[Occupymendocino] Who pays for fighting fires in Mendocino County?

[Richard Karch]

Found on mcn announce listserve

> By Mike Kalantarian
> 
> The Mendocino Lightning Complex Fires of 2008 burned nearly 55,000 acres.
> Thousands of firefighters were engaged in that effort: 47 were injured, and
> one died (Robert Roland, an Anderson Valley volunteer).
> 
> The county's largest private landowner, Mendocino Redwood Company (MRC),
> owns 10% of the county. So, one would expect about 10% of that burned
> acreage to belong to MRC. Instead, MRC hosted 42% of those fires (23,196
> acres), and more than a quarter of their burned acreage (6,000+ acres) was
> in Hack & Squirt zones. That means more than 10% of the total Mendocino
> Lightning Complex Fires took place in MRC poisoned forests.
> 
> MRC owns 228,800 acres but has only one habitable structure on all that
> land, so MRC pays the same State Responsibility Area (SRA) Fire Prevention
> Fee as the rest of us single-structure homeowners. When first assessed in
> 2012, that fee was $115.
> 
> Cal Fire reports the cost of the Mendocino Lightning Complex Fires at $48.5
> million. Since 42% percent of that event took place on MRC property, their
> fair share of the cost would be a little over $20 million. At the rate of
> $115 per year, it will take MRC (and the multi-billionaire Fisher Family of
> San Francisco, who own the company) more than 175,000 years to pay us back.
> The SRA fee structure obviously needs some serious rethinking.
> 
> Meanwhile, the proposed Measure V: "Shall the People of Mendocino County
> Declare Intentionally Killed and Left Standing Trees a Public Nuisance" can
> help address this inequity. It states: trees "intentionally killed and left
> standing...are a public nuisance and the party responsible shall be liable
> for any resulting damage." If such an ordinance had been in place in 2008,
> it could have helped recover some of those costs.
> 
> For more info:  http://www.citizensforfiresafeforests.com
> ______________________________________________

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