FIRE IN THE VALLEY

What Big Bear Built, Why It Is Changing, and What We Should Demand From Whatever Comes Next

By Theodore Trentman

Candidate, Big Bear City Community Services District Board of Directors

CONNECTING BIG BEAR

Fire in the Valley by Theodore Trentman

Fire protection in Big Bear did not begin with San Bernardino County Fire, the Big Bear Fire Authority, or even the governments we know today. It developed because people living in an isolated mountain community had to protect one another. Over generations, volunteers became organized departments, equipment improved, stations were established, paramedic and ambulance service became increasingly important, and separate local agencies eventually attempted something ambitious: provide emergency service across much of the Valley through one regional organization.

That history matters because Big Bear is now considering another major change. The Big Bear Fire Authority, created by the Big Bear City Community Services District and Big Bear Lake Fire Protection District, is moving toward a possible breakup. Big Bear Lake has been developing a proposal to obtain fire and rescue services from San Bernardino County Fire. Big Bear City and CSD will consequently have decisions of their own to make about fire protection, ambulance service, staffing, assets, governance, and the future relationship between emergency services on the east and west ends of the Valley.

After reviewing the Joint Powers Agreement, Fire Authority records, Citygate's fire-services review, the CliftonLarsonAllen forensic investigation, County Fire's proposal, budgets, meeting minutes, and hours of actual public-meeting transcripts, I believe the public discussion needs to change. We have spent enormous energy asking who paid what, who is responsible for the disagreement, and whether County or local government is better. Those questions have a place, but they are not the most important ones. The question that should come first is much simpler: when somebody in Big Bear calls 911 tomorrow, what emergency-service system do we have, what system will answer that call after this transition is finished, and will it actually be better?

The Big Bear Fire Authority is not merely a contract between two governments. It is a separate public agency created to consolidate fire protection, emergency medical services, administration, personnel, and operations across the participating jurisdictions. Historical records included in the forensic investigation show how significant that consolidation became. By 2018, the Authority reported that administration had been consolidated, jurisdictional boundaries had been removed for operations, standard policies and procedures had been implemented, and the Authority was managing its own financial responsibilities.

That is important because saying that the JPA may be dissolved can make the change sound almost administrative. It is not. Big Bear spent years building an operating organization across governmental boundaries. Employees, equipment, command, finances, stations, ambulance operations, pensions, assets, policies, and institutional knowledge became intertwined. Even the assets demonstrate how complicated the organization has become. CLA found that FPD, CSD, and the Fire Authority do not simply own one neat collection of property. BBFA uses assets belonging to its member agencies while also owning replacement assets purchased over time. CLA reported that no blanket transfer of ownership occurred when the Authority was formed, and that when member-agency equipment was retired or replaced, replacement property purchased by BBFA became BBFA property.

Dissolving the Authority therefore means more than changing the patch on a firefighter's sleeve. An operating system has to be unwound while emergency service continues every day. And that everyday service is probably not what many residents imagine. When Big Bear hears the word "fire," we understandably think about wildfire. We remember smoke settling into the Valley, ash falling from the sky, evacuation warnings, aircraft overhead, and enormous incidents requiring state, federal, County, and mutual-aid resources. But the everyday Big Bear Fire Authority is primarily an emergency-response and medical system.

Citygate examined 3,567 incidents during fiscal year 2024-25. Of those, 2,425, or 67.98 percent, were emergency medical incidents. Only 62, or 1.74 percent, were categorized as fire incidents. Another 1,080 involved other calls. Citygate also found that two or more incidents were occurring simultaneously 33 percent of the time, with the simultaneous-call rate increasing and the largest concentration occurring in Station 281's Big Bear Lake service area.

Those numbers change the way we should think about this entire debate. The local fire department is not an organization whose principal job is waiting for the next forest fire. Most of the time, it is responding to the everyday emergencies of residents and visitors. That is why ambulance coverage cannot be treated as an afterthought in whatever replaces the present arrangement.

