SPMH Hill: Weed abatement project to protect homes from wild land fire

September 23, 2005
Santa Paula News

An ambitious project to thin out brush to reduce wildfire fuel has been taking place on Hospital Hill facing Highway 150, according to a Santa Paula Fire Department official.

By Peggy KellySanta Paula TimesAn ambitious project to thin out brush to reduce wildfire fuel has been taking place on Hospital Hill facing Highway 150, according to a Santa Paula Fire Department official. Chief Paul Skeels said that California Department of Forestry and Ventura County Fire Protection District personnel are thinning brush and overgrown vegetation on the lower slopes of Hospital Hill, in an area ranging from Mill Park to June Street. The work also includes the area above the Harvey Drive and Cadway cul-de-sacs.“We’ve done a lot of thinning... we’re not cutting down any big trees,” said Chief Skeels. “Obviously, the objective is to provide more defensible space and less fuel for wild land fire” by creating more of a buffer zone for homes. “It’s a pretty big job that is not completed yet... we don’t get a crew everyday. I’ve been over to the site several times; it’s a bear, really steep there, it’s amazing. The concern for the neighbors down there is not to make the mudslide hazard worse; we’re very aware of that, but we have to do something, especially at the bottom of the hill. Most people seem to think it’s a good thing to do. They - and we - are cautious about the steepness of the hillside.”Crews are not digging up plants, but rather using chainsaws and weed-whackers to cut and thin the brush. “Eventually we’ll have some tightly controlled burns of small piles, when weather conditions permit,” with the California Department of Forestry and Ventura County Fire Protection District, with approval of the Air Pollution Control Agency.Crews have been working up to 150 feet along the bottom edge of the hill, for a distance ranging about a quarter of a mile. “It will be a good thing. We need to balance our protective measures, slippage and fire protection. We did some door-to-door work for the houses immediately at the foot of the hillside so the residents would know what we are doing.”
Similar work is also being done at other areas, including the north end of the city on property that the city acquired about a decade ago from Park Water Co. Work has been ongoing for about a month, with crews tackling the area hillsides on the average of twice a week.Santa Paula Memorial Hospital closed in December 2003, and Chief Skeels said that the work on the hillside is “basically doing the hospital’s weed abatement” that languished due to its bankruptcy.There is no fee for California of Forestry laborers - who are incarcerated - and the bill for work-related expenses is expected to be less than $2,000. “When it’s all over we’ll get a bill for it, and we’ll send that bill to the hospital” for the work specifically done on SPMH property, noted Chief Skeels.The close of escrow is pending on the purchase of the hospital by the County of Ventura, which plans to reopen the facility as an arm of the county Medical Center.



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