Policy

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Response to UC Hill Campus Vegetation Management Plan by the Claremont Canyon Conservancy

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The New Reality

The increased number and severity of wildfires in California over the past three years illustrates that we are in a new reality. Hotter summers combined with drought, longer, warmer falls and more prolonged Diablo winds, and now lightning, all brought about in large part by climate change, have altered our environment and increased the likelihood and danger of wildfires. (See notes A-D) Firefighters and government officials are telling us that once a wildfire gets started, our only recourse is evacuation. (See note E) The UC Hill Campus Vegetation Management Plan acknowledges this reality by making evacuation routes safer, removing highly flammable vegetation within 100 feet along Centennial Drive, Claremont Avenue and the Jordan Fire Trail. So far, so good.

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Comments from Jerry Kent regarding UC's Draft Plan and EIR

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The following comments are submitted by Jerry Kent on behalf of the Claremont Canyon Conservancy in response to the draft UC HILL WILDLAND VEGETATIVE FUEL MANAGEMENT PLAN/EIR (WVFMP/EIR). The Conservancy has been a strong supporter of University efforts to mitigate fire hazards on the Hill Campus since the 1991 fire. Including the significant fire hazard reduction improvements that were achieved by removing eucalyptus, pine, acacia, and other flammable planted and invasive vegetation between 2000 and 2007 in Claremont Canyon, at Chaparral Hill, and along the partial and incompleted joint EBRPD and UC Grizzly Peak Boulevard Ridgetop Fuelbreak.

A list of organizations endorsing a joint powers agency can be found here

  • Claremont Canyon Conservancy

  • Friends of the Montclair RR Trail

  • Garber Park Stewards

  • Kensington Neighbors for Wildfire Safety

  • Kensington Public Safety Council

  • Make El Cerrito Fire Safe

  • Montclair Neighborhood Council

  • North Hills Community Association

  • Oakland Firesafe Council

  • Oakland Landscape Committee

  • Piedmont Pines Neighborhood Assn

  • Regional Parks Association

  • South Hills Beat 35Y.

Update on UC’s Plan and EIR by Jon Kaufman

The Conservancy continues to follow vegetation management work by the major landowners in Claremont Canyon as the threat of wildfire continues. This work is even more important now since the pandemic has strapped the financial resources of public agencies and potentially weakened their ability to both prevent and fight future wildfires. The University has begun developing a plan to manage vegetation on its upper, less developed campus. This affects those of us who live in and below the Canyon. At an earlier public meeting the University announced that its plan would be released for public comment before the Environmental Impact Report on it was prepared. We have now learned that the plan and the draft EIR will be made public together later this summer with public comment to follow. While this may appear to make the process more efficient, it runs the risk of making it harder for the University and the community to reach agreement on what vegetation management the eventual project will include. The Conservancy fears that the plan and the project will not be adequate and that significant fire-prone vegetation will not be removed from the hills on UC land. We are following this matter closely and will be prepared to step in as appropriate. Forestry Professor Emeritus Joe McBride prepared a proposal for wildfire mitigation last year which we believe offers the University the best way to prevent wildfire in both Strawberry and Claremont Canyons and we again urge the University to adopt it.

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Fuel management proposal for UC Hill Campus by Joe R. McBride

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The purpose of this paper is to present a fuel management plan for University of California property located in Strawberry and Claremont canyons. The plan will identify site-specific fuel reduction treatments to reduce the fire hazard present in naturally occurring vegetation types and to convert highly hazardous plantations of eucalyptus and conifer species to less hazardous naturally occurring vegetation types.

Click here for Professor McBride’s full proposal.

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Comments regarding the NOP and IS from Stuart Flashman and Michael Graf

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These comment are submitted by myself and Mr. Michael Graf, Esq. on behalf of the Claremont Canyon Conservancy (“Conservancy”), a 501(c)(3) nonprofit membership organization, in response to the University of California Regents’ Notice of Preparation (“NOP”) and Initial Study (“IS”) for the above-referenced plan. We appreciate the opportunity to submit these comments, which enlarge upon comments made by the two of us at the public scoping meeting held on December 2, 2019.

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Comments submitted by Jerry Kent regarding UC's NOP and Initial Study

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The Conservancy has been a strong supporter of the University’s efforts to mitigate fire hazards on the Hill Campus since the 1991 fire—including the significant fire hazard reduction improvements that were achieved between 2000 and 2007 in Claremont Canyon, at Chaparral Hill, and along the Grizzly Peak Boulevard Ridgetop Fuel break between Grizzly Peak and Chaparral Hill.  We believe UC was able to accomplish important fire mitigation work at these project areas with limited funds, limited staffing, and without opposition by the public.

