I am a member of the Yankee Hill/ Concow community. It feels like every year we have to convince you to not cut services at our station. It’s beginning to feel like you don’t like us living in the foothills.
Not having the fire station open 24/7 impacts people’s ability to find options for fire insurance, which is already difficult to obtain. The fire station is also the first responders for the community. There isn’t an ambulance up here, we no longer have a designated area deputy. Paradise used to be the closest hospital and emergency room. When there are accidents here or a need for emergency response it takes at least 15 minutes, if not longer, for emergency response to come from Oroville or somewhere else, longer especially if the emergency is deeper into Concow or Big Bend. The local station is more familiar with all the back roads and in an emergency response time is critical.
Yes we have a fantastic volunteer group here, but we shouldn’t have to depend on them in every emergency situation during the winter months.
Our community matters.
Please keep our station open.
Operate this newer build Firehouse in Berry Creek!! You built it, now house it w/ staff. Or turn it over to the volunteer firefighters and offer more of these resources to the community.
Taking away a communities only “state funded” life saving resource is absolutely criminal.
Yes the vast majority of the area is being over run by illegal cartels and pot grows but it’s because you let it get that way.
There are still families with small children that deserve the same kind of protection as your children get!
Small fires and medical calls are frequent in these high country areas and tourism is year ‘round. In summer we get folks trying to reach remote areas of the lakes and other folks that go hiking or trail riding. In the winter folks come from all around the north state to snow mobile and make memories with their families. Unfortunately accidents do occur and not having a resource nearby could mean life or death for someone. Everyone knows adequate response times saves lives.
To boot- who exactly is getting the salary raise with the money that will be saved by closing these stations? What department do they work in?and What have they done to deserves such a large raise it will close multiple stations and make hundred of families feel less secure?
As a long time resident of Berry Creek I urge the Board to keep our, and other small community's fire stations staffed and operating year-round! In Berry Creek, we are already farther away from emergency services; a delay in care could potentially be deadly. Another concern, our little community is healing and slowly becoming more populated which typically leads to more emergency calls. This community already lost 17 lives and most of our homes in the Bear Fire; we cannot endure any more loss! Berry Creek needs our Fire Station!
In 2017 when the Butte County Board of Supervisors came after our fire stations, our citizens spoke up, and a couple supervisors listened. Those supervisors aren’t there now, but two who were, Supervisors Teeter and Connelly, were back after our fire stations again in December of last year, and odds are they’re back after them again as they prepare the 2023-24 County budget.
Back in 2017, Casey Hatcher (now Butte County’s Deputy Administrative Officer) argued that rising staff costs at Cal Fire necessitated the station cuts. This time, county administrative staff colluded with the Supervisors to create a new, rising-staff-costs reason to cut fire stations – but not a Cal Fire staff cost problem, a Butte County staff cost problem!
It now looks like Hatcher and other administrative staff, along with Supervisors Teeter and Connelly, have been grinding their Cal Fire axe since 2017. They wielded it in December when the board was missing a member (Durfee was not yet seated). Supervisors Kimmelshue, Ritter, Teeter and Connelly all voted to terminate the cooperative agreement they had with Cal Fire to keep stations operating year-round in Stirling City, Jarbo Gap/Concow/Yankee Hill, and Berry Creek. Their justification: we need to raise county staff salaries!
So, what did the supervisors really say with their votes? I think they said this:
1) citizens in Berry Creek, Stirling City, and Jarbo Gap/Concow/Yankee hill are less deserving of protection than the citizens in Robinson Mill, Forest Ranch, and Paradise, and
2) citizens of Butte County will pay for generous county wage increases by giving up year-round fire protection.
No supervisors! As public servants, don’t deprive some of your citizens of basic public safety in order to reward your employees with raises in other programs. Find ways to keep your existing public services and find constructive ways to fund the raises you voted for!
Back in 2017, then Butte County CalFire chief Darren Read said, “So next year when we have a [budget] increase, now we’re going to cut another station. Or another station. And pretty soon we don’t have that regional response to mitigate the big incidents.” Turns out, Chief Read was prophetic. But not only do we lose regional response ability, we lose the ability to provide first response to individuals who are our family, friends, and fellow citizens. It actually happened between December 2022 and April 2023.