Understanding what we have, however, should not become an argument for preserving it unchanged. Citygate found serious operational limitations in the existing system. According to its review, only three fire crews totaling nine personnel were on duty, along with one Battalion Chief for incident command. Citygate said the critical tasks associated with even a single-family house fire call for 15 to 16 total crew members within 11 minutes and 30 seconds of receipt of the 911 call for positive outcomes. Its conclusion was direct: the Fire Authority has both a speed-of-response and a weight-of-response challenge.

That does not mean nine firefighters are expected to do the work of sixteen alone. Mutual aid and additional responding resources are part of fire service. It does mean our local system does not have enough immediately available personnel by itself to assemble the recommended effective response force for a significant structure fire. Citygate also found that the organization is lean. It described necessary administrative positions supporting training, prevention, logistics, management, and oversight, identified possible single points of failure in areas such as payroll, IT, and management, but also found the Authority's policies, practices, and records consistent with best practices and described staff as knowledgeable and transparent. Most importantly, Citygate said the existing number of line fire and EMS positions could not decrease if the Authority were to remain independent.

That leads to a more useful understanding of the present situation than either side's slogans. The evidence does not describe a failed fire department. It describes a functioning but lean regional emergency organization operating inside a financial and governmental structure that has become increasingly difficult to sustain. That distinction matters because if the problem is primarily organizational and financial, replacing the organization does not automatically solve the operational problem. Whatever replaces it still has to put enough people and equipment on an emergency.

The financial history is also more complicated than simply asking which side paid more. The 2012 structure depended heavily upon a 50/50 funding concept. Over time, the financial realities beneath that formula became increasingly complicated. CLA determined that a disparity associated with the JPA's 50/50 funding provision could be identified as early as fiscal year 2016, when CSD's budgeted contribution exceeded FPD's by $138,340.

CLA's later forensic investigation demonstrates why the argument over which side contributed more has to be handled carefully. Excluding major consolidation items, CLA calculated cumulative FPD contributions of approximately $51.48 million and CSD contributions of approximately $44.04 million. When the 2019 and 2020 consolidation items are included, however, CLA's alternative calculation becomes approximately $51.71 million for FPD and $51.11 million for CSD, or 50.29 percent versus 49.71 percent.

Those numbers are not necessarily contradictory. They measure the financial history differently, and that is precisely the point. The Fire Authority became financially complicated enough that the simple statement "we paid more" does not explain what happened. CLA also did not uncover a simple financial villain. Its investigation identified issues and documentation weaknesses, but it also found that the potentially non-fire expenditures it tested had legitimate BBFA business purposes and followed written policies, even where procedural observations were made.

The more convincing explanation is less dramatic but probably more important: the agreement did not evolve adequately as the organization beneath it evolved. The department consolidated. Finances changed. Ambulance service changed. Assets became intertwined. Costs changed. Service demands changed. Yet the underlying governance and cost-sharing structure became a continuing source of conflict. By 2025, those financial tensions were no longer theoretical. Finance Committee records show officials trying to maintain full fire protection while dealing with the consequences of 50/50 invoicing. One proposed solution redirected approximately $1.2 million that otherwise would have gone to reserves in order to maintain operations and cover a comparatively small remaining deficit. Special counsel explicitly noted that doing so still would not resolve CSD's underlying shortfall under the JPA's 50/50 cost-sharing structure. In other words, they could balance a budget, but they had not solved the agreement.

The meeting transcripts help explain how the discussion evolved in a way official minutes cannot. Minutes tell us what action a board took, but they rarely convey the uncertainty, frustration, competing ideas, or reasoning that led there. By January 13, 2026, the question was being stated openly. One director requested that the JPA itself be placed on the agenda. Another specifically asked that the Board consider whether to continue the JPA and "clean it up" or dissolve it over time. Counsel cautioned the Board because the subject was not yet agendized and said the agreement would be brought back for consideration.

