we will go a long way toward improving the accomplishment. i think there are examples of how far you can go when you are encumbered by minimal analysis. the burned area emergency rehab is an example of a program that is rapidly executed, delivered with give results, and it is done with a wise demand on the part of the public regardless of where they stand on the environmental spectrum to get work done, stabilize areas after catastrophic wildfires, and it is an example of how far dollars can go when you're not encumbered. >> appreciate that. if we bring some common sense to the process, allocate resources with common-sense to be able to

address the problem, we will be able to receive an actual win-win. i appreciate that, sir. ms. wagner, have the upper to the to be able to go out and to colorado to be able to tour an area that was actually being treated. we were seeing a healthy forest emerged, talking about water table increases of 15% by giving in to be able to actually then the forest. healthy trees that were then being a will to survive and to be able to grow. is it pretty much your estimation that's when we see that tragedy of these fires in areas like south to route 25, reuter, impact to our watershed, impact on wildlife habitat, impacting those streams and endangered species, when that ice is the rivers, is a good, sensible approach to deal to bring together tools and that local commitment, working with up to commissioners, working with our local governors, working with the tribes to my

the people who live there and love it most to be able to have those sensible determinations of weather real risks are at. >> yes. we are keenly interested in working in that kind of environment and the doing our part to help sustain our nation's forests. >> great. thank you very much for that. hank kashdan, i would like to come back to you. you mentioned some of the great success of the good neighbor policy authority that the forest service has accumulated in collaborative efforts that are going on. given this, do you believe it might also be beneficial to expand this ability to blm land as well? >> definitely. the good neighbor authority as well as some of the other efficiencies model similarly, some similar authority in oregon and even some that has to do with hazardous feel money to be authorized to spend in a similar nature. it works. to apply it to the other federal

agencies is a good thing to do. >> thank you. >> i apologize for cutting you off twice, but you were able to answer in nine seconds a less. very good. i want to explain what i want to get done. the ranking member of the full committee this year and as marks of this particular bill. i have two other witnesses that me to talk about the bill but also have plans to catch. can i just asked if -- did you have any questions specific to 6089? if not, mr. gardner, i am assuming you are here for 6089. when i turn to you for questions on that tomorrow we will finish the questions and 6089. are two witnesses are here specifically for that bill and will be excused. bring the other two up for 5744 and then let's mr. ed markey give his opening remarks. to it that way. you are up. >> thank you, mr. chairman,

members of the house resources committee to allow me to join you today and participate in this. thanks in particular to congressman tipton for his work on this legislation and the work that he is doing to help protect colorado and the western united states. one of the most incredible resources this nation has offered. also, i want to welcome the witnesses and colorado. thank you, commissioners. we serve in the state legislature together. at thank you for your work there and here. i am stunned by the callousness of the department of interior subjection to the healthy forest bill 6089. we have a situation once again where washington is filling while our states are burning. in your testimony you state that governors can require blm to manage to meet the governor's objectives.

a fair return to the american people. a fair return to the american people? i have over 200 homes burned in my district. tens of thousands of acres burned. you want to protect wild and scenic rivers? what about the one that now has ash and debris flow, contaminating the river. dirty water systems that are overwhelmed. you are going to oppose this legislation because it gives the governor the authority to save his state? the ability to manage for resources protected by federal law. do you believe that bark beetle, been killed areas are high risk? >> yes, congressman. >> do you believe we ought to give the states the tools they need to protect their citizens and their state?

>> we believe -- we believe that we and the states should work together along with the local counties on this problem together. >> do you believe you know better than the state? >> no, sir. i would not substitute my judgment. >> then why would you oppose a bill that gives the state the ability to protect its citizens. >> we are managing national public lands and trying to do that to achieve ecological balance across -- across the nation. >> ecological balance. >> and to provide for jobs and opportunities as well. we've -- we -- we believe in the principles that were outlined that congressman tipton just raised and that mr. wagner agreed to. we believe that we should work in concert and do that at the state and local level with the governors. our cohesive fire strategy will allow us to continue to work on building resilience landscapes

and working together on fire prepared -- >> 90,000 acres and burned forest a resilience? >> not on that landscape, sir. >> 260 homes that have burned resilience? >> we have -- >> is what you're telling me, are your forest policies working? preventing this from happening to back. >> the bureau of land management has approximately 1 million acres of beetle killed trees out of the 58 million acres that we managed. we are focused on that issue. we have a plan for beetle kill infestation in colorado and other areas, and we are working through our local planning efforts with county commissioners, state foresters, and other land managers to address the issue, including the state government. our plans are reviewed by the governors of the states when we complete them. >> you mentioned the bill provides that high-risk areas

designated for 20 years and you object to that arbela killed areas going to be around for 20 years? >> twenty years ago in my a experience we did not anticipate the level of beetle kill that we have now or some of the other changes. >> i will ask again, are those beetle kill areas going to be around for the next 20 years? >> i cannot project, sir. >> you are telling me -- >> i'm saying that -- >> you can't guess? this baena dead trees will be there in 20 years to mac. >> my statement is that 20 years as a designated high-pressure area is too long, we believe. we believe that you can focus -- >> how long does it take catastrophic wildfires? >> excuse me. >> , what does it take to recover from a catastrophic wildfires? >> i have no idea. >> twenty years a list? or more? >> i can get back to you on that. >> i yield back my time. >> thank you.

i have just one question on this particular bill. anyone have other questions on this bill? that me ask bynum and we will make a switch. some of the other questions also would deal with the representatives bill, and we can fit in that concept as well. one bill specific to this command your testimony you said that 60 days dissing bush's high risk area is not enough time. how much time is enough? how much time do you need to make that designation? >> we would -- we would normally do that through our local working with county commissioners and the state and the state foresters we would work in with them to designate high-risk areas. >> sixty-first jack. >> i'm not sure how long it would take. i think the level of the problem that we have, the magnitude of the multi hazy landscape that we deal with, i have no estimate, sir. >> okay. and my frustration is not simply with you, but with almost every

agency around here. i am a schoolteacher, nine months to do it and it was over. my principal came to me and said the final touches on tuesday and i simply said, i can't cover all the material by tuesday. i'll get back to you when we are ready to actually take the test. you can imagine what would happen to me. in my professional was trained that you have to get it done with the deadline is there. yesterday we had another hearing, the same situation. i would not say when they will get it done. there is no deadline. we have another hearing when we said it would take an agency for years to do a study of landslide those are frustrating to those of us who are not inculcated into the climate of washington d.c. so, 60 days is not enough, that prevents an illusion of a problem that is difficult for me to wrap my mind around because i am used to hitting deadlines and have no choice in that matter. with that and i appreciate that. let me close this. i want to thank -- do you have a

question? i'm sorry. for this particular panel. okay. >> thank you very much. do you think that climate change or climate variability, the severity of fires in the united states. >> can i interrupt for just a second here? i asked a very good and legitimate question. it applies to the other bills as well. if i could do just 6089 sucking get these witnesses on their way and bring the other witnesses up, i would appreciate that. >> as you what you're saying. in that have any questions. >> a cake. commissioner tom jankovsky, we appreciate your attendance. we appreciate your final layout. you can be -- you can go back in the enjoy yourself at this particular stage of the game. i can invite david cooke from the arizona cattlemen's association.

