美国国家公共电台 NPR More Than 1,000 Families Still Searching For Homes 6 Months After The Camp Fire

 

More Than 1,000 Families Still Searching For Homes 6 Months After The Camp Fire

作者：未知 来源：美国国家公共电台 2019-05-09

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DAVID GREENE, HOST:

Today marks six months since the deadliest and most destructive wildfire in the United States in more than a century. It was the Camp Fire, and it destroyed most of the Northern California town of Paradise and also a couple of nearby communities. That fire claimed 85 lives. And NPR's Kirk Siegler is here. He has spent the last six months reporting on the recovery in and around Paradise, even living in the area for a while. And, Kirk, I guess the big question is, how are people doing there?

KIRK SIEGLER, BYLINE¹: Well, you know, David, what's most striking to me is that Paradise just doesn't look or even feel that much different than when we were up there covering the actual wildfire in November. It's still very stressed. The people who are left, they're still trying to remove all of the debris²; just a fraction of it has even been removed out of the town. So you see rubble³ everywhere still, collapsed⁴ shopping centers, neighborhoods leveled, houses in ruin.

And, you know, folks will feel like they've turned a corner, and then there's word of a new crisis. We're now learning that it may take years for the drinking water to even be safe. But if there's one big consistent through all of this disaster, it's been the fact that there just isn't enough housing for victims of the fire. There's no housing.

GREENE: Well, wasn't that already the case? Like, people had moved to Paradise because it was one of the only places in this entire region with affordable⁵ housing.

SIEGLER: Exactly. Certainly some people moved up there because they like the rural lifestyle. But a lot of people live there because it was the only affordable place. And many people were already living on the edge economically even before this disaster.

GREENE: And so you've reported that some people have been able to leave if they had the means to do it. But a lot of people just had no option. They've had to just stay.

SIEGLER: Yeah. And you get the feeling that, those who are left, all they've got is each other. This is a deeply traumatized community. I want to introduce you to a guy named Steven Murray. Let me take you there now as we're in his pickup⁶, pulling up to a storage unit outside of Paradise.

STEPHEN MURRAY: Right now, we are going to my storage. We're going to unload a bed. We're going to see what things I can grab for some Camp Fire survivors⁸.

SIEGLER: Stephen Murray is 43 with buzzed hair, a neatly⁹ trimmed goatee and tattoos¹⁰ covering most of his arms.

(SOUNDBITE OF DOOR OPENING)

SIEGLER: His storage unit is crammed¹¹ with donated sleeping bags, work boots, knitted hats, boxes of gift cards and now a couple mattresses¹³. He's hoisting¹⁴ them out of the bed of his pickup.

MURRAY: I don't know what I'm doing. I just know that people need me and need the support. And they need to see a smiling face every day and that's what I try to give them.

SIEGLER: It seems like everyone knows Murray. In the morning, he wakes up to dozens of texts from desperate people who need help. He tries to prioritize the asks he knows he can deliver on in any given day. He goes on Facebook at least once a day. In this live post, he's outside a Home Depot¹⁵ asking for help for a Camp Fire survivor⁷ who has severe burns.

(SOUNDBITE OF VIDEO)

MURRAY: Someone helped her get a house. She's in a wheelchair. I'm going to go look about building her ramp¹⁶. If anybody out there has anything that can involve her having her...

SIEGLER: He told me he relies on donations from GoFundMe pages for survivors.

MURRAY: It's not like we were given a book. Hey, when your house burns down, you lose your car and your job - what to do. So we're just kind of planning every day as it goes.

SIEGLER: Today, it's a Costco run to buy dozens of fans. Tomorrow, he'll help a former neighbor who's moving to a camper up to Oregon.

MURRAY: It's mind-blowing how some of these people are surviving and trying to get through life right now. And I'm one of them.

SIEGLER: Murray and his young family, two little kids and his fiancee, are sleeping on one king mattress¹² in an RV parked in a friend's pasture north of Chico. In fact, it's clear that helping¹⁷ others is how he's handling the stress of his own personal crisis.

MURRAY: We've got to work together. Negativity is not going to help nobody and it's out there. You know, you got a lot of depressed¹⁸ people that if they just worked together, they'll get a lot more accomplished¹⁹ as a team than individually.

SIEGLER: FEMA says there are about a thousand families here who still need even just temporary housing and that number could be higher. Some people were living off the grid²⁰ in the Sierra Foothills or in trailers in someone's yard or renting a room in a house off the books - none of those would easily qualify for official disaster aid. And these are the folks Murray is most concerned about.

DOMINICA SPRAGUE: (Laughter).

SIEGLER: An hour drive south of Chico, Dominica Sprague and her family could be counted in this crowd. They're now camped at the Fairgrounds in Yuba City. It's 750 bucks²¹ a month to park their RV here and use the showers. She tears up. It's the sixth place they've moved since the fire.

