The US Forest Service is losing the war
By Allen Schallenberger, Sheridan, Montana
District Rangers in the US Forest Service no longer range and supervise their districts, but instead tunnel through never-ending piles of paperwork in offices and fight huge forest fires. Since 1990 the USFS has lost 2/3 of its employees, including many of the ones who knew how to accomplish things outside on the actual forest. Morale is very low amongst the remaining ones, and many want to retire or find another job.
The forest products industry associated with our US national forests is all but dead. The large loss of skilled employees and a tremendous loss of equipment and milling capacity may be impossible to replace. The USFS — which is supposed to have a multiple-use mandate — has alienated many former supporters by systematically restricting access to public USFS lands and resources.
How did the once proud and efficient Forest Service become people standing in a soup line?
The answer lies with Congress, which has passed many laws restricting wise use; a thicket of Presidential executive orders; budget cuts; radical environmental groups desiring power and control over the land; abuse of the court system by these groups; and finally, apathy on the part of all of us. The original mission of the USFS was to produce water and wood products for domestic use. Over the years the USFS has strayed widely from that mission.
Now our forests are badly overgrown, home to dense tree stands with 10 to 100 times as many trees compared to when the Indians managed the forests years ago. Many trees are dying due to competition for groundwater and thus are impacting stream flows. That currently results in 1/2 of the USFS budget going to the fighting of fires. Hot, catastrophic fires have burned 90 million acres since 1993 in the US. Total cost of these fires is not considered, including costs like trees burned, watersheds damaged, homes, ranches, wildlife, and livestock burned, and streams boiled. The GAO and the USFS only consider the cost to put fires out. They don’t consider that the government is responsible for the other damages.
Make no mistake: the Indians managed our land for at least 10,000 years with relatively small, cool fires they intentionally set, usually in spring and fall. They also felled and used a surprising number of trees. The first white settlers encountered open forests with large trees, savannahs and prairies, abundant water and wildlife, all resulting from Indian management.
The current chief of the USFS is a woman engineer. Promotions within the agency which used to be based on merit now sometimes seem to be based on gender quotas. One of her goals is to increase the burning — with huge, catastrophic fires allowed to burn at the least cost per acre, which is a very poor accounting and management practice.
Recently she came out with an open lands project in which she wants to take over 400 million acres of private lands adjacent to the 193 million acres of USFS lands and stop the development or clear the development from the private lands. One way she would do that is with catastrophic fires burning from USFS lands onto private lands. Also, she wants lots more wilderness where the land is basically unmanaged and unused. And, yes, she would incinerate it with huge, very hot fires called Wildland Use Fires, or whoofoos. Also in the news is that she plans an 8% budget cut, and the USFS workforce will be reduced by another 2,700 workers. Many of them will be people who work on the land. Forest fires are allotted 48% of the budget.
We need to turn around this USFS war and get them moving again on wise management on the ground. Perhaps the best way to do that would be to bring in, as the Forest Service chief, a very smart US combat general with the toughness, political savvy and management foresight to get the USFS back on track. Restoration forestry — as defined by Thomas M. Bonnicksen, PhD, retired forestry professor, in his DVD “Protecting Communities & Saving Forests 2007″ — would be an excellent management guide. This DVD is available free from your local library.
We all must help this new proposed USFS chief get the needed top staff people in key positions. The slackers, the fence riders, and the “can’t do it” types should all leave. Congress must help on this by cutting the red tape load and improving and explaining the budgets with which they’ve burdened the USFS. Radical environmental leaders filing more than one lawsuit every five years against the USFS should find themselves on forestry work gangs learning the value of forest management and hard physical labor.
Reprinted from Agri-News, Tami Jo Arvik Blake, ed., February 22, 2008 [here]
S. 2593 - The Forest Landscape Restoration Act of 2008
Linked below are suggested amendments to S. 2593, the Forest Landscape Restoration Act of 2008 and an explanatory letter. These documents were crafted by members of the Western Institute for Study of the Environment.
Suggested Amendments [here]
Explanatory letter [here]
Your comments and suggestions for submitting this testimony are most welcome. No hearing has been scheduled yet, to my knowledge, but I am far out of the loop. Your help is sincerely requested.
