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Town staff outlines wildfire mitigation scenarios and budget ranges; council discusses regional coordination and grants
Summary
Emergency Manager Todd briefed the council on three planning-level wildfire mitigation scenarios (foundational, intermediate, comprehensive) with recurring costs from roughly $1M/year to $2.1–3M/year and capital ranges; council discussed regional coordination, evacuation modeling and grant strategies.
Los Gatos’ emergency manager presented a planning-level wildfire mitigation framework and three possible funding scenarios at the Dec. 16 meeting, prompting council discussion about regional cooperation and grant opportunities.
Emergency Manager Todd framed priorities as protecting life, responder safety, property/economic stability and environmental stewardship. He described program elements including enhanced roadside vegetation maintenance, open-space fuel treatments, chipping and green-waste pickup, community outreach, defensible-space inspections, data-driven wildfire-path modeling and evacuation/traffic analysis. Todd said more sophisticated modeling and structure-as-fuel analysis allow jurisdictions to prioritize treatments strategically rather than relying solely on uniform cycles.
Todd provided planning-level cost ranges: a foundational program with recurring costs near $1 million per year plus one-time capital of about $1 million; an intermediate program with mid-level recurring costs and $3–5 million in multi-year capital; and a comprehensive program with recurring costs of $2.1–3 million per year and $6–11 million in capital work. He cautioned those are estimates shaped from comparable jurisdictions and will be refined after evacuation modeling, urban-forest planning and a vegetation-management plan update.
Council discussion centered on: (1) whether the town should seek a parcel measure or other dedicated funding mechanism for an enhanced program; (2) the need to coordinate with neighboring jurisdictions, state and regional agencies and utilities (Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District and San Jose Water in particular); and (3) prioritizing evacuation modeling and low-cost code updates as early steps while pursuing grants for larger-scale capital work.
Next steps: staff intends to continue pursuing grant applications (including a Community Wildfire Defense Grant and FEMA/prevention grants), complete evacuation and traffic modeling, refine the town’s vegetation-management plan and propose a multi-year program and budget for council consideration.
