North State Public Radio is meeting information needs in wildfire country

Historic wildfires have ravaged Northern California over the past several seasons, and forecasters warn the trend will undoubtedly continue. While California has developed a complex system to communicate to the public during natural disasters, North State Public Radio in Chico, California has found that these notification systems can fail people particularly vulnerable: the elderly, the poor, or people who lose power and phone service during a natural disaster. 

Nearing the anniversary of some of the worst wildfires in their region, NSPR launched  an initiative to hear from people in the region about what information they need most during wildfires. Then they got to work providing that information with their own broadcast and reporting resources.

Tell us who you are, and share a brief summary of the reporting project?

North State Public Radio is the NPR affiliate covering a portion of Northern California. With support from America Amplified, we recently launched our series “Sounding the Alarm” about emergency communication in Butte County. The first story published in this series focuses on how residents who have survived deadly wildfires experienced emergency communication. Many told NSPR that there were gaps in this system. The second story in the series looks at one solution that some fire-prone communities have implemented to bridge some of these gaps.

How did community engagement inform your reporting? 

The two reporters writing the series spend several days visiting fire-prone communities in our region and interviewing residents in public spaces about what they experienced with emergency communication during wildfires and where they see room for improvement. We also are currently distributing a survey for residents in fire-prone communities to tell us more about communication with the emergency alert and warning systems in their areas. We are using the results of these surveys for future stories in the series and to inform our own emergency coverage strategy during wildfire season. 

How did you build trust in the community you were reporting on?

We are hoping to continually build trust in wildfire-prone communities by covering issues related to wildfires that are often overlooked by media outlets. Many in these communities have concerns about continuing fire risk as well as about the slow process of ongoing recovery from previous devastating wildfires. Helping to fill information gaps is a central part of our goal with this project. 

NSPR also has a Report for America reporter on staff specifically focused on fire recovery. This helps us keep a presence in communities and share out any crucial information. 

How are you bringing this reporting back to the community

We are reporting this series on-air and on our website. We’re also distributing paper versions of our wildfire communications survey at events being hosted in fire-prone communities. We are mailing the surveys upon request to those who prefer to receive a copy that way. 

What lessons do you take away from this project in terms of strengthening your engagement?

We learned that community members are really excited to engage and share their experiences when we choose a topic that resonates and is undercovered in our region. We were blown away by the number of responses of people who called in to get a copy of our wildfire survey. This response surpassed other engagement efforts we tried, despite not varying our strategies too widely.