Rebuilding Paradise: Nonprofit’s $500 ‘defensible space’ grants help cut residents’ insurance costs

By GABRIELA AOUN ANGUEIRA
Associated Press

PARADISE, Calif. (AP) — Five years after the 2018 Camp Fire killed 85 people and destroyed 90% of the homes here, residents of Paradise, California, face a new struggle: Finding homeowner’s insurance. Companies are raising premiums and canceling policies, but they’re also offering discounts for households that create defensible space by clearing a 5-foot-wide perimeter around their home from combustible material. To help homeowners who are financially and mentally exhausted from the burdens of rebuilding, the Rebuild Paradise Foundation created a grant that covers the cost of gravel for creating defensible space, improving insurability and fire safety.