Tuesday, February 18, 2025

Okanogan Conservation District unveils new wildfire protection plan

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OKANOGAN - After a year-long effort led by the Okanogan Conservation District, the 2024 Community  Wildfire Protection Plan (CWPP) for Okanogan County was officially approved on January 7 and signed by the Okanogan County Commissioners and the Washington State  Department of Natural Resources. The CWPP was published on January 16 and is available on the Okanogan Conservation District’s website. 

This updated document acknowledges the collaborative work of more than 1,000 community  members and over 100 partners, including Okanogan County Emergency Management,  Washington State Department of Natural Resources, USDA Forest Service, and the  Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation. This includes residents and business owners,  fire districts, local government organizations and non-profits, tribal partners, local, state, and  federal natural resource managers, and wildfire recovery, air quality, and additional  conservation groups.  

The CWPP promotes a county-wide wildfire hazard mitigation concept that is intended to  guide the way to a safe and sustainable future for Okanogan County, ensuring that people,  structures, infrastructure, wildlife, livestock, unique ecosystems, natural resources, and cultural  heritage are protected and resilient to wildfire. An active and up-to-date CWPP is required to  qualify applicants for certain wildfire resiliency grants and some forms of federal post-wildfire  aid. The accomplishment of this update in 2024 allows Okanogan County to have an active  CWPP until 2034.  

First authorized by Congress in 2003, CWPPs are intended to identify and prioritize areas for  hazardous fuel reduction treatments and recommend the types and methods of treatment to  protect communities and measures to reduce structure ignitability. The first Okanogan County  CWPP was drafted in 2009 and was last updated in 2013, one year before the Carlton Complex  Fire.  

The 2024 CWPP edition, succeeded in incorporating over 1,000 Okanogan County residents  who provided invaluable information highlighting their experiences with wildfire, concerns for  the future, and areas of priority for action. Public feedback was collected throughout 2024 via online inquiries, a community survey, and five hybrid public meetings that were organized in various locations across the County. 

This feedback was combined with local partner input and previous CWPP action item  information to assist the CWPP planning committee in the development of over 180 action  items. These project actions are not legally-binding but are intended to help prioritize and guide  planning efforts for wildfire resiliency, forest and shrubsteppe health management, and wildfire  recovery in Okanogan County for the next decade.  

Action items range from supporting already existing fuel treatments, education programs, and  efforts in pursuit of funding to retrofit and build new fire halls to supporting the use of  prescribed fire on private and public lands, the expansion of critical infrastructure, and  increasing access to air filtration systems to reduce wildfire smoke impacts on public health.  

In addition to those action items, the 305-page document provides a narrative of the drastic changes to the landscape and recent history of wildfire in Okanogan County, assesses current  and future wildfire risk, includes newly added sections to highlight air quality and shrubsteppe  management challenges, and includes educational information and resources for best practices  to assist property owners, residents, and natural resource managers with their wildfire  resilience and recovery efforts.  

The CWPP draft was offered for public review in September 2024 and received final approval  from the Okanogan County Commissioners on November 17th, 2024. It was then approved by  George Geissler, Washington State Forester (WA DNR) on January 7th, 2025, surmounting its  last hurdle in the process of becoming officially approved. The partners involved have  committed to annually revisiting the plan to assess the success of implementing the numerous  action items, with plans to perform a formal update in five years and a new plan in 2034.  

The CWPP is available online at https://www.okanogancd.org/cwpp. Physical copies are not yet  ready, but once printed will be available at the Okanogan Conservation District’s office and  other locations will be noted on the website. 

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