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HomeMy WebLinkAboutWildfire Advisory Committee 2019-06-19 Minutes1 WILDFIRE ADVISORY COMMITTEE WEDNESDAY, JUNE 19, 2019 AT 8:00 AM SPECIAL MEETING SAN RAFAEL COMMUNITY CENTER, ROOM 4 619 B STREET, SAN RAFAEL, CALIFORNIA MINUTES MEMBERS PRESENT: Gary Phillips, Mayor Maribeth Bushey, Councilmember Romeo Arrieta Robert Chatham, Alternate Gina Daly Lisa DelGallo Kevin Hagerty Paula Kamena Larry Luckham Stephen Mizroch Gregory Poulos Rich Rusdorf Thomas Vogl Brian Waterbury Lauren Withey MEMBERS ABSENT: Sandra Luna Tom Obletz Tom Unterman OTHERS PRESENT: Cristine Alilovich, Assistant City Manager Quinn Gardner, Emergency Manager Coordinator, Staff Liaison Lisa Goldfien, Assistant City Attorney Robert Sinnott, Deputy Fire Chief Deborah Meltzer, Community Member Paul Minualt, Community Member Randy Wallace, Community Member INTRODUCTION Mayor Phillips welcomed and thanked committee and members of the public in attendance. The Mayor provided a background to the committee formation and purpose to help fill out the details of the plan and contribute community perspective for ordinance updates. The Mayor responded to a question about committee timing and deadlines with a hope that much of the work would be completed within 2019. 2 Assistant City Attorney, Lisa Goldfien provided an overview of the Brown Act and directions for how the committee may communicate. Lisa provided a Memorandum outlining the open meeting laws. MEETING OPEN TO THE PUBLIC Public comment encouraged additional public outreach on the status of the plan and next steps to help keep the public informed and engaged. MATTERS BEFORE THE COMMITTEE If necessary to assure completion of the following items, the Chairperson may establish time limits for the presentations by individual speakers. REVIEW OF NON-CONTROVERSIAL ITEMS Quinn facilitated a group discussion to determine what the committee should be deeply involved with first. The group also referenced a spreadsheet provided by Greg that outlined each item and his thoughts, concerns, and prioritization. Quinn commented that while some items may not need the groups detailed input, they would require their support in terms of outreach and helping spread the message in their communities and social networks. 4. Expand goat grazing – no comments, funding issue beyond the committee’s immediate role. Approved as a low priority/ non-controversial item 5. Establish fuel interruption zones (open space) – Approved as a low priority/ non-controversial item. Funding issue beyond the committee’s immediate role. o As described in the plan is not the fire roads issue (Greg wants to talk more about fire roads) 6. Improve Public Education- committee discussed and keep as non-controversial o Greg - Plan calls for $100k – let’s exercise caution as a committee, if we are going to green light $100k we should talk about it as a committee. o Quinn – there is not $100k budgeted that the committee can green light the money to be spent. o Greg – it would indicate to the community that this committee is in favor of $100k expenditure; suggest using caution. o Mayor – allocation of funding will be determined by the City Council and Fire Dept – not productive as to what we truly intend to do regarding how much cost. o Larry - This committee is not appropriating funds – that is a separate process we will follow later o Gina – Let’s defer a conversation about funding now…what would be included in a parcel tax – that is the point at which we need to chime in as a committee as to what we would want to be included. o Mayor – County/JPA is polling and identifying amounts of funding per parcel and what would be covered by that; we will have them come to a future meeting. 7. Establish more Firewise communities – no comment. Approved as a low priority/ non-controversial item. 3 9. Coordinate debris removal – no comment. Approved as a low priority/ non-controversial item. 10. Engage CERT and NRGs – no comment. Approved as a low priority/ non-controversial item. 11. Re-engage volunteer broom pull days – no comment. Approved as a low priority/ non-controversial item. 16. No smoking in open space – committee discussed and kept as non-controversial o Greg thinks we ought to look at this and others that he has indicated in his document – we will attach Greg’s document to the minutes. o Quinn called for a vote of the committee – show of hands in favor of keeping this a non-priority/non-controversial for purposes of the committee 19. Vegetation study and mitigation plan – committee discussed and keep as non-controversial o Greg – inconceivable with current resources that the fire dept. doesn’t have an idea of what areas of the city are overgrown – to spend $30k on an arieal map – is that the best use of resources is something. o Gina – do we need a better understanding based on climate change - yes; how we get at that understanding is a question about how much that will cost/budget issue; we do need better mapping. o Quinn – equity issue that neighbor to neighbor reporting; it’s an allocation