Peter Hess
Lake County Prescribed Burn Association
Peter is an historian (Ph.D., GTU 1993) of the relationship between religion and the sciences, and he also research,publish, and lecture on religious and ethical aspects of climate disruption. He is qualified as a Firefighter Type Two (FFT2) and work with the Lake County Prescribed Burn Association (LCPBA), founded in 2019. They are a consortium of trained fire practitioners -- women and men, indigenous and non-tribal, old and young, rural and urban people -- working to educate the public about the ecological importance of regularly burning dead, senescent, and overabundant fuels in the Wildland Urban Interface, or WUI. They prepare, ignite, and control dozens of burns every winter, reducing the fuel load and helping to eradicate invasive species and restore resilient landscapes of plants native to California.
Peter is currently writing a paper for the Sierra Club (forthcoming in 2024) on the similarities and differences between ancient cultural burning practiced by indigenous tribes in California, and the prescribed burning increasingly practiced by forest agencies, municipalities, and private groups.
