Political Gumbo: Support the Firefighters

The City Council on Aug. 3 will vote on placing a parcel tax on the November ballot.

The funds will be used for upgrades to the Pasadena Fire Department.

Currently, the city is conducting a poll to test the water with the voters, and some locals are calling for more studies.

Let me end this poll business.

Ask anybody who lost their home in the Eaton Fire if they would have been willing to pay a parcel tax to save their home.

I suspect all of them would say yes.

Trust me, there is no time for more studies when you have to get out of the damn house in the middle of 100 mph winds and fire bearing down on you.

Sadly, the further we get from a natural disaster the more we downplay its impact.

Maybe now we look at Jan. 7, 2025 from a different lens now.

Yes, rebuilding is ongoing and people will be back home.

But that’s not the key lesson.

In this case, it’s about being prepared, personally with insurance and a go bag — hell, I wrote about go bags a dozen times, and I am embarrassed to say I didn’t have a bag in my car with the essentials.

It’s also about having a fire department in place that can save lives and structures.

Which is what the Palisades didn’t have due to cuts by Mayor Karen Bass.

Altadena on the other hand was in the hands of a department that made no efforts to save homes on the west side of town.

We should never wake up to communities that look like war zones, because we did not give our firefighters the tools they need.

Of course as a proud son of Altadena, I don’t get a vote. Still, my voice matters.

And any natural disaster that impacts Pasadena will impact Altadena and vice versa. That’s why Pasadena’s first responders were in Altadena saving lives that night.

Let’s not forget that the Eaton Fire wasn’t the first big fire in the area.

The 2009 Station Fire scorched 160,577 acres, killed two firefighters and destroyed more than 200 structures, forcing evacuations in Pasadena, Altadena, Crescenta Valley, Tujunga, Sunland, Acton, and La Cañada.

The 2020 Bobcat Fire also came close enough to Pasadena to cause evacuation warnings. It also came precariously close to the Mt. Wilson Observatory.

And remember this is earthquake country, which means at any time we could be faced with a disaster, with little time to flee.

Yes, it all sounds grim.

And hell, truth to tell it is grim.

But this is why we need to support local firefighters, so that when the worst happens there is hope and a chance that lives can be saved and property protected.

Yes, locals dug deep for the library and the schools, and even in those cases nobody wants to see their taxes go up.

But in this case, we have to do it, because the day will come when we need these services.

The clock is already ticking.