 Right. Good morning and welcome to the house environment and energy committee this morning. We are going to be hearing from our department of Forest Parks and Recreation on the Worcester range, long range management plan. Welcome commissioner. Great. Good morning. Thank you for having us. This is my first time in here this year. So it's good to see you. Well, I stepped into listening to something, but first time actually at the table for the record. My name is Daniel Fitzgoe. I'm the commissioner of Forest Parks and Recreation. I'd like to just provide some high level remarks, and then I'll pass it to our team who's going to tell you like how we plan, what's in the plan and what's next. I'm excited for you to hear from them because I think they're going to learn the most from them and the public answer most of your questions. Okay, so, so public lands they are invaluable state resources with over 360,000 acres under state ownership. The agency of natural resources is charged with these charged with studing these lands for all species, big and small public lands. They support our overall well being biodiversity and conservation, climate mitigation and resilience, research and education, our cultural and historical resources, local economies, community gathering spaces, incredible scenic views and the backdrop of our daily lives and so much more. It's important to remember that managing public lands and our charge and authority is a multifaceted responsibility and requires a holistic perspective that requires. The multiple benefits and values that they can provide and the diverse users. The agency takes its responsibility as a stewards of safeguarding these public precious lands very seriously with the ultimate goal of striking a delicate balance to support the well being of our environment. Our communities and future generations in our role as public land managers. I bet you can imagine. We get lots of input some very specific about a certain recreational asset or more broadly to do more with this or to do less of that. We are so fortunate to have dedicated professionals who have spent their careers studying, stewarding and loving these lands to strike the harmonious balance to ensure a public lands play a vital role in meeting today's and tomorrow's opportunities and challenges. In Vermont, we are so fortunate that we have established an approach to our planning and management as a team and our five districts across the state staff come together across the agency with their expertise to guide our work. This includes fisheries and wildlife biologists and ecologists, recreation specialists, watershed planners, forest health specialists and foresters. There is so much richness and bringing this collective voice to the table to make informed management decisions. If you look across the nation, we do it like no other state and we should celebrate that interdisciplinary approach that we have. The Worcester range management unit unit, which are interested in is an incredible gem of nearly 19,000 acres in the heart of several communities in central Vermont. The diverse unit includes popular recreation destinations with mountain biking at Perry Hill trails in Waterbury, hiking trails up Mount Worcester, Pinnacle and hunger for breathtaking views. One of the highest waterfalls in the state of Moscow falls and the crown jewel at Elmore State Park for camping, taking a dip in Lake Elmore or trekking up to the fire tower tower. And let's not forget the boundless hunting and fishing opportunities. There are so many opportunities for the monies to get out on the land and to bathe in it. It's also a place for all species to thrive with 27 state significant natural communities. It's part of the northern forest and one of the largest continuous forest blocks in the state and an important regional habitat linkage. The Worcester range and all public lands is something we should celebrate that they are conserved and also trust that we have put forward has been thoughtfully studied, assessed and vetted by experts that are thinking about all species, natural communities, forest health, watersheds, climate mitigation, adaptation, people and so much more. The same scientists that set the framework for a vision for an ecological functioning landscape and conservation targets are the same team developing long range management plans and stewarding their implementation. Over the past 2 months, nearly 700 for monitors took their time to share their feedback and we're grateful for that. We had the same amount for Mount Filo and Charlotte, which is really heavily. How you say area 1 theme stands out. The monitors care deeply about our forests and view them as a key strategy to address some of the most pressing concerns of our time. Climate change biodiversity collapse and the associated impacts on human well being. Many of the comments even go 1 step further make up an impassionate plea to halt all logging on the Worcester range. Now forever suggesting it's the best interest for natural and human worlds. We know these comments are coming from a very good place. Contrary to Agate may seem the comments are our comments and where the plan is are coming from the same place that motivates our staff of experts to recommend well planned. Ecologically based forest management as part of our management actions. Let me explain simply put. Forest management management can be a restorative act to help our forest become healthier and more diverse and complex to better withstand the stressors and mitigation of climate change now and into the future. There is no question that our forest are necessary part of the solution to address the climate crisis abundant wildlife provide clean air and water and provide space for humans to roam. Our expansive forest provides essential connections to the northern landscapes that animals and even plants will migrate towards in pursuit of temperatures conducive of their survival at the time of climate changes. However, if we ask our forest to provide these benefits into the future they need to be diverse and complex. The unfortunate reality is that many of our forests are not an exhibit simplified structures. Although they are on the road to recovery many mid and low elevation forests still bear the scar of Vermont's land use history. When stressors pass through the uniform forest they are at risk to invasive plants, insects and diseases and the degradation of our ecosystem to maximize the long term benefits. We need to make wise management decisions and employ an adaptive approach to forest management that is tailored to the unique conditions of each forest and addresses the need of both nature and people. This involves a spectrum of management strategies from passive to active. We also just released as directed by the General Assembly the Vermont forest future strategic roadmap. The roadmap highlights the value of producing high quality forest products from healthy resilient and sustainably managed forest right here in Vermont where we do it right and where we have a gold standard local wood is also part of our climate smart future. I have worked with many foresters over the years and I can tell you foresters and loggers and everyone across the supply train. It all starts with a love of the forest and they are always thinking about the future forest. It's not to exploit or to harm them, but rather to foster their health resilience and sustainability. I've been with the department for over 20 years and I have drafted two of Vermont's forest action plans, which is a 10 year broad vision for Vermont's forest. That's built on a vision and I'll quote the forest of Vermont consists of healthy sustainable ecosystems and provide significant environmental, social and economic benefits. And there is broad participation in the stewardship of forest by landowners, businesses, government and Vermont citizens. The vision for Vermont's forest is really built on five desired future conditions. This is what we're striving for as we go forward. They are. They are conserved native biological diversity across all landscapes. Maintain and enhance forest ecosystem health and ecological productivity. Maintain and enhance forest contribution to ecosystem services and maintain and enhance an ethic of respect for the land, sustainable use and exemplary management. And Vermont has a legal institutional and economic framework in place for forest conservation and sustainability. Under the big 10 of the Vermont forest action plan, state lands are one of just one part of meeting the vision of Vermont's forest. And when forest management is recommended and carried out on state lands, we can show exemplary planning, management and oversight for learning and sharing across Vermont. Public lands are Vermont's lands and it's our team's responsibility at A&R, guided by experts to plan for and manage them. We look forward to all reading all the comments, updating the plan, getting out on the land with Vermonters and continuing to conserve and steward public lands for all species in Vermont, big and small for today and tomorrow. Thank you for letting me share those high level opening remarks. I'd like to move directly into our team of experts here because they really will get into the details of what's in the plan and can kind