San Diego Fire Warnings Were Repeatedly Ignored

[Judi Lynn]

8:00 PM PST, November 14, 2003

San Diego Fire Warnings Were Repeatedly Ignored
In city and county, calls to boost resources often faded and tax hikes for readiness died at polls.

By Tony Perry and Joel Rubin, Times Staff Writers

SAN DIEGO — County officials have repeatedly been warned that too few firefighters combined with dry back-country brush and Santa Ana winds could produce uncontrollable wildfires nearly identical to those that killed 16 people and destroyed 2,469 homes last month.

Despite the warnings, local leaders and voters both failed to implement recommendations that fire officials said would help fight a massive wildfire.

A review of San Diego city and county records shows that fire officials over the last two decades have predicted that firefighters could be helpless to stop even a small brush fire because the region did not have enough firefighters and water-dropping helicopters.

The warnings came in reports from the fire agencies seeking more funding and in task-force studies after previous wildfires. Voters have rejected repeated proposals for funding improved fire protection with increased taxes. (snip/...)

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-warnings15nov15,1,5934005.story?coll=la-home-headlines

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[Noordam]

1. People died because San Diego people are CHEAP

While the murder trial I got into the forum is over, I was still posting on a forum in San Diego until the first LA Times article on the fire came up.

I had to stop posting there because I got so upset over people dying because San Diego ppl do not like to be taxed.

The first LA Times article pointed out, LA County had 3 or 4 copters that could be used to drop water. SD had ZERO. Up until a couple months ago they had one on lease but did not like paying the lease payments and the city and county fought over that.

San Diego pays like $85 per year per person for fire protection. A city the size of SD nationally would normally spend $120 per person for fire protection.

But not cheap ass San Diego Repugs. And the EXCUSES why and who is to blame for the deaths is unfucking believiable.

A) If the prisoners had been forced to work for their living.....

B) Gray Davis had lots of tax money and he miss spent it....

:grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr:

[xchrom]

3. i have a dear friend who lives in san diego

and has been having coniption fits over the same thing. and she has been having these fits long before the fire storm.
apparently san diego county is teriibly under-funded and there is a host of environental problems to go along with it.
would love to here more details both about fire hazards but other problems steming from funding as well.
time for a teach in.

[jamesinca]

5. San Diego is very republican

It is a cheap partisan shot but they got what they asked for. No new taxes, they read some lips down there. Home of Darryl Issa one of the instigator of the recall in CA. With all due respect to the dead and homeless down there now; no taxes = no social services. Wake up, dumb ass republicans. What is sick is people that have the foresight and intelligence,that can see beyond their political ideology, have had to suffer also.

[Noordam]

7. I forget the number but something like 10 of the

ppl that died, were in one area that did not get the word that a fast moving fire was coming their way. Lack of police and fire.......

[izzie]

2. Question? How do you get people to work for no money?

In the town I live in we have no police as they voted them out as it cost to much. In the town I used to live in we had no police as we never voted them in, That town had you dump your oun waste as to costly to pick it up. Did have a town dump. In winter roads were shut so no need to plow them. Cost to much. Small town are poor and cheep. Will you get to hospital fast? No but you will get there.High School? None town pays to send them to another town. It is a town meeting form of govt. with elected selectmen.If you get your road fixed you will be asked if the selectmen lives on that road. Our own joke.

[Noordam]

4. In smaller towns that "may" work

but not in the cites the size of San Diego.

[izzie]

6. Oh I know you are right but their thinking is the same as small town.

You put sewer lines in because you need them but then someplaces do not. Laws usually force it for the good of the whole. I believe in the good of the whole and if you want the backwards of small towns go there and live.I told friends who wished to move from a small city to a real country town in Maine. Look you are both old and very sick. You will never get to a hospital in time to be saved. Vol. can not do it. Now they are in the small town and guess what they are screeming about. They will never get to a hospital in a rush.So much for reason

[loudnclear]

8. Bush and Republican tax cuts will be responsible for endangering the

entire nation. Will it be grounds for charges of "treason?" Somewhere along the way, the many actions of the Bush administration and the Republicans and Democrats who have supported and voted for such rank actions should be grounds for charges of treason or high crimes since most of the actions have or will endanger national safety and security...from foreign policies that have enraged the world against us to economic policies that threaten to undo and undermine our national safety and security through bankrupting the government treasury and enriching INDIVIDUAL corporate largess. We should be throwing individuals from the Bush administration and their corporate thug-pals in jail like France and Russia are doing.

[smallprint]

9. This is an excellent article.

Somebody really did their homework on this one. I hope people in SD County get together and make some noise about this...

[Noordam]

13. If the SD forum is any clue

the answer is no. It is somebody's elses problem and they want their taxes low.

[leesa]

10. But... but...it's all Gray Davis' fault!

Yup keeping those taxes low. We burn every single year and San Diegans were well aware of the risk. It should be interesting to see what happens now, that, for a change, it is the Republican belt of wealthy people who were hit hard.

[Star]

11. email Dianne Jacob

One of the Supervisors on the County Board of Supervisors, Dianne Jacob, made several disparaging remarks during the fire blaming Governor Davis for this fire. I emailed her at that time, asking her what she had done to prevent those fires, and I emailed her again today with a copy of this article. I let her know that I will work to have her voted out of office when she is up for re-election. Here's her email addy, for those of you in SD who would like to email Ms. Jacob:

[e-mail]

[eileen_d]

12. Just read an article in The Nation

(the print version) saying basically the same things. I feel bad for the San Diegans who DIDN'T ask for this, and as for the ones who repeatedly voted down the new taxes: hopefully this unnecessary wake-up call will get through to them.

[young_at_heart]

14. Reagan preached " less government" as governor

and the mantra continued as president. The Republicans in Calif. heard it so often they believed it and now are paying the consequences.