by Katie McGrath Novak, Coordinator of the Colorado Forest Collaboratives Network
March 26, 2025
On March 20th, 2025, the Colorado Forest Collaboratives Network (CFCN) hosted an All-Partners Gathering
The goals of this meeting were to:
- Learn about current and expected changes happening in collaboratives and communities in the wake of ongoing changes at the federal level
- Understand how the CFCN can adapt our programming in real-time to support collaboratives in 2025
- Make space for community building
In this 2-part blog series, we summarize key takeaways and discussion points from the meeting. You’re currently reading Part 1: impacts of federal funding changes on Colorado’s forest collaboratives and communities. Part 2 is now available here.
Contents
- Who attended the meeting?
- A snapshot of a day in time: challenges and opportunities for forest collaboratives and Colorado communities as of March 20th, 2025
- Where do we go from here? How collaboratives are looking to the future, and how policy-makers, agency leadership, and support organizations can support forest collaboratives
Note to meeting attendees
This summary is our best effort at summarizing complex conversations from a long meeting. If you notice something missing or incorrect, please let us know!
Who attended the meeting?
The purpose of the Colorado Forest Collaboratives Network (CFCN) is to benefit and support place-based forest collaboratives in Colorado by connecting them to information, resources, and each other, and by telling their stories to make their value and needs understood. Forest health and related wildfire are among the top natural resource challenges Colorado faces.
The core constituency the CFCN serves are the ~75 community-based collaborative groups whose job it is to convene, connect, and communicate with counties, cities, agencies, and other stakeholders across large landscapes and multiple jurisdictions. These collaboratives are vital to addressing forest-related challenges, especially in the growing wildland-urban interface (WUI) and in the face of increasingly extreme wildfires.
Our meeting on March 20th had 39 participants representing place-based collaboratives, state and federal agencies, counties, water providers, and more, all who are in one way or another involved in collaborative forestry work in Colorado. Below is a snapshot of our attendees, gathered from a Zoom poll on the call:
Types of entities represented:
Non-profit: 49%
Government agency: 34%
Informal partnership or collaborative: 14%
University: 11%
Other: 6%
Scale of work:
Local: 54%
State: 46%
National: 26%
A snapshot of a day in time: Challenges and opportunities for forest collaboratives and Colorado communities as of March 20th, 2025
We know that in the midst of the recent federal administration change, things are changing every day. We asked attendees a few questions to understand the current state of forest collaboratives as of the day of the meeting, March 20th 2025. Here is a summary of what we heard.
Challenges for Forest Collaboratives & Colorado Communities
Many collaboratives have temporarily or indefinitely paused forestry projects due to federal funding freezes, funding pauses, and uncertainty about the reliability of obligated federal funds.
Several organizations were unable to pay local contractors for their services, after obligated federal funds were paused. One attendee said, “[We] had to stop all contractors working for us. This has decreased our ability to support communities.” Another shared that contractors in their area have been laying off employees and selling equipment to stay afloat. Two projects that have been halted include a 4-year wildfire mitigation program on private lands in southwest Colorado, and a program that would support frontline communities.
“[We] had to stop all contractors working for us. This has decreased our ability to support communities.”
“We have 4 forestry contractors who have gone out of business and 8 more who are unsure if they will survive the summer.”
The loss of these projects is likely to affect Colorado communities, from landowners backing out of wildfire mitigation projects, to potential impacts on clean drinking water and more.
Some of these now-halted projects were planned to take place on private lands. One organization said they have already halted two private lands projects, because homeowners and other partners are unable to commit in the face of financial uncertainty.
Other examples:
- One non-profit, which completed $400,000 of wildfire mitigation work in 2024, is losing nearly all of their funding and therefore will only be able to complete a fraction of the amount this year.
- One organization has indefinitely paused a project that would support clean drinking water for thousands of downstream users.
“Misinformation campaigns [are] being put out with limited capacity to respond on short media timelines due to staffing shortages in our federal partner agencies (or lack of permission for those agencies to respond).”
Beyond individual projects being halted or delayed, several attendees on the call expressed concern that they will lose built up momentum or social license in communities where projects are no longer moving forward and communications are limited. One person wrote, “Misinformation campaigns [are] being put out with limited capacity to respond on short media timelines due to staffing shortages in our federal partner agencies (or lack of permission for those agencies to respond).”
