With funding from the CAL FIRE Forest Health Program, the NCRP is supporting projects that seek to significantly increase fuels management, fire reintroduction, treatment of degraded areas, and conservation of forests: mitigating climate change, protecting communities from fire risk, and strengthening rural economies.
The Forest Health Program addresses the risk to California’s forests from extreme disturbance events including catastrophic wildfires, drought, and pest mortality. These events are the result of climate change, forest overcrowding, past land management practices, and an increasing number of people living in the wildland and urban interface.
CAL FIRE’s Forest Health Program awards funding to landscape-scale land management projects that achieve the following objectives:
In 2023, the NCRP was awarded a CAL FIRE Forest Health Grant as a pilot project to demonstrate an integrated approach to achieving the mutual objectives of the Regional Forest and Fire Capacity Program (RFFC) and CAL FIRE’s Forest Health Program.
The NCRP CAL FIRE Forest Health Pilot Grant will be implemented by NCRP in partnership with CAL FIRE and will adhere to the goals and requirements as defined in the California Climate Investments, Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, Forest Health Program, and Regional Grant Pilot Guidelines.
The NCRP developed a regional Forest Health screening assessment to prioritize forest health project areas, per CAL FIRE Forest Health categories. This regional assessment and its corresponding maps are intended to objectively filter and stratify the landscape through the lens of CAL FIRE Forest Health priorities in the North Coast Region, as well as provide background information for the development of projects by partners in the Region. The NCRP Landscape Priority Areas for Forest Health Projects assessment resulted in a series of maps of the high priority areas for forest health projects. This assessment was shared in a NCRP Forest Health Screening Workshop and feedback was provided by the NCRP Staff Team and Tukman Geospatial to support improvements. View the Responses to Questions and Feedback for the Assessment.
Applications were due August 4, 2024.
The NCRP CAL FIRE Forest Health Pilot Grant Project Proposal Review Meeting was held on August 28 & 29, 2024 at the Wharfinger Building in Eureka, CA for the NCRP Technical Peer Review Committee (TPRC) members to develop a draft suite of projects and contingency approach. For more information about this process, see Appendix A of the NCRP CAL FIRE Forest Health Project Review Process Guidelines. At this public meeting, project proponents and the public were welcome to attend and provide comment. The TPRC Meeting Project Review Summary and TPRC Meeting Summary describe the committee’s project selection process in detail.
At the NCRP Quarterly Meeting, held at Elk Valley Rancheria on October 18, 2024, the NCRP Leadership Council reviewed and approved the Technical Peer Review Committee recommendation and contingency approach for the draft suite of projects to be included in the NCRP regional award for CAL FIRE Forest Health Pilot funding. This meeting was also open to the public with opportunities for public comment. See the NCRP Quarterly Meeting webpage for more information.
We are pleased to announce the Priority Projects approved by the NCRP Leadership Council:
| Organization Name, Project Name | Location/Area Served | Total Project Cost | Funding Request | TPRC Recommended Budget | Leadership Council Approved Budget |
| Yurok Tribe, Stoo-Wen Ridge Healthy Forest Fuels Reduction Project | Northern Tribal Region | $1,615,227 | $1,615,227 | $1,615,227 | $1,615,227 |
| Mendocino County Resource Conservation District, Leggett Area Forest Health Project | Mendocino County | $1,998,805 | $1,998,805 | $1,989,355 | $1,989,355 |
| Humboldt County Resource Conservation District, Mail Ridge Wildfire Resilience Project, Phase 1 | Humboldt County | $933,880 | $833,880 | $833,880 | $833,880 |
| Shasta Valley Resource Conservation District, Siskiyou Juniper Treatment and Landscape Restoration | Siskiyou County | $1,905,492 | $1,905,492 | $1,429,119 | $1,429,119 |
| Scott River Watershed Council, East Fork Scott River Forest Health Implementation Project | Siskiyou County | $1,293,493 | $1,293,493 | $970,119 | $970,119 |
| Yurok Tribe, McKinney Post-Fire Initial Reforestation & Recovery Implementation | Northern Tribal Region | $1,528,281 | $1,528,281 | $1,137,074 | $1,137,074 |
| Shasta Valley Resource Conservation District, Forest Health and Resilience - Broadcast Burning - Siskiyou Prescribed Burn Association | Siskiyou County | $542,835 | $542,835 | $542,835 | $542,835 |
| Redwood Valley Rancheria Little River Band of Pomo Indians, Redwood Valley Rancheria (RVR) Fuel Reduction Project | Southern Tribal Region | $1,364,782 | $1,364,782 | $682,391 | $682,391 |
| TOTALS | $18,376,336 | $15,508,509 | $9,200,000 | $9,200,000 |
CONTINGENCY PROCESS FOR BUDGET AUGMENTATIONS
Per the NCRP Technical Peer Review Committee recommendation, the NCRP Leadership Council approved the following contingency process should a project drop out of the suite of projects or additional funding becomes available for any reason prior to the Leadership Council approval of the project suite.
