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FireSmart program to target high-risk Cowichan Valley properties

Regional FireSmart Kick-Start Project to promote wildfire awareness
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Program launched to help people make their homes and property better able to handle wildfires. (File photo)

The Cowichan Valley Regional District, in partnership with Cowichan Tribes and North Cowichan, has launched a program to assist residents to make their homes and properties more resilient to the threat of wildfires.

The goal of the Regional FireSmart Kick-Start Project is to promote wildfire awareness, conduct FireSmart assessments for households and farms that are in a high wildfire interface area and complete risk-reducing wildfire mitigation activities.

FireSmart coordinators will work with participating residents, educating them in FireSmart principles and options to reduce risk, and develop goals tailored to their unique property.

“We’re grateful to have received the provincial funding to begin this work, as the threat of wildfires in the Cowichan region is very real during our increasingly dry summers,” said April Diver, emergency program coordinator for the CVRD.

“In this first phase of the program, our FireSmart teams are targeting their support to vulnerable residents and high-risk properties, and we urge everyone to visit our website to learn more about how to qualify and apply for this service.”

For qualifying residents, FireSmart staff will conduct assessments, and in consultation with the home owner, reduce hazardous vegetation to create buffer zones from flammable material in support of FireSmart standards.

Once the mitigation activities are complete, they will conduct post mitigation assessments of each property which provide the home owner with any steps needed to maintain reduced risk to their property.

To learn more about the FireSmart Kick-Start Project, including links to the resident application forms, visit the CVRD FireSmart Information webpage.