Gov. Gavin Newsom is likely
watching his presidential ambitions burn to ash before his eyes. The
liberal governor has been dealing with raging wildfires in Los Angeles
County for weeks, which has become the costliest natural disaster in
American history.
The reasons for the infernos burning uncontrollably are many, not
least because the excesses of liberal governance hamstrung the first
responders. The Los Angeles Fire Department got its budget slashed
despite memos about how it could degrade responses to wildfires. The
equipment was shoddy, there was no water in the Santa Ynez Reservoir,
which was essential when the Palisades fire erupted, and the water
systems had severe deficiencies, where upgrades were annotated dating
back to 2013. Now, Mr. Newsom seems to be responsible for shutting down
an elite volunteer firefighting unit which could’ve helped the National
Guard combat the fires (via Washington Free Beacon):
California
Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration shut down a highly trained,
all-volunteer team of certified firefighters in early 2024—a move that
rendered the California National Guard incapable of sending a complete
firefighting force to Los Angeles until 10 days after the deadly fires
broke out in the city, the Washington Free Beacon has learned.
[…]
Launched
in 2020, Team Blaze was an on-call strike force staffed entirely with
certified firefighters of the California State Guard, a volunteer
militia force that reports directly to Gov. Gavin Newsom. Former State
Guard commanding general Jay Coggan said its members attended regular
trainings at their own expense, and an outside charity procured much of
the team’s firefighting equipment at no cost to the state. California
was obligated to pay Team Blaze only when the unit was activated to
fight a wildfire, and by 2023 Coggan had plans to expand its ranks to
1,000 certified volunteer firefighters on standby all across the state.
But
in January 2024, the Newsom administration disbanded Team Blaze after
barring its charitable benefactor from providing free firefighting
equipment to its volunteers. Team Blaze had to return its equipment to
the state and many of its firefighters quit, while those that remained
were transferred to support a separate state initiative called Task
Force Rattlesnake, a senior enlisted leader in the California State
Guard told the Free Beacon.
Task Force Rattlesnake is composed of
"hotshot" Type I handcrews trained to carry out the most dangerous
frontline wildfire duties. Rattlesnake deployed 14 of its Type I
handcrews to Los Angeles after Newsom activated the National Guard to
help quell the wildfires, California National Guard spokesman Lt. Col.
Brandon Hill told the Free Beacon. Hill disputed that Team Blaze was
disbanded, saying the force was "incorporated" into Rattlesnake "as
their reserve detachment."
Type I handcrews put out wildfires
where they stand, but they count on the support of Type II handcrews
working behind them to prevent the fires from spreading further. Team
Blaze maintained a force of Type II handcrews, and when it was disbanded
in early 2024, the California National Guard was left with no Type II
handcrews on standby.
That meant Rattlesnake’s Type I handcrews
had to battle the flames in Los Angeles for 10 days without the support
of Type II handcrews from the California National Guard, because they
didn’t exist when the fires broke out on Jan. 7. As flames engulfed the
city, the Guard sent 200 soldiers to Camp Roberts—situated 220 miles
north of the burning city—where they spent several days learning how to
perform the duties of a Type II handcrew, Hill told the Free Beacon.
Newsom’s office was not pleased with this report by the Beacon’s
Andrew Kerr, but maybe if competent people ran things, we wouldn’t have
had this catastrophe. The cuts to the budgets for emergency services
were later spent on transgender bars, gay choirs, and a host of other
niche lefty side projects that served little to no purpose other than
massaging egos and making the most unhinged sects of the liberal base
feel better about being weirdos. In the meantime, normal people would’ve
liked their taxpayer money going towards things like the LAFD and other
first responders since the city resides in an area where wildfires are
common.
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