Clearing the way

Chico Fire Chief Steve Standridge is concerned about the fire danger in Upper Bidwell Park, primarily when it comes to access.

Take, for example, when the Stoney Fire ignited last summer. The department found it challenging to battle the blaze because of the terrain, dense vegetation and heavy winds.

“We were all struggling just to find the seat of the fire … where it was going and the potential impact of that,” Standridge told the CN&R.

Despite these factors, the fire department was remarkably successful. The blaze was extinguished with no injuries or homes burned. However, the fire torched 962 acres and came frighteningly close to neighborhoods, causing evacuations. (See “Scorched earth,” Newslines, July 19.)

The department has since created its own internal map and protocol to better manage evacuations during disasters, chiefly due to the Camp and Stoney fires. Standridge says it identifies those areas of east Chico in the wildland-urban interface (or WUI, pronounced “wooey”)­—such as Canyon Oaks, Stilson Canyon and neighborhoods along Manzanita Avenue and Falcon Pointe Drive—as the highest risk, because the homes are so close to parks and open spaces prone to wildfire.

There’s another plan now in development that aims to tackle the other side of the coin: fire prevention. The city recently accepted a $158,907 Cal Fire Community Fire Prevention grant. It will help fund the development of a comprehensive vegetation fuels management plan for all publicly owned parks and greenways.

Standridge says he’s excited about the plan, because it is “much needed” and will help the department better understand the city’s fire hazards. He’s hopeful it will pave the way for projects that address his accessibility concerns as well.

“It moves [our knowledge] out of intuition into a more empirical assessment of our hazards, associated risks and vulnerable populations,” he said. “The question is, how much do we want to get in there and mitigate these fuel loads while also maintaining the natural character of the park?”

The plan development process will start this July and finish up before mid-March 2021, according to Linda Herman, city park and natural resources manager.

Using a combination of staff, contractors and volunteers, the city Public Works Department will start by compiling aerial footage and ground surveys. It will consult with Chico State, the Chico Fire Department, foresters and other local experts to inventory and map native, rare and invasive vegetation.

That data will be used to assess fire risk and identify projects and vegetation-control methods, along with recommendations for continued management. Ultimately, the plan will identify high-priority projects, with the top five going through environmental review. Throughout the process, there will be multiple public workshops and city meetings for review.

There are five creeks and greenways that run through the city: Mudd Creek, Little Chico and Big Chico creeks, Comanche Creek and Lindo Channel. Each of those corridors poses a potential fire risk, Herman said, but because the city doesn’t have a central guiding document, there are unanswered questions as to which areas are the most important to address, and how.

“It’ll be good to have those inventories and plans … something that guides us not just for Bidwell Park but also for the other greenways that go through our city,” she said.

Last year, her department brought goats back to Lower Park for the first time in 15 years to chomp on coarse, invasive species like star thistle to reduce fire risk (see “Four-legged weed eaters,” Greenways, Nov. 8). They’ll be back again this year, too, Herman confirmed.

While this tactic, along with the work of volunteer groups, has helped, there still are unsafe fuel loads in city green spaces, Herman said. A particular example is the highly flammable arundo grass in Lindo Channel, a ladder fuel that grows tall.

Much of the city’s greenways have become overgrown with such highly invasive species as arundo, Himalayan blackberry, European olive and broom due to “decades of unnatural fire suppression and infestation,” wrote Paul Moore, president of the Mount Lassen Chapter of the California Native Plant Society, in a letter to the city supporting the development of the plan. Restoring a natural balance of species in city park lands and open spaces is “of paramount importance.”

Woody Elliott, the plant society’s conservation chair, told the CN&R the organization also sees a “great benefit in removing biomass of invasive species in the forest understory” because it will lessen the community’s vulnerability to catastrophic fire.

A key component, in his view, is its inclusion of California Environmental Quality Act review for the top five projects. That will help fast-track the projects—once they receive funding—and ensure their environmental compliance. But maintenance is going to be a hurdle moving forward.

“It’s all well and good to do a once-through and remove your nonnative understory fuels. Two or three years later, you’ve got to go back and do it again and maintain what you’ve removed,” he said. “The city’s going to have to realize they’re on the hook for maintenance … otherwise in five years it’ll be same old, same old.”