Other negative impacts to communities included:
- Emergency services staff – such as search and rescue and seasonal fire staff – have been reduced just as wildfire season is beginning.
- Programs that prioritize inclusion are being reframed in a negative light, which may harm communities that benefit from these programs.
Many collaboratives have faced challenges in keeping up with their basic organizational functions and duties as a result of federal funding pauses, freezes, and uncertainty.
- One collaborative lost a federally-funded contractor who coordinates 100+ partners in shared visioning and coordination across jurisdictions. The group now has to find new capacity to restructure the partnership, or risk losing this valuable coordination.
- Another non-profit shut down completely for more than a month due to lack of funding reimbursements.
“A week ago I would have said we had 3 weeks before shutting down [our non-profit] completely. [Our federal grant is] coming through now but [I am] doubtful we’ll have federal funds past September.”
In organizations where funding has not directly been affected by freezes/pauses, the uncertainty and lack of trust in federal funds has made it difficult to confidently make longer-term plans. One attendee noted that their organization has not been able to complete their work as efficiently due to constant “chaos,” uncertainty, and confusion as things change on a daily basis.
In some partnerships, trust has waned due to lack of commitment and predictability from federal partners (not due to lack of trying by federal partners, but because they are facing their own restrictions and uncertainties outside of their control).
Multiple people also shared that the loss of open-source data from federal sources that they use to inform their management decision-making.
Multiple organizations represented on the call reported cutting staff time to stretch existing funds.
For example, one organization dropped to a 4-day work week; another cut all staff time by 35%. Others have not yet had to cut hours or lay off staff, but are planning ahead to do so within the year if they do not find reliable funds.
This has caused a deep emotional impact on the humans employed by these organizations. Attendees on the call reported feeling ‘financial and emotional stress’, ‘burnout’, ‘despair’, ‘low morale’, and questioning their career choice.
Attendees on the call reported feeling ‘financial and emotional stress’, ‘burnout’, ‘despair’, ‘low morale’, and questioning their career choice.
Opportunities for Forest Collaboratives & Colorado Communities
The good news is, communities and forestry professionals are coming together now more than ever to support important, cross-boundary forest management. Some people are seeing more public awareness of wildfire mitigation and the importance of federal funding in getting wildfire mitigation work done. They see opportunities to center local voices in forest management planning and advocacy. Partnerships may look different now and in the future, but they are strengthened as those that remain well-resourced are supporting those who have been more heavily impacted.
Additionally, there is still lots of great work happening all around Colorado. For example, Boulder County tax dollars remain strong and have funded successful wildfire mitigation projects through the Wildfire Partners.
Attendees on the call shared that, as federal funding becomes less available, they have begun thinking more creatively about funding. Many are now exploring ways to diversify funding sources for less reliance on a single entity, and are looking into non-federal avenues to pursue (for example, foundations or local tax measures). This has come with challenges; one attendee noted that they have already seen increased competition as many organizations flock to private foundations, and others noted that county-level funding is difficult to come by in counties with fewer economic resources.
Other positive impacts or potential opportunities that folks on the call identified included:
- This time of uncertainty has inspired some organizations to re-evaluate and affirm their organization’s strategic plans and mission.
- Non-federal partners may have a bigger role in gathering local support, planning and implementing projects.
- One attendee shared that they are using this time to think differently and reframe what is needed to solve large-scale forest and wildfire issues.
- There may be upcoming opportunities to engage differently with the National Environmental Policy Act and other environmental regulations.
- Projects that are not federally funded are still going strong, and many once-paused federal funds have been returned.
Where do we go from here? How collaboratives are looking to the future, and how policy-makers, agency leadership, and support organizations can support forest collaboratives
In part 2 of this blog post, we’ll share key takeaways from breakout rooms where we asked attendees the following questions:
- What is your strategy for navigating turbulence?
- What structures does your collaborative have in place to deal with times of uncertainty/change, or, what structures would you like to see?
- What opportunities do you see during this time of uncertainty/change? How are you getting creative right now?
- How might we need to think about partnerships differently?
We’ll also share opportunities for policy-makers, agency leadership, and support organizations like the CFCN to support forest collaboratives.
