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DAVE WINNACKER stood on a hill in Northern California as flames devoured the houses below him. The Alameda County Fire Department division chief had fought wildfires before, but the 2017 North Bay Fires felt different. A sense of helplessness overcame him as he watched them burn. I had engines assigned to them, he says. But you couldn t stop it.
A former Marine (and now a fire chief in the Bay Area s Moraga-Orinda Fire District), Winnacker was one of more than 10,000 firefighters who battled the infernos, which raged for three weeks. The blaze tore through a quarter-million acres, killed 44 people, and destroyed over 6,000 homes. At times, it spread at a rate of one football field every three seconds. The damage totaled $13 billion, a new U.S. record that would fall the following year.
Moraga Town Council considers objecting to fire district consolidation
By Tony Hicks
Moraga-Orinda Fire Station 41 (Photo: mofd.org).
MORAGA, Calif. - The Moraga-Orinda Fire District (MOFD) may consider consolidating with the Contra Costa County Fire Protection District, an idea that some in Moraga don t find very appealing.
The Moraga Town Council on Wednesday will consider officially objecting to the idea, which town manager Cynthia Battenberg says in a staff report will be discussed at MOFD s May 19 board meeting.
A draft version of the letter, which would come from Moraga Mayor Mike McCluer, says We strongly oppose MOFD spending resources studying a process for consolidation with ConFire. Resources should continue to be spent on the delivery of high-quality fire protection, fire safety, and emergency response systems.
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MOFD has an elected board of directors and is funded by approximately $26 million annually in property tax revenue (Shutterstock)
LAMORINDA, CA The Moraga-Orinda Fire District (MOFD) may consider consolidating with the Contra Costa County Fire Protection District, an idea that some in Moraga don t find very appealing. The Moraga Town Council on Wednesday will consider officially objecting to the idea, which town manager Cynthia Battenberg says in a staff report will be discussed at MOFD s May 19 board meeting.
A draft version of the letter, which would come from Moraga Mayor Mike McCluer, says We strongly oppose MOFD spending resources studying a process for consolidation with ConFire. Resources should continue to be spent on the delivery of high-quality fire protection, fire safety, and emergency response systems.
We are seeing conditions right now this year that are a month or two down the road, Cal Fire Chief Thom Porter said.
The agency warns Northern California is descending into a deep drought, which could make this wildfire season more destructive than last year.
The state is shelling out $150 million in grants to thin out fire-fueling vegetation such as dying pine trees. Cal Fire is using emergency funding to hire thousands of firefighters this season.
Cal Fire and Cal OES kicked off Wildfire Preparedness Week by urging homeowners to harden their homes against dangerous embers spread by wildfires.
Due to this year’s dry conditions, the Moraga-Orinda Fire District pushed their vegetation abatement deadline two weeks earlier, giving homeowners less time to remove dead brush from their property.