Let Burn Fires Wreak Destruction In Their Paths
Interim Legislative Fire Suppression Committee-Solicited Comment, January 30, 2008
From: Montana State Senator Aubyn Curtiss, SD 1
To: Members & Interested Persons
Lincoln County is my home and apart from times away for schooling at UCLA and a brief time following job opportunity in Alaska, almost all my adult life I have been privileged to live adjacent to the Kootenai National Forest. My husband before his disability retirement, served as fire control officer on the Murphy Lake District on the Kootenai, and because of his dedication to his job, our family life during fire seasons revolved 24 hours a day around fires and fire suppression. Early on we learned that early response determines the size and eventual cost of any fire. That is reality.
In recent years too many fires, because of federal policies, including let burn policies, and locked gates restricting access when fires were small, have been allowed to grow until virtually uncontrollable. I have communicated with some of the committee members before, but want to reiterate and emphasize the fact that Montana needs to re-examine any existing memorandums of understanding with the federal agencies to ascertain that policy differences will no longer contribute to excessive suppression costs. There must be an assumption that liability must be assessed when bad policy decisions of agency personnel allow fires to grow to catastrophic size, increase the costs of suppression and endanger the public.
Before leaving the regular session this year I requested information on the origin of fires and associated costs. I have a report from the fiscal analyst’s office, which though incomplete, indicates that cost of fires originating on federally managed lands in Montana is costing the state millions of dollars annually. In the four year period reported, the chart details costs in excess of 61 million dollars on these
Specific fires, alone. If cost statistics are now available, the committee should examine carefully the cost to Montana of federal “let burn” policy fires which start in wilderness or on federal property and wreak destruction in their paths when burning their way on to private or state owned property.
Required Reading
Flames of Dissent: The local spark that ignited an eco-sabotage boom — and bust
STORY BY KERA ABRAHAM. PHOTOS BY KURT JENSEN. The Eugene Weekly, Nov-Dec 2006
In a high-profile sweep that began on Dec. 7, 2005 and continues into the present, the federal government indicted 18 people for a spate of environmentally motivated sabotage crimes committed in the West between 1996 and 2001. No one was physically hurt in the actions, mainly arsons against corporate and government targets perceived to be destroying the planet. Yet the FBI is calling the defendants “eco-terrorists” and seeking particularly stiff sentences for the five remaining non-cooperators, whose trials are pending. Eight defendants have pled guilty, four are fugitives and one committed suicide in jail.
Segments of the American public have glanced at the mug shots inked into newspapers and seen dangerous eco-fanatics who belong behind bars. But here in Eugene, where most of the alleged saboteurs have lived, those faces are familiar to hundreds and dear to many. In recent months, EW spoke with more than a dozen local people who described the accused as compassionate, Earth-loving people, influenced by a time that also shaped Eugene.
Five years after the last act of arson, the so-called Operation Backfire arrests have sparked the national media’s curiosity. That attention, beaming like a headlight through a fog of paranoia, tends to obscure the other regrowth that sprouted from the ashes of Eugene’s eco-radical era.
This five-part series attempts to tell that story.
Part I: In Defense of Cascadia: The Warner Creek campaign [here]
Part II: Eco-Anarchy Rising [here]
Part III: Eco-Anarchy Imploding [here]
Part IV: The Bust [here]
Part V: The Ashes [here]
Academic Freedom at OSU
This topic came up a couple of years ago when researchers with scientific integrity requested a delay in publishing a politically-motivated piece of second-rate research on salvage logging. Oh boy, did the academic freedom card get played! There were special emergency legislative hearings then, and all those who requested the delay were excoriated in the national press.
Now we have a case where our extreme left-wing pisspoor excuse for a Governor hounded a nationally recognized and respected researcher out of OSU. Didn’t merely request a delay in publishing a paper, but cost a great researcher his job! Is that of any interest to the academic freedom alarmists?
Are there any other academics who the Gov disapproves of? Do you have list, Stinky Ted? Can we see it? Will you be doing all the hiring and firing at OSU from now on? What’s your political litmus test for employment at OSU?
Oh well, the subject is no longer hot, I guess. The constraint of academic freedom at OSU was a false alarm. It’s okay to screw the screws down when the academic in question is not PC. The knife doesn’t cut both ways, evidently. Fire at will, Teddy. OSU is yours to mold in your political image. The hysterics have crawled under their rocks, and the academic community is as silent as the dead.
