Marin fire officials assess new state hazard maps

Cal Fire has released a long-awaited set of updated maps outlining the fire hazard severity zones in Marin County and elsewhere in the Bay Area.

Marin fire officials say the maps, while mostly showing what they already know about fire risks in the county, could have implications for enforcement of state laws on defensible space and real estate.

“My first impressions are that it’s been a long time coming,” said Todd Lando, the board president at Fire Safe Marin. “My initial feeling is that I’m happy that the maps have been published. It gives us some leverage to move forward on some other decisions that need to be made based on the maps.”

In 2021, the state required Cal Fire to identify wildfire hazards in “local responsibility areas,” or communities with their own fire agencies. The Marin maps were part of a regional batch published on Monday.

“The best part about these maps is they’re bringing awareness to the known fire problem we have not only here in Marin but across the whole state, and highlighting that whether you’re in a suburban setting or a hillside community, there’s a wildfire risk associated with that,” said Jason Weber, chief of the Marin County Fire Department. “That’s the big takeaway.”

Weber also said he expected the maps to result in a broader application of a law known as the “zone zero” law. The law requires removing flammable materials — mulch, vegetation, plants, even garbage cans and items stored near a home — within 5 feet of structures.

The law has not gone into effect, but the state Board of Forestry and Fire Protection is developing the rules.

“This is likely to create significant changes to many properties,” said Lando, who is also a battalion chief and wildfire hazard mitigation specialist at the Central Marin Fire Department. “It’s the single best law that we have going forward to limit the kind of destruction we just saw in Southern California.”

Another law, Assembly Bill 38, requires an inspection and disclosure of wildfire hazards whenever real estate changes hands. It applies to buildings in the high and very high zones on the maps. Lando said many jurisdictions in Marin have gone “above and beyond” and adopted similar wildfire regulations, but the map will make enforcement easier.

“It’s one of our best tools to gain compliance with the fire code as it relates to wildfire hazards when a property changes hands,” Lando said.

The maps should not affect insurance rate decisions, according to the California Department of Insurance.

Marin municipalities can pass equally or more restrictive ordinances than the state, and some already have. For example, San Rafael has about 1,800 parcels in the high hazard severity zone and around 4,100 parcels in the moderate zone. Quinn Gardner, director of emergency management for San Rafael, said those parcels are already required to comply with the city’s vegetation standards for wildfire safety, which includes requirements for zone zero.

“The city adopted our citywide standards because we recognize that fire does not follow any lines on a map and has been actively supporting residents to adapt their homes to wildfire with good defensible space and by implementing home hardening measures,” Gardner said.

The maps show Corte Madera as being in the mostly moderate hazard severity zone; Mill Valley as mostly high and very high; Novato as mostly high and moderate; Larkspur as mostly moderate but high on its border with Mill Valley; Ross as moderate; Fairfax as a mix of high and moderate; San Rafael as moderate and high on its eastern border; Sausalito as a mix of very high, high and moderate; San Anselmo as moderate; and Tiburon as moderate but very high on Angel Island.

“I think all of them illustrate what we know,” Weber said of the maps. “The vast majority of this county is high or very high, others moderate, but when the wind is blowing 30 miles an hour, and you look at those slivers of high and very high and moderate all incorporated next to each other, all that tells me is the fire is going to burn with significant intensity. There’ll be significant structure loss, God forbid hopefully no life loss, but we’re going see that similar devastation if we don’t take action now.”

Cal Fire’s map zones are based on data like the amount of burnable vegetation, the area’s terrain and weather patterns in places where factors like wind are a significant contributor to a wildfire spreading, according to the state. The maps do not account for mitigation measures like home hardening, or recent wildfire or fuel reduction efforts.

Mark Brown, the executive director of the Marin Wildfire Prevention Authority, agreed that the maps create a baseline for when the state forestry board publishes its definitions for the zone zero law. He cautioned that Cal Fire is creating these maps for the whole state, painting with a broad brush.

“So it’s hard for them to use a detailed brush when they paint those maps,” Brown said. “Whereas when we do our own maps in Marin, we can be much more detailed.”

Brown said he is still analyzing the state’s methodology for the maps. He said he is not in “total agreement” with the state’s analysis because he thinks Cal Fire oversimplified fuel models, and averaged “high fire danger” weather data instead of extreme weather data to develop the maps.

“We are using very specific fuels data rather than simplified fuel data, and then we are using two distinct weather events to model fire and that are actual events that have occurred in Marin,” Brown said.

Brown said extreme weather conditions in wildfire modeling is important because they are when wildfires spread to urban areas.

“The Palisades fire, the Eaton fire, those weren’t average weather conditions, they were extreme weather conditions, and so we feel we should be modeling on the extreme conditions,” Brown said.

Lando said that in Marin, there is a “deep” understanding of how various interpretations of what encompasses a hazard can influence conditions “on the ground,” and laws. He said while the state maps show progress in how the state analyzes wildfire hazards regarding existing regulations, they don’t tell him any new information.

“This map is nothing magic,” Lando said. “There was never a moment where any of us believed we were going to look at these maps and learn that there’s hazards some place that we weren’t already aware of. They’re political boundaries to help us supply laws.”

For decades, fire agencies in Marin have been using a fire hazard map that uses wildland-urban interface boundaries — a geographic area where the developed environment meets the undeveloped — for regulatory measures on landscape maintenance and building codes, Lando said. Fire experts in Marin have defined a larger area as the urban interface zone than the state does, he said.

“We take into account areas that are at the periphery of where you might expect to see damage from a wildfire and include them because we think it’s important to take the maximum approach to wildfires and that’s proven accurate,” Lando said. “The way we’ve done it in Marin is the way they wish they’d of done it in Southern California right now.”

San Rafael has 386 parcels that are in the high severity zone but not within the city’s defined wildland-urban interface. Gardner said the maps could have implications for new construction on these parcels, depending on what is included in the upcoming state building and fire codes.

Weber said fire chiefs across the county will likely be bringing ordinances to elected bodies. Weber said a fire does not care what hazard zone a map says someone is in — it will burn with the same intensity and destruction, and ordinances should reflect that.

“We’ve learned time and time again from these large-scale fires, most recently in Los Angeles, that home hardening and defensible space are our path forward to creating a resilient community,” Weber said.

The maps go into effect in April after local municipalities have provided comment. The maps are available online at osfm.fire.ca.gov.