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By Ken Stone
Reprinted with permission from Times of San Diego, a member of the San Diego Online News Association
Photo: Julian Volunteer Fire Department advocate Lori Foss turns in petition signatures at LAFCO hearing. Photo by Ken Stone
October 17, 2018 (Julian) - Like a cliffhanger election, it will take a week or two for Julian residents to learn if they have a chance at saving their last-in-the-county volunteer fire department.
At an “extremely rare” protest hearing Tuesday morning, officials of the San Diego Local Agency Formation Commission accepted petitions aimed at preserving the Julian-Cuyamaca Fire Protection District.
Backers of the district — marked by the county for dissolution — submitted what they thought were enough signatures to guarantee a vote on keeping the district.
LAFCO officials announced that 615 written protests were submitted by the end of the hearing at the San Diego County Operations Center in Kearny Mesa — just over 26 percent of the district’s 2,361 registered voters.
Validated signatures representing 25 percent of registered voters are needed to force an election.
On Monday, when two batches of petitions were delivered, Julian fire department backers announced they had a little over 700 signatures. But a preliminary LAFCO count said only 603 could be confirmed. (The tally rose to 615 Tuesday.)
The difference could be that some signers were registered to vote at the same time — so their name wouldn’t yet show up on voter rolls.
San Diego LAFCO Executive Officer Keene Simonds said the county Registrar of Voters Office has promised to validate Julian-Cuyamaca protest signatures within five to 10 days.
That unofficial figure will be released, he said, ahead of a formal decision at a Dec. 3 LAFCO meeting on whether an election would be called.
An election could be in-person, by mail or “synched up to a March or June primary,” Simonds said.
It would be in early 2019, with LAFCO bearing the cost, he said.
Simonds said LAFCO has budgeted about $40,000 for a special election: “We picked it up on our tab.”
Protest hearings are “extremely rare because it incentivizes both parties either to agree to go forward” or halt a change so “you don’t have this [community] division.”
After working in three counties, he said, he couldn’t think of any examples “where we got even close to triggering an election.”
Five people used 3-minute slots to speak to Simonds and other LAFCO officials on their dissolution protest. (Only protesters were heard in the half-hour session attended by nearly 50 people.)
One Julian fire board member attended — Kristin Starlin. But she declined to comment on the protests. (A Sept. 10 LAFCO hearing had input from both sides.)
Protesters made two major arguments — both involving Cal Fire, which has taken over Julian fire services under an interim agreement with the fire district.
Cal Fire “falsified” its response-time promises to the county, said Julian’s Lori Foss.
Cal Fire engaged in fraud, said six-year Julian fire volunteer Ryan Grothe, who lives in Rancho Bernardo and works full-time for another department he declined to specify.
Constance Schmitt Newgard and Heather Rowell said Cal Fire should stay to fight wildland fires but not displace Julian’s structure-fire and ambulance service.
“Our dream is they — Cal Fire and JCFPD — work together,” Rowell said.
On Monday, Julian’s Patricia Landis noted the protest signatures and said in a statement: “From the outset of this dispute, residents of Julian and Lake Cuyamaca have been demanding the opportunity to make this momentous decision regarding their volunteer fire department. Now they will be given this opportunity.”
She also noted that district residents will vote Nov. 6 on Proposition QQ to raise the fire district’s benefit fee from $50 to $200 a year.
“The increase in revenue, beginning the end of 2019, is necessary to raise the level of service for Julian,” she said. “This is a fight that remains to be resolved.”
The issue is whether it takes a 50 percent approval to pass the fee or a two-thirds vote.
“Despite legal precedent, San Diego County Registrar of Voters has stated that the ‘district’ will have the power to decide if a simple majority or two-thirds of the vote is required to pass the initiative,” she said.
“This is a battle with big government. They had the money and power to spawn a hostile takeover of our historic volunteer fire department. But we have the human resources and passion to protect our community, retain our small-town character and preserve our way of life.
“We will fight each battle until we repel the intruders and finally win the war,” Landis said.
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