Defensible Space Chipping Hits New Record!

In an effort to comply with the City Fire Department defensible space clearance requirement deadline of June 15, 2011, homeowners in the high fire hazard area have been busier than ever preparing for the upcoming fire season.

Each year, chipping services are offered to those homeowners who reside within the Wildland Fire Suppression Assessment District located in portions of the Foothill and Extreme Foothill High Fire Hazard Areas of Santa Barbara’s foothills.

Chipping services are provided to encourage property owners to create defensible space and provide a cost effective way to dispose of cut material. This year we removed a record 500 tons of chipped material. That is higher than any other previous year since the district was formed in 2006.

The Fire Department would like to thank all of the property owners who took advantage of this service in order to create a more fire safe home, neighborhood and city.

Making Your Community Safe. One Project At A Time.

Last month we concluded our 2010 North Ontare Vegetation Management Project. This project took place in the extreme foohill zone of the high fire hazard area. This project was also part of the Community Fuels Treatment Network.

Through this project we treated over 20 acres of vegetation. We focused on removing dead material, limbing up trees, removing fire ladders, protecting sensitive habitat and species and removal of exotic/non-native vegetation. The remaining portion of this project included an abandoned avocado orchard that had also been burned in the 2009 Jesusita Fire. Due to the location of work, gaining access to chip the cut vegetation would have been difficult. The Fire Department worked in cooperation with the local homeowners and felt that a pile burn project would be the best method of removing the dead and down fuel.

Pile burning is still a very viable method of reducing hazardous vegetation and it worked well for this project. On Monday, April 18th, the Fire Department, with the help of both the CCC and CAL FIRE hand crews (based out of the Ventura Youth Conservation Camp), completed the burning of 12 large piles.

If you are interested in learning more about reducing vegetation through pile burning or any of our vegetation management projects, please contact us at 965-5254

Chipping Continues

It's that time of year again. We are a few weeks into our spring time chipping program and have seen more brush put out by homeowners than ever before.

Brush Pile Along Hillcrest Road

We are wrapping up chipping in the LAS TUNAS area this week and will begin the SAN ROQUE/ONTARE area on Monday, April 11th.

Great job folks and keep up the good work. Know that you are doing your part to take responsibility for keeping your home, your neighborhood and community more fire safe.

For a complete schedule click the following link: CHIPPING SCHEDULE

A map of the chip areas can be found here: CHIPPING MAP