There is talk of the Big Valley Power mill in Bieber being converted to a pellet mill but as far as I know, it’s just talk
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CalFire and USFS have thus far chosen the easy answers. Build fuelbreaks. More Prescribed fire. When I worked in SHU I burned tens of thousand of acres of standing brush in summer burns during the late 70’s and 1980’s on both sides of the Sacramento Valley. We can’t have that kind of a program these days…more people living in the wildlands, air pollution and RISK. We’ve got to far mechanical clearing and off season burning. Prescribed fire with no followup is NOT an answer. Fire scars that are 10 years old are as great a hazard as before the burn. Fuelbreaks are not the answer. They require constant maintenance and only protect a small portion of the population. We need a many pronged approach… we need new thoughts. I know bio mass is expensive, but so are mega fires. The fires in the last 10 years have demonstrated that new fire engines, new helicopters and super air tankers are not the answer. We lose more lives and houses every year . As much as it hurts to say it the Fire Service is failing in its mission. We’ve got to embrace climate change and change with it. If we’re going to live in a fire corridor like Paradise or West Redding we’ve got to make the community strong enough to survive the fire that happens when the ERC is in the 97th percentile. The community and the wildland managers have to work together. In both Paradise and Redding I see people rebuilding and putting up wood fences and decks…and planting redwood trees to replace the ones that burned. That’s just asking for another fire. So is the lack of fuel management in the wildland. Public agencies, Park Service and USFS have got to open those lands to fuel modification and repeated long lasting fire is NOT an acceptable option.
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We are definitely on the same page. What is the definition of Crazy… doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. I am not sure I think the Fire Service has failed its mission as much as it is a mission impossible to complete. the overly regulated and litigious nature of California will not allow it. There is a lack of real leadership . Every one wants control,no one takes responsibility. If some special interest group could make money off of this California would pass a law requiring people to do it in 30 seconds. Fuel breaks just by time and little else. Some of the old school methods from our days on the line would work . There is some cool new technology out there now that could help. But investments are heavy and the return hard to gauge. This discussion has brought some good ideas if they could be combined together it just might fly. Better land management takes money that LG, State and federal agencies don’t have or want to spend.
When my crew spent time with the Yurok Indian crews we learned their methods for control burning. If you do not want fire then you must learn how to control it. Best way not to have to clean up a mess is not to make one we were told. Emulate fires effects thru burning in the off season where possible and clearing the rest where it is not.
I dislike wooden fencing. One thing you did not see in Paradise post fire was wooden fencing… a lot of us who survived did not have them. I went to the town council after the fire and pleaded with them to stop this practice, or at least adopt the upcoming state mandates about not having a wooden fence get within several feet of your house. I was able to get this on a referendum the town voted on. But it failed. People want the security/privacy of a solid fence. We all don’t want to see each other I guess.
I am in the east end of Paradise. A lot of the film you saw on TV is within a couple of hundred yards of me. We survived the worst of the fire absolutely untouched. Burned to the edges of my Wire fence and stopped on all 4 sides .No properties around us survived. When told we must be the luckiest people on earth I explained luck is a matter of endless preparation . Some thought I was nuts for everything we did and the time it took. The rest want to hire me to do it for them.
It takes hard work , time and money that few are willing to spend. Land management at any level is a tough tireless vocation. Unfortunately most of us are soldiers in this war . We don’t get to choose how our time is spent or on what. Some are lucky enough to be able to use what they learned over the years and are a valuable resource.But there are not nearly enough of them I fear.
Every 3rd grader is taught global warming. It would be hard to find anyone (agree or not agreeing) who has not heard about it. But that is about where it stops. It turns to finger pointing and talking points after that. We look for someone to blame not for an answer… Any fool can point a finger. A wise old man told me once any idiot can make something hard, true genius comes in keeping it simple. A lot of what we have talked about here are simple things. workable , and all tried and true… but the expense,political backlash or possible risk evolved is too much… No one looks at the increasing possibility of another fire as risk… It seems like those in charge are more in tune in finding ways things cannot work than trying to find ways that they can . It is hard to change a mind that is already made up… USFS for one may fall into this Category. NPS is even worse. And Cal Fire is in… well California. we are a state of endless dysfunction made in the name of progress.
