Governor Brown’s revised state budget proposal could be good news for wildfire prevention groups. He’s included an additional 96-million dollars for forest thinning and watershed management. The chairman of the board of the Fire Safe Council of Nevada County, Dennis Casella, says he hopes they’ll get a chance to try to tap into some of the money…

click to listen to Dennis Casella

The money would augment the 160-million dollars in cap-and-trade revenue that the governor has previously proposed spending for forest improvements and fire protection. Casella sympathizes with fire agencies who’ve complained about the government raiding their prevention budgets and shifting the funding to firefighting efforts, without reimbursement…

click to listen to Dennis Casella

Governor Brown wants to use the additional money to implement his Forest Carbon Plan, just released, to improve the health of the state’s forests. The forest draw carbon from the atmosphere and store it in the trees, shrubs, and soil. The idea is to manage the forests in a way that will reduce tree mortality and increase the ability of forests to capture carbon.