Experts hold community meeting in Redding in effort to help reduce risk of wildfires - KRCRTV.COM

REDDING, Calif. —

Thursday, members of the Community Planning Assistance for Wildfire program participated in a community meeting in Redding in order to introduce themselves and provide information about their program.

The purpose of the program is for wildfire experts to provide an outlook and make customized recommendations that can reduce the risk of wildfires in an area and in this case, help Redding avoid any future disasters similar to the Carr Fire.

Members of the program arrived in Redding Wednesday where they teamed up with local officials and toured surrounding areas affected by the Carr Fire as well as developed areas in order to learn more about the land.

"It was interesting to look at the development patterns [like] on ridge tops for example. And the additional story behind that is, well yeah they're developed on ridge tops because they may not be appropriate to be developed in flood plains, so you always have a question of where is development appropriate and within those constraints how can we make it safer?" said President and Owner of Wildfire Planning International and founder of CPAW, Molly Mowery.

Around 50 people, ranging from local officials, fire officials, and the general public, attended the meeting hoping to learn more about the program.

The meeting also provided an opportunity for the program to learn from the community. Things like what the community believes are some of the challenges, opportunities the area has, and success plan ideas the community has.

The program will take these ideas to help them better assist the City of Redding when making recommendations on how to help the community protect itself from future wildfires.

"It really helps us to ground ourselves on what makes this community unique, so every community we work with may have some shared challenges about wildfire but there will be also some specific ways that communities will face a local challenge," Mowery said.

Luis Reed from Redding, who attended with her brother, said she really wants people to be prepared for potential fires that can happen anywhere.

"We are dry, we are hot, we have winds that rush through, we have seen all kinds of contrary things happen like the firenado and I just want more people to know what is going on and to be aware, to learn what they can do to make their place safer," said Reed.

She said she believes the meeting was a good outset.

"I thought it was a good start. It's going to take a lot of input from the community when the ones that are here make decisions, they are going to need a lot of support. They will need a lot of people standing up saying yes I can do something for my community, for my neighborhood," Reed said.

During the discussion, members of the community brought up some of the challenges including the long history of short staffing of firefighters due to budget constraint, illegal campfires from homeless encampments, the shift of vegetation, building/landscape design, and homeowners responsibilities and abilities limited on adjacent public land.

Redding Fire Chief Cullen Kreider said the program will help the city in identifying ways to improve prevention efforts for future wildfires.

"When they come back with their recommendations, you know that will come to the city council and some of those ordinances related to building in the wildland urban interface, so of those, addressing some of our open spaced areas, the city can look at those and maybe adopt stricter standards," Chief Kreider said.

The City of Redding is one of four communities selected through a nationwide search to participate in the program. The other communities include Gunnison County, Colorado; Mariposa County, California, and Pinetop-Lakeside, Arizona all funded through the U.S. Forest Service and private foundations.

The yearlong program will be set in four stages where they will kick off the project, conduct their community research and analysis, and have draft and final recommendations that the city can choose if they want to implement in their codes and plans.

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