 Well, let me let me thank everybody for taking the time to come out. We're here and I'll take this off for a moment. We're up here back in Buick County and I say back because very familiar this county to many of us not only across the state of California, but for that matter around the rest of the nation and the rest of the world ravaged by historic wildfires just two years ago took lives over 85,000 souls campfire and paradise. We're not that far away from that area here in a county that's not only once again being ravaged by wildfires, but by incident after incident that have required emergency efforts, heroic efforts to evacuate individuals and to address the acuity of a climate crisis that we're experiencing not only here in the state of California, but in many parts of the world. If you do not believe in science, I hope you believe in observed evidence. You walk around this community, you walk around this park around Lake Orville. You see the reality a reality that is set in in this state in very indelible ways and that is we're in the midst of a climate emergency. We're in the midst of a climate crisis. We are experiencing weather conditions, the likes of which we've never experienced in our lifetime. We're experiencing what so many people predicted decades and decades ago, but all of that now is reality. It's observed. It is part of a consciousness. It's part of the experience, not just the expression that is the state of California. 3.154 million acres burned as of this morning, close to 3.2 million acres burned in the last number of months here in the state of California. Over 7,700 wildfires. This contrast to last year where we had 4,900 wildfires and 118,000 acres burned 26 times more acreage burned this year in the state of California than in 2019. Tens of thousands of people being evacuated. The science is absolute. The data is self-evident. The experience that we have in the state of California just underscoring the reality of the ravages of climate change. And when I talk about the challenges here in Butte County, it's not lost on anyone who lives up here. The 200,000 people that were evacuated a few years ago in 2017 related to the spillway here on the Lake Orville Dam where we had to evacuate because of the massive amount of water and the runoff into the lake where the lake was overflowing. Because again of the acuity of extremes because of the climate. And so we say this often and I'll say it again, the hot are getting a lot hotter. The dries are getting a lot drier and the wets are getting a lot wetter. That's climate change. That's what the scientists predicted. That's the reality that we're experiencing here in the state of California. We have to own that reality and we have to own a response to that reality. And one thing that's crystal clear to me, good enough, never is. In the state of California, while it's led as it relates to climate change, we've got to step up our game. While we have adacious goals, while we're leading the nation in low carbon green growth as we've led the nation in our efforts to decarbonize our economy, we're going to have to do more. And we're going to have to fast track our efforts. Well, it's nice to have goals to get to 100% clean energy by 2045. That's inadequate to meet the challenges the state and I argue this nation faces. We're going to have to fast track our efforts. We're going to have to be more aggressive in terms of meeting our goals much sooner. And I have tasked now our administration led by two members to my right. Jared Boomfeld who runs the EPA in the state of California and Wade Crowfoot who runs our resource agency to go down in every prescriptive goal that the state has to go down that list. And to dust off our current processes, our current strategies and accelerate all of them across the board. In terms of the work we're doing to not just broadly decarbonize our economy, but to specifically adapt strategies to get more electric vehicles out on the street and to electrify our transportation. And to focus on our land use efforts in this state in a much more dynamic and deliberative manner to look at our soils policies in the state of California, our industrial and agricultural policies in the state of California across the entire spectrum. Our goals are inadequate to the reality we're experiencing. Mother Nature is three things been said by many people. Mother Nature is physics, biology and chemistry. She bats last and she bats a thousand. The reality we're facing this smashed mouth reality, this perfect storm. The debate is over around climate change. Just come to the state of California. Observe it with your own eyes. It's not an intellectual debates, not even debatable any longer. What we are experiencing the extreme droughts, the extreme atmospheric rivers, the extreme heat. Just think in the last few weeks alone, we've experienced the hottest August in California history. We had 14,000 dry lightning strikes over a three day period. We're experiencing temperatures, world record breaking temperatures in the state of California, 130 degrees. Arguably the hottest recorded temperature in the history of mankind in the state of California just a few weeks ago. We had 121 degree temperatures in L.A. County, Burbank Airport, 114 degrees. It was 103 degrees in one part of the state of California, three in the morning. You've seen the images now strung across the rest of the globe, these orange glows, the quarter inch thick snow that is these ashes that are falling hundreds of miles away from these fires. The fires that we are experiencing north California 800 miles down to southern part near the border of Mexico. 28 active large scale fires that the state of California is currently battling. 