Acknowledgments

The Marin County Fire Department wishes to acknowledge the efforts of individuals who played significant roles in the development of the Marin County Fire Management Plan: Foremost, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection for providing the vision and funding to implement this plan, specifically, Staff Chief Wayne Mitchell for providing his guidance and patience.

There are many individuals who played a part in developing this plan. Here are just a few of those individuals:

Deputy Chief James B. Selfridge validated new methodologies and provided historical information. Administrative Officer Deann Nielsen performed proofreading, editing, and countless revisions. Chief Stan Rowan provided political guidance and approved numerous purchase requests for equipment needed to create this plan. Fire Marshal Keith Parker contributed fire prevention information. Forester Kent Julin contributed information on project implementation and stakeholders. Accounting Technician Gabriel Garcia assisted with formatting and production.

Table of Contents  . . .  Click on words to go to that section.

A Prescription for Reducing Cost and Losses from Wildland Fire

The Marin County Fire Department is proud to protect one of the most beautiful places in the state. This protection is provided by firefighters stationed in seven fire stations and two lookouts. With the impending threat of a catastrophic wildfire, the department is always striving to provide the highest level of service to Marin’s inhabitants. By evaluating the county’s geographic environment, the department will reduce the fire danger by vegetation management in critical locations. The Marin County Fire Department has adopted the California Fire Plan in pursuit of this goal.

California Fire Plan Executive Summary

The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection and State Board of Forestry have drafted an update of the Plan for Wildland Fire Protection in California. The fire planning process defines a level of service measurement, considers assets at risk, incorporates the interdependent relationships of wildland fire protection providers, affords public stakeholder involvement, and creates a fiscal framework.

Goals and Objectives

The overall goal is to reduce the total costs and losses from wildland fire in California by protecting assets at risk through focused prefire management and increasing initial attack success.

The California Fire Plan has five strategic objectives:

1. To create wildfire protection zones that reduce the risks to citizens and firefighters.
2. To assess all wildlands, not just the state responsibility areas. Analyses will include all wildland fire service providers: federal, state, local government, and private. It will identify high risk, high value areas, and develop information on and determine who is responsible, who is responding, and who is paying for wildland fire emergencies.
3. To identify and analyze key policy issues and develop recommendations for changes in public policy. Analysis will include alternatives to reduce the total losses by increasing fire protection system effectiveness.
4. To focus and monitor the wildland fire protection system in fiscal terms. This will include all public and private expenditures and economic losses.
5. To translate the analyses into public policies.

Marin County’s Wildland Fire Protection Plan Framework

These major components will form the basis of an ongoing fire planning process to monitor and assess Marin’s wildland fire environment.

Perform a four-factor assessment that defines Marin County’s wildland fire risk and hazards.

1. Assess hazardous vegetation location and fuel loading as it relates to assets at risk.
2. Assess severe fire weather conditions based on occurrence and severity.
3. Assess levels of service provided to the citizens of Marin County. This measure is the percentage of fires that are successfully controlled before unacceptable costs are incurred.
4. Assess assets at risk that are protected. The plan will establish a methodology for defining assets protected and their degree of risk from wildfire.

Identify Stakeholders

Stakeholders are defined as national, state, local and private agencies and interest groups. Stakeholders will be identified for each asset at risk from wildfire. This will enable fire service managers and stakeholders to set priorities for prefire management project work.

Implement Prefire Management Projects

The Marin County Fire Management Plan takes action before fires occur to reduce the frequency, severity, and size of wildfires. Management projects include fuel reduction and fuel breaks, ignition management, and fire safe engineering activities. The wildland fire assessment will rank the priority for projects. The Marin County Fire Department will write prescriptions designed to protect these assets. Who benefits and who should share in the costs will be identified.

Defining the Wildfire Problem in Marin County

Defining Marin County’s high risk and hazard areas is a subjective equation. Every fire jurisdiction states that it has the worst fire problem in the county. Likely, the agency is right! In the event of a major wildland fire, every jurisdiction in the county and numerous state and federal agencies would be tapped for equipment under mutual aid agreements. Knowing that a fire respects no political boundary, every jurisdiction in the county has a high degree of fire risk.

Today’s wildfires are very costly! It is not unrealistic that cost figures soar to over $1-million dollars a day. This is just the suppression cost. Loss figures are sometimes hard to calculate. Not only homes are destroyed, but home-based businesses, utilities, recreation areas, and the habitat for numerous species.

The Mount Vision Fire is a perfect example of a large, damaging, and costly fire to extinguish. Suppression cost reached $6-million dollars. Structure costs reached $23-million dollars with the loss of 48 homes, with another 18 suffering substantial damage. The damage cost figure to repair utilities reached $1.3-million. Rehabilitation, the act of stabilizing roads and slopes for erosion control, cost another $1.3-million.

Fire departments alone cannot fix the problems. It will take cooperation from stakeholders in order to identify the hazards, design mitigation strategies, and seek funding from unconventional sources. Fortunately, Fire Safe Marin is a proven facilitator of local stakeholders.

Stakeholders

Stakeholders are defined as national, state, local, private agencies, or interest groups, with assets at risk from wildfire. This plan will establish a methodology for defining assets protected and their degree of risk. The assets addressed in the plan are citizen and firefighter safety, watersheds and water, wildlife and habitat (including rare and endangered species), unique areas (scenic, cultural, and historic), recreation, range, structures, and air quality. Stakeholders are identified for each asset at risk. The assessment will define the areas where assets are at risk from wildfire, enabling fire service managers and stakeholders to set priorities for prefire management project work. Major landowners, managers, and asset groups are listed below:

The largest landowner within Marin County is the United States government. The federal holdings equate to 80,233 acres. Most of this acreage is found in the Golden Gate National Recreation Area (GGNRA), Point Reyes National Seashore (PRNS), and the old growth redwoods located in Muir Woods National Monument.