Grass roots efforts can be good. But you better have a lawyer on your side because rest assured the Sierra Club has a bunch. Answers seem simple. getting to them seems impossible.
I feel for the boots on the ground folks of the fire service. They do a great job but seem setup to ultimately fail .
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Its sad that we can sit here and make an educated guess on where the next Paradise event will happen…Shingletown? Grass Valley ? Nevada City ? and we cant even begin to guess more rural Berry Creek type events in our future. Reducing the fuel near the homes is a must , as is hardening the existing homes.
One method I propose to do that is for California Legislature to establish a program for for home hardening tax rebates. This would be similar to the Solar Tax rebate credit where a home owner could get tax credit for hardening his home . Improvements like fire resistant landscaping, gutter guards, flame resistant deck, ember proof roof vents etc.
Another idea is for insurance companies to give a reduced rate for Fire Safe properties similar to the safe driver program.
Both of these programs could be California State programs…if Governor Newsome is sincere in talk about prevention of mega fires and conflagrations they deserve consideration.
I’d be very interested to hear if anyone else has ANY ideas on how to work ourselves out of this mess. Respond either on this forum or PM.
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Any one rebuilding in Paradise can tell you the State building codes changed this year and now require a number fire safe changes. Chapter 7A of the California Building Code (CBC) and Chapter R337 of the California Residential Code (CRC) contain standards associated with the construction of buildings in wildfire prone areas. Materials , front doors, venting ,covering of gutters. Sprinkler systems inside. It is about 20 to 40 grand tacked on to your rebuild. I am attaching a link so you can look at some of them.
https://hcd.ca.gov/building-standards/state-housing-law/wildland-urban-interface.shtml
I can get a discount on my home owners insurance by having an annual fire inspection. The city used to have inspectors hit every address Then due to budget cuts they discontinued the annual inspection. Post Fire the town returned to full inspections. There is a litany of brush and tree removal vegetation clearances from your home, no missing or broke shingles. gutter covers and road clearances… stuff like that. all part of new California requirements for living in the WUI (wildland Urban Interface) Empty lots need everything cut at 4 inches, all dead trees removed. all logs and rounds need to be split , stacked and covered with no more than 2500 feet present. And you need home addresses in clear site, 4 inch numbers and reflective. I got busted for that one… 
Getting existing homes not within Paradise in places like forbestown and concow may be problematic. I am not sure how they deal with fire inspection protocols and compliance at a county level. But having some sort incentive via a tax break would be an awesome Idea. I hate to think of California having another mandated program but perhaps a WUI inspection protocol wouldn’t be a bad idea. maybe…
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One thing I can promise you, the Governor’s decision to place 30% of the State’s land in conservancy by 2030 will only augment the already very bad situation pertaining to the excessive fuel loads.
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Yep. He will decimate California and retire to his ranch in Montana.
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Funny thing about the Newsom land in Montana, his neighbor’s land is owned by an Auberry logger. Should make some interesting talk at their fence.
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Dozer Keith brings up an important point. We have 149 Wilderness areas in California… areas where fire attack is limited and only Forest Supervisors or Park Superintendents can waive the rules. Suppression was limited on both August and Castle fires this year…both grew to mega fire proportions. Do we need these “set aside” areas What function do they perform? I recognize the need for Parks, but the proliferation of designated wilderness or national monuments bothers me. We will not be able to handle the fire problem in California if these huge tracts of land are left to continue under the same management policy they have displayed in the past.
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CalFire inspection program is a numbers game. Drive by inspections for vegetation clearance. It gives homeowners a false sense of security. We need to identify the cause of the homes burning in the wildland and correct that problem. CalFire Damage Assessment teams should be doing cause determination where possible in post fire analysis and that data should be made public. For instance…post Carr fire 2 retired CDF BC’s and I looked at the high value homes burned in West Redding… we found that many of them burned from artificial fuel loading. Residents had planted flammable vegetation, used bark as ground cover, built wood fences connecting to homes etc,. We found from interviews and analysis that many of the homes burned from spot fires. Post fire analysis in Paradise revealed that many of the homes burned from radiant heat. Homes spaced too close together in the trailer parks and older neighborhoods. Portable sheds and RV parked next to houses also contributed in Paradise. We need to learn the lessons these fires are teaching.
