PAYMENTS TO 

COUNTIES 

More Clarity Could 

Help Ensure County 

Expenditures Are 

Consistent with Key 

Parts of the Secure 

Rural Schools Act

Report to the Committee on Energy and 

Natural Resources, U.S. Senate

July 2012

GAO-12-775

United States Government Accountability Office

GAO
United States Government Accountability Office

Highlights of GAO-12-775, a report to the 

Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, 

U.S. Senate

July 2012

PAYMENTS TO COUNTIES 

More Clarity Could Help Ensure County 

Expenditures Are Consistent with Key Parts of the 

Secure Rural Schools Act

Why GAO Did This Study

Under the Secure Rural Schools Act, 

counties with federal lands may elect 

to receive payments to help stabilize 

revenues lost because of declining 

federal timber sales. Under Title III of 

the act, counties are authorized to use 

these funds for certain projects related 

to wildland fire and emergency 

services on federal lands. Counties 

received $108 million for Title III 

projects for fiscal years 2008 through 

2011. The act provides oversight roles 

for the Forest Service and BLM, 

requiring them to review counties’

certification of their Title III 

expenditures as they determine to be 

appropriate and to issue regulations to 

carry out the purposes of the act. GAO 

examined the (1) actions the agencies

have taken to oversee county spending 

under Title III, (2) consistency of 

selected counties’ expenditures with 

the act, and (3) extent to which 

counties have followed Title III’s 

administrative requirements. GAO 

reviewed agency and county 

documents and interviewed officials 

from the Forest Service, BLM, and 42

selected counties.

What GAO Recommends

If Congress chooses to extend Title III

beyond 2012, it should consider 

making explicit which types of 

expenditures are and are not 

allowable. GAO also recommends that 

the agencies issue regulations or clear 

guidance specifying the types of 

allowable county uses of Title III funds. 

In commenting on a draft of this report, 

the Forest Service and Interior 

generally agreed with GAO’s findings 

and recommendation.

What GAO Found

Both the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) have 

provided limited oversight of county spending under Title III of the Secure Rural 

Schools Act. Neither agency has issued regulations, and guidance available from 

these agencies is limited and sometimes unclear about which types of 

expenditures are allowable under the act. In addition, their guidance appears to 

be inconsistent with certain provisions of the act. For example, the Forest Service 

website contains a brief overview document of Title III, which generally echoes 

wording in the act, and a “frequently asked questions” document. These 

documents, however, do little to clarify language in the act, neither defining terms 

from the act, such as “emergency services,” nor specifying which activities the 

terms cover. Moreover, the agencies do not review the annual certifications of 

expenditures that counties are required to complete to determine whether 

counties spent funds appropriately and do not have assurance that they have an 

accurate accounting of the amounts of Title III funding spent and unspent by the 

counties. According to agency officials, the steps they have taken to provide 

guidance have been limited because they believe they do not have authority 

under the act to do more to oversee county spending. They also stated that 

Title III’s provisions are clear and do not need further clarification through 

regulations. As a result, they generally have not provided advice to counties on 

how to interpret the act and have not taken steps to assess whether counties are 

spending funds appropriately. 

The counties GAO reviewed reported using Title III funds for projects that were 

generally aligned with the three broad purposes of Title III—wildland fire 

preparedness, emergency services on federal land, and community wildfire 

protection planning—but GAO identified various expenditures by some counties 

that may not be consistent with specific requirements of the act. For example, 

consistent with the act, some counties used funds to provide homeowners with 

education on or assistance with home siting, home construction, or home 

landscaping to help protect people and property from wildland fires. Other 

counties, however, reported expenditures that appear inconsistent with the act’s 

provisions, such as spending on broader emergency preparedness activities 

including clearing vegetation along evacuation routes, updating 9-1-1 systems, or 

buying capital equipment. Counties may have considered such expenditures 

appropriate because the language of the act is open to varying interpretations 

and because of the limited and sometimes contradictory guidance and advice 

available to the counties from the agencies and other sources. 

Counties also did not consistently follow Title III’s administrative requirements, 

which include annual certification of expenditures, 45-day notification periods to 

the public and others before spending funds, and deadlines for project initiation 

and funding obligation. GAO found that some counties closely followed these 

requirements, whereas others did not. For example, some counties certified their 

Title III expenditures on time and in accordance with agency instructions, but 

some counties did not submit a certification for certain years when they spent 

funds, other counties submitted their certifications late, and still others did not 

consistently follow notification and project initiation requirements. View GAO-12-775. For more information, 

contact Anu Mittal at (202) 512-3841 or 

mittala@gao.gov.
Page i GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

Letter 1 

Background 4

Federal Agencies Have Provided Limited Oversight of County 

Spending under Title III 8

Expenditures by Some Counties May Be Inconsistent with the Act 12

Counties Have Followed Title III’s Administrative Requirements 

Inconsistently 23

Conclusions 28

Matter for Congressional Consideration 29

Recommendation for Executive Action 29

Agency Comments and Our Evaluation 29

Appendix I Objectives, Scope, and Methodology 31

Appendix II Comments from the Department of Agriculture, Forest Service 36

Appendix III Comments from the Department of the Interior 37

Appendix IV GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments 39

Tables

Table 1: Counties Contacted During GAO Review 33

Figures

Figure 1: Mobile Firewise Trailer Used to Haul Displays to Educate 

Residents on Firewise Principles 14

Figure 2: A Private Home in Montana Before and After Wildland 

Fire Mitigation Work Was Completed Using Title III Funds 16

Contents
Page ii GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

Abbreviations

BLM Bureau of Land Management

This is a work of the U.S. government and is not subject to copyright protection in the 

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without further permission from GAO. However, because this work may contain 

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Page 1 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

United States Government Accountability Office

Washington, DC 20548

July 16, 2012

The Honorable Jeff Bingaman

Chairman

The Honorable Lisa Murkowski

Ranking Member

Committee on Energy and Natural Resources

United States Senate

Counties containing federal lands have historically received a percentage 

of the revenues generated by the sale or use of natural resources on 

these lands. A steep decline in federal timber sales during the 1990s, 

however, significantly decreased revenues from national forests managed 

by the Department of Agriculture’s Forest Service and from some public 

lands managed by the Department of the Interior’s (Interior) Bureau of 

Land Management (BLM). The Secure Rural Schools and Community 

Self-Determination Act of 2000,1 reauthorized in 2008,2 was enacted in 

part to address this decline by stabilizing payments to counties dependent 

on revenues from federal timber sales. The act covers all National Forest 

lands, as well as certain BLM lands in western Oregon.3

Under the Secure Rural Schools Act, each county may continue to 

receive a portion of the revenues generated from the sale or use of 

resources from federal lands or can choose instead to receive annual 

payments based in part on historical revenue payments to the county. 

These payments were to decline each year, and states and counties 

 

1

Pub. L. No. 106-393 (2000). This act covered the period from fiscal year 2001 through 

fiscal year 2006. Pub. L. No. 110-28, Title V, § 5401 (c) (2007) reauthorized the act for 

fiscal year 2007. In this report, we refer to the Secure Rural Schools and Community SelfDetermination Act of 2000 as the Secure Rural Schools Act.

2

Pub. L. No. 110-343, Div. C, Title VI, § 601 (2008) reauthorized the act for the period 

from fiscal year 2008 though fiscal year 2011. Pub. L. No. 112-141, Div. F, Title I, § 

100101 (2012) reauthorized the act through fiscal year 2012.

3

Most of these BLM lands were originally granted to the Oregon and California Railroad 

Company and later returned to the federal government; they are referred to as O&C lands.

 
 

Page 2 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

received the most recent payment authorized by the act (for fiscal year 

2011) in early 2012.4

The Secure Rural Schools Act, as reauthorized, comprises three principal 

titles. Under Title I, counties are to use the majority of payments they 

receive for the same purposes for which they used federal receipts, in 

most cases for the benefit of roads and schools.5 Under Title II, counties 

may reserve a portion of the payments to fund certain land management 

projects that benefit federal lands. Title III, which is the focus of our

report, authorizes the use of a portion of the payments for certain 

purposes related to wildland fire and emergency services on federal 

lands.6 These authorized uses include carrying out certain activities to 

increase the protection of people and property from wildland fires, 

reimbursing the county for search and rescue and other emergency 

services performed on federal land, and developing community wildfire 

protection plans to help protect homes and neighborhoods. Counties 

must also follow certain administrative requirements under Title III, 

including publishing public notices of proposed uses for the payments and 

submitting annual certifications of Title III expenditures to either the 

Forest Service or BLM, as appropriate. For fiscal years 2008 through 

2011, 358 counties received a total of $108 million for Title III projects, 

and individual counties received from about $3,600 to over $2 million in a 

single fiscal year for such projects.7

The Forest Service and BLM are responsible for carrying out certain parts 

of the Secure Rural Schools Act. Both agencies calculate the amounts 

that counties are to receive each year, and both agencies are required by 

the act to review the counties’ certification of Title III expenditures as the 

 

4

Payments from the Forest Service go to the states, which then allocate payments to the 

counties, while payments from BLM go directly to the counties.

