The Manton Roadside Fuel Treatments Project (referred to as the Manton Road Fuel Reduction and Community Protection Project in the 2017 Tehama East Community Wildfire Protection Plan) entails roadside vegetation treatments (cutting, chipping and herbicide applications) along 22.01 miles of paved roads (800 acres of treatment area) within and surrounding the Manton urban area which is located 25 miles northeast of Red Bluff and the I-5 corridor and 10 miles due south of Shingletown and the State Route 44 corridor.

High traffic volumes along all the roads proposed for treatments create a significant risk of roadside ignition and fire spread into numerous privately owned and developed homesites and ranchettes, commercial buildings, public facilities, ranches, vineyards and farms as well as adjacent healthy mature oak woodlands that contain such structures. Once proposed treatments are completed, not only will ignition and fire risk be reduced, these treatment areas will create fire breaks or where appropriate, sites for backfire operations during wildfire events.

In uninhabited portions of the project area, roadside treatments can become linear control points from which future prescribed fire or other vegetation treatments not associated with this project can be conducted. Importantly, the use of herbicides within both newly created and newly maintained fuel break areas will both extend the life of this fire management infrastructure and reduce the cost of future maintenance.