There was a time when volunteer fire departments, paid fire fighters and local residents would work hand-in-hand to put out wildfires. It was an amenable relationship sharing hardships, goals and camaraderie.
Santa Cruz mountain residents awoke May 22 to a fast moving inferno that quickly spread to 3800 acres with no relief in sight. Growing gale winds fueled the fire. Steep ridges and dense redwood tree vegetation have created a largely inaccessible terrain. More than a dozen homes have burned to the ground. More losses are expected.
As forests have become legally "protected" from fire-fuel management the frequency and ferocity of infernos has dramatically increased. Has the Forest Service adopted a "make it burn" policy?
20 years ago approximately 300,000 acres of land in the United States were subject to conservation easements donated to private, tax-exempt charitable trusts. Today, over 7,000,000 acres are so held, an almost 25-fold increase. This amount of acreage is in addition to the millions of acres held in trust by federal, state, and local governmental entities.
The deliberate "reintroduction" of aggressive gray wolves is causing conflict between environmentalists and multiple-use conservationists and changing how residents interact with their own surroundings.
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