5

For the western Oregon counties containing BLM lands, Title I payments go into each 

county’s general fund to be used as the county determines.

6

Counties receiving $100,000 or less in payments may allocate all of their payments to 

uses authorized under Title I. Counties receiving more than $100,000 must allocate from 

15 to 20 percent of their payments to Title II and Title III projects or give the funds back to 

the federal government. Counties choose how to divide this percentage among Title II and 

Title III, although counties receiving $350,000 or more in payments may allocate no more 

than 7 percent of the payments to Title III projects.

7

Payments under all three titles of the act totaled over $2 billion for fiscal years 2008 

through 2011.
 

Page 3 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

agencies determine to be appropriate. The act also requires the agencies 

to issue regulations to implement the act, although it does not describe 

what the regulations are to address or establish a deadline for issuing 

them.

You asked us to report on federal oversight and counties’ use of Title III 

funds. This report examines for fiscal years 2008 through 2011 (1) actions 

the Forest Service and BLM have taken to oversee county spending 

under Title III, (2) consistency of selected counties’ expenditures with the 

purposes of the act, and (3) the extent to which these counties followed 

Title III’s administrative requirements.

To conduct this work, we reviewed relevant laws and agency documents, 

including the Secure Rural Schools Act, as reauthorized, and Forest 

Service guidance made available to counties. We also interviewed Forest 

Service and BLM officials about their oversight activities and obtained in 

writing Agriculture’s and Interior’s legal interpretations of relevant portions 

of the act. We reviewed the forms indicating counties’ election to allocate 

funds for Title III and the forms counties submitted to the federal agencies 

certifying that the funds expended in the previous year were used for 

authorized purposes. To obtain information about the projects and 

activities on which counties spent Title III funds, and their administrative 

practices related to Title III, we interviewed, in person or by telephone, 

officials from 42 selected counties of the 358 counties receiving Title III 

funds since the act was reauthorized in 2008. These 42 counties 

comprise a nonprobability sample of counties selected for variation in 

both the amounts of Title III funds received and in geographic location. 

We collected and reviewed documentation from these counties, including 

public notices related to Title III and detailed expenditure information. We 

did not, however, perform a financial audit of counties’ expenditures. 

Because the 42 counties we selected are a nonprobability sample, the 

information we obtained from these counties cannot be generalized 

beyond these counties; however, the information provided us with an 

understanding of how the selected counties spent Title III funds and the 

actions taken to follow Title III’s administrative requirements.8

 

8

In addition to these 42 counties that had spent Title III funds, we interviewed officials from 

three selected counties that had not yet spent any Title III funds to discuss their reasons 

for not spending the funds and their plans for spending or returning remaining funds. 

These counties were likewise selected for variation in Title III funds received and 

geographic location.

We also 
 

Page 4 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

interviewed representatives from several nongovernmental organizations, 

including the National Association of Counties, National Forest Counties 

and Schools Coalition, Western Governors’ Association, Headwaters 

Economics, Association of O&C Counties,9

We conducted this performance audit from August 2011 to July 2012 in 

accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. 

Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain 

sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our 

findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe that 

the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings and 

conclusions based on our audit objectives.

and National Fire Protection 

Association. Appendix I describes our objectives, scope, and 

methodology in more detail.

The Secure Rural Schools Act was enacted to help address fiscal 

difficulties confronting rural counties having substantial federal lands and 

a history of federal timber harvesting. In the years leading up to passage 

of the original act in 2000, debate focused on how to finance payments to 

these timber-dependent counties. Some interested parties, including 

county representatives, argued that the Forest Service and BLM should 

finance any shortfall in timber revenues from the agencies’ own 

appropriations and timber receipts, thus leading the agencies to either 

expand timber harvesting on federal lands or reduce their nontimber 

programs, while others argued that compensation for the shortfall should 

come from the U.S. Treasury and be completely decoupled from federal 

timber harvests. Proponents of continued federal timber harvests argued 

against decoupled payments, maintaining that such an approach would 

hurt local timber-related businesses.

The Senate committee version of what would become the 2000 act was a 

compromise between these two views, providing in Title I for decoupled 

payments to counties while in Title II reserving funds for certain countyrecommended timber harvesting projects and other activities on federal 

lands, including search-and-rescue efforts. The administration opposed 

tying funding to projects on federal lands and, late in the legislative 

 

9

The Association of O&C Counties represents the 18 western Oregon counties within 

which lie the Oregon and California Revested Grantlands, which are now managed by 

BLM. These are the BLM lands covered by the act.

Background 
 

Page 5 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

process, the bill was amended to allow counties to opt out of Title II, 

instead using funds for projects related to but not occurring on federal 

lands. This provision became Title III of the act. Because Title III was 

added late, little legislative history is associated with it that the agencies 

or courts can use to interpret its meaning.

The original act of 2000 established six categories of authorized uses for 

Title III funds:

• Search and rescue and emergency services. A county was allowed to 

use funds to reimburse all documented costs incurred and paid for by 

a county or county sheriff’s department for search and rescue and 

other emergency services, including firefighting, performed on federal 

lands.

• Community service work camps. A county was allowed to use funds 

to reimburse all or part of the costs it incurred to pay the salaries and 

benefits of county employees who supervise adults or juveniles 

performing mandatory community services on federal lands.

• Easement purchases. A county was allowed to use funds to acquire 

conservation easements and easements from private or other 

noncounty landowners, on a willing-seller basis, to provide 

nonmotorized access to public lands for hunting, fishing, and other 

recreational purposes.

• Forest-related educational opportunities. A county was allowed to use 

funds to establish and conduct forest-related after-school programs.

• Fire prevention and county planning. A county was allowed to use 

funds for (1) efforts to educate homeowners in fire-sensitive 

ecosystems about techniques in home siting, home construction, and 

home landscaping that can increase protection of people and property 

from wildfires and (2) planning efforts to reduce or mitigate the impact 

of development on adjacent federal lands and to increase the 

protection of people and property from wildfires.

• Community forestry. A county was allowed to use funds to assist in 

obtaining competitive Forest Service grants for improving forests in 

urban settings.

The 2008 act significantly narrowed the counties’ authorized uses for 

Title III funds. The act did not include the previous provisions authorizing 

community service work camps, funding to acquire easements, forestrelated after-school programs, and community forestry grant assistance. It 

continued to allow counties to obtain reimbursements for search and 

rescue and other emergency services, including firefighting, performed on 
 

Page 6 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

federal land, and it retained fire prevention and county planning as 

allowable uses of funds but further defined them, as follows:10

• Firewise. A county may use funds to carry out activities under the 

Firewise Communities program to provide to homeowners in firesensitive ecosystems education on, and assistance with 

implementing, techniques in home siting, home construction, and 

home landscaping that can increase the protection of people and 

property from wildfires.

• Search and rescue and other emergency services. A county may use 

funds to reimburse the participating county for search and rescue and 

other emergency services, including firefighting, that are performed on 

federal land and paid for by the participating county.

• Community wildfire protection plans. A county may use funds to 

develop community wildfire protection plans in coordination with the 

appropriate departmental Secretary concerned.

The Firewise Communities program is a nonregulatory program 

administered by the National Fire Protection Association and sponsored 

by the Forest Service, Interior, and state forestry organizations.11

 

10A sponsor of the Senate version of the bill that ultimately became the 2008 act noted 

that “county funding under Title III has been restricted and focused on programs that 

indirectly benefit public land management. In addition, provisions have been added to Title 

III to encourage compliance with its terms and greater awareness of the counties’ efforts 

by federal land managers.” 153 Cong. Rec. S3992 (Mar. 28, 2007) (statement of Senator 

Bingaman). One independent report had suggested that some counties may not have 

been spending Title III funds appropriately: Jonathan Kusel et al., Assessment of the 

Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act, Public Law 106-393

(Taylorsville, Calif.: Sierra Institute for Community and Environment, March 2006). 

It is 

designed to involve homeowners, community leaders, planners, 

developers, and others in efforts to protect people, property, and natural 

resources from the risk of wildland fire. Activities under the program 

include assisting individuals and residential communities with techniques 

to help protect homes from ignition due to wildland fire and to improve 

emergency preparedness in the event of a wildland fire. Communities that 

conduct certain steps can become recognized Firewise Communities 

sites. Community wildfire protection plans identify and set priorities for 

11The mission of the National Fire Protection Association, an international nonprofit 

established in 1896, is to reduce the worldwide burden of fire and other hazards on the 

quality of life by providing and advocating consensus codes and standards, research, 

training, and education.
 

