By Scott Dittrich, Opinion Columnist
Malibu is not just another small bedroom suburb of L.A. but a thriving beach and hillside community of artists, surfers, and preservationists. It is worth protecting and It pains me to wonder if this dream can ever be fully rebuilt. Personally,I’ve had a good run since I moved to the Bu in 1973. I’ve surfed and filmed — fires and floods — spent hours in the hills riding my mountain bike, raised two kids, got married in my backyard with my bride riding off on a horse, and after 40 years we’re still married. But will it ever again be the same?
It’s no secret that for years we’ve been fighting to keep the giant development forces at bay and prevent outside interests from changing the rural character that brought us here. Government at every level increasingly wants to impose its will on us. Those forces will now be turbocharged. As the rebuilding process moves forward, the Coastal Commission will attempt to prevent beach houses from being replaced, using sea level rise models as an excuse (and ignoring that Santa Monica Bay has risen 1 inch in 100 years). Caltrans, using flawed surveys showing a huge public demand for bike lanes in Eastern Malibu, will pile on (those surveys were dominated by the bike lobby while Caltrans never reached out to the 26,000 daily PCH motorists who reside inland). State Parks was planning to waste nearly $600,000 to replace the existing bridge over Topanga Creek with a structure six times as long. Why: to create a flatter flood plane to breed steelhead trout — again based on an unproven model that experience has shown will fail during the first big flood.
We have again been devastated by fire in spite of efforts by Malibu city staff and many in the community. Sometimesyou can’t overcome weather, but emergency warnings on our phones went out, and at least in Rambla Pacifico, hillside homes that aggressively followed home hardening and landscape management recommendations seemed to disproportionately survive. Even SCE, for once, didn’t turn off power before the wind strengthened. The fire stopped at the Franklin fire burn area from early December, which arrested losses. Franklin was a tribute to our firefighters. Of course, climate change will be blamed, but the climate does not change in 10 or 20 years. The true culprit is incompetent leaders at the state and county who emphasized woke politics over public safety.
But in our city we must recognize that failures outnumbered victories. None of us thought the beach homes were in such danger, though we often repeated that radiant heat from homes closer than 30 feet apart would see the domino ignition that occurred. Look at the beach homes that survived. Typically there was a break between structures.
Big Rock is another disappointment. In spite of all the efforts there, most homes burned. Water was a big issue because the new pumps used PVC fittings that melted. An SCE power pole fell across Big Rock drive, and in spite of the power being out, strike teams followed policy and remained on PCH. MRCA, as is typical, did not clear brush on its land. And, of course, the controlled burn recommended by fire experts after the 2018 fires was stopped by then SupervisorSheila Kuehl — to protect the environment.
There are, of course, many questions to be answered. Most failures originated from agencies outside our tiny city. How many of the fires were ignited by the homeless and thus are tied to the ineffective homeless polices by the county, state, and LA city? What happened to the six new reservoirs voted by taxpayers in 2014? Why weren’t fire strike teams posted with the predictions of strong winds? Why were fire (and police) budgets cut or frozen in spite of a doubling ofpopulation? Those are just a few. Malibu should have been a model for the rest of the county, but our county and LA city leaders failed in their first priority: public safety. They spent money elsewhere. They had become complacent. Instead of being innovative after the Woolsey and Paradise fires and passing legislation and funding to reduce fuel loads, and though a few new helicopters were purchased, the focus was on woke social policies. The residents of Malibu, the Palisades, and Altadena will be paying the price for years. The cost, of course, will fall on all Californians and even the nation.
Malibu will struggle with rebuilding and repopulation as we have always do. We will struggle to find answers and will change codes as we learn. But will California and LA County have the courage to honestly evaluate their failings and put the emphasis back on protecting the public? Will LA County change budget priorities so that such disasters do not reoccur, or will politicians blame climate change for strong winds and lack of rain, both of which are common in the City of Angels.