Nevada County’s Fire Safe Council is benefitting, for the first time, from the state’s fire protection fees. They’ve received three CAL FIRE grants worth a total of 250-thousand dollars. Council Executive Director Joanne Drummond says one grant augments funding to remove hazardous trees, most of which have been killed by the drought. They work with the Senior Firewood cooperative…

click to listen to Joanne Drummond

Drummond says there is no real local market for dead tree logs…

click to listen to Joanne Drummond

Drummond says the second grant is for the Council’s Special Needs Assistance Program, which helps defray the expense of creating defensible space around homes for low-income, senior, and disabled residents. And the third grant provides more money for one of their Community Wildfire Protection Plan projects, which would be the first phase of the Ponderosa West Grass Valley Defense Project. CAL FIRE has already responded to over 350 wildfires since the beginning of the year.