14,600 firefighters currently battling those wildfires. Mutual aid coming from every local municipality and mutual aid coming from around the world. We had firefighters come in from Israel. I was talking to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau sending firefighters from Canada. We're reaching out to partners. I was talking to Governor Murphy yesterday from New Jersey. New Jersey is sending engines out here on the west coast of the United States to the state of California. We have Utah and Texas. Montana has helped out. Obviously, Oregon and Washington not only are we receiving mutual aid from Oregon and Washington. We're going to need to reciprocate and provide mutual aid in Oregon and Washington. And they're also dealing with record breaking fires and loss of property. Economic impacts. If you say, all right, well, this is a health issue perhaps with the air we breathe and the air quality. Perhaps this obviously has an impact in terms of the quality of life. How about the economic consequences? Just ask the folks here in Butte County, $2.2 billion just to clean up the debris related. Just to clean up the debris related to the campfire. $2 billion just to clean up the debris. I don't know. I need to emphasize it a fourth time. The economic consequences of our neglect. You want to know the cheapest way to deal with this is to invest in the future, to invest in a low-carbon, green-growth future, to decarbonize our economy, to change the way we produce and consume energy. It is the cheapest way to go. The biggest cost is in our neglect. The biggest cost is not accelerating and fast-tracking our low-carbon strategies. And by the way, California is doing that five to one. We have more green jobs than we do fossil fuel jobs. Five to one, not two to one, five to one. We're proving this paradigm. You can grow your economy, 3.8% average GDP growth in the last five years in the state of California. And as we move to accelerate the decarbonization of our economy, but again, it's not enough. And it's not enough to do it alone. The state of California doesn't live in an island. Well, it's the largest state in our union. It's not even large enough to have the consequences in terms of marking a greater impact on reducing greenhouse gas emissions. And that's why we need to get other states on board. And I couldn't be more pleased in particular with our Pacific Coast Collaborative. With Oregon and Washington and the leadership of Governor Brown, not just the current Governor Brown and Oregon, the previous Governor Brown in the state of California and Governor Inslee up in Washington state. We've led a partnership not just in the Pacific Coast, but we also led a partnership in a U.S. Alliance, 24 states plus California, 25 states that have come together basically doubling down on the Paris Protocol. So as the rest of the nation moves in one direction, we are moving in a more enlightened direction. And I say we, that's 24 states plus the state of California. And that's impactful. Just think about California alone. This state, its population is larger than 163 nations that signed up on the Paris Protocols. There are 196 nations. California's population alone is larger than 163 nations. So we want to punch above our weight. We want to continue to punch above our weight, but we're going to need more people coming on board. We're involved in dozens and dozens of lawsuits against an administration that doesn't see eye to eye with us on this. And rather than lamenting about it, we'll continue to fight in the courts. We'll continue to win as we are overwhelmingly against the rollbacks of the Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act and continue to make a case, not even make a case, just prove what we've been asserting that these efforts will save taxpayers money that will lower the cost of consuming energy that will inert to building more resiliency in our environment and allow us to leave something a little bit better than this to our kids and grandkids. People that want to rollback vehicle emission standards so you can spend more money at the pump and produce more greenhouse gas emissions to crave more of what you see around me. That's beyond the pale of comprehension. We're fighting against that. And we'll prevail as long as more people come to this cause. And so I guess, forgive me, I'm being a little bit long-winded, but I'm a little bit exhausted that we have to continue to bait this issue. This is a climate dam emergency. This is real. And it's happening. This is the perfect storm. It is happening unprecedented ways year in, year out. You can exhaust yourself with your ideological BS by saying, well, 100 years ago we should have done this or that. All that may be true. And I'm not going to suggest for a second that the forest management practices in the state of California over a century plus have been ideal. But that's one point, but it's not the point. The reality here is the mega fires that we're experiencing come from these mega droughts that we've experienced. 150 dead trees, million dead trees in our forests in southern Sierras, beetle infested forests, those mega droughts impacting the mega fires. There's something else going on, not just bad past practices over a century related to forestry. That said, we do recognize we have to do more in terms of prescribed burns. We do have to do more on vegetation management. We do have to do more on our forest management efforts. And by the way, the state of California is doing more than it's ever done in that space. 