The Sierra Nevada Conservancy, a California state agency focused on improving the environmental, economic and social well-being of the Sierra-Cascade region, reports that its governing board recently awarded $8,649,243 in wildfire and forest resilience grants to 10 different projects in the Sierra-Cascade that will help protect natural landscapes and nearby communities from major disturbances, such as wildfire.
Grants from Proposition 4 funding will go to new projects focused on fuel reduction and community protection across nine counties. In Plumas County, the Sierra Institute for Community and Environment was awarded $990,766 for the Plumas County Resilience Project. Organizers promise the project will reduce wildfire risk, improve forest health and support workforce development through treatments near the towns of Quincy, Meadow Valley, Taylorsville and Genesse.
“Getting funds into the hands of our local and regional partners to reduce fuels in overly dense forests, widen and lengthen strategic fuelbreaks and enhance critical ingress/egress routes, which all help to protect communities throughout the Sierra-Cascade, has been one of our primary goals since voters passed the Climate Bond in 2024,” said SNC Executive Officer Angela Avery.
The SNC’s Wildfire and Forest Resilience Directed Grant Program seeks to create more resilient forest landscapes and watersheds, reduce wildfire risk and protect communities. All grants awarded in this program will reduce fuels near communities to protect them from wildfire.
Fuel-reduction work also contributes toward reaching statewide nature-based solutions wildfire risk reduction targets, said SNC. Nature-based solutions harness the power of nature to build California’s resilience to future climate-driven extremes, protect communities from the climate crisis and remove carbon from the atmosphere.
State leaders recognize that expanding NBS is essential to meeting California’s core climate goals, said SNC. Beginning in 2030, California aims to complete 700,000 acres of fuel-reduction work annually.
