Neighbors – we have several upcoming fuels reduction matching funds and volunteer assistance opportunities! The Coalition for the Upper South Platte (CUSP) has matching grant funding available to anyone within our CWPP area for fuel hazard reduction work. This would be the smaller CUSP crew (as opposed to the SWIFT crew that we had here last year). They do excellent work, and offer their services for $750 an acre. The landowner would pay the other $750 per acre.
Also, CUSP is planning several large volunteer projects for May 7, in honor of Wildfire Community Awareness Day. They will focus on our CWPP area, Palmer Lake, and the Green Mountain neighborhood directly north of the Academy. CUSP would provide sawyers to clear or thin oak patches during the next two months. The event would likely offer several dozen volunteers to haul brush to the road for chipping. CUSP would provide a chipper and may be able to haul chips offsite, since there would likely be a large volume. This is a great chance to work some of our more remote high priority stretches, such as the drainage north of Ken’s house (E-5: one of our “Top Ten” priority 1 projects). Alternatively or additionally, we could focus on expanding ROW clearing in E-4 (the Gauntlet), or S-4 and S-5 (the north end of Fallon Road and the portion of Evans Road just west of Fallon Road. These make up the remaining “Top Ten” priority one projects, outlined on pages 53-54 of the CWPP. We should be able to chip existing slash piles that are in place at that time, so take this opportunity to pile your slash in an accessible location. We would need to ensure that all affected landowners are on board with the project. Although CUSP will manage outside volunteer assistance and logistics, a CWPP steering team may be advisable to help plan this event. Please let me know if you would like to participate.
And yet another grant opportunity….the CAFA grant (also known as the Stevens Hazardous Fuels Grant) targets landowners directly abutting federal lands. As described on the CO State Forest Service (CSFS) website, this is for “Treatments on adjacent non-federal lands to protect communities when hazard reduction activities are planned on National Forest lands” (http://csfs.colostate.edu/media/sites/22/2014/02/Landowner-CommunityFinancialAssistancePrograms-rev4-21-14.pdf). This includes properties immediately adjacent to fuels projects included in the USFS Upper Monument Creek (UMC) planning area. In otherwords, any of our properties that abut the Pike National Forest, since this entire interface is included in the UMC Proposed Action. The Coalition for the Upper South Platte has offered to compile a grant application encompassing several projects, including within our CWPP. Proposals would be need the support of the Colorado State Forest Service (CSFS) and USFS. This competitive opportunity requires no funding from the landowner. However, showing in-kind work on the property or even within the community would likely increase chances of the project being chosen. I am preparing a map and narrative of all proposed projects within our CWPP that directly abut the Pike National Forest, and will coordinate with CUSP to ensure this information is included in their comprehensive grant proposal. Deadline is March 25, 2016.
FYI, the CSFS maintains a database of grant opportunities at http://nrdb.csfs.colostate.edu/Home/Search.
We can discuss this further at our next CWPP meeting.
Thanks, Diane.