Our project began with information gathering to identify existing research and resources on prescribed burns and for communicating about prescribed burns. This phase of our project included 1) a literature review of published research, 2) an environmental scan of other types of literature (e.g., government reports, existing communication materials), and 3) a series of key informant interviews with residents in Ohio, South Carolina, and Virginia (these states regularly conduct prescribed burns) as well as professionals who work for stakeholder organizations within these states or at the federal level.
We took the information we learned from our information gathering phase to develop the content within this toolkit. The messaging and materials in this toolkit were shaped by:
- What stakeholders indicated they would find most helpful in their communication planning, and what community residents indicated they wanted to learn about prescribed burns during our key informant interviews,
- What channels community residents wanted to get this information from, and
- Gaps we identified in existing prescribed burn communications resources that we found during our literature review and environmental scan.