Southeast Prescribed Fire Initiative
About
Fire is a critically important agent of renewal in natural ecosystems. However, wildfires can pose a substantial risk to people and infrastructure and the Southeast has more wildfires than any other region. The Southeast region also includes several fire-dependent ecosystems where prescribed burning is necessary to safely manage the land and resources. By promoting prescribed fire as a land management tool, SERPPAS partners minimize the risk of destructive wildfires while restoring critical habitat and species in the Southeast.
Working with fire experts from around the region, the SERPPAS Prescribed Fire Work Group developed a Comprehensive Prescribed Fire Strategy that guides their work. This strategy describes regional, state, and local activities needed to progress toward the strategic goals. The strategy recommends leveraging numerous funding sources, organizations, and networks, and identifies existing tools and models to maximize efficiency and success.
Managing both private and public land properly with prescribed fire helps restore ecosystems, reduces the risk of catastrophic wildfire, protects air quality, and improves wildlife habitat for game, at-risk, threatened, and endangered species. Military testing and training in the Southeast is critically linked to prescribed burning, as installations use this management practice for fuels reduction to reduce the severity of wildfires and to manage critical habitat. Increasing prescribed fire as a management tool on and off base can enhance military readiness by increasing flexibility under the Endangered Species Act by expanding and sustaining key habitats off-post; reducing fuels to create natural buffers to DoD facilities, infrastructure, and assets; and decreasing liability claims and fire costs from surrounding communities.
Strategic Objectives
- Identify, encourage, and support efforts to quantify and prioritize the use of prescribed fire to achieve desired conditions.
- Identify needs and opportunities to provide funding, capacity, and other support for prescribed burning in SERPPAS priority areas.
- Encourage new and share successful models of burn teams, Prescribed Burn Associations, and other collaborative burn groups.
- Increase burning across boundaries and sharing of personnel and equipment.
- Increase engagement with landowners, communities, and contractors by supporting programs that provide prescribed burning experience, training, and education.
- Encourage and support the development, dissemination, and utilization of new relevant fire science and tools that foster collaboration among scientists and natural resource managers and address the information needs of SERPPAS, regional fire managers, and partners.
- Promote cooperative conservation, protection of public health, and keeping areas in attainment with the National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) by encouraging use of basic and enhanced smoke management practices.
- Support efforts that identify and seek to overcome gaps in knowledge, training, and information needs relevant to prescribed burn practitioners, policy makers, and partners. Topics include but are not limited to: Climate Change and Carbon, Resilience and Sustainability, Societal Impacts (including social justice, diversity, and inclusion), and Liability.
Work Group Lead
Jennifer Fawcett
Extension Associate, Forestry & Environmental ResourcesNorth Carolina State University
jennifer_fawcett@ncsu.edu
Jennifer Fawcett is an Extension Associate in the Department of Forestry and Environmental Resources, Extension Forestry at North Carolina State University (NCSU). She coordinates the SERPPAS Prescribed Fire Work Group and assists in implementing actions within the SERPPAS “Comprehensive Strategy for Prescribed Fire.” She received her M.S. degree in Forest Resources from Clemson University, and is working towards her Ph.D. in Agricultural Education and Human Sciences at NCSU, with a focus on Prescribed Burn Associations. Jenn currently serves as an Advisory Board member for the Southern Fire Exchange, is a past President for the North Carolina Prescribed Fire Council, and is on the leadership team for the National Extension Wildland Fire Initiative.
Paul Catlett
SE Regional Wildland Fire Coordinator, DoD Fire & Emergency Management ProgramsTexas A&M Natural Resources Institute
paul.catlett@ag.tamu.edu
Paul Catlett graduated from the University of Florida with a bachelor’s degree in forestry. He worked as a forestry consultant for 7 years primarily conducting land management and prescribed fire in central and south Florida. In 1994, Paul became the Natural Resource Manager of Camp Blanding Joint Training Center, the primary training installation for the Florida National Guard in northeast Florida. Over the past 30 years, the red cockaded woodpecker was recovered on the installation and a wildland fire program was built that suppresses 100+ wildfires and conducts 20,000 acres of prescribed fire annually. In October 2023, Paul retired from the State of Florida and took a position with the Texas A&M Natural Resource Institute to support the Department of Defense’s wildland fire transition to the National Wildfire Coordinating Group.