Page 7 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

treatments to reduce flammable vegetation, which can fuel wildland fires, 

and recommends the types and methods of treatment on federal and 

nonfederal land that will protect at-risk communities and essential 

infrastructure; community plans also recommend measures to protect 

structures throughout the at-risk community from ignition. A community 

plan may cover one or more communities, and some cover entire 

counties.

In implementing Title III projects, counties must follow certain 

administrative requirements in the act. Specifically, each county must 

“publish . . . a proposal that describes the proposed use of county funds” 

in local newspapers or other publications and submit the proposal to any 

resource advisory committee, which is established for the county primarily 

under Title II of the act and is to contain 15 members representing diverse 

local interests.12 The county must then allow a 45-day comment period 

before using the funds. Counties do not have to notify or gain approval 

from the federal government regarding their plans. Counties that have 

spent Title III funds, however, must submit an annual certification to the 

Forest Service or BLM, as appropriate, stating that any Title III funds 

spent in the previous year went toward authorized uses. The 2008 act in 

effect during our review provided that the authority for counties to initiate 

Title III projects expired September 30, 2011, and the act stated that any 

Title III funds not obligated by counties as of September 30, 2012 were to 

be returned to the U.S. Treasury.13

The 358 counties that have received Title III payments since fiscal year 

2008 are located throughout the United States—in 36 states—but the 

payments were not evenly distributed geographically, in part because the 

amounts of federal land and historic timber receipts (two factors for 

calculating payments under the act) vary widely by county. About 

44 percent of total Title III payments for fiscal years 2008 through 2011 

went to counties in Oregon, with another 11 percent distributed to 

counties in northern California. The counties that have received Title III 

payments are diverse, with some located in rural areas with populations 

 

12For more information on these committees and Title II in general, see GAO, Update on 

the Status of the Merchantable Timber Contracting Pilot Program, GAO-10-379R

(Washington, D.C.: Mar. 4, 2010).

13In July 2012, as we completed our review, Pub. L. No. 112-141, Div. F, Title I, § 100101 

extended each of these dates by 1 year.
 

Page 8 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

of less than 100,000 and others near major urban areas, such as 

Portland, Oregon, and Seattle, Washington.

Both the Forest Service and BLM took few actions to oversee county 

spending under Title III of the Secure Rural Schools Act. Neither agency 

has issued regulations under the act, and the guidance that has been 

issued is limited and sometimes unclear; further, in some areas, the 

guidance appears inconsistent with certain provisions of the act. The 

agencies also have not reviewed the annual certifications provided by 

counties to determine whether counties spent funds appropriately, and 

they do not have assurance that they have an accurate accounting of the 

amounts of Title III funding spent and unspent by the counties. According 

to agency officials, the steps agencies have taken to provide guidance 

have been limited because they believe they do not have authority under 

the act to do more to oversee county spending.

To provide guidance, the Forest Service developed and posted on its 

website a brief overview of Title III, which generally echoes wording in the 

act, and a “frequently asked questions” document responding to 

questions on authorized uses of Title III funds. Agency officials told us 

they believe the frequently asked questions document provides sufficient 

clarity for counties to use when considering how to spend Title III 

funds. However, officials from several counties we contacted told us they 

found these documents to be of little help, and our review of these 

documents found that they do not clearly specify which types of 

expenditures are allowed under the act and which are not. For example, 

the act authorizes counties to use Title III funds for “search and rescue 

and other emergency services, including firefighting, that are performed 

on federal land” but does not define the types of activities covered by this 

phrase. Neither of the Forest Service documents defines such activities.

In addition, in the frequently asked questions document, the Forest 

Service lists eight specific uses of Title III funds and asks “Are Title III 

funds authorized for the following uses?” These uses include purchase of 

capital equipment, capital improvements, purchase of land, and training 

for emergency response. Instead of answering the question directly, the 

documents state that, for certain uses, such as construction of facilities, 

purchase of real property, and purchase of vehicles and other capital 

equipment, the act does not explicitly authorize these uses. It then further 

states that reimbursement for certain uses—such as the purchase of 

replacement equipment damaged or destroyed during an emergency 

response or maintenance of vehicles and equipment in proportion to their 

actual use for emergency services performed on federal land—may be 

Federal Agencies 

Have Provided 

Limited Oversight of 

County Spending 

under Title III
 

Page 9 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

allowable. We believe that such statements are confusing and unclear.

The document also directs the counties to consult their own legal counsel 

regarding the authorized uses of Title III funds. 

Our review showed that, in addition to being unclear, the Forest Service’s 

frequently asked questions document appeared inconsistent with certain 

provisions of the act. For example, regarding the Firewise Communities 

program, the act states that Title III funds may be used for those Firewise 

activities involving educating homeowners about, and assisting them with, 

techniques in home siting, construction, and landscaping to help protect 

people and properties from wildfires. The frequently asked questions, as 

well as the overview document provided by the Forest Service, define 

Firewise Communities as an approach that, among other things, 

“emphasizes community responsibility for planning in the design of a safe 

community as well as effective emergency response.” These documents 

do not emphasize that counties’ Firewise activities with Title III funds must 

be limited to providing fire-related education or assistance to 

homeowners. Moreover, the frequently asked questions document states 

that developing emergency 9-1-1 systems under Firewise may also be an 

authorized use of Title III funds, which is not an activity clearly authorized 

under the act. We are concerned that a Firewise definition that includes 

emergency response and the suggestion that developing 9-1-1 systems 

may be an authorized activity under the act could lead some counties to 

interpret the act as allowing expenditures that improve the county’s 

emergency response—a use not clearly authorized under the act. 

Officials in one county specifically directed us to the definition of the 

Firewise approach provided in the Forest Service’s overview document in 

explaining why they spent most of their Title III funds on activities related 

to effective emergency response.

The Forest Service and BLM also jointly developed a process to assist 

counties in certifying that the county’s Title III funds spent in the previous 

year went toward authorized uses, but the agencies do not review county 

Title III project expenditures to determine whether the funds have been 

used on county projects that are allowable. To implement this process, 

the Forest Service and BLM developed instructions that counties are to 

follow to certify their Title III expenditures, including requirements and 

certification procedures associated with the act and addresses for 

submitting the paperwork. The agencies also developed an optional form 

that counties may use for certification. These instructions and form are 

posted on the Forest Service’s website and, in 2010, the Forest Service 

also mailed a copy of the instructions and form to the counties. Once 

counties submit their certifications, officials from both agencies told us 
 

Page 10 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

they review the information contained on the forms. However, the limited 

information collected through the forms—typically the amount spent in 

each of the three allowable Title III spending categories, without further 

details regarding actual activities—does not allow either agency to 

determine whether counties spent funds appropriately, and senior officials 

at both agencies told us that they do not take additional steps to conduct 

this type of oversight. Some counties, particularly those in Oregon, 

provided the agencies with information describing their Title III projects 

beyond what was required in the act, but even so, agency officials told us 

that neither agency has reviewed this information to determine whether 

those Title III projects were allowable under the act.

Counties are required to submit certifications only for the years they have 

spent funds, and neither the Forest Service nor BLM has a process to 

contact counties to determine whether the counties spent funds but did 

not submit a certification. According to officials from some of the counties 

that we contacted, they did not submit certifications even when their 

counties had Title III expenditures. Of the $108 million in Title III 

payments provided to 358 counties for fiscal years 2008 through 2011, 

the counties certified having spent about $46 million—or less than half the 

total amount—by the end of calendar year 2011. However, because the 

agencies do not have a process to ensure an accurate accounting of the 

amounts of Title III funds spent and unspent, it is unclear whether this 

amount is accurate, and it will be difficult to ensure that counties return to 

the U.S. Treasury any funds that remain unobligated upon the act’s 

expiration. In August 2011, the Forest Service requested legal advice 

from the Department of Agriculture’s Office of General Counsel on its role 

in a county’s return of unobligated Title III funds. In a September 2011 

memorandum, the Office of General Counsel suggested to the Forest 

Service that it revise the instructions to counties for the certification due in 

February 2013, to require counties to indicate the amount of any Title III 

funds unobligated as of September 30, 2012. In January 2012, the Forest 

Service posted instructions on its website for counties on how to return 

unobligated funds, directing counties to self-report the amount of unspent 

Title III funds and request a bill for collection from the Forest Service. The 

agency official in charge of the Secure Rural Schools program told us that 

the agency plans to revise the certification process accordingly.

