7 On Your Side: 'Build back safer' regulations guide Paradise's recovery 6 years after Camp Fire
PARADISE, Calif. (KABC) -- Pacific Palisades and Altadena will need to be completely rebuilt after the recent wildfires, and figuring out how those communities will come back is months, if not years, away.
7 On Your Side's Phillip Palmer traveled to the town of Paradise, north of Sacramento, to look at the rebuilding path taken by residents and community leaders there.
The Camp Fire destroyed more than lives and homes on Nov. 8, 2018, it destroyed the community many of the 26,000 residents were drawn to. In the immediate aftermath, the desire of some was to rebuild the town just as it was -- but for others, the new Paradise had to be different than the old.
"It was really important to us that we learned lessons from what happened here and that we share those, but we're really looking at the science that exists now to make it better here," said Colette Curtis, the town's recovery coordinator.
Paradise was a blank slate six years ago, and the path of least resistance would have been to rush a timeline and allow residents to rebuild immediately. Instead, political leadership decided to require building standards never seen before, in an effort to avoid repeating history.
"We live in a wildland-urban interface," said Ron Lossande, a former mayor of Paradise. "We know that there's a chance of wildfires. Let's do something about it."
Paradise is currently the only city in the United States to require all new homes meet the "Wildfire Prepared Home Standards" established by the Insurance Institute for Business and Home Safety. That means ember-resistant vents, metal gutters, 6-foot vertical clearance for any exterior wall which keeps flammable material from gathering, and 5 feet of defensible space for every new home built.
Many of the changes you would likely never even know where fire-safe.
"When my wife and I designed our home, I didn't want to have a home that looked like a bunker," said resident Gary Ledbetter. "I wanted something that looked like a home. And you can do that, right?"
Traditional fences are fine, but the last 5 feet next to homes must be non-combustible material -- because six years ago, many fences brought the fire right into homes.
"It first and foremost comes down to building your home to a high standard, so that you have a home to come back to," said Steve Hawks, senior director for wildfire with the Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety.
Safety has come at a cost. The median home price before the fire was $236,000 -- now it's $450,000. But the community is doing what it can to defray those costs.
Jenni Goodlin of the Rebuild Paradise Foundation says they provide pre-approved fire-wise design plans and grants for hardening homes against fire.
"The idea is, if we are building back, let's manage it better this time, right? We have a new start, so let's start with, right after we build the home, let's provide homeowners with gravel, so that they have 5 feet of defensible space right out the gate," Goodlin said. "Versus someone just planting trees and not knowing or not understanding."
To truly protect Paradise, the town needed a layered approach that goes beyond just home building. Outside of town, hundreds of thousands of trees are being removed to slow the intensity of any fire as it approaches.
Inside Paradise, PG&E has worked for years to move more utilities underground. When they are finished, the only power lines that will be seen above ground will be outside of Paradise.
"I'm not aware of any community in this country --or even in the world -- that's going through a mass retrofit of undergrounding utilities," said Marc Mattox, Paradise's director of public works.
Roads have also been widened and reconfigured to have one lane leading into town and potentially three lanes heading out -- because six years ago, people died in their cars trying to evacuate.
"So we're building the houses but also the town," Lassonde said. "We're rebuilding the town in a way to be able to withstand something as catastrophic as the Camp Fire if it were to happen 100 years from now."
Many residents in Paradise likely would have built to a safer standard regardless of the tougher standards now in place. But by making it a requirement, each fire-safe home protects the family living next door. And that's a message people in Paradise hope Southern California hears.
"I hope that the town leadership is thinking long-term for that community about the building codes that they set," Paradise resident Casey Taylor said. "Because it would be a complete disaster, a complete tragedy, to waste the opportunity that they have right now to build back safer and stronger."
