In advance of the scheduled markup in the House Agriculture Committee of Farm Bill reauthorization legislation on May 23, Chairman Glenn “GT” Thompson (R-PA) rolled out a lengthy summary of all of the bill’s titles last Friday. We expect to see actual legislative text sometime in advance of the markup, likely Monday or Tuesday of next week.

According to the summary document:

Important programs that promote development of innovative wood building materials and building with wood products are reauthorized at current funding levels. These two programs are the Community Wood and Wood Innovation Grant programs which have been very successful in underwriting deployment of mass timber/cross laminated timber facilities across the country, as well as funding energy efficiency and other capital improvements at lumber mills. Community Wood also has an energy component and provides grants for these same facilities to heat and power their operations with biomass (sawdust) which improves not only their efficiency but delivers bottom line financial benefits as well.

The bill also adds a key workforce component specific to the logging, forestry and forest products sector. Specifically, provisions of the Jobs in the Woods Act (JWA) were added to an existing Farm Bill program known as RISE—Rural Innovation Stronger Economies. JWA provides grants of between $500,000 and $2 million to stand up vocational education and career pathway training programs to attract and develop workers for jobs harvesting timber and working in sawmills, among other settings.

Also notable in the House summary are provisions facilitating more forest management activities on federal forest lands. Specifically, the language creates what are known as Categorical Exclusions or CEs for forest management projects up to 10,000 acres in size. CEs allow these projects to move forward without costly and time consumer NEPA (National Environmental Protection Act) reviews.

Again, we will have a more thorough understanding of the direction this bill takes once we see actual legislative language. Unfortunately, Democrat leadership in the House has been publicly criticizing the proposal so it will likely move from committee on a party line vote. We will have more analysis and a better feel for prospects in the House next week.