Smokeys Helping Hand, LLC, a minority-owned small disadvantaged business based in Denver, Colorado, was awarded a $105,000 firm fixed-price purchase order by the Bureau of Land Management for the Cebolla Canyon Project 2023 on September 22, 2023. This total small business set-aside contract supports forest restoration services in Cebolla Canyon, Rio Arriba County, New Mexico, with a completion deadline of December 31, 2024. The scope of work includes removal of pinon and juniper trees from existing Ponderosa pine stands, with cutting, lopping, and scattering operations along meadow edges, slopes, hillsides, and canyon bottoms to improve ecosystem health and prepare fuel beds for prescribed fire operations.
The contractor is required to ensure all cut trees are completely severed from stumps with heights no greater than six inches, leave boles intact with limbed cut and felled material, and maintain clearance of at least 30 feet between felled trees and slash and any fences, improvements, or access roads. Smokeys Helping Hand brings substantial relevant experience to this project, having completed numerous vegetation management and hazard fuels reduction contracts across the Southwest for federal land management agencies. The contractor also maintains significant indefinite delivery vehicles with the U.S. Forest Service and other agencies, positioning it to support the Bureau of Land Management's broader ecosystem restoration and wildfire risk mitigation objectives in New Mexico.