Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAbout6/17/2025 Item 5l, Priest Donnie Priest < To:E-mail Council Website; CityClerk Subject:CDF Map 2025, very high fire risk, public comment As part of the public comment period to help influence the city in making decisions with regard to the local statutes about the new CDF map with the high fire risks, I wish to provide some insight and concerns. As this is a long term issues that has many facets, my response will be fairly lengthy. We have a second home at the end of Hill St, next to the city open space, in a high fire risk area. I agree with the need to accept the CDF map, but have many concerns with the discussion provided. OVERVIEW: With the new CDF map, the houses in our area are now in a very high fire risk area. The city owns the Maino open space, and is required to minimize fire risk, which they have not. There is also privately owned open space, as some of my neighbors have open space in their parcels, created when the French brothers subdivided the area back in the 80s. One of the things that the city did well is that the city required an 8 inch main for the fire hydrant, as well as other designs to help with fire fighting. However, there are many eucalyptus trees that have dead branches, piles of wood and branches underneath them in the open space. Eucalyptus trees are very high fire risk trees. A few years ago, the city did some cleaning, stacking, but at current, I have a huge concern with regard to how poorly the city has addressed the fire hazard on their open space property with specific regard to the eucalyptus trees. The CDF map does not acknowledge Highway 101 as a fire break, which was the most surprising thing to me, but it makes sense due to the high fire risk eucalyptus trees and poor maintenace of these eucalyptus trees for fires. I have two eucalyptus trees on my property that I am now hopeful to cut down to limit the fire hazard for others. The open space is also next to highway 101, where homeless people frequent as well as mountain bikers and hikers. I have seen cattle grazing, but I have never noticed sheep and/or goats. Cal-Trans is not very good at keeping the grass mowed, but a few years ago came in and really cleaned up the bushes and trees. There was a fire near the Broad St onramp recently, which I believe was started by a homeless person. The city, in close proximity, limited the width of the streets for ingress of fire and emergency trucks, as well as egress for people needing to evacuate, with the planters for the bike lanes, which greatly influences the risk of loss of life and property due to fire, besides creating more car accidents. The planters greatly limit the ability for people to evacuate, especially if a fire engine is being used on the road to help fight the fires. When my house was a rental, I had great renters, and they installed a fire pit in the back yard. No permit was needed, and this likely is not ideal considering the updated fire risks. In the past, and very recently, CDF has come and cleaned some of the open space to limit fire hazard, but I don't think they addressed the eucalyptus trees and the dead fuel sources under these trees. Policy FI=5.1 mandates that the city lessen the fire risk in the open space, but as the new map has shown, the city has completely failed with this regard. Eucalyptus trees are a known high fire risk, and the city has not taken care of the trees as well as the dead fuel under these trees. DISCUSSION: In my opinion, the eucalyptus trees and the lack of the city maintainence, in combined with the lack of the private property owners maintenance (with lack of city enforcement of their current ordinances) has created a situation which creates many issues and risks for the citizens of the city. A fire in this high fire risk area likely 1 will be started by a car on the freeway, with lesser percentages of it being started by homeless people, people smoking dope on the hillside, as well as a person living in a house creating a spark. While a common person would think the height of the grass is most important for fire spread, the reality is that the trees are more of an issue. Eucalyptus trees, not a native species, are high fire risk, which is compounded by all the crap underneath them created by the lack of maintenance and the natural occurrence of the trees dropping dead fuel. It would be much better if the eucalyptus trees were cut down and replaced with fire resistance trees, such as a grove of coastal redwood trees (a native species). There has been a constant problem over the years with fences being cut, at first by the mountain bikers, and more recently by the homeless making camps. In my experience, the city was great and prompt in fixing these fences when made aware. This is really a great thing, because cattle could have gotten onto the freeway. However, due to a fallen tree (minus branches) crossing the fence line, as well as the amount of bikers and hikers needing open spaces to cross fences. I do not think that having goats would be safe as the goats likely could not be contained, and could get on the freeway. While the city mentioned goats and sheep in their report for the ordinance, I have never seen any and do not believe this with regard to the area around Cerro San Luis. Goats also are not safe with the type of fencing and the freeway. When I cleaned up the homeless camp in my back yard, there was a spot where a fire had burned part of the plywood floor of the homeless camp. The real fire risk is due to the trees, not the grass. Grass management is mentioned, but the tree management seems to be omitted. PROPOSED IDEAS: 1) Have the city held to the same standard for the fire prevention of the open space as the private homeowners are. Have the city clean up the crap under the eucalyptus trees, and ideally cut down the high fire risk eucalyptus trees. The city can replace these trees with fire resistant trees, such as coastal redwood or coastal live oak. In a fire, an oak tree will suck up the water from the ground and overweight the branches, where branches can fall and hurt people if they seek shelter under an oak tree after a fire. 2) Evaluate removing the planters and bike lanes to improve ingress of fire and emergency vehicles due to the very high fire risk area, as well as evacuation of the citizens. 