Agency officials told us they believe that the act does not give them 

oversight authority, so they do not attempt to determine whether counties 

are spending funds appropriately and, for the most part, do not provide 

opinions or advice to counties on how to interpret the act’s provisions. 

The Forest Service official in charge of the program told us that when 
 

Page 11 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

counties ask him for advice, he is willing to discuss proposed uses of 

Title III funds but ultimately can do little more than point them to the act 

and the frequently asked questions guidance and advise them to consult 

their legal counsels. Officials with both agencies told us they do not have 

the authority to approve the counties’ projects or tell them how to spend 

the funds. The act, however, states that the agency “concerned shall 

review the certifications submitted . . . as [it] determines to be 

appropriate” and also that the agencies “shall issue regulations to carry 

out the purposes of this Act”14—language that we believe specifically 

authorizes oversight. As part of this authority, we believe the agencies 

would, for example, be allowed to issue regulations or guidance clarifying 

types of authorized expenditures, which could also facilitate the review of 

certifications by establishing criteria for allowable uses of Title III funds. In 

their legal views provided to us, the Department of Agriculture stated that 

the act was highly prescriptive and it was unclear what utility, if any, 

would be achieved through the issuance of regulations, and Interior 

stated that it believed Title III’s provisions are clear and do not need 

further clarification in regulations15

That the agencies have not developed clear guidance or regulations is 

particularly concerning because the act itself does not define key terms. 

For example, as noted previously, the act authorizes counties to use 

Title III funds for “emergency services” but does not specify the types of 

activities covered by this term.

—although, as noted earlier, the Forest 

Service chose to issue guidance in the form of frequently asked 

questions, suggesting the agency believed some clarification was 

needed.

16

 

14The act does not specify what matters the regulations are to address or contain a 

deadline for their issuance.

Similarly, while the act authorizes 

counties to use Title III funds to carry out activities “under the Firewise 

Communities program,” it does not specify what activities qualify as part 

of the program—for example, whether a community must be a recognized

15In its legal views, Interior further stated that it considers funds distributed under the act 

to be county funds and that therefore “it appears that the Department is limited in its 

authority to develop a regulatory structure to enforce the proper expenditure of the funds.” 

16The legislative history of Title III contains almost no information that clarifies the phrase 

“emergency services.” 
 

Page 12 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

“Firewise Community” for expenditures to qualify.17 Because the language 

of the law leaves certain provisions open to varying interpretations, and 

available guidance from the agencies has done little to clarify this 

language, counties have generally been left to make their own 

interpretations about which types of expenditures are allowable under 

Title III and which are not.

Selected counties we contacted reported using Title III funds for projects 

that were generally aligned with the three broad purposes of Title III—

wildland fire preparedness, emergency services on federal land, and 

community wildfire protection planning—but we identified various 

expenditures by some counties that may not be consistent with specific 

requirements of the act. The reasons for this may be in part because of 

language in the law leaving certain provisions open to varying 

interpretations and also because of limited and sometimes contradictory 

guidance available to the counties from the agencies and other sources.

Some counties we reviewed used Title III funds for Firewise projects that 

were clearly authorized, but others spent funds on broader emergency 

preparedness or educational activities that may not be consistent with the 

2008 act. As noted, Title III authorizes counties to spend funds for 

activities carried out under the Firewise Communities program but 

specifies that these activities are to involve educating or assisting 

homeowners with home siting, home construction, or home landscaping 

to help protect people and property from wildfires. Many counties we 

reviewed limited their use of some or all of their Title III funds to such 

activities that were consistent with the act. For example, regarding 

education, officials from several counties we reviewed told us that they 

used Title III funds to educate homeowners about the principles of 

Firewise, which include creating defensible space around homes and 

choosing home building materials, such as roofing and siding that are 

more resistant to wildland fire. Officials from these counties described a 

variety of methods for (1) distributing information, such as door hangers, 

print or radio advertisements, or calendars, to educate homeowners 

 

17To become recognized, communities undertake several actions, including completing a 

community assessment and creating an action plan, forming a Firewise Board or 

Committee, helping fund local wildland fire mitigation projects, and submitting an 

application to the Firewise Communities program.

Expenditures by 

Some Counties May 

Be Inconsistent with 

the Act

Wildland Fire 

Preparedness
 

Page 13 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

about Firewise principles and (2) making Firewise materials available at 

community events. Several counties used Title III funds for a Firewise 

coordinator, according to county officials, whose activities could include 

holding educational workshops, assisting communities with Firewise 

planning, hosting community events such as “cleanup days” to encourage 

homeowners to remove brush and other vegetation from around their 

homes, and assisting communities with applications for Firewise 

Communities recognition. An official from one such county told us that the 

county also formed a coalition of federal, state, and local officials with the 

goal of educating people about Firewise; this coalition used a portion of 

the county’s Title III funds to create an educational video on Firewise 

principles that is shown to homeowners. Some counties used Title III 

funds to purchase and outfit Firewise trailers, which county employees 

take to communities to publicize and educate residents about the 

Firewise program (see fig. 1). Officials from a few counties we reviewed 

noted that they have seen improvements at residences since the county 

began Firewise education.
 

Page 14 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

Figure 1: Mobile Firewise Trailer Used to Educate Residents on Firewise Principles

Similarly, a number of counties we reviewed provided wildland fire 

mitigation assistance to homeowners at their properties, through activities 

such as thinning trees and brush that could fuel a wildland fire. For 

example, one county we reviewed said it used all of its Title III funds to 

conduct wildland fire mitigation activities at or near private homes, many 

of which abut Forest Service, state, or private forested lands. County 

officials told us that volunteers, contractors, or crews from local fire 

departments performed the activities, with homeowners generally paying 

for half of the cost and the county paying the other half, primarily with 

Title III funds.18

 

18This county also used funds it received from other sources, including grants from the 

state, to pay for wildland fire mitigation activities.

Some other counties carried out similar work, but 

homeowners paid different portions of the cost, and counties used 

different sources of labor. For example, one county used youth crews and 
 

Page 15 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

parolees to do fire mitigation work.19

 

19The 2008 reauthorization of the act eliminated community service work camps as an 

authorized use of Title III funds; the original act authorized funds for county employees’ 

salaries to supervise people completing mandatory community service. The reauthorized 

act also eliminated forest-related after-school programs. Officials from this county told us 

that the youth crews were funded under these provisions before the act changed in 2008 

but that after the reauthorization, the program shifted from an education program to a crew 

performing Firewise mitigation work. The county officials also said they began using older 

high school and college-aged workers for the program.

Another provided grant funds to 

homeowners to arrange for the Firewise work themselves. To obtain grant 

funding from that county, homeowners must present an invoice from a 

licensed landscaping professional for work that might include tree 

trimming, brush removal and chipping, and installation of irrigation 

systems. According to county officials, homeowners may also receive 

funding to pay a portion of the cost of a new roof, siding, or windows or 

for purchasing fire-resistant plants. Another county used Title III funds to 

pay for personnel to inspect homes and educate homeowners on home 

siting and landscaping. The county’s inspectors evaluated homes on 

construction methods and materials related to wildland fire exposure, 

including roofing materials, attic vents, exterior siding, windows, exterior 

doors, stairs, and decks, as well as vegetation around the homes. A few 

counties that received smaller amounts of Title III funds took chippers to 

communities during Firewise event days to assist homeowners in 

disposing of materials cleared from their properties, according to county 

officials. (Fig. 2 shows a residence before and after the local fire 

department conducted mitigation work).
 

Page 16 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

Figure 2: A Private Home in Montana Before and After Wildland Fire Mitigation Work Was Completed Using Title III Funds

In contrast, some counties we reviewed used Title III funds for broader 

emergency preparedness activities under the Firewise program that do 

not appear consistent with the act because they do not involve providing 

fire-related education or assistance to homeowners. For example, two 

counties we reviewed told us they spent part of their Title III funds to clear 

vegetation along roads, some of which are potential emergency 

evacuation routes, and others said they removed vegetation from county 

lands, parks, schools, or cemeteries or from larger swaths of land to 

create fuel breaks—locations not directly associated with home siting, 

home construction, or home landscaping, authorized activities specified 

by the act. Four counties used Title III funds to update their 9-1-1 

telephone systems, according to county officials, and three used funds to 

purchase new address and street signs. For example, one rural county 

used Title III funds to purchase over 400 signs to make cabins, homes, 

and businesses easier for firefighters and other emergency responders to 
 

Page 17 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

locate.20 Officials in another rural county told us that before they began an 

effort to purchase and put up signs using Title III funds, the county had no 

street signs: homeowners would have to tell firefighters and providers of 

emergency services to look for the “tree with the pink tape,” for example. 

