The County is currently working with the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services (Cal OES) to pilot the California Wildfire Mitigation Program (CWMP), which will be funded, in part by a Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Hazard Mitigation Grant. The CWMP Home Hardening Initiative aims to perform defensible space and retrofit measures on existing residential homesites to mitigate against wildfire losses. The CWMP is targeting one (1) project area that is located both within the city limits of Placerville and the unincorporated areas of the County: Weber Creek (Project Area). The Project Area spans approximately eight hundred fifty-one (851) acres south of the City of Placerville. The majority of the focus is characterized by gentle to moderately steep terrain found along the Weber Creek drainage and in a few isolated locations. With a population of one thousand fifty (1050) people, the area contains five hundred twenty-five (525) total dwelling units, ninety two percent (92%) of which were built more than twenty (20) years ago. There are limited ingress and egress routes within and surrounding the focus area; it sits just South of United States Highway 50, the closure of which during a wildfire incident would severely impact traffic, evacuations, and emergency response Outreach efforts for the program will be aimed at encouraging clusters of homes to participate in measures to safeguard against the risk of wildfire losses. Homeowners within the Project Area who apply to participate in the CWMP will receive a home assessment by County staff, designated grant program staff, and /or contractors, to identify the defensible space and retrofit measures which are recommended to increase protection against wildfires.
