Regional Priority Planning in San Diego

The purpose of Resource Conservation District of Greater San Diego County's Regional Priority Plan (RPP) is to address the immediate need to increase regional capacity to identify, plan, and implement strategies and projects that create fire adapted communities and landscapes by improving ecosystem health, community wildfire preparedness, and wildfire resilience.

The RPP identifies and organizes projects through the Priority Projects List and summarizes the RCDGSDC’s efforts to identify, strengthen, and support capacity building partnerships, demonstration projects, and programs in the region to reduce wildfire risk and protect communities and natural resources and improve wildfire resilience. This includes the establishment of a local RFFC Collaborative group, a network of regional partner groups including land managing agencies, tribal nations, fire agencies, non-profit organizations, and community Fire Safe Councils. This group is currently made up of 45 entities, which were engaged to inform the Priority Projects List- this input has been crucial to the initial round of RPP data collection in which over 110 projects have been identified.

Plan Goals

• Increase engagement and coordination with stakeholders and regional partners to identify, plan, and implement projects that promote improving ecosystem health, community wildfire preparedness, and fire resilience.

• Develop a framework for organizing and managing priority project data.

• Increase regional capacity to identify, develop, and support programs that provide resources to address organizational needs such as workforce development and advanced training opportunities.

Geography of the Plan Area

The plan area encompasses San Diego County, which includes a highly varied topography with a mixture of urban and rural communities, more than 30 types of vegetative communities, and three distinct zones: mountain, desert, and coastal. It is the second most populous of California’s 58 counties, and according to 2021 Census data there are approximately 3.2 million residents. The area encompasses 4,300 square miles, 70 miles of beach along the Pacific Ocean, the Cuyamaca, Laguna, and Palomar Mountain Ranges, and includes hundreds of square miles of federally and state managed parks, forests, and preserves, as well as several Department of Defense properties. It borders Orange and Riverside Counties to the North, Mexico to the South, Imperial County to the East, and the Pacific Ocean to the West.

San Diego includes 18 incorporated cities and large areas of unincorporated County land, with a diverse structure of land ownership and management. More than 54% of the total land area in San Diego County is managed by federal, state, and local governments. Notably, San Diego County is home to 18 federally recognized tribal nations, more than any other county in the United States; however, the land under tribal ownership is comparably low, with total land holdings of just over 193 square miles. These communities are often in need of resources and capacity building.

Purpose of the Regional Priority Plan

This plan is developed as part of the Regional Forest and Fire Capacity (RFFC) Program. California Public Resources Code section 4208.1 established the RFFC Program to support regional leadership to build local and regional capacity and to develop, prioritize, and implement strategies and projects that create fire adapted communities and landscapes by improving ecosystem health, community wildfire preparedness, and fire resilience. To accomplish the RFFC Program’s objectives, block grants are utilized by recipients to support partner capacity, project readiness, implementation of demonstration projects, and regional priority planning to achieve landscape-level and community wildfire resilience consistent with the California Wildfire and Forest Resilience Action Plan as well as the California Forest Carbon Plan and Executive Order B-52-18.

The initial round of funding for the program was awarded to eight block grant recipients, six of which were working in this regional capacity and two of which were working at the statewide level. The program is continually evolving and growing, and as of early 2023, there are 13 block grantees working on the program. The state has been divided into geographic regions for this program, and the participants work collaboratively within their regions as well as state-wide. These regions currently include Northern, Central, Sierra-Cascade-Inyo, and the Southern California Regions.

The RCDGSDC falls within the Southern California (SoCal) Region

When this project initiated in 2019, our fellow regional block grantees included Inland Empire Resource Conservation District and Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy. Irvine Ranch Conservancy, Inland Empire Community Foundation, and San Gabriel and Lower Los Angeles Rivers and Mountains Conservancy are now part of the group as well.

In San Diego County, a program was developed that builds a framework for collaboration with regional stakeholders to identify, plan, and implement projects while focusing on actions that increase our regional capacity. The program goals include facilitating equitable collaboration, identifying opportunities for joint stewardship projects, providing resources for project and environmental planning, offering tools for prescribed burning and Gold Spotted Oak Borer (GSOB) management, and supporting workforce development opportunities.

In addition, a major deliverable of the first round of RFFC funding is to develop this Regional Priority Plan and Priority Project List, which will be used as a tool to advance regional collaboration, coordination, and project implementation. The RCDGSDC and RFFC partners’ progress toward achieving these goals is outlined in this report.