GOLDEN GATE CANYON - The Golden Gate Fire Protection District Board lacked a quorum for its regular meeting on April 24, 2025. Board members present were President Deb Curlee, and Secretary Marith Reheis. Niffy Ovuworie, Vice-President and Treasurer, was ill. Steve Green had an excused absence and Dave Primmer was unexcused.

Fire Chief Kyle Kociemba-Benson did give his report, stating “We continue to follow several pieces of legislation for the 2025 session that would have an effect on the district, and we encourage you to follow them independently: HB25-1009, Vegetative Fuels - Passed. HB25-1078, Wildland Firefighter Education. HB25-1182 - Risk Model Use in Insurance Policies. SB25-011- Detection Components for Wildfire Mitigation. SB25-142 - Changes to Wildfire Resiliency Code Board Administration.

“We have reviewed our new website with our contractor for compliance as well as received direction for meeting regulations with updates beyond July 1, 2025. We are in the process of finishing up these updates,” Benson wrote.

“We have begun migrating board records from 2023 and 2024 onto the site, the historical records beyond 2023 will be migrated into a google storage for CORA access if needed in the future.”

Grant project updates

“SIPA grant - $5500 - website update and ADA compliance - Status: Awarded! Project nearing completion - DFPC Firefighter Safety and Disease Grant - 30 sets of Tec Gen Wildland/EMS and extrication PPE - Status: Awarded. FFs were fit for gear in mid- April.

“The district has continued with a predictable start to 2025 with 15 calls to date,” Benson’s report continues. “The final bed storage unit was installed in C81, these units have greatly improved the utility of both trucks.

“Another huge thank you to the auxiliary for making these possible. The Lts have begun the process of upfitting the UTVs to make sure they are in service ASAP,” he added. “After reviewing our initial needs, we are looking at having some custom fabrication work done to build rack systems for both units.”

Bids received

The bidding process for the UTV and Trailer concluded on April 23 and will be reported in person during the next meeting. “We have received multiple strong bids on both, and are confident it will offset, if not completely cover, the cost associated with housing the UTVs.

“After discussion with Firstnet, we held off for a few weeks on implementation of the tablets to allow for a new ruggedized version of the hardware to become available. They should be in service by the end of next month,” Benson wrote.

“We are currently at an operational staff of 28 with 3 support staff. We have 1 staff on active-duty military leave.

“We have two very large trainings upcoming in May - May 3 - Multi Agency Wildland field day at Station 82, May 10 - Multi Agency Backcountry Field Day.”

CWPP

“The CWPP community workshop was a great success! We received feedback from approximately 10 percent of the district’s land owners. We will be moving onto our project prioritization and planning phase of the CWPP later this month,” Benson reported.

Grange President Terri Costeldia announced that the Auxiliary will meet on, May 2, at 7 p.m., and they will have a community breakfast on May 4, from 10 to 12 a.m.

The next regular Board meeting will be on May 22, 2025, at 7 p.m. at the Grange, 25201 Golden Gate Canyon Road. For more information, go to https:// MAIN - Golden Gate Fire Protection District.