High Fire Hazard Maps Delayed

By Alison St John / Reporter, KPBS Public Broadcasting

Published July 8, 2008 at 3:00 AM PDT

This story was published more than 16 years ago.

The fires in Northern California have delayed work on fire hazard maps for San Diego. The maps are important because they will affect building codes for new homes. KPBS reporter Alison St John has mo

The fires in Northern California have delayed work on fire hazard maps for San Diego. The maps are important because they will affect building codes for new homes. KPBS reporter Alison St John has more.

Cal Fire has postponed for a second time the release of updated maps that outline areas at high risk for fire. State law says new homes in high fire hazard areas must have roofs, walls, doors, windows and decks made of more fire proof materials. Dave Walls of the California Building Standard Commission says the new codes went into effect this month , even though Cal Fire hasn’t finalized the fire hazard maps.

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Walls : Supposed to take effect in January, they requested that we delay that effective date until July and they did not come back and indicate they did not have the maps ready … looking at the web site, all I see is the draft maps.

San Diego City officials say they sent the draft maps back to Cal Fire two months ago, saying more urban canyons need to be included in the high risk areas.

Most of Southern California is waiting for finalized hazard maps, because Cal Fire is too busy fighting fires to meet the state’s July deadline.

Alison St John, KPBS news.

Alison St John

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Alison St John currently serves as a general assignment reporter and occasionally co-hosts KPBS Midday Edition. She fell in love with KPBS Radio when she arrived in San Diego in 1985 and first heard NPR. She has been a voice on KPBS Radio since 1989, and has served as a news reporter for radio, TV and the web, as well as anchoring, hosting, producing and editing. Alison has reported on stories about North County and was based in the KPBS' North County Bureau. Alison covered the metro beat during the critical period of the San Diego City pension crisis, and the education beat while Alan Bersin was the controversial Superintendent of San Diego City School District. She covered health when the industry was converting to managed care and told welfare reform stories in the late 1990s when Clinton was “ending welfare as we know it.” She has covered land use issues extensively, looking at the challenges of meeting a growing population while preserving community character, and developing a better transportation system to meet environmental concerns. She has done many stories on the military in San Diego, and the series she edited on the challenges veterans face returning from active duty to civilian life won “Best of Show” from the San Diego Society of Professional Journalists. She occasionally hosts the KPBS Roundtable and KPBS Midday Edition. Alison has won awards from the San Diego Press Club, the Society of Professional Journalists, the Associated Press TV and Radio Association, and the California Golden Mike Awards. Alison was born in Tanzania, brought up in Scotland, and earned her degree in psychology and sociology from Durham University in England. Her postgraduate diploma is in student counseling. She worked in England, Nigeria, Switzerland, Belgium, India, and Japan before moving to the United States in 1981. She now lives in Oceanside and enjoys how her community is growing and changing.