of foreshadow and tell you what's coming next. That's okay. You can foreshadow it now or after. Well, I'd love for them to come up. I'm happy to answer any questions, but they have a lot of good information to share. I think they'll answer a lot of your questions that you may have, how we plan what's in the plan and they'll talk about what's coming next. Yeah. And I guess I would, I hope there'll be time at the end for questions for all of you with that representative Pat. I have a high and it can be done later. I have a I'm going to say a high level process question without getting into the details of the proposal. And I don't know if this is the right time. Yeah, I think maybe we could start with that. Okay. Okay. My understanding that ANR was required by I think it's act 59 to come out to promulgate rules for the planning process and that has not been completed yet, but the But this this plan was I'm going to say in my communities dropped without anyone's foreknowledge on people with pretty big impact. So I'm just like I would like you to address the process question of why that happened why did this plan was proposed at this time without having completed the process that I assume would have involved a description rulemaking of a public information process hopefully before you even propose a plan. Sure. I appreciate the question. So there's really two things going on. The way we've set out for planning of the long range manager plan is how we typically do that. Our staff do all the assessments. They do a public scoping process. They draft a plan and then go back out for public comment. That's how it's been done for years. We have identified an opportunity based on increasing our efficiency without losing our robust assessments and science to eventually go through a rulemaking process for state lands planning. We have not undertaking that that is not being directed by anybody that is something that we've identified as a process improvement in the future for us. Act 59 is the law that you passed last year that sets out the vision for conserving 30 by 30 and 50 by 50 in that planning process. The first step is to inventory state lands. The Worcester range will be part of that inventory. It also sets out definitions. The plan itself will be due at the end of December 2025. Once the definitions are set through the planning process, we'll be able to identify how they align with our land classification units within our state plans across the state. So we have classification units definitions are being developed and we'll be able to crosswalk those once that planning process is done. But the Worcester range will be considered as part of the conserved land within Act 59. I think I think though that representative was really asking about the requirement for the department to promulgate rules for how you do long range management plans and where you are in that process. Yeah. So we had we're not required to do that. We are choosing to do that based on some internal assessments for several years that we want to increase our efficiency because we have a lot of state lands. And it takes us a lot of time. And so we'd like to do that but we're not required to we are choosing to do that for our efficiency and and to maintain really the high quality planning process that we do. Well, we may have a difference of legal opinion on that. I mean, our legislative council has informed us that 2015 you were the department was required by the legislature to promulgate rules for plan. We may have difference. We just, we are following what our legal counsel is saying as well that we don't need to promulgate rule and that we have policies and procedures already in place. So we'll follow up on that. But you are promulgating rules. We are in the process of designing rules that will eventually we'll go to the making process. Yes. And when will those be completed? We haven't officially I don't know yet, but hopefully that sometime this winter spring, we'll be able to start that process. It's just a robust effort. We've been working on it for over 2 years. As you can imagine, it means a lot and we want to make sure we get it right. Just with or without and whatever the legal requirements are or not, no one in these communities have any idea that you were working on a plan of this magnitude until it was dropped on people. I think we can reflect and recognize that we could probably reduce a better public outreach ahead of time. We really tried to get the information out there. We've been following what we have been doing, but I think times have changed and I think we need to change as well. And I think we've recognized. Probably to our benefit and the residents benefits and the monitors that we actually do probably some more education outreach way ahead of time and get out on the land to explain what we're doing. So I take that point seriously and as we go forward. Thank you. And I have specific area of concern in the point in the plan itself, but we'll get to that. Representative civilian. No, thank you. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Oh, yeah. Commissioner, can you submit your testimony in. Thank you. My name is Santa Phillips. I'm the state lands administration program manager. My responsibility is policy and planning that guides state land management in the department of forest parks and recreation, but work across the agency. I'm going to open by talking about the management planning process broadly. Then we'll talk about the plan specifically and definitely want to reserve time for questions at the end. But within the agency of natural resources, as you know, we have three departments. They have different missions and I think it's important to call those out because those influence land management decisions in the planning process. So, within the department of forest parks and recreation, our mission is the conservation and management of Vermont's forest resources, the operation maintenance of maintenance of state parks and the promotion support of outdoor recreation for Vermonters. Alongside the Vermont Department of Fish and Wildlife mission of which is the conservation of all species of fish, wildlife and plants and their habitats for the people of Vermont. Alongside the department of environmental conservation to preserve, enhance, restore and conserve Vermont's natural resources. So each of these three departmental missions are in service for the agency's larger mission. Each department owns lands that advance the mission of their department. So, just to demonstrate the breakdown. Department of Forest Parks and Recreation owns the majority of lands, approximately 240,000 acres. 185,000 in state forest, the remainder in state parks, followed by the Department of Fish and Wildlife. 135,000 acres, primarily in wildlife management areas and then Department of Environmental Conservation owns roughly 2,000 acres of lands which are primarily lands associated with dams that they own and manage. And as I mentioned, each department owns lands and manages lands towards the specific mission of their department. And VSA 2603 provides a bit more direction about management of FPR lands. This phrase is particularly helpful. The commissioner shall manage and plan for the use of publicly owned forests and park lands. In order to implement the policy and purposes of this chapter, promote and protect the natural productive and recreational values of such lands and provide for multiple uses of the lands in the public interest. Although we own lands that advance the purposes of each department, we collectively agree that agency land management and planning is strengthened by collaboration between the 3 departments. And we've actually structured our work to reflect this concept and this core principle in practice. So throughout this process, you may have interacted with heard about the district stewardship team state lands across the state are split into five districts. Each district has what is called the district stewardship team, and we staff those teams with experts from across the three departments which contain at a minimum and often more. A stewardship forester who's the chair of the committee, a state lands forester, a recreation specialist, the parks regional manager, those are within FPR. We have a wildlife biologist that least one a fisheries biologist, the state lands ecologist from within fish and wildlife, and then from DC, we have the basin planner. The district stewardship teams are responsible for management of lands within their district and they're also responsible for drafting and developing those long range management plans like the Worcester range plan. We meet monthly and discuss the development of plans and management of those lands. Above them is what we call the agency land stewardship team. Those are essentially directors who have supervisory responsibilities over the state land management staff. The lands team is responsible for developing and adopting policies that guide state land management and also reviewing those final draft plans before they're ultimately recommended to agency leadership to sign off on. So the ultimate decision about a plan, a policy practice, etc. belongs to agency leadership, the commissioners and the secretary. But ultimately, the district stewardship