Editor’s note: Edward Huang, PhD, AICP, LEED AP is a principal researcher with California Institute of Environmental Design & Management (CIEDM), and a member of FAC Net. In this blog, Edward shares more about CIEDM’s efforts in 2025 to recognize wildfire awareness campaigns such as Wildfire Awareness Month and Wildfire Community Preparedness Day, both of which take place annually in May.
One smart approach to effective wildfire management for general public and fire protection practitioners alike is to participate and promote participation in awareness campaigns for wildfire prevention and preparedness to raise awareness of wildfire risks and mitigation measures. We can use May of each year to share awareness messages of wildfire readiness and resilience with concerned citizens and to encourage citizen participation, in light of the following campaigns that all take place in May:
- FEMA initiated National Wildfire Awareness Month through the month of May 2025;
- California Governor proclaimed and CAL FIRE promoted Wildfire Preparedness Week in the first full week of May (May 4-11th for 2025), and
- National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) promoted Wildfire Community Preparedness Day on the first Saturday of May (Saturday May 3rd for 2025, Saturday May 2nd for 2026).
As in past years, we as members of FAC Net at California Institute of Environmental Design & Management (CIEDM), were supporting and taking part in those above-listed regional and national campaigns throughout May 2025 at our Arcadia Ecohome site with the following actions.
- In response to NFPA’s call for Wildfire Preparedness Day Projects, we registered on May 1st with NFPA a month-long awareness-preparedness project, titled “CIEDM Wildfire Preparedness Actions @ Arcadia Ecohome.” With the registration, the Ecohome is marked as a participatory site on the Preparedness Day Project Map, and the interactive map provides a dropdown box with a brief information presenting our participation.
- Starting Friday, May 2, 2025, our gardener team kicked off firescaping work around the Ecohome building based on defensible space principals. It included cleanups of flammable materials around the Ecohome building by raking and removing dry leaves and twigs at the Ecohome’s yards, and in the adjoining public parkways and sidewalks. In addition, we cleaned off debris on roofs and in eave gutters.
- We engaged in online advocacy action mainly by a grassroots social media campaign to raise public awareness and actions by spreading the messages of the three regional and national campaigns and sharing what we’ve done to raise public awareness and actions.
The above actions represent the CIEDM 2025 Preparedness Day Project registered with wildfireprepday.org, and we are ready to take part again in May 2026 to stay wildfire ready and engaged in these important regional and national preparedness actions.
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