Paradise isn't really all that close to Reno. In fact, its a pretty substantial drive, given the terrain and roundabout way of getting there. Paradise IS very close to Chico (home of Chico State U) and Oroville (home of that giant dam that got scary a few years ago during massive rainfall).
Now Oroville actually
is surrounded by grasslands and oak scrub, and was also host to a pretty serious wildfire in 2020, two years after the disaster in Paradise; it took three lives and thousands of structures. That North Complex Fire also started in the woodlands, though, and only reached the grassy hills when it was well under way. Generally speaking, grass fires are a frequent but limited threat in the northern California summer, unless exceptionally dry and windy conditions prevail. Which, unfortunately, they do more and more often as our climate shifts in a more Mediterranean direction.
Republicans are experts on fire management and would be able to save the state within a few seasons, unless you ask them specific questions about fire managment, at which point they bluster and change the subject. "Well anything would be better than Newscum!" they may be heard to assert.