“Alexa, play Pandora. Alexa how does the traffic to Boston look today? Alexa, order light bulbs. Alexa, how much could I save by raising my auto deductible?”

California’s Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones and legislators from wildfire-damaged communities across the Golden State unveiled a series of new laws designed to strengthen consumer protections for wildfire survivors making insurance claims who struggle to recover, rebuild, and move forward.

"Everybody plays the fool, there's no exception to the rule." — The Main Ingredient (1973)

The great majority of workers’ compensation claims are valid.

When a major storm rolls into an area, there are often numerous citizens who believe the storm will be dangerous. Then there’s the second camp — the more dangerous camp — who may not believe the storm will be all that intense and do not effectively prepare themselves for the storm.

For emergency managers, people who are unprepared for emergencies creates a number of problems. For instance, lack of citizen preparation creates dangerous situations for public safety employees.

These local residents may not believe they need to prepare, because they think that they will still have access to numerous resources during a disaster. Social scientists often pinpoint this type of behavior to determine whether there is a behavior pattern that can be altered.

Emergency managers have long posited that more education helps individuals to know how they can effectively prepare for a disaster. But education often only goes so far — it does not take away the need for disaster preparation.

At the end of a heartbreaking week that saw deadly mudslides kill at least 20, residents of Montecito gathered to grieve, pay tribute to victims and commit to rebuilding their cherished community on the Southern California coast.

Mourners lit prayer candles and left flowers as a makeshift memorial for the victims after shedding tears, hugs and prayers during the vigil over the weekend outside the Santa Barbara County courthouse.

The oldest victim swept away in a California mudslide was Jim Mitchell, who had celebrated his 89th birthday the day before. He died with his wife of more than 50 years, Alice.

The youngest, 3-year-old Kailly Benitez, was one of four children killed.

As their names and those of 14 other victims were released Thursday, crews kept digging through the muck and rubble looking for more people.

The number of reported deaths from the mudslide has reached 17.

“At this moment, we are still looking for live victims,” Santa Barbara fire Capt. Gary Pitney said. But he confessed: “The likelihood is increasing that we’ll be finding bodies, not survivors. You have to start accepting the reality of that.”

In This Issue:
PARMA Member Spot Light
Join Us For PARMA's 44th Annual Conference!
Calendar at a Glance
PARMA Member to Member Forum
PARMA Workers' Compensation Resource Update
PARMA Outreach Committee Needs Your Help!
Calling All Future Leaders!
PARMA Board Nominating Report
New Law Changes Contract Requirement for Design Professionals
Our Sponsors

(TNS) - At least 13 people were killed Tuesday when a rainstorm sent mud and debris coursing through Montecito neighborhoods and left rescue crews to scramble through clogged roadways and downed trees to search for victims.

The deluge that washed over Santa Barbara County early Tuesday was devastating for a community that was ravaged by the Thomas fire only a few weeks earlier. In just a matter of minutes, pounding rain overwhelmed the south-facing slopes above Montecito and flooded a creek that leads to the ocean, sending mud and massive boulders rolling into residential neighborhoods, according to Santa Barbara County Fire Department spokesman Mike Eliason.

At least 25 other people were injured, authorities said at an afternoon press conference. Crews rescued 50 people by air and dozens more from the ground.

It was not until 1970 that Congress, under President Richard Nixon, passed the Occupational Safety and Health Act. There were 14,000 workplace fatalities that year. As part of the act, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, or OSHA, was established to set and enforce safety standards in the workplace. Since then, standards have improved and workplace fatalities have declined to less than 5,200 in 2016. Still, some jobs remain far more dangerous than others.

Today, the vast majority of working Americans are relatively safe in their work environment. Across all industries in both the public and private sectors, there were 3.6 deaths for every 100,000 full-time workers. For certain professionals, such as school teachers and administrators or writers and editors, mistakes almost never have physical ramifications, and workplace fatality rates hover just above zero.

(TNS) — North Bay lawmakers have introduced a bill to bolster the ability of emergency officials to contact residents who may be in harm’s way — a topic that has been scrutinized since last year’s devastating wildfires.

The legislation, introduced by multiple lawmakers, including state Sen. Mike McGuire, D-Healdsburg, would create uniform statewide emergency notification protocols. It also would require all counties to develop and adopt guidelines for using Wireless Emergency Alerts, a federally administered system that can send Amber Alert-style messages to cell phones in a disaster area.

As The Chronicle and others have reported, many North Bay residents said they received no official warning and were blindsided by the rapidly spreading flames that sparked in multiple counties in October.