CFRI Risk Assessment and Decision Support, Potential Operational Delineations (PODs).

Nested feedback loops in a wildfire-prone landscape: Implications for multi-level perspectives on resilience

WiRē Approach to Wildfire Adaptation: Research Embedded in Practice

A flexible process for empowerment | Tools for a science of practice

Fire exclusion, an expanding urban interface, and climate change have significantly altered the biophysical conditions contributing to fire risk, and professional and public perceptions of this risk are not necessarily in alignment with each other or climate trends. This presentation will address some of these challenges and consider adaptive responses.

Increasing wildfire risks require expanding the traditional toolbox of management strategies to better consider the diverse impacts, mitigation options, and unique needs of communities. We must understand where populations are at risk to wildfires, who is most likely affected, and how to best direct resources and mitigation efforts.

Working to create a fuels program at the local level from the perspective of the fire district. Managing contractors, HOA and Town presentations, and Fuels Management Plans.

Energy industry sites can often be involved in wildland fires in Colorado. Whether the fire origin or just a value at risk, fire districts in the Denver-Julesburg Basin know the hazards and utilize best practices in response.

In this presentation, several examples of wildfire decision support tools and their use in Colorado will be presented. Examples will include the use of quantitative wildfire risk assessment results to evaluate fuel treatment outcomes, an online potential operational delineation (POD) Atlas for wildfire response, and the integration of PODs and wildfire analytics for the strategic placement of treatments to enhance wildfire control opportunities.

This talk will describe a recent analysis we did using a satellite data-driven approach to delineate areas with common fire regimes (pyromes), and how those fire regimes are changing. Our analysis was conducted across the coterminous US, and for this talk we will take a more detailed look at Colorado and the Southern Rocky Mountains Ecoregion.

Team Rubicon, a volunteer disaster response group, successfully completed 93 HIZ mitigations and more than 108 acres of fuel reduction in Grand County, CO in early summer 2022. Learn how to mobilize communities and utilize volunteer organizations, such as Team Rubicon, as a force multiplier and to meet grant matching requirements and raise program effectiveness.

This talk from the National Weather Service will consider potential changes to the Red Flag Warning program. Proposed changes discussed will include Particularly Dangerous Situation (PDS) weather designations and dynamic weather criteria, including the Hot, Dry, and Windy (HDW) Index.

This session is to detail best practices and lessons for the State of Colorado, as learned through the eyes of an Owner’s Representative supporting the Oregon 2020 Wildfires, the largest recovery event in the State’s history. The presentation will explore the value added through third-party oversight, promotion of operational efficiencies, and navigating challenges with FEMA Public Assistance policies.

The overlap of social vulnerability and wildfire risk has garnered recent attention, but there is limited understanding of drivers of wildfire risk mitigation capacity in vulnerable communities. We present a new analysis of risk mitigation capacity across the state of Colorado and share insights about pathways that shape capacity.

In 1962 Everett Rogers popularized the theory of Innovation Adoption. Wildfire preparedness programs most often times work with innovators and early adopters but struggle to cross the “chasm” to reach the majority of the

community falling short of providing community wide preparedness. This presentation will dive into how communities can develop wildfire programs that drive action, measure success and reach a broader community at a meaningful

scale. This presentation will be enlightening, interactive and maybe even a bit entertaining.

This presentation will include an overview of emerging Risk Management Assistance tools and key lessons learned from fire practitioners who used these tools during the 2021 and 2022 fire season. The topic will ideally be of service to land managers looking to improve their management of risk before and during wildland fire incidents.

After a wildfire, it is tough to imagine another risk ahead, but there is still a threat to your home or business after the flames are extinguished—flooding. Join Butch Kinerney, Marketing & Outreach Branch Chief from FEMA’s National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP), to learn how the NFIP brings businesses and homeowners the extra layer of protection they need to financially prepare for flooding after a fire with flood insurance.

This interactive session, led by members of the Colorado State Forest Service GIS team, will be given provide attendees with a brief introduction to the Colorado Forest Atlas and associated applications, and review the best uses of each based on attendee-defined needs. Attendees will learn how to utilize the many useful features for visualizing and downloading data, creating maps and reports, and getting the most information out of the applications for their project.

In joint work between Colorado State University (CSU) and the Colorado State Forest Service (CSFS) an investigation was undertaken into potential barriers to accessing funds from the Forest Restoration and Wildfire Risk Mitigation (FRWRM) grant. We will discuss observed barriers to FRWRM participation and how changes to the grant process in upcoming cycles will aim to increase FRWRM accessibility.

Technology can help Firefighters fight wildfires better, faster, and more safely...learn what new Firefighting tech is available today and discuss and validate your wildest technology ideas with a technology expert!

To accelerate fire adaptation, we need to help Coloradans think differently about fire. In this presentation, see novel multimedia created to give Coloradans a more holistic understanding of forest fire and drive urgency to restore forests.

Cost-share incentives are an important tool for encouraging wildfire risk mitigation on private property. You might expect them to be particularly popular among people with lower incomes – but are they?

How do we get civilians to realize we're talking to THEM about preparing their private properties by reducing fuels - instead of just hoping firefighters will save every home no matter what? This engaging wildfire novel sneakily teaches about embers in the HIZ and general emergency preparedness and is endorsed by the Colorado State Forest Service, but we need to get it in the hands of people.

Stories of fire are an important part of “The Beginning Times”, as important as the other three elements, as they are one and the same…working in a sweet symbiotic relationship with each other.

For more than a century the wildland fire community has been organized primarily to suppress wildland fire and to ensure public safety and the protection of values with less attention being directed to ensure communities are fire adapted. This presentation will consist of panelists to discuss the evolution of a growing fire community to support Colorado communities in a focused manor with the long term result being a safer more effective fire response with fewer tragic results and an increased ability to live with fire.

Come hear from a diverse team of researchers, non-profit watershed coalitions, and consultants who have been working towards the common goals of public safety, secure drinking water supply, and watershed recovery after the largest wildfire in Colorado history. We will discuss lessons learned following tragic post-fire flooding and debris flows, mulching operations covering 9,000+ acres of burned hillslopes, many point mitigation projects, and the research, collaboration, and planning behind it all.

The Wildland Fire Mitigation and Management Commission, created by Congress in the 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, will form federal policy recommendations and strategies on ways to better prevent, manage, suppress and recover from wildfires, and provide recommendations for aerial firefighting equipment needs. We will hear from the Colorado members and others on the status of the Commission's work and their own priorities for the recommendations. Conference attendees will also have a chance to engage with the members directly.

We likely all know of and participate in numerous “communities of practice,” working groups, and similar organizations that bring together folks from different organizations who share common interests or concerns. Through a moderated panel discussion, multiple practitioners who have worked with the Wildfire Research (WiRē) Center (https://wildfireresearchcenter.org/) on projects in their communities will discuss their impressions of engaging with the relatively new WiRē Community of Practice, including how it has affected not only their own practices but also the usefulness of engaging with the WiRē approach for them, with potential insights for others considering developing, joining, or working with similar cross-institution working groups or communities.

This panel will apply a “Stages of Readiness” framework to gather community-connected partners of the Northern Colorado Fireshed Collaborative (NCFC) and showcase examples of how groups with different levels of capacity working in different watersheds are leveraging the resources of the NCFC to prepare landscapes and communities for a future with wildfire.