This county and another we reviewed purchased fire danger signs 

displaying the area’s current level of wildland fire danger (e.g., low, 

medium, or high), according to county officials, who told us that these 

signs were to help educate residents about the community’s wildland fire 

risk, as well as to motivate homeowners to perform mitigation activities. 

Officials from two counties told us that they were planning to use Title III 

funds to purchase and install water tanks in remote areas to help in fire 

suppression.21

Counties may have considered expenditures for improving their 

emergency response as allowed under Title III of the act because the 

Forest Service’s frequently asked questions and other documents do not 

emphasize that counties’ Firewise activities with Title III funds must be 

limited to providing fire-related education or assistance to homeowners. 

Specifically, officials in one county told us that they view Firewise as an 

“out-of-the-box program” encompassing a large range of activities, and 

they directed us to a Forest Service Title III summary document with a 

definition of the Firewise approach that includes effective emergency 

response22

 

20Some of the signs may have improved the ability of emergency responders to locate 

homes, but the act states that Title III funds may be used for “assistance with 

implementing techniques in home siting, home construction, and home landscaping.” 16 

U.S.C. § 7142(a)(1).

—an area in which this county spent the majority of its Title III 

funds. Some counties also received guidance on Firewise from other 

sources that may not have been consistent with the act. For example, 

officials from one county told us that they formed a group of Forest 

21At the time of our interviews with these county officials, these water tanks had not been 

purchased or installed.

22Officials from this county directed us to the following definition of the Firewise 

Communities program, found in a Forest Service document containing information on Title 

III funds: “The Firewise Communities approach emphasizes community responsibility for 

planning in the design of a safe community as well as effective emergency response, and 

individual responsibility for safer home construction and design, landscaping and 

maintenance.” This definition is also contained in a user guide to the Firewise 

Communities program developed by the National Fire Protection Association (National 

Fire Protection Association, A User Reference Guide to the Firewise Communities/USA® 

Recognition Program [Quincy, Mass.: 2009]).
 

Page 18 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

Service, state, and local officials and that all members of the group—

including a local Forest Service official—agreed that emergency response 

activities were an appropriate use of Title III funds under the Firewise 

category, despite the act’s limitations of Firewise activities to those 

involving home siting, construction, and landscaping. In Oregon, an 

association that provides guidance to counties receiving Title III funds 

advised the Oregon counties to explore the wide array of activities 

undertaken under the Firewise Communities program via the Firewise 

Communities website,23

Several counties we reviewed used Title III funds to educate youth on the 

Firewise program and other issues related to wildland fire that are also 

not consistent with the act. Education to homeowners about Firewise is 

clearly authorized under Title III, but youth education was one of the 

formerly allowable uses that Congress eliminated when it reauthorized 

the Secure Rural Schools Act in 2008. Specifically, some counties used 

Title III funds for youth camps, which county officials told us incorporated 

aspects of the Firewise program or wildland fire safety, and one county 

funded forest-related after-school programs that included a Firewise 

educational component. Officials in one of these counties provided a 

letter from a local Forest Service official commending the county’s use of 

Title III funds for a youth day camp under the Firewise program. A 

number of counties in one state gave their Title III funds to the state 

university’s cooperative extension service for Firewise education, which 

included “Firewise Youth Days.” During these events, extension agents 

visited schools to discuss issues related to wildland fire, including a 

Firewise component on how to make homes more resistant to wildland 

fire, according to an official from the university. Officials in a few other 

counties we reviewed told us they planned to use Title III funds to 

purchase materials—including Smokey Bear costumes—that would be 

used for youth education in schools or at community events. Officials from 

the state extension service and some counties that provided youth 

education told us that teaching children the principles of the Firewise 

program can help protect communities because the children may share 

the information with their parents.

many of which go beyond the Firewise activities 

authorized under Title III.

 

23The Firewise Communities website is managed by the National Fire Protection 

Association. 
 

Page 19 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

In its legal views provided to us, Interior stated that uses unrelated to 

homeowner education and assistance with respect to home siting, 

construction, and landscaping would not be consistent with the Firewise 

provision of Title III and, in its legal views, Agriculture agreed that it was 

reasonable to interpret the provision in this manner. Agriculture added 

that, in its view, these activities would qualify as authorized activities only 

if they were carried out in a community with a Firewise-recognized 

program and that activities associated with meeting the certification 

requirements for being recognized as a Firewise Community, or with 

maintaining that recognition once received, would have a direct link to the 

Firewise Communities program and would therefore also be authorized 

uses of Title III funds. However, these points are not explicit in the 

agencies’ guidance to counties, and some counties in our review that 

used Title III funds for Firewise-related activities had no communities that 

had received recognition as Firewise Communities, nor had they sought 

such recognition, according to county officials.

Counties we reviewed used Title III funds to pay for a wide variety of 

activities and equipment related to emergency services, some of which 

were clearly consistent with the act and others that were not. Title III 

authorizes counties to use funds as reimbursement for search and rescue 

and other emergency services, including firefighting, that they perform on 

federal lands. Some counties interpreted this provision in the act narrowly 

and limited their expenditures to after-the-fact reimbursements of county 

spending on emergency services on federal lands. For example, the 

sheriff’s offices in a few counties we reviewed submitted invoices for 

reimbursement for staff hours spent on search-and-rescue activities, 

including rescuing lost or injured individuals on federal lands. Some of 

these counties also kept track of county equipment used during these 

activities and reimbursed the appropriate department with Title III funds 

according to various usage rates. Another county set aside funds in case 

they were needed for a search-and-rescue incident, but no such incident 

had taken place in the county by the time of our review, and these funds 

had not yet been spent.

Some counties spent Title III funds on activities that went beyond 

providing search and rescue or other emergency services and may not 

have been consistent with the act. For example, instead of 

reimbursements for specific incidents, a number of counties used Title III 

Emergency Services on 

Federal Land
 

Page 20 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

funds to pay a portion of their fire or emergency services departments’ 

salary and administrative costs, including office supplies, utility costs, or 

insurance.24 These counties cited the high percentage of federal land in 

their county or the difficulty in breaking out the costs of emergency 

services on federal versus nonfederal land as justification for this 

approach. In addition, some counties we reviewed used the funds to carry 

out routine law enforcement patrols on federal land. Officials from one of

these counties told us that these patrols help reduce and deter criminal 

activity and enhance the safety of visitors to federal lands. They also told 

us that county deputies are able to serve as first responders to any 

search and rescue or other emergency situation. In addition to routine 

patrols, officials from a few counties told us they used Title III funds to pay 

for law enforcement activities related to marijuana eradication, vandalism, 

and thefts on federal lands, or for additional law enforcement presence on 

federal lands during holidays or special events.25

 

24An association that provides guidance to Oregon counties receiving Title III funds 

advised the Oregon counties that reasonable overhead, administrative, and capital costs 

(such as equipment, overhead, training, and administration) can be included for 

reimbursement, but recommended that the counties calculate a portion of these costs that 

could be fairly attributed to the services performed on federal lands. Association of O&C 

Counties, “More Sideboards for Title III Projects; the “Red-Face” Test Updated,” 

Memorandum, Jan. 15, 2009. 

Officials from one 

county told us that, without Title III funding, they would not be able to 

provide any law enforcement services on federal lands, especially given 

other large budget cuts the county had already experienced. Indeed, 

some counties told us that Title III funds were especially critical to their 

law enforcement or search and rescue operations because of worsening 

county fiscal conditions. A few counties we reviewed spent Title III funds 

for search-and-rescue training. For example, one county used over

$12,000 each year for training on flood, swift-water, and technical rope 

rescue operations. Another county used its Title III funds to pay the 

personnel costs of an employee who clears debris from roads after major 

storms to maintain access to federal lands. And still another provided 

funds to the county’s roads department to help rebuild washed-out roads 

after floods.

25Officials from two counties told us they used Title III funds to pay for law enforcement 

presence at Rainbow Family of Living Light gatherings. These gatherings often occur on 

public lands and can include as many as 20,000 people, posing logistical challenges in 

providing law enforcement, food, water, sanitation, and medical care to large gatherings of 

people in remote settings. 
 

Page 21 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

In addition, a number of counties we reviewed used Title III funds to 

purchase equipment for use during search and rescue and other 

emergencies, uses that fell outside the ordinary definition of the term 

services.26

 

26For example, the Federal Acquisition Regulation does not specifically define the term 

service, but it does define service contract to mean “a contract that directly engages the 

time and effort of a contractor whose primary purpose is to perform an identifiable task 

rather than to furnish an end item of supply.” 48 C.F.R. § 37.101. The regulation in turn 

states that the term supplies includes, but is not limited to, “public works, buildings, and 

facilities; ships, floating equipment, and vessels of every character, type, and description, 

together with parts and accessories; aircraft and aircraft parts, accessories, and 

equipment; machine tools; and the alteration or installation of any of the foregoing.” 

