Wildfire Protection Plan Nears Completion
Once the plan is signed by County Commissioners, additional funding will be available for fire mitigation projects.
A group of Columbia County citizens and officials has been working since early this year to establish a Community Wildfire Protection Plan (CWPP) for the County. The effort has been facilitated by the Blue Mountain Resource and Development Council (RC&D) a regional non-profit organization with its office in Dayton.
According to RC&D Council President Jerry Hendrickson, the purpose of the CWPP is to identify a wide range of issues that need to be addressed before the next wildfire strikes our region. "There are many things that can be done to mitigate the severity of the next fire and to make emergency operations more effective," says Hendrickson. Hendrickson, a retired educator from Asotin, has been a member of the RC&D board for six years and its President for the last two.
Three of the four counties served by the RC&D Council – Columbia, Garfield and Asotin – went together, with the Council's assistance, to hire a consulting firm to establish a plan for each county. The firm is Northwest Management, Inc., of Moscow, ID. Northwest Management is a natural resources consulting firm that provides a broad range of services, including forest management and environmental planning. They have already helped prepare dozens of CWPPs for counties throughout the Northwest. Funding of $95,000 was provided for the projects in the three counties. $45,000 comes from United States Forest Service and $50,000 from the Washington State Department of Natural resources.
In early 2007, a steering committee was established as part of the CWPP process for Columbia County to identify areas of need and develop priorities for its CWPP document. "One of the biggest things we've looked at is clearing brush along roadsides," says Hendrickson. "It helps maintain access during a fire and it makes the roads a better fire break." Some other possible projects the group in Columbia County is addressing include:
• Working with property owners to
maintain defensible space around
homes and other structures.
• Providing better access to water in
remote areas.
• Identifying bridges in need of repair
that currently have weight restrictions,
limiting movement of water tankers
during a fire.
• Providing training to emergency
personnel and to people who could
operate heavy equipment during a fire.
Another important issue the steering committee is addressing is communications equipment. "With firefighters coming from all over the state and all over the country, they work on a lot of different radio frequencies, and those frequencies are not always able to talk to each other," says Rick Turner, Columbia County Fire Chief and steering team member. "It was a problem during the Columbia Complex fire." He says that the group is also looking at locating more repeaters in the county to improve radio reception in the valleys and low lying areas.
The CWPP steering committee is made up of several local landowners, along with representatives from many interested groups. These include:
• Columbia County Commissioners
• Columbia County Sheriff's Office
• Columbia County Assessor's office
• Columbia County Planner's office
• Columbia County Conservation
District
• Fire Districts #1 and #3
• City of Dayton
• City of Starbuck
• Washington Dept. of Natural
Resources
• Washington Dept. of Fish & Wildlife
• U.S. Forest Service
• U.S. Bureau of Land Management
• Umatilla Tribe
• Bennett Lumber Co.
• Bonneville Power Administration
• Broughton Land Co.
• Columbia REA
• Columbia County Farm Bureau
• Columbia County Grain Growers
• Pacific Power
• Puget Sound Energy
• Washington Cattlemen's Association
Once the CWPP for Columbia County is signed by the County Commissioners, the county will be eligible for grant funds to implement the projects identified in the plan. "We've already missed some funding opportunities because we didn't have a CWPP in place," says Turner. "But starting next year we should be able to move forward on many of the projects where a need has been identified." New funding will be available through grants originating from the Forest Service, Department of Homeland Security, and other state and federal land management agencies.
The committee is working to finalize the plan and have it ready for review by October 31. It is hoped that it will be signed and implemented by the end of 2007.
Copyright (c) 2007, Blue Mountain News