Layout Draft 2016 Annual Report 03/06/2017 United States Department of Agriculture Forest Service FS - XXXX Forest Inventory and Analysis Fiscal Year 2016 Business Report DRAFT 1 Layout Draft 2016 Annual Report 03/06/2017 Disclaimer In accordance with Federal civil rights law and U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) civil rights regulations and policies, the USDA, its Agencies, offices, and employees, and institutions participating in or administering USDA programs are prohibited from discriminating based on race, color, national origin, religion, sex, gender identity (including gender expression), sexual orientation, disability, age, marital status, family/parental status, income derived from a public assistance program, political beliefs, or reprisal or retaliation for prior civil rights activity, in any program or activity conducted or funded by USDA (not all bases apply to all programs). Remedies and complaint filing deadlines vary by program or incident. Persons with disabilities who require alternative means of communication for program information (e.g., Braille, large print, audiotape, AmericanDRAFT Sign Language, etc.) should contact the responsible Agency or USDA’s TARGET Center at (202) 720-2600 (voice and TTY) or contact USDA through the Federal Relay Service at (800) 877-8339. Additionally, program information may be made available in languages other than English. To file a program discrimination complaint, complete the USDA Program Discrimination Complaint Form, AD-3027, found online at http://www.ascr.usda.gov/complaint_filing_cust.html and at any USDA office or write a letter addressed to USDA and provide in the letter all of the information requested in the form. To request a copy of the complaint form, call (866) 632-9992. Submit your completed form or letter to USDA by: (1) mail: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights, 1400 Independence Avenue, SW, Washington, D.C. 20250-9410; (2) fax: (202) 690-7442; or (3) email: [email protected]. USDA is an equal opportunity provider, employer, and lender. 2 Layout Draft 2016 Annual Report 03/06/2017 Forest Inventory and Analysis Fiscal Year 2016 Business Report Prepared by J.T. Vogt, Forest Service Research and Development, Southern Research Station, Forest Inventory and Analysis, Knoxville, Tennessee And W. Brad Smith (retired) Forest Service Research and Development, Forest Inventory and Analysis, Washington, DC. DRAFT Cover photo: Spruce bog in Bayfield County, Wisconsin, courtesy of Sjana Schanning, Ecologist, Northern Research Station FIA. 3 Layout Draft 2016 Annual Report 03/06/2017 Contents Executive Summary Introduction Changes From Previous Years’ Business Reports Fiscal Year 2016 Program Overview Outputs and Products Program Resources FIA Grants and Partners’ Contributions FIA Data Availability Quality Assurance Regional Program Accomplishments for FY 2016 Northern Research Station FIA Program Pacific Northwest Research Station FIA Program Rocky Mountain Research Station, Interior West FIA Program Southern Research Station FIA Program National FIA Program FIA Data Requests and Access Partners FY 2016 Spatial Data Requests FY 2016 Web Tools Consultations by FIA Staff National Inventory and Monitoring Applications Center National Forest Collaboration Other FIA Program Features Urban Forest InventoryDRAFT Forest Products, Utilization, and National Woodland Owner Studies Enhanced Forest Indicator Surveys Special Partnerships Spanning Cultures Program Safety Regional Safety Highlights for FY 2016 Northern Research Station FIA Safety Highlights Pacific Northwest Research Station FIA Safety Highlights Rocky Mountain Research Station, Interior West FIA Safety Highlights Southern Research Station FIA Safety Highlights 4 Layout Draft 2016 Annual Report 03/06/2017 Comparing FY 2015 Plans With FY 2016 Accomplishments and FY 2017 Plans Fiscal Year 2017 FIA Program Direction Long-Term Strategic Direction Conclusions Glossary of Terms Used in Appendixes Appendix A. Contacts Appendix B. Tables DRAFT 5 Layout Draft 2016 Annual Report 03/06/2017 List of Figures and Tables Figure 1. FIA implementation status, 2016. Figure 2. FIA program available funds and expenses by category, 2016. Figure 3. FIA appropriated funding level, 2007–2016 (projected). Figure 4. FIA program employees by job group, 2016. Figure 5. Grants and agreements by recipient group, 2016. Figure 6. Availability of online FIA data, 2016. Figure 7. Publication status of State reports, 2016. Figure 8. Forest ownership across the United States. Figure 9. Random forests model predictions of SOC stocks (0-100 cm) for all NFI plots with at least one forest land condition in the conterminous United States. Figure 10. Map of year of initial EAB detection by county, 2013 (as of Dec. 31, 