48 C.F.R. § 2.101. This regulation does not apply to county expenditures under Title III, 

but it does provide some general understanding of the term “services.” 

Examples of such uses in counties we reviewed included the 

purchase of supplies such as personal safety equipment, rappelling 

equipment, and blankets. Based on our review of county documentation, 

the equipment some counties purchased also included communication 

radios and GPS equipment, sonar equipment, watercraft, all-terrain 

vehicles, snowmobiles, and trucks for patrols. One county used Title III 

funds to update building infrastructure (e.g., improvements to the heating, 

ventilation, and air conditioning system) at its radio towers as part of a 

larger project to upgrade the local communication system to offer service 

to more agencies and cover a broader area. Another county purchased 

smoke detection cameras, which were installed in the national forests in 

the county to help detect wildland fires. Officials in one county said they 

used Title III funds to help purchase a new generator for the courthouse 

where emergency services departments were located, and officials in still 

another county said that the county used the funds for improvements at 

its 9-1-1 center facility. One county used Title III funds to purchase land to 

relocate and upgrade a runway at a county airport used for search-andrescue and firefighting operations. This county did so despite an opinion 

by the Department of Agriculture’s Office of General Counsel that the 

authorized use of funds under Title III of the Secure Rural Schools Act to 

reimburse search-and-rescue services would not include the purchase of 

land. According to officials from another county, it used Title III funds to 

purchase a vehicle used to patrol federal lands, even though it received 

informal advice from local Forest Service officials indicating that such 

purchases might not be authorized. According to officials from that 

county, local Forest Service officials told them that they did not believe 

vehicle purchases were authorized under Title III but were unable to 

direct the county to clear guidance on this issue; subsequently, the county 
 

Page 22 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

went forward with the vehicle purchase. Another county attorney advised 

officials in the county that they could purchase capital equipment with 

Title III funds, even with the fact that such purchases do not fall within the 

ordinary definition of the term services. In Oregon, an association that 

provides guidance to counties receiving Title III funds advised the Oregon 

counties that reasonable capital costs can be included for reimbursement 

but recommended that these costs would only seem appropriate on an 

annual, amortized basis, and in amounts that are proportional to the 

amount the county can demonstrate the assets are actually used for 

services performed on federal lands. The association also noted in 

guidance documents that any expenditures for equipment or facilities 

should be undertaken with great caution and that the county officials 

confer with county counsel.27

We asked the General Counsels of the Departments of Agriculture and 

the Interior for their views on whether the following categories of uses 

would be consistent with Title III: (a) the purchase or leasing of real 

property; (b) the purchase, leasing, or construction of buildings or other 

permanent improvements to real property; (c) vehicle purchases; 

(d) equipment purchases;28 and (e) training. In their legal views provided 

to us, the agencies stated that these expenditures generally would not be 

consistent with Title III.29

 

27Association of O&C Counties, “Sideboards for Title III Projects; the “Red-Face” Test 

Under Pub. L. No.106-393,” Memorandum, Jan. 31, 2001; “More Sideboards for Title III 

Projects; the “Red-Face” Test Updated,” Memorandum, Jan. 15, 2009; “Title III 

Restrictions, Secure Rural Schools Safety Net Legislation,” Memorandum, May 7, 2010. 

28Our question was confined to items such as nondisposable personal protective 

equipment, and electronic aids such as GPS location devices, which have useful lives 

extending beyond a single mission.

29In its legal views, Interior stated, “We can envision a scenario under which expenditures 

such as training and certain equipment costs may be considered to be directly related to 

the provision of emergency services on Federal land and, therefore, may be reimbursable 

under the statute. We understand, however, that the Forest Service has interpreted the 

statute to exclude expenditures for training and for nondisposable equipment, including 

personal equipment that is purchased in anticipation of responding to an emergency, and 

we currently are deferring to the Forest Service on this matter.” 
 

Page 23 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

Some counties we reviewed reported using their Title III funds to develop 

new or update existing community wildfire protection plans, as authorized 

by the act, but others went beyond these activities in ways that may not 

be consistent with Title III. Consistent with the act, officials we interviewed 

from 13 counties used Title III funds to either develop a new plan or 

update an existing one. For example, officials from one county told us that 

the county used Title III funds to hire a consultant to update its 

countywide wildfire protection plan, which was first developed in 2002. 

Another county used Title III funds to develop its first community wildfire 

protection plan, and officials told us that the Title III funds they received 

after reauthorization of the act in 2008 coincided with the beginning of 

their planning process and that, in developing the plan, they worked with 

local Forest Service officials to identify communities at risk and also 

worked with state forestry officials. In contrast, other counties we 

interviewed certified Title III expenditures for wildfire protection planning 

activities that may not be consistent with the act. For example, one county 

used Title III funds to purchase vehicles having firefighting capabilities, as 

well as other equipment associated with emergency response. Another 

county contracted for firefighter dispatch and suppression services using 

Title III funds. Officials from this county explained that county emergency 

service units cannot reach certain remote areas in the county quickly, so 

they contract with a state agency to provide dispatch and suppression 

services during the heavy wildland fire season; since the area served is 

largely federal land, the county pays for a portion of the contract costs 

with Title III funds. Another county used Title III funds to hire a consultant 

to develop an animal evacuation plan and purchased fencing to be used 

in case livestock were evacuated because of a wildland fire, according to 

county officials.

The 42 counties included in our review that had spent Title III funds did 

not consistently follow the related administrative requirements. As noted, 

Title III requires counties to certify expenditures annually and provide 45-

day notification to the public and any applicable resource advisory 

committee before spending funds. The 2008 act in effect during our 

review also required projects to be initiated by September 30, 2011, and 

funds to be obligated by September 30, 2012.30

 

30As noted, Pub. L. No. 112-141, Div. F, Title I, § 100101, which was enacted as we 

completed our review, extended each of these dates by 1 year.

We observed variation in 

Development of 

Community Wildfire 

Protection Plans

Counties Have 

Followed Title III’s 

Administrative 

Requirements 

Inconsistently 
 

Page 24 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

the extent to which counties in our review followed or anticipated following 

each of these administrative requirements. Specifically, we found the 

following variations:

• Certification. Some counties certified their Title III expenditures on 

time, and in accordance with agency instructions, and other counties 

did not. As noted previously, counties that have spent Title III funds 

must submit an annual certification to the Forest Service or BLM, as 

appropriate, stating that any Title III funds spent in the previous year 

were used for authorized purposes; this certification is due by 

February 1 following the year in which funds were spent. We found 

that many counties submitted the Forest Service’s certification form 

for the preceding year’s expenditures, and some provided letters 

certifying their expenditures.31

 

31Counties are required to certify their expenditures annually but are not specifically 

required to use the Forest Service’s form when doing so.

In certifying their expenditures, a 

number of counties provided additional documentation, such as 

project descriptions, public notices, or accounting spreadsheets. In 

contrast, some counties did not submit certifications at all or submitted 

their certifications late, some certified expenditures for multiple years 

simultaneously, and some acknowledged putting incorrect information 

on the certification form. We found various reasons for counties not 

complying with the certification requirements in the act. Three 

counties, according to county officials we interviewed, did not submit 

their certifications to the Forest Service for years they spent funds 

because they were unaware of the requirement to do so. Two other 

counties submitted certification forms for some but not all years in 

which they spent funds, and many counties submitted their 

certification forms after the February 1 deadline specified in the act, in 

some cases because they were initially unaware of or overlooked the 

requirement to do so. Seven counties we interviewed did not certify 

expenditures on the basis of calendar year, as instructed by the 

Forest Service, but reported expenditures either for fiscal year or for 

multiple years. Officials from one such county said they provided 

expenditure information by the county’s fiscal year because those 

expenditures had been audited and noted that it would be difficult to 

break out expenditures by calendar year. Another county certified its 

total Title III expenditures for 4 years on one form. Moreover, some 

counties did not certify the proper expenditure amount on their forms. 

For example, officials from two counties told us that, upon reviewing 
 

Page 25 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

the certifications they submitted, they discovered that they had 

underreported their Title III expenditures on their certification forms for 

a particular year, and officials from another county told us that they 

had overreported expenditures by including Title III funds received 

under the previous version of the act. The two counties that 

underreported their Title III expenditures provided corrected 

certifications to the Forest Service after discovering the errors, but an 

official from the county that overreported told us that it would be 

difficult to separate Title III funds received and expended under the 

two iterations of the act because of the county’s accounting and 

auditing processes. This variation in county compliance with the 

certification requirement has contributed to the agencies’ previously 

noted lack of an accurate accounting of the amounts of Title III funds 

spent and unspent.

