Chap. 104.—An ACT to amend and re-enact Section 541 of the Code, as amended,
relating to forests, so as to impose upon the several counties the obligation to
make certain annual payments into the State Treasury for the purpose of pro-
tection of forests, especially from the ravages of fire, and to prescribe the effec-
tive date thereof. {H 97]

Approved March 1, 1944

Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Virginia:

1. That section five hundred forty-one of the Code of Virginia, as
amended, be amended and re-enacted, as follows:

Section 541. Duties of forest wardens; enforcement of laws; action
in case of fires and payments of costs of suppression; counties to pay
annual sums for protection of forests, etc—(a) The duties of the forest
wardens are to (1) enforce all forest laws of this State, (2) protect the
State forests, (3) see that all rules, regulations and laws for the protec-
tion of the State forests are enforced, (4) report violations of the forest
laws to the State forester, (5) assist in apprehending and convicting of-
fenders.

(b) When any forest warden sees or there is reported to him a
forest fire, he shall repair immediately to the scene of the fire and em-
ploy such persons and means as in his judgment are expedient and neces-
sary to extinguish the fire, within the limits of the expense he has been
authorized to incur 1n his instructions from the State Forester. He shall
keep an itemized account of all expenses thus incurred and immediately
send the account verified by affidavit to the State forester for examina-
tion.

(c) Upon approval by the State forester the account shall be paid
from the fund provided for protection of forests in the several counties,
as appropriated for such purpose. Any person having a claim for com-
pensation hereunder may avail himself of the ordinary process of law in
a proceeding in the county in which the services were rendered against
the Commonwealth, in which the Chairman of the Virginia Conservation
Commission shall be made a party.

(d) No such payments shall be made to any person who has malic-
iously started the fire or to any person whose negligence caused or con-
tributed to the setting of the fire.

(e) Whenever possible the State forester shall collect the costs of
fire fighting done under the direction of a forest warden in accordance
with the provisions of this section and approved as provided in this sec-
tion, from the person responsible for the origin of the fire by his neg-
ligence or intent, and shall return any costs so collected to the State treas-
ury for credit to the special fund hereby provided for, and such amounts
shall be repaid to the county in which the costs were incurred, but not
exceeding the payments made by that county in the fiscal year in which
such costs were accrued, and the Attorney for the Commonwealth of the
county in which the fire occurred shall institute and prosecute the neces-
sary proceedings. No action for trespass shall lie against the State for-
ester, or any agent or employee of the State forester, or any forest warden
on account of lawful acts done in legal performance of their duties.
(f{) Each county in this State upon presentation to its governing
body of an itemized statement duly certified by the State forester shall
repay into the State treasury monthly beginning July first, nineteen hun-
dred forty-five, any amounts expended in the preceding month by the
Virginia Conservation Commission in such county for forest protection,
forest fire, detection, prevention and suppression, not exceeding in any
one year an-amount measured by the acreage, computed upon the basis
of one cent an acre, of privately-owned forests in the county, according
to the United States Forest Survey of nineteen hundred forty subject to
additions and deductions of acreage since the making of this survey. In
any additions or deductions of acreage from that given by this survey,
any land, other than commercial orchards, sustaining as its principal
cover a growth of trees or woody shrubs shall be considered forest land,
irrespective of the merchantability of the growth, and cut-over land shall
be considered as forest land unless or until it has been cleared or im-
proved for other use. Open land shall be considered as forest land when
it bears at least eighty well distributed seedlings or sprouts of woody
species per acre. The amounts so repaid by the counties into the State
treasury from time to time shall be credited to a special fund for forest
protection, forest fire detection, prevention and suppression in the State,
and, with such other funds as may be appropriated by the General As-
sembly or contributed by the United States or any governmental or pri-
vate agency for these purposes shall be used and disbursed by the Virginia
Conservation Commission for such purposes.

(g) In any case in which the State forester and the governing body
of any county can not agree upon the additions or deductions to privately-
owned forest acreage in a particular county, or to changes tn forest acre-
age from year to year, the question shall be submitted to the judge of
the circuit court of the county by a summary and informal proceeding, in
term or vacation, and the decision of the judge certified to the governing
body and to the Virginia Conservation Commission, respectively, shall
be conclusive and final.

2. The effective date of this act is June first, nineteen hundred forty-
five.