Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency Friday, waiving certain environmental regulations to hasten local forest management projects throughout the state in preparation for the next wildfire season.
“We want to get ahead of this by moving forward in an efficient and effective manner to protect lives and protect property before lives are lost and property is lost,” Newsom told an audience in Lake County, the site of several massive wildfires in recent years.
Saying he was declaring “an emergency in advance of an emergency” to protect communities most at risk of wildfire danger, Newsom stressed that the state could no longer afford to wait for fires to begin before deploying emergency resources.
“We’ve got to step up our game; dare I say it, get our act together,” he said. “This fire season, it’s right around the corner and we cannot be once again flat-footed and just in a reactive and a suppression mode. We’ve got to be much more proactive.”
California experienced two of its most destructive and deadly wildfire seasons in 2017 and 2018, and experts say climate change continues to heighten the risk each year. On recommendations from the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, Newsom is pushing to clear dead trees at a expedited pace, a move he said is essential to diminishing future threats.
Some state environmental activists, though, were quick to criticize Newsom’s order, likening it to recent statements made by President Donald Trump, who blamed California fires on poor forest management, despite scientific evidence showing that climate change is a much greater factor.
“Gov. Newsom should reject the Trump approach of logging and rolling back critical environmental protections,” said Shaye Wolf, climate science director for the Center for Biological Diversity.
The center and other environmental groups said focusing on retrofitting and creating defensible space around homes is more effective than thinning forests, and that clearing trees might even create more danger by loosening soil that could cause mudslides.
Newsom also pledged $50 million for fire preparedness in low-income communities and invited the private sector to introduce innovative fire protection proposals.
The order, which will apply to 35 clearance projects in Northern and Central California over the coming year, allows fire officials to work around multiple state regulations. Those include provisions of the California Environmental Quality Act, one of the nation’s strictest state-level regulations.
Newsom said sticking with the state’s normal forest management process would drastically slow down the ability to act.
“Some of these projects quite literally, not figuratively, could take two years to get done, or we could get them done in the next two months,” he said.
The union representing state firefighters praised Newsom’s plan.
“These circumstances are unusual, unpredictable, unseen in our lifetime, and courageous decisions that sometimes go against the political winds need to be made,” said Tim Edwards, president of CAL Fire Local 2881.
Senate Minority Leader Patricia Bates, R-Laguna Niguel, praised Newsom for acting with urgency ahead of the wildfire season.
“I stand ready to assist the Governor with any legislative action to eliminate bureaucratic roadblocks that could slow these projects,” she said in a statement.
While environmental groups bristled at Newsom’s plan, they continue to agree with him on a wide range of other issues.
“On the whole we see (Newsom) as an ally on environmental issues,” said Kathryn Phillips, director of Sierra Club California. “I think what we’re disagreeing with here is an approach to a problem that we all recognize.”
The state’s environmental laws are designed to protect California’s soil stability, watershed and wildlife habitats, she said, and waiving environmental reviews could have unintended consequences.
“For some suspension of oversight now, what’s the consequence going to be later?” she asked. “Are we going to end up having huge silt floods and mudslides?”
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