05/20/05 PNW governors unite on drought

05/20/05 PNW governors unite on drought

Washington Ag May 2, 2005 Governor Christine Gregoire hosted her counterparts from Oregon, Idaho and Montana in Spokane late last week to come up with a united front on how to address drought issues and combat wildfires this coming summer. Gregoire said having the region's governors speak as one gets more attention. Gregoire: "With that wisdom we've come forward with some ideas about what we want to say to the congress with regard to preparation for us in drought readiness, firefighting. If we should have agricultural damage to crops in any of our states, how we can position ourselves to access monies that are available at the federal level for that kind of damage. So we have united in a number of things that we are going to take away and send a common and collective statement to congress, the White House, to the administration." The governors agreed to share National Guard manpower and aircraft to fight wildfires. What they want from the federal government is the okay to rapidly respond to fires even if it's on federal land. Gregoire: "We have already had 55 fires in Washington state. You haven't really heard about them, because with our rapid response policy they were put out before there was any major spread at all. It is that kind of philosophy and tactic that we all collectively want to employ." I'm Bob Hoff.
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