He has been fighting California fires for 35 years. He is now in the legislature

It is safe to say that there is no legislator more familiar with the fight against fires against the winds of Santa Anna than Saint. Kelly SyrtoS

He is one of only a few former firefighters in the history of the legislature and the only former career firefighter at the time of service, according to the California State Library (current member of the Assembly Heath FloraRepublican from Ripon, worked for three summers as a firefighter and voluntarily joined another 15).

The Republican of Muruta spent 35 years in the field – starting as a firefighter and a paramedic for the Fire Service in Ingulwood and retired as chief of the Fire Service battalion in Los Angeles County.

During this time, he was appointed in various fires in southern California and led a 20 -person impact team in a Canyon fire in 2007, which burned one of the areas affected by Palisades’ recent fire.

Yet, when it came to special Senate session bills related to the latest fires, the Syrto said it was almost left out of planning. Meetings to discuss the initial response to the legislature were limited to Democrats.

“Because of Pete, people, I have been in the fire service for 35 years,” Saito said Recently on the Senate floor, where he voted for two bills to finance fire recovery. “I ask you, there are no more meetings of Kakus to come up with a Senate democratic plan or for a democratic plan of the Assembly. … We need a plan from all of us to make sure that this will not be repeated. “

Senate President Pro Tem Mike McGuireDemocrat from Santa Rosa did not answer a request for comment.

Chris Micheli, a longtime lobbyist, said that democratic Senate leaders usually choose a handful of legislators to work on major issues such as wild fires. “These working groups do not include Republicans. But of course, Republicans can introduce their bills and can obviously make a contribution to legislation. ”

Tim Edwards, President of the Union representing state firefighters, said – no matter which party – it helps to have someone in the legislature who has worked in trade so that they can communicate questions to other legislators, such as the support of the Seirato A recent proposal to Transition of seasonal firefighters to year -round employees.

“Public safety is a unique thing, so to get someone who actually worked work to translate and explain that things are really great for the legislation,” he said.

Public Service: From fires to government

The 65 -year -old Sairo was born and raised in the valley of San Gabriel and wants to be a doctor who grew up. But he did not have the best estimates, so a neighbor firefighter encouraged him to try the paramedic path.

There have been many memorable moments over his decades as a firefighter. He does not like to talk about the bad: “There are too many of them. It is usually when people die and you can do nothing about it. ”

He prefers to think about those where he managed to save life. One was a fire for a residential building in the late 1980s or early 1990s, he said, where 40 people jumped from the second story to escape from flames.

“I was disturbed that I had to figure out how to manage 40 patients who … had broken legs and hips and cracked heads,” he said. “We still didn’t have a system, so I somehow came up with an optimized system on how to overcome them.”

This inspired conversations in the LA County Fire Service to create a formalized system, now known as the simple triage and quick treatment or starting of the system.

“That’s where my mind goes, how to organize something fast and then make it go through a quick process and end it,” he said. “That is why it is so disappointing to be in the legislature because you see a problem and you think,” Okay, well, to see, we can do this, that and that, and then let’s continue it. And it doesn’t go. ”

The Seira entered the selected service when he was running for the Muruta Municipal Council in 1997 while still working for the fire department. He served in the City Council until 2006, after which he retired to spend more time with his wife and three daughters. He withdrew from the fire department in 2015 and returned to the Council in 2016, serving a total of four stays as mayor.

In 2020, he won a place at the State Assembly, where he served two years before moving to the Senate. He now serves in seven committees and is the deputy chairman of four of them: budget loans, natural resources, public safety and housing.

Seyarto does not focus on wild fire legislation as a state senator – he says he prefers to apply what has been learned in the fire service in various fields of politics. He introduced only a few bills related to the 2021 fires, none of which had passed.

The role of the legislature

So, how does the Sairto think the legislature should approach fires?

The Seyto said that the most active role of the legislature would be to hold a comprehensive state strategy focused on prevention, reaction and restoration, instead of the partial approach, which the state often undertakes with legislation aimed at a specific community affected by fire.

He said that the comprehensive approach would require bilateral efforts that unite experts in the various problems related to this: housing, insurance and local authorities.

“We have to understand these things and we cannot understand them if we only have discussions about the cause of the Democrats, or only discussions of the Republican kakusi,” he said. “This is an entire legislative body (joined) experts in the field of issue.”

Overall, the serto said that stopping a fire, after it began, was a challenge. Therefore, risk management is crucial, he says: Identifying the fire hazard zones and hiring sufficient staff to clear a brush or manage controlled burns that can prevent or spread fires.

He also presented a bill last month to allow Evacuation routes in fire hazard zones To meet funds on proposal 4, which the voters approved last year for financing climate -related projects.

“It’s all about saving these people first and so you have evacuation routes … and not allow a bureaucratic structure to prevent the process,” he said. “It is this type of bureaucratic process, especially when it is related to public safety, we really have to remove … So we do not continue to repeat the same catastrophes, one after the other.”