Q&A

QUESTIONS & ANSWERS
Several emailed and phone called questions have been received.  Here are some of them, with answers.  The more recent questions are added at the bottom.


Q:  My property isn't in one of the subdivisions.  Does the Red Hill CWPP apply to my property?
A:  Yes.  If your property within the Wildland-Urban Interface (WUI) covered by the CWPP, then the CWPP applies to your property.  SEE MAP

Q:  My property isn't in WUI #47 or #49.  Does the Red Hill CWPP apply to my property?
A:  Yes.  If your property is near the WUI areas covered by the CWPP, then the CWPP will affect your property, particularly if your property is to the northeast of the WUIs (because the predominant winds drive fire to the northeast).

Q:  What is the point of a CWPP anyway?
A:  The point is to understand what citizens of the whole Red Hill area feel is important to them with respect to risk of catastrophic wildfire that could threaten lives and private property.  What are the things that you want to protect most?  How do you think that federal and state land management agencies should deal with the threat of wildfire?

Q:  We would like to know where any money is coming from.
A:  Funding for the Red Hill CWPP as well as the outreach is in part through a New Mexico Association of Counties' Wildfire Risk Reduction Program.  This grant is financed by the Bureau of Land Management.  NMAC Wildfire Risk Reduction Program funds have been used for preparing the other WUI level CWPPs in Catron County.  Additional funding for these projects are through the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act of 2000 Title III funds.

Q:   Where is the information and policy made for this extra-governmental organization?
A:   The Red Hill CWPP and Outreach projects are not extra-governmental; they are projects of Catron County government, and are by and for the people of the Red Hill area if the people in the Red Hill area choose to participate.  The projects are being guided by the CWPP contractor (Lif Strand), the Catron County Fire Chief and the NM State Forestry Dept., with state and federal land management agencies as collaborators.
      More information on CWPPs may be obtained at New Mexico State Forestry's website, which says:  Community Wildfire ProtectionPlans (CWPP's) are authorized and defined in Title I of the Healthy Forests Restoration Act (HFRA). Federal and state funding for hazardous fuel reduction projects is dependent on whether a county or community has a signed and approved CWPP. CWPP's have three main components: (1) Collaboration with all stakeholders throughout the CWPP process, (2) Identification and prioritization of hazardous fuel reduction areas and (3) addressing the treatment of structural ignitability within the CWPP area. CWPP's are reviewed by the New Mexico Fire Planning Task Force by the the 1st of December each year and if approved placed on this website.

Q:  What is the NMAC? Who funds that, and what policies come from it?
A:  New Mexico Association of Counties (NMAC) is a nonprofit, nonpartisan association representing and serving New Mexico’s thirty-three counties.  Its membership is comprised of elected county officials and through them, represents the interests of all counties to promote effective and efficient county government.  The NMAC Board consists of one member from each county, the officers and ex-officio members.  Until her recent illness and death, the president was Catron County Manager Sarah Merklein.
     NMAC is funded by dues paid by the county members.  Business partnerships supply additional funding.
     NMAC addresses the following:

• Lobbying to advance the legislative priorities of the counties 
• Avenues from which to continue county officials' professional education, including current issues and best practices
• Bringing educational services to county members
• Self-insurance pools that provide coverage for member counties: Workers’ Compensation, multi-Line (county property and liability coverage) and Law Enforcement pool 

Note that CWPP NMAC grants are actually funded by BLM.  NMAC's job is grant administration, not policy setting for CWPPs.  The CWPPs originated with the federal Healthy Forests Restoration Act (HFRA) of 2003.  All CWPPs must include the same basic information, adjusted for local community input. The areas of community input are determined by the County's own CWPP, and those areas were determined partly by the citizens of Catron County via public meetings as well as HFRA.

Q:  Who among the county commissioners is responsible for CWPP? Who among county employees is involved? In other words, who is accountable to the voters for this project? 

A:  No one single commissioner is responsible for CWPP.  My direct supervisor for the work I do as CWPP Contractor is the Catron County Fire Chief, Zina McGuire.  Linda Cooke, who works in the Commission office, deals with the NMAC/Catron County paperwork.  

     The implementation part of CWPPs (how the work of reducing hazardous fuels gets done) is discussed at monthly meetings of the Catron County Wildfire Reduction Task Force, an inter-agency meeting that is open to the public.  The Task Force is led by Zina McGuire (Catron County Fire Chief) and Doug Boykin (NM State Forestry, Socorro District). The next meeting is this coming Thursday, January 10 2013 in Reserve at 10 a.m. at the Catron County Fire Administration building.  Red Hill's CWPP will not be directly discussed at that meeting as we are still discussing how all agencies will coordinate to review the CWPP process to ensure that there is continuity and congruence between all the WUI CWPPs as well as the whole-county CWPP.  The Task Force is a continuation of the old "20 Communities" group that has met to discuss and coordinate approach to wildfire and community protection in Catron County for about a decade.