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Conservancy submits comments regarding UC's Vegetative Fuel Management Initial Study, by Jon Kaufman

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We were pleased to learn that the Initial Study is not the complete plan that UC intends to make the subject of the Environmental Impact Report. As was noted at the scoping meeting, the Initial Study is too vague and non-specific. As UC and its consultant develop the full plan, we urge that the following points be given careful consideration.

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UC Professor Emeritus Joe McBride's comments regarding UC's Vegetative Fuel Management Initial Study

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On November 20, 2019, UC Berkeley issued a Notice of Preparation (NOP) of an Environmental Impact Report (EIR) for its Hill Campus Wildland Fuel Management Plan. The following response by UC Professor Emeritus Joe McBride was submitted to the planners, along with oral comments given at a December 2 scoping meeting:

Response to UC Berkeley Hill Campus Management Plan – Joe McBride – Nov. 25, 2019

… Vegetation management treatments are proposed (e.g., defensible space; shaded fuel breaks; roadside fuel breaks) without providing the details of these treatments.  It is suggested that ‘five types of vegetation treatment activities are proposed for implementation, but no specific details are given as to how decisions will be made in the three vegetation treatment types to select one or more of the vegetation treatment activities.  More specificity is needed to access the environmental impacts and the potential effectiveness of the vegetation treatment activities.

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The Claremont Canyon Conservancy and UC Professor Joe McBride collaborate, by Jon Kaufman

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Members of the conservancy’s board of directors spent much of the past summer working with UC Berkeley Forestry Professor Emeritus Joe McBride developing a plan to manage vegetation in Strawberry and Claremont canyons. I am pleased to report that Joe’s plan is now available at www.claremontcanyon.org/fuel-management-proposal. We urge UC to follow the plan as it is the standard for how to minimize the damage of a future wildfire.

Introducing the Oakland community preparedness and response program by Doug Mosher

In light of continued wildfire and earthquake disaster threats to Oakland, the Oakland Firesafe Council has begun a new program called Oakland Community Preparedness and Response (OCPR). The program, which launched in September, will help citizens and groups in the Oakland hills and foothills—both high- risk areas due to the “very high-hazard wild fire zone” at the Wildland-Urban Interface and the 120-mile-long major earthquake zone along the Hayward Fault—to prepare for these threats. The goal is to bring about fewer injuries and deaths and lower financial losses in the event of a major disaster, such as a wild re or earthquake.

Summer update, by Jon Kaufman

Conservancy volunteers were busy in June and July working on the trails in our canyon, while efforts to make us safer from wildfire were moving forward at UC, in Oakland, and in Sacramento.

In June, our volunteers relocated a small section of the Willow Trail, where it had become a seasonal creek, and a little further up the trail moved a creek crossing where erosion had begun to weaken one of the corners.

President's Message, by Jon Kaufman

At its March meeting, the Conservancy Board of Directors elected new officers—including Marilyn Goldhaber as Vice President, Nancy Mueller as Secretary, Kay Loughman as Treasurer, and myself as President. Tim led this organization with dedication and a steady hand for much of the past 18 years. Fortunately, we are not saying goodbye to Tim; he will remain on the board as a member-at-large.

I begin my term with a shout-out to retiring president Tim Wallace.

Oakland reconsiders vegetation management in biennial budget, by Elizabeth K. Stage

Oakland’s current $4 million funding level for vegetation management, for which the Conservancy and other local organizations lobbied hard, will need our support again soon. In February, the city’s finance director, Katano Kasaine, told the City Council that these funds, to be spread over two years, were a “onetime appropriation” and thus were not included in the baseline budget.

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UC awarded $3.6 million grant for its Hill Campus by Jerry Kent

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After more than a decade of disappointments in its failure to obtain funding to assist with vegetation management and wildfire protection, the University of California is once again hopeful as it has been awarded a $3.6 million grant from Cal Fire.

UC’s Grant Proposal to Cal Fire: The University of California at Berkeley proposes to treat vegetation in 250 acres in its Hill Campus (upper parts of Strawberry and Claremont canyons) to reduce wildfire hazard to its buildings and nearby homes, targeting areas forested with “flammable eucalyptus and high fuel volume.” UC will also create defensible space within 100 feet of roads, fire-trails, buildings, and homes and increase the reliability of the 150 KV transmission line that supplies power the campus and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

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