i'm sorry, the national cattle the association. toil from the national resource. i'm doing this without glasses, coordinator from pat to county arizona. china said that panel. and while they're coming up, mr. tipton, i will give you the last comment on your bill. let me give you time to introduce your piece of legislation. we will have the other two witnesses introduce their testimony, and then we will open up the questions again. mr. tipton. >> thank you. i just want to make sure that the list of organizations, concerned citizens in colorado and throughout the united states are supporting 6089 to be able to submit their letters of support for the record. >> thank you very much. without objection so ordered. once again, i apologize for shifting gears and everyone here, but i am trying to get everything to move in the proper order. one of you, i know, as a flight going out this afternoon. we will get you there on time. i appreciate that. we have not had a chance to introduce your piece of

legislation. can i give you five minutes to address our legislation? >> i appreciated. >> thank you mr. chairman. i first want to address the congressman earlier comment about the ability of people live in the concrete jungle of massachusetts to be able to understand wildfire and forest issues because that is an ironic comment coming from a gentleman who lives in a landlocked desert states, voting in this committee just two days ago authorized chilly for oil and gas off of the ocean. of the coastline of massachusetts. the gel mention square up where he thinks he has expertise to be allowed to vote because of the desert state member obviously should never be allowed to vote on anything to do the russians in the country. although our job is to vote on

everything. making those out -- distinctions is absolutely appropriate. we are here because the taxpayer of america, funded all, including the response to wildfires and response to what happens after the wild fires are completed, it is a national issue, and the taxpayers help out. that is the essence of what this institution is all about. ieper of the sunland, out of many one. that is with all revolution was about to make it invisible work. i just wish these gentlemen appreciated that. and i want to thank you, congressman or chairman for holding this hearing to consider

legislation to combat wild fires. i am glad that the full committee will be holding an investigative hearing next tuesday. today we are considering a bill have co-sponsored. we have a very serious problem, and i am willing to name it. the problem that we have impacted our land across this country is climate change. if you think storms and drought conditions and catastrophic wildfires are just random, freak events then you are in deep, deep denial. when sigmund freud's study denial he suggested that when people are forced to face unpleasant facts they're prone to, one can deny the reality of the fact of right. to, minimize the seriousness of the issue or , three, predicted the project responsibility of the applause the situation on some 13. this is an apt analogy to how

the climate deniers have to present to deal with severe weather events, droughts and wildfire. for months the majority has denied that there was a problem. now the majority apparently is willing to accept part of the reality, we are approaching dust bowl-like drought conditions and fires are becoming larger and more severe, but they still denied ever cause of the push to the extremes is actually caused by climate change. instead, they're going to project the responsibility of wild fires on to and from a loss, land management agencies, litigation, endangered species, and even immigrants. if we are serious about reducing catastrophic wildfire we first must admit that there is a link between climate change and wildfire. the undersecretary of agriculture, howard sherman, has submitted this link exists. the chief of the forest service has admitted this link exists. scientists around the world

approve in this link exists. earlier this week in massive job of vice twice the size of the island of manhattan broke off the p. deming glacier in greenland. scientists point to warming of ocean temperatures as the culprit. i have suggested that we rename it to nighter island where those who question the science behind global warming can spend the summer cooling off and escaping the heat waves, the draft plan the wildfires that have beset the united states. today to of those bills seem to be legislating from to nighter island. the goal that i have is to introduce here legislation that will make it possible to recognize that we have a problem it also recognizes that we don't have the type of scientific certainty to lock in logging and grazing projects for ten and 20 years like the other measures proposed. instead, my bill allows the

forest service and bureau of land management the flexibility to defending -- and in areas impacted by insects and disease without waiving environmental laws and forcing federal agencies to make decisions on projects in unrealistic time france. i feel also that my bill recognizes the constrained fiscal environment and gives the federal agencies additional authorities they desire to stretch their federal dollars further, as we will hear from both the forest service and bureau of land management storage of contracts and authority is very helpful by allowing agencies. i think you, mr. chairman, for the opportunity to make the opening statement. i appreciate the panel that will be here to discuss the subject. >> thank you. let me -- mr., and a stand you have the first fight that has to go out. all right. can i ask you if you can make your statement first for the record and then mr. cook and the will will open up questions.

so, if you would. >> the natural resource coordinator for the county. i also do work for many other entities, the state legislature, other counties to make such a. the need for sweeping a massive reform and the mechanisms to expedite force megaprojects to reduce hazardous fuel to increase forest l. and economic development cannot be stressed enough. the current system in place is heavily laden with out of date along with unclear and can strict mandates obama land management agency slowing down an already cumbersome system even more. many more roadblocks to fill the reductions to rigid activities by counties along with pre and post fire activity need to be addressed and removed as well, and there is no doubt in the minds of apache county elected officials are on the western regions that something drastic has to happen. unless we have drastic and

sweeping changes made to management practices we will lose our great western timber stands. it will affect a very cultural and historic uses of the people, the people's ability to derive economic benefit, recreational ability, strategic capability along with the loss of massive amounts of habitat and wildlife. h.r. 5744 can go a long way in getting that because we are at a point where emergency measures are needed now. having this week just attended the strategic planning meeting for the national institute of the elimination to catastrophic wildfires in the keynote address , it is completely evident that multiple people's and entities with tickets and experience on the lands see the threat to our nation in heritage the bulk of the participants were prior land management agency people who have come together alongside multiple ph.d. scientists, research professors, and college teams that were present to address these issues.

one thing that was notable during this advance was the multiple instances in which presentations and conversations turned to the issue of catastrophic wildfires on our forest and what to do with the forest throughout the country and mainly, especially, in the last. this is due to the overwhelming evidence that our current state of affairs will lead to nothing but irreparable damage. another topic that needs to be highlighted and addressed that goes hand-in-hand with catastrophic wild fire prevention is the necessity of the roadway networks that cannot be neglected. those rose to -- road when networks time and time again after the fire. remember, we just went through that last summer. 838 square miles destroyed. those drug when networks are a critical part of that wild fire prevention. those have to be infertile with our future plans, including with this bill. sweeping changes are necessary

to the stewardship of our land, and the model of county stewardship by apache county, ariz., needs to be replicated throughout the united states. h.r. 5744 would allow county stewardship and others to more easily move forward with a wild fire prevention and protection of health, safety, and welfare under all those areas. profiler activities, almost next to none if you want to know the truth being on the ground. zero, if you will. most fire recovery programs were often so short-sighted, mismanaged, or misguided as to be useless to the very people and resources that they were meant to be helping. multiple programs came down, and many of us have to ask after going through the conundrum of bureaucracy and red tape and seeing no outcome. agency after agency, dollar up $1 was waved in front of the victims of these fires with no outcome whatsoever. where did the money go?

millions of dollars and absolutely not usable by anybody affected. the very fabric and core of the matter practices and conservation of our natural resources in this country are reviewed with the best available science, one of the greatest losses in our history will occur these times to call for immediate action. excuse me. unfortunately. these bills and questions can begin an attack upon these problems. we need to remember, too, that this is the catastrophic wildfires that are just a symptom of the disease. that is taught to a great extent, mismanagement by federal land management agencies of our land held in trust for the public. with that to my would just like to remind everybody, and that'll historical not that we need to get to back in control, the government and fire. george washington alluded to that when he stated, the mechanization of government, how they were like fire and it was a dangerous servant and a fearful

master. >> thank you. i appreciate your testimony. mr. kirk. >> german bishops, members of the subcommittee, thank you for inviting me to testify on the house resource bill 5744. my name is david cut enamor rancher. my wife and i along with our son and daughter run a cal calf operation on public and private lands. today i am also a representative of the public staff counsel. why start raising represents the earliest use of western land as our nation expanded westward. today those lands and resources continue to be essential for livestock, wildlife habitat, open space, and rural economies of the west. however, a hands-off management approach the federal agencies has led to severe damage of the resource. by all but shutting down logging and continuously reducing

grazing on public land multiple use industries are suffering. this mismanagement is causing a buildup of fuels that lead to catastrophic wildfires. when catastrophic while fire breaks out there are no winners about the wildlife, the rural communities are the taxpayers. that is why we are here today, to discuss real and immediate belief -- relief to the dangerous situations on a near. last year in arizona alone we had 1 million acres burned up impacting 100 ranching families in displacing about 18,000 head of cattle. as of this week over one-half million acres and burned this year alone. the overall cost of wildfires range from 3-10 times fire suppression cost, not counting property loss, personal-injury, and death. for ranchers the cost includes displaced cattle, lost of ever structure, and tens of livestock

what is the cause of this destruction? we should start by looking at nipa. agencies face a tremendous workload of our early bird and some analysis and other regulations. they plan, study, get sued, plan and study for months and even years on and creating backlogs and pilot. extreme anti logging and anti grazing environmental groups which in the wings to file suit up procedural points like missed deadlines often times collecting attorneys' fees. in doing so they ad agency were close and further worsen the backlog. the result is tremendous economic uncertainty. the forest service estimates a current backlog of 2600 grazing allotments. i have personally been involved in an age your process to renew a simple 505 head permit. we should also take a look at another environmental law that has added greatly to the problem

while fire poses a huge threat to many species, yet esa is often used to let activities such as timber harvesting and grazing. the very activities that should be used to reduce fuel load and diminish the threat to wildlife. the spotted owl has all but wiped out the timber industry in the west and drastically reduced crazing. by the way, over half the mexican spotted owl nesting sites were destroyed the wild fire alone. how long do we have to watch everything from what light have attached in the subdivision, natural resource, and of go up in smoke on the news. the catastrophic while fire prevention act goes to the art of the problem. regulations that have led to over root of fuels will expedite grazing and many projects and encourage free enterprise solutions on federal lands that will reduce the threat of catastrophic wildfires.

