Cross-Discipline Teamwork Protects Material Choice in California’s WUI Response

AWC’s Government Affairs team tracks and engages on state policy nationwide to support legislation that reflects the value and benefits of U.S. wood products and oppose or improve legislation that could restrict market access. In 2025, the team reviewed over 2,000 bills and sent 30 letters on specific measures in 12 states around the nation, with the highest engagement in Washington, Oregon, New York, New Jersey, North Carolina, Massachusetts, and California.

One of the key successes of our state-level advocacy came from our proactive engagement in California, where early wildfires heightened pressure for immediate legislative action on wildland urban interface (WUI) construction. AWC moved quickly to monitor post-fire sentiment, engage key decision makers, and keep members informed through two member-only briefings, one online and one at the annual Spring Meeting, focused on the potential impacts to codes and legislation in California, and how those could set precedent for other states.

AWC’s effectiveness in the state was driven by coordinated teamwork across the Codes, Fire Service Relations and Government Affairs teams. Each has long-standing relationships in the state among legislators, the fire service, building code experts, academia, and local officials. These strong relationships were critical to gaining early insight into potential regulations and legislation, as well as the credibility to engage from a technically grounded position.

Importantly, the Codes team’s multi-year effort on the development of Chapter 7A performance requirements, the WUI chapter in California’s Building Code, set the foundation for the Government Affairs team’s policy strategy. In conversations with local officials and legislators, AWC was able to point to Chapter 7A as the state’s existing, robust, performance-driven framework for WUI safety and that post-fire concerns were already addressed in the code. This technical foundation helped steer the response away from reactive legislation that could have overreached into building code territory or created unnecessary material restrictions.

As a result, California’s post-fire response did not translate into new WUI legislation affecting material choice. Instead, the provisions of Chapter 7A have now been updated to become California’s standalone Wildland Urban Interface Code. This ultimately protected market access for wood products and further strengthened our position as leading authorities and technical experts in California.