If you thought private fire-fighting was a rich So Cal thing, you need to know what's happening in rural Nor Cal

Theo Whitcomb reports for the High Country News out of Siskiyou County, California, where Hmong pot farmers have established their own firefighting branch in the wake of this year's wildfires.  Here's an excerpt: 

In late June, lightning struck the western slope of Mount Shasta, a volcano in Northern California, igniting the Lava Fire. Four days later, gusting winds sent flames billowing towards the unincorporated community of Shasta Vista, where over 3,000 residents, predominantly Hmong Americans, live.

One resident, Neng Thong, who bought property there a year earlier, joined with 30 others to form a firefighting force. The community saw no choice; people no longer trusted the county or state to protect them. A seven-year crackdown on cannabis farming had eroded what little trust existed between the Hmong American community and county leaders. Thong believed the county would simply use the fire as an opportunity to clear the area. Others thought the county would implicitly approve the destruction of their property. Recently, vigilantes who’d fulminated against the subdivision on the sheriff’s Facebook page openly mentioned arson, with one user wondering whether it would be legal to start a fire. Sheriff Jeremiah LaRue, in a recent interview, brushed off the exchange, saying that the vitriol is “just kind of the way Facebook is.”

“They announced that they’re going to burn our town down,” Thong told me a month later, showing me a screenshot of the comment. “We wanted to save our property. If we hadn’t stayed, the entire area would’ve burned.”

An earlier post about these events is here, with a focus on the Hmong man who was shot by law enforcement.  

Another interesting angle on this is that wealthy communities have set up private fire fighting services in recent years in southern California, and wineries and tourist destinations are doing it in Sonoma and Napa counties.  But I wouldn't have expected it to happen in relatively poor Siskiyou County, where racial difference and attendant distrust seem to be the driving force.