Another Fire, Another Lesson Not Learned

San Diego Union-Tribune Sunday, February 15, 2009

By Cary Lowe

Watching Australia suffer massive loss of life and property in its worst fire season in history takes us back to the debates that raged following Southern California's last wave of wildfires. For the third time in five years, we experienced homes and businesses burning by the hundreds, as firefighters attempted to limit the damage with their overextended resources. Wildfires are not a new phenomenon in Southern California, but it was easier to live with them when only a small portion of the land was occupied. When wildfires occur today, they have the potential to take out entire communities, leaving thousands homeless, cutting off transportation corridors, threatening vital services and scarring the environment. In an era of ever hotter and drier weather, they are occurring more often. Yet we continue to live in a state of denial. Cities such as San Diego and Los Angeles are threaded with brushy canyons and hillsides, like wicks waiting for a match. On the outskirts of urban areas, development continues to spread into rural canyons and ridgelines, surrounded by decades of accumulated fuel, and dotted with palm trees, shake roofs and other time bombs. Amid all that, our approach to dealing with the wildfire threat is a bizarre combination of hoping for wetter, less windy weather to reduce the likelihood of fire, and then shuttling firefighting resources around the region in a large-scale game of whack-a-mole when the fires inevitably occur. The potential devastation from wildfires in urbanized areas can no longer be treated as just another cost of living in an otherwise desirable setting. The 2007 Witch Creek fire wiped out more than 1,000 homes across a huge swath of north San Diego County before the winds subsided and fire crews got it under control. At about the same time, the Griffith Park fire in the heart of Los Angeles was poised to sweep across the Hollywood Hills until the weather changed abruptly. Just last fall, wind-driven flames wiped out a large part of Montecito and briefly threatened Santa Barbara. These are not risks that a reasonable society can continue to take. An effective approach to cutting our exposure to wildland fire hazards requires consistent, statewide action on several fronts: First, land-use decisions must take these hazards into account. That means identifying areas where the danger level is unacceptably high and tightly regulating development in those areas. It also means evaluating whether new development itself contributes to the danger level. Much has been made of the so-called shelter in place communities built in recent years, including several in north San Diego County, and how well they

survived serious wildfires. That strategy is based on the stay and defend program pioneered in Australia, but is being reconsidered in light of the high casualty rate in the recent fires. Also, when such communities intrude into wildland areas, the activities of their residents or their supporting infrastructure may themselves be the source of fires, which then threaten their older, less protected neighbors. Most of the major wildfires in recent years have sprung not from natural causes but from human activity, such as the abandoned bonfires that torched Malibu and Montecito and the sparking power lines that set off the Witch Creek fire. At the state level, Sen. Christine Kehoe, D-San Diego, and others are working on legislation to require certification that local fire agencies have sufficient resources to protect new homes before subdivisions may be approved in fire hazard areas. Whether done through a new mandate or as part of the standard environmental review, this is a critical determination. Next, the wildfire hazards associated with existing development must be reduced. Fire officials know only too well the characteristics of building location, design, construction materials and landscaping that make individual structures and entire neighborhoods vulnerable to wildfire. The state has adopted stricter fire-related building standards for wildland-adjacent areas, but they apply only to new development. Retrofitting existing communities to reduce fire hazards will be expensive. On the other hand, we currently are spending nearly $1 billion a year fighting wildland fires, mainly to save homes, and still losing another $1 billion or more in property, not to mention the loss and severe disruption of human life. Insurance companies and public agencies need to stop functioning as enablers of our bad practices. Property insurers should charge commensurately higher premiums for structures that are particularly vulnerable to fire due to their location, design or construction. Mortgage lenders should be requiring higher insurance coverage in fire hazard areas and imposing tougher loan underwriting standards to reflect the higher risk. Otherwise, the rest of us are subsidizing those who choose to live in beautiful but hazardous locations or who fail to take reasonable protective measures. At the same time, owners of property that is more likely to be caught in wildfires, or even contribute to the wildfire hazard, should be paying their fair share to assure sufficient fire services. Residents of high-risk areas also should be receiving education in how to prevent fires, how to make the stay-or-go decision in the event of fire and how to protect their property effectively if they stay. Finally, fire services must be better organized and provided with adequate funding. Firefighting in most places is geared toward putting out individual building fires, not wildfires. Moreover, the rural areas where most wildfires originate are commonly served by small, lightly staffed local agencies, or the better-equipped but thinly spread CalFire. That jeopardizes cities such as San Diego, located downwind from where the fires typically start.

San Diego County recently took the first step toward creating a regional fire authority, tying together numerous such agencies in the backcountry and allowing collection of fees from new development to support fire services. More planning and coordination is needed, along with steadier funding, especially to deal with multiple simultaneous wildfires as in 2007. Despite the recent rejection by San Diego County voters of a uniform fire services tax, a charge that varies depending on location and fire vulnerability would be fairer and more easily approved. We have put off addressing these issues for far too long. If the sight of Rancho Bernardo, Santa Clarita and Montecito in flames didn't spur us to action, maybe the prospect of an Australia-style conflagration will. Lowe is a San Diego land-use lawyer and planning consultant.