Upper Sugarloaf is latest to join national fire-safety program

Upper Sugarloaf residents Kathleen Defever (left) and neighbor Lynn Fox (right) are co-chairs of their neighborhood’s Firewise committee, which includes Carla Lantier, mother of Tiburon Fire Protection District Fire Marshall Mike Lantier (center), who helped develop the risk assessment and action plan. (Elliot Karlan / For The Ark)

Tiburon’s Upper Sugarloaf neighborhood is the latest Tiburon Peninsula community to join a national program aimed at helping residents work together to reduce fire risk.

The neighborhood was recently certified as a Firewise community under the national Firewise USA program, which prompts homeowners to work with fire officials to create a multiyear action plan that makes individual properties and whole neighborhoods more resilient to wildfires.

The Upper Sugarloaf neighborhood is the third Firewise community in the area, joining the Harbor Hill Homeowners’ Association in Tiburon and the De Silva Island Homeowners Association in Strawberry, according to the National Fire Protection Association, which administers the program. Firewise USA began in 2002 with 12 pilot neighborhoods and now has more than 1,000 active communities across 40 states.

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