An Ambassador by Any Name Doth Broaden Wildfire Resilience: re-post from FAC Net Blog by FACO Director
This story highlights the efforts to leverage neighborhood volunteers to lead wildfire preparedness. Wildfire Mitigation Professionals and neighborhood leaders across Colorado and the country are building upon the model of Wildfire Adapted Partnership Neighborhood Ambassadors (southwest CO). …
The home of Philip and Linda Walters who were serving as Neighborhood Ambassadors when the Weber Fire approached their home in 2012. Note the red retardant line just above the house and the mitigated area between the house and the road. Photo by Rich Graeber, Division Chief in East Canyon on the Southwest Colorado Incident Management Team during the Weber Fire.In 2012, the 10,000+ acre Weber Fire blew through a wilderness study area and into the canyon of a neighborhood where I’d been supporting wildfire preparedness through neighborhood ambassadors. The residents’ defensible space and roadside thinning enabled firefighters to protect every structure and build a fire line along their dead-end road and defensible-spaces, a feat which would not have been possible a few years earlier.
