Preparedness Is What We Build Together
As California enters peak wildfire season, CAL FIRE, the Butte County Fire Safe Council, and community partners gathered in Paradise during Wildfire Preparedness Week — a reminder that preparedness is empowerment, and that what we build, we build together.
May is Wildfire Preparedness Month
The safety of our communities and the health of our landscapes are inseparable — it's something we come back to again and again at the Butte County Fire Safe Council. Preparedness isn't fear. It's empowerment. It's neighbors helping neighbors, communities choosing to invest in their future before disaster strikes, and the recognition that what we're building, we're building together.
As California enters peak wildfire season, CAL FIRE recognized Wildfire Preparedness Week (May 3–9, 2026) with events across the state. As part of this statewide effort, CAL FIRE hosted a public event on Friday, May 8th, in Paradise.
Wildfire preparedness in Butte County is deeply personal. Over the last seven years alone, more than 400,000 acres have burned in the county. Thousands of homes have been lost. Lives have been lost and many changed forever. But what stands out most is not only the devastation, it's the strength of our communities. Just a few years ago, Butte County had only eleven recognized Firewise USA communities. Today, that number has grown to 49 — neighbors working together, communities organizing around shared responsibility, and a cultural shift from reactive response to proactive collaboration.
The event was held at Blue Oak Terrace, within the footprint of the Camp Fire, where CAL FIRE, the Butte County Fire Safe Council, local residents, contractors, and partner organizations came together to implement a comprehensive fuels reduction and restoration project spanning more than one hundred acres. See BCFSC's latest Press Release on a portion of the project here: South Paradise Blue Oaks — Project Notice. The work here isn't just about reducing vegetation, it's about restoring stewardship to the landscape, reintroducing good fire back into an ecosystem that evolved with it, and building long-term capacity alongside the residents who live here.
That's what preparedness looks like. Not a one-time project or a single agency working alone, but sustained collaboration, and the recognition that what we build, we build together.
Thank you to CAL FIRE for their continued partnership, and to every firefighter, fire safe council, Firewise leader, agency, tribe, contractor, nonprofit, and community member who continues to show up across Butte County. The progress being made belongs to all of us.
"We are all downstream." — Margaret Hasse