‘Everybody’s getting kind of depressed’: San Lorenzo Valley hit hard again by brutal storms

SAN LORENZO VALLEY — Dani Piserchio clocked out of her job as a corporate law disclosure analyst late Tuesday and began the journey back to the newly purchased home she had just moved into with partner Don Saputo off of Bear Creek Road in Boulder Creek.

The valley was already dark when she arrived so she had to use the light on her cellphone to navigate the steep driveway, which was covered with tree branches and debris from yet another powerful storm that brought heavy rainfall and wind gusts as high as 80 mph to the mountains.

The path was still somewhat unfamiliar, as Piserchio and Saputo moved in only six weeks prior, but it didn’t take her long to recognize what had occurred while they were away at work.

A gargantuan fir tree, estimated by Saputo to be 180-200 feet tall and 8 feet around had collapsed sometime that day and decimated the corner bedroom of the home. After checking that their two dogs — Trooper and Cairo — were safe, Piserchio traversed back down the driveway hoping to find a phone signal so she could alert Saputo, who was still working a shift as a California Highway Patrol officer.

“I shot a text to him like ‘Hey, mentally prepare yourself because I don’t know what we’re going to do next.’ “

Cleanup efforts began in quick order when the sun came up Wednesday and by Thursday morning, crews from Davey Tree had arrived to begin sawing away chunks of the shockingly large tree, piece by piece.

“We were going to remodel that portion of the house anyways,” said Saputo. “It is what it is. Nobody was hurt. It would have been a different story if people had been hurt.”

As of Thursday, the couple was still without power and gas, but they planned to continue to stay in the section of the house that was undamaged.

“We’re camping in a really expensive tent,” said Saputo with a smile.

Outage issues

Large swaths of the San Lorenzo Valley have also been experiencing prolonged power outages since Tuesday’s storm, as the winds scattered power lines across roadways, while many that remained intact hung low from entanglements with redwood limbs.

According to PG&E spokesperson Denny Boyles, 10,770 customers were without power in Santa Cruz County as of about 3 p.m. Thursday. “We’ve made good progress today on assessment, and restoration,” wrote Boyles. “We will be updating customers tonight and tomorrow about final restoration times.”

Kurt Seger has lived in a Boulder Creek neighborhood off Highway 236 for more than 45 years. He said that while residents are keeping a close eye on one another, the seemingly endless parade of winter storms is starting to take its toll.

“Everybody’s getting kind of depressed,” said Seger. “It’s getting to be a little stressful. People are going stir-crazy, people are tired of the winter. I don’t mean to complain, but it’s just how it is.”

Seger said he especially worries about the youth in his area who have had to grapple with a traumatic string of disasters dating back to the CZU Lightning Complex Fire from 2020, which came within a few yards of consuming the entire block.

“These last couple years have been really hard on the kids,” said Seger. “You can tell the constant barrage and … the last three years of COVID and the fires; it’s just rough.”

Many children and adults alike in the San Lorenzo Valley that are navigating the difficult storm conditions this year were also impacted by the 2020 fires.

Michele Callahan’s home was destroyed in the CZU fire and she has been living with her mother, Carol, near downtown Boulder Creek until her home is rebuilt. The pair have also been without power and heat since Tuesday after a massive oak tree in their front yard was toppled in the high winds and took out a power line on its way down.

“One disaster after another,” said Michele Callahan, who was at home when the tree fell while her mother was out buying groceries. She said she quickly phoned her mother after the incident and asked her to “pick up some milk and a chainsaw” on her way home.

Potential disaster

The stormy conditions had let up by Thursday morning and work crews across Santa Cruz County took advantage of a gap in the clouds to continue repairs and assess damages.

“There’s potentially a lot of private property damage really throughout the county but especially in the San Lorenzo Valley, so we’re trying to collect some information on that,” said Hoppin.

The Santa Cruz County Office of Response, Recovery and Resilience is actively collecting preliminary damage information from residents solely to support a possible federal disaster declaration in response to the recent storms.

“If there is going to be a federal declaration for the state because of the flooding and wild weather that we’ve had beyond January, we’d like to try to get included in that because that brings in the individual assistance dollars for people that have had private property damage that is not covered by insurance for whatever reason,” said Hoppin.

The survey is available in English at forms.office.com/g/h5eiZTZNdH and Spanish at forms.office.com/g/NyuKP2c8uK. According to Hoppin, more than 1,000 people had completed the survey since it launched Wednesday.