Home saved from fire -- against his will

[Sequoia]

RANCHO SANTA FE, California (AP) -- Dr. Jorge Llorente became irritated recently when the fire department kept rejecting his plans to landscape his hacienda-style home with jacarandas and avocado trees.


Fire-blackened hills surround the yard of Dr. Jorge and Barbara Llorente in Rancho Santa Fe, California. But he is grateful now.

Those restrictions may well have saved his multimillion-dollar home when a wildfire passed through last week.

"Now that we have a chance to see how it works we are tickled pink," the retired surgeon said. "I'm a convert. I'm a true believer."

Rancho Santa Fe has lots of converts after braving last week's Southern California's wildfires, the first major test of the stringent construction and landscaping standards adopted by the community in 1997. The San Diego suburb lost 53 houses, but none of them were in the five subdivisions that embraced restrictions designed to be so tough that people can stay in their homes if they cannot evacuate.

http://www.cnn.com/2007/LIVING/homestyle/10/31/fireproof.ap/index.html

[SoCalDem]

1. DUH!!

Everyone who buys in California should look at a picture of what was growing there BEFORE the houses are built..and to refrain from the over-kill landscaping. Not only does it WASTE water, but most people don't stay IN their homes long enough for the trees to actullay get big enough to shade the house, and why risk losing the house over some "pretty trees & stuff".. :grr: