SOLANO COUNTY, Calif — Solano County residents are still picking up the pieces years after the devastating LNU Lightning Complex Fire tore their lives apart in 2020.
The fire burned from Aug. 17 through Oct. 2 after thousands of lightning strikes ignited fires in Lake, Napa, Solano, Sonoma and Yolo counties. Six of those fires merged together to burn a total of 363,220 acres, destroying 1,491 structures and damaging 232 more in 46 days, according to Cal Fire.
A total of six people were killed, making this California's sixth-largest wildfire and 11th most destructive wildfire in recorded history.
More than 500 of those structures damaged were in Solano County. The county received 99 permits to rebuild and only 48 of those have been completed, according to Matthew A. Davis, Solano County Administrator’s Office Public Information Officer.
Cheryl and Tim Patelzick live in Winters on the outskirts of Solano County. They were one of the many victims who lost nearly everything in the fire.
“The fire was on the top of the hills and before [my husband] could get into his truck… the fire had come all the way down the hill,” said Cheryl. “It was like a firestorm… It just took out everything.”
What remains of their home is the foundation it was on, an old brick walkway and an angel statue untouched by the flames.
“We’re lucky we have our house built now, most people aren’t even that far,” said Cheryl.
A total of 11 homes were on their street. Only one survived the blaze.
“It’s like we have 200 acres of our own out here now because there’s nobody left,” she said. “[Our neighbors] houses burned and they either sold, can’t sell, were too old to rebuild or didn’t have insurance to rebuild.”
Insurance is something Cheryl and Tim stress is mandatory to have in the area. They were in the middle of building an addition to their home, spending over $100,000. Cheryl says the addition was only about 80% complete and unable to be insured since it wasn't finished, leading them to being "incredibly underinsured" when everything burned down.
It's something Cathy Brusseau knows all too well. She says a fire in 2006 wiped out her $300,000 insurance claim and she hadn't yet recovered. She lost everything in the 2020 fire and was only able to escape with her life, purse, Porsche and parrot.
"Everything we had, it all burned. There was nothing salvageable," she said. "We had two neighbors who died in the blaze."
Brusseau, like many others, moved away — unable and unwilling to go through such tragedy again.
“Being forced to leave our family ranch after 60 years has been a bit unnerving,” said Brusseau, who moved to Angels Camp from Vacaville shortly after the fire. “Moving to the heart of the gold country was an easier choice than trying to rebuild in English Hills, Vacaville.”
A lack of insurance isn't the only thing driving residents away from rebuilding their homes.
Some residents told the county they're unable to rebuild "due to the high cost of construction" and their insurance policies "do not adequately cover the cost of rebuilding a similar-sized dwelling" among other problems, according to Davis.
However, Cheryl and Tim say what the county required of neighbors to get out of the red tape is a main contributing factor.
"There wasn’t much help from the county. They just changed, as they would go, they would change the rules as they gathered their information," said Tim.
The duo says they paid nearly $15,000 for multiple soil samples to test if the arsenic levels were within safe standards to rebuild. They were rejected multiple times until the state tested the soil in the region and adjusted what was considered to be "safe" arsenic levels in the area, according to Terry Schmidtbauer, Solano County Director of Resource Management.
The couple, along with their three dogs and three kids, lived in a trailer on their burned property for nearly two years while working "full-time" with the county to cut through the red tape.
"Being here in the extreme weather was really hard. It was a struggle… not only physically, but it was a mental struggle for all of us," said Cheryl. "The county's system is disgracefully inadequate in processing and paperwork. One hand doesn't know what the other is doing... The redundancy, apathy and disorganization is crazy."
Meanwhile, some residents are still in the process of rebuilding, though there aren't as many questions or changes this far into the process.
"Solano County is proud of its effort to have provided timely cleanup options for our LNU Lightning Complex Fire impacted residents and to now assist them in their rebuilding efforts. The County received a 2022 Achievement Award from the National Association of Counties and a Congressional Commendation from U.S. Congressman John Garamendi for these efforts," said Schmidtbauer. "The county continues to prioritize rebuilding efforts in the LNU fire impacted area, including permit fee reductions for fire impacted residents and processing permits expediently as possible."
Davis adds the Solano County Board of Supervisors also waived impact fees if the new home was not larger than the destroyed one.
"I would love to give a shout out to somebody in the business who was helpful but I can't come up with a single person," said Cheryl. "It's sad."