ultimately reducing festa communities in the landscape, and endangered species. it puts special focus on to priority areas. the wild land urban interface and the endangered species habitat. if the agency's miss the deadline in automatically deemed those projects and plant under the buck. while fire does not wish for in this deliberation and high risk situations and neither should we. still, the bill allows for 30 day public review and comments. no longer would radical environmental groups be able to laugh at the last minute to bring projects to denise. finally, this bill requires the use of existing es a emergency provisions which allow for a formal consultation. this bill was just common sense and will put people to work and held countless communities while improving the health and safety of our forest. again, thank you for the opportunity to testify today and that exports your questions. >> thank you very much, and i appreciate how both of you hit the mark. that is very kind. we're watching it very well.

we now are opening up to questions. i will yield my time because i no you're probably on the same deadline. we will talk to you about how you should be using letter on. let me allow me to yield my time to you. >> i appreciate it. mr. wagner, mr. roberson, the timetables are failing us. i mean, i just witnessed for our contracts to get private industry for large coffered the for initiative, six months, and we knew it was coming. i mean, this is inappropriate. in fact, i am very aware that the chief had to fly into albuquerque to even oversee these types of contracts. i mean, this is not rocket science, and i know we have to get it right. you disagree with the timetables. what would you like to see as far as timetables? six, five years? that is inappropriate what we're

doing right now. give me your time to will quickly. >> what would like to say is, i appreciate the lead of local elected officials and mideast cases. the heart of the successful work we're doing. states are planning a very similar role. we agree, there is more to be done. we would like to work with you to find all the right tools to be most expeditious. >> unlimited of my time, sought to recapture the spirit you give me a timetable. give me what you looked at as a timetable. we said 60 days. give me a timetable. if ..

together we identify high-risk areas. >> so what's wrong with 60 days? i don't see a problem with 60 days. let me explain to you. i see a lack of trust by the federal government with counties and states. and that has got to stop. i don't see the federal government keeping promises one iota. there's limited finances we can do here. when we start to look at these widespread swats to take care of, it has to reinvigorate the private sector so you return money on investment. mr. cook, give me your experience. we just saw this fire. it was a disaster because this

forces are returning anytime soon, isn't it quite >> not only is it not returning any time soon, it is a large $56 million. i would give the total up the loss in revenue and economic growth in rural communities. >> you have a kinship in stewardship with the force and fire at, don't you? you have to watch very carefully. >> communities and when ranchers want the land to be the best shape it possibly can. many times the agency's hand tie ourselves to what we can do. i'm reading a biological assessment now were the number one threat according to the recovery plan and the biologist doesn't remember that but they want to reduce grazing and doesn't address the fuel whatsoever. >> embracing private enterprise, actually creating money and royalties i think is our

education system, is that not quite >> i agree. i saw a depelchin information and to secure rule school act. you know, in the west we want to be put to work. we want industry, jobs. we don't want government handout we want to put bloggers back in the forest, cattle and land and we want to manage things in our state do we want to do so. >> mr. shamley, i know you just got back from a conference on the west coast and you've got amazing information, do you not? that you want to share with us? >> there is a growing movement of academia. former employees of the agencies. i am in full agreement of a pier one of the only long-term fixes is back to the state of the public lands because there is no feasible way to manage the forests as a system is now. we are going to keep losing millions, steve destroyed massive amounts of habitat on

the wall of fire and we are enabled currently to do anything about it. our county stewardship are grim is old, working and we are the ones protect and the spotted owl pass. i don't see lytic and alongside. >> you're actually blazing the trail. it's pretty much common sense, is it not quite >> we've created a lot of jobs for a lot of people are ready. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman. what i experienced recently aside flew to the island of hispaniola downspouts near florida and flying there you see half of the island has lost green and the other half is barren. the dominican republic and haiti. there must be something wrong there. i'm not going to argue with you, sir because you know your business better than i do, but apparently they are the reason

for all of our problems here. the there are places in the world, where we can see the consequences of black up regulations or lack of control over natural resources. i don't also understand the science, but on issues of climate change, anyone who wants to see evidence of climate change, i invite you to the islands where i am from. you will see coconut trees and chide the water. because of the rising sea. and at this time, i yield the remainder of my time to mr. marquis. >> i thank the gentleman very much. you know, in 2012 we are beginning to emerge from the great recession, the new drought for a new era is threatening a majority of our country.

the dust bowl was surely due to an actual punch, but it was also man-made as years of poor land management had not the strength from our soil, leaving it to turn to dust as the rain dried and the winds and trade lands. the drought of 2012 is also man-made, but not because we failed to learn the lessons of the land. we did. it is man-made because we failed to keep the want teens from nature or the drought of 2012 is yet another data point in the ever growing canon of climate catastrophes. mr. romm, the frequency, the intensity of these five years in the west, how much of it do you think we can attribute to this rapidly changing climate here in the united states in on the

planet? >> you know, i think that is the question of the day. i had an article, which i would like to commend the record. the next dust bowl and heat caused by climate change. let me frame it this way. i think we know global warming makes extreme weather more likely any kinds of extreme weather more distraught goods. the analogy people have used as a baseball player on steroids. you don't know that any individual home run was caused because of the steroids, but if you are breaking records you've never broken before, and this is what is going on, the atmosphere is just a more main. scientists knew there were three reasons that global warming is going to make wildfires worse. obviously whenever it is hotter, it is drier. the palm or severity is based on soil moisture.

soil moisture is driven by how much evaporates, how much comes down and how much of that race. so when it's hotter, you get more of operation. so global warming makes drought worse and makes drought longer. the second they know it was sealed it and there was never any doubt about that. obviously, as this spring -- we had no winter. winter was like spring is here come the spring like summer and summer was like how lavishness. and that is that global warming. so when you have spring becomes summer, the snowmelt goes early. colorado had staggering loss of ice. it's actually interesting i lived in your district, mr. ted didn't. -- tifton and so i know what the place looked like 20 years ago when i know what it looks like

now. when you get the earlier snowmelt, many of these western regions, including colorado where he lived doesn't get a lot of precipitation in the summertime. it requires the stream flow from the reservoir of snow, snow and ice is the reservoir. so the second impact global warming causes drought and wildfire as you lose the snowmass -- snowmelt earlier. third is the global warming actually changes the climate. that is why it is called climate change. it shifts the subtropical dry adults and unfortunately when you expand the subtropical dry adults, that hits the southwest. we will see less precipitation and that is the double whammy that states like colorado are going to be hit by. more evaporation. and then finally the bark beetle, which we talked about.

>> my time the gentleman yield it to me and i've been very appreciative of, but the time has expired. so will come back. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i think, to get the focus back on top and the hearing, some question, is the bark beetle and imminent threat? maybe we can just -- yes or no i think covers it. ms. werner, to mr. with you? >> there is concern -- >> is there imminent threat? >> yes. >> server? [inaudible] >> congressman, yes. i brought it to you to focus and see how small it is. >> great, thank you. sir? >> it's not a yes or no question.

it is a long-term threat. this species has become invaded because of climate change and the climate will keep changing, so we'll keep invading. it is an imminent threat and 20 years from now. >> thank you, sir. >> absolutely. >> mr. shamley. >> yes, absolutely. >> senator from her state of colorado had requisitioned the study came from at the request to the u.s. forest service and said the primary reasons we were seeing the bark beetle infestation is because of the forest service actions including the timber harvesting, active management, drought lack of allocation of resource and timber management, limited access to areas due to the inability to be able to provide accessories in my federal land designation for treatment as the primary contributing factors to the rampant bark be the

outbreak. so i'd like to ask the question since this was the report that came out, which i i think help identify the problem, do you think an expedited approval authority can help us actually do that given the information we received out of those forest service out of colorado that by getting in and they need these devastated areas, we increase the water cable and the help of trees? >> would like to see more work in bark beetle restoration. >> thank you so much. but that ideal the balance of my time to my colleague, mr. gosar. >> what we have is a pandemic. it's about cankers and blanks as well because what we do with someone here who has the measles and were all stuck around here so they're much more contagious to everything else around here. we have different species that have different requirements like ponderosa pine. we want to see 10 to 25 trees

per acre instead of 600 trees. so we have a problem here and we've got to address it. by allowing them to see and we are aggressively created a pandemic, are we not? >> yes, we have serious concerns about insects and disease and prevalence because it's hot. >> so, the little jar that the gentleman showed us is just a focal point for the disease if you don't get rid of it because what you are doing is if there are areas that continue to create the infestation. true? >> yes, conditions are right. >> the longer it stands, the bigger the problem. what do you think about that, mr. cook? >> well, i ranch in the pine area up to 7000 feet in elevation and a few which are talking about. what i don't understand is when you talk about the dry, u. of trees competing for the same drop of water. the forest seems to be thin.

i don't know why we can't agree with that and move forward and would have a much healthier forest of religious we would just do so. >> mr. shamley, would you agree with? >> yes, i would because i can take anyone who wants to see tours of our once great forest and show your whole entire hillside and the personnel are the ones who indicated that due to it being too thick of a tree stand and a lack of activities and mayor, dee became weakened because they were competing for water and that is when the beatles moved in. >> i want to take us back to the fire over some mitigation by the tribes, which was interesting when we had the tribal lands problem. >> not at all because they treat the land here they are proper stewards and think about congregation, not preservation. >> i will stop it here. they are thinking about conservation and are treating the forest?

