County of Yolo starts Fire Safe Council
Yolo County will soon have its own Fire Safe Council. With funding from CAL FIRE, the Yolo County Resource Conservation District (RCD) and Office of Emergency Services (OES) are leading the effort. On Tuesday, February 23rd at 2:30pm they will host a virtual kick-off meeting where stakeholders will hear a Fire-Safe-Councils-101 presentation. Yolo OES and the RCD will discuss the steps and timeline for creating the Fire Safe Council, and experts will be available to answer questions. Key stakeholders on the Fire Safe Council include the County and city governments, Yolo County Board of Supervisors, Tribal representatives, local fire departments, CAL FIRE, utility providers and other related local and state agencies and organizations as well as the general public. Interested members of the public are welcome to attend. The agenda can be found on our website at https://yolorcd.org/wp-content/uploads/yolo-county-fire-safe-council-kick-off-meeting-agenda-2021-02-23.pdf. For those who cannot attend, the session will be recorded and posted on the Yolo County RCD’s wildfire resources webpage here: https://yolorcd.org/resources/wildfire-resources/.
The main function of the Yolo County Fire Safe Council will be to provide support for wildfire prevention, wildfire response and post-fire recovery efforts by implementing priority projects identified in the Yolo County Community Wildfire Protection Plan (CWPP). The RCD is leading the development of the CWPP as part of the CAL FIRE grant program. The planning process began in the fall of 2020 and will be completed over the course of the next two years. As the first step, a CWPP steering committee is meeting to develop a draft wildfire risk assessment that will be available for Fire Safe Council and community input in early fall. Once the wildfire risk assessment is finalized, the RCD will be holding a series of public meetings in the wildfire-prone communities in the greater Winters area, Esparto and Capay Valley. All interested members of the public, including in neighboring counties, will be able to provide input in this process.
In the meantime, RCD and OES staff are available to assist community members affected by the recent wildfires.
If you would like more information about this topic or current wildfire-related programs in Yolo County, please contact RCD Program Manager Tanya Meyer at meyer@yolorcd.org. For wildfire emergency response-related inquiries, please contact OES staff member Kurt Johnson at Kurt.Johnson@yolocounty.org.
