FireSmart is coming to Cortes, June 11 to 13

Roy L Hales/ Cortes Currents - The Strathcona Regional District will be carrying out FireSmart assessments on Cortes Island between Tuesday, June 11, and Thursday June 13. This is a free evaluation of the exterior of your home and surrounding yard,  which usually takes about an hour.   

“I started doing home assessments across the Strathcona Regional District in January.  I have come to Cortes a few times to do public education and have tagged on some home assessments.  I was just there in May for emergency preparedness week, and through that we had quite a few requests to come back for home assessments,” explained Bonnie Logan, Wildfire Risk Reduction Coordinator with the SRD.

“Usually there's only one wildfire risk reduction coordinator and that would be me, but I am eight and a half months pregnant. I'm  in that danger zone at that point where they like you to be close to a hospital. We hired Jeff as my maternity leave replacement. So Jeff will be coming over to Cortes  and he's going to be doing free FireSmart home assessments.” 

 Cortes Currents: How did the assessments go in other communities?

Bonnie Logan: “There’s definitely some common trends that we do see, like  firewood stacked up against a home or under a deck because it's nice dry storage, and most people are lacking sufficient storage. Wood decks are another one. Unfortunately, wood combustible,  there isn't really a good answer. That is  the most common decking system.

“We do have some suggestions on how to mitigate that. Again, it's not a pass or fail. It's not 'all of these things need to be done right now!' Some of these things are very small. There’s general housekeeping, like keeping your roof and gutters clean, mowing your lawn, raking some debris away from the home and then maybe moving that firewood pile in the summer when you're not using your wood stove.”  

“Everybody really buys into the program because it's not all or nothing. It’s a bit of a choose your own adventure.  Everything we're talking about is scientifically backed.  These aren't just  Bonnie Logan's ideas, or Jeff Caring's ideas, and they're not just the Strathcona Regional District pushing this program. These are tried, true and tested; based on science and research. So once you start talking to people and pointing out some of these things, they say, ‘Oh, I never looked at that’ or ‘I never considered that.’  It's a conversation with people and people realize that Rome wasn't built in a day. So the feedback's been really great, actually.” 

 Cortes Currents: How do you carry out an assessment?

Bonnie Logan: “We start with the roof and the structure, and then we work down and out.” 

“FireSmart has three zones.”

“The immediate zone, which goes out about five feet, is going to be your roof. We'll be looking at what type of materials on the outside of the house. What materials the house is built with, and then what materials surround the house. Something super common we see is  firewood stacked up right against the house, which can be a hazard in wildfire season.” 

“Moving outwards: we move into the intermediate zone and then the extended zone. We get a little bit more lenient about what can be in those zones.  Depending on how big your property is, you might not have that bigger zone. You might end up in your neighbour's yard and at that point, you have no control over what your neighbour does.” 

“Nothing is a requirement, it's just education and awareness for the homeowner. There's no follow up.  We're not going to come back a month later and finger wag at anybody and say, you didn't do these things.” 

“Some of these things we're talking about, like a roof, that's a big ticket item to potentially replace.  It's more about when that roof does need to be replaced, maybe we make a different choice if we have a combustible roof, like a cedar shake roof.”