>> this is an oxymoron. >> it came to a halt amid the apache reservation where they do treatment. >> let me ask you one question at a dynamic forest of tall growth trees or as a young growth come in medium growth in old-growth? >> at the old mixture. >> thank you. i appreciate it. >> before i turn to mr. markey i have questions. before i do that, mr. shamley. i don't know if mr. cook is on the same flight. do not think it's going to be offensive if you leave to go to the airport when you're going to go. the one which in our heads, please feel free. >> mr. markey, given the other questions? >> just going to come back to you. >> just to be reflective of what happened in explaining the bark beetle and why it's now

reproducing out once here, but twice the air, why the change in temperatures are causing that to happen, why it is expanding its footprints in larger and larger areas because of climate change and the changing temperatures and you're just trying to explain that scientifically has a reality that has led to the metastasis station of the problem in the same way new england winters are now four degrees warmer than they were in 1970. said the massachusetts and vermont maple trees are now going further and further north, heading towards canada and that's just the changing climate, change in temperatures. we barely had a winter last year. so while you're doing is pointing out the facts of the maple trees are going further and further north in the bark beetles are reproducing twice a year to cause more and more damage in the climate is at the heart of it. it's a big change occurring.

and so i don't know why we just can't agree on that because it's not just the west is doing win. it's a common problem we all have to do with. first of all you can put a band-aid on a culinary and try to together policies, but you have to step back and look at the larger climate cancer that's out there and say what can we do to reduce the longer-term impacts? that is what you bring to this discussion and we thank you for. commissioner gibbs, as a wild land fire fighter can you tell us how effect is air tankers are addressing wildfire situations like we saw recently in colorado springs. >> the utilization of air tankers is important. i think is most effective when you put resources on the ground for communities, nec engineer

tankers as heavy seropositive and they can carry more, but the single-engine air tankers certainly have more versatility. they are easier to get around. quiet f10 the big heavies cannot fly of course when it gets windy and the single-engine air tankers tend to be more versatile. you can get more up in the air as well. >> thank you, sir. whether it is a flash flood or flashed out a flash of lightning ignited wildfires, climate change is increasing to all parts of the country. and what happens in the midwest does affect massachusetts. it does affect arizona because there is an extreme weather boot

tax. there is higher prices to every american because of this trial. a $7 a bushel for corn, we are looking at real consequences. can you talk about that? the economic impact on every american? >> certainly every american is very concerned about the explosion of the wildfires, but i think and i said -- i read much of the literature and written a great many articles on i believe it is through food prices that most people experience climate change because people can adapt. we can go when it's hot to an air-conditioned room, but a farm is just out there ask those to the weather. there is no question food prices have been static at levels that we haven't seen in 20 years. oxfam projects food prices will double or triple.

>> can i go to mr. cook quickly. are you concerned about the impact it has on corn and other business? >> absolutely pure corn price directly affects beef and cattle prices and they move together. that opens the whole mother discussion. any agriculture producer in the western midwest is always concerned with stroke. >> do you think climate change is playing a role here in this expansive drought? >> my thoughts are a little bit different and probably yours, congressman. with all due respect our timeline in which you speak a today is that a pebble on the size of the sand on the beach somewhere. >> is a pebble on the sand? >> not at all. i don't think there's any question that climate change is making the drought worse. i don't know if this'll be

another round of questions, but people have to understand there's a difference between warming the average temperature in changing the climate. there have been two or three major studies in the last several months that say when he lussier the case, you become the jet stream. when you weaken the jet stream, weather patterns get stuck. there have been two or three peer-reviewed studies. if you ask wire heat waves lasting longer, why are highest lasting longer, climate change driven by carbon pollution. >> sorry to interrupt you. i have one second left. >> let me ask one quick question on my own if i could. appreciate you being here, and your service in the northwest on the ground and you learn to trade up there. the reference was made today, which obviously piqued my interest with home runs and steroids. homeruns are also also a cause of quark in the back.

let me ask you an alternative method here, ms. wagner. one of the witnesses said there is little empirical research to document the fact that lower fuel loads and reduction in fuel reduces depression. ms. wagner, could you discuss the researcher agency has done with respect to the effects of the reduction on wildfire behavior? >> to specific publications i can cite from the angora fire in california and from the wallow fire in the southwest. we've had scientists look at pre-and post-fire impacts and feel treatments. we see in a fiery as recently summer on the national forests fontanelle and through visual pictures as well as science, you can see the difference that a standard that is thinner, that have ladder fuels removed and how fire behaves when it

encounters that environment. i pass the two provide publications to the committee. >> thank you. let me ask one specific question from your testimony about 5960 in your written testimony that it adds mountain pine beetle for a culture assessment under the healthy forests restoration act and section 404. section four 04 does authorize assessments on federal land and the secretary determines is at risk of infestation by or is infested with force damaging insects. can you simply define force damaging insects? >> i believe the term defines itself -- >> i would say the amount of time that would qualify -- >> you are correct. it is defined in statute. 42, which does include the mountain pine beetle. so i guess the question i have

to ask is how is this new authority that would be given to you, its authority in in statute? >> some of the authorities were specifically for the forest service and that may have been one of those. i can get back to you on that. >> i think he needs to be a little bit clarified. >> i can get back to you. >> thank you. we'll see we'll see if there's a second round of questions. any other questions you'd like to ask? >> ms. wagner, canopy forest fires, they are intense, are they not? >> yes. >> in many cases they sterilize the story soil, do they not? >> post-fire we are able to determine intensity of the fire and some cases we're seeing impacts of soil. >> is it easier to mitigate or tougher when you sterilize soil? >> just have to recover from.

>> topsoil is much thinner than it is back east, are they not? >> soil types are deathly concerned when impacted by fire. >> let me ask you a question. we also have inabilities for bogus rules that impact our harvesting process. they are a core part of how we go into the forest. tell me what part of a road mitigation is tougher to do than sterilize soil? >> i'm sorry, i'm not following your question. >> when we do an interim road, how is that mitigation worse than sterilize soil? >> we have the ability to design rose said they are low impact. >> i would agree definitively. mr. shamley, tommy some of these other things you've been doing

that drew so much attention in your local comic or most recent speech. >> well, one of the big things of course was the multiple counties and scientists were actually able to hear about the county stewardship. we had to use all the force the county possesses to protect health safety and welfare. they passed rustic resolutions to bring the fidelity to washington, which we did in january to move on to the fourth of either get something done or were going to fix it. at that point after tidwell ditched the meeting, are locals and the only ones i can give due credit to, not the agencies as a whole. a local supervisor are the ones who work with addison said yes, you're right. the area needs to be treated and yes you are right beside we are targeting was completely left off any target plans by the u.s.