SPRAGUE: I don't know how to describe it other than complete chaos²².

SIEGLER: Now, to hear her tell it, folks around here are getting compassion²³ fatigue²⁴ toward Camp Fire survivors. There's a lot of price gouging²⁵. Most RV parks don't let you stay more than a few weeks at a time.

SPRAGUE: I don't want a handout²⁶. None of us want a handout. But this has made it so impossible for anybody to survive, especially when you're on a fixed²⁷ income. And we live on Social Security.

SIEGLER: She's hoping to move to Arkansas. She's got family there and maybe a job. California is just too expensive. And there's nothing to rent, let alone something that's affordable.

SPRAGUE: There's no place here to go. We were looking at parking on the side of the street with a bunch of other homeless.

SIEGLER: There was already a severe housing shortage and growing homelessness crisis in rural Northern California even before the Camp Fire. For Ed Mayer, the executive director of the Butte County Housing Authority, this disaster peeled back the band aid, exposing just how vulnerable these communities are.

ED MAYER: We've really lost our ability to produce housing that is affordable to our citizenry, and this is the larger tragedy.

GREENE: The larger tragedy - that voice in a story from NPR's Kirk Siegler, who's still in the studio with me. What does he mean there, larger tragedy, Kirk?

SIEGLER: Well, David, he's talking - we've backed ourselves into a corner because there's not enough affordable housing in this country right now. And so many people are being forced to live in these high-risk places - be they high wildfire risk zones or flooded areas or flood-prone areas. And, you know, Paradise is just the latest example of this.

GREENE: I mean, this town was all but destroyed. Could this be a game changer when people start rethinking about all of this, our housing situation, how we respond to disasters?

SIEGLER: Well, that's actually the subject of our next reporting mission. What we're going to try to find out next is look at what is out of whack²⁸ with how we respond to disasters like this and what needs to change. And I think a lot of communities are watching with worry what's happened in Paradise and thinking it could have just as easily been them or it may be them next.

GREENE: NPR's Kirk Siegler here at NPR West with me. Kirk, thanks.

SIEGLER: Thank you.

1 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

2 debris   

n.瓦砾堆，废墟，碎片

参考例句：

• After the bombing there was a lot of debris everywhere.轰炸之后到处瓦砾成堆。
• Bacteria sticks to food debris in the teeth,causing decay.细菌附着在牙缝中的食物残渣上，导致蛀牙。

3 rubble   

n.（一堆）碎石，瓦砾

参考例句：

• After the earthquake,it took months to clean up the rubble.地震后，花了数月才清理完瓦砾。
• After the war many cities were full of rubble.战后许多城市到处可见颓垣残壁。

4 collapsed   

adj.倒塌的

参考例句：

• Jack collapsed in agony on the floor. 杰克十分痛苦地瘫倒在地板上。
• The roof collapsed under the weight of snow. 房顶在雪的重压下突然坍塌下来。

5 affordable   

adj.支付得起的，不太昂贵的

参考例句：

• The rent for the four-roomed house is affordable.四居室房屋的房租付得起。
• There are few affordable apartments in big cities.在大城市中没有几所公寓是便宜的。

6 pickup   

n.拾起，获得

参考例句：

• I would love to trade this car for a pickup truck.我愿意用这辆汽车换一辆小型轻便卡车。||The luck guy is a choice pickup for the girls.那位幸运的男孩是女孩子们想勾搭上的人。

7 survivor   

n.生存者，残存者，幸存者

参考例句：

• The sole survivor of the crash was an infant.这次撞车的惟一幸存者是一个婴儿。
• There was only one survivor of the plane crash.这次飞机失事中只有一名幸存者。

8 survivors   

幸存者，残存者，生还者( survivor的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The survivors were adrift in a lifeboat for six days. 幸存者在救生艇上漂流了六天。
• survivors clinging to a raft 紧紧抓住救生筏的幸存者

9 neatly   

adv.整洁地，干净地，灵巧地，熟练地

参考例句：

• Sailors know how to wind up a long rope neatly.水手们知道怎样把一条大绳利落地缠好。
• The child's dress is neatly gathered at the neck.那孩子的衣服在领口处打着整齐的皱褶。

10 tattoos   

n.文身( tattoo的名词复数 )；归营鼓；军队夜间表演操；连续有节奏的敲击声v.刺青，文身( tattoo的第三人称单数 )；连续有节奏地敲击；作连续有节奏的敲击

参考例句：

• His arms were covered in tattoos. 他的胳膊上刺满了花纹。
• His arms were covered in tattoos. 他的双臂刺满了纹身。 来自《简明英汉词典》

11 crammed   

adj.塞满的，挤满的；大口地吃；快速贪婪地吃v.把…塞满；填入；临时抱佛脚( cram的过去式)

