"Smoke is like water…the drainage system…is a statewide problem. You can only put so much smoke in the air."
The biggest problem you have with smoke are social problems, because there is no measurement for that. When the local people don't want to see smoke anymore in town, they don't want it anymore. And many years ago—I tell people this—is that smoke is like water. We all know where most of the people in the state live, in the fall, when most of the burning is done, all the drainage system in the state, from the Mogollon Rim goes to Phoenix. It either goes down this system to the Verde, or as you go across, it goes down the Black River and White River systems in the eastern part of the state, and they form the Salt River. And all that stuff goes to Phoenix. When the people in Phoenix they don't want to see smoke anymore, it restricts what we can do up here. That is a statewide problem. You can only put so much smoke in the air, and then you have health problems, again. You have the legal problems of how much smoke you can put in the air. So even though if we had all the plans done, and all the money in the world and all that stuff, you couldn't do all the prescribed burning that you wanted to, because you have all those other issues. And those are really difficult.