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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2019.02.20 Wildfire Safety Commission Minutes ACTION MINUTES FOR A MEETING OF THE WILDFIRE SAFETY COMMISSION Wednesday, February 20,2019, 11:OOAM to 1:OOPM Training Room, Ashland Fire Station#1, 1860 Ashland Street I. CALL TO ORDER: Stephen Gagne, Bruce Moats, Doug Kay, Tracy Peddicord, Daniel Dawson, Tonya Graham,Alison Lerch, Chris Chambers II. INTRODUCTIONS David Lane Cat Gould, Tree Commission catgouldggmail.com Kent Romney III.APPROVAL OF MINUTES: January 19, 2018 Doug motions to approve,Bruce second, all in favor IV. PUBLIC AND GUESTS FORUM Stephen will send the proposals from David Lane to the Commissioners for review for the March 2019 meeting. Kent Romney has lived in Ashland for 10 years. He has been working in public safety for a couple decades and is working with the USFS on the national CMAT teams. He has been on 4 assignments and has a background as a structural and wildland firefighter in Josephine County. Cat Gould is new on the Tree Commission. There is discussion on a collaboration with the Tree Commission and Wildfire Mitigation Commission for Earth Day on April 20,2019 to educate citizens on the Wildfire Safety Ordinance pertaining to trees. Both commissions will need to have a working group meeting to align and cross pollinate. Stephen,Doug, Tonya, Alison and Chris will put together a doodle poll for this working group. V.ADJUSTMENTS TO THE AGENDA Add Commission Rules to New Business Move 2019 Fire Season Meeting to New Business VI. CITY COUNCIL CHECK IN VII. NEW BUSINESS A. Commission Rules a. City Commissions follow Public Meeting Law. All commission email is public record. An email quorum is considered a Public Meeting. It is encouraged to not have an email conversation beyond logistics for a meeting. If Commissioners want to inquire about a specific item for the next meeting,they should email the Staff Liaison and Chair. You can also Blind Carbon Copy(bcc)the Commissioners to avoid this issue. If the Commission creates subcommittees,these meetings need to be noticed with minutes posted. We should call these working groups,not ad hoc subcommittees. If Commissioners take notes at meetings,they are part of the public record. It is encouraged to keep these notes in a folder and save them for the record. Commissioners should declare their conflicts of interest and not vote on something if it will be one. A City of Ashland conflict of interest is anything that would impair your independence of judgement. There is State Conflict of interest which is a direct benefit, and potential conflict of interest,where it is not as obvious. When in doubt, shout it out. Tonya mentioned the Chairs of Commissions will be trained on this information that would include the Public Meeting Law rules in plain,tight language. B. Oregon Ready, Set, Go! Website (Dan) a. Dan projected the is Klamath Ready, Set Go! website(oregonrsg.gov)that has substantial content including the Intterra data that was collected in 2018 for all homes in Ashland. There is a place holder on the home page that says Assess My Risk. Once you click on that, it brings you to an online map that you can scroll through and see all homes that have been assessed in Oregon. You can create a thorough report with the home risk data. The site also has GIS data layers embedded in the risk portal. Chris would like to talk to the Keno Fire Chief about seeing if the Ashland data can be hidden from this page. Ashland Fire &Rescue is in the process of working with WiRe, a wildfire research team, to roll out the Ashland Intterra risk data in 2019. C. Spring Retreat(Stephen) a. Stephen will send out a doodle poll for a March retreat before the regularly scheduled March Commission meeting. A main topic for this retreat is to determine if the Intterra risk data should be accessible to all citizens. Emergency Preparedness is also a hot topic with the three-month campaign. i. Retreat Agenda: • WiRe Pre sentation/Intterra Data • Revisit the document from last retreat(illegal campfire issues) ii. Details: • March 6th: 12-3pm, Station 1 D. Engaging Real Estate Agents in Ashland Meeting(Stephen) a. Kelly, Tonya, Steve, Chris and Alison met and talked about engaging numerous real estate agencies in Ashland to get insight from this community about future wildfire inspection proposals. Tracy and Stephen will work on this topic. E. Report regarding Jackie Bachman's discussion about campfire culture (Alison) a. Alison is presenting at the OHRA on March 18th and will report back at the next Commission meeting. F. Request from Mayor re"Travelers Ambassadors" a. All proposals working with travelers need to be run through the Mayor to avoid any miscommunications with work and cross pollination that is in process. G. 2019 Fire Season Campaign(Tonya) a. The team came up with a 3-month wildfire preparedness campaign starting in April. The May campaign will use literature from the Terri Eubanks,the Community Preparedness Coordinator. The group would like to leverage partnership from organizations and get sponsors for the campaign. The