参考例句：

• He crammed eight people into his car. 他往他的车里硬塞进八个人。
• All the shelves were crammed with books. 所有的架子上都堆满了书。

12 mattress   

n.床垫，床褥

参考例句：

• The straw mattress needs to be aired.草垫子该晾一晾了。
• The new mattress I bought sags in the middle.我买的新床垫中间陷了下去。

13 mattresses   

褥垫，床垫( mattress的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The straw mattresses are airing there. 草垫子正在那里晾着。
• The researchers tested more than 20 mattresses of various materials. 研究人员试验了二十多个不同材料的床垫。

14 hoisting   

起重，提升

参考例句：

• The hoisting capacity of that gin pole (girder pole, guy derrick) is sixty tons. 那个起重抱杆（格状抱杆、转盘抱杆）的起重能力为60吨。 来自口语例句
• We must use mechanical hoisting to load the goods. 我们必须用起重机来装载货物。

15 depot   

n.仓库，储藏处；公共汽车站；火车站

参考例句：

• The depot is only a few blocks from here.公共汽车站离这儿只有几个街区。
• They leased the building as a depot.他们租用这栋大楼作仓库。

16 ramp   

n.暴怒，斜坡，坡道；vi.作恐吓姿势，暴怒，加速；vt.加速

参考例句：

• That driver drove the car up the ramp.那司机将车开上了斜坡。
• The factory don't have that capacity to ramp up.这家工厂没有能力加速生产。

17 helping   

n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的

参考例句：

• The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
• By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。

18 depressed   

adj.沮丧的，抑郁的，不景气的，萧条的

参考例句：

• When he was depressed,he felt utterly divorced from reality.他心情沮丧时就感到完全脱离了现实。
• His mother was depressed by the sad news.这个坏消息使他的母亲意志消沉。

19 accomplished   

adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的

参考例句：

• Thanks to your help,we accomplished the task ahead of schedule.亏得你们帮忙,我们才提前完成了任务。
• Removal of excess heat is accomplished by means of a radiator.通过散热器完成多余热量的排出。

20 grid   

n.高压输电线路网；地图坐标方格；格栅

参考例句：

• In this application,the carrier is used to encapsulate the grid.在这种情况下，要用载体把格栅密封起来。
• Modern gauges consist of metal foil in the form of a grid.现代应变仪则由网格形式的金属片组成。

21 bucks   

n.雄鹿( buck的名词复数 )；钱；（英国十九世纪初的）花花公子；（用于某些表达方式）责任v.（马等）猛然弓背跃起( buck的第三人称单数 )；抵制；猛然震荡；马等尥起后蹄跳跃

参考例句：

• They cost ten bucks. 这些值十元钱。
• They are hunting for bucks. 他们正在猎雄兔。 来自《简明英汉词典》

22 chaos   

n.混乱，无秩序

参考例句：

• After the failure of electricity supply the city was in chaos.停电后，城市一片混乱。
• The typhoon left chaos behind it.台风后一片混乱。

23 compassion   

n.同情，怜悯

参考例句：

• He could not help having compassion for the poor creature.他情不自禁地怜悯起那个可怜的人来。
• Her heart was filled with compassion for the motherless children.她对于没有母亲的孩子们充满了怜悯心。

24 fatigue   

n.疲劳，劳累

参考例句：

• The old lady can't bear the fatigue of a long journey.这位老妇人不能忍受长途旅行的疲劳。
• I have got over my weakness and fatigue.我已从虚弱和疲劳中恢复过来了。

25 gouging   

n.刨削[槽]v.凿( gouge的现在分词 )；乱要价；（在…中）抠出…；挖出…

参考例句：

• Banks and credit-card companies have been accused of gouging their customers. 银行和信用卡公司被指控欺诈顾客。 来自辞典例句
• If back-gouging is applied, grinding to bright metal is required. 如果采用火焰气刨，则应将其打磨至可见光亮的金属表面。 来自互联网

26 handout   

n.散发的文字材料；救济品

参考例句：

• I read the handout carefully.我仔细看了这份分发的资料。
• His job was distributing handout at the street-corner.他的工作是在街头发传单。

27 fixed   

adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的

参考例句：

• Have you two fixed on a date for the wedding yet?你们俩选定婚期了吗？
• Once the aim is fixed,we should not change it arbitrarily.目标一旦确定，我们就不应该随意改变。

28 whack   

v.敲击，重打，瓜分；n.重击，重打，尝试，一份

参考例句：

• After years of dieting,Carol's metabolism was completely out of whack.经过数年的节食，卡罗尔的新陈代谢完全紊乱了。
• He gave me a whack on the back to wake me up.他为把我弄醒，在我背上猛拍一下。