Thank you for the information, Paul. I'd like to somewhat disagree. In 2009-ish the congress approved some stimulus $$$ for national forests.
Besides a bunch of useful projects that make sense (fire breaks, bridges etc) there are also new buildings for the forest
bureaucrats. The forest headquarters, currently located in Goleta, will move to Santa Maria.
The Monterey and Mt. Pinos Ranger District offices (in King City and Frazier Park, respectively) will also get replaced with new buildings.
I see nothing wrong with them working from home or a trailer, if the roads to both Caliente springs are not fixed. There is no need for new buildings.
Forest Service officials refused to release the official dollar figures for each project. All 18 national forests in California received
a combined total of more than $203 million in federal stimulus dollars.
Here's the link to refusal to disclose all projects to avoid public input to our government masters:
http://www.lpfw.org/docs/Stimulus/20090324FOIAResponse.pdf
Also, I checked and the cuts to the budgets were rather minuscule after environmentalist outcry. In fact, 2011 budget included additional $38mln for the entire country. Even 2010
cuts represented 0.76% of the overall budget. So far, the cuts did not apply to pay increases. The cuts were applied into not doing anything and holding taxpayers hostages.
Source: http://www.fs.fed.us/publications/budget-2011/fy-2011-usfs-budget-overview.pdf
Not arguing... just venting out....
Peace
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/26/2011 09:02PM by Sam D..