That moment matters because the question initially before the Authority was not simply County Fire or no County Fire. It was whether the existing regional arrangement could or should be repaired. Citygate then presented substantial recommendations. It suggested reducing the Fire Authority Board to two FPD representatives, two CSD representatives, and one at-large representative. It said major changes were needed to cost-sharing, deployment, and fiscal policies. It suggested allowing either member agency to pay for a higher service level if it wanted one. It also said current revenues could not support adding staffing or services.

Most importantly, Citygate identified two potential choices: determine the feasibility of both partners entering County Fire, or remain in the current partnership and update the JPA. Citygate did not say the Fire Authority had to disappear. It said the existing arrangement needed major repair and that County Fire should also be investigated.

The February 10, 2026 meeting therefore became one of the most consequential in this story. The agenda itself was explicitly titled "Discussion Regarding Review and Possible Direction to Initiate Amendment to Joint Powers Agreement; Further Discussion of Fire Services Review." Staff told the Board the meeting was intended to determine next steps, including whether to begin amending the JPA, and said the discussion could encompass services, costs, cost apportionment, governance, and service alternatives.

The official minutes contain another crucial distinction. The Board agreed that its discussion was not based upon the quality of the fire service's performance, but on business concerns involving organizational sustainability. It discussed past funding problems, possible amendments, service proposals, annexation, LAFCO, and potential dissolution. The Board then unanimously directed each member agency to solicit a County Fire proposal based on the emergency-service level its own constituents needed and the associated cost.

The transcript makes that decision even more interesting. During the discussion, Citygate's representative specifically urged that ambulance service be included in the County inquiry because the Fire Authority was then providing both fire and ambulance service. The discussion also reflected an intention that the Authority, FPD, and CSD move together in obtaining information so that the three entities would be aligned in evaluating the option. The County investigation was initially being discussed as a way to obtain information about all services and evaluate the future collectively.

There is one question I still cannot answer from the documents we have reviewed. Among the records and transcripts available for this report, I have not found a comparably developed proposal showing what Citygate's second option, remaining together and rewriting the JPA, would actually look like. That does not mean nobody discussed it. It does not prove negotiations did not occur where legally permitted. It does not mean an amended agreement would have been accepted by Big Bear Lake or CSD, and it certainly does not prove a repaired JPA would have solved the staffing and revenue problems Citygate identified.

But there is an important difference between concluding that an alternative will not work after developing it and never presenting that alternative to the public at the same level of detail as the alternative that ultimately moved forward. We now have a County proposal with stations, personnel, apparatus configurations, and costs. I have not found the equivalent document for a rebuilt local partnership. That is not an accusation. It is a hole in the public record we currently possess.

The County proposal finally gives residents something concrete to evaluate. County Fire's presentation establishes the existing Big Bear Lake baseline. Within the FPD boundaries, Station 281 currently has a three-person paramedic engine and a two-person advanced-life-support ambulance. Moonridge and Boulder Bay are unstaffed. County describes that as four suppression personnel and one non-suppression employee on duty per day within the FPD boundaries.

County then offered four configurations, and they contain genuine potential improvements. Depending upon the option selected, County would increase dedicated suppression staffing in Big Bear Lake, staff Moonridge again, provide a wildland fuels crew at Boulder Bay, participate in Battalion Chief coverage, and provide additional equipment including a snowcat and front loader.

The Big Bear Lake board ultimately expressed support for continuing to explore Option C. Under that model, Station 281 would have a four-person medic truck, Moonridge would have a three-person medic engine, and Boulder Bay would house the wildland fuels crew. That represents seven suppression personnel per day plus the fuels crew. County proposes paying one-quarter of the Station 281 medic truck staffing, the fuels crew, and one of three Battalion Chiefs, while also contributing a snowcat and front loader. The estimated Option C contract requirement presented by County is approximately $7.99 million.

