Wildfire Hazard Planning Advisory document

From Mike Caplin:

All,

A couple of days ago I received an email from CAL FIRE on a draft Fire Hazard Planning Advisory document from the Governor’s Office of Planning and Research (OPR).  

Once finalized, the intent is for OPR to provide that document to counties and cities to advise on how planning documents and ordinances should be updated to address the threat of wildfires.

The draft is currently open for public comments until December 18, 2020.  

Here is a link to OPR’s page on it https://opr.ca.gov/news/2020/11-09.html

And here is a link to download the draft documenthttps://opr.ca.gov/docs/20201109-Draft_Wildfire_TA.pdf

Here is a link to an FAQ document (which recommends that comments be submitted using a form that is provided rather than in a letter) https://opr.ca.gov/docs/20201109-Wildfire_TA_FAQs.pdf

And here is a link to the comment submission formhttps://www.surveymonkey.com/r/firehazard (if you use this form (based on SurveyMonkey), be sure to check all of the boxes on the first page you may want to comment on, as you will be limited to comment only on subjects that were checked).

I have not read all of it, but from a quick look the document appears to be heavily influenced by urban bias, and very much in need of public comments from people who understand the situation in rural communities subject to wildfires.  

It is heavy on restricting development in rural communities subject to wildfires.  While it also acknowledges the need for wildfire fuel reduction work, it makes no mention of the need to amend laws to allow that work to actually take place without regulatory hindrance, leaving that to continue to fail to meaningfully address the problem, and fails to acknowledge that if people are allowed to meaningfully address the wildfire fuel accumulation problem, the problem could actually be largely solved (instead, apparently assuming the problem is insoluble).

Once in final form I expect this document could influence Monterey County’s updates to the County’s coastal plans, and its inland general plan and ordinances.

My take is that documents like this are dangerously bad policy to the extent they work to further concentrate California’s population into urban areas, which makes California more subject to biological hazards like pandemics, and to attack by weapons of mass destruction.  About 95% of California’s population is already concentrated into urban areas, which make up only about 5.3 percent of California’s land.  https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/decennial/2010/cph-2/cph-2-6.pdf   Table 2, page 42 in your pdf reader.

Best,

Mike