Sierra Nevada Regional Meeting held for first time in Tahoe
STATELINE, Nev. – For the first time, the California Wildfire and Forest Resilience Task Force held its Sierra Nevada regional meeting in Tahoe, at the Tahoe Blue Event Center. The task force unveiled their new developments and discussed the headway that local and regional partners have made in the field.
Tahoe also represents another first for the meeting, in that it’s the only area that is managed by both California and Nevada. Wade Crowfoot, Secretary of the California Natural Resources Agency and co-chair of the task force, expressed his interest in learning from the bi-state management strategies.
Crowfoot also outlined the three major goals of the task force: integrating efforts for local, regional, state, and federal agencies; increasing the pace and scale of work that needs to be done; and building regional leadership. He said, “The answers are not in Sacramento or in Washington D.C. They’re here in the Basin.”
Serrell Smokey, the chairman of the Washoe tribe, spoke on the efforts of Washoe people as stewards of the area. “Fire is a living breathing entity… and we need to work with fire to reimplement traditional ecological knowledge into the lands,” said Smokey. SB 310, which was passed in September, gives more freedom for Indigenous tribes and groups in California to perform cultural burning.
Kara Chadwick, deputy regional forester of the U.S. Forest Service and Chief Joe Tyler of CAL FIRE both spoke on the efforts to control fire in the area. Chadwick stated that this year, the U.S. Forest Service has done fire control services on almost 300,000 acres of land. 71,000 of those acres were treated with prescribed fire, the most that has ever been done in California. She also added that despite this being an active fire year, they “continue to have a success rate of 95% in putting out those fires on first attack.”
Tyler said that presenting in Tahoe was special because of CAL FIRE’s history here—the organization was established in 1885 in the Basin because of fire and forest concerns. Though CAL FIRE rebranded in 2007, their full name is the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. Tyler called on this when he said, “We need to turn our attention to a more resilient forest,” and pointed to investment in technology as a major part of it.
Those technologies were revealed by Chadwick and Tyler as the Interagency Treatment Dashboard and Fuel Treatment Effectiveness Dashboard. These two dashboards show where fire treatments have happened and how effective those treatments are—which informs both the public and firefighting efforts in different areas. Tyler said, “”This new dashboard is a tool for the public to see how fuels treatments had a positive impact on the firefight and how this work is making a difference.” Chadwick added, “No other state in the country is tackling wildfire resilience at this scale or with this level of innovation.”
The Interagency Treatment Dashboard will be integrating information from the Tahoe Conservancy and timber companies for version 1.1, which will also incorporate the three years of work done from 2021 to 2023.
Patrick Wright, director of the task force, highlighted the work done in the Tahoe area, which started in response to the Angora Fire of 2007. “No other region has made an interagency commitment like this… and it is particularly gratifying to see that work in defensible space, home hardening, and fuel removal during and after the Caldor Fire.” Wright then went on to say the state’s 2025 Action Plan will focus on developing data and tools, regional resources, and aligning strategies across California—which will help deliver fire resilience tools targeted to Sierra Nevada and Northern California.
Kacey KC, head of the Nevada Division of Forestry, Jason Vasques, executive director of the Tahoe Conservancy, and Julie Regan, executive director at the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency all spoke about the local and regional efforts to fight fire and build forest resilience in the Basin. KC spoke about the lessons learned from the Angora Fire and how they applied to fighting the Caldor Fire, especially across state lines.
Vasques pointed to the Forest Action Plan created by the Tahoe Fire and Fuels Team. He stated that planning and implementation on a neighborhood level rather than a parcel level “helped us get in front of wildfires and changed the game.” He also highlighted their investment in multi-use and multi-benefits projects, especially in thinking about the relation to wildlife and recreation.
Regan touched on the work done with the Washoe tribe in restoring the Lahontan cutthroat trout to Meeks Bay. “The partnerships you’re hearing about truly run deep,” said Regan. “Our compact between California and Nevada remains a cornerstone and touchstone, and that collaboration is at the center of what we do.”
Crowfoot said, “There are so many lessons we can learn from the work that’s being done here… which could improve effectiveness across the board.” He pointed to the work being done in coordinating vegetation management with utility companies as well as state and federal management, along with the bi-state compact.
The meeting also held two panels focusing on integrating wildlife protection and recreational development in the process of creating programs for wildfire crisis reduction and forest resilience.
In other local projects, the Tahoe Gateway Forest Health Implementation Project, meant to reduce wildfire risk and restore a mosaic of habitats to the area, was approved in January of this year. Work began in May and is anticipated to complete in five years.
The meeting concluded with Crowfoot and the rest of the task force members thanking the various partners and speaking about the next regional meeting. It will take place in Sacramento and will focus on synthesizing research into addressing forests and wildfires.
Eli Ramos is a reporter for Tahoe Daily Tribune. They are part of the 2024–26 cohort of California Local News Fellows through UC Berkeley.
Support Local Journalism
Support Local Journalism
Readers around the Lake Tahoe Basin and beyond make the Tahoe Tribune's work possible. Your financial contribution supports our efforts to deliver quality, locally relevant journalism.
Now more than ever, your support is critical to help us keep our community informed about the evolving coronavirus pandemic and the impact it is having locally. Every contribution, however large or small, will make a difference.
Your donation will help us continue to cover COVID-19 and our other vital local news.