forest service for treatment. this town party try to have burned down. not try come it did burn down. the other has to treat the residence and a watershed and that are deemed -- protecting the pack completely left off any plans or maps. >> mr. côte, i know there is an example of this interscholastic we are talking about, we really mimic this and shows that you can mitigate and take care of the forest and you can also have increased grazing. you can also have a number of different proprieties you are increasing endangered species. there is a ranch in utah and maybe the ranch that showed any -- but there's a proper balance, is there not the shows

this working? >> absolutely. speaking to myself, we monitored the spotted owl on her own ranch. we pay for the monitoring or so because the agency fails to do so. the fish and wildlife service says the monitor the species. we find that doesn't happen, so in fear of litigation was imprimis we hire the biologist who does the monitoring for agency itself. what we have come to find out is the owl in my opinion and research as they did not read and research in the other cattle are not present enough for us. so we have a lot of data and science that we show the grazing impact, when done in the proper methods, nothing but benefit endangered species. >> back to the organ, i am very stewed about botany as well, sir. so when we have an unhealthy situation, it endangers everything. you don't have enough like going

to the canopy bottom. you don't have diversification of different species and therefore what it does is hers the spotted owl, hurts the whole plethora of species within that environment, does it not? >> it does and that's a discussion we have with the fish and wildlife service today is cattle grazing creates transition zones. around the zones, and the cattle trade zones around the wildlife and file boxes to benefits the species is the g mayor. >> thank you very much. i assume you're talking about centro? that's my district. mr. markey, any other questions? >> yes, i do. this discussion about steroids, i'd love it. i have a chart. it's now four years old, but it still works for the purpose of this discussion. what i had was my staff go back

about four years ago and track the number of players in the major leagues who had more than 40 home runs per year. over a period of 1920 as babe ruth over a 40 home run. , the average weighs 3.3 players per year average more than 40 home runs. ickey mantel, willie mays. ed williams, all of a sudden in about 1995, it started to spike up to eight, nine, 10, 11, 12, 13. and it stayed very high until major league baseball at the congressional hearings finally decided they were going to test for steroids, artificial substances.

no longer that her diet and corked bats, smaller ballparks, bigger players. the list is checked for the steroids. and guess what? it went back down to 3.3 players per year are averaging more than 40 home runs per year. and by the way, this chart looks exactly like despite any amount of co2 in the atmosphere and the rising temperatures on the planet since the dawn of the industrial age. when human beings started to inject additional carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. and you know, it will take a number of congressional hearings alternately before we finally come to realize that these other ingredients that climate deniers want to attribute this dramatic rise to in the same way the

major league baseball did all the way from the commission are down to the lowliest ballplayer who has a stake in this phony system that was put together. or rather, reflection of the reality that once we get the artificial, additional chemicals out of our system, then the climate will start to calm down, the wildfires will start to calm down. the droughts will start to calm down. but until we get the steroids out of the climate, and so we admit that we are playing a role in this, then all of the other issues that the band-aids are trained to deal with the harm that is being done, both to the players into the game, on an ongoing basis. what do you think about this? and very correlation, is it not? >> yes, and it's moved beyond correlation to causation. you can move beyond when you have an underlying theory. we know carbon dioxide from

burning fossil fuels fossil fuels fossil fuels. they did make a greenhouse gases. if there were no greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, the planet would be 60 degrees fahrenheit colder than there'd be no civilization as we know it. i would just like to make a point. i've learned a great deal at this hearing. i'm not an expert on short-term forest management i'm an expert on the medium and long term. there is no question that the trees compete for water and there is no question that drought is a big problem for trees and also exacerbates the bark beetle problem because trees killed our people by releasing. and the drought problem the problem is we are on a track

where your districts are going to see bubbles of soil moisture in the coming decade that are worse than the dust bowl, which was a- three, which means that you're going to end. there'll be more drought and wildfire and some other congressmen will come and say we've got too thin for some more. in 20 years after that, within until there's nothing left. defending to deal with drought is not a sustainable solution. it is the end of all trees and all of your districts. as someone who has skied in your district and lived in height, i must say i love your district. >> i thank you. in the same way we note that infielders and outfielders went from 13 home runs to 15 homers, somehow we knew they were mickey mantle and willie mays and something must be wrong and the extra weight lifting they were doing, i think most people know there's something wrong. as soon as we admit it in the

beef industry and every other industry would get to the heart of solutions we have to put in place. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you. i may just ask one last question and i hope this'll be the end of it. we've got planes to catch. robby richardson was probably the best second baseman in the history of the world. i loved him. casey stengel once said he doesn't smoke. he doesn't drink. he doesn't stay outside and he still can't hit 250. >> although he was roommates with bikini atoll. no, i'm sorry, that was bob served the aaton rodger merits. it is the perfect non-sequencer that non-drinking coming-out carousing can help you live longer, but doesn't help you hit a curveball. so i appreciate that. unless there is a question from any members, i want to thank our witnesses for being here. there may be additional

questions for members. if there are, i ask you to respond in a timely manner with that. i thank you. i hope you make your flights. i appreciate your chance to visit with us in on the testimony given here today. thank you very much in this committee will stand adjourned. [inaudible conversations]

>> cleveland clinic's president and ceo discussed upcoming changes in health care policy at national press club. a health care law makes great strides in providing access, but does not do enough to control costs. he also noted the law does not have enough incentives to encourage people to take care of themselves. from washington d.c., this is an hour. [applause] >> today speaker had that one of america's most respected medical institutions, ohio's cleveland clinics. a ceo,.you are delos cosgrove presides over a system comprised of the cleveland clinic, eight community hospitals, 18 family in a military service centers, a hospital in florida, center for brain health and nevada, an

executive health center in toronto and the hospital currently under construction in abu dhabi. his leadership has emphasized patient care and patient experience, including the reorganization of clinical service, organ and disease-based institute. he has launched major wellness initiatives are patients, employees and communities. under his leadership, the cleveland clinic has consistently been named among america's 99 most ethical companies by the atmosphere institute. dr. cosgrove is university school of medicine and completed medical training in massachusetts general hospital, boston children's hospital and broke general hospital in london. he was a surgeon in the u.s. air force and served in vietnam as a chief of u.s. air force casualty staging flight. he was awarded the bronze star and the republic of vietnam accommodation medal.

he joined the cleveland clinic in 1975 and was named chairman of the department of thoracic and cardiovascular surgery in 1989. under his leadership on the clinic our program is ranked number in america by you of new world report for 10 years in a row. he has performed more than 22 dozen operations and earned an international reputation for expertise in all areas of cardiac surgery, especially valve repair. he has three patents for developing medical and clinical products used during surgical environments. his visionaries thinking, medical expertise and dedication have earned him numerous awards and honors. he is a member of both the cleveland medical hall of fame in cleveland business hall of fame. he held business for northeast ohio and is highly ranked among modern health care's 100 most powerful executives.

among dr. caused as many attributes is known for his ability to provide high-quality care while holding costs down. he is also known for his concern that health care reform might stifle medical innovation. we look forward to hearing his views on these and other issues affect a supreme court ruling on the affordable health care act. ladies and gentlemen, please show me a welcoming to the national press club, dr. cosgrove. [applause] >> well, thank you very much. but the nicest introduction i've had today. [laughter] i would like to share with you some of the experience and some of the things that are going on around cleveland clinic and how it reacts to the affordable care act. first of all, let me tell you a little bit about our organization. we are a very innovative organization. we are 91 years old,

not-for-profit. you do try partner mission of education and clinic or care. we are positioned lab and all of us are salaried and employed by the institution. there are no financial incentives to do more or to do less, which is an important aspect of what we are. we all have one-year contracts and there is no tenure. each year we have an annual professional review, which is part of maintaining the quality of our organization. now, it is interesting to look at health care and see exactly where it came from and how we're organized. the design we currently have dates back to 1950 and much of it relates to the overt act, which encourage communities across the united states to develop hospitals and be responsible for the care of that community. since that time, health care is improved, longevity has extended and with that we've seen diseases change this change as well as therapies change.

and now we are doing with chronic diseases. six of the seven major causes of death in the united states are chronic diseases. so it is no longer possible to have other type allergy in one hospital in the hospital can be all things to all people. so what is the crisis we are currently dealing with what we've heard so much about in the united states and what does the affordable care act and how did he try to address these? well, there're three main things were trying to address. the first is access. you have heard about how the affordable care act and another 32,000 -- 32 million people currently did not have insurance currently have insurance. this is a major step forward. the other problems around quality and quality with variable across the country. finally, caused was escalating.

