REGION: Low turnout disappoints fire saftey organizer

Wildfire survivors learn safety tips at Rancho Bernardo meeting

By GARY WARTH - Staff Writer | Thursday, July 24, 2008 5:12 PM PDT ∞

RANCHO BERNARDO ---- The organizer of a fire safety meeting in Rancho Bernardo on Wednesday night said she was disappointed by a low turnout.

"We needed to fill this whole room, and I was a little surprised we didn't," said organizer Trisha Bennett, who lost her Lake Hodges Hills home near Escondido in last October's wildfires. "The public is apathetic."

More than 50 people attended the meeting at the Rancho Bernardo Presbyterian Community Church. Bennett said 1,000 should have been there.

While disappointed in the public's turnout, she was particularly upset that members of the county Board of Supervisors did not attend the meeting, but rather, sent representatives.

"I had about 25 questions I was going to put to them," said Bennett, who formed the Lake Hodges Hills Fire Safety council after the 2003 fires.

A few people confronted representatives of Supervisors Bill Horn and Pam Slater-Price after the meeting, at times raising voices and calling the young aides "sacrificial lambs" sent to a meeting filled with homeowners impatient with the county's response to wildfires in 2003 and 2007.

Much of that anxiety was fueled earlier in the meeting in a presentation by Bill Hoffmann, a businessman and member of the San Diego Fire Safety Forum.

Hoffman reminded the audience that Proposition 172, passed by California voters in 1993, specifically cited fire safety as one of the needs that would be funded by a half-cent tax. Billions of dollars have been raised in the state through that proposition, including $258 million in San Diego County, which has used the money only for law enforcement, he said.

A recent grand jury report recommended reallocating that money for fire safety, which Hoffman said could bring $40 million a year.

The county also has a reserve fund of $725 million, but will not use it, Hoffman said, because supervisors insists it is for emergencies.

"What are we faced with?" he said. "We've had two massive fires, and those aren't emergencies?"

Others speakers included California Chaparral Institute Director Rick Halsey and Bill Middleton, retired assistant fire chief for San Diego. Both are members of the San Diego Fire Safety Forum.

Halsey asked how many people in attendance had lost homes to fires, and a third raised their hands.

"We live in a fire-prone environment," Halsey said. "Fire is as important here as rain. We didn't know that until five years ago."

Halsey said San Diego County has a history of seriously inadequate fire-protection services, and he urged people to become active in pushing for greater action and awareness.

Location, fuel management and building design are crucial for fire prevention, Halsey said.

"We have to look at the total fire environment," he said, explaining that there are areas where homes simply should not be built.

"A lot of homes in the last 10 years looked like they were built to burn," he said about roofing material he referred to as "kindling."

Halsey also said fuel management does not mean merely clearing away vegetation, but replacing wooden fences and keeping wood piles away from homes.

Outlining things the county must do to improve fire safety, Middleton said the first and foremost need is a consolidated fire department like the ones that exist in all other Southern California counties.

Middleton said he has been interviewed recently on radio stations outside the county, and he was asked a question he never hears here: "Why aren't the people outraged?"

Also at the meeting, Rancho Penasquitos resident Bob Hatch shared what he had learned about Australia's program of prepare, stay and defend as a way for citizens to fight fires.

Rather than relying only on a professional fire department that often is overwhelmed during large wildfires, Hatch said Australia has a program that teaches residents to be prepared to fight fires themselves.

People who are unprepared or unable to stay and fight are told to evacuate immediately because those who leave at the last minute often are the ones to perish, he said.

The Australian program was instituted in 1983 after a fire that killed 47 people and destroyed 2,000 structures.

Of those who died, two out of three were found just outside their homes, trying to leave at the last minute. In the 2003 San Diego County wildfires, 12 out of 16 people who died were found just outside their homes, he said.

People who were trained in the Australian program, however, were safer during large wildfires because they either evacuated sooner or stayed to fight the fire with proper equipment and training.

After 1983, people who had trained in the program saved 99.9 percent of threatened houses while 66 percent of unattended houses burned, he said.

For more fire-prevention information, visit the San Diego Fire Safety Forum's Web site at http://sdfiresafety.org.

Contact staff writer Gary Warth at (760) 740-5410 or gwarth@nctimes.com.

Next Previous

More Stories

Tags: Top NCT News Local Regional

Bookmark and Share

Ads by Yahoo!

