Wildfire: Regional Forest and Fire Capacity Program: local assistance grant program: regional landscape grants

The law gives regional and local partners more ways to fund projects that reduce wildfire risk, protect communities, and improve ecosystem health. It also expressly supports approaches tailored to forests, chaparral, shrublands, grasslands, and coastal sage scrub.

What the law does ​

• Authorizes the Department of Conservation, the Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, and the Wildlife Conservation Board to award regional landscape grants to qualified regional entities for regional wildfire-resilience strategies.
• Requires the Department of Forestry and Fire Protection and the Wildlife Conservation Board to develop grant-funding guidelines with the Wildfire and Forest Resilience Task Force before issuing their regional landscape grants.
• Makes advance payments available indefinitely for Regional Forest and Fire Capacity Program grants.
• Expands local fire-prevention grant activities to include vegetation modification and ignition prevention, including infrastructure hardening, ignition-resistant materials, and education or planning to reduce human-caused fires.
• Directs landscape-scale wildfire funding toward ecosystem-health projects in chaparral, shrubland, grassland, and coastal sage scrub, as well as regional landscape grants.

Who it affects ​

• Regional entities, including local and tribal governments, resource conservation districts, joint powers authorities, state conservancies, and qualified nonprofits.
• Local agencies, fire safe councils, tribes, conservation corps, University of California Cooperative Extension, nonprofits, landowners, and community groups seeking wildfire-prevention funding.
• Residents and communities in high and very high fire-hazard areas.

Context ​

The grants must support goals in California’s Wildfire and Forest Resilience Action Plan.