35 high profile projects we got done would have taken it 10 years based upon previous past practices. We were able to get those things done in 15 months. These fuel breaks that you're seeing, these high profile fuel breaks, including by the way, just a stone's throw from here. Efforts five years in a row to create fuel breaks that have actually saved a lot of property, potentially lives just in this area. We recognize our responsibility to do more in that space as well. And we're doubling down on that still from what we did last year with a partnership with the federal government, the U.S. Forest Service, where we did an amendment of understanding so we commit to the next few decades. To do more in partnership to double the amount of acreage that we're covering through our forest management efforts. So we do recognize that, but that's not just the issue here in California, Washington, Oregon and other western states. When you have a heat dome over the entire west coast of the United States, when you have temperatures, record breaking temperatures, record droughts, then you've got something else at play. And that's exactly what the scientists have been predicting for a half a century. It is here now. California folks is America fast forward. What we're experiencing right here is coming to a community all across the United States of America unless we get our act together on climate change. Unless we disabuse ourselves of all the BS that's being spewed by a very small group of people that have an ideological reason to advance the cause of a 19th century framework and solution. We're not going back to the 19th century. We're not apologists to that status quo. We believe in the fresh air of progress versus the stale air emphasis, stale air of normalcy. And so that's California. We're going to leap in the future. We're going to accelerate our low carbon green growth strategies. We're going to create more economic opportunity in this space, more resiliency, a sustainable mindset. And we're going to advance this cause in partnership with hundreds of sub-national and national leaders around the rest of the world. One of the great inheritance I received as the 40th governor of California is the work of the 39th in establishing an MOU under two protocol with 200 plus nations and governments, sub-national governments around the world. That's leadership. We want to build on that work. The U.S. clients, the U.S. alliance, climate alliance, we want to build on that. And we want to build on the framework of our cap and trade program, build on the framework of all of these audacious goals on electric vehicles, all of our audacious goals on waste and diversion, all our audacious goals as it relates to getting to 100% clean energy. But we've got to fast-track all of that if we're going to, I think, be judged well in the future. Because right now everything we've done has been adequate. Continue to do what you've done, you'll get what you got. And so that's why I'm here a little more animated, explaining this to my four kids and my little four-year-old who's moved from talking about a novel coronavirus, actual language a four-year-old uses, to now talking to me about what is going on outside and why he can't play around with a soccer ball outside. That's not the world I want to leave to my kids. It's not the world you want to leave to your kids. This is not a world that anyone should be experiencing. And we don't have to. Our decisions, not conditions, that will determine our fate and future. And so I'm very, very proud of California's leadership in the absence of national leadership. And I recognize our responsibility again to accelerate those efforts. So with that, I just want to ask Wade and Jared perhaps either one of you come up both of you, maybe amplify some of what I may have said and maybe talk a little bit more about what we've been talking about the last few weeks as we're experiencing this historic fire season. Hi, Jared Blumenfeld, Secretary of Cal EPA. I just want to stop by really saying, you know, the governor framed it as a leadership issue, just the profile in leadership that is the governor. I've had the privilege of working with the governor for a long time when they're difficult issues. You know, if you just imagine the beginning of this administration, I remember the governor, the last governor hadn't even left office and we had the first fires come in day upon day upon day upon day. The state has been buffeted by emergencies. And when it comes to making tough decisions, the governor has made them and they're not always popular decisions. And climate is one of those issues that we all know as Californians is here. I think the scientists told us in reports after reports that it would be coming 20 years from now, 20 years from now, we'd be facing what we're facing right here today in Oroville. And I just wanted to start by saying, be safe, first of all. Like we have these masks. They've become like the Swiss army knives. Like they're good for COVID, but they're really good for the crappy air as well. And make sure we're using them. The N95 is really helpful on your phone. You can get an app that shows you the air quality right here right now. The air quality index is 508. It's healthy below 50. So really right now is the time to take care of your lungs, especially if you've got kids, folks in your family with asthma, the elderly. This is a time to really make sure that you're not going outside. This is not a time if the air quality is dangerous and you can get lots of different apps that tell you the air quality from the air resources board and others. Please, please, please, like we don't have to be breathing this air. And also make sure the air quality in your home. If you have the opportunity to get an air filter, really I'd advise one. Next thing the governor, like he phoned late at night, both Wade and I, and we work as a big climate team within government and said we need to do more and we need to do it faster. And he reiterated like, wait, Jared, this really is a climate emergency. We really need to tackle this as if our lives depended on it because they do. And so that sense of urgency that you hear from the governor, he's pushing on us to make sure we look at every single aspect. And he's right. California is leading the nation when it comes to renewable energy. It is leading the nation when it comes to electric vehicles. It is leading the nation when it comes to building