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Napa Valley Vintners raise $2.1 million for wildfire resiliency

A nonprofit trade association, NVV is the largest private donor supporting Napa County’s Community Wildfire Protection Plan. The money was raised through a fundraising campaign last year, with 100% of the proceeds going towards the effort. 

Among the grantee recipients are The Napa Communities Firewise Foundation (Napa Firewise) and Napa County Resource Conservation District (RCD). Together they are collaborating with local and state government offices such as Napa County Fire Department, CAL FIRE and other nonprofits to help further safeguard against wildfires in the region.

• Read more: The cost of wildfires to winegrowers
  

The money will be used to implement 100 miles of strategic fire roads throughout the county, establish 300 acres of native habitat to reduce wildfire risk and provide education to 400 landowners and residents on forest health and wildfire resilience.

Napa County supervisor Anne Cottrell said, “Addressing the issue of wildfires in Napa County is a top priority and I am pleased that, as a community, we have taken positive steps towards making Napa County more fire resilient over the last couple of years. This grant by the NVV will help us take another big step forward.” 

According to the project collaborators, fire roads included in the grant will provide critical access for firefighters in the event of wildfires, and will also act as fire breaks to reduce or halt the spread of wildfires. The effectiveness of the fire roads will be further reinforced by planting wildfire-resilient buffers. This will help reduce dozer line maintenance, control erosion, provide wildlife habitat and improve wildfire resilience.

Jaime Araujo, member of the NVV board of directors and owner of Trois Noix said: “It's important that we collectively put forward solutions to prepare Napa Valley for the next wildfire event. We're humbled to be able to contribute to these efforts and are grateful to all the donors who helped raise these funds.”

As reported by Harpers last month, in 2022 there were 7,490 wildfires in California according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. The total acreage burned last year was 362,455, though this was well below the five-year average of 2.3 million acres.

Despite the 'quiet' year as measured in acreage, several significant wildfires burned in California in 2022; these include the Oak Fire in Mariposa County, which burned over 180 structures, the McKinney Fire in Siskiyou County, which caused four fatalities and the Mosquito Fire in Placer and El Dorado counties, which was California's largest wildfire of the year. In total, California wildfires claimed nine lives in 2022.

Further still, the California wine industry contributes approximately $170 billion each year to the US. economy.

• Wildfires
• NVV
• Napa Valley Vinters