Only one way out

If you drive past the Chico airport up to the mountain-ridge community of Cohasset, population about 2,000, and keep going, past the store and the school and the church, you’ll come to the TV tower, which is where the paved road ends and a dirt road—the historic Ponderosa Way—begins.

If you keep going, you’ll go all the way to the Ishi Wilderness Area—if you make it that far. The road has not been maintained for years, and in places it’s virtually impassable.

For a couple of years now Paradise resident Doug Laurie has been trying to alert people to Ponderosa Way’s problems. He admits that his purpose is largely selfish: He wants access to fishing streams up there that flow through national-forest land.

It’s not just the bad road: About three years ago, Laurie says, Sierra Pacific Industries began systematically locking its logging roads, making the fishing creeks inaccessible.

But there’s another, more important reason for fixing the road. It’s the only fire escape route other than Cohasset Road itself. If a fire were to close off that road, everybody north of the blaze would be trapped.

It’s the same potentially dire situation residents of Paradise’s Upper Ridge faced until recently, when Forest Highway 171 was put in connecting Inskip to Butte Meadows.

Laurie is looking for allies in his campaign to get the road repaired, which was why he recently attended a meeting of the Cohasset Community Association’s board of directors. There, he explained how he’d contacted all the responsible parties—Butte County, Tehama County, the Lassen National Forest and Sierra Pacific Industries—to no avail. Each is responsible for stretches of the road, he said, but none was willing to pay to fix it.

“I thought if I could point out the safety issue and the lack of access to state and federal lands, they would take it seriously,” he told the CCA board. “Most didn’t respond.

“Selfishly,” he continued, “I am pretty upset that I don’t have easy access to state and federal lands, especially in the Deer Creek area, that are featured on the Lassen National Forest website.”

That there were huge, water-filled potholes in the road wasn’t news to the Cohasset folks. “We call them ‘the Great Lakes,’” said board President Linda Hartsong.

As they told Laurie, they’ve been trying for years to get the road repaired. They’re well aware of the danger posed by the lack of a fire escape route.

Maggie Krehbiel, who chairs the association’s Emergency Preparedness Committee, said, “We are absolutely, 100 percent aware of the situation [with the road]. But we’ve been told there’s no money to fix it. I just don’t know what else we can do.”

The association has prepared an emergency evacuation plan that is available as a brochure or online at the CCA’s website. “There’s only one way out!” it reads in large, bright-red block letters. “Are you prepared?”

Their county supervisor, Maureen Kirk, has done all she can do, they said. Butte County’s section of the road is in relatively good shape, fortunately, but even if it weren’t, she’s told them, the county has no money to maintain it.

“The problem is Tehama County,” Laurie said. But it gave the same reason for not maintaining the road that the U.S. Forest Service did: no bucks in the budget.

“They kinda have to establish priorities based on population,” Krehbiel said, adding that apparently the authorities believe there aren’t enough people in Cohasset to warrant putting in an escape route.

Cohassians, as they call themselves, know how quickly an emergency can develop. So far they’ve been lucky and avoided a major fire, but in January 2009, when the worst winter storm in decades hit the North State, Cohasset residents lost power for several days, and PG&E closed Cohasset Road for 12 hours to repair downed power lines. The community was cut off from medical and all other services.

“What would have happened if some husband had a heart attack using a chainsaw on a tree or, God forbid, if a baby should choke?” Krehbiel said to a CN&R reporter at the time. “There are no trained medical personnel up here and no fire service.”

The New Year’s storm, as it was called, became impetus for Cohassians to ramp up their Emergency Preparedness Committee “to take care of ourselves and each other for at least one week,” as Krehbiel wrote in a letter to residents. The group has set up various sub-committees to handle everything from food supplies and emergency medical care—a registered nurse, Liz Weber, is in charge of that—to heavy-equipment management.

Elaborate preparedness menus were drawn up, with the goal being for all residents to be able to go at least three days without outside help. “That means having an adequate supply of food, water, prescription medication and a safe means to heat your home and cook your food,” Krehbiel wrote.

Wildfire is a greater danger than snow, however, so the CCA, with help from Cal Fire and other state and local agencies, has drawn up a sophisticated emergency evacuation plan and asked Cohassians to keep copies in their homes and cars.

In the meantime, members of the CCA board have pledged to work with Laurie to keep pressure on the agencies responsible for maintaining Ponderosa Way. They’re not optimistic, but they’re going to keep trying.

Laurie knows how things work, however. “I worry that it’s going to take a tragedy to get that road fixed,” he said.