Brian Fennessy
speaker
69 appearances
1 recordings
1 series
first heard Jan 2025
last heard Jan 2025
Brian Fennessy’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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Appearances
You could tell there was a fire. All the smoke was in the community. I mean, were the dozens of homes that were were burning. Yeah. Yeah. Just incredible. Just incredible. Yeah.
Yeah, I, I think so. You know, in what I drove and yeah. Yeah, I went to John Muir High School, so I'm really familiar with the area that you're talking about.
And with the winds really subsiding as they have, they're not done, but they were – even in the time I was there, from about 7 in the morning, 6 in the morning, whatever it was, until about when I headed back south in noon, the wind had really tapered off. It was still strong.
I agree. I mean, even Lake, you know where Lake is. I couldn't believe that Elliott, you know, junior high or middle school, whatever they call it now, was on fire. I mean, there was fire all the way down to New York Drive. And so to me, it was just shocking. And these are businesses, commercial businesses, as well as residential structures.
But to your question, Dr. Drew, yeah, I truly, I'd feel pretty comfortable based on the area that you're talking about. You know, the thing with these fires is, and maybe you don't hear it very often, there's not a lot that we, the fire service, can do when the winds are blowing like this. We can get people out of the way. We can get behind where the wind's blowing, try to hurt it.
But until that wind stops, We could have 1,000, 2,000 fire engines there, and it's not going to make a significant difference until that wind starts to calm and we can get in there and do work. That's what I figured. Mother Nature owned us the last couple of days.
You know, I'm familiar with the fair plan only because we hear a lot about it, right, as the fire service. And we've been kind of pulled into the matter in a variety of different ways. You know, you've got the fire hazard severity zones,
that we determine the fire service and where, well, the insurance companies use a whole nother method that we're not familiar with to determine risk versus hazard. And you get into this debate with them, what is risk versus hazard? And quite frankly, I'm not the brightest guy in the world. To me, they're the same, right? I mean, it's the same thing.
And, you know, I have friends, of course, and colleagues that are paying a fortune for their insurance through this fair plan, as you say. And I would not be at all surprised if what you heard was accurate. There are people that just can't afford this insurance if you're on a fixed income and retired and those sorts of things. And I think where we get caught up in this a little bit is
is many of these properties we don't believe maybe are as at risk as perhaps the insurance companies say they are. But we're not included in the conversation. And the fire service nationally and certainly statewide is working their way into those conversations now. I've stood there next to people, next to developers, and I said, do you see this as a concern, a fire hazard concern?
And there's been times where I've said, No, you've done everything that we've asked you to do. You've done the, uh, defensible space. You've got the, the, everything is, is accurate. Well, you know, we can't get insurance, you know, for this place. And I just scratched my head. I mean, we are the, we're the experts, right?
We know where the Santa Ana corridors or where the Canyon quarters are, are the insurance company doesn't ask us. They've got their own methodology and, and, um, We don't necessarily agree with everything that they've come up with.
Yeah, that's a great question. And, and, you know, given the position I'm in, you know, as a fire chief, I don't know that it would be prudent or responsible for me to speculate. Um, cause I really don't, I don't know. I mean, however, if you, if you talk to people that do know me, I'm, I'm big on accountability.
And, um, again, I can't speak to the mayor, the governor, the president's whatever the thing is. Um, Yeah, I just don't know. I'm not well versed in that and really have to remain apolitical.
Well, I do agree with a lot. And you're right. I remember that very clearly as well. I mean, we had not just fuel breaks, but actual fire breaks. I started in 1978 with the U.S. Forest Service with the Oak Grove Hotshots, right there next to La Cunada High School. There was a hotshot crew there that was about 18 years old, and they spent 13 years with the U.S.
Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management. Much of that early time, spending time on those fuel breaks, you know, after fire season, cutting out fuel breaks, piling, burning, all those. And I mentioned that all the time. We used to spray herbicides everywhere. you know, on the fuel breaks back when you could. How dare you? Oh, my goodness.
Yeah, using products that you can't use today. And they were very effective. And I don't know anything about the field mouse. I mean, I think as a young, you know, firefighter, you know, everything was tied around budget. And if there wasn't budget to have. So in the summer, I spent time on a fire crew, on a hot shot crew. And in the winter, I had an opportunity to work on a fuel screw.
And they'd fly us up to the fuel breaks or whatever. We maintained the fuel break network that you're talking about in the front country of the Angeles National Forest. And over time, that management started to cease. Why? I don't know. I assumed it was budgetary. I don't know about the environmental piece of it.
Well, there's a lot of that, right? In Northern California, look at the logging industry. You know, the spotted owl and all these other things. And, you know, the Forest Service used to be a resource agency. They will tell you they still are. But again, they've become a fire agency. And there's a number of things that are going on, some of them very public. And I've been on my soapbox a bit.
They're not paying and benefiting their firefighters and they're leaving in droves. Well, who has to make that up? Local government and CAL FIRE. And we've been trying to publicly put pressure on the Washington Office of the Forest Service to do something about that. So I don't want to chase that rabbit because your question's a good one. Yes, we need to be putting fire on the landscape.
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