California AB 2473

Existing law, the California Emergency Services Act, requires the Office of Emergency Services and the Department of Forestry and Fire Protection to jointly establish and lead the Wildfire Forecast and Threat Intelligence Integration Center, which serves as the state's central organizing hub for, among other things, wildfire forecasting. Existing law requires the center to, among other things, provide specified intelligence and guidelines about wildfire threats to government agencies and designated alerting authorities. Existing law authorizes the Governor to proclaim a state of emergency, and local officials and local governments to proclaim a local emergency, when specified conditions of disaster or extreme peril to the safety of persons and property exist, and authorizes the Governor or the appropriate local government to exercise certain powers in response to that emergency. This bill would require the Wildfire Forecast and Threat Intelligence Integration Center to proactively coordinate with the National Weather Service and the California State Warning Center to share forecasted extreme, life-threatening fire weather conditions to ensure wide distribution of information for all potentially impacted agencies. The bill would require the Wildfire Forecast and Threat Intelligence Integration Center to create a written report that contains specified information analyzing forecasted extreme, life-threatening fire weather conditions and disseminate it to the California State Warning Center. The bill would require the California State Warning Center to proactively disseminate the report and related information to operational area duty officers and public safety answering points within the geography of an impacted area. The bill would authorize the proclamation of a state of emergency or local emergency based on the information contained in a report, as specified. This bill would require the Wildfire Forecast and Threat Intelligence Integration Center to create and disseminate a training program for operational areas to interpret the analysis of the reports described above and educate the operational area emergency managers on the urgency, information, and potential actions to take upon receipt of a report.