Second of two parts. Read part one: The politics of the wildfires
We are on the cusp of Southern California’s 2009 wildfire season. It’s been two years since the devastating wildfires of 2007, yet our elected officials have still not stepped up to the plate to craft a hard-hitting fire prevention land management policy. What’s holding officials back?
Sen. Diane Feinstein may have the answer. Back in 2007, Feinstein visited the San Diego region only weeks after the fire storm nightmare had struck. She arrived while thousands of families were still sifting through the ashes of their burnt homes.
Feinstein lashed out at city and county leaders for not being better prepared for the fire storms. Her commentary stood in stark contrast to the “love fest” of media and local politicians that had just rocked out Qualcomm Stadium. Mayors, county supervisors, and other officials gathered in Mission Valley under the bright lights of full TV and local media coverage. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger stopped by. In an almost party-like atmosphere, leaders patted themselves on the shoulder for conquering the fires, administering evacuations, and for inter-agency cooperation.
But on the question of prevention of future catastrophes-in the form of land use and site planning policies desperately needed to take control of the wildfire problem-the region’s leaders were mute. Feinstein, however, had plenty to say. She made it clear that San Diego would be foolhardy to allow suburban development to go unchecked. Feinstein immediately proposed a new set of laws which she called the Fire Safe Community Act.
This act would establish national standards for site planning, building codes and defensible space around homes and buildings. The message was simple: San Diego and other California counties need to regulate and possibly even restrict growth in high-risk areas.
Further, we need to better train public servants to assist in wildfire ecology research, and reorient fire fighting so it occurs at a more community scale. Despite the importance of Feinstein’s visit, it was underplayed and glossed over by our local media.
But it turns out that Feinstein was on to something. The most comprehensive study of the role of local governments in wildfire prevention is the American Planning Association’s (APA) 2005 “Planning for Wildfires” report. If our local officials haven’t read it, they should. The report argues that wildfires tend to be “very much a people triggered hazard,” since 80 percent of fires are ignited in some way by humans. It emphasizes that wildfire destruction is fundamentally linked with suburban development decisions — including building design, subdivision design, land use regulations, and landscaping.
Related links: Pocket Change: Fire in the hole | Fire Season Guide
The APA report makes a simple point about places like San Diego: wildfires occur so frequently here that we now need to adjust our region’s urban development pattern (as well as the physical design of our homes), to be in sync with the natural cycles of episodic wildfire.
So, what part of ‘wildfires are burning our suburbs’ do our officials not get?
Here are a few critical policy steps needed to make the San Diego region more fire safe — steps that, thus far, have not been on the radar screens of our city and county governments:
1) Delineate fire-prone sub-regions
File photo. (AP Photo/Mike Meadows)
The first important step is simple: the region needs to designate a “fire plain,” similar to state, regional and local “flood plains,” which define vulnerable environments that are then subject to specific rules about the nature and scale of development. The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CAL FIRE) has recently developed the “Fire Hazard Severity Zone ” where the state will be responsible for protecting development against wildfires. Guidelines are established for land owners, builders and residents in these zones. Unfortunately, local governments up to now are not willing participants.
As fire ecologist Rick Halsey has said, “Local governments can ignore these FHSZ designations… there is too much political pressure.”
CAL FIRE states that its Fire Hazard Severity Zone maps will be “considered in city and county general plans.” “Considered” is not a strong enough policy prescription. Either the state government, or some third party, needs to monitor the degree to which fire severity maps are part of local plans.
2) Incorporate wildfire protection into the formal planning process
Second, wildfire needs to be part of the everyday language and rules of local government planning — it should be incorporated into environmental reviews, the General Plan, Specific Plans, the Subdivision Map Act, and building and other codes. How these tools are organized to embrace fire planning remains to be better understood, but what is clear is that without formalizing the connection between fire planning and urban planning, the rapid development of the distant suburbs in the zone of fire hazards will not be adequately protected.
We can’t leave the job to the private sector, either. Developers don’t usually take wildfire into account on their own. They often paint best case, rather than worst case, scenarios. So, communities need rules that can be locally enforced.
3) Make fire planning part of the environmental impact assessment process
In the words of Rick Halsey, “fire is basically non-existent in CEQA (California Environmental Quality Act) plans. And if fire is ever considered at all, it is about how fire may impact the community, NOT how the community will impact fire.”
(Photo by Steven Bartholow)
Environmental reviews of large projects offer one possible tool for greater wildfire input into future development. General Plans should be another place where wildfire planning is factored into development. By law, hazards and mitigation measures are identified in General Plans, normally under the Safety element. Because General Plans are legally binding, they would be excellent vehicles for writing in specific regulations that would force developers and builders to create sustainable and less fire-prone communities.
4) Zone for fire safety
Zoning is another powerful tool in the arsenal of future fire-safe urban planning. Zoning can raise and lower densities where appropriate. It can also help preserve agricultural areas, wilderness zones, and open space buffers. Zoning can be used to create open spaces on the rims of hills and mesas so spreading wildfires have less fuel as they roar up steep slopes.
Many California counties have hesitated to use zoning to reign in subdivisions in former estates, thus destroying agriculture and creating suburban lot designs that are difficult to defend. Senator Feinstein told the media after the 2007 fires: “Local governments have to begin to look at their zoning and siting of large subdivisions in the path of Santa Ana winds in parched, dry areas of the state.”
For decades in San Diego County, rural estate zoning (20 or 40 acre lots) was the norm in the eastern back country. Yet, beginning in the 1990s, the building industry began lobbying to allow land owners to rezone their land for suburban subdivision. In 1998, a citizen group — opposing this move for its overuse of water and fire hazard dangers — sponsored an initiative called the Rural Heritage Watershed Act. It was defeated after the building lobby spent tens of millions of dollars to defend suburban lot zoning.
How ironic that the Rural Heritage Watershed Act’s arguments about suburban subdivision and wildfire dangers in the eastern wildlands proved to be accurate. Sadly, the region has not learned its lesson. Our elected officials would have us believe that massive armies of fire trucks and tanker planes are the main answer to future wildfire threats. As yet, they have not seriously considered rethinking the way we build our city in the places where it touches the dry rural, wildfire-prone natural landscape.
Larry Herzog is professor and chairperson of the graduate program in City Planning, School of Public Affairs, San Diego State University. He is an author and editor of numerous books and essays, and recently received the Fulbright Specialist award in Architecture and Urban Planning. This essay is part of a new book on the environmental design future of American cities.
Tags: city council, county, creek, fire, fires, policy, SDNN, suburbia, Uncategorized, wildfire, witch, zoning
Comment by: Don Green Posted: September 16, 2009, 3:44 pm
This is a good solution to restrict and or regulate growth. Ofcourse its good, its from the Urban Planning perspective. From a fire prevention perspective– not so good. There are too many existing homes for a prospective urban plan to adequately address, in terms of preventing large-loss-of-property fires. Unfortunately, too many experts look towards the fire agencies to provide guidance, and frame their planning around that guidance. Big mistake! The agency firefighters are great at fighting fires, not providing state-of-the-art technology and strategy to cope with wildfires. Virtually every home now in existence can be made wildfire resistant; and by a lot more than just “brush clearance.” The problem is, the cutting edge wildland urban interface fire researchers get scant attention by the fire agencies, so they cant enhance the agency firefighters’ knowledge base. So the planners and politicians meet with the fire agency “experts” and come away with what we have now: an under appreciation for using new technology and methods for preventing wildfires.