Senator Feinstein: Officials Should Consider Capping Development

By Ed Joyce / Reporter, KPBS Public Broadcasting

Published October 24, 2007 at 7:23 AM PDT

This story was published more than 16 years ago.

California Senator Dianne Feinstein told KPBS this morning that local officials should reconsider how much development is allowed in San Diego County. KPBS reporter Ed Joyce has more.

Feinstein says local officials have the ability to toughen and tighten building codes and control zoning. She says San Diego County officials need to rethink how much and where development is allowed.

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Feinstein : I think with the Cedar Fire and the tremendous loss there and now these fires and the tremendous loss here, all in four years, the message is loud and clear to the board of supervisors and your county and city planning departments. Begin to take a look at both the building codes as well as the zoning. Is it smart to put new housing developments in Santa Ana wind areas in increasingly dry territory abutting hillsides which remain year in, year out tinder dry?

She says particularly in the San Diego area, there's a consistent and constant threat of wildfire in the county. Feinstein says putting more combustible buildings in the path of those fires only adds to the problem. She spoke this morning with Alan Ray on KPBS Radio.

Ed Joyce, KPBS News.

Ed Joyce

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Ed Joyce was the environment reporter and afternoon news anchor for KPBS-FM. Before joining KPBS, he worked as an editor/columnist with Copley News Service in San Diego. Ed has an extensive background in newspaper, radio, web and TV journalism. After graduating with a B.A. in Communications from the University of Washington in Seattle, Ed began a career in broadcast journalism. His work has included stints in public broadcasting, commercial broadcasting and education -- working as an affiliate professor of communication and reporter at the University of Idaho and Washington State University in Pullman, Wash. During the past 20 years he has worked in radio, TV and print as a news reporter, anchor, writer, editor and producer. Along the way he has won numerous awards for general news reporting, newswriting, feature and issue reporting and breaking news reporting from The Associated Press, The Society of Professional Journalists, San Diego Press Club and other organizations. During the mid-1990s, while working for Oregon Public Broadcasting, he was a frequent contributor to National Public Radio, including a feature report on the memorial service for 14 U.S. Forest Service "hotshots" who died fighting a wildfire in Colorado (the crew was based in a central Oregon town). He’s also filed reports with Marketplace, KQED’s California Report and Climate Watch and with national and regional networks throughout the United States. At KPBS, Ed continues his contributions to National Public Radio and other national and regional news organizations. He has won awards from the Society of Professional Journalists and San Diego Press Club for his environmental reporting at KPBS-FM-TV and for producing and anchoring radio newscasts. In 2007 he was selected a National Press Foundation fellow for Understanding Violent Weather II program. The seminars were held at the National Weather Center in Norman, Okla. In 2008 he spoke at a UC San Diego conference on U.S. National Security as part of the school’s Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation. Ed led a discussion with the 18 foreign government officials and academics about the political debate over climate change. In 2010, Ed was elected to a three-year term on the board of the San Diego Press Club.

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