Are Lightning Fires Unnatural?
I have just posted the BEST environmental research paper of 2007 in the History of Western Landscapes colloquium.
Are Lightning Fires Unnatural? A Comparison of Aboriginal and Lightning Ignition Rates in the United States by Charles E. Kay, Utah State University, is a paradigm-shattering report.
The Western U.S. (and the eastern half, too) is covered to a large extent by pyrophytic (fire-adapted) vegetation. The standard (old paradigm) thinking is that the fire-type plant assemblages are completely natural in origin and distribution across our landscapes. Dr. Charles E. Kay challenges that assumption in Are Lightning Fires Unnatural?
Using simple math and abundant archaeological and lightning-fire records, Dr Kay demonstrates that the number of human-set fires (per million acres) must have vastly exceeded the number of lightning ignitions, perhaps by as much as 35,000 to 1. One of his conclusions:
This would suggest that lightning-caused fires have been largely irrelevant in structuring plant communities throughout many areas in North America. It also turns out that it does not require very many native people to completely alter fire regimes because lightning ignition rates were so low and aboriginal ignition rates so high.
That’s a bold statement. It changes everything we thought we knew about the history of our ecosystems. If Dr. Kay’s hypothesis is to be accepted, and I for one do, human beings played a key role, THE key role, in the presence and distribution of vegetation in North America over the last 12,000+ years.
Dr. Kay’s logic, math, and source data are unassailable. His hypothesis is very strong. Are Lightning Fires Unnatural? is one of the most important research papers of this century, so far.
I am personally proud as a peacock and pleased as punch to be able to post this work at W.I.S.E. I feel like we have finally arrived; and that we are so cutting-edge it hurts.
Please read Are Lightning Fires Unnatural? and submit your thoughts below (in the comment window). I am anxious to know if others view this paper like I do, and/or what your take is on it.
Thinking Freely About Global Warming
A guest essay by Joe Bourbon
I really don’t care who disagrees with me on this. So before I begin, get over yourself.
Global Warming, Climate Change, Ice Age- each of these things occur, they are called weather, and people have to deal with the weather… all life has to deal with the weather. People do not control the weather, and people do not influence the weather.
Now, if you are someone who is big on science, you will know a couple of things that don’t fit your silly political argument about global warming, so you moved your argument over to climate change so your argument could adapt to the weather. Kind of like humans do. I know it bugs you that one way humans adapted to weather is by constructing power plants that heat our homes.
You may find it interesting, or you may not, that man’s rise to dominance on this planet has occurred largely since the last major ice age. Now to someone who hasn’t fenced themselves in to the global warming/climate change small intellectual yard, this information comes as no surprise.
It’s real damn hard to come to prominence when there’s a mile high glacier breathing down your neck in North Texas.
The global warming/climate change crowd conveniently leave out the sun when they point to the so-called “evidence” that the earth is warming and warming at an alarming rate. I personally look forward to the summer of 2013 when they say all the ice in the arctic will melt away. Now, I know when there is still ice up there in the summer of 2013, there will be no stories about how they were wrong, yet again, but I can hope. It seems to be the word of the month.
Another small problem with the global warming/climate change crowd is they don’t have the historical data, they ignore a warm period that led the western civilization out of the Dark Ages and into the Renaissance (a French word).
Moving on, we’ve got an axis-of-spin North Pole and we have a magnetic North Pole, and Santa lives at the North Pole with those fuzzy, adorable mankiller polar bears who enjoy Coca-Cola. Also some vodka drinking Ruskies who may or may not know they are now free to live near the magnetic pole. Now I’m going to leave this point alone. Extrapolate what you wish from it. Because I’ve yet to say anything here.
Local Paper Publishes Hit Piece on Fed Official
Our local paper, the Albany Democrat Herald, saw fit to publish an excruciatingly ridiculous hit piece on Agriculture Undersecretary Mark Rey last Sunday. Herein we engage in some debunkery and fight fire with fire.
The ADH (editor Hasso Hering) chose NOT to put the article on their website, but it ran all over the country. The Juneau Empire ran the complete story and posted it [here]. That’s where we downloaded it, but it’s word for word what the ADH ran.