• Public notification. Some counties notified the public about their 

proposed uses of Title III funds via published local media and offered 

the required comment period as required by the act, whereas other 

counties did not. As noted previously, before moving forward with 

Title III projects, the act directs each county to publish a proposal 

describing its planned use of Title III funds in local newspapers or 

other publications, after which the county must allow a 45-day 

comment period before using the funds. Officials we interviewed from 

some counties said that they closely followed these requirements or 

even went beyond them. For example, one county published its 

Title III public notices for 45 business days and included project 

details and a public hearing date as part of the notice. Officials from 

another rural county told us that they published notices on a county 

website because the county has no local newspapers or television 

stations; they said they also advertised Title III projects via letters and 

e-mails to county residents. In contrast, other counties followed only 

part of the public notification requirement. For example, four counties 

published notices in their local newspapers but did not allow for a 45-

day comment period before moving ahead with projects or activities, 

according to county officials and documents; one such county issued 

a public notice and allowed only a 3- to 5-day notification period 

before holding a public hearing to allocate Title III funds. Other 

counties issued public notices in some years but not in others, 

according to county officials we interviewed. For example, according 

to county officials we interviewed in one county, they published a 

notice in 2009 for planned Title III expenditures that year but did not 

issue another notice until 2012, when they published a notice for all 

Title III funds received for fiscal years 2008 through 2011. This notice 

was published after the fact, when the county had already spent much 
 

Page 26 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

of the funding advertised in the notice. In addition, we found four 

counties that did not issue any public notices on their Title III project 

proposals, and officials from these counties told us that they were 

unaware of the requirement to do so. We also noted variations in the 

degree of detail in the published notices, with some notices fully 

describing the Title III projects and others simply including one-line 

descriptions. For example, one county published a paragraph on each 

of its Title III proposals, which detailed specifics of each project and 

expected outcomes, such as enhanced public awareness about 

Firewise and improved countywide emergency response maps, while 

other counties provided one-line descriptions of their project proposals 

or repeated the same information in notices published in subsequent 

years. Nevertheless, officials in most counties that published public 

notices told us that they received virtually no substantive comments 

on their proposed projects. Officials from five counties told us that 

they had received substantive comments on their Title III proposals.

• Notice to resource advisory committees. Some counties submitted 

Title III project proposals to applicable resource advisory committees 

as required by the act, while others did not. Officials in one county told 

us that they presented proposed Title III projects at resource advisory 

committee meetings, and officials in four counties told us that they 

wrote to the committees to notify them of their Title III projects. Other 

counties, however, did not notify their resource advisory committees 

of Title III projects. Some of the reasons cited by county officials for 

not notifying resource advisory committees include (1) they were 

unaware of the requirement to do so; (2) the committee meets only 

once a year in the summer, which does not coincide with the county’s 

timeline for the Title III budgeting process; and (3) the county planned 

to notify the resource advisory committee but did not because a local 

Forest Service official stated that resource advisory committees were 

involved only in Title II, not Title III projects—despite specific 

reference to such committees in Title III of the act. Some counties that 

did not provide required notification told us they were unable to do so 

because no applicable committee existed in the county. For example, 

the resource advisory committee in one county we reviewed became 

active only in 2011, according to county officials, and other counties 

still do not have applicable committees because they did not receive 

any Title II funds, the primary purpose for forming such committees. In 

some instances where the advisory committees were not formally 

notified, county officials told us that they believed that informal 

notification had been provided because some officials involved in 

selecting the county’s Title III projects also sat on the relevant 

resource advisory committee. In one such county, officials told us that 
 

Page 27 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

one person had simultaneously served as both the county manager 

and the chair of the resource advisory committee, so he was clearly 

aware of the county’s Title III projects. Officials in a number of 

counties told us they received no, or minimal, input from resource 

advisory committees, but several other counties said that their local 

committees were more involved by sometimes providing input on 

Title III project selection or approving selected projects. Nevertheless, 

the act provides no formal role for resource advisory committees in 

selecting or approving Title III projects.32

• Project initiation. Some counties initiated projects by September 30, 

2011, as required by the 2008 act in effect during our review, and 

others did not. The counties did not receive their Title III funds for 

fiscal year 2011 until 2012, but officials from some counties told us 

that they developed a process enabling them to initiate projects before 

the deadline. For example, one county ensured that it had completed 

the necessary steps for initiating its Title III projects before the 

September 30, 2011, deadline, including budgeting for the projects 

and completing the associated public notification process, according 

to county officials. In contrast, other counties told us that they did not 

initiate all of their Title III projects by the September 30, 2011, 

deadline for varying reasons. For example, officials in one county told 

us that county guidelines prohibited initiation of projects before 

funding was actually received. Another county had not initiated all of 

its Title III projects because some of its previous projects had cost 

less than estimated, unexpectedly leaving the county more Title III 

funds to spend; county officials told us that they were selecting 

additional Title III projects to use the extra funding. Officials from one 

county told us the county took no steps to initiate any projects by the 

deadline because it was unaware it would receive Title III funds in 

2012. Counties now have additional time to initiate Title III projects, 

however, because the 2012 reauthorization of the act extended the 

deadline for initiating such projects to September 30, 2012.

• Obligation of funds. Officials we interviewed from nearly all 42

counties that had spent Title III funds told us that they anticipated 

obligating all of their Title III funds by September 30, 2012—the 2008 

act in effect during our review required unobligated funds to be 

 

32Under earlier versions of the bill ultimately enacted in 2000, these committees would 

have had a more significant role in selecting and reviewing Title III projects, but such a 

role was eliminated from the version that became law.
 

Page 28 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

returned to the U.S. Treasury after that date—and officials from 

several of these counties told us they had already done so. 

Nevertheless, some county officials reported being confused about 

this part of the act. For example, officials from one county told us that 

they were initially unclear about what was required for funds to be 

considered “obligated,” but after seeking guidance from a number of 

sources, they determined that their budgeting process was adequate 

to meet the act’s requirement. Similarly, officials in another county told 

us they believed they had 3 years from when they received Title III 

funds to spend them and were thus unaware of the September 2012 

deadline; despite this misunderstanding, the county had already 

obligated all of its Title III funds at the time of our review. Similar to the 

requirement for initiating projects, however, the deadline for obligating 

Title III funds was extended to September 2013, allowing counties 

additional time to obligate funds.

For more than a decade, the Secure Rural Schools and Community SelfDetermination Act has allowed the Forest Service and BLM to aid 

counties that include federal lands by providing payments to help offset 

the loss of revenue these counties once received from federal timber 

sales. Within the act, Title III has helped counties address the 

consequences of their proximity to federal lands by providing 

reimbursements for emergency services the counties furnish on those 

lands, as well as funds to help protect communities from the threat of 

wildland fires. The act contains language limiting the use of Title III funds 

in carrying out these activities, but it does not define key terms or fully 

specify the activities that qualify as allowable uses of Title III funds—

leaving some of its provisions open to interpretation. The Forest Service 

and BLM have provided relatively little oversight of county expenditures 

and have not issued regulations as required by the act; moreover, the 

guidance they have provided is sometimes vague and does not always 

appear consistent with the act. Such limitations, in combination with the 

sometimes-unclear language in the act itself, have left counties to 

interpret on their own what is allowable under the act and what is not—

and some counties are spending their Title III funds in ways that appear 

inconsistent with the act’s requirements with little oversight from the 

agencies. In light of the lack of clarity in the act and agency guidance, and 

because of the constrained fiscal environment that some counties are 

experiencing, some counties may be adopting a more expansive 

interpretation of what is allowed under Title III so as to supplement scarce 

county funds and maintain county services. In addition, some counties 

are not fully abiding by the administrative requirements of Title III, such as 

Conclusions 
 

Page 29 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

providing sufficient notice of proposed spending or not properly certifying 

earlier expenditures.

If Congress chooses to extend Title III of the Secure Rural Schools and 

Community Self-Determination Act beyond the 1-year reauthorization 

recently enacted, it should consider revising and clarifying the language 

of Title III to make explicit which types of expenditures are and are not 

allowable under the act.

We recommend that the Secretary of Agriculture direct the Chief of the 

Forest Service, and that the Secretary of the Interior direct the Director of 

BLM, to issue formal federal regulations or clear guidance specifying 

types of allowable county uses of Title III funds, to help counties make 

appropriate decisions regarding these funds.

We provided a draft of this report for review and comment to the 

Departments of Agriculture and the Interior. In its written comments, the 

Forest Service, responding on behalf of the Department of Agriculture, 

generally agreed with our findings and recommendation. The Forest 

Service’s comments are reproduced in appendix II. The Forest Service 

also provided technical comments, which we incorporated as appropriate. 

