June 23, 1998 Congressional Oversight

OVERSIGHT HEARING ON FOREST SERVICE LAW ENFORCEMENT
TUESDAY, JUNE 23, 1998

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Mrs. CHENOWETH. What is correct with regards to your salary and your
pension?

Mr. WASLEY. The simple fact is I collect a salary of $110,700 a year as a GS&SHY;15 Step 10 with the Forest Service. As a retiree and an annuitant under the DC Police and Fire system I was entitled to a certain percentage of my service time with the United States Secret Service. I collect that also.

Mrs. CHENOWETH. And that pension is $44,600 a year.

Mr. WASLEY. No, it is not.

Mrs. CHENOWETH. What is it?

Mr. WASLEY. I'm not sure that's germane to this hearing. And I'm not attempting to be flippant or anything else. I believe this is a private matter, and I don't believe my retirement annuity is subject to the public record.

Mrs. CHENOWETH. You've been with the agency for almost 2 years, yet the
reporting requirements and accountability measures of your department are almost non-existent, sir. And I would imagine that even the Secret Service has better accountability than the Forest Service law enforcement does. How do you account for this lack of accountability?

Mr. WASLEY. Speaking for the law enforcement investigations division, we are a new—relatively new organization, born only in 1994. There are certain adjuncts to our organization that take time to develop. The necessity for true data to be collected and utilized in staffing and in all decisionmaking process was not inherent in former Forest Service law enforcement structure. I'm trying to make it that way now.

Mrs. CHENOWETH. What is the rate of turnover in your work force?

Mr. WASLEY. Very low.

Mrs. CHENOWETH. You mentioned large events as a special challenge. What can you tell us about the Rainbow Family event that is planned for early July that is already getting underway in eastern Arizona?

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Mr. WASLEY. As of yesterday, we have 3,000 or so Rainbow Family folks there on the Apache Sitgraves National Forest. We have made, to my knowledge, three arrests so far. There have probably been somewhat less than 100 incident reports—anything from complaints to injuries, to the traffic accidents—all of the things you might imagine with that sort of gathering. That's as of this morning.

Mrs. CHENOWETH. How will this event impact your ability to meet other law enforcement needs?

Mr. WASLEY. Certainly, we have limited resources. We have to devote a certain amount of resources to this gathering. There will be some impact. At this time of the year, I don't think it's going to be measurable.

Mr. JOSLIN. Madam Chairman, if I could?

Mrs. CHENOWETH. Yes, Mr. Joslin.

Mr. JOSLIN. Not just the impact of large group gatherings such as the Rainbows on the Apache-Sitgraves in eastern Arizona is not only on law enforcement, but also on our regular work force to deal with those situations. And every year, as you know, they're somewhere, always on a national forest. And what we have set up there is an incident command team, the type of command team that we use for fires and other large events, and the law enforcement folks are a part of that. But it's all done in cooperation with the local and State law enforcement agencies. So it's an impact not only on our law enforcement people, but all the rest of our people in those areas, plus the other law enforcement agencies involved. It's a tremendous impact.

Mrs. CHENOWETH. Thank you. How do you feel that this Rainbow Family event will impact your overall costs to the program?

Mr. WASLEY. We have budgeted a certain amount for this type of large group gathering. I don't know the figures off the top of my head. But we have planned for this.

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Mrs. CHENOWETH. Let me say that I'm about to draw this particular hearing to a close. We will have other hearings on this issue. We will be asking you for more information. But, in closing, we are going to follow through with more oversight into this exceedingly important issue. And we'll be working with the GAO to do a much more detailed investigation into the data collection and reporting mechanisms within this agency. We will also be doing a complete analysis of the legal authorities for law enforcement activities for the agency. We need to understand exactly who has what authority by law so that we can better determine how best to coordinate law enforcement activities. And we would appreciate your submitting all of the data which we requested today in a timely manner. I would like to ask before I make my closing statement if there is anything else anyone would like to add for the record. Mr. Woodward?

Mr. WOODWARD. No, thank you.

Mrs. CHENOWETH. Thank you. Mr. Hill?

Mr. HILL. No, thank you, Madam Chairman

Mrs. CHENOWETH. Mr. Joslin.

Mr. JOSLIN. One thing that I would add is in connection with law enforcement national forest system, the area that I work in, we hold meetings daily—on a daily basis. Mr. Wasley has at least one member of his staff there are those meetings to keep us fully informed, and we, in turn, keep his folks fully informed of activities going in the national forest system so that we are coordinated in that fashion. And thank you for the opportunity to be here today.

Mrs. CHENOWETH. You're welcome. Mr. Wasley?

Mr. WASLEY. I would just like to comment on our, the officers' routes to the local community. I just had the good fortune to travel to Kentucky, where I worked with two law enforcement officers in the Forest Service who had spent in excess of 25 years in the very communities where they were born working for the law enforcement agency of the Forest Service. I gave an award earlier this year to a person, a law enforcement officer from California who had spent 31 years in the same community. All I'm doing is mphasizing the fact that we do have very close ties—local ties to local communities in the Forest Service.