Those are meaningful potential gains, and they should be acknowledged. If County Fire can place more suppression personnel within Big Bear Lake, reopen Moonridge, add a dedicated fuels crew, and connect those resources to a larger regional organization, residents should know that. But the proposal also contains one of the most important unresolved issues in this entire transition: ambulance service.

County Fire's presentation says that if Big Bear Lake contracts with County Fire, ambulance service coverage will remain the responsibility of CSD. County's representative said there had been discussion with CSD and that CSD was interested in continuing to deploy an ambulance from Station 281, with County willing to partner in keeping it there to preserve response times and coverage. The written proposal is even more explicit: "Ambulance service coverage is the responsibility of the CSD and is not addressed in this proposal."

That sentence deserves far more attention than it has received. Almost 68 percent of the Fire Authority's calls were EMS. County Fire's proposal may improve dedicated fire-suppression staffing while leaving the service responsible for the majority of current call volume outside the County contract. That does not mean the ambulance system will be worse. It may work very well. CSD may operate it successfully in partnership with County. There may ultimately be advantages. But we do not yet have enough in the County proposal itself to make that judgment.

Before this transition is complete, the community needs to know how many ambulances will operate in the Valley, where they will be stationed, who staffs them, who pays for them, who dispatches them, what happens when multiple medical calls occur simultaneously, how ambulance personnel interact with County firefighters, and what contractual commitments guarantee that coverage. That is not a detail to work out later. It is central to the emergency-service system.

County Fire's regional response concept also reminds us that no organizational chart changes the geography of Big Bear. County describes its Battalion Chiefs as regional resources. They may respond outside the FPD boundaries to other County incidents, while additional County chief officers can likewise respond into Big Bear Lake when larger incidents require them. County presents that sharing of resources as an advantage of its regionalized deployment model. That makes sense, but it also illustrates something larger. A serious structure fire may still require resources from multiple stations and agencies. A major wildfire certainly will. Even if the Fire Authority disappears, regional cooperation cannot disappear with it. The real test is whether the agreements replacing the Authority make that cooperation stronger, weaker, or simply different.

There are therefore real potential gains from County Fire. Big Bear Lake could gain dedicated suppression staffing. Moonridge could become staffed again. Boulder Bay could become the base for a wildland fuels crew. County could contribute command resources and specialized equipment. The community could gain access to the institutional depth of a much larger fire organization. There is value in scale. A large regional fire organization can maintain specialized capabilities, administrative depth, training infrastructure, reserve resources, and command systems that are difficult for a small independent department to duplicate economically.

At the same time, we need to be equally precise about what could be lost or changed. We cannot responsibly say that Big Bear is definitely going to lose firefighters, stations, ambulances, or response capability simply because the Fire Authority changes. In some areas, the County proposal actually points toward increased staffing. What we are unquestionably in the process of changing is the local regional organization itself. Today, one Fire Authority operates across the participating jurisdictions. It employs personnel, owns equipment, coordinates fire and EMS functions, and is governed by local representatives from both member agencies. Property and equipment from multiple owners are integrated into its operation. If the JPA dissolves, each of those functions has to be transferred, divided, replaced, or redesigned.

The asset question alone is substantial. CLA found that FPD and BBFA had approximately $12.6 million in combined historical asset cost as of June 30, 2025, while also noting that it did not receive the detailed CSD asset schedules necessary to incorporate those assets into the same analysis. The public therefore deserves to see an asset-transition plan, not simply a service proposal.

Local control has value, but local control is not enough by itself. A locally governed department that cannot afford sufficient staffing is not automatically superior. Citygate said current revenues do not support adding staffing or services. Anyone advocating for a continued local or Valley-wide organization therefore has to answer difficult questions too. What does the new JPA look like? How is the 50/50 problem replaced? How is governance changed? How do we pay for the staffing Citygate says is needed? Can Big Bear Lake purchase a higher service level without forcing CSD to match that expenditure? Can CSD do the same? How are ambulances funded? What reserve level is sustainable? How are future capital costs divided?

