The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire) is updating its website and its notification and education app of several years, Ready for Wildfire, with the overall goals of becoming more responsive and efficient, an official confirmed to Techwire. Among the takeaways:
• After a process of several years, the agency refreshed its website this summer, going live with an updated version around the July 1 start of the state fiscal year. Officials will continue to refine the site and add data through year’s end. Scott McLean, Cal Fire information officer, told Techwire the initiative generally aims to do a better job of aggregating information, making it easily accessible and serving as a resource for seven related departments.
“Our website, it’s not just Cal Fire. It’s Resource Management, Returning Veterans, the Fire & Resource Assessment Program, Board of Forestry; the Office of the State Fire Marshal, Communications and Fire Protection. It’s a huge project, a huge product,” McLean said, noting that each “shop” will contribute its own information, but Cal Fire IT will be responsible for the finished site.
• Cal Fire is also working with vendor Exegy to refresh Ready for Wildfire, its education and notification app of about five years that’s developed from the website of the same name. Two key issues underpin the app’s renewal. The agency is “changing over to a Web-based product to make it easier for us to work on it,” McLean said.
• Ready for Wildfire will continue to be primarily an educational and informational tool — not an app conveying life-or-death information during conflagrations. But Cal Fire is mindful of a mutual-aid coverage area that stretches from Oregon and Nevada to Mexico — and the fact that its app does help residents track wildfires based on ZIP code and phone location.
“We cannot sit on our laurels. We have to assist the different agencies in getting their information out. We’re looked at as a centralized location,” McLean said.
• With that goal in mind, the agency is having a “back door” built into the app, so that instead of relying on third-party vendors, officials will be able to update information in-house. The exact timing isn’t certain, but Cal Fire hopes to have the app in beta test mode by early fall.
