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Minutes- September 15, 2016

COBB AREA COUNCIL

Public Meeting

Thursday, September 15, 2016, 6:00-8:00pm

Little Red Schoolhouse/Cobb Mountain Lions Club

15780 Bottle Rock Rd., Cobb, CA 95426

Draft Minutes

 

  • Call To Order @6:07

 

Number in attendance: 20

Committee board members present – Eliot Hurwitz, Barbara Flynn, Jessyca Lytle,  Jessica Pyska,

Gary P. (Absent)

 

  • Announcements

 

    1. Cobb Community Investment Fund presentation of a $3,000 check to the CAC for start-up funding. Boards members Robert Stark and Jessyca Lytle presented the check to the CAC.
    2. Mike Dunlap, Secretary of the Mountain Lions Club gave an update about the Mtn Lions Club and the closure of the Cobb Mtn Recovery and Donation Center. The Lions are looking for funding to support the continued work needing to be done on Little Red Schoolhouse building. He encouraged everyone to consider this building as our community center.

 

  • Approval of Minutes for August 18th

 

Jessyca Lytle moved to approve the minutes – Barbara Flynn seconded, all were in favor.

 

  • Public Comment of Non-Agenda Items

 

Joan Moss –Community Member

Shared a letter to the editor that she wrote about the current state of recovery/business in the county

Madeline Martinelli – Board member for South Lake Fire (council or district?)

There is a training for volunteer fire fighters starting in October for Fire Fighter I certification. It is free of charge. Currently there are 4 volunteers in Cobb area and there are none in Loch Lomond area. You have to live in the district and must be 18 yrs of age to apply. Call 987-3089 or go and get application

Sasha Shempliner – Hamrony Air (local contractor). Works with a product called “airkrete” and would love to show/inform people about this insulation product that is extremely fire resistant and biodegradable.

The CAC invited him to speak at our next meeting about “airkrete” and other fire wise building/products.

 

  • Information Only – Discussion Items

 

    1. Lake Grand Jury Report 2015-2016 (BOS has 90 days to respond as of June 30th)

I don’t have notes for this for some reason…

Information Only – Discussion Items  Continued

 

  • Terry Daniels and Carole Cole-Lewis (Lake County Time Bank)

 

Topic: Service exchange/rebuilding

They formed the Lake County Time Bank in 2011 – to get the greater community to come together to exchange services through currency of time rather than cash. Mr. Daniels is originally from an area in NY where there was a crisis of affordable housing. He was part of a group that created a housing cooperative called home enterprise. They got people together to pull/share skills and cash/resources to work on remodeling houses and help create more affordable housing. An entire community built quickly around this work. Licensed professionals for electrical, plumbing, engineering, etc. are a part of this as well as those who do not necessarily have the skills, but want to help and have the time. Licensed professionals also gave classes and instruction to those unskilled at specific tasks. Volunteers were all ages and had varying levels of abilities – they always found a job for everyone who volunteered. A tool cooperative was also created as a result of the housing projects. Both Terry and Carole proposed the idea that after the Valley Fire, this may be a way (with the skills and capital) to help rebuild more affordable housing. If Cobb is interested in doing this or starting this he is interested in helping to create this. They invited all to join the time bank, and if enough people are interested in the home enterprise concept they’ll start it up.

 

  • Andre Siberry  (Engineer), Cobb Area resident

 

Topic: Firewise building

Mr. Siberry explained the basic concept of the Fire triangle   – Air – Heat – Fuel-   These are the things required for a fire to burn,  and if one missing then the fire cannot continue to burn. All firewise building is based upon this concept. He suggested reducing fuel and the continued maintenance of reducing fuel around structures to prepare in advance. Know the Fire ladder – grass – brush – trees –  If you can interrupt this ladder then the fire does not have a chance to become a larger fire. He reminded everyone that heat rises – fire moves uphill faster than downhill . This also means that even a creeping fire can come up under your deck. If a deck area is not cleared of brush/pine needles or a barrier is not installed to prevent the fire from creeping under your deck, then a fire can catch both the deck and then the home on fire. If possible around decks, a non-flammable material  like hardiboard can be put into the area between the deck and ground to keep the fire from getting under the house. Also another very important thing : Don’t put your wood pile next to house or leaning up against your house. In general he stated to build your home out of as many things as you can that are not flammable. Examples -Stucco is much more resistant to fire than wood siding; a Metal roof is much more resistant than shingles. Remember to annually clean up roof – keep pine needles off, clean rain gutters, etc. Also keep brush and tall grasses at a minimum around your home. Doing all of these things does not prevent your home from burning in a fire, but it will help with the odds. Best to prepare. Prepare your place to a level that if no one is able to protect your house after a fire has gone through and is still hot/burning for days, then your home has a better chance.