It was written by a tweak named Matthew Daly, a stringer for the Associated Press in Seattle and frequent mouthpiece for radical extremists. Here’s the opening:
WASHINGTON - He overhauled federal forest policy to cut more trees - and became a lightning rod for environmentalists who say he is intent on logging every tree in his reach.
Who says that, Matt? It’s a total canard, a perfectly false accusation. Stupid, really. Did someone really say that? Whom? Afraid to name your sources? Or did you just make it up and attribute it to vague, unnamed straw men?
After nearly seven years in office, Agriculture Undersecretary Mark Rey still has a long to-do list. Near the top: Persuade a federal judge to keep him out of jail.
That’s a reference to Federal Judge Donald Molloy and the lawsuit against the use of fire retardant brought by a Eugene-based group called Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics [here, here].
George Taylor Sets the Record Straight
George Taylor, Oregon State Climatologist and manager of the Oregon Climate Service at OSU, explained his reasons for retiring in his bi-weekly newspaper column, Weather Matters [here]. As usual, George was more than gracious. We post his recent column in full:
Setting the record straight
by George Taylor, February 24, 2008
By now you’ve probably heard the news. After nearly 19 years at OSU, I’m retiring.
Unfortunately, some things being said (and written) about me are either inaccurate or misleading, so I’m going to take this opportunity to set the record straight.
“Taylor calls himself the state climatologist”
Yes, and I call myself George, because that’s what my parents named me. And in 1991, Steve Esbensen, chair of the Atmospheric Sciences Department at OSU, appointed me as State Climatologist (SC).
Originally, the SC position was a Federal one, but those were eliminated in 1973. States were urged to appoint their own SC, and Oregon did so in 1978. As in the case of most SC programs, Oregon’s position was a faculty appointment at the land grant university. Very few were appointed by Governors. Larry Gates, Allan Murphy and Kelly Redmond preceded me as SC at OSU. I arrived here in 1989, when Kelly left. In 1991, when the SC received state funding for the first time, Steve appointed me.
By the way, George Keller of OSU and legislators Cliff Trow and Tony Van Vliet were instrumental in getting funding for the office. Senator Trow sponsored the funding bill.
“Taylor doesn’t believe in global warming.”
Sure I do, and global cooling as well. Climate varies all the time, on a variety of time scales.
I believe that climate changes as a result of a combination of natural variations and human effects (including, but not limited to, greenhouse gases). But in my opinion, past changes in climate (in Oregon and elsewhere) are more consistent with natural variations than with increases in greenhouse gases.
That doesn’t mean things won’t change in the future. That doesn’t mean we “shouldn’t do anything.” But based on looking at climate data for many years, I am convinced that the effects of things like tropical Pacific ocean conditions and solar radiation has dominated our climate, at least in the Northwest.
“Taylor was probably asked to resign.”
Nope. I’m leaving on my own, and the decision was mine (in consultation with my wife, Cindy, of course). Here’s why:
1. In 2003, I was diagnosed with cancer. Surgery, chemotherapy and radiation followed. Also baldness (temporarily). Things look great now. But cancer really got my attention!
2. Last summer I turned 60. That got my attention as well.
I started wondering “shall I keep doing what I’m doing, or do something else for the rest of my career?” I decided on the latter.
I’m going to start a small consulting business. Initially, at least, I’ll focus primarily on a type of storm analysis called “Probable Maximum Precipitation” (PMP).
PMP is required whenever a dam or large water containment structure is built or relicensed. PMP helps determine the maximum flood that might be expected, and this in turn determines how big and strong the dam needs to be. A very important application of weather and climate, for sure, and not many scientists are qualified to assess PMP. That will probably keep me busy.
And I’m hoping for other new and interesting pursuits. I may be retiring from OSU, but not from weather and climate studies.
And MVS [Mid-Valley Sunday] Editor Hasso Hering has invited me to continue writing my bi-weekly columns, something I have very much enjoyed.
It’s been a fun ride, but I’m not going to stop riding. I’m just going to get on a different horse.
We wish George Taylor all the best. He deserves and has earned it. His dedication and expertise are unmatched. George is much loved in the community for his character, devotion, and community service far beyond climate and weather concerns. That will not change.
We also wish the best for the Oregon Climate Service, but fear that organization is headed downhill fast.
Please Help Us Out
You are cordially invited to join the Western Institute for Study of the Environment.
