PublicSafety4PVNow
Insofar as the claim of Rusty Lloyd Day that the town has done too little about fire safety, I find it odd that he cites the Coffee Park, Paradise and Marshall fires as examples. The Coffee Park fire and the Paradise fire were both attributed to PGE equipment failures, the Marshall fire was set by an arsonist. If Mr Day would truly like to make an impact, he would focus on the undergrounding of PGE equipment rather than filing spurious lawsuits against his "friends" and neighbors.

Arson is of course a nonmitigatable event. It would be refreshing if Mr Day would focus on the correct solution to the problem of fire safety --it has little or nothing to do with the housing element in Portola Valley.

-Sharon Richards

Here's the thing I've never fully understood (but suspect I know the answer)

I know Rusty has put a lot of effort into learning about fire safety, and he cares about it a lot.

I also know ("based on information and belief" as lawyers say), that Rusty and Angelo and PVNU are passionate about blocking the Wedge and other development.

Which is their ultimate goal: being fire safe, or blocking development they don't like?

Are they using fire as their first argument, and if they lose it will they pick earthquakes or native burial grounds or anything else they can throw at the wall to block development? Or, if a fire plan could be created that the fire marshall would approve, is there any world in which they would say "OK, we like the solutions they've found, so we'll support development that the experts have determined to be safe" ?

David B
(Sorry I'm no longer in PV to help the good fight)

Aalfs' statement that the process included "hundreds of residents observing and commenting" is increasably disingenuous. Any resident who commented in opposition to any part of the housing element was ejected from meetings, told they were resented, called a NIMBY, kicked off committees and/or had whisper campaigns based on outright lies started against them.
There is a lot of unhealthy political behavior behind the current plan and it has left many of us out of the conversation. Any potential to negate the work of a community is only negating the work of a small careful selected community of like minded residents