Likewise, Interior generally agreed with our findings and recommendation, 

and its written comments are reproduced in appendix III.

While Interior generally agreed with our findings and recommendation, it 

expressed concern about how we characterized BLM’s review of 

certification forms submitted by counties. Interior noted that it believed 

BLM had fulfilled its responsibilities under the Secure Rural Schools Act 

because BLM reviewed the certifications submitted by counties. We made 

changes to the report to clarify that the agencies did not review county 

certifications to determine whether counties had spent funds 

appropriately. Interior also suggested we amplify our discussion of its 

legal interpretation regarding oversight responsibilities; however, we 

believe this point is sufficiently addressed in the body of our report and 

have made no changes in response to this comment.

We are sending copies of this report to the Secretaries of Agriculture and 

the Interior, the Chief of the Forest Service, the Director of the Bureau of 

Land Management, the appropriate congressional committees, and other 

Matter for 

Congressional 

Consideration 

Recommendation for 

Executive Action

Agency Comments 

and Our Evaluation
 

Page 30 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

interested parties. In addition, the report is available at no charge on the 

GAO website at http://www.gao.gov.

If you or your staff members have any questions about this report, please 

contact me at (202) 512-3841 or mittala@gao.gov. Contact points for our 

Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on 

the last page of this report. GAO staff who made key contributions to this 

report are listed in appendix IV.

Anu K. Mittal

Director, Natural Resources and Environment
Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and 

Methodology

Page 31 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

Our objectives were to examine (1) actions the Forest Service and 

Bureau of Land Management (BLM) have taken to oversee county 

spending under Title III, (2) consistency of selected counties’ 

expenditures with the purposes of the act, and (3) the extent to which 

these counties followed Title III’s administrative requirements.

To conduct this work, we reviewed relevant laws and agency documents, 

including the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination 

Act of 2000, as reauthorized; legislative history on the act; legal opinions 

related to Title III; and Forest Service guidance made available to 

counties, including the Forest Service’s frequently asked questions 

document and guidance provided on returning unobligated funds to the 

U.S. Treasury. We also obtained legal interpretations in writing from the 

Department of Agriculture’s Office of General Counsel and Department of 

the Interior’s Office of the Solicitor on various issues related to the act 

generally and Title III in particular, and we interviewed Forest Service and 

BLM officials about their oversight activities. In addition, we reviewed the 

forms indicating counties’ election to allocate funds under the act to 

Title III projects and the forms counties submitted to the federal agencies 

certifying that the funds they expended in the previous year were used for 

authorized purposes.

To obtain information about the projects and activities on which counties 

spent Title III funds, as well as about their administrative practices related 

to Title III, we used a semistructured interview template to interview, in 

person or by telephone, officials from 42 of the 358 counties receiving 

Title III funds since the act’s 2008 reauthorization. These 42 counties 

constitute a nonprobability sample of counties receiving Title III funds, 

which we selected to reflect variation in the amount of Title III funds 

received, the amount spent, and geographic location. We initially 

contacted 30 counties that Forest Service records indicated had spent 

Title III funds, selected as follows:

• one county selected because of concerns about questionable Title III 

spending, conveyed by the Forest Service;

• one county selected because of concerns about questionable Title III 

spending, conveyed by congressional staff; 

• one county selected on the basis of our review of certifications;

• two counties in Oregon selected because they received the most 

Title III funding of any county in the nation; and

• twenty-five counties selected from locations across the country that 

receive Title III funding, in an attempt to include variation in amounts 

of funding received and variation in geographic location.

Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and 

Methodology 
Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and 

Methodology

Page 32 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

We contacted an additional 15 counties because Forest Service files had 

no records of any Title III spending by these counties, and we sought to 

interview county officials to discuss their reasons for not spending funds. 

After contacting these counties, however, we learned that 12 had indeed 

spent Title III funds, while 3 counties had spent no Title III funds at the 

time of our review—giving a total of 42 counties in our review that had 

spent Title III funds and 3 that had not.1

We collected and reviewed documentation from the 42 counties that had 

spent Title III funds, including public notices related to Title III and 

detailed expenditure information. We did not, however, conduct a 

financial audit of counties’ expenditures. We interviewed the 3 counties 

that had not yet spent any Title III funds to discuss why they had not and 

to discuss their plans for spending or returning any remaining funds. 

These counties were likewise selected for variation in Title III funds 

received and geographic location. Because the 42 counties we spoke 

with make up a nonprobability sample, the information we obtained from 

these interviews cannot be generalized beyond these counties; however 

the information provided us with an understanding of how the selected 

counties spent Title III funds and the actions taken to follow Title III’s 

administrative requirements. See table 1 for the counties we contacted 

during our review.

 

1

Initially, we contacted 15 counties that did not have a certification form for Title III 

expenditures in 2009 or 2010 in the Forest Service files. Of these 15 counties, however, 

12 had in fact spent Title III funds, leaving only 3 counties that had not spent any Title III 

funds. We did not find certification forms for these 12 counties for varied reasons. Some of 

these 12 counties had started spending Title III funds only in 2011 and, therefore, were 

not yet required to submit spending certifications; others had spent funds and not 

submitted certification forms to the Forest Service; and still others told us they had 

submitted certification forms, even though we did not find the forms in the Forest Service’s 

files. We asked these 12 counties questions about their Title III projects and administrative 

practices and included them in our sample of 42 counties that had spent Title III funds. 
Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and 

Methodology

Page 33 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

Table 1: Counties Contacted During GAO Review

Alabama Covington

Arizona Coconino

California Butte

Plumas

Shasta

Siskiyou

Tulare

Colorado Gunnison

Park 

Rio Blanco

Saguache

Florida Liberty

Marion

Georgia Lumpkin

Idaho Boise

Clearwater

Idaho

Shoshone

Michigan Mackinac

Minnesota St. Louis

Mississippi Greene

Scott 

Missouri Iron 

Ripley

Shannon

Montana Granite

Lincoln

Missoula

Sanders

New Mexico Catron

Rio Arriba

North Carolina Cherokee

Graham
Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and 

Methodology

Page 34 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

Oregon Douglas

Josephine

Lane

Pennsylvania Warren

South Dakota Lawrence

Tennessee Stewart 

Utah Emery 

Washington Skagit

Skamania

Yakima

Wisconsin Forest

Wyoming Fremont

Source: GAO.

To determine the total amount in Title III payments that counties had 

received for fiscal years 2008 through 2011, we accessed reports from 

the Forest Service’s All Service Receipts database and summary 

documents on total payments from BLM. To determine the reliability of 

the Forest Service’s All Service Receipts database, we verified data 

inputs into the system back to source documentation, verified payment 

amounts with county officials we contacted, and interviewed 

knowledgeable Forest Service officials. We found that these data were 

sufficiently reliable for the purposes of this review. To determine how 

much Title III funding counties reported spending from 2009 through 

2011, we collected certification forms submitted by counties to the Forest 

Service and BLM before May 18, 2012, and totaled the amounts indicated 

therein. For counties for which we did not find certification forms in 

information provided to us by the Forest Service, we collected additional 

certification forms directly from the counties and included their reported 

spending in our total amount.

To obtain perspectives on Title III from nongovernmental entities, we 

interviewed representatives from several nongovernmental organizations, 

including the National Association of Counties, National Forest Counties 

and Schools Coalition, Western Governors’ Association, Headwaters 

Economics, Association of O&C Counties, and National Fire Protection 

Association. We also reviewed reports from these and other 

organizations, including research on county expenditures under the 

Title III program and outside guidance related to Title III and the Firewise 

Communities program.
Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and 

Methodology

Page 35 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

We conducted this performance audit from August 2011 to July 2012 in 

accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. 

Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain 

sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our 

findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe that 

the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings and 

conclusions based on our audit objectives.
Appendix II: Comments from the Department 

of Agriculture, Forest Service

Page 36 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

Appendix II: Comments from the Department 

of Agriculture, Forest Service
Appendix III: Comments from the Department 

of the Interior

Page 37 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

Appendix III: Comments from the 

Department of the Interior
Appendix III: Comments from the Department 

of the Interior

Page 38 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act
Appendix IV: GAO Contact and Staff 

Acknowledgments

Page 39 GAO-12-775 Secure Rural Schools Act

Anu K. Mittal, (202) 512-3841 or mittala@gao.gov

In addition to the contact person named above, Steve Gaty (Assistant 

Director), Ellen W. Chu, Richard P. Johnson, Anne Rhodes-Kline, Lesley 

Rinner, and Leigh McCaskill White made key contributions to this report.

Appendix IV: GAO Contact and Staff 

Acknowledgments 

GAO Contact

Staff 

Acknowledgments 

(361331)
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