team is making recommendations to the lands team who's recommending to leadership. This is really core to everything we do. And I want to just explain why this concept and the associated staffing structure. I think is one of the most underappreciated aspects of how we do our work. And we think is an enormous public benefit. Here's why we center the experts in our decision making those recommendations in the management plan are coming from the people who know the land based best who have spent their field season out. Walking around the land visiting the resources that are their particular lens of focus. Their experts in their field, they've devoted their careers to the work that they're doing and are often contributing sort of at the leading edge of science. To inform management of lands across large landscape scales in the face of the various crises that. Danny brought up in her introduction. And finally, I think this is pretty important while many of these staff have other job duties. State lands are where they really have the opportunity to translate their expertise into practice. For them, it's exciting, it's expiring inspiring and for many it's why they chose this career in the first place so it's something they all really enjoy. And I think it's of enormous public benefit that we're putting 12 to 14 experts around the table to spend time together monthly talking about what really is the most logical intelligent decision for this particular land base. And this level of staff engagement leads us to a plan that we're proud to share that proposes management informed by the best available science and that. We think Vermonters can have confidence in that it was prepared with care and knowledge of the land based in question. So why management plan. This is pretty important foundational question. Why do we do this in the first place we accomplish a few things through management planning. First, it gives us the landscape scale resource planning and management perspective. It allows us to think about the multiple uses and think about how we balance them, not only across a particular management unit, but across the full state lands portfolio. It allows us to understand public desires and opinion. It creates space for us to provide the opportunities that the public is seeking and that are consistent with the agency and department missions and policies. And then also equally important. It allows us to establish continuity of management vision across staff. These are generally 20 year plans. Staff turns over in that time that ensures we're taking the long view. This is the process in a nutshell. We begin with each of those natural resource assessments. That's a lengthy process spend lots of time in the field collecting the information that's in the plan. We then move on to public scoping, which I also consider really the assessment of public opinion, public interest in those lands that was completed in 2020. Worth noting that through the public scoping process, we received roughly 725 comments. And that's alongside the roughly 700 comments that we received on the draft plan management plan. So we did have very high public engagement in the scoping process that was completed in 2020. We then prepare a draft management plan. That was released on December 1st. We collected public comment between December 13th and February 2nd on that draft management plan. We hosted two public meetings. One in Worcester, one in Stowe. Those were recorded. They're still available to view online. Now we're in the process of reading all of the comments received. So every member of that 12 person district stewardship team will review all of the comments received. That's obviously going to take some time. So we've really just started that process. And are beginning to process the, all of the comments that came in through various avenues. And then we move on to developing an updated management plan. I'm going to provide a really high level overview of the Worcester range. I'm going to skip the slides that we prepared that are really specific to the resources because I want to make sure we get to the management recommendations as well. Before I skip those slides, I'm just going to point out that the plan. It's long is available on our website and goes into detail about each of those individual natural resources. So. As we opened with the Worcester range. It's almost 19,000 acres right in central Vermont. It's in the Northern Green Mountains, biophysical region, and it contains a number of prominent features that you may be familiar with, including hunger mountain Elmore State Park, the Perry Hill trails in Waterbury, Stowe Pinnacle, the Middlesex Notch Wildlife Management Area, and the new Brownsville Forest Acquisition Stowe. Here's the breakdown of ownership across the departments. The large majority of that is in FPR ownership almost 18,000 acres is CC Putnam State Forest. That's about 1000 acres of that is Elmore State Park Fish and Wildlife owns a little less than 1000 acres across to wildlife management areas, and then also worth noting there are some non fee ownership interests as easements adjacent to the fee ownership that creates this connected landscape. Whenever we do a management plan it's important that we consider state lands in the larger landscape context and what's going on around it. This is very, it's situated right in the core of a pretty remarkable conserved landscape so just to note some of the recent large protected lands immediately adjacent. Some of the former Atlas Timberlands are now protected with working forest easements, the Vermont Land Trust, Worcester Woods Forest Legacy easement and the new Northeast Wilderness Trust Woodbury Mountain Preserve are all part of this connected landscape. So part of the important forest block and connectivity block as identified through Vermont conservation design. It's entirely within it forms the core of 245,000 acre highest priority blocks for intact forest and habitat connectivity. And it's part of a critical north, south and east west linkage for wildlife movement. So you can see the Worcester Range outlined in black here. There's a key connection between the Adirondacks and Western Mass, north and east to Maine and Brunswick and all the way up to the Gas Bay Peninsula providing that critical connectivity for wildlife to move as the climate changes. It provides that critical ecological and wildlife connection from the northern green mountains to the northeastern Highlands. And it also provides connections west to Bolton Mountain and Mount Mansfield and south across route to an interstate 89. So connections that I'm going to cruise through really quickly just so we can get to the next part of our slide but just noting 27 natural community types in a notable diversity of species with communities ranging from low elevation flood plain forest all the way up to high elevation boreal forest. Enormous variation in wildlife habitat, as you can imagine across 19,000 acres featuring deer wintering area, hard mass feeding areas mapped vernal pools. And also large contiguous interior forest. There are a number of notable recreation highlights 43 total miles of trail in the Worcester Range broken down by type. That's 10 miles of mechanized or multi use trail six miles of motorized trail 27 miles of pedestrian trail and it features, as I mentioned before some well known and popular recreation destinations. Just on the water resources just noting the extensive headwater network in the Lake Champlain when you ski in the oil watershed basins popular water resources for humans include Moscow and falls and Lake Elmore. Also, because of the mountainous terrain, important to call out that ground waters abundant in the mountains resulting in frequent seepage at the surface and a series of headwater wetlands. And a number of small pocket wetlands are widespread and provide important landscape diversity across the range. So, in just a moment where I'm going to hit on these couple of high level slides about the management plan overview and I'll turn it over to Jim. I wanted to just start by calling out the major management proposals that in some way represent a change from what has occurred there and what people know is is happening on the Worcester Range so. First, this draft management plan proposes expanding the highly sensitive management area classification. By approximately 5,500 acres that's 29% of the unit that more than doubles the amount of highly sensitive management area that we already have in the unit and I'll show you a map of that in a moment. It's proposing forest management on almost 2000 acres, which is 10% of the unit Jim will talk more about that in a moment. It's establishing management direction for new acquisitions. So the Brownsville forest is a new acquisition as well as the Patterson Brook headwaters on the east side. So, because those were recently taken into state ownership, they're not part of an existing management plan for this unit. The plan also formalizes some pre existing recreational uses like mountain bike use at Brownsville forest and winter biking at Perry Hill. So this. Is essentially making that our management plan into the future and then it's proactively managing some unauthorized recreational uses. So that's things like. Trail development where people didn't seek state permission to do that and this is identifying that and saying where we're going to be proactive in addressing that. One of the main outputs of the plan is the assignment of the land management classifications. These 4 categories indicate where different types of management will be emphasized. Based on our assessments, each acre is assigned to 1 of 4 classifications. The 1st is highly sensitive management area. These are places where uncommon or outstanding resources and where protection of those resources is the primary management consideration. 