INC NEWS - What can be learned from other peoples mistakes?

[Mike - Hotmail]

Neal Peirce is a national syndicated columnist who covers a number of 
regional and local growth issues in his articles.

I just received this one and thought I'd forward it on to the listserve as 
an appropriate follow-up to the recent posts by Melissa and Jennifer.


  For Immediate Release
  Normal Release of Sunday, November 4, 2007

  FIRE AND WATER:  TWIN CHALLENGES

  By Neal Peirce

        Could there be a pattern here?
        The San Diego and Los Angeles areas are hit by a raging series of 
high-impact wildfires -- the worst in the state's history.  Many of the 
blazes coincide with areas already scorched in 2003 by fires that themselves 
were declared California's worst ever.
        But is there any move to move homes away from the areas where a 
century of firefighting has left many forests choked and overgrown, thick 
underbrush creating tinder-box conditions?  Apparently not.  Most homeowners 
vow that they'll stay in the fire-prone areas, or return to rebuild on the 
charred foundations of their former homes.
        Across the continent, "exceptional drought" -- the National Weather 
Service's worst category -- impacts Georgia and its neighboring states. 
Water levels fall so drastically in Lake Lanier, the 38,000-acre North 
Georgia reservoir that supplies water to almost 5 million people, that the 
lake may dip into its storage capacity dregs in less than four months.
        But Georgia limps along without a state water plan.  No one wants to 
talk about water rationing.  In suburban rings around Atlanta, sprouting new 
subdivisions don't have to prove a long-term water source before developers 
plunge into construction.
        "We're growing faster than our water resources.  We have a shortage, 
not only in drought, but when it's raining," says Atlanta Mayor Shirley 
Franklin.
        A stiffer assessment comes from Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.): 
"Georgia has been sleepwalking.  The Atlanta region has the most rapid 
growth rate in the history of urbanization.  But Georgia's never done an 
assessment of its water capacity."
        In California, there's praise for the professionalism of last week's 
fire-fighting effort. President Bush rushed to send federal firefighters, 
aircraft, grants for temporary housing and repairs, plus funding to clean up 
debris.
        But the myopia about the future seems profound.  Climate change is 
already having an apparent impact, with a 1 degree Fahrenheit temperature 
rise across the West.  "Megafires" are sprouting; fire seasons far longer 
than just 20 years ago.
        Natural watersheds, warned California Forestry Director Ruben 
Grijalva last June, are being seriously encroached. With baby boomers and 
others constructing large houses up and over the canyons, man-made 
structures and paved surfaces are expanding rapidly, increasing surface 
runoff during storms.  That leads, in turn, to more soil erosion and less 
water for trees or vegetation.  The inevitable result: more fires, whether 
intentional or accidental.
        Plus, the raging fires themselves release significant quantities of 
greenhouse gases.
        Smarter land use planning for the fire-prone areas tops Grijalva's 
list of solutions.  But instead, notes Bill Fulton of Solimar Research in 
Ventura, "We Californians are trying to fireproof ourselves" by building 
houses with buffers and fire-retardant construction materials.  Press 
attention last week focused on how that tactic actually protected some 
subdivisions.  Though Fulton notes the obvious: smart land use planning is 
an infinitely superior solution; "subdivisions in highly flammable forests 
don't make much sense."
        And it's not just a California problem.  This year, Idaho and Utah 
have seen their largest wildfires in the last 50 to 100 years: Arizona, 
Colorado and Oregon registered their record years in 2002, and Texas in 
2006, Tom Swetnam, a University of Arizona-based scientist, told a 
congressional hearing last week.  Over 8 million acres of forest and shrub 
have burned across the West this year, second largest number in history, 
behind 2006.
        There's now a "flame zone" of states suffering persistent drought 
and susceptibility to faster, hotter, more erratic wildfires, intensified by 
global warming, says Blumenauer.
         Repeatedly, he notes, Congress faces calls for disaster 
supplemental funds.  "Our hearts go out every time.  But it's really 
governmental malpractice," he insists, whether the issues are fires, floods, 
reinsuring homes on constantly pounded barrier islands or letting people 
relocate in New Orleans' low-lying, hurricane-prone Ninth Ward.  "We never 
seem to tie the pieces of causation and prevention together."
        And it's all but sure to get worse, he notes, with rising 
temperatures and an expected 100 million more Americans by 2043. 
"Government has promised more than nature can deliver; we're using our 
resources to protect a status quo that is not protectable."
        Assuming Blumenauer's right, what to do? One possible idea: Congress 
could create a new set of federal watershed basin authorities, not to 
dictate to state and local governments but rather to sit down at the table 
with them to balance risk and investment.  Negotiating, perhaps, reasonable 
levels of federal construction funding in return for state and local 
agreement to focus on prevention, careful planning, adaptation to the 
immutable forces of nature and climate change.
        Including, Catherine Ross of Georgia Tech suggests, accords on 
building and maintaining critical infrastructure -- the base of state, 
regional, national competitiveness.
        Easy to do in a complex federal system? No. But there has to be a 
better formula than we have now.  It's obvious: this century is already too 
dangerous to keep sitting on our hands.