Fire Safe Sierra County has been awarded $2.1 million to implement the Sierraville Fuels Reduction Project within the community of Sierraville. Funding has been provided by the USDA Community Wildfire Defense Grant and is valid for five years.
The grant will provide funding for the design, layout, and implementation of hazardous fuels reduction on approximately 500 acres of private lands within and adjacent to the community. The goal of this project is to increase forest resiliency to wildfire by reducing the horizontal and vertical continuity of fuels thereby improving stand health, vigor, and ability to withstand damaging agents. The project is intended to connect to existing and planned public lands fuels projects, thereby increasing the efficacy of landscape scale fuels reduction treatments within the Wildland Urban Interface.
The grant required the project to be identified within the existing Sierra County Community Wildfire Protection Plan to be eligible, and Fire Safe Sierra County included the entire 500acre project area for funding. The tentative project area includes private lands stretching from West Willow to the Highway 89 corridor and extending south through Old Truckee Road, as well as an area near the hot springs. The grant also required a sizeable match, which was provided by the National Forest Foundation, the organization sponsoring the neighboring “Sierra Valley Fire Protection Project”, slated for 2023 implementation.
Fire Safe Sierra County will begin outreach for the project after the grant agreement is signed, expected in late summer 2023. Participation in the project is entirely voluntary.
For more information, please contact Fire Safe Sierra County at sierracountyfsc@gmail.com, or voicemail at 530.289.8025.
Fire Safe Sierra County is a non-profit organization promoting wildfire resiliency throughout Sierra County, California.