Month: December 2018

November 15, 2018
Draft Meeting Minutes
COBB AREA COUNCIL
PUBLIC MEETING
Thursday November 15, 2018
Little Red Schoolhouse/Cobb Mountain Lions Club
15780 Bottle Rock Rd., Cobb, CA 95426
Mtg called to order at 6:02pm
PRESENT: Gary Prather, Eliot Hurwitz, Jessica Pyska, Cindy Leonard, Cathy McCarthy
Ron Hasket has submitted his resignation due to not having enough time to do the job.
38 community members present
Moment of Silence for the victims of the Camp Fire National Disaster
•
Approval of Minutes from October, 2018 Motion to approve Rich Curtola, seconded by Gary Prather
SHORT ANNOUNCEMENTS
Kelly- This Sunday is a Lion’s Club “Leo’s” meeting 12-18 age. 1:00 at Little Red. They will be creating a low-sugar hot chocolate recipe.
There will be a holiday Christmas dinner at the Lion’s club on Christmas Day. Looking for food donations and also names of the families that would need Christmas dinner delivered to their home.
Cindy reports that the Friends of Boggs Mountain membership drive was a big success and that it doubled membership! Trail rebuilding will be in phases and so that sections can get up and open as soon as possible. There is a professional trail builder who is helping to train the Friends of Boggs in building long-lasting trails. This is important for planning the volunteer trail building parties. Calpine donated $20,000 for the purchase of the proper sized excavator.
TREASURER’S REPORT Gary states balance was $2951.93. Cindy has reimbursement of $277.50 for Cobb Resilient supplies and having the maps laminated. Brings the total balance to $2,674.43.
PUBLIC and BOARD COMMENT ON NON-AGENDA ITEMS (3 mins./individual)
Jessica: Family Health mental health resource in Kelseyville:
Given all that we have been through together over the past few years, it is not unusual to feel overwhelmed and triggered by these new fires. The Lake Family Resource Center in Kelseyville received a grant to help our community manage the stresses of these repeating disasters. They are offering free short-time counseling for Lake County residents. The help is here, should you need it. Kelseyville Office
5350 Main Street
Kelseyville, CA 95451
707-279-0563 – Main Business Phone
707-279-8564 – Confidential Fax
Another resource is the Disaster Distress Helpline, 1-800-985-5990, is a 24/7, 365-day-a–year, national hotline dedicated to providing immediate crisis counseling for people who are experiencing emotional distress related to any natural or human-caused disaster. This toll-free, multilingual, and confidential crisis support service is available to all residents in the United States and its territories. Stress, anxiety, and other depression-like symptoms are common reactions after a disaster. Call 1-800-985-5990 or text TalkWithUs to 66746 to connect with a trained crisis counselor.
Jessica: Dark Sky proclamation will happen at the BOS meeting this coming Tuesday. No change in law, just promoting it as good development
John Hess is reminding us about an application for “Share Institute” programs $500 grants for schools. Magdalena and Jessica will send out any promotional notices he has.
FireWise Community Update: Cindy Reports that the group meetings at the recent Cobb Resilient event were successful in getting some new people interested in the Firewise project. There are 3 groups now that are on the verge of completing their Firewise application for certification (which will hopefully happen before the end of the year) and another group (Pine Grove and Gordon Springs) that is forming.
Short reports from CAC Committees as needed
CAVERN: There are more small radios available for purchase from Mel when he returns from vacation. $28 for a pair. Which way is the best way to communicate during an emergency? All ways!!
Glenneth states that there is more wood available to pick up at Hoberg’s this Saturday from 8-4 at the South Gate.
Concerns about the clearing that CalFire will be doing along Bottlerock road:
50 feet upslope, 100 feet downslope. Only 35% of homeowners have signed right of entry sheets. Ben Nichols has approved the CAC to piggy-back on the letters they have sent to homeowners.
Ken is concerned about the erosion that will happen if there is clear-cutting along Bottle Rock. He is really concerned about Harrington Flat and how that area could be cleared. We need some clarification on exactly what they will be doing.
Jessica is concerned about the area along the creek and will they work with Fish and Game?
Rich Curtola is concerned about the burn ban on property owners who have less than an acre.
Gary states that CalFire opposed the burn ban when it was imposed, but it was the Air Quality commission that forced it.
Perhaps we will have warming fire all winter long?
Eliot states that we should address this topic in more depth at another meeting.
Magdalena will take these concerns to Calfire and ask for clarification as she and Chief Nicholls have already agreed that the Firewise program could piggyback a letter of encouragement onto Calfire’s mailings to those residents.
• Supervisor’s Comments (None. Supervisor Brown was not present.)