CalFire inspections should not be limited to vegetation clearance. I know there is no statutory authority, but those inspections should include Fire Safe recomendations… for instance if a residence has fire wood stacked in an unsafe manner or some other fire hazard that is not vegetation it should be noted on the inspection report. CalFire inspections should go into a data base and insurance companies should be able to use that data… just as they use CHP records to check your driving record.
We’ve got to change the way we’ve been doing business…its not working any more.
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The information about Federal Wilderness Areas and RARE II areas is missed by many in the “forest management” arguments JMHO
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I know a lot of the August was outside my scope of interest, but do you have any examples? I wasn’t aware of much due strictly to it being wilderness. On the east side before it was absorbed by August when TGU had the Elkhorn, and then the Calfire Team complexed it, they were going as hard as they could to keep it out of the wilderness, and when it slopped into it, they had some IHC’s doing handline and firing in the wilderness with aircraft direct retardant support approved. However with one final slop over a line to the south compromising the entire plan, Ops agreed it was too risky to have humans down in there and pulled everyone out and onto the top to keep the ridge along the boundary. A lot of the east side fire was left to burn strictly because there was severe drawdown and resources were focused on other fires with higher life/structure risk.
I can vouch for the two pieces of wilderness in Tehama County, it’s wilderness because it’s wild. If fire gets in either, there’s few places inside to safely make a stand, especially with any resemblance of minimizing impact to the land. 2-4 hour travel time by ground one way makes logistics expensive, and adds a lot of risk for little gain. In the past, both areas have had to resort to CH-47’s bringing in troops, with LZ’s limited to the back ramp offloading onto the Mill Creek Rim while the front half hovered over the canyon.
Don’t mean to detract from the bigger picture of the topic, just saw this and wanted to slightly defend it as not the reason August went big.
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The radiant heat push is rapidly becoming a major factor in these high loss fires. The Tubbs Fire (2017) burned almost identically to the 1964 Hanley Fire, with the notable exception of the area West of Highway 101, known as the Coffee Park area. The extreme radiant heat push triggered the urban conflagration beginning on the East side of Santa Rosa and pushing out to the West by the wind event which was in progress. Combining the high wind, high heat radiant push and close proximity of the urban housing created the deadly rapid expansion of the Tubbs Fire into heavily populated areas. Much of the Tubbs footprint had not sustained significant fire since the Hanley Fire and included areas of snags left from the Hanley.
We began to see these modern era Wildland Urban Conflagrations back in 1980 on the Panorama Fire in Southern California and again on the Tunnel Fire (1991) whereby major urban areas are decimated by a wildland fire that the radiant heat push preheats the structures in front of the main fire and are initially ignited by an ember lodging in a receptive area of the exterior. One of the aftermath solutions evolving out of the Panorama Fire, is the inclusion of walls being built on new developments between the native vegetation and the community. While not a 100% cure, it has substantially reduced the losses in those areas that have them. Secondly, the emergence of green belts between those walls and the native areas are further aiding the resilience of the structures.
One additional factor, which is impacted every aspect of every fire in CA is that since the 1970 and today, is that the population of California has more than doubled. The WUI factor is being impacted by both an increase in population and a move from the urban to suburban and rural push. While the conspiracy theory nuts are convinced this all is a government plot using Directed Energy Weapons (DEW), the reality is: that the lack of vegetation management, not simply forest; more people in the WUI, which also increases the lack of responsibility in the WUI; Building and Resource Codes lagging way behind the population growth curve has brought to where we are today. There is no single phased approach which is going to mitigate or extract us from this point but each of these three major contributing factors has to be addressed both individually and as a part of the total picture. We must have meaningful legislation that works instead of the feel good legislation such as allowing the power utilities to pass along to the rate payers, the costs for the power utilities lack of responsible line maintenance.
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The Drive by fire inspections here were a joke. They only looked at the view from your driveway and were very inconsistent on what you were sited for. Existing homes were allowed to get away with violations that burned lots were not because the house and fence blocked the views. I left some things undone because I wanted to talk with the inspectors about how to best deal with them… They did not get out of the car so it went unnoticed. Years back we got full inspections. But budget cuts stopped that practice.
