As previously announced, Dammeron Valley Fire & Rescue (DVFR) was awarded a Fire Prevention & Safety (FP&S) grant for fuel removal. The grant provides for six (6) days during 2023 where the department can hire a chipping contractor to remove fuels residents in Dammeron Valley clear as they make their properties more “fire adaptive.”
The first day of contracted chipping in the Valley is tentatively scheduled for Wednesday, 31 May beginning at 9AM. There are two options available to residents for chipping:
Option 1 – As you remove fuels around your home (e.g., trees, limbs, bushes), you can stack them in an orderly fashion with all cut stems/ends facing the same direction. Piles should be no more than 6 feet long by 6 feet wide and no taller than 6 feet. The pile should be accessible from the street and convenient for the chipping crew to access.
Option 2 – Bring the fuels you remove around your home to the Community Garden on Wednesday, 31 May to be chipped and made available to the Garden for use.
The chipping crew will only handle organic fuels. Here are the guidelines:
We understand the brush piles on the side of the roads will be unsightly, but we need to give residents plenty of time to cut fuels so the chipper contractor has a full day of work. We appreciate your patience.
We are excited to begin the process of making Dammeron Valley as fire adaptive as we can and mitigate as much risk to wildfire as possible. As a reminder, we will be hosting a Department of Natural Resources (DNR) Wildland Fire Engine Workshop in Dammeron Valley on 3 June 2023. You will see many fire trucks from various agencies conducting a simulated wildfire event and we hope to learn a lot of lessons from this exercise. Thank you again to those who signed up to participate as the crews work through various structure protection tactics and techniques.
If you would like a fuels mitigation assessment, please visit www.dvfirerescue.org/wildfire to request one.
As always, please feel free to contact DVFR if you have any questions. You can find contact information at www.dvfirerescue.org/contact and you can contact Chief Hennessey directly.