Tahoe California Conservation Corps provides aid to Los Angeles area
LOS ANGELES, Calif. – Two California Conservation Corps (CCC) crews from the Tahoe region are currently providing post-fire mitigation efforts in the Los Angeles area after the historical wildfires this last month.
30 corpsmembers and three staff from the Tahoe center located in Meyers, Calif. were dispatched on Monday, Jan. 20. Prior to that, two Tahoe CCC wildland fire fighting crews were dispatched to the Eaton Fire on Jan. 8 and returned at the end of January.
The most recent dispatch of the two Tahoe Crews on Jan. 20 was in response to California Governor Gavin Newsom’s executive order requesting the Corps, along with other agencies, develop a plan to mitigate the risks of flash floods, mudslides, and debris flows in the burn scar areas, created by the fires, and to respond promptly to any flooding, mudslides, or debris flows that may occur if significant winter storms hit the Greater Los Angeles area in the coming weeks and months.
Tahoe corpsmembers are specifically working on watershed protection efforts. This entails installing barriers that prevent burn scar area contaminants from washing into storm drains and into regional watersheds due to rainfall. The specific barriers are called straw wattles, silt socks and silt fences.

“We are installing silt fencing along the actual beach to keep some of the contaminants from washing through and out to the ocean,” Dana Howard said, Deputy Director of the California Conservation Corps.
The work is expected to take weeks with hundreds of thousands of linear feet of both the wattle and the silt sock to install in regions impacted by the Palisades Fire and Eaton Fire.
The California Conservation Corps is a state agency that provides a workforce development program for young adults ages 18-25 with environmental protection and conservation as its focus. The Corps is a part of the California Natural Resource Agency (CNRA) and is the oldest and largest conversation corps in the United States. The Corps has over 25 locations across the state and 1,600 young adults enrolled at any given time. It’s the only state run conservation corps in California.
“What we are doing is getting the next generation of conservation minded leaders in place,” Howard explained. He says departments like State Parks, Water Resources, CAL FIRE, and Fish and Wildlife are going to need people.
The Corps exposes young adults to the idea that a career in protecting and enhancing the environment is one that is viable, sustainable and meaningful.
Here in Tahoe, nearly 90 corpsmembers live at the center in Meyers with over 25 staff supporting the young adults.
The Tahoe center’s work spans two wildland fire fighting crews in partnership with CAL FIRE, a Forestry Corps with members who are enrolled in the Forestry Program at Lake Tahoe Community College, and crews working local and statewide projects in the areas of defensible space, trail restoration and emergency response.
Both the Palisades and Eaton Fire together burned over 37,000 acres, and over 16,000 structures, damaging more. Nearly 30 civilians have died. CAL FIRE reports both fires 100% contained as of Feb. 1.

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