efficiencies. And I actually want to thank everyone for doing their part. The governor called on us two weeks ago to prevent blackouts. People around the state, big businesses, small businesses contributed. And even things like using less water and, you know, helping for drought actually helped save energy as well because a lot of our energy in the state is moving water around. So literally everything that you've all been doing, appreciate it. We want to make it easier. We want to make it so that it's second nature, so that you're not even thinking about, you know, replacing that light bulb because you replaced it with an LED 15 years ago. So we want to save you money. And that I think really is the governor's point. Many of the policies that contribute to climate change are actually hard on your pocketbook. And we're trying to create an economic recovery that's based on a innovation. And, you know, I don't really know anyone in my life that's more of an innovator than the governor. Like how we use innovation to springboard our economy future into the future is really by green jobs, a green economy. So the main thing today I'd want to say is be safe. If those numbers are above 50, which most of the state is, please don't go outside. Get one of these N95 masks, because we do have to go outside and monitor it. And then we'll be coming. The governor has asked us month after month to give him proposals that show what we're doing, to activate what we're doing. And Wade and I had the chance of going to a climate conference. Everyone around the world is looking to see what California is doing. And I'm just incredibly grateful that we have a leader like Governor Newsom, who's not only leading California, but leading the world when it comes to climate. Wade? Thanks, Governor, and thanks, Jared. I'd start by locating us and sharing a little bit about where we are right now. We are in the Lofer Creek portion of the Oroville State Recreation Area. And that is a beloved recreational asset in this part of the state. One of 280 state parks in our state. The Oroville State Recreation Area, the undeveloped portion around the lake, burned over about 70% in the last number of days. More broadly, across our state park system, 10 of our 21 park units have been impacted by these recent fires, including, of course, Big Basin State Park that the governor toured last week. State parks are a point of pride for Californians and really one of the crown jewels of an amazing natural ecosystem we have in California. And I think as we talk about the human cost of these impacts, we have to also elevate the natural resource impacts of these fires. Fact is California has world-renowned nature and world-renowned biodiversity of plants and animals. And when you talk about almost 3.5 million acres of California land, that's over 3.5% of the state burning, major impacts to our environment. And certainly our watersheds. We stand in a very important watershed for the state in the state water project. And the fact is these fires damage our watersheds. They also, of course, damage our infrastructure. We know from the energy challenges of the last couple of weeks where fires knocked out transmission lines that climate-driven catastrophic fires threaten the infrastructure that brings us our daily standard of living. On the energy side, but also the water side, we're not far from the Hyatt Power Plant at the Orover Reservoir that actually had to relocate operations downstream because of fire threats. So these challenges are real to people and communities, to nature, to our infrastructure. And I think what both Governor and Jared said is absolutely true. We're seeing impacts today that we thought would materialize by mid-century. And that's a really important point because we used to talk about climate adaptation or climate resiliency as sort of a future planning exercise, a little bit of a kind of wonky forecasting effort. The fact is, climate resilience is about protecting our people and our nature now. So under the Governor's direction, we're increasingly focused on, you know, with Jared's leadership, how do we drive down carbon pollution? We need to obviously transform our transportation, our building, our energy system. But then what steps can we take to actually reduce pollution and protect people in nature from the climate impacts that are already here? So I'm really excited to be helping to lead on this effort, really focused on climate resilience and where can we find ways to continue to lead the world reducing carbon pollution but in ways that recognize the reality, which is as we do that, we need to do more to protect our communities and our natural places. So I'm really excited about the work that CAL FIRE has continued to do on the proactive front of really reducing wildfire risk to communities, even while they do heroic work responding to these wildfires. And as the Governor said, while we can be proud of what's happened in California, we have to do so much more. And that's what we're looking forward to doing in the coming months and years. I just thank Jared and Wade and me. Both of them have a long history of being environmental champions and Jared left the Obama administration representing the EPA on the West Coast of the United States and Wade was in the Brown administration and both have a little history with me when San Francisco was leading this state in many respects, cities across the country in terms of some of our efforts to establish new expectations in terms of our low carbon efforts. So we're bringing a world-class team back and we've got a lot of work to do. Look, let's talk just briefly and I'll open it up to questions in a moment. We have now currently have five active fires that are five of the most destructive fires over the last in the history of the state, five of the 20 most destructive that are currently being suppressed, which is just remarkable when you consider that. We just came out August the hottest and recorded history. 