The FireTech Podcast Season 2 (2025) examines emerging dynamics of public-private-people partnerships (4Ps) in building wildfire resilience.
Through conversations with community partners and technical leads, host Shefali Lakhina examines how diverse partners cultivate trust, accountability, and responsiveness to shared wildfire resilience goals on the frontlines.
In this episode Shefali speaks with Jeff Ravage from Coalitions and Collaboratives (COCO) and Anissa Watson from the Skeena Watershed Conservation Coalition. They’re working on the Cold Fire Project, a fungi-powered solution to the wildfire crisis.
Jeff is the Chief Technology and Science Officer for Coalitions and Collaboratives, a Colorado-based NGO focusing on all aspects of fire, WUI communities, and ecological restoration. He is a researcher in forest mycology and works closely with the Denver Botanic Gardens Sam Mitchell Herbarium of Fungi. Jeff is actively involved in work on carbon offset protocols and consults on biomass utilization and carbon policy for municipalities and agencies. He has lectured and presented papers all around the U.S.A. on fungal techniques for ecological restoration. He actively promotes novel methods of forest mitigation and restoration to achieve the goals of forest health and longevity; much of which is outlined in his book: “The Green Evolution”. He’s always willing to sit down over a frothy drink and discuss forest ecology, lignicolous saprophytes, or aposematic anurans.
Anissa is the Director of Program Execution at the Skeena Watershed Conservation Coalition in British Columbia, Canada. Anissa brought her children to Gitxsan Lax Y’ip in 2006 and set down deep roots. Along with being a mom of four incredible humans, Anissa is a community organizer at heart. Connecting with people and seeking local solutions to big and small issues is a driving force in her work. As an active community member herself, Anissa is a volunteer firefighter, a women’s self defense instructor, a small time farmer, a soil nerd, river guide, and solo adventurer.