OUTCOME: Capacity
Problem
North Coast Tribes as sovereign nations have unique challenges rooted in the historical erasure of Tribal stewardship of California’s forests and wildlands, ongoing agency regulations, policies and procedures that create barriers to Tribal land stewardship, longstanding misunderstanding of Tribal practices, and a long history of underfunded programs.
Solution
Tribal Capacity - Fund and support Tribal evaluation of their own capacity needs and Tribally-determined assistance to address those needs.
Background and Context
The Tribes and Tribal communities in the region share the needs of many rural communities, including the need for local capacity – personnel, equipment, infrastructure, and other resources – to carry out ecosystem and community resilience work. California Tribes also face unique challenges that extend from first contact to current barriers that discourage and often prohibit Tribes and Tribal members from employing traditional stewardship strategies, from engaging in collaborative work, and from developing capacity. There is now an urgent need to support and rebuild Tribal CBO and community capacity to engage in these cultural practices to correct the legacy environmental issues created by their suppression. There must be a significant increase in local, well-equipped, and trained personnel for land stewardship, including beneficial fire and the practices and activities that are applied before, during, and after the use of fire.
Building Tribal capacity includes building capacity for rapid fire response by qualified firefighters with access to the appropriate equipment to extinguish or begin to contain a large fire as additional resources are being dispatched to the incident. This immediate response to community and wildland fires that start within and adjacent to the WUI can help fill community protection needs that federal and state agencies may not have the resources to address, due to capacity limitations or due to multiple competing wildfire events that draw resources to other areas. Having local fire response capacity can help to reduce the frequency and scale at which extreme wildfire events affect communities in the region.
Recommendations
Each Tribe has a unique set of needs to develop and sustain their capacity to apply Indigenous knowledge and practices, including TEK, locally and on the needed larger scale. Support is needed for both near and long-term capacity building and for long-term strategy implementation to provide services for the entire region and to provide sustainable careers for local community members. To carry out ecosystem and community resilience work, Tribes need support to build capacity so that each Tribe can dedicate staff, leadership, and community knowledge holders to restore Tribal stewardship strategies, apply regional Tribal science, and for local Tribal people to apply TEK to the land and to carry out ecosystem and community resilience work. North Coast Tribes need adequate opportunities to meet, discuss, and develop shared priorities related to community, ecosystem, and watershed resilience.
Tribal capacity needs assessments must be led by Tribes, must be respectful of Tribal sovereignty, and must ask questions that are applicable to Tribal communities. Thus, NCRP will support Tribes in evaluating and filling Tribal capacity needs. The NCRP Director of Tribal Engagement and the Tribal Technical Assistance team work intimately with Tribes in the region seeking opportunities for inter-Tribal collaboration and developing Tribally-led programs to support regional Tribal capacity building and to support North Coast Tribes in the application of Tribal stewardship strategies.
To ensure success of community and ecosystem resilience efforts on all lands in the region, Tribal members, with coordination by regional Tribes, must be an integral part of the year-round trained workforce for fuel management, forest and community restoration and revitalization, firefighting, and other core activities. Tribal crews should lead and conduct the majority of the work in Tribal communities and are integral to the stewardship of their ancestral lands.
Actions
NCRP Tribal Technical Assistance Team will conduct interviews, meetings, and outreach to determine Tribal capacity assets and needs.
NCRP Tribal Technical Assistance Team will conduct interviews, meetings, and outreach to determine Tribal capacity assets and needs.
Seek funding for Tribal and Community Fire Stations, personnel and equipment. Funding is needed for vehicles that can respond rapidly to fires and incidents. Vehicles such as a 4 person 4×4 fire module that can carry a small water tank in the vehicle are all desperately needed by local tribes and communities.
Seek funding for Tribal and Community Fire Stations, personnel and equipment. Funding is needed for vehicles that can respond rapidly to fires and incidents. Vehicles such as a 4 person 4×4 fire module that can carry a small water tank in the vehicle are all desperately needed by local tribes and communities.
Fund and support North Coast Tribes to plan, develop, and construct infrastructure as well as hire employees with the capacity to expand existing Tribal fire and ecosystem management departments.
Fund and support North Coast Tribes to plan, develop, and construct infrastructure as well as hire employees with the capacity to expand existing Tribal fire and ecosystem management departments.
- Leadership and succession planning.
- Training, conferences, and certifications (including stipends for attendance).
- NEPA, CEQA, and permitting training.
- Personnel recruitment and retention.
- Partnership development.
- Organizational and individual contractor capacity as is appropriate.
- Other needs as determined by interviews
- Compile and integrate Tribal land management plans.
- Compile and integrate Tribal Climate Action Plans.
- Support Tribal consultants to share their experience with collaborating/developing MOUs with state and federal agencies with other Tribes.
- Support designation of local Tribal representatives, resource advisors, consultants etc. who can work with IMTs on wildfire response and integrate local knowledge, support use of local crews, and protect local resources.
- Seek funding to train individuals to be part of functioning local Incident Command Teams.
Seek funding for Tribes to develop and/or maintain secure spatial datasets that help tribal governments better protect cultural resources while providing essential data on an as-needed basis to fire managers to reduce impacts during fire management actions to these cultural resources.
Seek funding for Tribes to develop and/or maintain secure spatial datasets that help tribal governments better protect cultural resources while providing essential data on an as-needed basis to fire managers to reduce impacts during fire management actions to these cultural resources.
Seek funding for satellite prescribed fire training facilities within and adjacent to Tribal Reservations and Tribal lands (See Fire Resilient Forests – Beneficial Fire Capacity Solution).
Seek funding for satellite prescribed fire training facilities within and adjacent to Tribal Reservations and Tribal lands (See Fire Resilient Forests – Beneficial Fire Capacity Solution).
Support cultural burning as a Tribal action funded by philanthropy within the scope of Tribal constitutional jurisdiction as opposed to a state or federal action (See Fire Resilient Forests – Tribal Cultural Fire Solution).
Support cultural burning as a Tribal action funded by philanthropy within the scope of Tribal constitutional jurisdiction as opposed to a state or federal action (See Fire Resilient Forests – Tribal Cultural Fire Solution).