3) Excluding for cooking food (BBQ, Smoker, etc), require a fire evaluation or some other aspects for fire pits, chimeneas, and other open flame sources for all properties in a high fire risk area. Have a mechanism if the PD encounters this during a noise complaint to inform code enforcement. I am all for people having great conversations over beers, wine and a fire, but it should be evaluated to make sure it is done safely. A screen is required on a chimney of a house, but what about external fire sources not in a house? 4) Allow for solid fire proof fence base of varying height based upon need for houses to freeway border as well as to open space. For the freeway, allow a higher fence height so it can also be a sound wall. This way, the property owner would pay for the wall instead of the city. For those that border open space, the upper part of the wall can be see through, while the lower part can be fire proof. By having a fire proof wall, the limited resources of firefighters can be better used. A low concrete wall would limit the grass fire, but not the tree fire, with an open space for views on top. The hillside fence standards 17.70.090(c)(8) should be redone, with a new addition allowing for sound walls (fire walls) on the edge bordering a freeway and a lower fire wall bordering open space. With the fences at my house, I am only allowed to have a fence where I can see how the city is not taking care of the open space for high fire risk with all the dead fuel under the eucalyptus trees, but cannot make a fire block to limit the impact of the lack of city following its own made rules to limit the risk of fires from burning down my house, as well as a huge percentage of the houses in the city. 5) Consider ordinances with regard to possession of cooking/fire aspects (as well as use) in the open space area to limit the risk of fire by homeless people. Something needs to be done to limit the risk of fires by homeless people and their activities in the open space. I don't know an easy way to keep people from smoking their dope while on a hike, etc, using the open space. 6) Change the tree ordinance to ease the permitting (or eliminate the tree permit needed) to remove a eucalyptus tree in a very high fire risk area. Have the city also cut down their eucalyptus trees and replace 2 them with more fire resistant trees so that the freeway can be used as a fire break. Ask the question, if Highway 101 is to be a fire break, then what needs to be done to achieve this? 7) Besides CDF,, consider asking the property insurance companies what would need to be done to lessen the fire risk and increase the probability for the insurance companies to be willing to still provide insurance coverage to the citizens of the city. This will help the citizens be able to maintain their fire insurance without going to the high fire risk insurance of last resort. 8) Enforce the current yard cleaning ordinance for fire prevention, specifically with regard to high fire risk trees with dead branches underneath. Consider offering loans or financial help for tree removal, whether a lien against the house, etc. Many elderly people may not be able to get a loan against the property to pay for the tree removal, although there is a ton of equity in the home. Cash-flow is different than equity. I know a elderly family who lost their fire insurance because they could not afford the 30K required to remove trees and fix their house to insurance requirements, even though there is over 2M of equity in the house. Prop 13 shows this concept. ISSUES AND/OR CONCERNS WITH THE ORDINANCE AS MENTIONED: 1) Need to follow the law. The city should follow the law. By requiring the removal of vegitation on an existing house with a change of fire risk from the past, this may become an improper use of eminent domain. This is more blatant than the city requiring sewer lateral replacements of properties not close to the property with a permit requiring the lateral replacement. For example, I know houses with established redwood trees close to the residence. In order to comply with the new fire code, whether the triggering event is to sell a house, etc, these trees would need to be cut down. Trees have huge values, and there are established formulas to determine the value of each tree. Thus, if the city requires the homeowner to remove a tree, without other willful linkage to achieve some other benefit to the homeowner, this should trigger the need for the city to reimburse the homeowner for the cost of the tree. While required by the state, the logic is still flawed, and the supremacy clause makes the constitution the rule to follow first than that of the state. It also creates a slippery slope. In the future, if the city determines it is an issue that there are high home burgaralies in an area, could a city come in an take the valuables inside a house and keep it for themselves to limit the risk of home burgaralies? A burgaler is less likely to break into a house if the city has already taken all the valuable items. It is the same concept, as the city is taking something of value from an individual for the benefit of others, without fair compensation. In this case, though, it is limiting the fire risk where the homeowner already has insurance to cover the liability of the fire risk to others, as well as there is the civil court system to fix this should it happen. 2) Provide more specifics about the actual use of sheep and goats. It is mentioned, but I do not believe that the sheep and goats are used to the extent that the wording may lead a reader to believe. 3) Omitted material. There was no mention of how the planters and bike lanes have increased the risk to loss of life and property in a high fire risk are. There was no mention of the fire mitigation required by the city on the city owned property to lessen the fire risk to the citizens of the city, especially with regard to the eucalyptus trees in the Maino open space. There was also no mention of likely causes of a major fire, such as the freeway, homeless, etc. 4) Viewpoint change needed. The ordinance allows for the approval of the CDF map per state requirements, but the discussion is skewed toward the city goal of limiting development, which is in contradiction to required state law. It does not show any insight as to how to limit the areas of high fire risk in the map fpr the future and improve the ease of the citizens to obtain fire insurance. This means limiting the risk of fire, increase the likelihood to obtain fire insurance, have lower fire insurance rates, etc. For example, ask the 3 question, what would need to be done in order to make highway 101 a fire break? What would need to be done to have the insurance companies be willing to write new policies in certain areas? This would mean having the city council represent the citizens instead of representing their own power goals, city goals, and/or special interest goals. 