A hearing designed to provide the public with information about fuel management and defensible space for fires in Santa Barbara County revealed differing philosophies between government officials and environmental groups.
“The purpose of this is primarily to clarify and explain a fairly complex and in my opinion needlessly controversial part of what we do,” County Fire Chief Eric Peterson told the Board of Supervisors on Oct. 2.
Peterson explained the need for more fuel management throughout the region, and even the state. The practice includes controlled burns intentionally set by firefighters in specific areas, along with roadside grass and vegetation clearing with chainsaws and sometimes heavy equipment.
Several fire marshals, chiefs, and captains from various agencies throughout the county, including Cal Fire, Los Padres National Forest, and municipal fire departments were in attendance to support Peterson’s statements.
“Fires that occur in this county that escape initial containment or initial attack quickly become a mutual threat,” he said, adding that coordinated efforts to manage wildlands to prevent fires was just as important as clear communication during an actual disaster.
Fuel management has been a hot topic in Santa Barbara County since December 2017’s Thomas Fire, one of the largest conflagrations by area in California’s recorded history, and the following Jan. 9 debris flows in Montecito that claimed 22 lives.
The events created a new level of urgency among fire agencies to pursue preventative measures more aggressively, Peterson said.
“A changing climate and extended fire seasons have added to this urgency by forcing fire agencies to focus primarily on fire suppression, rather than on meaningful fuel treatment programs,” Peterson said. “Managing the fuel load, particularly in areas adjacent to communities, has become critically important as we become more vulnerable to the impacts of uncontrolled vegetation fires.”
Since 2004, nearly a half million acres of Santa Barbara County have been scorched by wildland fire, compared to just 648 acres burned through fuel treatment programs. The county has roughly 2,000 more acres targeted for work, but the numbers are a sharp disparity that reveal how little control firefighters have over the current landscape.
And even though Peterson called for little concrete action from the Board of Supervisors following the presentation, his and other fire agencies’ proposals were met with resistance from the local environmental community.
The California Native Plant Society submitted comments opposing the extent and range of proposed fuel breaks (cleared space around a home or property that prevents a fire from spreading from tree to tree unchecked).
Likewise, Los Padres ForestWatch Conservation Director Bryant Baker argued in a letter to the board that even appropriate fuel breaks around homes would not solve all the issues along what firefighters call the “wildland/urban interface.” He said the county should be more restrictive on where it approves more housing developments in those areas instead.
Carla D’Antonio, a plant ecology professor at UC Santa Barbara, told the supervisors that while prescribed burning had proven effective for reducing fire risk, its efficacy was reliant on the types of trees in the ecosystem being targeted. To put it simply, it may work in the Sierra Nevada mountains with mixed conifers, or pine trees, but the county’s chaparral forests burn very differently.
Any plan to limit fires on the coast must be approached with that in mind, D’Antonio said.
The hearing concluded well after the Sun‘s press time.
This article appears in Oct 4-11, 2018.