What the Heck is A CWPP and Why Do I Need One?

Residents of Coal Creek Canyon (CCC), like all foothills dwellers, understand that the privilege of living in our beautiful mountains comes with the responsibility to protect our environment, lifestyle, and to help our neighbors in times of emergency. We don’t have the municipal resources that urban dwellers take for granted, like water, sewer, snow removal, and municipal fire protection services. We step up and handle these things ourselves. Always have, always will. And now it’s time to step up and help our volunteer fire department draft a new Community Wildfire Protection Plan to give our homes,communities and forests a fighting chance when the inevitable wildfire comes.

What is a CWPP?

A Community Wildfire Protection Plan (CWPP) represents the best opportunity we have to address the challenges of living with wildfire, as a fire adapted community, in a way that brings about comprehensive, highly effective, and locally supported solutions.A CWPP identifies and prioritizes areas for hazardous fuel reduction treatments and recommends the best methods for fire mitigation actions on private, county, state, and Federal land. Effective fire mitigation will help protect our lives, homes, businesses, forest, wildlife, our beloved mountain lifestyle,and our volunteer firefighters!

The Coal Creek Canyon Fire Protection District (CCCFPD) had a CWPP prepared for us in 2008. It is now outdated and will be updated in 2023. Much has changed in the last 15 years, from advances in firefighting science to the climate changes we’ve all witnessed. Wildfire is now a much higher risk in our beloved canyon and the mountains which surround it. Luckily, there are many ways to make our CCC communities more fire adapted, and thus more likely to survive a wildfire. That is the ultimate function of a CWPP.

Why Do I need a CWPP?

The most important word in Community Wildfire Protection Plan is COMMUNITY. This is YOUR plan!Compiled by The Ember Alliance, a well-respected organization focused on wildfire mitigation and community preparedness, the CWPP documents the risk of every community in the Fire District with well researched, step-by-step recommendations and prioritization of the mitigation measures required to allow the Fire Department to safely protect our lives and property. Firefighter safety is of utmost importance to the community. Implementation of recommendations in the CWPP is left solely to the discretion of the individual property owners. If residents choose to do the work outlined in the CWPP,we can help with everything from forming a local fire mitigation group, to finding funding, to selecting certified contractors.

How Can I Have a Voice in Our CCC CWPP?

Come to the community meeting in April to meet The Ember Alliance team, learn exactly how they use the latest fire science to map our community and make recommendations on effective fire mitigation measures “from the front door to the forest.” And let them know what your biggest concerns are as aCCC dweller facing the constant threat of wildfire. Speak up, take the survey, get your questions answered, join in – if there was ever time to step up…this is it!

For more information, and to sign up to get email notifications of CWPP news, visit our website at

www.CoalCreekCWPP.org Groups of concerned residents are already forming in each of the 14 CWPP communities within the Fire District. Give us your street address when you sign up and we can send you information specific to your neighborhood.

Save the Date!

When:

Thursday, April 27 from 6:30 to 8:00 pm

Where: CCCIA Community Center, 31528 Hwy 72

Who: Meet the CCCFPD Chief, Garret Ball, the Community Outreach Committee folks, a Colorado StateForest Service forester, the team from The Ember Alliance, and neighbors from CCC who share yourconcerns.

Why: Because we need your input! And we will take good care of you. We know how much it is to askyou to give up an evening after a long day of work and school. Feel free to come a bit early. We will havesome healthy snacks in case you haven’t had dinner yet. We will also have supervised activities to keepthe kids busy while you attend the meeting