Should additional funding become available for any reason prior to the NCRP Leadership Council Priority Project approval for inclusion in the NCRP CAL FIRE Forest Health Pilot Regional Grant (presumably on October 18, 2024), reallocation of funding will augment the priority project budgets, up to the full funding request, in order of score rank. This reallocation would be made to those project budgets that are recommended for funding award, but had their budgets reduced.
The reallocation of funding process will adhere to the Project Budget Under-Runs and Funding Reallocation Process Policy described in the NCRP Policies and Procedures Handbook, 2024 (see page 19, APPENDIX A: NCRP POLICIES).
Eligible applicants are: federally recognized Native American tribes or non-federally recognized California Native American tribes; local, state, and federal public agencies; universities; special districts; industrial and nonindustrial private forest landowners; and non-profit organizations.
Eligible Forest Health projects must be large, landscape-scale projects with multiple, integrated benefits. The minimum grant amount requested should be no less than $500,000. The maximum allowable amount is $2 million. The NCRP may choose to fund a portion of the proposed project based on funding availability and other considerations.
Eligible projects must complete grant-related activities no later than December 31, 2028. All projects selected for inclusion into the NCRP CAL FIRE Forest Health Pilot portfolio must have their environmental compliance completed within one year of project portfolio approval and must demonstrate progress toward completing the work within six months of award. The NCRP will begin to review all awarded projects within 12 months of the subgrant award and may reallocate awarded funds to a different sub-grantee within the project portfolio, in accordance with the NCRP Policies and Procedures Handbook reallocation protocol, if environmental compliance is not complete or reasonable progress toward completing the project work cannot be demonstrated.
Eligible projects must yield substantial benefits, have a well-defined scope of work, be feasible to implement within the grant term, and contribute to the goals of CAL FIRE’s Forest Health program and the NCRP Vision for North Coast Resilience Plan. All projects must include one or more activities supported by the Forest Health Program:
● Forest Fuels Reduction
– Eligible activities must focus on treating understory trees and brush with the goals of reducing fire hazards, improving tree growth, stabilizing carbon in retained trees, and increasing forest resilience to catastrophic disturbances. Forest thinning activities can be manual or mechanical and must be designed to change stand structure to: 1) concentrate carbon storage in widely-spaced and larger trees that are more resilient to wildfire, drought, and pest outbreaks; and 2) reduce the likelihood of wildfire transitioning into the forest canopy. Commercial harvesting activities should focus on promoting carbon storage in remaining trees and must be compatible with achieving resilient forests with stable carbon storage that provide co-benefits such as fish and wildlife habitat, increased biodiversity, and wildlife adaptation to climate change. Pre- commercial and brush removal activities are also eligible.
● Prescribed Fire
– Eligible activities must focus on the need to reintroduce fires to fire-adapted forest ecosystems. Applying fire to the landscape may serve multiple purposes including, reducing fuel loads, creating heterogenous and diverse vegetation, maintaining cultural practices of indigenous communities, and/or promoting healthy ecosystem processes such as water storage and pest control. Prescribed burns may be completed with private or public burn crews.
