The California Fire Foundation is pleased to announce the 2025 Southern California Grant Opportunity for California-based fire departments, firefighter associations, nonprofit organizations, and tribal entities serving communities within Southern California Edison’s service area.
Donor Name: California Fire Foundation (CFF)
State: California
County: Sacramento County (CA)
Type of Grant: Grant
Deadline: 09/30/2025
Size of the Grant: $10,000 to $100,000
Grant Duration: Grant Duration Not Mentioned
Details:
The 2025 Southern California Grant Opportunity builds on these findings, funding projects that address urgent needs across community, landscape, and infrastructure resilience, while supporting equitable, innovative, and collaborative approaches to wildfire preparedness.
Focus Areas
Funding priority will be extended to projects aligned with the California Fire Foundation’s Wildfire Mitigation & Resiliency Symposium’s recommended strategies:
- Cross-Cutting Strategies
- Develop flexible funding models and bridge grants for nonprofits and agencies.
- Create metrics beyond “acres treated,” including health, equity, and community engagement outcomes.
- Support community wildfire planning efforts (CWPPs, RWMPs, RPPs).
- Built Environment Strategies
- Improve evacuation planning, road networks, and refuge areas.
- Identify and address water flow deficiences, storage gaps, and access challenges.
- Fund local personnel and planning to strengthen county- and city-level climate adaptation strategies.
- Landscape Strategies
- Support agricultural buffers, greenbelts, and native plant barriers around communities.
- Expand prescribed burning and herbivory programs with optimized burn windows.
- Assess and invest in public green spaces as fuel breaks.
- Incorporate Indigenous land management practices into wildfire buffering.
- Community Strategies
- Expand Firewise USA communities and Fire Safe Councils.
- Build trust and communication with vulnerable communities, using multilingual and accessible formats.
- Support community organizing, education, and training programs that improve wildfire preparedness.
- Fund home hardening and retrofit micro-grants, including support for renters.
Guidelines
- Applicant must be a California-based fire department, firefighter association, nonprofit organization, or tribal entity located in Southern California Edison’s service area.
- Other groups may apply when partnering with one of the above entities, including through fiscal agency.
- Projects must benefit communities within Edison’s service area, with priority given to under-resourced populations in high fire-threat zones.
- Requests should generally not exceed $15,000 (exceptions may be considered). Matching funds are not required.
- Funding decisions are typically communicated within 4–6 weeks after the application window closes. Applicants can track the status of submissions via the online grants portal.
- Symposium participants will receive priority consideration, but the opportunity is open to all eligible applicants in the service area.
For more information, visit California Fire Foundation.
