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Mohave County emergency management outlines community wildland protection plan, evacuation coordination and grant prospects
Summary
County emergency management summarized the Community Wildland Protection Plan, interagency coordination, evacuation routes and a FEMA award that could fund high-priority fuels work in the Hualapai Mountains.
Mohave County emergency management staff presented the county’s approach to wildland fire mitigation and interagency coordination to the Board of Supervisors on Feb. 6, describing the county’s Community Wildland Protection Plan and ongoing efforts to link local fire districts, state agencies and federal partners.
Joe Dorner, director of risk and emergency management, said Mohave County’s emergency team is small — "3 and a half personnel," he said — and that the county relies on a network of federal, state and local partners to implement mitigation and suppression activities. Dorner said the county’s Community Wildland Protection Plan began in 2007, was completed in 2008, updated in 2019, and will be revised again in the next 24 months.
Dorner described priorities from the plan: improve fire prevention and suppression emphasizing firefighter and public safety; reduce hazardous fuels near communities; promote community involvement; and develop evacuation and communications plans. He said some areas in the county are outside established fire jurisdictions and therefore may not receive immediate response from a nearby fire district, a condition he described as creating "no-man’s land" response challenges.
Dorner and Mike Browning, the department’s emergency manager, said Mohave County and partners have used inmate crews and intergovernmental agreements to support fuels projects and to maintain secondary evacuation routes in Hualapai Mountain Park. They said Mohave County worked with BLM and state forestry on fuels reductions and public outreach in Pine Lake and Pinion Pines and that the county has helped install emergency sirens in mountain communities.
The presenters told the board that the state has received FEMA funding — "$3,700,000" — to treat several high-risk communities in the Hualapai Mountains and that the Arizona Department of Forestry and Fire Management will lead those projects. Dorner emphasized that project details and schedules remain under state management and that county staff are supporting the effort.
Commissioners asked about coverage gaps in unincorporated areas, communications interoperability, hazmat capability and which agency leads broad, countywide emergencies. Dorner and Browning said jurisdictions share plans, conduct tabletop and full-scale exercises, and use a local emergency planning committee to coordinate training and hazmat planning; they said Kingman and Lake Havasu City have the most robust local hazmat capabilities. On incident leadership, presenters said unified command arrangements depend on the hazard type and location; a countywide emergency would typically trigger mutual-aid, incident-management teams and coordination with the state.
Dorner said the county issues press and social-media notices for prescribed burns and coordinates with BLM when burns are scheduled. He and Browning asked supervisors to note that rural areas often lack the infrastructure and code-enforcement capacity of larger jurisdictions, which complicates fuels removal on private land.
No formal board votes occurred in this presentation; supervisors asked staff to continue interagency coordination and to pursue grant opportunities where feasible.