– Help support our efforts to present the best in environmental science to the public
– Participate in our Members Forum, a place for in-depth discussions, posting notices, and networking with like-minded individuals
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Membership fees are $50 per year. Please visit the JOIN WISE page [here]
Thank you for your patronage and other contributions to W.I.S.E.
Before The Wilderness
For your edification and pleasure, please check out the latest title in the W.I.S.E. Library:
Blackburn, Thomas C. and Kat Anderson, eds. Before The Wilderness: Environmental Management by Native Californians. 1993. Malki Press - Ballena Press [here]
Before the Wilderness is one of the best and most important works ever published in the field of Western landscape natural/cultural history.
The title is not a joke. Wilderness is a modern concept. Before Euro-American mythical glosses and ugh! racist and destructive laws were enacted to codify “wilderness,” the land was home to people and animals. Wilderness is a myth. This book is a fascinating and scholarly exploration of the facts.
What else is there to say? A must read.
Make Their Case
We received the following note from Yahoo at Yahoo, a nom-de-plume no doubt.
You refuse to understand or even see all sides of any given issue. Y at Y
Got me! Partly. I don’t refuse to, but I definitely don’t understand the Sierra Club’s position. Why don’t you explain it us. Make their case.
Because I think I nailed them. Their goal is to incinerate America’s priceless heritage forests and any and all private property within 30 miles of Federal land. By “incinerate” I mean burn it hot and hard, altering whatever ecosystem is there to ashes and weeds. They do so to gain control over those properties. They seek to destroy, render useless, and then seize control of the burned lands. By “control” I mean dehumanize, leave to rot, sprout tick brush, and burn again.
Why else would the Sierra Club (and their ilk) sue every single Healthy Forest Restoration Act project since that Act was widely discussed, debated, passed, and funded by the U.S. Congress, signed by the President, and implemented by the USFS as ordered?
Do they despise and seek to undermine democracy in general?
Is it because “the loggers are cutting ancient forests”? Hardly. Have you read the HFRA? It expressly forbids any fuels management in old-growth stands. And yet, the old-growth stands are the ones that need the treatment the most! They are the stands with the most resource values most at risk from catastrophic fire. That’s what the top foresters and forest scientists say, and I agree. But the HFRA is very limited to second-growth near private property and communities.
Instead of restoration forestry, as implied in the title, the HFRA is a fuels management program in dense, high-risk forests at edges of the USFS boundaries. The idea is to prevent private property (ranches, farms, tree farms, rural residences, rural communities, and sometimes urban areas) from being incinerated by fires that arise on Federal lands.
Why is the Sierra Club against that? Make their case.
They were bugged because the diameter limits weren’t small enough. The point to any forest treatment is what’s left, not what’s removed.
For maximum safety, the USFS could strip their land to bare dirt a mile wide inside their boundary. But a better idea would be to leave a park-like forest with widely-spaced tree crowns and grassy understories that are periodically control-burned to prevent fuels build-up. You know, the heritage condition, referencing the healthy, sustainable forests of pre-Contact eras.
The HFRA doesn’t go that far, even in second-growth, but it’s a start. Or would be, if the ilks didn’t sue to enjoin every HFRA project.
I have no idea why they do that. I see only evil motives and tragic outcomes in their machinations. Make their case.
State Climatologist Taylor Retires
George Taylor, State Climatologist for Oregon, today announced his retirement.
Dear colleagues-
After nearly 19 years here, I have decided to retire from OSU. I have gotten involved in mapping and analysis of extreme precipitation for use in dam safety and other engineering applications, a field known as “Probable Maximum Precipitation.” I am starting a small consulting company to pursue PMP studies, and I am excited about the prospect. Prior to coming to OSU, I was self-employed for a number of years, so I know what I am getting into!
Thank you for your support and friendship during my time here. I wish you only the best in the future.
George
George Taylor is a dear friend. He is not only one of the top weather experts in the world, he has a wonderful family, goes to church regularly, rides a bike, eats organically, and is multi-talented and super-intelligent.
George has had to put up with a lot of flack because he doesn’t buy into the global warming hoax. See The Great State Climate Debate [here].
His scientific research tells him that the small global temperature variations of the last century are typical oscillations and not a rush towards climate catastrophe.