52% of the unit is recommended to fall into this category in this plan cycle. Special management are places where unique or special resources exist. Where the protection or enhancement of these resources is an important management consideration. General management. These are areas that can support a variety of uses or management actions within these areas management is focused on sustainable use of resources and minimizing conflicts. An intensive management is areas characterized by high levels of human activity. These are places like state parks or trail heads. So. The proposed breakdown in the 1st draft was 52% highly sensitive management area, 23% special management, 25% general management. And a nominal percentage intensive management. I just have my own edification go back through. I'm familiar with the highly sensitive management, but reiterate perhaps the special and the general and the difference between and intensive and what the differences are on the ground. Yes. So within each of these high level categories, we have a series of subclasses. And so special management, the language is unique or special resources where the protection or enhancement of these resources is an important management consideration. The subclasses within special management are highly variable. And I'm happy to provide the list of what those subclasses are, but what that looks like on the ground could actually look very different depending on what subclass. is falling into. Is it fair to say it might be management for a particular species? Yes. Yep. And general management. Excuse me does not have as many subclasses. And so I think this sprays captures it. These are areas that can support a variety of uses or management actions. Management is focused on sustainable use of resources and minimizing conflicts. Intensive is intensive is characterized by high levels of human activity. So that's like state parks and trail heads. We do any as intensive management for a campground or parking lot or exactly. Yeah. So this is providing a bit more detail about that proposed increase in the highly sensitive management area in black on this map. You can see the already classified highly sensitive management area from the previous management cycle. So this this is and was a little over 4000 acres. The large majority of that is the Worcester range natural area, which covers the spine of the Worcester range. And then the little one in the top left is the Moscow and falls natural area. That's just 80 acres. So to distinct natural areas that are classified into that. This is the HSM a category. This plan proposes. 5500 acres of new HSM a additions in two locations. The first is the Moscow and watershed area. I think a quick question from representative bond there. I'm just curious about the term management. Looking to first category would be classified the highly sensitive management area. Does that mean that you just basically let it be it. You be not itself or is there active management or what does that mean. In that context, the first two here. It doesn't explicitly. Prohibit management. It's management that promotes those unique or special resources or is consistent with protection of those unique or special resources. So, then now would it be different from. Highly sensitive management area. I mean, or yeah. I mean, I guess I'm confused on highly sensitive manager. Sorry, how would it be different for special management area? I think it might be helpful to after this actually provide the more detailed description of each of these what I've. Shared with you is my paraphrased. Description of those and I know that the details of our land management classifications are probably going to be helpful to answer some of these questions and also the subclasses. Yeah, okay, they will be. So, to just elaborate on the 2 areas where we are we are proposing expanding the highly sensitive management area. The 1st is. What we're calling the mosque and basin expansion. That area feeds the mosque and falls natural area. And it adds low elevation stands to our high sensitive management classification area. That was really motivated by a desire to connect those 2 natural areas and the group has done that. Through the hsma designation and then the 2nd area to expand is adding. Essentially dropping that elevation align around the Worcester range natural area and adding mid elevation natural communities to our highly sensitive management classification area. These are also areas within fragile soils. And that when you take both of those into consideration. The majority of that 4,200 acres is that mid elevation inclusion essentially dropping the elevation align. And then 1200 acres is that connection providing that connection between the mosque and natural area and the was arranged natural area. And what are you dropping the elevation to. Okay, back to you. I don't remember the. I'm sure if I may Robert say no ecologists with fish and wildlife. I believe that we used a combination of natural communities and some practical boundary delineations to identify that highly sensitive management area. So some of it was based on. The configuration of the land, but also the mapping of natural communities that was done during the sesame days. So at this point, I'm going to turn it over to Jim Duncan. Thank you. Thank you. And thank you for the opportunity to present here. My name is Jim Duncan, and I'm the state lands manager with the division of forests and forest parks and recreation. My role is to oversee the 5 districts or forestry staff that do state lands management, specifically our stewardship foresters state lands foresters and the outdoor recreation specialists. I'm going to speak to you about the, some of the specific forest management and other management proposals in the plan. Before I dive into the specific management actions for the Worcester range, I think it's valuable to take a step back and share what we mean by the term active forest management. The next approach to forest management is guided by statute as we know 10 vs a 26, so 1 and 26, so 3. And we use science based practices and tools to maintain or improve forest conditions. We use ecologically informed and sustainable forestry to identify when interventions are needed to maintain forest health or improve landscape level diversity and when appropriate apply active forest management techniques. Active forest management includes a number of activities that manipulate trees, shrubs and other plants, such as timber harvests, invasive plant treatments, encouraging food producing trees and stand improvement to give healthy trees more space to grow. Our dedicated staff of professional foresters working with our colleagues from across the agency have the training education experience to develop the forest management activities informed by the latest science and they do it exceptionally well. Our robust environmental reviews conducted at each stage of project development ensure that not only are our timber harvests and all our active management done systematically. They're done in ways that manage or improve, but not to grade forests as a whole and meet our statutory obligations. On the Worcester range specifically this plan proposes to use 13 harvests across 1,935 treatment acres over the 20 year plan as 10% of the total land area. Another 38% of the unit we propose other active forest management approaches to maintain existing features or respond to changes, including invasive plant control. Master crop tree release and pruning such as for apples and Oaks open land and young forest management and ecosystem restoration. On 52% of the unit we propose passive or very limited management, largely letting natural processes prevail. As we know the force of the Worcester range provide numerous ecosystem services such as clean air clean water carbon storage wildlife habitat and climate regulation. These services provide a variety of benefits to the people of Vermont. The forest management activities proposed in the plan are intended to maintain these benefits and services and meet the many goals and objectives of found in the LRMP. With a long range plan and the map shown here identifies. A lot of zoom out of all the treatment areas. And a zoom in on the CC Putnam forest in particular to show the treatment schedule and locations. There's been a lot of discussion about timber harvest. I thought it'd be helpful to talk about why we do state timber harvest on state lands. When justified by the conditions on the ground and the latest science timber harvests are a powerful tool when combined with other techniques to achieve many goals of the plan and maintain the benefits and services for monsters have come