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About The nugget. (Sisters, Or.) 1994-current | View Entire Issue (May 6, 2015)
Wednesday, May 6, 2015 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon 7 Preparedness event readies folks for wildfire season By Jodi Schneider McNamee Correspondent S a t u r d a y, M a y 2 w a s N a t i o n a l Wi l d f i r e Preparedness Day. To mark the occasion, the Sisters- Camp Sherman Fire District hosted the second annual Sisters community event to help residents learn how to make their homes and neigh- borhoods safer from wildfire. From Sisters Country fire history to the basics of defensible space, there were tips, tools, and teachings that everyone could use to help raise wildfire awareness and bring neighbors together to work on projects to protect homes. Assistant fire manage- ment officer Jinny Reed from the Sisters Ranger District kicked off the program with a general discussion on the wildfire outlook in Sisters Country for this year: “What I found to be most important during my fire management career in Central Oregon is that a strong community is very important when you’re deal- ing with a disaster such as wildfire. The different orga- nizations are here to sup- port you. It’s interagency cooperation that helps pro- tect you and your property. We have had several years of dry winters and our snow pack has been declining for the past 10 years, and now it’s very extreme. Part of our greatest risk for our fire district is the fires that start in the National Forests from lighting strikes. And they work their way down into our communities. So when we don’t have the normal snow- pack, and when fuels are a month or two ahead of sched- ule, then when we get light- ning we have a greater risk of larger fires occurring.” A PowerPoint presenta- tion pointed out that Sisters Country has been having above-average temperatures, especially this year. These conditions may continue throughout the summer. “The fuels in the forest are dryer than normal, and what we are seeing in April is common for August,” said Reed. Sisters Fire Manager Ben Duda from Oregon Department of Forestry (ODF) pointed out that the Oregon Forestland-Urban Interface Fire Protection Act, often referred to as Senate Bill 360, enlists the aid of property owners toward the goal of turning fire-vulnera- ble urban and suburban prop- erties into less-volatile zones where firefighters may more safely and effectively defend homes from wildfires. “Basically it’s a law that requires homeowners to do some simple things around their home to create defen- sible space. It’s all about educating the public and teaching you what you can do for yourselves to protect your own homes,” Duda said. “It’s not about creating a dirt donut around your house, you can still have natural landscaping, a dry landscap- ing. What sets most houses on fire is the embers, ember showers. There are things around your house that you can do to protect your home and by doing that it makes it safer for the firefighters to protect your home.” The mission of ODF pri- marily is for protection of private lands within our dis- trict, which includes all of Sisters Country. “We fill in the gap between the Forest Service and the rural fire department; we bolster the initial attack,” said Duda. After giving a brief fire history of Sisters Country, Sisters-Camp Sherman Fire District Chief Roger Johnson explained to the public what the “2014 Greater Sisters Country Community Wildfire Protection Plan” is all about. “The Community Wildfire Protection Plan is essentially part of our planning tool, it was all of our agency part- ners that came together, the Forest Service, ODF, the City of Sisters, the fire department, the county com- missioners, and the county forester,” Johnson said. “We all got together and met over the course of months and we rated all of the seven commu- nities around Sisters Country. We looked at the vegetation, we looked at the fire history, and we looked at the infra- structure. We then looked at how many exits the commu- nities have, and what risks the infrastructures have, and are there schools there and how many people live in that area. We developed this plan that rates every community in this region based on cumu- lative risk, so it’s a really neat tool for you to look at and see what community that you live in, and ask how high is my risk? And what makes it such a high risk? “What it does for us is it helps us prioritize fuel reduc- tion work and things like that to make your community safer. We are really proud about our partnerships within the region. It’s great to have the Forest Service and ODF and our fire department all based in the same area and working under one command system. It’s an integrative response, and that’s what it takes to be effective in the region.” Download Sisters Country C o m m u n i t y Wi l d f i r e Protection Plan online at www.sistersfire.com. Sisters Fire Safety Manager Gary Marshall dis- cussed how homeowners can maximize their fire protec- tion around their houses. “We have four Firewise communities in Sisters right now and are working on another one in Crossroads. Our goal is to reach out and work with the neighborhood associations and create addi- tional Firewise communities within the district. There are steps to take to get defensible space around your home. It’s the little things that hom- eowners can do on their property that can give them protection.” IT’S TIME TO GET YOUR FIREWOOD! CUT & SPLIT YOUR OWN... ... OR PLACE YOUR ORDER We’ve got you covered for all your needs! Files/Tools Bar Oil/2-Cycle Mix Personal Protective Wear Hard Hats • Eye Wear Chaps • Face Shields Saw Tune-up New Chain & Sharpening We Sell WOOD-CUTTI NG PERMITS & Rent Log Splitt ers Your Local C Chainsaw Dealer Great fi rewood is easy, early spring is the perfect time of year to prepare for next winter. A large stack of fi rewood — cut, split, and protected — assures that you will be warm all winter the easy way. Heating with fi rewood is as basic to humans as eating and sleeping. It should be your fi rst harvest of the year every year if you cut your own wood. Cool weather is just right for the exercise of chopping and stacking fi rewood. Even if you buy your wood-pile, this is still the time to do so. Firewood is one of the most cost-effective ways to heat your home — always has been, and you can’t beat the comfort. A good wood-pile should be stacked and covered on top so that air can fl ow around und Year-round the split pieces. Even cut green, split lit fi rewood stacked in this manner will cure quickly and will be bone-dry — Kindling — — — next winter. It’s easy if you do it now! SISTERS Dave Elpi, elpeez@aol.com FOREST PRODUCTS Sisters Forest Products LLC SistersForestProducts.com 18155 Hwy. 126, Sisters FIREWOOD SALES 506 N. Pine St. 541-549-9631 www.SistersRental.com 541-410-4509