Over the past 13 years, the Big Thompson Watershed has endured intense natural disasters that have tested the resilience of our communities and ecosystems. The 2012 High Park Fire and the historic 2013 flood left lasting scars across the region. More recently, the 2020 East Troublesome and Cameron Peak Fires, the two largest in Colorado’s history, ushered in new waves of post-fire flooding and debris flows. These cascading events didn’t just impact the landscape—they exposed gaps in our ability to prepare for and recover from wildfire-related threats.
These experiences became a wake-up call. They galvanized an already engaged group of stakeholders who understood one thing clearly: the time to plan is before fire strikes.
From Awareness to Action: The Motivation Behind the WRAP
Our watershed is no stranger to wildfire risk. But what makes the Big Thompson different is the strength of its partnerships. The Big Thompson Watershed Health Partnership (BTWHP) has brought together federal, state, and local agencies, nonprofits, utilities, and other stakeholders who all share a deep commitment to the health of this landscape. Out of that collective commitment, the Wildfire Ready Action Plan (WRAP) was born.
The WRAP was driven by a vision to protect the watershed’s ecological integrity, economic viability, and cultural heritage. It’s not just a document, it’s a living roadmap built on local knowledge, best-available science, and a shared desire to reduce risk, build resilience, and act collaboratively.
Clear Goals, Shared Values
The WRAP process helped us clarify what we were working toward. Collectively we defined four main goals:
- Identify values at risk to post-wildfire impacts.
- Pinpoint pre-fire mitigation efforts that could reduce future damage.
- Prepare for post-fire recovery, from emergency coordination to restoration workflows.
- Strategize implementation and funding, aligning projects with our values and priorities.
Throughout this process, we grounded our planning in stakeholder-defined core values:
- Safety – Protecting people and infrastructure.
- Resiliency – The ability to adapt and recover.
- Environment – Sustaining habitats and ecosystems.
- Community – Supporting education, outreach, and collaboration.
- Sustainability – Creating long-lasting, self-supporting systems.
- Water – Reliable and clean water for all.
Prioritizing the Vulnerable
Our watershed spans diverse terrain and land uses—from mountain communities to critical water supply infrastructure to popular recreation corridors. This diversity means that some places are more vulnerable than others, either due to steep terrain, proximity to fuels, or limited community capacity.
To guide our planning, we conducted a robust susceptibility analysis to identify where wildfire hazards intersect with critical values at risk. These include water and wastewater systems, drinking water infrastructure, energy infrastructure such as power plants, substations, and gas pipelines, telecommunications infrastructure like fiber optics, essential medical and emergency services including hospitals, clinics, and fire stations, as well as roads, communities and more. Data was sourced from local, state, and federal agencies as well as utility providers with infrastructure in the watershed.
We then integrated local knowledge and expertise—drawing from fire districts, conservation groups, and other partners—to validate and enhance the analysis. This combination of scientific modeling and community insight ensured that our Wildfire Ready Action Plan reflects both the technical data and the lived experience of those who know the landscape best.
Turning Planning into Action
One of the most powerful outcomes of the WRAP is a publicly available susceptibility map, helping everyone from landowners to agencies see where risks are highest. Alongside this tool, we developed a prioritized list of 180+ wildfire resilience projects, with a stakeholder-vetted Top 10 ready for funding, design and implementation.
The WRAP includes:
- Project “cut sheets” detailing each high-priority project.
- A repeatable process to evaluate and add future projects.
- A centralized data and mapping platform to guide planning and communication.
All of this helps our partners speak the same language, act collaboratively, and scale impact beyond isolated projects.
Meeting Challenges Head-On
Creating the WRAP wasn’t without challenges. The biggest? Scale. Working across the entire HUC-8 watershed meant balancing landscape-level strategy with local needs. Our team had to balance broad regional planning with fine-scale project details, ensuring we remained both strategic and actionable.
We also had to work within limited resources, making stakeholder engagement and prioritization even more crucial.
Stakeholders at the Heart of the Process
The success of the Wildfire Ready Action Plan (WRAP) is rooted in deep and sustained collaboration. A core planning team—made up of Peaks to People Water Fund, Larimer Conservation District, Big Thompson Watershed Coalition, and Estes Valley Watershed Coalition—guided the process from start to finish. Together, we engaged a broad group of local, state, and federal stakeholders whose expertise and input shaped every major decision.
Participants included Larimer County Office of Emergency Management, Loveland Fire Rescue Authority, Estes Valley Fire Protection District, Northern Water, the cities of Greeley and Fort Collins, Colorado State Forest Service, Loveland Water and Power, and many others with a direct stake in the health and resilience of the Big Thompson watershed.
Over the course of the project, we held six in-depth stakeholder workshops, conducted bi-weekly planning team meetings, and ran ongoing review cycles to refine goals, datasets, and the final list of priority projects. This inclusive and iterative approach built trust, fostered alignment, and created a strong sense of shared ownership—critical ingredients for long-term success and implementation.
Measuring Success Over Time
Just as importantly, our stakeholder network remains active, providing informal feedback, real-time observations, and ongoing collaboration. The WRAP is not a one-and-done plan—it’s a living framework designed for adaptive management. While formal monitoring protocols are still evolving, we’ve already built in tools to track progress and assess impact:
- Project-level tracking tools to monitor outcomes.
- A repeatable prioritization process for updating the plan over time.
- Data and maps to measure changes in risk and resilience.
- Our stakeholder-led prioritization process is designed to be iterative, evolving alongside our knowledge and capacity.
A Model for Collective Resilience
The Wildfire Ready Action Plan is more than a list of projects—it’s a collective commitment to safeguard the Big Thompson Watershed’s forests, water, and communities from the growing threat of wildfire. By uniting science, local knowledge, and shared values, we’ve created a model that not only prepares us for what’s ahead—but also strengthens the fabric of our community in the process.
Together, we’re not just preparing for wildfire, we’re building a future that’s ready for it.