Wildfires: defensible space: grant programs: local governments.

Existing law requires the Director of Forestry and Fire Protection to establish a statewide program to allow certain entities, including counties and other political subdivisions of the state, that have completed a specified training program, to support and augment the Department of Forestry and Fire Protection in its defensible space and home hardening assessment and education efforts. Existing law requires the director to establish a common reporting platform that allows defensible space and home hardening assessment data, collected by the qualified entities, to be reported to the department. Existing law requires the department to establish a local assistance grant program for fire prevention and home hardening education activities and provides that local agencies, among others, are eligible for these grants. Existing law describes eligible activities under the local assistance grant program as including, among other activities, development and implementation of public education and outreach programs. This bill would authorize those public education and outreach programs to include new technologies and game elements to enhance and accelerate the education of property owners. Existing law requires the State Fire Marshal to identify areas of the state as moderate, high, and very high fire hazard severity zones based on specified criteria. Existing law requires a local agency to designate, by ordinance, the State Fire Marshal's moderate, high, and very high fire hazard severity zones in its jurisdiction within 120 days of receiving recommendations from the State Fire Marshal, and authorizes a local agency, at its discretion, to include additional areas within the jurisdiction of the local agency as moderate, high, and very high fire hazard severity zones. This bill would require the department, when reviewing applications for the local assistance grant program, to give priority to any local governmental entity that is qualified to perform defensible space assessments in very high and high fire hazard severity zones and that reports that information using the common reporting platform, as provided. Existing law requires a person who owns, leases, controls, operates, or maintains a building or structure in, upon, or adjoining a mountainous area, forest-covered lands, shrub-covered lands, grass-covered lands, or land that is covered with flammable material to maintain defensible space of 100 feet from each side of the structure, with more intense fuel reductions between 5 and 30 feet around the structure and an ember-resistant zone required within 5 feet of the structure, based on regulations adopted by the State Board of Forestry and Fire Protection. Existing law requires fuels to be maintained and spaced in a condition so that a wildfire, burning under average weather conditions, would be unlikely to ignite the structure. Existing law provides that the requirement for an ember-resistant zone shall take effect for existing structures one year after the effective date for new structures. A violation of these requirements is a crime. Existing law requires the board to classify state responsibility areas, defined by reference to certain conditions of forest and vegetation cover and excluding municipal and federal areas, where preventing and suppressing fires is the state's financial responsibility. This bill would instead, without reference to weather conditions, require fuels to be maintained and spaced in a condition so that a wildfire would be unlikely to ignite the structure. The bill would require a person who owns, leases, controls, operates, or maintains a building or structure in the state responsibility area, regardless of location or forest and vegetation cover, to maintain defensible space of 100 feet from each side. The bill would authorize regulations to alter the fuel reduction required between 5 and 30 feet to integrate the ember-resistant zone, and would provide that the requirement for the ember-resistant zone shall instead take effect for existing structures 3 years after the effective date for new structures, as specified. By expanding the scope of a crime, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. The bill would also make conforming changes with respect to a person who owns, leases, controls, operates, or maintains an occupied dwelling or occupied structure that is within a very high fire hazard severity zone designated by a local agency. This bill would incorporate additional changes to Section 4124.5 of the Public Resources Code proposed by SB 675 to be operative only if this bill and SB 675 are enacted and this bill is enacted last. The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.