Sawtooth Valley Fire Collaborative Meeting

Al Jones, Battalion Commander for our Smiley Creek Fire Protection District asked me to share information about the annual Sawtooth Valley Collaborative Meeting in Stanley this coming Thursday and Friday, May 23 and 24. The meeting will take place at the Stanley Firehouse. View Meeting Agenda.

The whole purpose of the meeting and the collaborative is to engage the public and land owners into increasing engagement with the Forest Service in regards to fire preparedness and mitigation. It was started back in the Halsted fire days to see if we could encourage the Forest Service to help reduce the severity and scale of large fires and reduce smoke. So it is mostly a way to engage with the overlying agencies and hope to get the public’s voice heard.

This particular meeting is what to do to prepare for a fire, FireWise homes, funding for fuel reduction, that sort of thing.

I believe there is a field trip out to see some firewire homes and some fuel reduction areas that the FS has done. This group helped start the fuel reduction in the Alturas - Petit area.

Blaine and Custer Counties will be there discussing the CWPP (community wildfire protection plan) and are both in the process of updating their plans.

Suzy Hayes

Sawtooth City Association Pres