right now with the $16 trillion obligation that the united states has come a 50 of that is related to medicare. the health care bill will do little to affect that obligation. in fact, we'll probably see increasing cost. so how will we as an organization and how will health care as an organization beginning to deal with these issues as we go forward. let's take them one at a time and talk about how we as an organization begin to deal with these. first of all, access. insurance doesn't necessarily mean you get to see your physician. one of the individuals in the audience came to me and said here in washington was not difficult to see a physician. there's a number of steps to go to to try and see a physician. so we begin to address each one of these. the first thing we did is put in place nurse on call peers at 2:00 in the morning when your

child has a temperature of 103, you can get on the telephone and get good advice from a nurse or a suggestion about where you might go to get their ip. last year we had 20,000 phone calls. this is a free service of the cleveland clinic. the second area we did is frequently when you call up is hard to get through on the telephone, so we put together a call center. a call center has an average of 30 seconds to answer the phone and only a 3% drop rate on your phone calls. and when you call to make an appointment, each time you are asked, would you like to come today? last year we saw 1 million same day appointments. the ability to see those appointments were able to make 95% of those appointments available on the same day basis. then there's the emergency room.

everybody will complain about the weights and emergency room. we changed our method a year ago on how we see people in the emergency room and now the average rate is under 30 minutes from door to see the doctor and all of our emergency rooms across our entire health care system. so we try to begin to address the day-to-day needs of access. the second issue is quality. i would point out to you the quality is really not want to. it is three things at health care. first of all, if they clinical experience, physical experience and an emotional experience. the clinical experience we begun to address with electronic medical records. the electronic medical record begins to make data available to you across the entire organization. move from outpatient facility to community hospitals on the main campus with electronic medical record with you all the time.

anytime you see a doctor and information is available at that point. the other thing we thought was incredibly important has begun to have transparency. transparency comes in a lot of forms. starting some 30 years ago we began to look at outcomes and begin to understand how you understood what outcomes were. each time i look at those, we always found there was an issue we could do better in. and so, starting eight years ago we said we begich whenever institutes to put together in outcomes spoken make it publicly available. these outcomes books are published and are available on our website. that is part of transparency around our quality and additionally we think transparency about what's going on in your care should be available to you at any point.

so we opened a medical chart and you can see your chart anytime you want and the hospital by simply asking for it. so the further you should be able to know about your medical history and medical record when you're not in the hospital. so we have electronic medical records you can be available to you over the internet. we have almost 500,000 people who now have access to this. interestingly, we now know that people who use this tape that are care of themselves. diabetics have their blood with host levels and they take better care. so we encourage people to actively participate in their care along the way. further we have begun to understand complications within the hospital and we have worked specifically and been very transparent and only about the entire organization, but the individual departments and

positions outcomes that we post this publicly for the physicians. interestingly i would tell you there is no more competitive group of people than doctors. doctors do not like to see themselves on the bottom of the list. if you want to improve the quality of a physician, all you have to do is rank them and make it public and it's amazing how fast things move out. we've had a lot of experience that way. the physical part of coming into the hospital is also part of everybody's experience, so we began to look at everything as far as the physical experience in hospitals concerned. in the architecture, the light coming into the room and increase class to bring my natural lightning. we begun to bring art into the hospital. the speakers no longer spend their time teaching people. they play in the public space with classical music is to come in, which adds nothing to the

cost is greatly enhance the atmosphere of the facility. we bring in art therapy, music therapy and even amazingly we have dogs walking around or hospitals. i laughingly say there's nothing better than a from a lab. and the pediatric see that regularly. we like to have the physical experience be a positive one as well because it helps with healing. the third and perhaps most is the emotional aspect of being in the hospital. we are very concerned about this because anybody of the 43,000 people who work for the cleveland camera and the experience of the hospital and i had one of those experiences when a relative called me to the room -- a relative of my ways called into the room, a very upset family and i wanted to know why they were subset appeared to her surgery had gone

gray. they were upset because underneath the bed were dustbunnies. that ruined their entire experience. so we brought all of our 43,000 people together and took them offline for three hours. we sat them around roundtables like you have here, we've got yours, nurses, environmental service people, people who drove buses, people on the loading docks and talked about the cleveland clinic experience. that has been a major during changing how these people are engaged. we no longer address them as staffing.yours. i've are the cleveland clinic is addressed as a caregiver and that has changed the atmosphere. and with that we now find our staff in the top 90th percentile of the country as far as a cat scores and patient satisfaction is concerned. an important factor in people's experience when they go to the

hospital. finally, let they talk about cost. one of the important names we have to realize about cost as we have perverse incentives. one of the major things by reducing cost is employing physicians. all of the physicians at the cleveland clinic are employed, myself included. i get a straight salary, so we did not make a difference whether he did research operations a day or for, i got paid exactly the same amount, so there was no incentive to do more. our system really encourages people to do more. essentially in the trade dispute what you kill. a little strange. but nonetheless, the incentives are wrong. so as we need to begin to move to an incentive that does not incite you to do more, and in

fact and since you to take care of the patient can be paid for that. the involvement of the doctors has been proven that the salary.errors to reduce costs. the dartmouth atlas look at organizations around the country in the two that came up with the lowest medicare costs are the mayo clinic in cleveland clinic, both of which employee donations. the other thing physicians do is bring them around to involvement in the organization. we involve physicians in everything. we are physician led and evolve them in purchasing decisions and utilization decisions. all of which helps bring about lower cost. the other aspect of bringing about lower cost of integration of health care systems. we are completely integrated across our organization. so that has allowed us to do a

couple very important things. first of all, we have reduced duplication of services. we have rationalized services. we have rationalized and gone around and consolidated pediatrics, trauma, rehabilitation, her surgery, obstetrics and gone to places, which do a bigger volume and as a result of bigger volumes do more and as a result of that give better quality and more efficiency. that certainly has been proven to be the case in multiple studies across the country. we also recognize now that health care is changing. the hospital is becoming less and less the epicenter of care delivery. care delivery is going from inpatient to outpatient to home care and we now can see that hip replacements and the replacement

are done with 24 hour stays and many people going home the same day that they've have those procedures. it is simply the dance of care. it's also the advanced than change and the type of diseases we are dealing with. more chronic diseases, less acute diseases and acute diseases and surgical diseases are taking care of his outpatient and inpatient spirit the other perverse incentives is around all of us. there's no incentive for us to take care of ourselves. we smoke. we become obese, don't exercise and we go to get health care and expect to get great care. let me give you a couple of examples. first of all, you have to realize that 40% of the premature deaths in the united states are secondary to three things. smoking, eating and lack of exercise. let's take smoking, for example.

the incidence of smoking in the states is 20% and the scary part is it's rising. it's associated with the majority of cases of cancer for the united states. so we began a very aggressive approach to this. we started out by having no smoking allowed not just in our buildings, but anywhere campuses, parking garages and property of the cleveland clinic. then we had smoking cessation for all of our employees. then we decided we would make a bold step and stopped hiring smokers. i checked. one of the smart things i've done. and then, we rolled this program out of smoking cessation into the community. and hulk try smoking cessation

laws and public places in the state of ohio. in cuyahoga county, where we are located, the incidence of smoking is gone from 20% to teen% in five years, so you can make a difference and perhaps we have saved more lives by doing that then one would in a cardiac surgical career. the epidemic of obesity as terrifying. right now, one third of the united states is overweight. one third is obese. obesity is leading the epidemic of diabetes. right now, 10% of the cost of health care in the united states is secondary to obesity and the projections are in the next 10 years that i will go to 20%. so we will not control the cost of health care in the united states and must be controlled the pandemic of obesity.

so again, we figure we need to begin to address this. so we started out with food. we took the trans-fats out of all the food we serve in the hunt at all. we've made 40 changes in cafeterias that the food we serve. we took the candy bars out of vending machines, sugar drinks at a vending machine and then returned to exercise. we gave our employees free curves, free weight watchers, free access to jens and over the last two years, we lost 380,000 pounds. it's a start. so, do you say think represent an absurd that also take out into the country and we need to begin to address these. let me just for a moment tell you a story.

and i think you will understand the reason for this story. two and a half years ago, 25-year-old opera singer was flown into the cleveland clinic and the dead of the night from here as she was end-stage lung disease and had she not had a young transplant, she clearly would've died. she received a young transplant, double lung transplant, was extremely sick, kept in a medically induced transplant for four weeks, eventually recovered, left the hospital, came back, saying opera, three months later for the team that of the doctor. that summer she married the man who stood by her through this entire event.

