How new fire plan aims to help California agencies focus on prevention

California fire agencies are emphasizing prevention – now more than ever.

After a summer that saw massive blazes char thousands of acres across the state – including the Cranston fire near Idyllwild and the Holy fire in Orange and Riverside counties – a shift has begun, to focus efforts to prevent or lessen the destructive effects of such blazes.

“The severity of wildfires has continued to grow over the past decade and there is no evidence that the severity is going to decrease anytime soon,” said Daniel Berlant, an assistant deputy director for Cal Fire in the state Fire Marshal’s office. “We have to recognize that we have to do more to stop these fires and make sure our homes and communities are more resistant to wildfire when they occur.”

California, in its first new blueprint in eight years for handling the increasing wildfire threat brought on by drought and outbreaks of tree-killing pests, is placing a special emphasis in its 2018 Strategic Fire Plan on such efforts to prevent or lessen the fire effects.

That plan provides “broad goals with specific objectives,” said Berlant, who is the co-chairman of the committee that wrote the plan.

At a recent meeting of the Mountain Area Safety Taskforce, Patrick Reitz, the chief for the Idyllwild Fire Protection District, talked about the preventive steps taken to help the Cranston fire fight. He heaped praise on the assembled representatives of public-safety agencies and organizations.

“Everybody in this room played an important role in the Cranston fire and allowed us to have a community to come home to,” Reitz said earlier this month at the Idyllwild Nature Center. “The fuel breaks, the abatements, all the planning and education that went in ahead of time allowed for a successful evacuation and repopulation.”

Fuel breaks carved into the San Jacinto Mountains before the Cranston started on July 25 were credited with saving homes in southern Idyllwild – and possibly prevented the flames from racing into town.

The 2018 Strategic Fire Plan will cover about one-third of the state; Cal Fire is responsible for that much of the land – 31 million acres. The U.S. Forest Service is to protect another third, and local fire departments are to handle the rest.

There are 3 million-plus housing units in what officials call the Wildland-Urban Interface, where homes are built into fire-prone areas, Cal Fire said.

Statewide, a record 5,717 structures were destroyed by wildfire in 2017 in areas served by Cal Fire. From 2010 to 2017, there were a record 50-plus wildfires of 1,000 acres or more in that territory, more than in any decade since the 1960s, Cal Fire said.

Edwina Scott is executive director of the Mountain Communities Fire Safe Council in Idyllwild, which educates residents and business owners on wildfire safety and helps them comply with regulations. She welcomed the revised plan.

“I think that it’s a great idea. You can’t emphasize prevention enough,” she said.

There’s still a lot of dry brush and timber that can burn, Reitz warned.

“None of this mountain is safe,” he said.

Education is key

The new goal: “Increase fire prevention awareness, knowledge and actions implemented by individuals and communities to reduce human loss, property damage and impacts to natural resources from wildland fires.”

To reach that goal, here’s what the plan aims to do:

• Educate landowners, residents and business owners about the risks and their responsibilities of living in distant mountain communities and where rural neighborhoods abut brushy hillsides.

• Educate the public on why structures ignite, the role embers play in such ignitions and the importance of fire-safe building materials, designs and retrofits.

• Assist property owners in complying with fire-safe regulations by using social media and new technology.

• Continue to increase the number and effectiveness of defensible-space inspections, and promote compliance with defensible-space laws.

• Actively investigate all wildland fires. For those resulting from negligent acts, pursue appropriate civil and/or criminal actions, including cost recovery. Authorities have attributed the 13,000-acre Cranston fire and the 23,000-acre Holy fire that burned in Riverside and Orange counties to arsonists; the suspects are in custody.

• Understand why fires start, and focus prevention and education efforts to change human behavior that ignites fires.

The plan will be implemented over the course of several years.

Fuel break saved homes

The plan dovetails with Gov. Jerry Brown’s executive order this year that reduces regulatory barriers for increasing the number of projects to clear brush and thin forests, including the use of intentionally set fires, and do more educational outreach to landowners.

Gregg Bratcher, Cal Fire division chief and unit forester, pointed out evidence of the effectiveness of such measures, particularly the fuel breaks, in protecting Idyllwild during the Cranston fire.

He gestured toward Inspiration Point on the southern edge of Idyllwild along Highway 243. On one side was a blackened moonscape. On the other, homes and towering trees stood untouched.

Between them, a fuel break.

Below the homes and near the highway, the forest had been thinned.

“This is where the stand is on Idyllwild, right here. If it would have snuck back in here or would have went up the hill and would have wrapped back around …” Bratcher said, not finishing his thought.

Bratcher said he hopes the new fire plan will allow for more such preventive maintenance of the forest. Cal Fire is applying for grants and will get money from the state to carry out the plan.

“If you change the fuel conditions, you change the fire behavior,” he said. “Ultimately, it helps the fire department protect lives and property.”