Citygate actually provided the beginnings of that model by suggesting a five-member board and the ability of individual agencies to purchase higher service levels. What we do not yet have is the finished version. If a modernized local system cannot answer those questions, history alone is not a reason to preserve it.

County Fire should face precisely the same test. Saying "County has more resources" tells us very little unless we know which resources are actually committed to Big Bear. Which staffing levels will be guaranteed in the contract? Which stations are guaranteed to remain staffed? What happens to ambulance coverage? What resources are physically based in the Valley and which must travel here? What happens during a regional wildfire when the larger system is under enormous demand? How do costs escalate over five, ten, or twenty years? What happens to existing employees? Who owns the apparatus? What happens to Fire Authority assets? What authority remains with local elected officials? What happens if the arrangement does not perform as expected? Those are not anti-County questions. They are pro-accountability questions.

One of Citygate's most important observations may also be one of its simplest. There is no federal or state law establishing one universal fire-service staffing level or outcome for every community. Citygate said the level of service is ultimately a local policy decision: communities receive the level of service they can afford or choose to fund, and that may not be the level of service they desire.

That means the decision before us is bigger than choosing an agency. We first have to decide what level of protection Big Bear requires. Only then should we decide who can best provide it. Big Bear is a mountain community surrounded by forest. It experiences severe winter weather. It has difficult access routes, seasonal tourism surges, aging structures, medical emergencies, simultaneous calls, and development pressures. County Fire itself identified wildfire exposure, winter-weather challenges, seasonal tourism, increasing emergency demand, and aging structures as characteristics that make this community unusual.

The fire system we build should be designed for that Big Bear, not merely designed to settle today's disagreement.

As the next County agreement, CSD resolution, Fire Authority dissolution document, ambulance agreement, or transition plan appears, residents should evaluate them by outcomes rather than organizational names. We should know how many firefighters are on duty every day, how many ambulances are available, where they are stationed, how many paramedics are on duty, which stations are staffed, what happens when the first ambulance is already transporting a patient, what happens when two or three emergencies occur simultaneously, how many firefighters can reach a structure fire quickly enough to perform the critical tasks Citygate identified, who provides prevention and inspections, who commands a major incident, what resources are guaranteed rather than merely potentially available, what happens during a major wildfire or snow emergency, who owns the stations and apparatus, what happens to existing firefighters, what the system costs over time, who makes the decisions, and who residents hold accountable when the promised service is not delivered.

If a proposal cannot answer those questions, it is not finished.

For much of this controversy, the debate has sounded like a choice between Big Bear Fire and County Fire. I no longer believe that is the right question. The right question is what emergency-service system the Big Bear Valley needs for the next twenty or thirty years and which structure can reliably provide it. That could ultimately be County Fire. It could be a substantially redesigned local arrangement. It could be a hybrid system in which different agencies provide different services but operate under strong regional agreements. The evidence should decide.

There is also a larger issue underneath all of this. Big Bear Lake and Big Bear City are separate political communities, but in everyday life we remain deeply connected. People live on one side and work on the other. They shop across boundaries, attend schools across boundaries, drive the same roads, use many of the same services, and face many of the same hazards. Fire exposes the artificiality of those lines more quickly than almost anything else. A burning house does not know whether it is inside a city. A heart attack does not know which agency receives the property tax. A wildfire certainly does not care.

That does not mean Big Bear Lake and Big Bear City must become one government. It does mean we should be very careful about allowing governmental disagreements to produce operational walls that did not previously exist. The Valley spent years learning how to operate fire service across those boundaries. If we dismantle that structure, whatever replaces it should preserve the lessons that worked while correcting the things that did not.

After reviewing these records and listening to the discussions that produced them, I do not believe the evidence supports pretending the existing Fire Authority is fine. It is not. Its funding structure has produced recurring conflict. Citygate identified significant governance and fiscal problems. Current revenues do not support the additional staffing the system needs. The present operation has response-weight limitations. The 50/50 structure has become a persistent source of disagreement. Those problems are real.

