Buellton council introduces ordinance adopting CAL FIRE fire-hazard maps; county fire marshal urges defensible-space work

The Buellton City Council introduced Ordinance 25-05 on June 12 to adopt the state’s updated fire hazard severity zone maps for areas inside the city, a step staff said will add new building standards and defensible‑space requirements where parcels are newly designated as high or very high fire hazard.

The measure, required within 120 days of the state’s update, would incorporate the CAL FIRE maps into the city municipal code and the General Plan safety element. Planning Director Andrick told the council the maps were released March 10, 2025, and that the ordinance as drafted contained a text error (an incorrect code reference) that must be corrected from the listed section to the proper section before final adoption.

The update will place additional construction and fuels‑management requirements on new development in affected areas, Andrick said, including fire‑resistant roofing, siding and window standards and expanded defensible‑space rules. He said the maps themselves are produced by the state and are intended to reduce structure ignitability by addressing fuels and construction features.

Santa Barbara County Fire Marshal Mike Tan, who joined the meeting by videoconference, said the state maps model where fire could occur without accounting for local mitigation actions. “There will be fire on that landscape again and again and again,” Tan said in describing California’s fire‑prone environment, but he emphasized that homeowner actions, local fuel breaks, light‑fuel agricultural areas, roads and nearby fire stations reduce the risk that a fire will destroy homes.

Tan walked council through practical implications: the maps are a vegetation‑based hazard designation and not a direct insurance‑rate mandate, noting that the California Insurance Commissioner has told insurers to assess risk rather than simply read hazard maps. He recommended community wildfire protection planning (CWPP) and Firewise-style home mitigation and said county fire and local partners can work with neighborhoods to identify defensible buffers along creek corridors where access and permitting are more complicated.

Council members asked about interactive parcel lookup tools and insurance impacts; Tan pointed to SantaBarbaraCountyFire’s website and the county’s interactive web map for parcel queries and said homeowners who harden homes and maintain defensible space will see better risk profiles. Several council members praised local residents and the Fire Safe Council for moving toward Firewise accreditation in Rancho Estates.

The council voted to introduce the ordinance by title only, with the requested code‑section correction, and directed staff to return for further reading and a subsequent adoption hearing. The introduction was approved unanimously.