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San Bernardino County Sun (California)
As Southern California temperatures rise to somewhere north of unbearable, with the start of the region’s infamous fire season just around the corner, a federal plan to reduce the state’s firefighting attack capabilities by up to 50 percent in some places is dumbfounding.
In San Bernardino County, home to one of the most urbanized and most dangerous mountain forests in the nation, with approximately 100,000 residents and $7 billion in assessed property values, it means a reduction from 25 staffed engines last year to 15 engines this year. On weekends, there will be 20 engines available, although fires don’t generally work on a schedule.
And although the aviation resources and hotshot-crew staffing capabilities for forest areas will remain comparable to last year’s levels, the drastic reduction in manpower, leading to fewer fire engines at the ready, will only aggravate the threats posed in the event of a wildfire.
And that threat is expected to be high.
“There are still millions of dead trees in this forest,” said Gene Zimmerman, former supervisor of the San Bernardino National Forest. “Most of the communities are hilltop, with one way in and one way out. . . . This is not a forest to cut spending on.”
We echo Zimmerman’s sentiments. An excessively rainy winter means abundant grasses this spring, which will dry out quickly in the summer months.
The disastrous fires of 2003 should act as both a pertinent reminder of how dangerous and out of control wildfires can become, as well as a convincing argument on why we cannot afford to cut firefighting resources in the face of danger.