SACRAMENTO – As part of the Newsom administration’s key priorities to strengthen the state’s wildfire response and resilience, CAL FIRE has announced $90.8 million in grants for 94 local wildfire prevention projects across California.
Over the past five years, CAL FIRE has awarded over $450 million to over 450 projects across the state through its Wildfire Prevention Grants Program.
“In addition to tremendous investments in personnel, equipment and technology, proactively building community resilience to wildfire is another important component of California’s strategy to reduce the impacts of catastrophic wildfires. These investments support local fuel reduction, forest health and other projects that build natural resilience and protect lives and property in vulnerable communities from the increasing impacts of climate change,” Governor Newsom said in a statement released by his office.
Wildfire Prevention Grant projects include hazardous fuels reduction and wildfire prevention planning and education, with a focus on improving public health and safety while reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Over two-thirds of the projects are awarded to low-income and disadvantaged communities.
The 94 local projects honored in this latest round are located across the state, including:
• Alameda County supports tree trimming and removal along evacuation routes within the City of Oakland, while also serving as an important firebreak along these vulnerable corridors.
• Fresno County for a project to remove 12,000 dead or dying hazard trees and 46,500 cubic yards of soil fuels to improve the protection of at least 1,000 habitable structures.
The funding will also be used to educate property owners about forest fire prevention.
• Mendocino County is to remove hazardous vegetation along roads and driveways to approximately 300 habitable structures near Leggett, in an area that has not experienced fires in the past half century. The goal is to reduce the risk of devastating wildfires, reduce the rate of fire spread, create safe entrances and exits, and reduce forest fuel pollution along roads.
• Tahoe Truckee Airport District of Nevada and Placer counties for fuel reduction projects near Truckee that will improve forest health and return the landscape to a more fire resilient state through maintenance of existing firebreaks and targeted burning, which would reduce fire intensity and improve forest health by reducing fuel volumes and ladder fuels.
• Orange County for a multi-phase hazardous fuel removal project, including 953 eucalyptus species on inland slopes, to protect 1,228 single-family homes.
• Riverside County should increase defensible space and street protection between habitable buildings and open spaces in Murrieta, improving fire protection for more than 115,000 residents and over 32,000 structures in the city.
• San Luis Obispo County for 19 wildfire prevention projects in nine wilderness frontier communities that address hazardous vegetation through prescribed grazing, shaded firebreaks, roadside clearing, forest thinning, and prescribed fires.
• Santa Cruz County for projects to reduce roadside fuel use along major evacuation routes and to fund a countywide chipping program to meet residents’ needs for defensible space and reduce the impact of wildfires on properties.
• Siskiyou County shall protect habitable structures in the Town of Weed and surrounding areas through fuel reduction, dilution and burning to reduce fuel pollution and fire hazard near existing communities.
The Wildfire Prevention Grants Program supports California’s Wildfire Resilience and Forest Resilience Action Plan and is funded in part by California Climate Investments, which leverage funds from the Carbon Trading System.
For a complete list of wildfire prevention grants, visit the CAL FIRE website at https://www.fire.ca.gov/what-we-do/grants/wildfire-prevention-grants.
(Press release from Governor Newsom)