Today you will hear from current Butte County Cal Fire Chief Sjolund. He will show that despite assurances from the Supervisors, volunteer response was inadequate. I hope Chief Sjolund conveys the value of the Amador program for all citizens of Butte County. We all deserve the same level of public safety.
Supervisors Kimmelshue, Teeter and Connelly, you need to fix this if you are asking us to re-elect you in 2024. Fixing it means keeping all the Amador stations funded and operational, year-round, in 2023-24. The budget crisis you all created by raising county wages should not be fixed by taking year-round fire and first response services away from a targeted group of citizens, us, our family, or our friends.
Today, please direct staff to keep all the Amador Stations (including Jarbo Gap, Harts Mill and Stirling City) in the 2023-24 budget and open year-round.
HAVENT The residents of Berry Creek been through enough? And those in the surrounding area? What’s the justification for having the station closed? Maybe you think having a fire station open during a non-peak fire season makes sense, but there are so many other services fire stations provide that are counted on by local communities. And more importantly, having those other engines and staff pulled from more populated areas puts those areas at more risk as well. Please keep the station open year-round with trained professionals.
157 calls to closed stations is unacceptable. That’s 157 times other engines were pulled from their call areas. Berry Creek’s average call time was 26min. Also unacceptable. On top of that I and four other people I know were all able to obtain State Farm insurance (a week before you closed our station) at an affordable price which I’ve been unable to acquire after the Camp Fire. A sign things were looking up for our community! If you don’t right this wrong and open us up again year round we can all expect non-renewal notices soon. Over time the small amount saved to close the stations will end up costing the general fund more when properties aren’t able to be sold or mortgages get defaulted on because they aren’t able to be insured. California FairPlan covers nothing is is unaffordable. Also not recognized by some mortgage companies. This will drive property values down. Please do the right thing and open these stations year round again. It was wrong and the findings in the report being shared by Chief Sjolund proves that.
Hello,
Would like to see locally staffed fire protection and medical emergency personnel in place in the ( budget affected communities!).
Last winter we had a medical emergency at our home in Berry Creek and we couldn’t get phone reception and there was a great deal of snow in the road.
A family member had to wear a heart monitor for 30 days following the onset of symptoms.
Would be great if we could be afforded the same peace of mind as others who live in the city limits..
We need our emergency services..
Thank you.
Which fund did the PG&E trust money go into, and why will it not support these fire stations and their communities, especially Jarbo Gap, only about 7 miles from where the fire started?
Didn't the Supervisors discuss closing the fire station at Jarbo Gap just a few years ago? It was pointed out then, and it remains true today, that Jarbo Gap provides emergency services for most of Highway 70 all the way to Qunicy. In addition to fighting fires, they also provide medical and rescue services to communities all along Highway 70. Several people testified at that Board meeting that they wouldn't be there but for medical services provided by CalFire stations near them. The first priority in county budgets MUST be Public Safety. If the current Board doesn't understand that, maybe it's time to replace them with people that do.
All three towns need there fire department opened. There's Wildland , structure fires , medical call's , car accidents and hazmat etc. We pay property taxes.
Keep all fire resources available year round. This community has been through enough and the security of having these resources at all times is necessary.
I support the year round opening of a fire station especially in the community of Berry Creek, where my family lost everything during the Bear Fire. We cannot make rebuilding plans without access to emergency services. Thank you for your consideration in this matter.
Please consider closing stations that are closer to other resources, IE city fire, or cities that have contracted with CalFire, and leave the outlying stations open.
Douglas Poppelreiter
74 year resident of Butte County, lifelong resident of CA.
I am strongly urging the Board to keep the fire station open year round in Berry Creek. When you shut it down seasonally, it was done with no notice to our community. We have been devastated by the Bear Fire. We are still in survival mode up here, and the only way back to a new normal is to have emergency services available on the mountain. We pay taxes and don't receive much for it, especially when our supervisor doesn't have our back. We have lived here 19 years and do not want to live anywhere else, but the anxiety of not having a staffed CalFire station is high. We deserve to have year round emergency response. Please vote to support Berry Creek!
All of the firehouses need to be kept open year round. As one of the Camp Fire survivors I know. The extra manpower is needed. Cloding them down causes extra response time to go to emergencies from stations farther away. Those mountain communities need them to be open all of the time.
