As California grapples with the most extensive wildfires in the state’s history, OPR has released a draft update to the Fire Hazard Planning Technical Advisory (Fire Hazard Planning TA) for public comment. The draft update has been prepared in response to Senate Bill 901 (Dodd, 2018) and Assembly Bill 2911 (Friedman, 2018), which called for OPR to update the Fire Hazard Planning TA to include specific land use strategies to reduce fire risk to buildings, infrastructure, and communities.

The document is meant to assist cities and counties as they revise their general plans and provides guidance on:

  • outreach and engagement to promote more robust and collaborative wildfire solutions; 

  • conducting comprehensive wildfire hazard and risk assessments; 

  • aligning and integrating these assessments across a variety of plans; and 

  • developing general plan policies and programs that reduce risk for existing and future communities. 

Moreover, the TA includes sample policies and programs, case studies, potential funding sources, and numerous other resources and tools to support local level planning and implementation to reduce wildfire risk at the community scale.