TUNED UP
Class act
Forsberg wins Legends Night; Fastest 5 Days in Motorsports to launch Wednesday.
Hands4Hope volunteers distribute needed school supplies to local students.
Sports, A6
News, etc., B1
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C a l i f o r n i a ’ s O l d e s t N e w s pa p e r – E s t. 18 51
Volume 170 • Issue 99 | 75¢
mtdemocrat.com
Monday, August 23, 2021
Fire experts challenge changes to road regs Eric Jaramishian Staff writer Firefighting professionals are in flames over proposed changes to existing firesafe road regulations that will potentially threaten safety of firefighters and residents who live in high fire risk areas. Fire-safe regulations adopted by the California Board of Forestry and Fire Protection have been around for 30 years, requiring access roads be 20 feet wide and dead-end roads limited to 1 mile in length. Changes proposed in April would eliminate 1-mile dead-end road regulations and reduce the 20-foot road width standard to 14 feet for existing roads supporting new developments. Fire professionals like Doug Leisz, former associate chief of the U.S. Forest Service, contends that firefighting trucks and vehicles cannot pass each other on a 14-foot-wide road. “When you start moving vehicles, including bulldozers and fire trucks into a fire, it takes up 9 feet of width on a road,” Leisz said. “So how can you get a car by? You can’t. So what happens when that congestion happens? The fire can’t be fought.” Proposed regulations would limit length of dead end roads in new developments to 800 feet to half a mile, depending on the size of land parcels but for existing roads limitations would be removed for dead-end roads. Many dead-end roads in El Dorado County are longer than 1 mile and most development occurs off existing roads. “All it takes is for one tree to fall down and all of a sudden you have a gridlock and people cannot escape,” Leisz said. Fitting are these discussions of updating California fire safety policy as the state continues to struggle with one of the worst wildfire seasons it has ever faced. The Dixie Fire to the north has burned more than 600,000 acres, becoming the largest single fire recorded in state history. More locally, the Caldor Fire has burned more than 70,000 acres in El Dorado County. Leisz was one of 18 firefighting professionals who sent a formal letter to the Board of Forestry, addressing their concerns that the proposed changes to regulations weakens public safety. The letter recommended that an environmental impact report would be beneficial to addressing the effects of proposed changes. “It raises the question to me, if they n
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Mountain Democrat photos by Aaron Rosenblatt
A chimney still stands at a Grizzly Flat home destroyed by the Caldor Fire. The blaze has burned more than 70,000 acres in El Dorado County and razed dozens of structures.
Caldor Fire’s growth will depend on wind n Destroyed structure count at 104 Thomas Frey Staff writer While damage assessment is ongoing, Cal Fire reported Friday morning that at least 104 structures have been destroyed. The most impacted community is Grizzly Flat in south county where homes, an elementary school, a church and post office were razed. Overnight Thursday firefighters saw short-range spotting and fire activity in steep drainages where the blaze is now fueled by weakened timber. A “fairly strong” southwest wind forecast for Saturday could push the Caldor Fire north, according to a Thursday night briefing from Eric Schwab, Cal Fire operations section chief. “Obviously, I don’t like the sound of that,” Schwab said, “but if I had to have a 20-mile-an-hour wind, that’s the direction I would want it because it is again going to push the fire out into the forest with a lot less infrastructure there.” Schwab added that high humidity would assist the hundreds of firefighters working tirelessly to stop the blaze. “If the humidity goes up, it slows fire behavior down,” Schwab said. “(It) allows us to get closer to the fire’s edge to work. So high humidity is beneficial to us.” As of press time Friday the Caldor Fire hit 73,415 acres. Containment remained at 0% and 6,905 structures continue to be threatened. The blaze first sparked Aug. 14 near Omo Ranch and has since burned to the north and east nearly up to Highway 50.
See Roads, page A6
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See Caldor fire, page A7
Fire retardant covers the roof of a Slug Gulch Road house in Somerset.
Flames continue to burn near Grizzly Flat Road Thursday.
Voting options available for displaced Thomas Frey Staff writer El Dorado County Elections has created several options for residents affected by the Caldor wildfire to ensure their vote will be cast in the Gubernatorial Recall Election. Ballots were mailed out Monday and began arriving Tuesday and Wednesday while many people were evacuated. “We know people have very serious concerns right now,” said Bill O’Neill, El Dorado County Registrar of Voters. “We don’t want voting to add to their stress; we want to make it as easy as possible for
them if they would like to vote.” Mail for the evacuated area is being held at the Shingle Springs/Cameron Park and the Diamond Springs post offices. Contact those locations to see if your mail is there. If so, you can retrieve your ballot. If it is not there, the county voting office at 2850 Fairlane Court is open Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Another option is emailing vbm@ edcgov.us with your name, physical address, date of birth, name of the election (Gubernatorial Recall Election) and the address where you would like the new ballot sent to.
Elections personnel has visited every evacuation center to talk with voters and have had people fill out a form requesting a replacement ballot, which will be printed at the office and delivered back to the voter in a couple of hours. In the coming week, the elections office will be setting up in-person voting at the evacuation centers. Voting centers all over the county will be open Sept. 4. To see a list of locations visit edcgov.us/elections. The deadline to submit a ballot is Sept. 14 at 8 p.m. Any questions can be answered at the elections office by calling (530) 621-7480.
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