Wood for Life
Santa Fe National Forest, Chama area, Zia Pueblo, and Navajo Nation
2024:
- The National Forest Foundation (NFF) established three new wood banks that support communities in and around the 2-3-2 landscape through the Wood for Life Program:
- Chama Peak Land Alliance (CPLA) Wood Bank provides firewood for seniors and disabled individuals in the Chama region. Grants, including $15,000 from the Alliance for Green Heat, allowed CPLA to secure 14 log trucks of wood totalling over 200 cords.
- The Navajo Nation Tri-Chapter Wood Bank operated by the non-profit Hozho Nahasdlii sourced wood from Rio Chama.
- The Zia Pueblo Wood Bank received 20 loads of fuelwood from a restoration project on Rio San Antonio on the Santa Fe National Forest.
- This year approximately 500 cords of fuelwood were cut, hauled, and processed for Tribal and traditional communities, providing heat sources, hazardous fuels reduction, and post-fire mitigation.
2023:
- Project was developed in partnership with the National Forest Foundation (NFF), the Santa FE National Forest (SFNF) and the Navajo Nation to provide fuelwood from forest restoration on the SFNF to the Tri-Chapters of the Navajo Nation.
- Over 90% of the Navajo Nation relies on wood as the primary source of heat in homes.
- 1,050 acres of forest restoration provided a total of 63 loads (roughly 14k cords) to Tribal and local communities; 3 Navajo Nation Chapter Houses received 20 loads each and 3 loads went to a local land grant community.
- NFF contracted with a local contractor and successfully hauled all planned wood for this project putting wood into the hands of Indigenous and local communities.
- For the People, a Tribal non-profit assisted with approximately 763 hours of community volunteer time over 11 days providing wood to 95 homes, 75 of which were elders.
- The effort showcased the capacity of the Navajo Nation to get involved in forest stewardship and their commitment to participate, not just in receiving the end product, but in engaging with forests in the development of sustainable projects to support the WFL program and to provide wood for Indigenous communities.
- Often Tribal communities lack supplies and equipment for processing such as chainsaws, wood splitters and trailers; funds from external partners can be used to support these needs in ways federal funds cannot.
