STATEMENT FROM MAYOR RICK MULLEN on post-woolsey fire city council meeting
On Tuesday, December 4, the Malibu City Council held a special meeting with multiple items related to the devastating Woolsey Fire, the largest wildfire ever to hit Los Angeles County, which destroyed hundreds of homes in Malibu and charred nearly 100,000 acres in Los Angeles and Ventura Counties. Nearly 500 community members attended, with the Council Chambers at capacity and three overflow rooms set up with monitors for people to watch the meeting.
"We have experienced a catastrophic event and community-wide trauma, especially those unfortunate families who lost their homes. However, as the tiny green shoots have already begun to poke through the charred stubble of our beloved mountains, so we are slowly resuming the patterns of normalcy in Malibu. It is a welcome moment to be back in City Hall and conducting the people’s business, and taking strong steps to rebuilding and doing everything we can to assist our community members. We will examine every aspect of this disaster so that we can understand it, come to terms with it, and be better prepared for future disasters. During the Council meeting, community members gave more than three hours of impassioned testimony voicing critique, questions, suggestions for the future, personal stories of tragedy and heroism, frustration, anger, optimism and hope. The City encourages all community members to continue to share their views, ideas, criticism, complaints and suggestions. Every comment, criticism and suggestion from the residents is valued and will be considered. There are many good ideas on how to improve and plenty of observations on how things went during the fire and in the days following. I thank everyone who took the time to come to the Council Meeting and offered their heartfelt observations and suggestions. There were things that went well and things we can improve on for the future, and the message from the residents was heard loud and clear by all of us on the Council and the City staff." - Rick Mullen, Mayor, City of Malibu