2013). Figure 11. Ash volume per hectare by EAB invasion status and inventory year with linear regression lines. Figure 12. Estimates and standard errors of proportion of burned area by tree-mortality severity class, and geographic zone in Oregon and Washington National Forests System (NFS) lands (1993-2007). Figure 13. Estimated mean post-fire dynamics for California forests' carbon pools following (a) low, (b) moderate, and (c) high severity fires. Significant trends are indicated by an asterisk. Figure 14. Upper Tanana Valley study region in Alaska. The solid lines are the airborne laser scanning flight lines (spacing of 2.5 km). Figure 15. A grid cell with two GEDI overpasses. Figure 16. The empirical and estimated variances as a function of the number of overpasses. Figure 17. Delineation of riparian areas based on flood magnitude allows a flexible delineation for application across broad, diverse watersheds. Figure 18. Fremont cottonwoods require flood disturbance to regenerate. Figure 19. Screenshot of the Southern Forest Products storymap depicting how wood moves around the Southern United States. Figure 20. Hardwood saw logs in West Virginia. Figure 21. A landscape view of Cruz Bay from the subtropical dry forest on St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands during the summer of 2014. Figure 22. A look inside the plant diversity within the neotropical dry forest of Mona Island Natural Reserve, Puerto Rico. Figure 23. Aerial photographyDRAFT from the NAIP are used to interpret every FIA plot location classifying land use, land cover, and agent of change. Figure 24. Requests made to the FIA Spatial Data Services Center in FY 2016. Figure 25. Urban forest inventory implementation status. Figure 26 Number of motor vehicle accident incidents by Unit, 2011-2016 Figure 27 - Number of OSHA recordable cases by Unit, 2011-2016. Figure 28. Planned FIA implementation status, FY 2017. Figure A-1. FIA regions and headquarters. Table 1. Overview of land area, FIADB forest area, RPA forest area, estimated P1 pixels and estimated P2 plots by region in FY 2016. Table 2. Annual FIA appropriations and allocation of FIA-appropriated and State-contributed funds for fieldwork only for FYs 2007–2016. 6 Layout Draft 2016 Annual Report 03/06/2017 Table 3. FIA grants and partners’ contributions, FY 2007 through FY 2016 (10-year summary). Table 4. Number of database retrievals using FIA Web applications by fiscal year. Table 5. Number and hours of significant consultations by FIA staff, by customer group, FY 2016. Table 6. Fia urban plots by State and metro/urban area Table 7. FIA program Federal employee estimates for hours worked, miles driven, aircraft hours flown and safety incidents reported for FY 2016 DRAFT 7 Layout Draft 2016 Annual Report 03/06/2017 Executive Summary For more than 80 years, the Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) program has played an integral role in providing the information vital to managing the Nation’s forest resources. In recent years, an increased number of major decisions regarding the Nation’s forests have been made with reference to and reliance on FIA findings and forest resource evaluations. Contemporary topics include carbon sequestration, forest product sector and employment trends, biomass availability, land cover and land use change, pollutant effects, and fire risk. In 1999 (Farm Bill, Public Law 105–185) and again in 2014 (Farm Bill, Public Law 113–79), Congress directed the Forest Service, an agency of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), to reevaluate its statewide inventory mission and to make the transition from an approach in which each State is surveyed periodically to one in which each State is inventoried annually. FIA developed these plans, in concert with its partners, to carry out the congressional mandate. FIA’s Strategic Plan for Forest Inventory and Analysis includes a requirement for an annual business report that outlines the status and progress of the national annual inventory program. This annual business report, our 19th, tells the taxpayers, partners, and clients what the program has accomplished with the financial resources provided and what the program will accomplish in the coming year with budgeted financial resources. This relationship with taxpayers, partners, and clients is integral to FIA’s continued success because accountability is our first priority. Some key findings of this annual report are— Annualized progress. In fiscal year (FY) 2016, FIA maintained annualized inventory activity in all 50 States including the Tanana Valley in interior Alaska. The total area currently sampled represents about 90 percent of all U.S. forest lands, with interior Alaska outside the Tanana Valley representing the remaining 10 percent of the Nation’s