to expect from forests. We can use timber harvests to address the legacy of past land use practices such as large scale clearing for agriculture and subsequent abandonment that has left many of our forests in a state far from their pre contact condition. We can use timber harvests to make forests less susceptible to pests and diseases and prepare them for a range of stresses from climate change to invasive plants. We can even use timber harvests to accelerate the development of old forest characteristics by diversifying species and age classes and adding wood to debris to the ground and creating more standing dead trees. Timber harvests are a critical tool in state lands because they can be done at scale affordably and sustainably to maintain and enhance Vermont's forests and address the many things that we think about as natural resource managers. Timber harvests on state lands also generate forest products that Vermonters want and need everything from home heating to flooring to furniture to electricity, as well as good jobs in rural communities. Some stands on state lands are well suited to sustainably produce these forest products on an ongoing basis. The fact that we can meet some of Vermont's need locally on exceptionally well managed lands instead of exporting our consumption to places where forests may not be managed as thoughtfully is something that we take pride in. And it's all of these outcomes that drive the use of timber harvests on state lands and never revenue. Looking at the types of harvest Vermonters might see on state lands. It's important to acknowledge when we do what. Patch cuts where most of the trees in a given area are cut can be valuable tool for certain forest conditions, such as a forest dominated by diseased beach. Take the stand and gotten state forest where the over story beach outnumbered all other trees three to one and the under story was 80% beach and nearly all of that beach was diseased with beach park disease and invasive pest complex. Harvests like this one shown here open up the forest floor to sunlight giving species other than beach a chance to establish diversifying the forest and restoring a more balanced mix of conditions and a better forest health overall. And it's important to remember that patch cuts like these become vibrant healthy forest once more as shown in this patch cut from college state forest 30 years ago that has regrown into a diverse forest adding resilience and complexity across the landscape. We have a question from representative on our question about when you do the patch cuts. How do you keep invasives from. It's the place that I work before we tried to report we just gave up. Because it meant lacing it with chemicals if we were going to do so we just gave up. So what do you do to keep invasives from taking over. So, if invasives are not already present on the site we use we have a really robust cleaning requirement for any material any machinery that comes on state lands to prevent introduction of invasives on to that land base. For areas that have already established invasive plant populations we have we use a range of techniques from mechanical pulling and grinding to herbicide application ahead of treatment for specific plant populations to pre treat. Those areas so that once the other trees are removed. You don't allow light to these invasive plants so we can do targeted treatment of specific populations before harvest to prevent spread and further establishment of those invasive plants afterwards. And then there's a whole other range of techniques that we can use with other kind of to mechanical or chemical treatment. We just found that that just didn't work. You had to do it like 6 times and just keep putting on more and more. I mean, I'm where you are in the state as a significant challenge, but if we want to talk about some of those invasive plant control mechanisms, I'd be happy to print someone to do that. Definitely have lots of questions. So, briefly representative Smith and then Pat. Yeah, thank you. Thank you for your presentation. You're still concentrating on the Worcester range right now, right? Yeah. I am. Okay. My question. I don't know if there are any hunting or fishing restrictions that pertain right now. But if there are, would you let me know? Or do you plan on having any hunting or fishing restrictions on that? There are no plans for any hunting or fishing restrictions. Are there none now? None now. I'm sorry. I'm thinking about it, but. My other question is when you're planning to cut, isn't there a 40 acre law or a clear cut law that you have to get permission to go over 40 acres? Yes, you have a heavy cut requires an cumulative over time. The patch cuts that happen on state lands are well are in the single digit number of acres. We're not talking anything at the scale of a 40 acre clear cash cut or clear cut. So it's a highly different scale of operations. We just don't have those types of large scale operations on state lands. If the cumulative effect over time triggers that heavy cut law, we do a review through that process, but we are never doing a 40 acre. Thank you representative Pat. You mentioned relative at a high level, what the benefits are of. Forestry practices. Does the plan the plan, the Worcester range plan in terms of the specific locations. In middle sex and Worcester state exactly what the benefits are for those specific. Locations just to make sure the question is does the plan state what those specific benefits are for each locations. In those, in those community in those towns. Yes, the plan does not currently state the long term goals for those stands. That's something that I can address in the comments. I think we can address in the plan. It's in a revised version of the plan potentially we can explain that better because right now that plan text is not included those statements because the concern. The probably the biggest concern is about the. Impact on water flows downstream from there, which you may have heard from some of some of the comments. And from my point of view, very incredibly serious concerns. Absolutely. And I have a slide on water resources where I think we can adjust that a little bit more. So I can come back to that if that's all right with you. Okay, so I want to just make a quick public service announcement. We told our next witness that we're running really running over so we'll have an extra. You know, 15 minutes. Okay, I'll try and keep it brief. Thank you for that. We want to make sure I'm not asking you to necessarily cruise through just want to let folks know we can take a little moment to rush. Thank you chair. So, moving on just again to other types of timber harvests that 1 might expect to see on state lands. These are examples of more limited harvest that involves single trees groups smaller patches that can spur growth and add complexity. The selection of the appropriate harvest type is driven by the unit goals and the site and that's made based on conditions on the ground and includes another round of robust environmental review and planning across our agency. Climate change is a topic of great concern to all resource managers and we can be all the certain that it will impact the forests of the Worcester range. So, we're looking at resource management strategies in the plan and beg climate change considerations in their management. Looking specifically at forests and forest management climate change may alter growing conditions. They longer growing seasons favor invasive plants and pests. It can also impact operability for active management increase the risk to forest management road and trail infrastructure, especially around rain events. Furthermore, research and modeling suggests you'll see a relatively slow pace of change in our forest species mix in the absence of disturbance in our region. We've embedded numerous mitigation strategies in the plan to lessen these impacts. These include matching the harvesting and management equipment to the site to improve. Sorry to the site retaining woody debris and active management areas improving our management infrastructure like rows and trails to be resilient to flooding and heavy rain events. And improving forest structure and age class diversity to make stands resilient to fire wind and drought, as well as managing to get non native plants, pests and basque pathogens, all of which bring climate change resilience and adaptation and mitigation benefits. Much of this management unit has no active habitat management and functions in a more or less natural state operation across the agency. We can use active civil cultural treatments and timber harvest to create structural diversity. And to maintain intact forests as well as enhancing wildlife food sources as I alluded to earlier. We can create complex forest to support more wildlife species and habitats with a variety of ages and cover types. And we signed those land management classifications explicitly to protect wildlife movement corridors and make sure that those areas of priority connectivity are preserved. This management unit has a large diversity of recreational opportunities with varying levels of intensity of use and that diversity can and does overlap with wildlife happening at several locations. And this just shows the use of