● Cultural Fire
– Distinguished from Prescribed Fire. Cultural Fire is the intentional application of fire to the land by an Indigenous person or cultural group (e.g., family unit, Tribe, clan/moiety, or society) to achieve cultural goals or objectives and based in Tribal or Traditional Indigenous law.
● Pest Management
– Eligible activities must address pest control and related forest health improvement, while reducing pest-related mortality, improving tree growth, stabilizing carbon retained in trees, and increasing forest resilience. Activities may include forest thinning and/or brush removal. Forest thinning activities (manual or mechanical) should change stand structure to increase carbon storage in more widely spaced trees that are more resistant to wildfire, drought, and insect attacks. Harvesting activities should focus on removing dead, diseased, suppressed, or slow-growing trees for the purpose of promoting carbon storage in remaining trees and must be compatible with achieving resilient forests with stable carbon storage that provide co-benefits such as fish and wildlife habitat, increased biodiversity, and wildlife adaptation to climate change.
● Reforestation
– Eligible activities should establish a diverse, native forest, which will result in stable carbon sequestration and storage, improved watershed and habitat functions, and forest resilience. Species selection must be appropriate for the site and may be used to address climate adaptation. Climate appropriate seed lots may be identified using the U.S. Forest Service’s Seedlot Selection Tool.
Reforestation of recently burned areas is also eligible for funding including planning, site preparation and planting; fire suppression repair costs are not eligible. The Forest Health program does not fund afforestation or the establishment of forests in historically non-forested areas.
● Biomass Utilization
– Eligible activities must:
1) Utilize woody biomass for wood products such as post and pole, firewood, dimensional lumber, plywood, or other products which allows for continued carbon storage
2) Generate energy though combustion or gasification, which displaces carbon-intensive fossil fuel- based energy; or
3) Utilize woody biomass to help develop markets for beneficial uses of the material. Beneficial uses include, but are not limited to, dimensional lumber, animal bedding, biochar, artistic and cultural products, cross-laminated timber, mulch, oriented strandboard, pulp, post, shredding, and veneer products.
Note: Modification of vegetation adjacent to roads may be an eligible treatment in a Forest Health project, if the roads are connecting large forested landscapes and are critical to maintaining forest health via forest fuels reduction, prescribed fire, pest management, reforestation and/or biomass utilization. Roadside fuel reduction to improve public safety (for egress of evacuating residents and ingress of responding emergency personnel) as a major project component is not an eligible activity for Forest Health grants.
All revenues collected as a result of activities paid for, in full or in part, with Forest Health Program grant funds must be tracked and re-invested into the project to further grant objectives.
Detailed information about the eligible project activities is excerpted and modified from the California Climate Investments, Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, Forest Health Program Grant Guidelines, December 2023 and can be found in Appendix A.
This schedule is subject to change based on new information
GOAL: To support project proponents develop application materials for the NCRP CAL FIRE Forest Health Pilot Solicitation in accordance with the source funding guidelines and eligibility requirements. This included but was not limited to the following:
WHO: The team of technical assistance providers was made up of regional experts that provided peer-to-peer proposal development support based on project need. The time allotted to each entity receiving proposal support may varied but was between 2-6 hours or more based on need and availability. It was recommended that project proponents attend one of the informational workshops (see Workshops section below) and become familiar with the project application preparation and submission requirements prior to developing an application.
HOW: Weekly office hours were attended on Zoom for real-time question/answer sessions and to schedule peer-to-peer proposal development support meetings. Weekly office hours also included Tribal only break-out sessions to meet with the Tribal Engagement support team.
GOAL: To provide GIS support to project proponents. This included but is was not limited to the following:
WHO: NCRP’s GIS support team, Tukman Geospatial staff.
HOW: Consulted with Mark Tukman (mark@tukmangeospatial.net)
It was recommended that project proponents attend one of the informational webinars held in May and June 2024 to become familiar with the project application preparation and submission requirements. Workshops were held via zoom with opportunities for participants to ask questions, with zoom meetings recorded and posted here.