George’s mistake, if any, has been to be honest about his findings when asked. He has not gone out of his way to pound his message into the Media and World Wide Web (I am guilty of such behavior, George is not).
For his honesty George has been hounded by political nitwits like Governor Ted Kulongoski, who publicly declaimed, “Taylor is not my climatologist.” George’s dean, Mark Abbott of the College of Atmospheric Sciences at OSU, has also been less than supportive. Both Ted and Mark are extreme global warming alarmists. They are wrong in their climate assessments, too, but science does not enter into their politics.
Finally George had enough of the backbiting, sniping, jerking around, and public insults, and decided to take early retirement. Ted and Mark cannot steal his retirement funds. George is forming his own consulting company, too, to work on protecting us all from major floods. As Oregon’s State Climatologist his concerns have always been the safety and well-being of Oregonians. His efforts in that regard will continue
I salute George Taylor and wish him all the best. I am glad he is done with those fools at OSU. Now he will have more time to play guitar with me. He has contributed some excellent essays to W.I.S.E. [here], and we all hope for more of them, now that he a little more free time.
SOS Forest Kudos are sent to George Taylor, and a song, and a prayer. Beyond the blue horizon lies the rising sun.
Ninth Court and the Sierra Club Are Slime Ball Arsonists
The following horrible news just came in. It seems the Sierra Club is up to their old sick tricks of burning down America’s forests and all the neighboring private property, too. The raging arsonist commies at the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals share the slime pit. If you know a Sierra Club member, please feel free to set their home on fire.
Logging in limbo
By JIM MANN The Daily Inter Lake, Sunday, Feb 17, 2008 [here]
James Stupack has become an experienced hand at fuel reduction work, carrying out the first project exclusively aimed at reducing national forest fire risks to adjacent properties from Hungry Horse to West Glacier in 2004.
Stupack, the owner of Tough Go Logging, is now neck deep in fuel reduction projects on the Flathead National Forest as a subcontractor on projects in the Swan Valley and on his own contract in the Blankenship area north of Columbia Falls.
But those projects and others — nine across the Flathead Forest and hundreds across the country — were approved under a special rule that has been found unlawful by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. In ruling in favor of the Sierra Club, the court ordered a lower court to issue an injunction to stop projects approved under the “categorical exclusion” rule, but that has yet to happen.
In Memorium - Dr. Benjamin Stout
A great forester, teacher, and I am proud to say my friend, Dr. Benjamin Stout, passed away last Fall. The following obituary was written by his family, especially by his daughter Susan, Research Project Leader at the USDA Forest Service, Northern Research Station in Irvine, PA. Ben and Susan were the only father/daughter Fellows of the Society of American Foresters in the history of that organization.
Ben was greatly admired, respected, and loved, and he is greatly missed. All of his friends in Oregon once again extend our sympathies to his family.
Benjamin Boreman Stout, 83, 1545 Takena St., SW, Albany, OR died Sunday morning July 29, 2007 at the Good Samaritan Hospital in Corvallis, OR.
He was born March 2, 1924 in Parkersburg, WV and grew up on the Stoutland Farm in Ben Lomond, WV. He graduated from Point Pleasant (WV) High School in 1941 and enrolled as a forestry student at West Virginia University. After the start of World War II, he enrolled in the Enlisted Reserve and was called to active duty on May 13, 1943. He served with Patton’s army in the Europe, liberating a concentration camp, and participating in Patton’s grand march toward Berlin. His military experience was recognized with the Bronze Star “for meritorious achievement in ground combat against the armed enemy in the European Theater of Operations.”
After his return from war service, he completed a bachelor’s degree in forestry at West Virginia University in 1947. He went on to earn a master’s degree in forestry from Harvard University in 1950 and a Ph.D. in forest ecology from Rutgers University in 1967. The first steps in his career were as a consultant forester, and then as manager of Harvard’s Black Rock Forest in Cornwall, NY. Later, he served as Professor of Silviculture at Rutgers University in New Jersey, where he went on to serve as Chair of Biological Sciences and Associate Provost (1959 - 1978). He ended his academic career as the Dean of the School of Forestry at the University of Montana in Missoula from 1978 through 1985. Finally, before his retirement, he served as director of the acid deposition research program for the National Council for Air and Stream Improvement from 1985 until his retirement in 1991.