Resources
Documents
Websites
North Carolina State University Extension Forestry
Southeast Prescribed Fire Update - Driptorch Digest
Southern Fire Exchange - Friends of Fire Podcast
Story Maps
The Fourtown Fire - Fire Management on a Landscape Scale
Webinar Recordings
SECAS Third Thursday Forum: Conducting prescribed fire under stronger air quality standards
Recording
PowerPoint Slides
SFE and SERPPAS Virtual Workshop on PM2.5 and Exceptional Events
*PowerPoint slides are accessible in the YouTube description.
News
Longleaf Landscape Stewardship Fund 2025 Request for Proposals
11/20/24
The National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) seeks proposals to work with landowners to voluntarily restore, enhance and conserve longleaf pine and bottomland hardwood forests within the historical longleaf pine range. The Longleaf Landscape Stewardship Fund is a funding opportunity for on-the-ground natural resource conservation projects. This RFP reflects a public-private partnership supported with Federal funding from USDA’s Forest Service (USFS) and Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD), the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS), and private funding from Altria Group, the Bezos Earth Fund, Energy Transfer, International Paper’s Forestland Stewards Partnership, the Orton Foundation, and Southern Company. Approximately $31 million in grant funds is expected to be available in 2025, thanks in large part to a third-year major contribution from the Bezos Earth Fund and increased funding from NRCS. Grant awards are expected to range from $250,000 to $3,000,000.
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Interior Department Announces Downlisting of Red-cockaded Woodpecker from Endangered to Threatened
10/24/24
The Department of the Interior announced that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is downlisting the red-cockaded woodpecker from endangered to threatened status under the Endangered Species Act. This milestone is the result of five decades of collaborative conservation efforts between the Interior Department, federal and state partners, Tribes, the private sector and private landowners that have resulted in increasing populations of these remarkable birds throughout their range.
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2024 Catalyst Fund Grant Awards
9/30/24
The Network for Landscape Conservation is pleased to announce 15 Catalyst Fund grant awards for Partnerships working to implement place-based, community-grounded conservation at the necessary landscape scale. Catalyst Fund grants are intended to allow for strategic investments in strengthening a Partnership’s collaborative capacity in ways that create enduring forward momentum within the Partnership and accelerate conservation progress into the future. Congratulations to the winners in the SERPPAS footprint in Florida and South Carolina!
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FEMA Joins the Sentinel Landscapes Partnership to Support Climate Resilience and Military Readiness
9/24/24
The Sentinel Landscapes Partnership announced the addition of the Federal Emergency Management Administration (FEMA) to its Federal Coordinating Committee (FCC). The FEMA Office of Resilience joins the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), the Department of Defense (DOD), and the Department of the Interior (DOI) in designating sentinel landscapes to support mutually beneficial land-use and climate resilience around military installations across the country. FEMA joins the FCC following the signing of an addendum to the Sentinel Landscapes Memorandum of Understanding.
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Interior Department Announces More Than $157 Million in Funding for Wetland Conservation Projects and National Wildlife Refuges
9/10/24
The Department of the Interior announced that more than $46.2 million in grants was approved by the Migratory Bird Conservation Commission which will conserve or restore 91,425 acres of wetland and associated upland habitats for waterfowl, shorebirds, and other birds in 17 states. These grants, made through the North American Wetlands Conservation Act (NAWCA), will be matched by more than $99.1 million in partner funds.
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Acting Deputy Secretary Daniel-Davis Announces $236 Million from President Biden’s Investing in America Agenda for Wildfire Resilience and Recovery
9/10/24
The Department of the Interior announced $236 million in funding allocations from President Biden’s Investing in America agenda to support wildland fire management into fiscal year 2025 across the nation. The funding will help reduce risk from wildfires, support improved wildland firefighter training, expand efforts to rehabilitate burned areas in collaboration with partners, and advance wildfire science. Today’s announcement brings the total the Department of the Interior has allocated for wildland fire management from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law to nearly $1.1 billion across the nation since it went into effect in fiscal year 2022.
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Events & Webinars
- Drought and Aquatic Ecosystems in the Southeast U.S. Workshop
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January 7 - 9, 2025
Raleigh, NC - Flames and Feathers: The Role of Fire in Shaping Northern Bobwhite Ecology
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January 7, 2025
Webinar (hosted by The Southern Fire Exchange) - 2025 Southeast Land Conservation Conference
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March 26 - 28, 2025
Ashville, NC
SERPPAS Meetings
February 2025
- Spring 2025 Steering Committee Meeting
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February 19 - 20, 2025
Atlanta, GA