To quote from the legendary Bill Veeck, “there are only two seasons—winter and baseball.” Now that spring is finally here and San Francisco Giants baseball has begun, it’s time to rejoice.

Monthly Highlights:

The Menlo Park Fire Protection District is proudly the Sponsoring Agency for one (1) of the twenty-eight (28) Task Force teams. Menlo Park's team is California Task Force 3 (CA-TF3). CA-TF3 is a local team that responds regionally, statewide and nationally as part of the National Response System. CA-TF3 operates under guidelines established with a Cooperative Agreement with the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). CA-TF3 has a long history in the Fire District and has had the support of the State and Federal government for decades.



On February 28th, I was honored to be a table guest of SCCFSC board member Harold Schapelhouman, the retired Menlo Park Fire Chief at the inaugural CA-Task Force 3 Foundation’s Crab Cioppino fundraiser. The California Task Force 3 Foundation exists to raise funds and receive charitable donations to distribute for charitable purposes in support of the Urban Search and Rescue Program known as California Task Force 3. The inaugural fundraiser goal was to provide better support to their Canine Teams. A good time was had, and I got to spend time with many folks who are the first to respond to disasters of all stripes like the Oklahoma City Bombing, Hurricane Katrina, 9/11 and many, many others. It was humbling and joyous to be part of this. Thanks Harold!

OK, enough from me this month—I’ll head back to the dugout and let the SCCFSC team step up to the plate. Thanks for reading.

Yours truly,



Seth Schalet

CEO, Santa Clara County FireSafe Council

The meeting was held on February 13, 2026, at the Santa Clara County FireSafe Council Headquarters, to plan 2026 and beyond and to develop a partner list for those organizations we want to be part of the South Bay PBA. We look forward to scaling this up and bringing good fire training, education and use to Santa Clara County and adding Rx fire to our Forest Health Grant program practice to reduce invasive species, facilitate effective fuels management and lower the risk of catastrophic #wildfire in the areas we treat! 

We will be incorporating technology for monitoring embercast and restarts utilizing N5 Sensors, Inc. and utilizing BurnPro3d, powered by WIFIRE Commons, a science-driven, decision-support platform to help the fire management community understand risks and tradeoffs quickly and accurately when planning and conducting prescribed burns.

A big thank you to the California State Coastal Conservancy for providing the initial $400,000 seed funding grant to get this up and running.

The South Bay PBA is excited to announce it will be hosting the courses to obtain a Firefighter Type II certificate, along with additional community workshops! There will be 20 available spots for the Firefighter Type II training.

As the PBA continues to take shape, we encourage you to regularly visit the Santa Clara County FireSafe Council’s South Bay PBA webpage for the latest updates, opportunities to get involved, and information on how to obtain your Firefighter Type II (FFT2) certification. Start your training now!

The Santa Clara County FireSafe Council has been conditionally approved by the California Fire Safe Council (CFSC) for a funding extension under the 2025 County Coordinator Grant Program. This funding extension is the result of the $9.5 million Direct County Coordinator Program appropriation in the State of California 2025-26 budget. In partnership with the CAL FIRE Wildfire Prevention Grant Program, CFSC was able to integrate this appropriation into our existing Wildfire Prevention Grant, thus creating a wrap-around grant program with a longer planning and implementation horizon – exciting!

We are looking forward to working with Senator Becker and advocating for funding through SB 973 legislation he has cosponsored. SB 973 addresses a core challenge communities face: while proven strategies like home hardening, defensible space, fuels reduction, evacuation planning, and community education reduce wildfire risk, many communities lack the capacity to assess risk, prioritize projects, and implement solutions at scale. The bill responds by pairing standardized, state-led wildfire risk assessment guidance with locally delivered implementation capacity—ensuring state wildfire strategy consistently translates into on-the-ground action.

Announcing our guest speakers of 2026.

Not that you need any enticement to attend our monthly board meetings—but just in case! The slate of 2026 guest speakers on tap is taking shape. Here is the line up for what's coming up. 

April: Dr. Yifang Zhu will share study Indoor and Outdoor Volatile Organic Compound Levels during and after the 2025 Los Angeles Wildfires.

May: Jackson Yip, Cofounder of Paladin Industries, will present and demo Paladin’s Initial Attack (IA) platform. IA includes evaluating the fire, patrolling, monitoring, determining what additional resources are needed and implementing suppression actions to stop the fire and protect both firefighters and public safety.

June: Jay Balagna, MPH, MPhil, RAND School of Public Policy, is the lead author of Accelerating Technological Innovation Across the U.S. Wildfire Management System and will present on these findings.

July: Hussam Mahmoud will make a repeat appearance at our monthly Board meeting series. Since his first appearance three years ago, he picked up a fancy new title, Craig E. Philip Endowed Chair of Engineering, Professor of Civil & Environmental Engineering, Director, Vanderbilt Center for Sustainability, Energy, and Climate. Hussam will present on the recently released study he chaired, Wildfire Modelling and Artificial Intelligence.

September: What happens if EV charging stations burn in a wildfire, or low charged EV batteries die and start clogging the roads because they run out of juice? Join us for this insightful presentation to review an emerging issue and study all Emergency Managers, City Planners--and EV owners should read: The green gridlock: Projecting the unintended wildfire evacuation risks of EV adoption study 

Khondhaker Al Momin, E.I.T is a Ph.D. Candidate in Transportation Engineering at the University of Oklahoma, and the lead author of a recent study examining the unintended wildfire evacuation risks associated with increasing electric vehicle adoption, integrating infrastructure dependency, evacuation modeling, and system-level risk analysis.