The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection is providing $98.4 million in new forest heath grants to fund wildlife resilience projects.
The CAL FIRE funding is intended to pay for landscape-scale, regionally based land management projects to restore existing and recently burned forests. The projects also are intended to increase long-term carbon storage.
Legislation enacted in 2021 provided $1.5 billion for wildlife resilience. Funding that has already been released paid for more than 553 wildfire resilience projects, including fuels breaks to home-hardening to reforestation.
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“California, along with states throughout the West, is on the frontlines of extreme climate impacts that are driving more destructive wildfires — and our state is taking aggressive action to protect communities and make our forests more resilient,” said Gov. Gavin Newsom. “We’re investing in community-based projects that will protect lives and property, and restore forest health across the state.
CAL FIRE’s Forest Health Program awarded 22 grants for projects on state, local, tribal, federal, and private lands covering 55,000 acres and 14 counties. Several projects include work in severely burned areas; three projects located in Plumas and Lassen counties will reforest 24,000 acres burned in the 2021 Dixie Fire.
