The 2009 operational "Fire Management Plan" builds on the 2004 document.
Yosemite National Park Fire Management Plan - 2004
The Yosemite 2004 Fire Management Plan/Environmental Impact Statement guides the implementation of a complex fire management program. The program includes wildland fire suppression, wildland fire used to achieve natural and cultural resource benefits, fire prevention, prescribed fire, fire ecology research, and the use of mechanical methods to reduce and thin vegetation in and around communities.
One goal of the program is to reduce the threat of wildland fire to public safety, to the park’s wildland urban interface communities, and to its natural and cultural resources. Another management goal is to return the influence of natural fire to park ecosystems so they are restored to as natural a condition as possible. Since 2004, Yosemite has completed annual updates to its fire management plan. View the 2009 operational "Fire Management Plan" [683 kb PDF], for example.
The Fire Management Plan /Environmental Impact Statement proposes to reduce risk to park wildland urban interface communities within six to eight years, and to restore park ecosystems within 15 to 20 years. Some of the work which will be done to reduce the risk of unwanted wildland fire in and adjacent to wildland urban interface communities will involve mechanical methods. The primary methods to reduce wildland fire risk and to restore park ecosystems, however, will be prescribed and wildland fire.
