Cow Creek tribal leader urges landscape-scale stewardship, cultural burning and statutory certainty

Tim Vredenberg, director of forest management for the Cow Creek Band of Umpqua Indians, told the Senate committee his tribe supports the Fix Our Forest Act and urged stronger tribal roles in landscape restoration.

Vredenberg described a decade in which nearly 20% of the tribe’s reservation burned and said about 1,100,000 acres of the tribe’s ancestral area have burned repeatedly. “Fires are returning to the same places 2, 3, even 4 times, destroying the native ecosystems and replacing them with invasive species,” he said.

He told senators that historic tribal management supported 35 to 50 trees per acre, while many modern stands exceed 1,500 trees per acre, generating unprecedented fuels and hotter burn conditions. The tribal witness recommended the bill expand categorical exclusions to reach landscape scale, modify Good Neighbor Authority to empower tribal reinvestment in restoration, and incorporate tribal cultural burning practices.

Vredenberg urged agencies to consider tribal proximity when designating high-priority firesheds so that tribal lands and neighbors can coordinate treatments: “If asked and activated, tribes can vastly improve the and amplify the quality and impact of the federal, federal land managers,” he said.

His testimony framed tribal stewardship as central to protecting water, wildlife and cultural places and urged Congress to move beyond short‑term fixes toward large‑scale, locally led restoration.