I am a member of the Yankee Hill/ Concow community. It feels like every year we have to convince you to not cut services at our station. It’s beginning to feel like you don’t like us living in the foothills.
Not having the fire station open 24/7 impacts people’s ability to find options for fire insurance, which is already difficult to obtain. The fire station is also the first responders for the community. There isn’t an ambulance up here, we no longer have a designated area deputy. Paradise used to be the closest hospital and emergency room. When there are accidents here or a need for emergency response it takes at least 15 minutes, if not longer, for emergency response to come from Oroville or somewhere else, longer especially if the emergency is deeper into Concow or Big Bend. The local station is more familiar with all the back roads and in an emergency response time is critical.
Yes we have a fantastic volunteer group here, but we shouldn’t have to depend on them in every emergency situation during the winter months.
Our community matters.
Please keep our station open.
Operate this newer build Firehouse in Berry Creek!! You built it, now house it w/ staff. Or turn it over to the volunteer firefighters and offer more of these resources to the community.
Taking away a communities only “state funded” life saving resource is absolutely criminal.
Yes the vast majority of the area is being over run by illegal cartels and pot grows but it’s because you let it get that way.
There are still families with small children that deserve the same kind of protection as your children get!
Small fires and medical calls are frequent in these high country areas and tourism is year ‘round. In summer we get folks trying to reach remote areas of the lakes and other folks that go hiking or trail riding. In the winter folks come from all around the north state to snow mobile and make memories with their families. Unfortunately accidents do occur and not having a resource nearby could mean life or death for someone. Everyone knows adequate response times saves lives.
To boot- who exactly is getting the salary raise with the money that will be saved by closing these stations? What department do they work in?and What have they done to deserves such a large raise it will close multiple stations and make hundred of families feel less secure?
As a long time resident of Berry Creek I urge the Board to keep our, and other small community's fire stations staffed and operating year-round! In Berry Creek, we are already farther away from emergency services; a delay in care could potentially be deadly. Another concern, our little community is healing and slowly becoming more populated which typically leads to more emergency calls. This community already lost 17 lives and most of our homes in the Bear Fire; we cannot endure any more loss! Berry Creek needs our Fire Station!
The us forestry and pge burnd are community and you do this two us thus could be considered terrorism
In 2017 when the Butte County Board of Supervisors came after our fire stations, our citizens spoke up, and a couple supervisors listened. Those supervisors aren’t there now, but two who were, Supervisors Teeter and Connelly, were back after our fire stations again in December of last year, and odds are they’re back after them again as they prepare the 2023-24 County budget.
Back in 2017, Casey Hatcher (now Butte County’s Deputy Administrative Officer) argued that rising staff costs at Cal Fire necessitated the station cuts. This time, county administrative staff colluded with the Supervisors to create a new, rising-staff-costs reason to cut fire stations – but not a Cal Fire staff cost problem, a Butte County staff cost problem!
It now looks like Hatcher and other administrative staff, along with Supervisors Teeter and Connelly, have been grinding their Cal Fire axe since 2017. They wielded it in December when the board was missing a member (Durfee was not yet seated). Supervisors Kimmelshue, Ritter, Teeter and Connelly all voted to terminate the cooperative agreement they had with Cal Fire to keep stations operating year-round in Stirling City, Jarbo Gap/Concow/Yankee Hill, and Berry Creek. Their justification: we need to raise county staff salaries!
So, what did the supervisors really say with their votes? I think they said this:
1) citizens in Berry Creek, Stirling City, and Jarbo Gap/Concow/Yankee hill are less deserving of protection than the citizens in Robinson Mill, Forest Ranch, and Paradise, and
2) citizens of Butte County will pay for generous county wage increases by giving up year-round fire protection.
No supervisors! As public servants, don’t deprive some of your citizens of basic public safety in order to reward your employees with raises in other programs. Find ways to keep your existing public services and find constructive ways to fund the raises you voted for!
Back in 2017, then Butte County CalFire chief Darren Read said, “So next year when we have a [budget] increase, now we’re going to cut another station. Or another station. And pretty soon we don’t have that regional response to mitigate the big incidents.” Turns out, Chief Read was prophetic. But not only do we lose regional response ability, we lose the ability to provide first response to individuals who are our family, friends, and fellow citizens. It actually happened between December 2022 and April 2023.