 

  • Tony Gonzalez (Gonzalez Brush Busters), Cobb Area Resident

 

Topic: Brush Removal using goats

Goats are the solution – they can very quickly reduce fire fuel up to 80-90%. Mr. Gonzalez stated that the fire came about 75ft from his house, but since he had goats they helped to keep the fuel down, and he could stop the fire. Goats are good for areas that are either very steep or flat. He uses electric netting (powered by solar panels) for fencing for wherever you need the goats. He keeps dogs (Great Pyrenees) fenced in with the goats to protect the goats from predators. Goats eat poison oak, blackberries, manzanita, etc. – they will also eat the dead leaves on the ground from last year. They can be destructive with smaller trees, but they don’t hurt larger trees. He moves them often enough so they don’t get to harm most-sized trees. He’s been goats to reduce/eliminate brush and grasses since 2004.

He typically charges weekly $750-$1400 depending on the size of the job and the goats can clear areas about an acre in size in around a week.

(At the mtg. John Carlisi suggested in agenda and notes and on website to include contact information)

Contact Information: Gonzales Brush Busters (707) 349-1814  www.goatsforlandscaping.com

 

  • Committee Reports

 

    1. Emergency Preparedness – (Jessyca Lytle reporting out for Gary Prather- Committee Chair)
      1. Communications – Jill Martin (nothing new to report)
      2. Hazard Mitigation – Success of brush removal using goats on Gary’s property. The goats were extremely effective and cleared acres of areas very quickly.
      3. Maps – Gary is working on getting Calfire Incident command maps and will continue from there to make corrections/adjustments to road labels, etc
      4. Resources –( Robert Stark) For consolidation project is moving forward. Mr. Stark also mentioned that he met with new Lake County OES director and the new community development director along with all of the other county water agencies/district managers  to start working together to compile a list of agencies and staff to have authority to step in and work in incident areas in the event of an emergency. Specific agencies (such as water district personnel) need access to emergency zones without question by law enforcement or other emergency incident authorities.  Also these agencies will work together to have a coordinated emergency preparedness plan through OES director.
    1. Rebuild Advocacy – Ron Haskett (not present this evening nothing reported)
    1. Neighborhood Watch – (Inez Wenckus – Committee Chair)

Planning on doing future mtgs. There are 14 neighborhood watch gourps in the county to date. If anyone is interested in starting one for their neighborhood contact her

Robert Stark stated neighborhood is needed –recently equipment stolen off of property where a house is being built on Sulpher Creek rd.

Barbara Flynn stated the same as Robert – recently at the pub – caught on camera- a person stealing $300 off of the bar (money meant to pay the band)

    1. Cobb Abatement Monitoring – Karl Parker – Committee Chair)

Karl gave a detailed summary report with a slideshow. The cleanup has many moving parts.

For wood removal – major amounts of wood have already been removed – also wood delivery program for Cobb – free wood for Cobb residents. No bark is on the split wood. The bark was taken off during the splitting process. Sign up using Lake Co Lumber form and then they will deliver to your house. The link to the form is on the CAC facebook page.

For metal removal – they are currently collecting, washing and transporting the metal.  As of this morning Karl was told they already took away 5 40’containers of metal.

For the Cleanup of structures –there are 2 categories for the cleanup. The first category is anything less than 1% asbestos can be removed and taken to Eastlake landfill once the permits have been completed.

The second category is anything more than 1% asbestos. This has to be removed more carefully and debris taken to special location out of county. All workers will be Hazwoper trained and certified. The primary clean up concern is the friable asbestos. It is not harmful unless it is airborne.  That is why they are keeping the cleanup area moist with water during any part of cleanup process.

Ques – Concerns about enough water and crews managing the dust. Karl said he will follow up on this.

The CAC Cobb Abatement Monitoring Committee is getting weekly updates from Scott Schellinger, the Development Director for Hobergs site. These are posted on CAC facebook site and will be posted on the website in the future.

 

  • Decision/Approval Items – none?
  • Adjourn

 

At 8:11 pm Jessica Pyska moved to adjourn and Pete Germenis seconded the motion, all were in favor.