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Chris Anthony spent his career with CAL FIRE, finishing as Chief Deputy Director. Now he’s focused on a critical question: how do we connect innovation with the needs of firefighters and communities?

Sean spent time with Chris during a recent conference that SidePorch helped run focused on a resilient rebuild following the LA Fires.

In this conversation, Chris shares:

✨ Why the biggest gaps are not technical but in procurement, legislation, and communication
✨ Military models that show how to move ideas from concept to scale
✨ Innovations giving him hope:

• 🚁 Rain and autonomous Blackhawk helicopters
• 🌱 BurnBot scaling prescribed fire for resilient landscapes
• 🏡 Fireside helping residents harden homes and track risk reduction
• 🧪 Research like Burn Pro 3D and Agni-Nar shaping fire behavior models

Chris’s vision: technology that not only fights fires faster, but helps communities live with fire, through prevention, planning, and resilience.

👉 Listen now and join the conversation: How can innovation reshape our relationship with wildfire?

💬 Share your thoughts in the comments or forward this to someone working at the intersection of technology, policy, and community resilience.

Shared Ground is produced by Sean Knierim and Allan Marks. Thanks to Cory Grabow, Kara Poltor, Corey Walles (from The Recording Studio) for your support in launching this effort.

For more stories of resilience & rebuilding, kindness & generosity: visit shared-ground.com and subscribe to Sean's substack. We invite you to share your own stories of resilience at the Shared Ground website - whether in response to the January fires in LA or other situations.

Follow us at seanknierim.substack.com, Instagram, or wherever you listen to podcasts (Apple Podcasts, Spotify, etc).

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🔥 From Wildfire to Renewal: Greenville’s Reimagined Future

In 2021, the Dixie Fire wiped out Greenville, CA in under an hour, destroying nearly a million acres. Among those left standing in the ashes was Tyler Pew, a fourth-generation local and design-build contractor. Faced with total loss, he moved back home from San Francisco and asked: What if recovery is not about rebuilding the past, but creating something better?

Tyler shares the hard truth about disaster recovery, why the toughest years often come 5 to 7 years later, and the difference between a “closed fist” and an “open hand” when rebuilding a community. He draws on lessons from other disaster-hit towns, integrates indigenous Mountain Maidu land wisdom, and helps launch innovative housing initiatives like Welcome Home Greenville.

📑 Check out the incredible body of work that Tyler and the LMNOP Team have led with a group of partners HERE — a 3-year index of projects completed in the general time sequence of the work.

This is a story of resilience, regeneration, and finding hope in the next generation.

🎧 Listen now to learn how tragedy can become transformation, and how open-handed leadership can shape a stronger future.

👉 If you have faced setbacks or care about community resilience, share this episode with someone who needs to hear it.

Shared Ground is produced by Sean Knierim and Allan Marks. Thanks to Cory Grabow, Kara Poltor, Corey Walles (from The Recording Studio) for your support in launching this effort.

For more stories of resilience & rebuilding, kindness & generosity: visit shared-ground.com and subscribe to Sean's substack. We invite you to share your own stories of resilience at the Shared Ground website - whether in response to the January fires in LA or other situations.

Follow us at seanknierim.substack.com, Instagram, or wherever you listen to podcasts (Apple Podcasts, Spotify, etc).

Send us a text

How do communities recover after disaster? And what happens when leaders try to move forward quickly, speeding past a process that would honor what has been lost?

In this episode, Sean sits down with Jennifer Gray Thompson, founder of After the Fire USA. Jennifer has walked into some of the hardest-hit communities across the country, helping people navigate recovery after megafires.

They talk about what defines a megafire, why grief cannot be skipped, and how communities find strength not in strategy documents, but in each other.

Jennifer offers sharp insight into what makes Los Angeles both powerful and vulnerable. She also shares what gives her hope after years of doing this work. And how she cares for herself while caring for others.

If you care about climate, loss, leadership, or recovery, this conversation will stay with you.

Listen to hear:

• Why resilience requires opening ourselves to accept grace
• What makes megafires different from other disasters
• How communities like yours can show up for one another

Shared Ground is produced by Sean Knierim and Allan Marks. Thanks to Cory Grabow, Kara Poltor, Corey Walles (from The Recording Studio) for your support in launching this effort.

For more stories of resilience & rebuilding, kindness & generosity: visit shared-ground.com and subscribe to Sean's substack. We invite you to share your own stories of resilience at the Shared Ground website - whether in response to the January fires in LA or other situations.

Follow us at seanknierim.substack.com, Instagram, or wherever you listen to podcasts (Apple Podcasts, Spotify, etc).