This past week a fifteen year old boy from Vancouver, WA was charged with five misdemeanor counts for starting the Eagle Creek Fire on September 2. Now that the fire is mostly contained and the alleged culprit will be brought to trial, attention is focusing on post-fire recovery. While it will be years before the severely burned portions of the Gorge will again look as we remember them, much of the fire burned in a mosaic pattern, leaving large stands of trees intact in some places. Still there are major concerns about long term impacts from this fire which burned nearly 50,000 acres in the Western Gorge, from Angels Rest to Cascade Locks.
On this episode of Locus Focus, Peter Cornelison (Hood River City Council member and field representative for Friends of the Columbia Gorge) and Gorge resident Cynthia Winter return to give us an update on the state of the Gorge post fire.
As field representative for Friends of the Columbia Gorge, Peter Cornelison is responsible for building support and activism among Gorge residents for protecting the Columbia Gorge. A Friends staff member since 2003, Peter is a Hood River resident who has been active in a number of local conservation causes and organizations. Peter is a former president and board member of the Hood River Valley Residents Committee and a member of the Hood River Waterfront Community Park Association. He was elected to the Hood River City Council in 2014.
Cynthia Winter is the founder and Principal of Winter Resources, a consulting practice that helps organizations and people use their unique leadership skills and resources to have greater impact in their work. She lives near Corbett, Oregon, and was one of hundreds of evacuees during the first week of the Eagle Creek Fire.
- KBOO