Nevada County residents with ideas and opinions on what the federal government should do about wildfire resilience and response are invited to attend a special “Meet the Candidate” ZOOM meeting of the Nevada County Coalition of Firewise Communities on Tuesday, June 11, online from 5:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m.
Congressional District 3 candidates on the November ballot are incumbent Kevin Kiley and challenger Jessica Morse. Mr. Kiley has declined to participate in the event. Ms. Morse has experience in wildfire resilience at the state level and would like to hear from local residents and Firewise community representatives. Her bio information is below.
No registration is required. The Zoom link is https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86527176490?pwd=RW5RN0owZjdCVy9ZMHVaZWZvYlA0dz09 and is also at www.NCCoalitionFWC.com
The candidate will not make a formal presentation – she will respond to comments and questions, which may be submitted in advance at the Coalition website or during the Zoom.
The Coalition takes no position on either candidate. Discussion will focus specifically on wildfire and environmental issues – the host will not respond to questions or comments about other topics. To learn about other policy positions for both candidates, visit www.VoteSmart.org.
Biographical information provided by Congressional Candidate Jessica Morse:
Prior running for Congress, Jessica Morse served as the Deputy Secretary for Forest and Wildland Resilience at the California Natural Resources Agency (CNRA), working on the frontline of California’s wildfire crisis and fast-tracking wildfire prevention efforts.
She is a fifth-generation resident of Congressional District 3 which includes Lake Tahoe and the Eastern Sierra.
Following the devastating Camp Fire in Paradise, Morse looked for solutions to prevent catastrophic wildfires in California. As CNRA deputy secretary, she designed and implemented a national model for wildfire prevention programs that protect California families, homes, communities, and public lands, yielding significant reductions in megafires. Morse is also a member of the U.S. Wildland Fire Mitigation and Management Commission. The federal government owns 57% of California’s wildlands.
Morse has spent her career in public service. She deployed to Iraq with the U.S. Agency for International Development and spent the next decade serving in national security roles in the State Department and Defense Department fighting corruption, human trafficking, and terrorism. She is 41 years old.
Wildfire prevention is “part of my motivation for running for Congress,” Morse said in a 2023 interview with the Sacramento Bee. Because the federal government owns such a large percentage of the land in District 3, “we will not get ahead of the fire crisis if the Feds don’t do what we just did in California, and there’s not anybody at the federal level advocating for this resilient-specific program. And that’s what I would do in Congress.”