DISCUSSION ITEMS
(no formal presentations this month)
Report on Cobb Resilient 2018 – Magdalena. The attendance was lower than at Cobb Safe earlier in April due to late promotion, but the quality of the presentations and attendance was high. We had a few county officials and agents present this time, and we made a strong impression on them with the fact that we had residents talking to each other instead of only listening to officials or experts. The entire event is being made into a video so anyone can watch the presentations. We hope to have raw edits of clips available soon, but it will take substantial time to fully process 700 GB of data for the full video. .
-Magdalena states that one unique character of Cobb is our mixture of large and small landowners. We need to learn from some of the large landowners that have lived on Cobb for generations. They have lots of experience that we can learn from those families.
Roberta Adams is suggesting that we get a herd of goats for our community and it could be shared around for difficult clearing situations
• Discussion of new Hazardous Brush ordinance
Michael reports that this was formally proposed November 6th and then it was discussed at the following BOS meeting. The existing public resource code already states that homeowners must have 100 ft. defensible space. The new ordinance would enable the county to go onto your neighbors property. There would be inspectors and if something is found out of compliance, the homeowner is contacted. If the land is not cleared within 30 days, then it will go into abatement and then the county will clear it. The homeowner will be sent the bill. Civil penalty builds.
This is specifically for unimproved lots that are next to a structure. The wording also states that the property line must be cleared.100 feet.
Shaded fuel break has been the approved method in the past, why not now?
Comments from Michael: This only applies to unimproved land. The way it reads is possibly not the way they intended. Because each property owner will have to clear 100 feet on both sides of the line, you will have 200 feet cleared thousands of feet all over the county, so it will have great impact, but the county is stating that they do not need to do an environmental impact study. That seems wrong–do the math, this would be a tremendous amount of environmental impact. Also this seems to be a tremendous fine system. Michael states that there already is a CalFire mechanism to eliminate any fire hazards, so this isn’t needed.
Rich Curtola- The county has no money, so is this being written just to raise money? Eliot states that Jim Steele and Anita Grant (county counsel) wrote it.
Roberta wonders if all the trees are cut, then will everyone will just put up wooden fences and so no difference to the fire safety.
Gary Prather: has a problem with the section 58.4 requirement to get rid of seasonal and recurrent weeds.
58.6 improved parcel: why aren’t parcels of 6 acres and greater? What is the structure definition?
Improved next to unimproved parcels 59.2 requirement next to the improved roads. Will he need to maintain the logging roads? If they are going to implement this, why is the cost not shared?
Eliot suggests that we have a public workshop to discuss this so that it can be clarified.
Tom feels like his comments were not respected at the Board of Supervisor’s meeting. He said he asked about programs and funding, but was told that is not in this, it is in another ordinance. He feels he was not shown respect when he was told he needs to read up on the laws.
Jessica and many others want to make sure that this ordinance will include the standing dead trees that were burned in the Valley Fire. They have fallen on people’s homes and vehicles and we worry that they will eventually fall on people. For example, there are many next to Hwy 175 that could fall onto cars. Jim Steele told Cindy at the BOS meeting that this ordinance is not for that purpose and there is another ordinance for the dead trees. What is he referring to? We have been contacting landowners about these trees and getting nowhere.
In general, we feel the community needs clarification and to have a workshop before this thing is passed. We applaud that they are doing this, but there are too many loopholes and too much responsibility on the large landowners. If this is going to be a model for other counties, let’s do it right! Then we can show that it actually works.
Gary is meeting with Rob Brown tomorrow who wants to see what Gary is talking about. His property shares a border with 23 homes. There is no way that two of us could clear all that space within 30 days, and certainly not by ourselves with all the physical work and cost.
Motion on the floor from Magdalena to delegate John Hess to accompany Gary Prather at his meeting with Rob Brown to bring the items discussed tonight to the attention of Rob. Motion seconded: Glenneth Lambert. Eliot called the vote and the motion was passed.
Status of Measure L and Fire Dept. Funding
Eliot states that he spoke with Jim Comisky and that by the next CAC meeting we should know the outcome of the vote. December 6th is when the final outcome will come out according to what Rich Curtola heard from the county today. It seems like perhaps there are other funding options, and those need to be explored if this does not pass. There should be affordable solutions in this very poor community.
Roberta states that Jim Comisky has spent a lot time answering her questions. Do we want to start our own fire department again? We want to have a fire department, so she would love to work with someone to write grants or figure out how we can fund our fire department.
Michael suggests that the CAC puts a bulletin board or comment section on the website. Jessica will do this.
Eliot entertained a motion to adjourn. Jessica so moved. Seconded by Gary. Meeting adjourned at 7