The fires is Paradise where fueled by too many spot fires to comprehend. I was here. Drove back into it from Chico to get family out and was here a good part of the day before I gave up and left. Hot ash was flying everywhere. PGE may have started the fire but it was not the reason Paradise burned down. We were. It was a single 100 dollar fine if you got sited vs the cost and time to clean it up. Once the houses caught fire it got up into the trees around the houses and things just multiplied. Fire safety was just too inconvenient. The fire inspections here were done in August and September in the height of fire season now carry daily fines. It unleashed a army of weekend warriors running Chainsaw and Brush cutters in heavy fuel during red flag warnings so they can clear their property before they get fined.
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One of the areas that I would cite as an example of a great starting point. The fire leadership in the WUI zones needs to become much more engaged with the public in education and exposure to the hazard mitigation. One example of this type of leadership was Chief Bob Roper, VCFD. Chief Roper was very engaged with both the public and the city councils of Ventura County. Ventura County is a very diverse economic region with extremely wealthy in the Thousand Oaks and Westlake Village communities and very low income population in the much of the less developed areas of the County. He had a very unique ability to work with and speak to all of these various communities and convey the message of the necessity of defensible space across the entire County. Chief Roper was also heavily invested in the Ready, Set, Go program that helped people to understand the value of properly preparing for a wildland fire along with the steps to ensure a safe departure from the fire zone once it broke out. Working with the cities, he helped bring the message along with the creation of green belt zones in new housing tracts and within the Dept by having a very aggressive and constant VMP program. While not 100% perfect, these community outreach engagements have seen noticeable reductions in the structural losses in Ventura County.
Is that approach viable everywhere? Perhaps not, but it does indicate that when fire leadership gets involved, there can be improvements made.
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Agree, and I will add this. While CALFIRE has implemented more expansive inspections and hired seasonal inspectors, the agency is completely anemic in its follow up enforcement on violators. It just has not had the stomach to give out fines and see enforcement to the courts. This is not always the case statewide, but by and large is poor at best.
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In FKU inspections are not limited to just vegetation, they encompass anything that could be flammable like deck chairs, firewood, or even paint and gasoline. This is only if an inspection occurs, which is hit or through the years for us, we had one last year but not this year.
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I for one look forward to a full fire inspection. We used to have them here and I loved them, looked forward to it. I got a lot of good information and was able to transform our property and help the neighbors do the same. In Paradise code enforcement manages the inspection fines now. They have no problems accessing fines. Inspections are a great tool and should be done on a more consistent basis in places like the ridge. I bet 90 percent of Paradise would fail on comprehensive inspection.
Backing up to @Dozer_Keith comments… I am in agreement. Leadership is key . I wish there were more people like Chief Roper out there willing to stand against the popular ,politically correct tide and do whats right… Just takes a couple of dominoes falling to start change.
I am a big proponent of defensible space and preach and practice it daily . But I am just one trying to live by example and get others to follow. Getting the right people involved is everything.
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NorCal Scan and all… I have deliberately tried to avoid any Agency clash on this thread but the August and Castle fires have both burned off USFS land and destroyed many homes. I will point out as prima facie evidence that the dozer lines on the August Complex and the Elkhorn fire stopped at the USFS boundary. USFS and CalFire have two different approaches to fighting fire…it should probably be an entire different thread. I’m not demeaning any person’s or crew’s individual effort but lack of direct attack, Big box tactics, wilderness fire policy, a broken ordering system and out of area IMT’s all contributed to the lack of effective effort on the August complex. USFS is an Agency without a mission. In past decades they produced timber… now they are actively withdrawing land from general use. There are at least 4 separate Wilderness areas impacted by the August fire Snow Mountain, SanHedrin, Yolla Bolla and Chancuella , not to mention the Snow Mtn/Berryessa National Monument.
I was a career wildland firefighter for CDF with a long ICS pedigree, and in my opinion the US Government Land and Fire Management polices are a direct threat to the citizens of California. The fires in the last decade have proven they do not respect administrative boundaries.
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