From the October 2012 Battle Mountain News

Post date: Jul 3, 2014 10:12:32 PM

November Annual Meeting - Changes to Backyard Burn Rules - Board Election

On November 12th, from 7 to 9 pm, we will having our annual meeting to report on the grant projects we will be wrapping up this winter and our plans for the future. As we go to press, the Monterey Bay Unified Air Pollution Control District Board [MBUAPCD] voting on changes to their rules for backyard burning. The rule changes primarily impact the San Lorenzo, which regularly falls out of compliance with State air quality standards in winter. There has been concern her about how the rule changes might effect Bonny Doon. We are lucky to have David Frisbey from MBUAPCD, the District community liason for the rule changes, as our guest speaker for the November annual meeting. Bring your questions!

Last, but most importantly, the November annual meeting is when we elect new members to out Board. Help us build a fire adapted, resilient community within our fire ecosystem – consider joining our board. For more information, contact us by one of themeans below.

Neighbors Helping Neighbors

Federal grant funds ultimately come from our taxes; the money goes up the chain to Washington, then comes back down, loosing a chunk every step of the way. It is far more effective to keep the money local.

The Bonny Doon Fire Safe Council is expressly organized to do just that. We are very lucky to have the Ben Lomond Conservation Camp on our mountain. Their 12 to 15 man crews are available for just $200/day to 501(c)(3) non-profits community groups with the requisite liability insurance, such as your Fire Safe Council, to perform fire preparedness projects in the public interest.

In practice this means getting a group of neighbors together to come up with an idea and the minimal funding for a neighborhood project. The crews are prohibited from working on projects for individual small landowners or on creating or maintaining the 100' of defensible space around homes mandated by Public Resources Code 4291. The 2010 San Mateo/Santa Cruz County Community Wildfire Protection plan, http://www.santacruzcountyfire.com/cwpp.html defines and prioritizes the public interest for our purposes. Examples are securing a shared access road, clearing shared space, chipping the slash generated in a neighborhood-wide initiative to clear defensible space, etc. Further examples are in our Community

We are actively soliciting projects for the coming fire prevention season. We will work with you in scoping and planning the project, fill out the necessary paperwork, and coordinate the logistics of actually implementing the project.