5) Limiting of development. I have concerns that the limiting of development in high fire risk areas may not be legal with regard to other laws, as well as it would create higher costs of housing. Housing affordability is a huge issue, and there are other associated (linked) aspects that need to be balanced. A general concept of the CA state requirements for housing is that a development can be denied if there is no feasible way to mitigate or avoid the adverse impact (fire risk). However, the city's own description shows how fire-resistant building standards can mitigate this. From my reading of the agenda report, the city wants to go back to their low growth viewpoint, bucking the state law mandates to fix the housing crisis, instead of creating local ordinances, that in conjunction with the city doing their required open space fire mitigation, likely could allow for development. The city has for decades wanted and acted in a way for limiting growth to a maximum of 1%. SLO is an area where housing affordability is constrained. COMMENTS FROM COUNCIL AGENDA REPORT: 1) Policy FI-5.1 states that the city SHALL reduce the risk of wildfires. The new CDF shows that it has failed to do this. There is no mention of the eucalyptus tree removal. There is no mention of cleaning up of the debris under the eucalyptus trees. The CDF map is based upon "potential fuel over a 50-year period." Eucalyptus trees are non-native trees, high fire risk, and the city has shown by the current condition of the trees on Cerro San Luis/Maino open space, that the city has failed in their required duties under the statute. The word shall means required, as the statute does not use the word should or may. 2) The number of households effected greatly increased. While the CDF map is different than the proprietary maps that the insurance companies use, a huger percentage of the city is impacted. This changes the political power, as well as financial aspects, as people are more likely to vote and act when something impacts their lives. There are 3 main ways to get the city to change: the city passing laws, citizen initiated propositions, and the court system (lawsuits). The increase of the number of effected households increases the probability of a citizen initiated proposition being successful, as well as needed, since the city has failed greatly in its duties. A citizen based proposition to force the city to comply with its own laws and take care of the fire hazards would have a better chance of passing. I could see a proposition limiting the city to fund discretionary aspects and limit the city from providing raises to its employees until the fire hazards are mitigated creating the needed leverage for the city to comply with its own laws. A lawsuit is more of an individualized approach to fix issues with the city's actions. I am not a lawyer, but I am sure that due to the loss of equity involved with a requirement to remove very valuable trees within a certain distance of a person's house may create lawyers to evaluate whether a lawsuit would be successful due to an improper use of eminent domain, or damages done by the city's lack of compliance with its own laws by not mitigating the severe fire hazard creating a situation where the fire hazard zone has expanded. The key to this aspect is when the property must comply with govt code section 51189 and if eminent domain is properly used. 3) The city states it is going to put together a plant list with regard for fires. The plant list should include high fire risk, such as the eucalyptus tree. The city's current list on their hand-outs, omits fire resistant evergreen trees. I would hope that the city incorporates this style of tree, and consider the native trees, such as coastal redwood and coast live oak as fire resistant evergreen trees. 4) In the discussions about the ADU development, traffic flow is mentioned. The city recently installed planters and bike paths which has been controversial. The city should evaluate due to the new fire risk map, if 4 these bike paths should be removed. The threat to the houses and lives may be more important than the benefit gained for the bikers. 5) The city discusses a suite of management approaches for fire reduction. It failed to mention that trees create a higher fire risk than grasses. It seems that the city discusses grass management, but omits the discussion about high fire risk trees, such as the eucalyptus grove. As mentioned above, the CDF uses a 50 year window, so removal is required in order to lessen the fire risk, which the city is required to comply with per FI-5.1. The city should evaluate whether the removal and/or the replacement of eucalyptus trees is mandated. Redwood trees are fire resistant, and a grove of redwood trees may lessen the area of high fire risk as compared to the grove of eucalyptus trees that have debris under them, and likely will continue to have debris over time. Hopefully the city's VMP will incorporate tree replacement and removal of the high fire risk trees 6) Grant funding was mentioned, but there was no mention of city funds being used to lessen the fire risk in the open space. The city is required by statute to lower the fire risk, so it should be willing to spend its own funds to promptly lessen the fire risk, such as cutting down the high fire risk eucalyptus trees and clearing the dead fuel for a fire under these trees. If the city can spend millions of dollars on planters and bike lanes that increases the risk for the houses in the Anholm district which is now high fire risk with limited ability to evacuate as well as limited ability for fire engines to work, then the city should be able to spend the funds to limit the risk of these houses burning down. If the city is unwilling to use its own funds to lessen the fire risk in the open space, then the city should change the fire ordinance that requires it to do so. 5