Oregon Senator Ron Wyden and Idaho Senator Mike Crapo were joined at a Wednesday news conference by other legislators and Forest Service officials to hail the recent passage of legislation to permit disaster relief funds to be used when fire suppression expenditures exceed their 2015 ten-year average.  The bill doesn’t go into effect until 2020, when the federal Budget Control Act expires, but the legislators say there are additional expenditures in the bill to achieve the same result in the next two fiscal years.  Wyden says they had to do that with the constraints currently in place.  The group also says the law expanded the Good Neighbor Authority program to allow for needed road reconstruction and improve on the ability for the federal government to partner with state foresters on restoration projects across state-federal boundaries.