GSFFC Member Organization receives $1.3 million in Community Wildfire Defense Grant funding to reduce wildfire risk to area

A wildfire risk mitigation fiscal award and Fire Adapted Communities Program Manager job opportunity are coming to the greater Santa Fe area!

A 1.3 million dollar grant awarded to Greater Santa Fe Fireshed Coaltion member the Forest Stewards Guild (the Guild) will reduce the wildfire hazard for Santa Fe, Pueblo of Tesuque, Pueblo of Nambe, and surrounding communities. Under the eligibility terms of the Community Wildfire Defense Grant (CWDG), this funding will support projects described in the 2020 Santa Fe County Community Wildfire Protection Plan.

Over the next five years, the Guild and partners in the Greater Santa Fe Fireshed Coalition will conduct over 500 home hazard assessments and complete more then 125 acres of high priority fuel mitigation treatments. The Coalition will work to elevate public outreach and education while simultaneously increasing the number of Fireshed Ambassadors. Expansion of the Fireshed Ambassador program, which is based on the knowledge that neighbors are influenced by neighbors and that volunteer community leaders can multiply the efforts of subject matter experts, will foster Fire Adapted Communities. This work will be facilitated by a new Fire Adapted Communities Manager

The project will restore and maintain watersheds by expanding wildfire mitigation work in the federally-identified high-risk/state-designated priority landscape around Santa Fe. Implementation of fuels mitigation treatments will utilize a sliding-scale cost-share approach to distribute CWDG funding equitably to underserved neighborhoods and individuals. Fuels mitigation activities will include forest thinning, community chipping days, and removal of green waste through collection and disposal at county facilities.

Through the newly-minted CWDG program, the USDA Forest Service is investing $197 million in 100 projects across the U.S. Funded by President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, CWDG helps communities, tribes, non-profit organizations, state forestry agencies, and Alaska Native corporations plan for and mitigate wildfire risks as the nation faces an ongoing wildfire crisis. For more information on all funded proposals, visit www.fs.usda.gov/managing-land/fire/grants/funded-proposals.

Gabriel Kohler

The GSFFC is a coalition of public and private organizations. The GSFFC is not a subdivision of the State of New Mexico, as defined in the state’s Open Meetings Act, §§ 10-15-1 to 10-15-4 NMSA 1978. Although federal agencies participate in the GSFFC, the Coalition is not a federal advisory board and was not created by a federal agency, as defined by the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA), 5.U.S.C. app. 2, §§ 1 to 16 (2012). The GSFFC operates informally to support its partners, and is not incorporated as a non-profit, 501(C)(3), partnership, or other legal status.