the land management classifications to maintain that critical content for. Recreations of a topic on the Worcester range briefly some of the management actions in the plan as proposed are managing our new parcel of Brownsville. Having dispersing use and better managing use of still pinnacle. Improving trail sustainability at several locations and managing our access pressure pressures, which are significant at some of these locations listed and clean the Waterbury trail. And if I met a still pinnacle moss land falls and middle sex. And finally, managing unauthorized uses and making sure that those uses don't create downstream impacts on other resources across the system. Finally, I wanted to talk a little bit about managing for water quality and flood resilience. The goals and strategies in the plan focus on maintaining enhancing forested areas surrounding surface waters. We focus on protecting water quality, maintaining and improving stream connectivity, improving fish habitat and natural stream processes and improving angler access and promoting fishing opportunities. In addition, there are tactics on current land away across state lands that includes strategic wood additions to streams to promote more complex stream structure provide fish habitat. And a significant effort underway to upgrade legacy roads, including for forest roads and skin trails that may have predated state ownership that are now current source of sedimentation. We are working actively and upgrading those legacy roads are latest amp standards to address some of the downstream flooding concerns that really can be driven by the infrastructure more than the vegetation removal from timber harvests. So we're using our timber or forest management to go in and fix those for the next one. I have a question because that's one of my issues is in seeing the post flood state of the in forest. In my neck of the woods, you're exactly right. It's the road infrastructure that's causing a lot of the challenges and I guess I'm wondering, do you ever remove roads or. Does this plan include the removal of any of those roads because it seems to me it's not just how the roads are built, but it's that they're there at all in these very sensitive areas and they are increasing the surface area of impervious surfaces. It's hard to know what size to size a culvert, particularly high up in these watersheds in the current state of our climate. And I'm just curious, does this plan have any plan for removing any road infrastructure. Excuse me. Existing state forest highways are going to be maintained in this road plan in this plan. There are legacy. I believe there are legacy roads that will be closed out that may not be fully closed out. Finding whether the road is open or not is just challenging me to get into old logging roads. In areas where we're doing active management, we would use that timber harvest as an opportunity to address those past road maintenance practices. And this plan explicitly calls for using our acceptable management practices and meeting all the recommendations and requirements in there. On all of our roads and we're fortunate to have a really fortunate and unfortunate to have a really clear example of how well these interventions work on our forest roads to July floods. So, this has shown us that sections of road that have been upgraded to these standards essentially came through unscathed sections immediately down slope from those roads that hadn't yet been treated had serious erosion impacts. So, we know that these amp's work to prevent erosion to disperse water off of the road and into the landscape and utilize forest buffers and existing infrastructure to vent downstream cascading effects from high event high flow events. So that is a challenge, but one that we're slowly being or starting to be able to pick away at. Presenting second. Yeah, I'd like to follow up on the road question. I just asked. In your slides you talk about the chunks of this area being. These were left alone. They're not going to be active management under. Are there roads through those areas. I believe there are certain roads that are either management rows and I believe a vast trail goes through a portion of this and I'd have to go back to the plan to look explicitly on what the road system is within those areas. If we're not thinking that there's going to be active management on those areas, why would we be, why would we be maintaining. It's a good question. The definition of highly sensitive management area is about the range and intensity of management tools that are allowed. There is limited management allowed in highly sensitive management areas, not strictly passive management requirement. So addressing, there was an invasive plant population that became established and has sensitive management area mechanical treatment could happen in an HSMA. If there was a road that had natural resource, it was natural, it was causing natural resource degradation. And managing that road is in line with HSMA because it's preserving and ensuring that the resource values of that HSMA are not compromised by other activities. So we would use management when it's needed to protect those areas and protect the reasons that those areas are designated the range of tools we have is very limited in an HSMA. So for example, timber harvest and salvage logging are not compatible with an HSMA according to the plan as written. But I can also look into that road question more. I would have wanted to come back with some more information. So if that's something that can provide representative that would be helpful. Yeah, that would be helpful. And we've heard a lot in this committee about the incredible value of old forests. And I would very much, this seems like a really wonderful opportunity for us to maximize old forests in this one small part of the state, given the fact that it's publicly owned, and it's a pretty large relatively large indigenous area. And it's the way I understand old forests are really compatible with road networks. So I would love to hear more about how this interface representative that's a fantastic segue to the next slide which is our BCD old forest targets and Bob Zaynor state ecologist. I would, if it's okay, we can move on to that and maybe a bit time to talk about that. For the record Robert Zayno ecologist with Vermont Fish and Wildlife. I just want to talk very briefly about Vermont Conservation Design, if that's possible. I know you've heard enough about Vermont Conservation Design you can probably give the presentations now. Not as well as you. But to step back to start talking about the intersection of Vermont Conservation Design and state lands planning and if you'll indulge me a few personal comments here. I started working state lands ecology 2008 my very first inventory project was natural community inventory and assessment in the Worcester range. I was out on the ground actually finding and mapping these natural communities that have ultimately been used to inform the development. So with math. I think something like a dozen or more years, serving on all five of the district stewardship teams monthly meetings for each of the five districts. Maybe two or three hours for each meeting well over 1200 hours of sitting around a table discussing the ins and outs of state lands management and how we can do the best management possible considering all of the different values uses of that. I think that is a testament to how well our state is doing this state lands management and when I've gone to regional conferences national conferences with other ecologists told them what I do that I'm there at the table doing this work. They're universally impressed with our system. They're jealous of our system. So I just wanted to offer that perspective of our land management process in the state. Back to Vermont Conservation Design. So Vermont Conservation Design is a statewide vision for maintaining ecological function. It's broad. It encompasses forest blocks repairing areas and then finer scale features. It offers some broad guidance for how to maintain those and some of that guidance depends on the scale of the future. The guidance for maintaining forest blocks is much broader than the guidance for maintaining a rare natural community. Even with all that VCD is not a parcel by parcel management plan. It was never intended to be a parcel by parcel management plan. So you can't just say well Vermont Conservation Design has this. Therefore the land management for a particular parcel is this land management for particular parcel should be guided by what's on the ground the land use history. The public values and benefits everything that is going on in that stewardship team discussion is I think the appropriate implementation of Vermont Conservation Design to a particular place. Also just want to emphasize that Vermont Conservation Design envisions a whole range of strategies for maintaining forests and the ecological functions of forests. It has old forest where there's very little management young forest with very intensive management to maintain that special habitat and then a broad range of forest where well managed well well managed forest that's consistent with maintaining forest blocks and their ecological functions and the Worcester