19 people have lost their lives in these fires. We anticipate that number may potentially go up as we get back into areas that have been ravaged by flame and obviously smoke begins to clear. 3,900 plus structures have been destroyed. Many more structures we anticipate we will learn about over the course of the next days and weeks. Here's the good news. The weather is beginning to cooperate. The good news is the winds have settled down. The good news is there's weather starting to appear offshore that will create environment where we may get a little bit of precipitation, a modest amount of precipitation. In a perverse reality with all this smoke, it cools the temperatures down. The smoke blanketing now in the state of California. It actually advantages some of our efforts in terms of mitigating the spread. The only downside by definition is the air quality and then the inability for some of our air resources to get in. But nonetheless, the spread is mitigated as a consequence. We've made great progress on the LNU complex and the SCU complex, the CZU complex. We are making progress on this complex of fires, 23% contained in this northern complex, otherwise referred to in the past as the bare fire. 253,000 acres roughly are in this current complex. The August fire in this state is the largest in California history. It currently is a 24% containment. That August complex is 747,000 acres. Just that one complex of fires, 747,000 acres alone. Again, something we've never seen in our lifetime. And so I want to just again express deep respect, admiration for all of our frontline folks out there doing the hand crew work, doing the work on making sure we're dozing, creating these breaks. Not just the suppression efforts of Cal Fire and all the mutual aid. Also local law enforcement, our sheriff, California Highway Patrol police that have really come to the aid of so many on the evacuations, our health and human service teams working in a COVID protocol environment to help people safely navigate our congregate shelters and provide opportunity to isolate and quarantine in the hotel rooms in a way we haven't done in the past. I'd be remiss not referencing all of that and acknowledging their extraordinary work and couldn't again be more pleased or proud of that. With that, I also today have peace legislation that I'll be signing that is relevant and impactful. We noted a few months ago in anticipation as wildfire season, we had a series of public events in anticipation of this wildfire season. We had updated folks on the work we were doing on our vegetation and forest management, the historic amount of resources that we were putting into preparing for this year's wildfire season. But we also marked because of COVID and because of other circumstances related to reduction in availability of incarcerated personnel that could help provide some supplemental support for Cal Fire in terms of providing suppression and hand crew help through CDCR, California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, that we supplemented our workforce, our seasonal workforce by 858 people. I announced last week we had hired 830. Today I can state that all 858 firefighters have been hired pursuant to that emergency supplemental that we had appropriated a few months back. But one of the things that we have been working towards for a number of years going back to the Brown administration where there were efforts last year where we made progress. But this year where we actually got this done, Eloise Reyes, thank you for your leadership, incredible leadership. Stu entering a bill that will help give people opportunity and hope. And those are those prisoners that are out there, thousands of prisoners that are on the front lines that are near the end of their time in prison that are getting credits and want the opportunity because the training they're receiving once they're out of the system to be able to potentially join a workforce of which they've been trained and have actively participated in heroic ways of advancing, meaning their suppression efforts are demonstrable when you see them. This bill that I'm about to sign will give those prisoners hope of actually getting a job in the profession that they've been trained. And I just want to thank everybody in the legislature, the legislative leaders and others that supported this bill. Small number of people didn't feel it was appropriate to give these folks a second chance. And that was unfortunate. But the good news was fortunate enough did. And I'm looking forward to signing this piece of legislation here in a moment. And I just want to thank Scott Buttnick, so many people I could thank for their advocacy in this space. I want to thank Brian Rice and the California a lot of the leaders within our California unions that recognize this moment and the opportunity to do this in a thoughtful and judicious way. So I am belaboring this except to say I brought this piece of legislation appropriately. I thought here today that will give these these future firefighters and emergency personnel a chance by getting them opportunity to sponge their records, giving them a chance to get a certificate, getting a chance to potentially get a career ladder coming out of prison. So let me sign that and I'll answer any questions. And this is AB 2147 for the record. So this is official. And very grateful again to those rats for our outstanding work. So that's it in a nutshell. I can do a COVID update if you wish 3200 plus new positive cases down to 3.7% positivity over the seven day period. We are making progress in that space. We'll update you more over weekend and in our Monday presser. Happy to take questions. Hi, Dale Castler from the Sacramento be when you talk about accelerating the climate change efforts. First of all, was it a mistake for the state water board