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Vacaville event honors legacy of MLK A3

Congressmen present more than $6M for projects A4

WEDNESDAY | January 18, 2023 | $1.00

DAILYREPUBLIC.COM | Well said. Well read.

DA: Suspected gunman in Suisun killing was out on bail for suspected role in Fairfield killing Daily Republic Staff

DRNEWS@DAILYREPUBLIC.NET

Aaron Rosenblatt/Daily Republic

Cal Fire Battalion Chief Marshall Turbeville explains the process for developing the proposed California

Fire Hazard Severity Zones map during a meeting at the Solano County Events Center in Fairfield, Tuesday.

Solano residents want state to take ground-level view for fire maps Todd R. Hansen

THANSEN@DAILYREPUBLIC.NET

FAIRFIELD — Many of the two dozen people who attended Tuesday night’s meeting on the proposed Fire Hazard Severity Zone Map would like to see actual land uses and existing topography factored into the final version. Those who spoke were clearly not convinced the maps reflect what is actually on the ground – whether that includes the efforts by landowners to mitigate fire risk or changes in the uses from wildland to agriculture, for example. At least one speaker thinks the detailed information that went into making the maps should be made public before final decisions are made so residents can have input on those building blocks. The bottom line for many of those at the meeting boiled down to the cost and even the availability of fire insurance, and how the new maps will affect that critical issue.

“The difference for most people is the fire hazard map and reducing the risk,” Supervisor John Vasquez said in an interview after the meeting. He said that while the state maps may play a part, insurance companies have their own mapping off of which they develop policy standards, mitigation requirements and ultimately costs. The silver lining is there are ways to certify properties to show insurance companies there have been efforts made to reduce the risk of wildfire, including a relatively new program being driven by the insurance companies themselves. Marshall Turbeville, battalion chief for the Sonoma-Lake-Napa Unit of the state Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, said the state maps are not going to reflect a parcel-to-parcel view. It is going to be more general and take in the historical landscape. “It’s modeled for what it could be,” said Turberville, explaining

that means wildlands. “I believe the intent of the map is to keep homes from burning,” Turbeville said. For those properties now in a higher hazard area, any new construction will have to meet the higher standards for fire-safe construction and materials. The maps also only address the State Responsibility Areas within the county, with three hazard levels. Solano County has 86,971 acres in State Responsibility Areas, pretty much the same as existed that last time the maps were done in 2007. However, 31,570 of those acres are now placed in very high hazard areas, representing 36.3% of the SRA. That is 21.5% more than in 2007. The map shows 27,416 acres of the SRA (31.5%) is in the high hazard area, down 4.9% from 2007; and 27,987 acres in the moderate hazard area (32.2%), down 16.6%. Down the road, maps of wildland See Maps, Page A8

OES lifts evacuation warning for Suisun Creek area residents DRNEWS@DAILYREPUBLIC.NET

FAIRFIELD — Solano County Office of Emergency Services has lifted the evacuation warning for residents who live within a quarter-mile of Suisun Creek. The bigger issue right now is the number of roads that have been closed – including two different stretches of Pleasants Valley Road, the county reported. Most of the closures are in the northern part of the county. The good news is that the weather is cooperating, with a storm coming in Wednesday, but dry weather expected after that. “We have received less than (a) half-inch of precipitation over the

past 36 hours,” the OES reported in its afternoon briefing. “Showers are expected tomorrow, but otherwise dry over the next week. Widespread overnight lows will be in the 30s for the next seven to 10 days.” The OES continues to watch creek and lake levels, reporting “creeks continue to flow from runoff, but water levels have dropped significantly.” As of Tuesday afternoon, 13 customers were without power due to three outages. The county encourages residents to sign up at www.AlertSolano.com for emergency updates in your area. The active road closures in unincorporated area can be found at https://bit.ly/3jXMyiK.

Aaron Rosenblatt/Daily Republic

A road sign marked “Flooded” is placed along Lyon Road near Soda Springs Road near Fairfield, Tuesday.

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FAIRFIELD — A man charged in a murder case in Suisun City was out on bail at the time of the killing on a separate murder case in Fairfield, the Solano County District Attorney’s Office confirmed Tuesday. Richard R. Klein, 51, of Martinez, appeared in court Tuesday and is charged with one count of murder in connection with the Suisun City case. Klein is also charged with being a felon in possession of a firearm and the enhancement of discharging a firearm during the commission of a murder, the District Attorney’s Office said in a statement. Additionally, Klein is charged with an enhancement for committing murder while being out of custody on another criminal case. The District Attorney’s Office and law enforcement have not

released the name of the person who was killed, only stating that he was 37 and had been shot multiple times. The killing occurred about 9:50 p.m. Dec. 15 on the 1200 block of Potrero Circle. The victim died at a nearby hospital. The Solano County SheriffCoroner’s Office has said the case “is protected” and could not release any information. Suisun City Police Chief Aaron Roth was not available for comment Friday afternoon. Suisun City police detectives worked with the Solano County District Attorney’s Office Major Crimes Task Force on this investigation, the Police Department said last week in a community update to note Klein’s capture. Investigators from both entities were able to identify and locate Klein. Klein has been See Suspect, Page A8

Storms: The past three weeks were the wettest in 161 years in the Bay Tribune Content Agency How wet has it been recently in Northern California? New rainfall totals show that no person alive has experienced a threeweek period in the Bay Area as wet as these past 21 days. The last time it happened, Abraham Lincoln was president. From Dec. 26 to Jan. 15, 17 inches of rain fell in downtown San Francisco. That’s the second-wettest three-week period at any time in San Francisco’s recorded history since daily records began in 1849 during the Gold Rush. And it’s more than five times the city’s historical average of 3.1 inches over the same time. The only three-week period that was wetter in San Francisco – often used as the benchmark for Bay Area weather because it has the oldest records – came during the Civil War when a drowning 23.01 inches fell from Jan. 5 to Jan. 25,

INSIDE The complex psychology behind keeping Californians safe in a megastorm. Page A6

1862, during a landmark winter that became known as “The Great Flood of 1862.” “The rainfall numbers over the past three weeks just kept adding up. They became a blur,” said Jan Null, a meteorologist with Golden Gate Weather Services in Half Moon Bay, who compiled the totals. “We had a strong jet stream that was bringing in storms, one after another. It was hard along the way to separate the individual storms.” So much rain fell since Christmas in Northern California that some cities, including Oakland, Stockton, Modesto and Livermore, already have reached their yearly average rainfall totals. In other words, if it didn’t rain another drop until See Storms, Page A8

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