Wildfire and Forest Resilience Task Force: interagency funding strategy: multiple benefit projects: grant program guidelines.

Existing law establishes in the Natural Resources Agency the Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, and requires the department to be responsible for, among other things, fire protection and prevention, as provided. Existing law establishes the Wildfire and Forest Resilience Task Force and requires the task force to develop a comprehensive implementation strategy to track and ensure the achievement of the goals and key actions identified in the state's "Wildfire and Forest Resilience Action Plan" issued by the task force in January 2021. Existing law declares that the department has extensive technical expertise in wildland fire prevention and vegetation management on forest, range, and watershed land, and, when appropriately applied, this expertise can have significant public resource benefits, including decreasing high-intensity wildland fires, improving watershed management, and improving carbon resilience, among other benefits. This bill would require the task force, or its successor, to develop, in partnership with the agency and its member entities, an interagency funding strategy that promotes integrated, multiple benefit projects that address wildfire, watershed function, biodiversity, and climate adaptation and mitigation, to achieve landscape resilience on fire-prone lands and outcomes more aligned with an ecosystem-based approach, as defined. The bill would require the agency and other relevant state entities to review and update relevant grant guidelines for certain climate change, biodiversity, conservation, fire, and watershed restoration programs to encourage multiple benefit projects. The bill would also require the programs to review and revise relevant grant guidelines to reinforce the program alignment to integrate conservation action with landscape restoration actions to ensure that landscapes are protected and well managed for climate, biodiversity, water security, and fire resilience. The bill would further require, to the extent feasible, investments in natural and working lands to be guided by California's Nature-Based Solutions Climate Targets and the Natural and Working Lands Climate Smart Strategy.