Fire Mitigation and Education

Fire prevention and education activities in the Palm Springs - South Coast Fire Management Zone serve an area populated by 20 million people. The wildland urban interface, where homes and preserved open space intermingle, are host to the severe wildland fires that make the news worldwide every summer. Recreational opportunities in wildland areas receive the use of not only the experienced woodsman but the novice visitor unfamiliar with fire risks in chaparral (a fire adapted ecosystem) and a desert scrub vegetation (a fire-intolerant ecosystem). The same lack of awareness occurs along border immigration corridors where international travelers bring different cultural fire practices into the tinderbox of southern California sometimes with fatal results. This area has some of the fastest burning ground cover in the western U.S. and is truly a fire adapted ecosystem. The mission of the BLM fire prevention staff is to educate public land users, enforce fire policy, and mitigate fire damage risks through fuels modification and community protection.

The Palm Springs - South Coast Resource Area is covered by two Fire Mitigation and Education Specialists, Chuck Robbins who covers prevention activities for Los Angeles, portions of San Bernardino and Riverside Counties and Clay Howe who covers prevention activities for San Diego and Imperial Counties.