Nevada City, CA – On Tuesday the Nevada County Board of Supervisors approved fund acceptance for a new grant to mitigate wildfire risk in Penn Valley. The Lower Deer Creek Project targets 1,000 acres of hazardous fuels reduction around critical infrastructure, key roadways and areas in the Deer Creek Canyon above and adjacent to Lake Wildwood.
The Phase 1 grant totaling nearly $700,000 will be used to support community engagement and complete treatment design and environmental compliance. An additional $200,000 of in-kind match will be provided by Firewise Communities for their efforts in coordinating this project.
“This funding is a critical step in making our community more resilient to wildfire,” said Supervisor Sue Hoek. “Lake Wildwood is a densely populated community with limited evacuation routes, making it hard to evacuate, especially when minutes count. This project will help firefighters protect this community and the surrounding areas during a wildfire.”
Lake Wildwood is one of five communities identified in the 2024 Evacuation Study as being the most evacuation constrained County-wide. This new award, which comes via the FEMA Hazard Mitigation Grant Program (HMGP), represents the first major investment to address the outcomes of the Evacuation Study at scale. Several recommendations cited in the study such as the creation of shaded fuel breaks along Bitney Springs Road, Pleasant Valley Road, and Mooney Flat Road are included in the project scope.
Phase 2 of the project will consist of over $4 million in hazardous fuels reduction work.
“It is rewarding to see the strategic plans that make up the Roadmap to Resilience be leveraged to get work on the ground in key locations,” said Alex Keeble-Toll, interim director of emergency services. “We have taken what we learned from our community and technical experts to successfully advocate to funders for impactful wildfire mitigation projects.”
Both Phase 1 and Phase 2 of the Lower Deer Creek Project require a 25% match that will be satisfied through the in-kind participation of Firewise Communities in the project footprint. The Lake Wildwood Firewise Community has been especially instrumental in helping to define localized priorities for treatment, including those around water tanks, water treatment facilities, and in the Deer Creek canyon and will continue to be integral to project success.
“This area has seen two major destructive fires in the past 35 plus years, both of which threatened large parts of Lake Wildwood,” said Barbara Tiegs, former Chair of the Lake Wildwood Firewise Committee. “This is one of the most densely populated areas in Western Nevada County, and as a resident of Lake Wildwood, I’m very excited about the additional protection that will be provided.”
Next Steps
A Community Town Hall is planned for later this spring and an interactive parcel map will be stood up in advance of the Town Hall so that residents can verify if they are within the project area.
For more information visit ReadyNevadaCounty.org/LowerDeerCreekProject.
About the Nevada County Office of Emergency Services (OES)
OES works under the Emergency Preparedness Board Objective, leading the community in all hazards planning, preparedness, response, and recovery with a focus on wildfire. OES focuses on improving county-wide evacuation routes and safety, continuing to strengthen early alert and critical communication systems, and working with residents and community partners in emergency preparedness, defensible space, home hardening, green waste disposal, and fire- safe land stewardship. Learn more about OES Projects at www.ReadyNevadaCounty.org/Projects.
A recent Review-Journal letter to the editor mischaracterized Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto’s Southern Nevada Economic Development and Conservation Act, also known as the Clark County Lands bill. As the former executive director of the Nevada Conservation League, I wholeheartedly support this legislation, so I wanted to set the record straight.
Sen. Cortez Masto has been working on this bill for years in partnership with state and local governments, conservation groups like the NCL and local area tribes. It’s true that the Clark County lands bill would open 25,000 acres to help Las Vegas grow responsibly, while setting aside 2 million acres for conservation. It would also help create more affordable housing throughout the valley while ensuring our treasured public spaces can be preserved for generations to come.
What is not correct is that the money from these land sales would go to the federal government’s coffers. In fact, the opposite is true.
The 1998 Southern Nevada Public Lands Management Act is a landmark bill that identified specific public land for future sale and created a special account ensuring all land sale revenues would come back to Nevada. In accordance with that law 5 percent of revenue from land transfers goes to the state of Nevada for general education purposes, 10 percent goes to the Southern Nevada Water Authority for needed water infrastructure and 85 percent supports conservation and environmental mitigation projects in Southern Nevada. This legislation has provided billions to Clark County and will continue to benefit generations of Southern Nevadans. Sen. Cortez Masto’s lands bill builds upon the act’s success.
So here’s the good news: All of the money generated from land made available for sale under Sen. Cortez Masto’s bill would be sent to the special account created by the 1998 law. Rather than going to an unaccountable federal government, the proceeds would continue to help kids in Vegas get a better education, bolster outdoor recreation and modernize Southern Nevada’s infrastructure.
I know how important it is that money generated from the sale of public land in Nevada stay in the hands of Nevadans, and so does the senator. That’s why she opposed a Republican effort last year to sell off 200,000 acres of land in Clark County and other areas of the country that would have sent those dollars directly to Washington.
Public land management in Nevada should benefit Nevadans. We should protect sacred cultural sites and beloved recreation spaces, responsibly transfer land for affordable housing when needed and ensure our state has the resources it needs to grow sustainably. I will continue working with Sen. Cortez Masto to advocate for legislation, such as the Clark County lands bill, that puts the needs of Nevadans first.
Paul Selberg writes from Las Vegas.
click to expand photos
Las Vegas High’s baseball team claimed a 3-2 home win over Coronado on Friday.
Las Vegas (9-13-1) next hosts Rancho at 10 a.m. Saturday. Coronado (13-14) hosts Chaparral at 3:30 p.m. Monday.
Contact Alex Wright at awright@reviewjournal.com. Follow @AlexWright1028 on X.
LAS VEGAS (FOX5) — Nevada’s jobless rate is holding steady, but the state is still adding jobs.
A new report from DETR shows February’s unemployment rate unchanged at 5.3 percent, with the labor force growing by nearly 3,800 people.
MORE ON FOX5: Nevada unemployment rate rises to 5.3% in January
Nevada now has about 1.6 million nonfarm jobs, up 2.2 percent over the past year and 1,500 more jobs than in January.
“This month’s report shows a strengthening labor market,” said David Schmidt, Chief Economist. ”Compared to the report for January, the pace of job gains in the past year increased from 1.9% to 2.2%, building on what was already the fastest pace of job growth in the country. While the unemployment rate remained stable, the labor force participation rate rose to 63.7%, 1.7 percentage points higher than the national level.”
In Las Vegas, employment ticked up by 1,100 jobs in February, about 0.1 percent, and is up more than 25,000 jobs compared to last year.
Reno added 1,000 jobs on the month, while Carson City shed about 200 but is still slightly above where it was a year ago.
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