and then she began to get short of breath again. she came back to the cleveland clinic after extensive medical therapy and could not be sustained or improved on that therapy. she was placed on an artificial lawn for three weeks waiting for a second set of lungs. she received a second set of laws and is now living in washington and singing opera again. i would like to have you made charity tilman who is with us today. [applause] charity i think is here with her grandmother. her grandmother is tom lantos'

wife. tom was a congressman and lasting she was here, he spoke before this group. he was the congressman of california for 27 years. ms. lantos, which you stand up? [applause] i answered is this to you because i think this is an example of american medicine at its very best. and we need to address the three issues that i talked about. access, quality and cost, if we are going to be able to continue to drive this sort of quality medicine in the united states and provide quality care so people like charity can return and saying opera for a and contribute to our society. thank you very much for the privilege of talking to you

today and sharing some of our experiences. [applause] >> how has the cleveland clinic managed to reduce costs without sacrificing outstanding care for which the clinic has long been known for quiet >> i think one of the main things are done has been involved with decisions in our decision-making and the physicians understand about the things that they can do. for example, they came together around pacemakers, hips, and the replacements, purchasing and be reduced or purchasing by about $125 million in the last two years. >> what can be done about the decreasing number of.yours who will take care of our growing population quiet >> the number of doctors is actually not decreasing. the problem is we never produce

enough positions in the united states to look after demands. we been up order porter physicians forever. are going to have a shortage of 90,000 doctors across the united states and were simply going to have a shortage of nurses bordering on a million nurses. and so were going to have other people be they caregivers. physician's assistant are becoming increasingly use. that allows everybody to reset the top of their licensure and technicians are coming in to replace much of the work that nurses have previously done. ..

as a result of the affordable care act? >> ? >> wow. [laughter] i don't think we know yet how the affordable care act is going to affect us. we haven't seen the implication in the number of patients we're going so to see or the how we're and figure out how we're going take care of them. clearly any health care organization, a major cost is people. it's about 60% of the cost of running the cleveland clinic right now. and obviously we like to do that most efficient way we can and we'll have to wait to see what the demands require.

>> tens of thousands of patients die each year because of infections in doctors officers. how can we reduce that? >> that is a great question. it's one of the things we've brought to the attention. we've seen a 50% reduction in the incident of central line infection across the country simply by bundling and using standard procedures. and i think, we're increasingly looking at the same thing pilots look at. checklist, i think it was effective in bringing checklist to medicine. interestingly now, part of the other major issue and cost is the end of life, and we think that there is a lot that we can do to both make that a more civil and kind experience, and at the same time let people pass in a less costly way.

and so we're looking at checklist and abu dhabi and now doing a research project trying to develop those sort of ends of life checklists that will remind people about where you are in the process, have you talked to the family about it. and and i might say parent threatically here, if you don't mind, i think it is an important topic. i would encourage you all to think about this yourselves. i know, many of you have this experience. both physicians and family and patients are stress at end of life. the worst thing can happen is not have the discussion about the difficulty that this represents for most people. i found in my surgical career, if i enter into a discussion with the family and say i will do everything possible to keep

your loved one if i think they can return to a useful member of society. at the end of that time, i think if we come to the point i don't think it's going happen. ly come to you and we will have a discussion about this and i will not make life go on just endlessly for keeping your loved one alive. i have always been greeted by thank you so much, doctor, i'm pleased that i look forward to those discussions and i'm greatly relieved you had that discussion with me. it -- if you will enter into those individuals laymen and have that discussion with your physicians, it will be good for the patient, it will be good for you, and it will be good for the doctor. >> are there growing risks from antibiotic resistant back bacteria. what needs to be known prescribing the antibiotic developing process? >> completely over my head now.

clearly, antiby yachtic therapy is something that increasingly people are concerned about from getting a resistance. we have seen it in tuberculosis and staff infections we have selected out by our use of antiby yachtics. i think it's important antibiotics be used judicially and the pharmaceutical companies be encouraged and supportive as they develop increasing antibot jobbings and take care of those. >> how can health insurance companies reduce their cost so they can devote for of the north carolina to provide needed health services to their clientele. >> i'm not in the insurance business. >> prostate cancer is often in the news with differing medical

opinions. wait or surgery what is your take? >> it's interesting now we're beginning to understand the differences in prostate cancer. it has been done out of a study that almost ten years done at the cleveland clinic looking at question jettics of the prostate cancer. we realize some are aggressive and some are not aggressive at all. and differentiating between those, we can begin to decide what is the most appropriate type of therapy. >> when a 0 -- sort pharmaceutical companies were concerned it would reduce sales of the heart and blood vessel drugs how does it happen? and how does help improve heart health? >> i'm sure you're aware that we have seen about 30% decrees in the incident cardiac death in the united states in the last 25 years. i think it has been a result of

several things. it's not just coronary bypass surgery. it's about the fact there's better awareness of taking care of yourself, et. cetera. and better diet and exercise. and i don't know that any of these drugs have been substantially decreesed in their use. >> what do you think of steps such as mayor bloomberg proposed to cap bottle sizes of soft drinks or prevent some items from being sold. >> i think you have to salute mayor bloomberg for the proactive stances and encouraging wellness across no objection. he was the one of the first people to that begun to take transfat out of the food. he raised awareness on many issues whether this is the solution to the obese problem, the size of your drinks and

cup. it remains to be seen. i'm not particularly optimistic about it. >> you said no longer hire smoker. do you hire folks that are obese at the clinic? [laughter] the american disability acts protects people from disimenting against people who are obese and under as advisement we do not discriminate against people who are obese. >> if a patient who received care later sees a doctor who is no affiliated with the clinic under the system of record access will the doctor have access to the records. >> '03. we yeah we like to provide access to the records without being involved in the electronic medical record it's not possible so send it. we can give it to the patient and the patient can take it to the referring doctor. if you get treated at cleveland

clinic and get sick in los angeles, you have access to your records and take with you. >> how serious an issue is noncompliance by patients? failing to take the full dosage of prescribed medication? >> this is very big nonclients is a big issue. and we're trying to figure how we can begin to address this. we realize just making a phone call and saying it you take your pill today doesn't do it. and we're actively involved right now interesting discussion with todd thyme warner cable who can bring intho in to people's television sets a away to communicate back and forth between the doctor. so you can actually see the patient, would you hold up your bottle of pills and did you take one? thing is the next step beyond the phone call which started out as a routine office visit and caused a phone call reminder and a group of ways to do this?

scholarship sort of fashion. thing is the next step hopefully for the future begin to drive compliance. >> a news report yesterday indicated that there have been 18,000 cases of whooping cough in the this year and the original vaccine is not sufficient. what should be done to prevent further outbreaks? >> i think the concern about whooping cough is a major concern. mainly driven by the fact that scare about autism. and that mothers and fathers are not getting their child immunized because of the fear of autism. i think that has been pretty much disproven. i don't think there's many question about it now. this whooping cough epidemic had not happen had we had the continuation of the imization. i think that's the reason for it. >> copd is the third largest killer of americans.

what is the importance of research into lung disease does the clinic plan to increase such research? imla >> yes. my father died of copd. he was a smoker. and i don't think i have ever seen someone with chronic on constructive pull their disease who is not a smoker. the biggest thing we can do is begin to drive smoking out of the general public. this is a huge public concern, and we're not going get that improved until we do take care of the major cost which is really smoking. >> how can health care institutions better work together to share or code development for effective processes, technology, or clinical capabilities? >> i'm started to feel like dr. oz here. [laughter]

let me take it to a higher level. we're starting to see now a tremendous change in hospitals across the country. the hospitals are coming together in systems, systems are collaborating, we're starting to see systems talk to systems. and as we begin to head in and just one little fact 60% in the united states are part of the system. and as we have systems come together we start to get more standardsization of care, more efficiency, and more collaboration going on there. >> speaking dr. oz being a popular tv figure. what more can the media do to educate about better health care practices? >> yeah. well, i think there's a tremendous need for medical education. and this goes television print,

everything, and there's going to be a big process of educating people about what they current health care act entails. i think very, very few people recognize exactly what is in the bill. and what the implications are both for your personal care, and for the health of the nation. that's going to be a big education process for you all too. i think i don't think you can do too much to emphasize the importance of people taking care of themselves in terms of smoking and obese, et. cetera. frankly, my major concern is the public generally has not come to grips with the pandemic of obesity. and just to put it out in some the of perspective for you. if you like at the disability, the total disability of employees including the clinic, and you take out people who have cancer, 90% of those on permanent disability are morbidly obesity.

