fire safety vegetation rules

Santa Rosa approves redrawn fire hazard maps

Paulina Pineda, PRESS DEMOCRAT

Roughly 3,100 more properties fall within risk zones; opponents fear insurance rate hikes

Santa Rosa leaders approved updates to the city’s fire hazard areas in what they described as a push to better safeguard the city from another destructive wildfire.

About 3,100 properties across parts of Bennett Valley and in Oakmont will be added to the city’s so-called wildland urban interface, or WUI, under the expanded boundaries.

The approval Tuesday by a 6-0 vote came over objections from a group of residents who have raised questions about the process used to craft the maps and the implications for their properties.

The neighbors, who live in the area surrounding Matanzas Creek south of Hoen Avenue, worry they could see property insurance rates rise or lose coverage altogether by being included in the updated boundaries.

State forestry board new rules for California’s new ‘Zone Zero’ fire-safety proposal

April 23, 2026

Noah Haggerty, LOS ANGELES TIMES

CalFire Defensible Space webpage

After years of heated debates among fire officials, scientists and local advocates, California’s Board of Forestry and Fire Protection released new proposed landscaping rules for fire-prone areas Friday that outline what residents can and can’t do within the first 5 feet of their homes.

Many of these proposed rules — designed to reduce the risk of a home burning down amid a wildfire — have wide support (or at least acceptance); however, the most contentious by far has been whether the state would allow healthy plants in the zone.

Many fire officials and safety advocates have essentially argued anything that can burn, will burn and have supported removing virtually anything capable of combustion from this zone within 5 feet of houses, dubbed “Zone Zero.” They point to the string of devastating urban wildfires in recent years as reason to move quickly.

Forests, Land UseCalifornia Board of Forestry, fire safety vegetation rules, Safety Zone, wildfires, Zone Zero