Today you will hear from current Butte County Cal Fire Chief Sjolund. He will show that despite assurances from the Supervisors, volunteer response was inadequate. I hope Chief Sjolund conveys the value of the Amador program for all citizens of Butte County. We all deserve the same level of public safety.
Supervisors Kimmelshue, Teeter and Connelly, you need to fix this if you are asking us to re-elect you in 2024. Fixing it means keeping all the Amador stations funded and operational, year-round, in 2023-24. The budget crisis you all created by raising county wages should not be fixed by taking year-round fire and first response services away from a targeted group of citizens, us, our family, or our friends.
Today, please direct staff to keep all the Amador Stations (including Jarbo Gap, Harts Mill and Stirling City) in the 2023-24 budget and open year-round.
HAVENT The residents of Berry Creek been through enough? And those in the surrounding area? What’s the justification for having the station closed? Maybe you think having a fire station open during a non-peak fire season makes sense, but there are so many other services fire stations provide that are counted on by local communities. And more importantly, having those other engines and staff pulled from more populated areas puts those areas at more risk as well. Please keep the station open year-round with trained professionals.
157 calls to closed stations is unacceptable. That’s 157 times other engines were pulled from their call areas. Berry Creek’s average call time was 26min. Also unacceptable. On top of that I and four other people I know were all able to obtain State Farm insurance (a week before you closed our station) at an affordable price which I’ve been unable to acquire after the Camp Fire. A sign things were looking up for our community! If you don’t right this wrong and open us up again year round we can all expect non-renewal notices soon. Over time the small amount saved to close the stations will end up costing the general fund more when properties aren’t able to be sold or mortgages get defaulted on because they aren’t able to be insured. California FairPlan covers nothing is is unaffordable. Also not recognized by some mortgage companies. This will drive property values down. Please do the right thing and open these stations year round again. It was wrong and the findings in the report being shared by Chief Sjolund proves that.
Hello,
Would like to see locally staffed fire protection and medical emergency personnel in place in the ( budget affected communities!).
Last winter we had a medical emergency at our home in Berry Creek and we couldn’t get phone reception and there was a great deal of snow in the road.
A family member had to wear a heart monitor for 30 days following the onset of symptoms.
Would be great if we could be afforded the same peace of mind as others who live in the city limits..
We need our emergency services..
Thank you.
Which fund did the PG&E trust money go into, and why will it not support these fire stations and their communities, especially Jarbo Gap, only about 7 miles from where the fire started?
Didn't the Supervisors discuss closing the fire station at Jarbo Gap just a few years ago? It was pointed out then, and it remains true today, that Jarbo Gap provides emergency services for most of Highway 70 all the way to Qunicy. In addition to fighting fires, they also provide medical and rescue services to communities all along Highway 70. Several people testified at that Board meeting that they wouldn't be there but for medical services provided by CalFire stations near them. The first priority in county budgets MUST be Public Safety. If the current Board doesn't understand that, maybe it's time to replace them with people that do.
All three towns need there fire department opened. There's Wildland , structure fires , medical call's , car accidents and hazmat etc. We pay property taxes.
KEEP STATIONS OPEN
Keep all fire resources available year round. This community has been through enough and the security of having these resources at all times is necessary.
I support the year round opening of a fire station especially in the community of Berry Creek, where my family lost everything during the Bear Fire. We cannot make rebuilding plans without access to emergency services. Thank you for your consideration in this matter.
Please consider closing stations that are closer to other resources, IE city fire, or cities that have contracted with CalFire, and leave the outlying stations open.
Douglas Poppelreiter
74 year resident of Butte County, lifelong resident of CA.
I am strongly urging the Board to keep the fire station open year round in Berry Creek. When you shut it down seasonally, it was done with no notice to our community. We have been devastated by the Bear Fire. We are still in survival mode up here, and the only way back to a new normal is to have emergency services available on the mountain. We pay taxes and don't receive much for it, especially when our supervisor doesn't have our back. We have lived here 19 years and do not want to live anywhere else, but the anxiety of not having a staffed CalFire station is high. We deserve to have year round emergency response. Please vote to support Berry Creek!
All of the firehouses need to be kept open year round. As one of the Camp Fire survivors I know. The extra manpower is needed. Cloding them down causes extra response time to go to emergencies from stations farther away. Those mountain communities need them to be open all of the time.