Wildfire Ready Workshops
To help further prepare the community for wildfire season and in alignment with National Wildfire Awareness Month, the City of Santa Rosa hosted a series of virtual Wildfire Ready workshops in May 2021. Each webinar focused on a different topic related to wildfire season and the recordings from each are available for viewing below.
Historical and Scientific Wildfire Education - May 24, 2021
To kick off the Wildfire Ready series, it is important to acknowledge our local history as it pertains to wildfires. This workshop featureS Dr. Peter Nelson, a life-long Sonoma County resident, Indigenous community member, and educator whose research includes Indigenous archaeology, Indigenous environmental studies, and settler colonialism. In this session, Dr. Nelson shareS the history of control burns used as an ancestral practice by our Indigenous communities as well as the use of fire as an opportunity for renewal. Santa Rosa Fire Department staff also speak on the various types of burning that take place, as permissible, around the County (land and piles) as well as the City of Santa Rosa’s Vegetative Debris Pile Burning Ordinance. Participant questions and answers close out the session.
Presenters: Dr. Peter Nelson, UC Berkeley; Fire Chief Scott Westrope, Santa Rosa Fire Department; Magali Telles, City of Santa Rosa Director of Community Engagement; Paul Lowenthal, Assistant Fire Marshal, Santa Rosa Fire Department
Preparing Your Home and Property - May 25, 2021
Are your property and home wildfire ready? In this workshop, Santa Rosa Fire Department staff discuss lessons learned from 2017 Sonoma County wildfires and the 2020 Glass Fire and discuss what residents can do to ensure their homes and property are wildfire ready. Topics covered in this session include the Wildland Urban Interface (WUI); funding for wildfire prevention; home hardening and defensible space; weed abatement; and more.
Presenters: Fire Chief Scott Westrope, Santa Rosa Fire Department; Magali Telles, City of Santa Rosa Director of Community Engagement; Scott Moon, Fire Prevention Bureau Division Chief and Fire Marshal; Paul Lowenthal, Assistant Fire Marshal Santa Rosa Fire Department
Our Shared Trauma Around Wildfires - May 26, 2021
Through evacuations, fires, planned power shut-offs, other life stressors, and now a global pandemic, it is important to take care of our well-being and connect with others. Join trained facilitators from the Sonoma Community Resilience Collaborative as they provide the community with resilience tools to manage times of crisis and life stressors. These tools can be used anytime, anywhere, regardless of the situation, whether it be a presentation at school, an interview for a job, dealing with tantrums, or even through preparing for natural disasters. Presenters: Magali Telles, City of Santa Rosa Director of Community Engagement; Gricelda Correa, Santa Rosa Community Health Communications & Community Engagement Manager; Becky Ennis, SOS Community Counseling Executive Director; Susan Dunn, NAMI Education & Support Services Manager, Travers Collins, Battalion Chief Santa Rosa Fire Department
The Sonoma Community Resilience Collaborative is a community-wide initiative launched after the 2017 wildfires to support long-term resilience and social connection across Sonoma County. Their vision is to prevent the progression of stress and trauma effects from becoming more serious behavioral, physical and social impacts in our community through an evidence-based train-the-trainer model taught by our partner, Center of Mind-Body Medicine. Please visit socoresilience.org to learn more.
Our Shared Trauma Around Wildfires - May 26, 2021 (Spanish language only)
A través de evacuaciones, incendios, cortes de energía planificados, otros factores estresantes de la vida y ahora una pandemia global, es importante cuidar nuestro bienestar y conectarnos con los demás. Únase a los facilitadores capacitados de Sonoma Community Resilience Collaborative, ya que brindan a la comunidad herramientas de resiliencia para manejar tiempo de crisis y factores estresantes de la vida. Nuestra visión es proporcionar a nuestra comunidad con herramientas de resiliencia para lidiar con los múltiples desafíos que hemos enfrentado y seguimos enfrentando como comunidad. Estas herramientas han existido durante siglos y se pueden usar en cualquier lugar, en cualquier momento, independientemente de la situación, ya sea una presentación en la escuela, una entrevista para un trabajo, o incluso preparándose para desastres naturales.
Sonoma Community Resilience Collaborative es una iniciativa comunitaria que fue hecha después de los incendios forestales de 2017 para apoyar la resiliencia a largo plazo y la conexión social en todo el Condado de Sonoma. Nuestra visión es prevenir que la progresión de los efectos del estrés y el trauma se conviertan en impactos conductuales, físicos y sociales más graves en nuestra comunidad a través de un modelo de formación de formadores basado en la evidencia impartida por nuestro socio, Center of Mind-Body Medicine. Presentadores: Magali Telles, City of Santa Rosa Director of Community Engagement; Gricelda Correa, Santa Rosa Community Health Communications & Community Engagement Manager; Rosa Bernal, Case Manager at PDI Surgery Center
Preparing for an Emergency - May 27, 2021
Be prepared for the next emergency! This final Wildfire Ready workshop covers the City of Santa Rosa's designated evacuation zones, neighborhood travel routes, tools and resources for preparing for an evacuation, and information about emergency alerts and notifications. Staff from the Santa Rosa Fire Department also talk about lessons learned from the 2020 Glass Fire and how Santa Rosa is preparing for the 2021 wildfire season.
Presenters: Fire Chief Scott Westrope, Santa Rosa Fire Department; Magali Telles, City of Santa Rosa Director of Community Engagement Paul Lowenthal, Assistant Fire Marshal; Neil Bregman, City of Santa Rosa Emergency Preparedness Manager; Adriane Mertens, Chief Communications & Intergovernmental Relations Officer; Representative from Santa Rosa Police Department