But I also do not believe the evidence supports the idea that the Fire Authority failed because the firefighters or the fire service itself failed. The February 10 minutes explicitly distinguish the quality of the service from the sustainability of the organization. Citygate described knowledgeable staff and best-practice policies while simultaneously identifying serious structural problems. That distinction may be the most important lesson in this entire story. We should fix the problem we actually have.

I also believe the County proposal deserves serious consideration. Increasing suppression staffing, reopening Moonridge, adding a fuels crew, expanding command depth, and gaining access to a larger regional organization are substantial potential advantages. But I am not prepared to call the transition complete, or demonstrably better, while ambulance service remains outside the County proposal, while final contractual commitments remain to be seen, while the disposition of assets and personnel is still being worked out, and while we have not seen a comparably developed version of Citygate's other alternative: a repaired regional partnership.

That is not indecision. It is the standard we should apply to a decision this important.

My purpose in writing Fire in the Valley is not to tell people whom to blame. It is to make the story understandable enough that blame becomes less useful than evidence. Residents should not have to attend months of Fire Authority meetings, sit through hours of City Council and CSD meetings, download hundreds of pages of agenda packets, understand public-agency accounting, decipher a forensic investigation, and watch hours of video simply to understand who may arrive when they call 911.

That is the information government should make understandable. And when it is not understandable, we need to connect the pieces ourselves.

That is what CONNECTING BIG BEAR means to me: connecting today's decisions to the history that produced them, political claims to the documents that support or contradict them, costs to actual service levels, governments to the people they represent, and the east and west ends of this Valley to the fact that many of our most important problems remain shared problems.

I do not want Big Bear to preserve the Fire Authority merely because we built it, and I do not want Big Bear to dismantle it merely because maintaining the partnership became difficult. I want us to understand what generations before us built, understand what is wrong with it, understand exactly what is being proposed in its place, and then make a decision that the next generation will be glad we made.

Whatever replaces today's system should be demonstrably better: better able to respond when several emergencies happen at once, better able to assemble enough firefighters for a serious structure fire, better able to provide dependable ambulance and paramedic service, better prepared for wildfire, winter, tourism, and growth, financially sustainable, transparent about its costs, clear about who is responsible, and accountable to the people it protects.

If County Fire can demonstrate that, we should be willing to recognize it. If a redesigned local system can demonstrate something better, we should be willing to recognize that too. But we should not lower the standard simply because the political process has already started moving.

Fire protection is one of the most fundamental promises a community makes to itself. Big Bear spent generations building the system we have. Before we replace it, we should know—not merely hope—that the next promise is stronger.

Theodore Trentman Candidate, Big Bear City Community Services District Board of Directors CONNECTING BIG BEAR

Fire in the Valley is a living report. It should be updated as the final County Fire agreement, ambulance-service plan, CSD proposals and resolutions, Fire Authority dissolution documents, asset and employee transition plans, budgets, and other governing documents become public. Principal Public Records Consulted

This report is grounded in public records and meeting transcripts. Principal materials

reviewed include:

 Big Bear Fire Authority Joint Powers Agreement and historical consolidation records.

 Citygate Associates, Fire Services Review / Preliminary Results Briefing, 2026.

Big Bear Fire Authority agendas, minutes, finance committee records, and budget

materials, including January 13 and February 10, 2026 proceedings.

CliftonLarsonAllen LLP, Final Big Bear Fire Authority Forensic Investigation, June 19,

2026, with attachments and exhibits.

San Bernardino County Fire Protection District, City of Big Bear Lake Fire/Rescue

Contract Service Options, 2026.

Public meeting transcripts reviewed for key Fire Authority, Fire Protection District, City

Council, and CSD discussions concerning staffing, ambulance service, funding,

governance, County Fire, and the future of the JPA.