Public lands that are overgrown tree plantations are not really forests in the sense you'd like to think. 

Exactly what they are needs to be discussed at length, a much as anything else because climate change has rendered old definitions not only obsolete but actually dangerous; this year's fire season being a perfect example.

The forested areas on public that are not old growth need to be thinned, and replanted with appropriate species to achieve biodiversity, fire resistance, and carbon sequestration. They probably also need to be treated to reduce pest infestations and disease. And all of this needs to be done with an eye towards the new climatic normal

If possible, human action needs to aim at the "rewilding" of those old plantations, so that some facsimile of ecological equilibrium--carbon, hydrological and fire cycles--can reestablish itself .