'A Possibility We Will Lose The Entire City': City Officials Taking Action To Lower Auburn's Risk Of Wildfire
AUBURN (CBS13) - Due to its proximity to the American River and plenty of dry brush to burn, the city of Auburn is a high-risk area for wildfire, so city officials are taking action to protect the area from potential disasters.
Twice in one year, CBS13 has covered a fire in Auburn City Councilmember Daniel Berlant's backyard.
"I've really been trying to push our city to be better prepared," he said.
The city council put together a group of residents and business owners that identified several actions Auburn can take to prevent wildfires.
"One of those items was making sure homeowners are compliant with defensible space codes but how do we make sure they're doing that?" Berlant said.
That's where the Auburn City Fire Department comes in. This week, the department will present its prevention plan to require mandatory home inspections at a town hall meeting.
"There's a possibility we will lose the entire city. We need to take it a step further. We need to inspect every parcel," said Auburn Fire Chief Dave Spencer.
We asked Spencer if the department has the staff to carry out home inspections.
"That's a great question. We don't. We're a small department," he said.
With only two full-time fire stations, the department will be forced to split the work. Here's the plan.
According to Auburn City Fire, there are approximately 5,000 structures in the city, which will be split into three groups of roughly 1,600 homes. Each group will be inspected every three years.
"With the Camp Fire and other large-scale fires, what we're learning is the problem is home hardening and structure-to-structure ignition," Spencer said.
Auburn City Fire hopes to hire seasonal defensible space inspectors to help with the workload. This plan will be presented at a town hall meeting this week before it could potentially be written into the municipal code.
So what if this goes through and a neighbor fails the defensible space inspection? Spencer said fines, citations and several enforcement options are on the table.
