MidPen To Conduct Forest Health Initiative

REDWOOD CITY, CA — It's as if Arlo Guthrie's voice could be heard through the trees: "This land is your land."

Given it's expanding the land it manages, the Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District decided last week at its board of directors meeting to do a little cleanup of the forest to make it safer and healthier.

An additional 210 acres, which have already gone through an environmental review process as part of Midpen’s integrated pest management program, can now be included in Midpen’s current fuels management work. Projects include creating new fuel breaks, as well as maintaining vegetation in existing fuel breaks and along evacuation routes for increased wild land fire safety.

Midpen staff worked with local fire agencies to identify high-priority areas for additional fuels reduction work near the wild land urban interface, including parts of Bear Creek Redwoods, Saratoga Gap, Windy Hill and Picchetti Ranch open space preserves.

“A changing climate, 150 years of fire suppression and a growing population are combining to create a longer and more intense fire season in California,” Midpen Senior Resource Specialist Coty Sifuentes-Winter said. “To meet these current challenges, Midpen Open Space is proactively expanding our environmentally sensitive fuels management.”

In addition to increasing fuels management now, Midpen is working on a state-required environmental impact report that will allow the public agency to continue expanding fuels management work into new areas of its preserves beginning next year.

This year, Midpen also began a new forest management pilot program aimed at increasing forest health and resilience to wild land fire by reducing fuel loads.

Wildland fire prevention, preparation and response are central to Midpen’s land stewardship.

Staff works year round maintaining hundreds of miles of fuel breaks and fire roads. More than 11,000 acres of Midpen’s public open space lands are grazed by cattle to help restore native grasslands, while reducing fuels to reduce fire danger.

Midpen provides annual fire suppression training to staff who are often first responders to fires and assist fire departments as ecological advisors. Smoking, campfires and firearms are not allowed in Midpen open space preserves.

“Fire is a fact of life in California, and everyone plays a role in living safely with it. Midpen’s role is to manage our open space lands for public safety and ecological health, while coordinating closely with local fire departments responsible for fire suppression,” Sifuentes-Winter said.

More information may be obtained by visiting: www.openspace.org/fire