Advertisement

Pre-Registration Comments[-]Go to Top

Kurt wrote on Jul 25, 2008 1:22 AM:In response to Gary Warth's July 24, 5:12pm article on the NCT Web site (above)…

I attended the Fire Preparedness meeting in north Rancho Bernardo on July 23 and counted between 107 and 109 people in attendance. This included Tisha Bennett and her husband Jack, 7 or 8 presenters (including 2 from the county), 2-3 people with brochures and tables (and goods or services to sell), plus 3 additional county employees - 2 young staff members from the Board of Supervisors (Slater and Horn's offices) and one community liaison person. The Supervisors invited by Tisha Bennett could not attend, the aides explained, because of "prior private commitments."

This boils down to about 94 or 96 members of the public in attendance. I recognized 8 or 10 people from the immediate Lake Hodges area -- maybe there were a few more. The remainder appeared to be Rancho Bernardo residents, many of whom lost their homes in the Oct 2007 Firestorm.

Two graying, neck-tied county employees from the Department of Planning and Land Use (Fire Marshal Ralph Steinhoff and one other) made a brief tag-team presentation from several sheets of handwritten notes on what the county was doing in response to the recommendations made by Tisha Bennett, Bill Hoffman, Rick Halsey, Bill Middleton and others.


Tisha Bennett apparently organized this meeting with a vision of 500 to 1,000 people discussing fire preparedness options and an open Q&A with elected members of the Board of Supervisors. What she got was 90+ citizens with unanswered questions and two young BoS staff members promising to "report back" to their bosses.

In addition to organizing meetings for fellow fire victims over the past 10 months and lobbying for a County-wide Fire Department, Tisha is taking part in a class-action lawsuit against SDG&E for their alleged role in the Witch Creek Fire while simultaneously arm-wrestling Allstate Insurance Company claims officials, who are offering $100,000 or $200,000 less than she needs to rebuild her home -- as reported by Katie Couric and Sandra Hughes on the CBS Evening News on July 14. Yes - Tisha was featured on the national news that day in a story about Allstate's practice of underinsuring homeowners. ... It does appear that Lake Hodges residents are growing weary of fire preparedness and fire recovery meetings. There have been perhaps 50 or 60 such meetings of various sizes since October, 2007, with as few as 5 and as many as 80 attendees per meeting.

Apathy is one word. Exhaustion is another.

-- Kurt, Lake Hodges

Do you know the price wrote on Jul 25, 2008 7:35 AM:of gas? You are lucky to have that many attend.

Michael wrote on Jul 25, 2008 8:08 AM:Maybe everyone should file a lawsuit against the county for disbanding our county fire department over 30 years ago and never doing anything to replace it. It was CDF, now CalFire who they seem to be against the most, but without them where would we be. I worked for Poway and Firefighting is always a low priority.

Ed wrote on Jul 25, 2008 10:48 AM:I was at the meeting. As stated by Kurt above, there were about 100 people (vs. 50) homeowners at the gathering. The lack of attendance was, in my opinion, the lack of adequately advertising the event. I've been going to all of the United Policy Holder and RB United meetings, among others, since the October fire. I heard of this meeting only by accident. Sure glad I was there. Trisha needs to attend some of the "other meetings" around town, especially the one next week (Thurs, 7/31/08, United Policy Holders @ the RBCPC) and solicit email addresses for informing all of future "fire issues" meetings.
The most significant thing I learned at this meeting, is that we voters need to purge the current Board of Supervisors from office as soon as possible, either by the voting booth or citizen class-action.

Kurt wrote on Jul 25, 2008 1:03 PM:People with the greatest talent would never WANT to be a County Supervisor, so we're lucky to have the ones we have.

They're human and not perfect... they could be a lot worse. Talented people can make a LOT more money in private industry or private practice and not have constituents constantly biting at their heels.

Being a supervisor is a great diplomatic balancing act. Some wild fire activists and fire victims in rural and suburban areas want to move funds from the Sheriff's crime control budget and give it to the fire people for fighting and preventing fires. That isn't popular with the half of the County residents deep in the cities and along the beaches with low risks of wild fire and higher risks of crime.

And of course, NO ONE wants to pay higher taxes.

People are growing weary of fire preparedness meetings and things will quiet down until another big fire storm comes through and then there will be another uproar.

Public opinion, sloshing back and forth, like the waves of the ocean...

BEST thing to do is forget about government and be prepared to do as much as you can by yourself. PREPARE your property to resist fire, PREPARE your family to evacuate themselves and their most cherished belongings when fire threatens, GET YOUR insurance coverages and claims materials READY in case you need them and make sure you are NOT underinsured.

Government can't do everything. Those who expect that it will, are ALWAYS going to be disappointed.

-- Kurt

Registered Comments[-]Go to Top

Advertisement

Videos