NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Paul Solarz is a real life Smokey the Bear who knows how to prevent and manage forest fires. And his company, PatRick Environmental, recently landed a contract, backed by stimulus money from the Recovery Act, to do just that.

PatRick won a bid to trim areas of Oregon’s Deschutes & Ochoco National Forest and Crooked River National Grassland. This controlled thinning will promote new growth and cut some trees so that natural wildfires don’t become unmanageable.

The project is just one of thousands being carried out across the U.S., in which stimulus money is being used to shore up the country’s infrastructure and generate much-needed business for local companies.