Wildfire Crisis Strategy Planning, Project Prioritization and Monitoring

In 2022, the Forest Service launched a 10-year strategy to address the wildfire crisis by increasing the scale and pace of forest health treatments in the places where wildfire poses the most immediate threats to communities. Towards this end, the Pacific Southwest Region (Region 5) and Pacific Southwest Research Station (PSW) are working collaboratively to address associated information needs and analysis capacities at a range of scales from individual landscapes to ecoregions to region wide. One essential element of this work is a five-year planning model designed to meet the intent outlined in the Regional Forester’s 5-Year Planning Effort Leadership letter. The five-year planning model relies on a range of tools to assist in identifying spatial opportunities and then projects tracking through each phase of implementation and reporting. Identification of spatial opportunities relies on strong collaboration between researchers and planners to deliver the highest quality data and technological tools to forests and landscapes. 

PSW, in collaboration with other stations and university partners, is supporting the region and the WCS landscapes in a variety of ways, including the development of performance metrics that reflect landscape outcomes across a range of resource values, and analytic support in using the performance metrics for planning, accomplishment reporting, and monitoring. The unprecedented investment and large spatial scale of treatments make this a tremendous opportunity to learn about our influence on wildfire risk and ecological resilience, in turn enabling us to adapt our management. Region 5 is working collaboratively with PSW and others to build a monitoring program for the six WCS landscapes in California, focused on project outcomes related to wildfire risk reduction, ecological resilience and resistance, an all-lands approach, and habitat condition.