County in Colorado adds jobs and resources in anticipation of new wildfires

By Alan Gionet

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    JEFFERSON COUNTY, Colorado (KCNC) — Jefferson County issued a Red Flag alert on Friday morning as heat and dryness combined to increase fire danger. Douglas County and Boulder County did the same. It means a significant portion of the area around the Denver metro area has upped warnings as fires burn in other parts of the state.

“Fire doesn’t go by a calendar or go by red flag days,” said Erik Alpine, assistant chief of Foothills Fire & Rescue. Alpine was speaking of the year-round nature of the threat of wildfire. Smaller departments like Foothills, which is tucked between Golden, Genesee, and Evergreen and works fires and medical calls on Lookout Mountain, are trying to make inroads in helping people mitigate property and prepare for evacuation should fire come, but the largely volunteer department is also very busy answering 700 plus calls a year, including accidents on Interstate 70.

“Some departments have larger budgets than other departments. Having the county jump in will certainly kind of help balance that out and everybody gets a piece of the pie then.”

Jefferson County is pulling together a program under the sheriff’s office that will help coordinate planning and fire mitigation in the county and even have its own brush truck for assisting a firefighting.

“We’re hiring new staff. We’re bringing in new equipment and we’re focused not only on the fire response, helping our partners respond to wildfires when they occur in the county. But really our primary purpose is the proactive side of it, doing the fire mitigation,” said Brian Keating, wildland fire program manager.

Keating comes to Jefferson County after decades in the federal firefighting service. In November, voters approved a TABOR override ballot request called 1A. It set aside $30 million for infrastructure and public safety in the county. The budget for the new effort will be about $4.5 million a year, with an initial $2.4 million in expenditures to help stand the office up.

Keating says they are in the process of hiring 37 people to plan and help with mitigation. The huge job of mitigation assistance in the county has been falling largely on the local departments, many of which have put people in the role of mitigation specialists. But in the county, the suggestions and guidelines vary. There is hope the new program will help even that off.

Keating explained some of what’s on his list. “Making our homes more defendable and safer. Being prepared so they know how to evacuate. And that will give us the space to actually engage fires and do our job. Because if we’re focused on trying to evacuate people because folks don’t understand that process, that means we’re not putting out the fire.”

Alpine looks forward to the county’s assistance as they try to deliver messages about preparing for evacuation and mitigating property damage.

“We’re all going to be singing from the same hymnal as it were,” said Alpine.

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