The parks offer recreational opportunities that bring numerous tourists into the county year-round. During the Vision Fire, bed-and-breakfast inns and 16 major businesses lost $1.365-million due to the lack of tourism.

There are over 140 miles of hiking trails and four hike-in campsites for visitors to explore. Although wood fires are prohibited, illegal campfires are still a source of ignition.

The parks offer scenic vistas and provide a home to nearly 20 percent of the states flora and 45 percent of the bird species of North America. Sensitive species include coho salmon, steelhead trout, elephant seals, red legged frogs and tule elk. PRNS also has the highest number of spotted owls in the nation.

Other assets within the parks include rangeland and historical areas. The park allows grazing lands and has a working horse ranch. Of historical significance, is the West Marin Pierce Ranch built in 1859.

The National Park Service is in the process of completing a fire management plan for the Point Reyes National Seashore and Golden Gate Recreation Area. The fire management plan and activities incorporate public health and environmental quality considerations. The plan will address desired objectives, but is balanced with other societal needs, including air quality, public health, and safety. The Marin County Fire Department provides resources that assist the National Park Service with its planning effort and project implementation.

The Marin Municipal Water District (MMWD) manages over 21,000 acres of watersheds and reservoirs. MMWD is a public agency that provides drinking water to 170,000 people in a 47-square-mile area of Marin County. This land is not only used for water storage, but provides recreational activities and habitat.

In 1995, MMWD developed a 10-year plan for managing the vegetation on the watershed. This plan represents MMWD's most comprehensive natural resources management effort ever. Among the plan’s goals are: fire-hazard reduction, minimizing the potential for erosion, and controlling the spread of non-native plants that can displace native plants and animals. The plan also calls for the restoration of meadow and oak woodlands, and the protection of rare plant species.

One of the primary goals of the vegetation management plan for Mt. Tamalpais is to reduce fire hazard. Since the start of record keeping in 1859, major fires have raged through MMWD lands periodically. An 1882 fire burned an estimated 65,000 acres, and a 1923 fire swept south over 40,000 acres from Novato to Alpine Lake. In 1945, the last major fire consumed vegetation on 20,000 acres of watershed land. Fuels have been accumulating since then. Some areas of chaparral and evergreen forest have not burned in almost 70 years. With dry summers the rule, the potential for another disastrous fire is great.

MMWD and MCFD are creating a strong defense against wildfires by building a network of fuel breaks that will help firefighters contain wildfires. Both agencies create the breaks by thinning heavy vegetation along fire-protection roads in strategic ridgetop areas to provide access for firefighters and create fire protection zones where they have a better chance of containing fires. Within these zones, ground fuels are removed and lower branches of larger trees are pruned, while retaining as much forest canopy as possible.

Both agencies conduct carefully managed burns on about 100 to 200 acres per year (less than one percent of watershed land). These prescribed fires serve to control non-native plants, reduce fuels, and maintain natural habitats. Left unchecked, invasive plants create a heavy fuel load and push out native species, reducing biodiversity on Mt. Tamalpais.

The State of California owns or manages over 17,000 acres of land within Marin County. The areas include five State Parks and two State Historical Parks that draw almost 1.5-million visitors annually. The California State Parks Department conducts prescribed fires within China Camp and Mt. Tamalpais in order to reduce non-native plant species.

Under the leadership of State Parks, the county’s most successful multi-stakeholder project was implemented. A series of controlled burns combined with mechanical clearing by homeowners created a community fuel break along Panoramic Highway and Ridge Avenue above Muir Woods.

The County of Marin Open Space District (Open Space) is responsible for 32 open space preserves with holdings equating to over 12,000 acres of land. They manage lands in a fashion that ensures the protection of environmental integrity through time. Wherever possible, a "light on the land" approach is preferred to excessive human intervention. This reduces management costs and ensures that open space areas are maintained in a fashion consistent with their wild and natural character. Unfortunately, this wild and natural character creates areas with a high fire hazard. Most open space preserves adjoin urban development by design, which compounds the hazard.

Open Space lands provide recreational opportunities while supporting many different species habitat.

Besides open space lands, Marin County owns over 5000 additional acres. The county is aware of the fire problem that exists. In the county’s general plan, it states, "Fire hazards in Marin County threaten lives, property, and the natural environment. Marin forest and chaparral areas, which have been prevented from burning for as long as 40 years, pose a significant hazard to scenic environments and residential communities. Many Marin homes face an increased fire risk due to factors such as steep slopes, narrow streets, flammable roofing materials, proximity to old and overgrown vegetation, and distance from fire stations."

The general plan continues, "…communities located in the urban fringe face risks in the event of a wildfire. These risks are increased by flammable building materials, stilt and pole construction along steep slopes, poor road access, confusing street addresses, and dense vegetation immediately surrounding homes near the wildland."

And finally the plan says, "A major wildland fire in Marin could cause severe damage to open space and park lands. Land would be scarred by fire fighting techniques involving bulldozing, road cutting, and fire retardant chemicals. Rainfall following a major fire could cause severe erosion, landslides, and mudslides. Landslides and mudslides might endanger roads and homes and would disrupt plant renewal by displacing topsoil. Wildland fires also threaten residences located near forest, brush, or grassland areas. Dry natural cover can set a home on fire during a major wildland fire and many of these homes are surrounded by trees and brush."

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