Defensible space: Forested communities take prudent precautions

An elegant home on Antler Ridge Road is the rally point, the fallback position for firefighters if the Elkhorn Subdivision west of Whitefish is ever overrun by fire.

But the chances of firefighters being forced to the fallback position have been slimmed, mostly because of tree thinning and other fire protection work that has been pursued by subdivision homeowners over the last couple years.

The Elkhorn subdivision was one of the stops on a "timber tour" hosted by the Kalispell Chamber of Commerce Thursday.

The forested subdivision is one of eight Flathead County communities that have joined forces with the Libby-based Resource Conservation Development Council in fuel reduction programs. And it stands out as a model project because of the initiative taken by subdivision homeowners, said Bill Swope, an RC & D community forester.

Homeowners created a subdivision fire protection committee two years ago, and within a year the committee was pursuing fire protection grant money, available through the National Fire Plan.

"Two years ago, we wanted to tap in the various people around the valley who know what they are talking about," said Mike Frost, chairman of the committee.

The group consulted with Forest Service and Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation officials, and eventually pursued a grant through the state that would be administered by RC & D. Swope got involved to help individual homeowners develop protection plans.

The subdivision has 38 property owners, and the fire protection effort attracted 25 of them, Swope said.

"I didn't have to convince anybody that they needed to do some work," Swope said. "Pretty much everybody was on board who sent in an application."

Participating homeowners did thinning work this summer, most of them through logging contracts and some doing the work themselves. And to complement that work, the homeowners committee convinced the Department of Natural Resources and Conservation to thin a 15-acre tract of state land on the western perimeter of the subdivision.

"It all happened pretty

quick," Swope said, noting that state officials were first contacted in March and already the thinning project is nearly complete.

Now the homeowners are urging similar work on state lands along the south side of the subdivision.

Swope said the Elkhorn project involved working with individual property owners on ways to improve "defensible space" around their homes, along with improving access for firefighters. Part of a community protection effort involves planning for a future firefighting effort, he said.

And those plans led to the house at 400 Antler Ridge Road, a model for defensible space and preparation, through a customized fire suppression system designed by owner Dan Richardson.

The system is designed to wet a 30-foot perimeter around the entire house, along with wetting the house itself through six sprinkler heads that can be mounted on the roof within 30 minutes. There's a 2,500-gallon water reservoir, a 30,000-gallon pond, and two pumps fueled by large propane tanks, one of which is buried. IN addition to the sprinklers, the pumps can power a 250-foot fire hose that can be used to fight fire on the perimeter of the property.

"What he can basically do is make it rain here for 24 or 36 hours," Swope said.

The Richardson house was easily picked as the safety zone for firefighters.

"If they had to retreat to a safety zone, this is it," Swope said.