Protecting Homes and Communities – Part 2: The Future is Fire Resistant

Tags: Achievable Housing, Cross-Laminated Timber (CLT), Defensible Space, Emergency Preparedness, Fire Resilience, Forest Futures, Forest Futures Salon Series Winter/Spring 2025, Lunch and Learn, Sierra Institute for Community and Environment, Sustainable Housing Solutions, Wildfire Resilience

This blog is part of a three-part series breaking down steps you can take to protect your home before and during wildfire season. 

• Part I: Building Community Resilience
• Part III: Navigating Wildfire Risk

Protecting Homes and Communities: A Lunch & Learn on Wildfire Risk Housing Solutions

With wildfire risks on the rise, now is the time to figure out solutions for protecting homes in our communities. The Tahoe Truckee Community Foundation (TTCF) is excited to host an Achievable Housing in Action Lunch & Learn event on Friday, May 16th, 2025 in partnership with TTCF’s Forest Futures program. 

This special collaborative Lunch & Learn focused on what you can do to harden your home against wildfires – and about some of the bigger conversations unfolding around innovative housing materials and insurance programs that can help address the growing wildfire challenge. 

This virtual event will bring together experts from across the community to share practical steps and emerging solutions that can help safeguard homes and communities from wildfire threats.

Presenters include: 

• Eric Horntvedt, Wildfire Prevention Manager at the Truckee Fire Protection District 
• Jonathan Kusel, Executive Director of the Sierra Institute for Community and Environment
• Ryan Valdez, Managing Director of RockRose Risk. 

The Future is Fire Resistant: Jonathan Kusel, Executive Director, Sierra Institute for Community and Environment

Achieving fire resistance isn’t simple. The materials required must be stronger than steel, seismically resilient, and visually appealing enough to make homeowners want to choose them.

In 2024, the Sierra Institute received a $1 million grant from TTCF’s Forest Futures program to support their production of mass timber, a fire-resistant construction material that can utilize wood thinned in forest restoration activities.

Leveraging this funding, The Sierra Institute has launched a community-scale wood processing operation that produces cross-laminated timber (CLT), a type of mass timber that presses together smaller pieces of wood to create a strong, light, and fire-resistant material. 

This initiative helps provide an outlet for wood being thinned from the forest in restoration activities while creating a sustainable solution for building fire-resistant homes. It is a key part of the Sierra Institute’s broader strategy to promote forest health, forest restoration, and resilience against wildfires.

At the helm of the Sierra Institute for Community and Environment, Jonathan Kusel is pioneering new approaches to both forest management and fire-resistant building practices. Kusel will share insights on how CLT is transforming both the forest industry and wildfire-resistant construction, offering a look at how sustainable building practices can help protect homes and communities from the growing threat of catastrophic wildfires.

Equip and Protect: Essential Education for Safeguarding Homes

This collaborative Lunch and Learn is an excellent opportunity for community members to learn about both proactive steps for wildfire resilience – and emerging solutions in building materials and insurance. Whether you’re a homeowner looking to make your property safer or interested in learning more about cutting-edge solutions coming down the pipeline, this event will spark thinking about how we can better prepare for a future of growing wildfire risk.

Following presentations from our housing and wildfire risk expert. There will be a Q&A session to follow where attendees can ask questions and gain further insights into solutions for home hardening, fire-resistant construction, and wildfire risk insurance. Register now. 

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting. (Calendar Invite to Follow)

Event Details:

• Topic: Home Hardening, Insurance, and Wildfire Risk Housing Solutions
• Date & Time: Friday, May 16, 12:00 PM – 1:00 PM
• Location: Virtual on Zoom
• Registration: Click here to register

Continue Reading:

Part I: Building Community Resilience

Part III: Navigating Wildfire Risk

Read Our Forest Futures Salon Series 2025 Blogs

• Forest Futures Salon Series Kicks Off with Stories of Stewardship
• Spotlight on the Speakers of Forest Futures Salon #2 – Wood Innovations: Building a Regenerative Sierra Economy Through Forest Restoration
• Forest Futures: Building Resilience from the Forest Floor Up, Part 1 – Turning Forest Risk Into Opportunity
• Forest Futures: Building Resilience from the Forest Floor Up, Part 2 – Powering Communities with Local Wood Innovation
• Forest Futures: Building Resilience from the Forest Floor Up, Part 3 – Designing a Regenerative Future: Mass Timber and Creative Architecture
• Protecting Homes and Communities – Part 1: Building Community Resilience
• Protecting Homes and Communities – Part 2: The Future is Fire Resistant
• Protecting Homes and Communities – Part 3: Navigating Wildfire Risk
• Not All Fire Is Destruction: Reclaiming Fire as a Tool for Forest Stewardship
• Growing a Forest-Focused Future: Building Careers in Stewardship, Fire, and Wood