A review of last year's California state budget shows California Governor Gavin Newsom Reduced funding for wildfires and forest resilience by more than $100 million.
Budgetwhich was signed in June and covers the 2024-25 fiscal year, eliminated $101 million from seven “wildfire and forest resilience” programs, according to a report by Newsweek.
California fires, responsible for the destruction of more than 10,000 buildings in the United States Los Angeles The area remains uncontained.
Fire crews battle the Kenneth Fire in the West Hills section of Los Angeles Thursday, January 9, 2025. (Ethan Swope/AP)
Cal Fire received a $5 million reduction in spending on fuel abatement teams, including money used to pay for vegetation management work in California National GuardThe report noted.
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Other changes:
- $28 million was cut from multiple state preserves that are working to expand wildfire resilience
- $12 million has been cut from a “home hardening” trial that would protect homes from wildfires
- $8 million in spending on monitoring and research was cut, most of it earmarked for Cal Fire and state universities
- $4 million was cut from the Forest Legacy Program, which encourages landowners to manage their properties
- $3 million reduction in funding for the Interagency Forest Data Center
California Gov. Gavin Newsom, right, surveys damage in Pacific Palisades with Cal Fire's Nick Shuler on Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025, in Pacific Palisades, California. (Jeff Gretchen/MediaNews Group/Orange County Register via Getty Images)
Newsom's communications director, Izzy Jardon, called the budget cuts a “ridiculous lie,” in a statement to Fox News Digital on Friday night.
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“The governor has doubled the size of our firefighting military, built the largest aerial firefighting fleet in the world, and the state has increased forest management tenfold since he took office,” she wrote. “Facts matter.”
Destruction caused by the Palisades Fire in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of Los Angeles on Friday, January 10, 2025. (AP Photo/John Lusher)
His office attached statistics indicating the overall increase in spending and staffing over a number of years since he took office in 2019, rather than commenting on the recent cuts.
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Cal Fire did not immediately respond to a request for comment as of 8 p.m. Friday.
