We have had many residents share with us their stories of insurance cancellation letters. This problem is very real right now, and engaging us for a free Home Wildfire Assessment and becoming part of a Firewise Community are two good ways we can fight back.
Here is what we did in May to address the insurance issue and improve fire resiliency in Oak Park:
Firewise
- The Ventura Regional Fire Safe Council (VRFSC) is providing $1,000 microgrants for Firewise-recognized communities to make structure and/or defensible space improvements.
- Country Glen HOA was awarded a $1,000 grant for defensible space improvements.
- Canyon Cove HOA was awarded a $1,000 grant for dryer vent mesh replacement.
- Country Meadows HOA was awarded a preliminary $1,000 grant for ember-resistant mesh improvements to their vents. Their leadership is still working this through with the VRFSC.
- Regency Chambord HOA has submitted its Firewise application to the Ventura County Fire Department (VCFD) for review and is scheduling an initial walk-through.
- Mae Boyer East Community was formed by John Faucher and Lori Gunn and is in the process of submitting its application to VCFD. This will be our first non-HOA Firewise Community.
- Morrison Sutton has started the application process to become a Firewise Community.
- We are actively reaching out to other HOAs and neighborhoods in Oak Park to work on their Firewise recognition. We have found that this is the gateway to improved fire resiliency for individual homes as well as for the community as a whole. The California Department of Insurance also mandates that insurance companies provide rate discounts for community programs such as Firewise USA.
Assessments
- Seven or eight more assessments were performed this month.
Marketing
A couple of marketing events that the Fire Safe Council attended:
- A Community event at Fire Station 89 in Agoura. Doug Wilson sat at the Agoura Fire Safe Council table, gave out cards, and got four people registered from Oak Park.
- A community event at the Oak Canyon Park duck pond. Chabad held a festival for the Jewish Lag B’Omer holiday jointly with the Agoura Hills Fire Safe Council. We added another five names to our database at the event.
Grants
- We received an $8,100 grant from Ventura Regional Fire Safe Council that will support our website and social media campaign for the next year. This is actually a 3-year grant that will be paid out one year at a time.
Other
- The Center for Geospatial Science and Technology (CGST) has made some final requested changes to an interactive map that will be available on our public website. This map will identify homeowners’ defensible space that needs to be mitigated and will provide a measuring tool to identify the boundaries of the defensible space for which Rancho Simi is responsible. We will be sharing this with Rancho Simi as well. In addition, the CGST has provided us with .png and .pdf versions of static maps of the different areas of Oak Park. These will be made available on the website as well.
Please click here to set up a free Home Wildfire Assessment, and contact us if you are interested in launching a Firewise program in your community.