range plan is using that strategy. I wanted to kind of share a little bit of analysis I've been working on and this may be something if you're interested in it. It's probably not going to be something easily done in five minutes. And I'd be happy to explain more about this if you would like at another time but we have targets for old forest in each of the states by a physical region in the Northern Green Mountains is 95,000 acres. I'm partnering with the Wildlands Woodlands Farmlands and Communities Organization and Harvard Forest to look at their assessment of wild lands in doing ones so places that are mostly passively managed. In my opinion, very likely to become old forest over time, using that to get a gauge of where we are towards achieving those targets for old forest into the biophysical regions. It's roughly 80,000 acres, 81,000 acres of wild lands in the Northern Green Mountain region. That includes the Worcester range natural area. It does not include those 5500 acres that my colleagues just shared that are now going into that highly sensitive management area and the methodology used in that Harvard Forest Wildlands Woodlands report would now be counted as a new wildland so we can up that 81,000 acres to 86,500 based on this new plan. Putting that into perspective across the state. We're actually doing really well towards our old forest, our future old forest targets in the Northern Greens. This is not all old forest now but the idea is that it can become that old forest with the Southern Greens but when we looked across the state, those are two regions that we've really done a lot towards those targets. The other regions of the state are places where there's much more work to do. I think that matters because as we close that gap in the Northern Greens, a relatively small gap, I think we should be very thoughtful and strategic about the types of places that we are setting aside to become old forest over time. And we should really focus on the representation of natural communities and the VCD target is not just an acreage number it's proportional representation of the primary matrix broad forest natural communities in the region. And what this bar chart here is showing in the green is sort of the rough balance of six main matrix forest types in the Northern Greens and the blue bars are representing the current wildland or future old forest conservation status or how those, say this right, how those communities are represented in those wild ones. So in the blue bars above the green bar it means we've got more of that than would be proportional and that's high elevation spruce fir forests where the blue bars below the green bar. It's a type of natural community where we can represent we should represent more of it to have that full ecological representation. And the one on the very, what would that be your right where the blue bar is almost non visible and the green bar is high that's low elevation hemlock forest. And that's, that's very poorly represented in future old forest in the Northern Greens. And on the map there which shows a portion of CC Putnam State Forest. The, the community that's poorly represented is that turquoise blue color. You can see there's very little of it in CC Putnam and if I had showed the whole Worcester range unit that point would essentially be the same. So we can't just using the Worcester range. We're not going to achieve those natural community representation goals for future old forest. What I'm hoping is that by expanding this analysis, I think we should be looking broader at all of the opportunities for future old forest and thinking about where we can strategically find that natural community representation. And I hope that this will be the type of work that gets considered in the act 59 process where we'll be thinking broadly about all types of land conservation and how to balance that to achieve that statewide conservation plan. I want to go back to your previous slide so make sure I understand that. Sure. And what the difference between wild and weak and wild land strong is on the bars. Yes, great question. It's a reflection of the permanence of the protection mechanism for the land and I think if I have this right. This was what Harvard forest and wilds and woodlands. They made this determination, not me. Strong wildlands would be things like federal wilderness areas or state natural areas where there is or an easement where there's like a third party protection to it. And then the weak wildlands would be areas that might be administrative and designated, but not have that additional layer of protection. Or like a highly sensitive management area. Yes, correct. Do we have you said you said state lands with a third party. We have some state land natural areas with an easement. Or other third party involvement. I think we do this is seeing nods. I don't know if I want to. Yeah, I guess things like chemistry, but maybe the example of that or. Because there's a deed restriction on it. Yeah. Okay. I actually. I will double check whether I believe state natural areas are included in strong because of the extra levels of protection, but I'm not certain that. Sure. Yeah. The wildlands strong. The ones that I can say confidently are coming from state lands or the state natural areas. And that is, they did analysis of the process that it would take to essentially reverse that state natural areas are designated. They require public process and then they're signed into effect by the governor. So to reverse a state natural area would require the signature of the governor and public process. So in their analysis that put it in strong state lands week. As I said, highly sensitive management areas, those are designated through the one range management planning process. And typically those could be changed from management plan to management plan. Realistically, and why they ended up in this analysis, the qualifying characteristics that turns something into highly sensitive management area are not likely to change on the ground. And therefore they probably remain in that category that landed them in the wild land designation. Thank you. That's a Senate bill. Don't worry about us. Yeah, that's the slides that I had on Vermont conservation design and the list range plan. I'm happy to take any more questions. Otherwise, I'll turn it back over to my colleagues. Well, that's, I think, and and representatory has a question I know I do and you offered to come back. I think we will definitely take you up on that offer. And so if you have a quick question for now, we'll try and then we do need to be aware of time. Sure. I think it's a quick question. You mentioned 30 by 30 bill we work on last year. So in your opinion. Is there any reason to fold up this management plan and 59. I guess I might respectfully defer that to the commissioners. I think that we're constantly working on plans. I mean, like I said, this has been a long time coming to get this was to plan together and it does seem like there's always the next thing, but. Turn that over the commissioner. Let's go. Yeah, I think I answered this a little bit earlier that at this point we feel like what's in the Worcester manager plan, the lines well with act 59 should align those definitions when they come out after the inventory. Because the Worcester range will be part of. The inventory as all state lands. And we have these land management classification units, which will eventually line up some point when we get there with the definitions, which are still being worked on. So, just to follow up on that. Commissioner. Could you imagine at as a result of processes related to act 59 that then some adjustments to the management plan for the Worcester range would need to be made. I think it's too early to tell that I don't. I will say we have 360,000 acres that we manage for. So, whatever comes out of it, we'll look at holistically across the state to all our lands that we manage and land for facing units. I think what we have here in the Worcester range. If we're looking at the different definitions were heavy on what I would think would be the ecological reserve area, which I would guess would be 50 some percent of. The unit and less on the natural resource management in some areas based on the landscape will be at different percentages. It's really based on ecological assessments and work that the staff does. I think we should be proud that how much is that is in here and then it's grounded in science and truth on assessments representatives. So do you have a question and then thanks. I'm sure, you know, I hear the need for management, particularly as it relates to invasive species and I love beach trees, but three to one and that they have, I, you know, bark disease that. I hear that I guess I remain just really concerned about downstream flooding and how that's managed if you clear cut and you know how that timber harvesting. So, maybe you guys will come back later, but that that seems pretty concerning to me. I can try to address that quickly if you want. It's all right. When you actually when you speak again to say for the record, your name for the record, this is Jim Duncan, state lands manager. There's there's a lot to get into in that, but I think at a fundamental level we can look just in no Hampshire