Geos Institute has offered to do graphic design. The main notion of the campaign is to create a sense of urgency. i. April: Prepare your Home ii. May: Be Ready for an evacuation iii. June: Be SmokeWise H. Wildfire Mitigation Commission Name Change a. The proposal passed first reading on February 20, 2019 and goes to second reading on March 5th. The commission would be called Wildfire Safety Commission by the April 2019 regular meeting. VIII. Noon PRESENTATION,Q &A A. City of Ashland Electrical Utilities (Thomas McBartlett) a. Thomas passed out a map showing the electrical breakers and connections where the city interfaces with PP&L lines. The monitoring system is being upgraded so the electrical department can remote in and shut down a system. b. What is your assessment of the level of maintenance that you have a budget for vs. the maintenance schedule that he feels the system needs? i. They are doing a good job,they maintain the entire system every 3 years. They have a full-time tree trimming crew. The system is overbuilt capacity-wise. Some of the older areas need better wildlife guarding from time to time. Overall, the City stays a head of the curve. They do inspections on 10%of the poles a year. c. Is there any concern of risk from our tie in lines? i. PacifiCorp had put a lot of new modernized control especially near Oak Knoll. The biggest threat is the trans line across the interstate. There is always concern of vandalism in rural areas. d. Is there a Regional Director that runs the service lines in the area? i. Yes, and Thomas works closely with them. e. What is the status of the line that runs overhead to the power plant. i. It is deactivated and grounded. They patrol on foot and test it for a couple days a year. f. Is it standard practice during a wildfire to turn off a part of the grid? i. When Thomas was in Eastern Oregon,this was standard practice and those decisions were made on the ground. During the 2009 Siskiyou Fire, Chris asked for the power to be turned off. g. Do you feel like you know enough of the adjacent systems to Ashland and their maintenance? i. Thomas always gets phone calls when Pacificorp trims their trees and they are very aggressive about it. He can get the detail of their trimming schedule if the Commission is interested. He feels confident in Pacificorp's maintenance schedule. He will get that information and share it with Alison and Stephen. h. What was the cause of the fire on Siskiyou Blvd near House of Thai? i. That was a street light circuit. There aren't any more of those circuits in Ashland. IX.REPORTS IF TIME ALLOWS(2 min each) A. Illegal Campfire Issue (Chris) a. Coop Agencies/Mutual Ordinance b. Budget Partnership—Parks and Rec c. Drone Operations idea: status,bid, including Federal Property Fly-over, enforcement jurisdictions update d. OHRA(Alison) i. Alison is scheduled for a presentation to the board on March 18'at 5pm. e. Fire Adapted Communities Network Group i. Tracy, Chris and Alison attended the Unhoused Conference Call in February. f. Cowork with Forest Lands Commission i. Chris suggests that Stephen,Alison and Shannon should meet before the in- service. Alison and Stephen will set up a meeting. B. Evacuation Study Session(Chris) a. Ashland Fire &Rescue is planning of a mock evacuation on Wildfire Preparedness Day. The department is working on looking over the city for evacuation routes. Chris will ask Chief D'Orazi for an update at the March meeting. There was discussion about how to address re-entry after an evacuation. C. Chamber Wildfire Task Force (Smoke/Evac/Business)—Alison a. Today is the Rogue Regional Resiliency Forum with 100 representatives from Jackson and Josephine Counties at SOU. D. Firewise USA a. There will be 35 Firewise USA neighborhoods at the end of 2019. E. Plant List Subcommittee a. Nothing to report. F. Tree Commission Report a. Nothing to report. It may be a good idea to have rotating attendance to these meetings. Stephen will prepare a sign-up sheet for Tree Commission and Forest Lands Commission meetings. G. WMC members attending other committees-anything pertinent to report? X. REVIEW AND SET COMMISSION CALENDAR/NEXT MEETING A. Rogue Regional Resiliency Forum: February 20, 2019, 12:00pm(Station 1) B. Second Reading for Commission Name Change: March 5, 2019, 7:00pm(Council Chambers) C. Next WMC Meeting: March 20,2019, 11:00am(Station 1) XI. AGENDA ITEMS FOR March 20, 2019 A. David Lane's Fire Storm Proposal B. 2019 Fire Season Campaign(Tonya, Tracy) C. Rogue Valley Earth Day collaboration with Tree Commission D. Business Smoke Program(Hazel) E. Real Estate Presentation(Tracy) F. City Emergency/Business Preparedness (Chief D'Orazi) G. Ashland Is Ready Evacuation Drill (Chief D'Orazi) H. Vacant lot count(Chris) XII. ADJOURN: In compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act,if you need special assistance to participate in this meeting,please contact the Public Works Office at 488-5587(TTYphone number 1 800 735 2900).Notification 48 hours prior to the meeting will enable the City to make reasonable arrangements to ensure accessibility to the meeting(28 CFR 35.102-35.104 ADA Title I).