From “Safe Moraga:”
Moraga, California — February 14, 2025 — Today, SAFE Moraga, a nonprofit organization formed by Moraga residents, filed suit in Contra Costa County Superior Court against the Town of Moraga, a semi-rural East Bay Hills community situated many miles away from local highways and within or near a Very High Fire Hazard Safety Zone (FHSZ).
With its suit, SAFE Moraga seeks to compel the Town to study wildfire evacuation safety to ensure that Moraga’s residents and the many students, employees and other persons who visit Moraga each day are able to safety (sic) evacuate in the event of a wildfire.
The suit is a Verified Petition for Peremptory Writ of Mandate and Complaint for Declaratory and Injunctive Relief, and contends that the Town of Moraga is “the Bay Area’s Pacific Palisades” and one of the cities
most at risk of urban firestorm. Despite the grave danger wildfire poses to Moraga residents, who must rely upon very limited and narrow two-lane roads (one lane in each direction) in the event of a need to evacuate, the Town of Moraga to date has refused to study the realities of wildfire evacuation and emergency response. A study undertaken by the City of Orinda, Moraga’s neighbor to the north, shows that southern Orinda neighborhoods (those nearest Moraga) will be severely constrained in the event of a need to evacuate. To date, the Town of Moraga has demonstrated little to no interest in undertaking its own wildfire evacuation study for the benefit of Moraga residents.
Cheryl Sabnis, President of SAFE Moraga says, “The recent fires in Pacific Palisades and Altadena, and the tragic loss of life of those who did not evacuate in time, is a grim reminder to all that wildfire takes no prisoners. Those who cannot evacuate in time pay the ultimate price.”
Urging the Town of Moraga to do the work needed to help residents plan and prepare to safely evacuate in the event of wildfire, Sabnis says, “Moraga’s Town Council needs to stop hoping that Moraga residents will never need to evacuate and start fulfilling their obligation to understand, plan, and prepare for this critical and life-threatening reality.”
SAFE Moraga’s suit comes on the heels of the Town’s approval of a 66-unit luxury apartment building, which fails to comply with state and local requirements in several respects as alleged in the suit (the “Project”).
On January 15, 2025, approximately 150 residents of Moraga attempted to attend a Moraga Town Council meeting to voice concerns about wildfire evacuation safety associated with approval of the Project, with many residents literally left in the cold, forced by the Town Council to observe the meeting from an unheated tent while temperatures hovered in the 40s. Despite scores of verbal and written comments raising wildfire evacuation safety concerns, the Moraga Town Council unanimously approved the Project, refusing to review or consider relevant data submitted by residents regarding the grim realities of wildfire evacuation facing Moraga residents.
Says Sabnis, “The safety of Moraga residents is far too important an issue to ignore. Because residents apparently cannot rely on Moraga’s Town Council to take wildfire evacuation safety seriously, SAFE Moraga has no choice but to ask a court to compel the Town Council to do its job to care for the safety and welfare of Moraga’s residents.”
So, I gathered this group would like to build a super highway into Moraga? That won’t go! Part of Moraga’s charm, quantness and behind-the-times nature are due to its restricted roads coming in. Leave it that way. Maybe those concerns should buy emergency use bicycles for their evacuation.
If you read it, the group favors that the Moraga Town Council limit development. Which would keep that quaintnes and behind-the-times nature of Moraga that you mention. More development necessitates realistic emergency planning…something that (it appears) like the Town Council has been unwilling to do. Note – I’m not a Moragan, but live along one of the Moraga evacuation routes in Lafayette. It’s a concern for us as well.
State legislators are in the pocket of real estate developers who want to build, baby, build. Build dense housing, that is. Not new roads. Let someone else pay the future price in wildfire deaths.
I saw the Oakland Hills fire move from a small plume next to Grizzly Peak Road to an inferno crossing Tunnel Road a mile away in less than 15 minutes. Over a dozen people died during those 15 minutes. Residents cannot outrun such a wildfire on clogged roads.
Our developer-sponsored building rules ignore fire safety. They must be repealed, this year.
I support many of the objectives of SAFE Moraga. What I don’t support is litigation as a tool of persuasion. They seem to be good at trolling and suing but ineffective when it comes to persuading residents to support their goals which would in turn move our elected officials.
This piece should probably be filed under Letters to the Editor. Anyway, sounds like this is really NIMBYism against a housing project smartly disguised with the fear of a firestorm. Those two issues should not be conflated as the former can be addressed as part of the approval process and the latter can be addressed in the voting booth.
Jackson D –
Submitted to us as a press release, hence its appearance as such.
This has little to do with fire safety and a lot to do with stopping development. Safe Moraga = Save Lafayette and how did that turn out in the end.
As a residents of Moraga, my wife and I took it upon ourselves to prepare for fire suppression by removing brush and dead trees from our property. We suggest other property owners do the same to benefit themselves and their neighbors.
Moraga badly needs extra lanes in and out. A time of day reversing third lane would be one option.
But hey, let’s load another 1000 passengers on the Titanic which is already short on lifeboats.
Oh… you had to go and say “Titanic.” And we were having such a good morning.
Go down to the Safeway and hangout if there’s a fire you’ll be fine.
When I saw notice of this from “SAFE”, I thought, oh, the big ass development on Country Club is finally happening, and I should be concerned about evacuation, but no, this is some little $h!t next door. The big Bruzzone property next to it on Country Club isn’t even in the conversation. You shouldn’t pretend that huge vacant development space next door doesn’t exist. We have only 2 lane roads for evacuation. Traffic studies should already show congestion during normal commute times and school times. Evacuation is already a known danger. I don’t oppose new housing, but don’t be stupid about it.
“Imagine a 4 lane freeway exiting a tunnel near the point where Pinehurst Road begins its hairpin climb up the Oakland Hills, climbing a 6% grade over the Indian Valley Ridge, descending into the southwestern end of Moraga Valley, streaking past the south side of Miramonte High School, cutting across Moraga Way near Ivy Drive with a big cloverleaf, then passing through the pear grove north of Moraga Center right through today’s Moraga Commons, and then running along the Lafayette-Moraga Trail through Burton Valley until intersecting with Highway 24 at the Pleasant Hill interchange. Expandable to six lanes with Moraga’s population, estimated today at 16,707 people, blossoming to 50,000 people! That in 1953 was the Shepherd Canyon Highway 77 vision of Contra Costa County and the California Highway Commission (CHC) today known as Caltrans.”
That was nuts then. Nuts now. Who are these people selling nonsense dreams without consequences? A 4 lane freeway into Moraga and beyond…? Could it be for the money?