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| Idaho Capital Sun |
We will be discussing the intersection of planning and wildfire risk management this week. A number of you have brought up planning efforts during our past classes, so I look forward to discussing it in depth. Please enter at least three discussion questions based upon the assigned readings for the week. Remember that the readings are intended to get you thinking about the broader topic for the week. Don't be afraid to pose questions that reach beyond the readings or prompt us all to think creatively about the topic.
Comments and questions are due by noon on Monday before class. This provides enough time for our discussion leads to synthesize questions. Please enter comments and questions even if you are leading discussion for the week.
See you all on Wednesday.
Jakes et al mention that their respondents believed “any regulations that could be interpreted as limiting growth or private property rights would be difficult to implement” (359) and planners interviewed by Mockrin et al seem to maintain that, for themselves and the communities they represent, freedom equates to the right of (certain) humans to occupy and build upon every bit of land (6). “Growth” has been naturalized by economic theorists and politicians as a necessary element of healthy societies, but unfettered growth is definitive of cancers that consume their host body. Fire is a profound limiting factor on the indeterminate growth of plants upon which this naturalized concept is based. How are the current conceptions and implementations of community “fire-adaptation” acting as a cloak for continued expansion of the WUI into what Mockrin et al call a “range of settings” (6)?
ReplyDeleteRelatedly, could fire-adaptation instead mean allowing for and accepting LIMITS to the growth of modern human societies and how could this kind of relationship be promoted/made palatable? In other words, how could we re-frame the “problem” from FIRE to the never-ending EXPANSION, including into fire-prone places? And how could this be combined with efforts (in both rural and urban areas) to support social and environmental health?
If, as suggested in Paveglio et al and other readings, one disincentive for community members who opt to disregard wildfire regulations and/or fail to initiate personal wildfire mitigation could be reduced fire suppression response, how would it work? Would properties be put on a “bad list”? Or would it be up to firefighters on the ground to assess which properties receive their efforts? Are regulations and mitigation efforts designed to keep infrastructures safe without suppression efforts? Or to keep firefighters safe when protecting the infrastructures?
Something that really struck me within the responses of the Mockrin et al. paper was the ways in which respondents phrased their viewpoints, and how strongly their language style clashes with the academic style of the paper. People responded frequently in aphorisms and fairly sweeping generalizations/examples in casual language ("mumbo-jumbo stuff", "turning a blind eye", "I mean, that would be everybody", "development drives the bus", "they want to make us tell their neighbors [to mitigate]") - and sometimes responded with such fervor that the researchers themselves were moved to comment on the frequent themes of violence in the language. Could a mismatch in communication style be an issue here? Why/why not (and how deeply are people's values reflected in the way they speak)?
ReplyDeleteThe Paveglio et al. paper features a table (Table 1) of various variables and respondents' level of agreement. I noticed that the variable "Public lands fire risk" had both the lowest mean and the highest standard deviation. I'll be honest, I am not exactly the world's greatest statistician here, but this reminded me of the paper we read about the opposition to the Forsythe II project in Colorado, where many people were neutral or generally favored land use policies, there was a vocal strong opposition deviating from this view. What could this combination indicate here? What other questions could be explored with this information (i.e. checking for pockets of disagreement and finding out why)?
Authors of the Jakes et al. paper noted that degree of behavioral change could be a strong limiting factor in adopting mitigation activites. Alex mentioned a few weeks ago that one way to work with those resistant to change due to a love of the natural landscape might be to do less mitigation than recommended. What are some other ways to work with people and change behavior in small degrees? If we shifted our view on behavioral change to match our views on the long-term nature of landscape change, could that help?
(re: the second question) not the lowest mean as in the lowest number but as in the closest to 0. Told you I'm not a math person
DeleteMockrin et al mentions a "growth machine" were development proceeds despite obvious disaster vulnerability, which in my opinion can be seen throughout Idaho. Why do local planners continue to give-in-to big money development projects despite the known hazards? What knowledge does the public have the influences driving these decisions and consequences that may proceed them?
ReplyDeleteIn the Jakes et al article I found it interesting that "Most of the CWPPs we examined focused on reducing
wildland fire risks to communities, with little or no mention of healthy forest ecosystems." due to certain local social and ecological contexts which was the case in California. Why do some people have a hard time understanding that creating a healthy forest can improve wildfire resilience? If citizens in California are so up in arms with forest management activities why are people shocked by the recent wildfires the state has experienced?
Jakes et al. 2011
ReplyDeleteHow much has changed regarding CWPP writing and implementation since this was published? Discussions earlier in the semester brought up the emerging practice of outsourcing of CWPP writing to consultants with established templates. Is this different than the facilitation role of consultants mentioned in this paper? How would this outsourcing potentially degrade the importance of this document? Are there benefits to outsourcing to consultants with prior experience with CWPPs but lacking local knowledge?
Paveglio et al. 2021
The regulatory approach to WUI fire risk mitigation seems unlikely to succeed at large scales based on the general attitude towards private property in this country, and especially in many rural communities. Would incentivizing development within previously existing developments be better suited to reducing WUI expansion and increasing risk of fire damages? I’m thinking more broadly about carrot vs stick approaches to housing development in the US, as the WUI continues to be developed.
Mockrin et al. 2020
Mockrin et al. (2020) was one of my favorite reads thus far, for the reasons Kate mentioned. The language of the interviewee’s was such a stark contrast to academic communication. How could we implement a system of support for wildfire resilience that builds in the ability to simply “leave people alone”, if that’s what they want? Or maybe we’re already living under such a system by default.
In Hockrin et al., one the major themes or constraints in adopting planning solutions is the temporal mismatch between the original timeframe of established planning regulations and the evolving nature of wildfire risk. Another type of temporal mismatch—arbitrarily determined “update cycles”—also appear to negate post-fire improvements on existing regulations. Is there a way get these scales more in synch by coupling planning regs to local ecological conditions?
ReplyDeleteJakes et al.: For at-risk rural communities with reduced “capacity”, how can we ensure that landscape-scale fuel treatments (treatments beyond the community’s capacity to enact) are carried out in a way that builds local capacity?
Similar to how herd immunity works to lower an individual’s risk of infection, large wildfires on public lands might offer the most practical and efficient solution for reducing risk a the individual homeowner scale. Yet perception of these fires is often negative (associated with higher risk): “Thus, risk from large wildfires starting on public lands are those which cross a high enough “risk threshold” to prompt preemptive mitigation action“ (Paveglio et al. 2021). Is it merely the scale of these fires that pushes them over the "risk threshold", or is it something to do with the transmission of risk between public and private? Yeah, that's vague. Have to think about what I mean there.
Mockrin -
ReplyDeleteMockrin et al.'s interviewees seemed to have a solid grasp of their wildfire problem and potential solutions, but simply valued other things more highly than they did wildfire safety. If community members understand the problem they are facing, is pushing for more aggressive land use policy and regulation the right path forward?
Paveglio -
Due to the lack of support for private land regulation, would it be more effective to motivate landowners to work on the HIZ through insurance companies? While it would introduce a whole new set of socioeconomic issues, requiring home owners in high risk areas to have wildfire insurance would create incentive for mitigation activities.