at the Hoverbrook research forest and they've done. Paired watershed studies that included completely clear cutting and herbicide and entire watershed and comparing the water yield from one to from that to one that was not treated at all. And even that complete nuking of a hillside or watershed generated very little change overall in the peak stream flows where the second low flows in treatments that are more typical of what we would see on a small patch cut in Vermont. We found very negligible, very limited and short lived changes to stream flow on the order of years. Again, not at peak flows, but on the low flow. So I think there's a lot of good signs that Hoverbrook that has shown the limited effects of vegetation removal and. In concert there are many studies that show the importance of the road infrastructure as we were talking before about the forest road infrastructure. And that's what we get the most bang for the buck and overall the first the best thing we could do for flood resilience in these areas is preventing conversion of these forests to something else and that's already been done and and having these as state lands that are served in perpetuity. Commissioner for the record gained up its scope commissioner. It may be beneficial. I recommend that maybe we bring somebody back to give you a whole understanding of how we approach forest management in Vermont. Because the visualization that we're clear cutting is not really the approach that we take a lot single selection of species managing for diversity regeneration the next future forest. So that you had a presentation earlier about wildfires in Quebec where it was clear that that is not the Vermont way when you're driving and seeing farce they are being managed and you don't see these big swaths of clear cuts. I realized when you look at it on a plan and we identify an area as potential active management. It may look alarming that it's going to be this clear cut and it's that is not what it is. So we'd be more than happy to understand how it's managed for climate adaptation and mitigation while like all those things and Vermont really I think it's a gold standard. I know that the Worcester planning commission in their comments I believe the middle sex planning commission also in their comments, but I'm not sure about that has asked you very specifically to to delay implementation of this plan. The chief issues in Worcester and middle sex is the water flows below where you would be doing forestry practices. I think at this point, I know most people in Worcester have had explained to them that there's no clear cutting being so that is, that is not an issue. The issue is that as you know, we were within inches of flowing over the spillway at the at the right spill reservoir and that will happen again. And so we're not talking about whether it's going to cause an additional foot of water level. We're talking about whether it's going to cause an additional four or five inches of water level and that's that's where people are coming from. That's where I'm from. And I'd like to offer, I think what we'd be offering is future protection by growing a healthier, more diverse complex bars. And I'll add there's also significant concern in Montoya itself. I appreciate your suggestion that we maybe have a more in depth example of ford forst management having gone with PR on several of those visits with rural caucus understanding. I think it's really helpful to get into that level of detail. We, and this committee, you know, I appreciate that other communities may have an understanding that we're not clear cutting, but this committee is. Getting a lot of incoming emails from folks that would be helpful, I think. I apologize. Thank you for your testimony. We should get out in the woods. That would be great. So, I guess, I, I'm going to kind of put a wrap on this, but I. Well, I have a question about when was the last time a timber sale happened in this management area. I'd want to double check this, but I think the last one was in 2013. And there, there's a list in the plan of the previous harvest is going back to the 80s. And I think there was one in 2013 before that was only 2000s. I'd have to look though and verify that. And can, can one of you speak to why there hasn't been a management plan on this management unit since it's and part of the state's portfolio for a long time. Danielle Fitzville commissioner. I don't know for sure, but there are times when we develop a management plan. We put the management like we have identified harvest in this proposed plan. Once we get through those, we don't put more on. So we may have gone through all those. And then a lot of times when we haven't done learn a while is because there's a lot of assessments that go into actually. The design of description and we have a lot of other things that we do. So we have to prioritize. So if we're working on roads to do to increase resilience of our road network, we have invasive species. We have recreation pressures. We have to prioritize all those. And a lot of times forest management does not fall to the top. So it's usually will always delay pretty much in our management activities. So, but I guess, how does a plan without a plan? How does a timber sale happen and proceed on state land? That's why that's why we haven't probably, we've probably gone through them all. And so that's why you're not seeing them in the list of range. I'm guessing. I'm through them all. Sorry. In the previous, we had, this is not the first plan was we've had a was to range plan for. Oh, and when did it? I guess I had heard that there wasn't one. So, so there, there is, there is a previous plan that had identified potential commercial harvests. And once we get through everything that's in the plan, we're done. And that's why sometimes doing a new plan or doing a man, we have to go through a process of amendments or new plans for all the range of management activities. Not just vegetation management. Great. Thank you. Oh, can I just, yeah, and I want to just circle back to, we'll go ahead, representative seconds. Just, just a comment. I do hear a lot about how you see a natural resources is a science based agency and I don't doubt for a moment that everything you do is science informed, but I also want to make the point that these sorts of planning plans are very complex and require a huge amount of judgment based decision making. And a lot of those judgments come from our values. They are often politically informed as well. And I want us to just keep in mind that just because something is science informed doesn't necessarily mean that the decisions that we make. Can't be contested, because there are different ways to interpret the data. And, and, and the, and the lens that you look at the scientific data can drastically change how you might act based upon that data. I appreciate you sharing that. I mean, absolutely we have science grounded and helps make our informed decisions, but we have to look at the broad values and benefits and different users. It's really multifaceted. Hence why we go out public scoping and public comments are all part of helping us understand the values of the monitors and we're hearing one, we hear a lot and every issue that comes forward to us is always two sides to hear it on both sides. And so it's a really delicate balance, but we do ground ourselves in in science, but also the expert opinions and the monitors values, but we are charged with that responsibility and we take it very seriously. And as I said, it comes from a love of the land to and all of Vermont and our future, the staff care deeply, and I am trying to engage with in here. Yeah. Yeah. And also just, you know, Phillips state line administration program manager, just to respond to that point as well. I think that's also why it's so compelling. The district stewardship teams developing the plans and recommending them. And I think one thing I just want to point out about this plan is from the point that the district stewardship team drafted this recommended it through the agency lands team is the directors and passed it up to leadership to review before and now public to review and comment. There were no changes the recommendations of the district stewardship teams that prevailed. So that I think that's very grounding in how we develop our plans that it is, it is those experts that are writing and are recommending all the way up to the highest level. So that is our bell and we need to put a wrap on this meeting and I just want to say thank you so much all of you for your hard work and I know it's all about passion that we have for our force broadly and our state lands in particular. I appreciate that you are surprised it's only two sides I suspect it's multiple. I do want to circle back on I would like more information on roads, the road infrastructure and how they're being managed I think that we need to know about that and also the differences of the management types we need the specifics to understand. Even I mean, is it are those definitions in the plan. And the roads in the plan. I mean, I, okay, so. That's the kind of thing we need more of and we will also hear more about from Bob Zeno and a future date and thank you again for coming in. Thank you very much for the morning.