Flanked by La Cañada Mayor Laura Olhasso, county Supervisor Mike Antonovich, Rep. David Dreier (R-San Dimas), state Assemblyman Anthony Portantino (D-La Cañada Flintridge) and dozens of members of the media, Schwarzenegger promised to fast-track a state permit for a fourth dumping site needed to dispose of the truckloads of mud that overwhelmed the foothill neighborhood.
“We all have to work together in order to get this permit as quickly as possible and to be a help to the people whose homes have been damaged,” Schwarzenegger said.
Forty-three homes were damaged in La Cañada and La Crescenta. The worst damage occurred in Paradise Valley, where nine homes were tagged as uninhabitable.
An elderly resident had to be pulled from her home by a Los Angeles County Fire Search and Rescue team, but aside from that incident, no deaths or serious injuries were reported.
Schwarzenegger and other elected officials have called on the federal government to provide assistance to residents whose homes and yards were damaged by debris flowing from federal forest land onto private property.
“Last night, our worst fears were realized,” Olhasso said Saturday. “I cannot tell you the devastation that you can see. My heart was in the bottom of my stomach.”
At a Saturday evening press conference, Antonovich compared the damage to something only seen in movies. He called for a federal response to the U.S. Forest Service’s initial response to the Station fire, which he said caused the disaster.
“We are suffering from the incident that the U.S. Forest Service created when they let the Station fire continue to burn,” he said.
