Ranchers in Oregon have scrambled to get their cattle out of harm’s way this summer. (Courtesy of Juliet Connant)
This summer’s historic wildfires in Oregon have taken a toll on ranchers and their more than a million cows and other livestock, prompting a unified plea by the state’s top leaders for federal help.
Gov. Tina Kotek declared a state of emergency and invoked the Emergency Conflagration Act eight times to deploystate resources to help ranchers and local communities. And at the end of July and in early August, she called on the U.S. government for help.
She asked the U.S. Department of Agriculture to designate 23 counties in central, southern and eastern Oregon disaster areas and open up federal resources to help devastated communities, a plea that was backed by all eight members of Oregon’s congressional delegation, Democrats and Republicans.
“As climate chaos continues to worsen – turning fire seasons into fire years that see millions of acres scorched and countless lives forever changed – we must make sure communities can access the federal resources they need to equitably recover from these increasingly devastating fires,” the lawmakers wrote.