Wildland Division

The responsibilities of the Wildland Division are broken down into two main categories. The first responsibility of the Wildland Division is wildland fire suppression readiness and response. This responsibility includes coordinating the Wildland Strike Team, wildland training, overseeing equipment and the equipment cache, managing the Wildland Operations Plan, the Resource Mobilization plan, and all National Wildfire Coordinating Group (NWCG) certifications for regional and district staff.

The second responsibility is as important as the first: reducing the threat of a catastrophic wildland fire in the Wildland Urban Interface (WUI) through prevention efforts like public education and hazardous fuels mitigation. The Wildland Division is responsible for coordinating Firewise activities with communities, such as "wood chipper days", implementing and updating the Community Wildfire Protection Plan (CWPP) and the 2001 WUI Ordinance, coordinating fuel reduction projects in high priority areas, grant research, managing the wildland fuel crew, and a Santa Fe County GIS WUI Hazard Homeowner Assessment Project.

Since 2004, growth in the Wildland Section has expanded in all areas despite the fact most of our activities depend on the availability of grants. In 2004 the Section had one full time WUI Specialist paid out of a Collaborative Forest Restoration Program grant (CFRP). Santa Fe County converted that position to a full time permanent Captain position in the fall of 2007. Three full time/term wildland crewmembers were also added in 2008 and paid out of the same CFRP grant. A volunteer Lieutenant position for the Section was also added in 2008. As of 2009, county funding accounts for 33% of the Section operating budget; the remainder comes from grant funding sources.

For more information on projects the team is working on, weather or training you can visit their web site at www.sfcfire-wildland.com.