Forestry Zone 0 Committee Requests Public Feedback at Apr. 23 Meeting
By Laurel Busby
News & Information Editor
The California Board of Forestry and Fire Protection's Zone 0 Regulatory Advisory Committee will be gathering input from the Los Angeles and SoCal residents at its Apr. 23 meeting.
Residents can attend in person or online, and registration is available at this link. Before the meeting, which will be held from 1-7 p.m. in Calabasas, the most recent draft of the proposed Zone 0 Regulations will be posted on the committee’s website.
Zone 0 rules, which are intended to prescribe the foliage allowed within a 5-foot perimeter around structures, are an effort to better protect homes, businesses, and other buildings during fire outbreaks, according to the committee’s website. In 1965, Zone 1 was created to regulate plants within 30 feet of buildings, while Zone 2 went into effect in 2006 to address the landscape within 30-100 feet of structures.
Last year, the state passed legislation requiring the California Board of Forestry and Fire Protection to establish Zone 0—an ember-resistant defensible zone within the first 5 feet around a structure, according to the board.
About a year ago, the Pacific Palisades Community Council, the Palisades Forestry Committee, and The Urban Wildlands Group opposed a draft of the proposed rules, which then proposed to ban grass, ornamental plants, native plants, shrubs, branches, fallen leaves, tree needles, weeds, and woodchips within 5 feet of structures. In addition, trees, boards, firewood, synthetic lawn, attached window boxes, and trellises would have been banned under that proposal.
In an Apr. 26, 2025, letter to the Zone 0 committee, Dr. Travis Longcore, a UCLA adjunct professor who is the science director of The Urban Wildlands Group, and three associates stated, “The advisory committee does not appear to have heard from scientists who have concluded that some vegetation, especially fire-resistant native oak species and perhaps species such as Deodar Cedar, protect structures from fire by intercepting embers and altering where embers land…. To read the draft rules, one would think that all vegetation combusts and burns faster than structures. To the contrary, well-maintained and hydrated vegetation has much higher moisture content than structures and is more fire resistant than structures, as has been obvious in post-fire reviews in California, including the rapid assessments from the Eaton and Palisades fires.”
With the upcoming May 1 deadline for brush clearance, which will include inspections by the L.A. Fire Department, David Card, the president of the Palisades Forestry Committee, sought to remind people that there is no need to consider the Zone 0 proposed rule changes, since they are still in flux.
“The State’s Zone 0 draft regulations are just that: a DRAFT that keeps changing; it’s not enforceable now,” Card said. “ Please do not cut down trees under the mistaken thinking that Zone 0 is in effect. People need to follow the current LA City Fire Department’s Brush Clearance regulations.”
Information on the current brush clearance regulations are available in this previous Canyon News article.
The advisory committee meeting on Zone will be held at the Calabasas Community Center, The Grove Room, 27040 Malibu Hills Rd. Comments can be emailed to PublicComments@bof.ca.gov.