discussion. o All of Fairhills is overgrown – later conversation re: funding. If one of these neighborhoods goes up, it’s billions, not $30k. First meeting – we have a lot of work to do and we need to get through this list because time is ticking at this is urgent; I don’t think we should be talking about money. o This committee isn’t allocating funds anyway. The piecemeal approach doesn’t provide the uniform evaluation that fire department needs to make an adequate assessment of needs. The notion you could do it piecemeal and have it cost free isn’t logical. o Should we even be talking about money? No o Timeline of the mapping? I would hope vegetation mgt issues will have remedied, so the mapping will not look that same if you started right away – how long does the mapping take at the parcel level? o Mayor – timeline we/staff can get back to you on what the timeline of these items are and what would be implemented when. 20. Fire road analysis and fuel breaks o Potential of environmental impact study – can take up to 2-3 years – need to look at timeline o Greg – fire road re: EIR – state has waived some requirements in order to move forward more quickly – the city could look at doing it with agreement to waive the EIR – encourage city to look into that. 24. Sign improvements – no immediate comments. Further discussion requested sign improvements be part of the evacuation plan improvement discussion. 26. Additional vegetation and mitigation staff – no comment. Approved as a low priority/ non- controversial item. 4 o Question on status of rehiring for vacant vegetation management staff positions. One starts this month, another is in background. 27. Increase police ranger staffing – no comment. Approved as a low priority/ non-controversial item. 30. Improve alerting capabilities – Committee wants this to stay on the list. o City just updated Nixle; some controversy re: opt in/opt out, but most of that will be State laws o We have redundancy with County as back up to o Paula stated she thinks sirens would have gone a long way – disagree that they wouldn’t be heard and think it would have gone a long way in Santa Rosa; shouldn’t be excluded because it’s cheap o Have to have different modalities of alerting; a lot of older resident. o Mayor proposed bringing to one of these meetings to discuss 31. Increase early fire warning detection – no comment. Item is in progress, committee believes it is important but outside their scope. 32. Review and expand evacuation planning – Committee wants this to stay on the list (maybe beyond the scope of what the committee can fix but wants to have a bigger discussion about this) o Public comment – fire trucks, very narrow roads – how do people escape if they have no way out. o Signage is important, so the parking is clear and fire trucks can get out. o Mayor stated the need for public education on the issue. 33. Assure critical infrastructure - committee discussed and keep as non-controversial, but will come back to it to provide update to the committee o Paula expressed disappointed to see one of the items isn’t undergrounding the power lines – I don’t understand. The city ran a construction project 18 years ago. We back up to open space – not all power lines, but PGE and put those power lines underground. o Homeowner’s insurance cancelled o MBB – CPUC makes the decision and it costs a lot of money. o Staff can research if we can make undergrounding required with new development. 34. Assure staff can send and receive alerts – no comment. Outside committee’s scope 35. Assure staff can communicate – no comment. Outside committee’s scope 36. Garage door battery backups – Committee wants this to stay on the list, it will need to be a local ordinance. o Gina proposed that any item that may have direct cost to homeowners should be considered by the committee. Other members supported that notion. 38. County collaboration – Brief discussion about ongoing efforts. Outside the committees scope, but staff will provide updates as it related to their work and impact areas. Robert raised questions and concerns about the PG&E Public Safety Power Shutoffs. Quinn briefly addressed, and mentioned that the Federation will be hosting a community meeting on July 11th to 5 help community members know how to prepare. PROPOSED MEETING DATES AND TIME The committee agreed to meeting at 4:30pm-6:00pm on July 10th and July 31st, with future meeting dates to be set at upcoming meetings. Quinn committed to sending out the current vegetation ordinances prior to the next meeting for the groups review. By request the item list will be updated to reflect the group priorities and shared before the next meeting. FUTURE TOPICS The committee agreed to look at items related to vegetation ordinances at the next meeting, including items 1, 2, 3, 8, and 13. Romeo suggested a back up topic be selected in case time allows. The group agreed to number 12, the WUI map review, as a secondary discussion item. Gina suggested evacuation and alerting items be a meeting topic. ADJOURNMENT: 9:30am NEXT MEETING: July 10, 2019. 4:30PM