The Oak Park Fire Safe Council (OPFSC) is working closely with the Ventura Regional Fire Safe Council (VRFSC) and the Resource Conservation District of the Santa Monica Mountains (SMMRCD) to provide free Home Wildfire Assessments for Oak Park residents. These assessments identify areas where your home and defensible space (yard) can become more wildfire resilient, and provide you simple suggestions to protect your home and family from wildfire.
Assessments are performed by personnel from VRFSC, SMMRCD and personnel in Oak Park who are trained on both the tools and the process for the assessment. More than 50 assessments have already been performed in Oak Park. When a homeowner contacts us (or one of our partners directly), an appointment is scheduled and the assessor will meet you at the scheduled time. HOAs or their management companies can contact us to do an assessment of the common areas of their HOA.
Wildfire can burn through living and dead brush and native fuels adjacent to your home. Additionally, studies have shown that embers can travel up to a mile or two in front of a wind-driven wildfire. In open brush, these embers are responsible for the rapid spread and advance of the fire, while in developed areas, accumulating embers are often responsible for igniting homes. Our assessments are not just for homes around the perimeter of Oak Park; they also reduce the chance that these wind-driven embers will ignite sustainable fires next to structures within our community.
To begin an assessment, the assessor will first examine the structure of your home and identify opportunities to make it less susceptible to wildfire. Areas of concern are the attic and other vents into the home, debris in gutters, debris caught in crevices in the roof, door and window gaps (for example lack of a tight seal under the garage), and others.
Once the assessor has identified opportunities for improved wildfire resiliency in the structure, they will evaluate the defensible space around it (your yard). Here the primary focus is what we call Zone 0, or the area within five feet of the structure. Although ideally you would have nothing that could burn within that area, that is often not realistic. There may be plants there that you want to keep, or perhaps there is a flammable fence connected to the home. The assessor’s focus will be on working with you to make suggestions that will improve the situation. These might include things like moving a wood pile or propane tank that is next to the home to another location, removing some plants or trimming them back, replacing bark mulch with another material, trimming trees so that they are at least five feet away from the home or replacing the part of the fence directly adjacent to the home.
Every home is different, and every homeowner’s solution for resiliency will be different. The main thing is to improve your resiliency, which provides better protection for you, your family, your property and our community. This starts with one of our free assessments.
CLICK HERE TO SCHEDULE YOUR FREE ASSESSMENT