that's how big the problem is. >> a number of states have indicated they unwilling to expand medicaid as part affordable act. what will it do to the health care systems like the cleveland clinic? >> if we don't have medicaid patients covered, we're going have more patients who are not paying patients. currently, we are the largest medicaid provider in the state of the ohio. and this is going to have more patients with without reimbursement for us. and that will cause the rest of us who buy insurance to have their premiums go up. >> how did your hospital and abu dhabi come about. are you planning other hospitals in more countries? >> it's an interesting sort of history. at 9/11 happened, we were operating on about 35 patients a

month particularly from the middle east. and at that point, it went to five in about two weeks. and so my predecessors ceo said why don't we try to meet them half way and establish something in london. we tried to buy a hospital in london. we tried to lease a hospital in london. we looked at greenfield in the meantime people began to realize we were willing to go offshore. we inquires from 70 countries at one time. we and we looked many of these, and by far, the most attractive was abu dhabi. and i think it's important that we point out to you that our arrangement in abu dhabi is not such that instead of spending money and northeast ohio, we are investing it in abu dhabi. that's not the case. in abu dhabi of the government is building the hospital, they

are paying our salaries and they are paying is a management and consulting fee. now, and so essentially we're using intellectual capital there to drive your dollars back to northeast ohio. in the bigger scheme of things, if you look at what the world wants from the united states right now, they're not particularly interested in our steel or refrigerators or in many cases they want the entertainment, our innovation, they do want our graduate education, and they do want our health care. and our facility is the first facility from the united states has taken the challenge of going in an entirely overseas and staffing the hospital, bringing the design to the hospital, bringing protocols to the hospital and takes responsibility for doing it. it's a great tint to begin to help design the health care

delivery system for a country. >> given the success of the cleveland clinic and it being replicated in other countries why aren't there more hospitals like yours here in the united states. >> the cleveland clinic was started as system that was looked at as very innovative and radical at time it was founded. with employed physician. they were looked as medical -- at the time it was started. and then that has not been the tradition. its very difficult to change from the system that is currently exists most places to what we are. and because most physicians are very entrepreneurial. now what's happening now right now across the united states is changing that enormously. right now 60% of the doctors in the united states are employed. and 75% of the medical graduates graduates are now going to be employed instead of being

self-employed. so you're seeing hospitals come together in systems, hospitals employs physicians, essentially that is looking increasingly like the cleveland clinic over a period of time. and i think that you're beginning to see that change happening. it will not happen fast. but it is important, i think, for the long-term affordable it does happen. >> you talked about your staff being on salary. how serious are the other concerns that physicians cannot afford to practice or don't find the pay completelying. compelling. has it been a problem in your profession? >> no. i think it's worthwhile to talk about to you about how we pay and set salaries. we look at what the average salary of medical center is across the united states. we pay for the department average in the 90th percentile

of that. and that means, and pediatricians don't get paid the same as neurosurgeons do. but we pay according to specialty, the expertise the individual has in the specialty, and what the national standard for that specialty is. >> to what extend do medical malpractice lawsuits weigh on the cleveland clinic. is it getting better or worse? >> tort reform has been something that was clearly not in part of the affordable care act. and i think it's important thing we're going have to eventually deal with. in ohio we had tort reform, and it has decreased our cost of malpractice very significantly. we think that there is estimated that about 4% of health care cost in the united states are attributable to malpractice and

people trying to avoid them. >> what are the cost and benefits of medical tourism where americans go to other nations that are major procedures that are costly in the u.s. >> it's interesting there's been a great deal made out of people leaving the united states to get care out of the united states and the data essentiallies look at medical tourism places to places like india and singapore. they give the data about the numbers that go there. the vast, vast, vast majority of those are from southeast asia, and the middle east and not from the united states so it is a trickle of people who leave the united states for health care outside. i think it has almost negligentble economic health care cost in the united states. >> do the people who utilize the

24-hour call center have to have national hurricane insurance? >> no. >> aren't there other factors beyond cigarettes, and obese like air quality and chemicals and what are you doing about these? >> [laughter] you goes are -- you guys are mean. there's no question there are multiple other things that affect health care. those are the those red light three big ones. the thing that currents me the epidemic of autism. autism, frankly, was something that was not seen from most of us when we were kids. and now it's one in 88 live births. the the implications for that both for society and for the economics are stunning. at other end of life, the other

thing that concerns us is alzheimer's disease. if you get to be 80 years old. your chance of having alzheimer's is 25%. the economics of that and it's now risen into the top seven death in the united states. the implication of those two things at beginning and end of life are stunning. until we going identify whether it's environmental factor, or just other factors and going deal with those, is going to put a huge burden on the cost on health care in the united states and around the world. >> what recommendation do you have to get schools to change the lunch menus and vending machine away from junk food and drinks to healthy. >> we are fortunate to have mike as the chief wellness office. he has reached out into the schools of cleveland ab when we begun to actively help them

improve the quality of their lunch meals that they serve. and this has been a big effort that's going on a long time. the other corollary of that the epidemic of childhood obesity which is directly related to school grades. we have done a great deal of research on the particular topic as well. so the food issue in schools is a a acute. we're trying to deal with it locally. i think it's going to be something that has to be taken up on on national issue. there are 30 some agencies here in the washington that regulate food in one way or another at this point. >> how will the affordable care act affect medical innovations? >> i'm concerned about the begins to look at the ethical

sei of the drug or device, and practice decide whether you're going pay for it or not. let e me give you an example, if you develop a heart valve it takes you about ten years of work to get it approved by the fda to be sold. if you're going tell if one heart valve or better than another. it's going to be ten years to be able to understand. i don't think many venture capitalist willing to invest in a twenty year project. i'm concerned that beginning to fund things on that basis will begin to drive a lot of innovation out of health care in the united states. you have to realize that health care and products that are developed here are sold all over the world in one of the major exports for the united states whether it be pharmaceutical or

devices or other things used in health care. and that may well slow because right now we know quite clearly that some of the regulatory process is a lot faster outside the united states than it is inside the united states. i think we have to remember sort of on a bigger scale that you can't do anything new without attend risk. and as society becomes so risk adverse, we are not going to see innovation that has driven health care to the point which is doubled the life expectancy in the united states in the last 100 years. >> republicans in congress have talk abouted a need to repeal and replace obamacare. are there any aspects you would repeal and what would you replace them with? >> let me defer just a little bit on that. [laughter] i think more importantly we have to say that we're -- the law

does a couple of things very well and not so well. we know it's not going to control cost. and so we're going have to do that. and it's probably going to be lead by the private sector. the second thing one of the things about controlling cost there's not a lot of in this law about providing incentives to take care of yourself. and i would like to see more incentive for people do that. and interestingly, just recently we helped senator senator wyden that would set up criteria for people under medicare to begin to have financial incentives for meeting various milestones. keeping their weigh under control. blood pressure, et. cetera, and we found that very small incentives financial incentives

drive significant behavior. and by that, we mean, we found for example, we had 3,000 diabeteses at the cleveland clinic. only 15% of those were seeing a doctor regularly. we were shocked when we found that. what we did is put a series of incentives in place, now 50% of the people chronic disease management with the wellness that i talked to you about before, with the financial incentives we now seen our cost curve flatten so we are no longer seeing inflation and the cost of looking after our patients. >> which other health care facilities do you consider to be innovative? have any other clinics had ideas you find impressive? innovation can happen any place. we see it everywhere. i don't think you can look at health care and expect it to

come from one organization. i think there are great things happening on multiple location. i think the important thing is to find those and incorporate them bodily into the organization. a number of years ago, i told everyone of the employees doctor employees of the cleveland clinic i was going take one trip a year and learn something new in the world. i thought we were turning loose a couple thousand spies to find good thing. i think there are lots much places. we have to look for new ideas whenever we can find them. >> what is the impact impact of providing more home based medical care for elders? >> yeah. the thing that is driving home care is the fact that the diseases have changed. people now have chronic diseases, that not going to be looked at in the hospital and better be looked at at home.

the implications are we have to build the system to do that, secondly, it's going to reduce the cost of locking after pairvets and they're going to be better cared for at home. i don't think anybody would rather be in the hospital than be at home. and that's the direction we're trying to move. >> we're almost out of time. before asking the last question, we have couple of housekeeping matters to take care of. it first of all i'd like to remind of the upcoming speakers on july 24 judy coan or closet -- complex issues in play in the run to the november election. on august 28 general james of the u.s. marine corp. will discuss the role. and september 6 kathleen turner planned parenthood board offed a advocated october 2nd