recently to postpone the the planned shutdowns of those power plants in Southern California in the name of grid reliability. I mean that takes us a step back doesn't it was absolutely not a mistake. It was the right thing to do. Three plants will be extended for three additional years one the redondo plant for one year. It was necessary in order to create and provide for reliability. We're simply coming too close in terms of megawatt peak usage and load and we need to address reliability particularly moving into the new year 2021 2022. So absolutely was the right decision to do. And while you have a small step back. We're going to make giant leaps forward to make that negligible in the context of our total overall strategies. So when you talked about getting to 100% green energy green grid by 2045 is that are you talking about a new piece of legislation what specifically are you going to do to attack some of these issues. Well I think 2045 is too late. So absolutely we're looking to fast track all of these efforts across the spectrum across the board. We've already reached our RPS portfolio goal in 2018 of 34% ahead it was a 33% goal ahead of the 2020 deadline proving California can move into the future and grow its economy. We accordingly are generating over 50% of all our electricity from non non fossil fuel for sources that includes hydroelectricity and the nuclear that we are generating that's not part of the RPS. But nonetheless gives you a sense of the totality of California's efforts moving into space. So we think we're not only up to the challenge we're more than capable of achieving more audacious goals and so we're currently in the process of putting together new ideas new strategies to accelerate our efforts. Accelerate the application implementation of commitments we previously made and to look at these goals these stretch goals 2045 and see if we can pull them closer into the future. Okay I'll ask some questions from the pool now this first one is from Keeley Webster of the bond buyer. Do you know how much grant money you're expecting from FEMA for each of the counties that you've sought assistance for. Is there any concern about the availability of FEMA money now that President Trump has suggested he might take money from FEMA for the cares to. Well we're the beneficiary the state of California of over $4 billion that's being redirected from FEMA into our unemployment and Pua system. We are getting those checks out and we're doing so as quickly as possible and we're hoping that very shortly Congress Senate in particular can get their act together and allow for more certainty moving forward in a new source of funds and not redirecting from existing FEMA reserves. That said specific to the question a peak gainer had a FEMA was out here in the state spend two days with us touring the wildfire damage throughout the state of California. We have extraordinary partnership with FEMA not only with Pete but the regional director Bob and others and so we have all the confidence in the world that will continue in the spirit of partnership and collaboration to to see the kind of support into the future that we've received in the past. And I also have confidence based upon the totality of these climate induced emergencies that are not just wildfire related but also hurricanes in other parts of the country that Congress will see to it and president will see to it that appropriate resources are made available to support those in needs. And so no I'm not concerned about those dollars running out. Thank you. This is from Carla Marinucci from Politico. President Trump has been silent on California and Western wildfire fires while he's tweeted on numerous issues and races. He's golfed and attended attended campaign rallies his last lament on California's current situation was three weeks ago. What's your reaction to his his failure to publicly address this latest devastation. Well I can only speak to the conversations I've had with the president. I spent close to 30 minutes on the phone with the president yesterday specific to the wildfires here in California we walk through the current status report on the act of fires the larger complexes. We actually specifically talked about the county and some of the recovery efforts from the campfire and he reinforced his commitment to our effort and we were grateful. Yesterday to announce two new refer to his F mags that were approved by FEMA and the administration. The major disaster declaration that was approved a number of weeks ago that has helped advance our efforts to provide assistance not just business assistance and county support but also the prospect now. Shortly of individual assistance to individuals that have been impacted and evacuated from these fires so he has been proactive in that sense. And to the extent that he has made public comments I imagine there'll be more public comments forthcoming based upon the conversation I had with him yesterday. OK this thank you this is from Sherry Mossberg at CNN and you alluded to the the MOU from last month. In the name of safety what is the state doing to better manage and restore the forest and mitigate wildfire threat. And how does the new memo of understanding with the federal government play into that. And I plays directly that California last year moved forward to no longer twiddle our thumbs and talk about or lament about the good old days when we were more active in vegetation and forest management. We decided to do something about it. In fact one of the first actions I took as governor of the state of California I went up to Placer County on a ridge and talked about the imperative of doing some forest management some thinning and some prescribed burns to address a population. Vulnerability so we didn't experience another campfire. We were able to commit to 35 high profile projects impacting and advancing our efforts to protect some 200 vulnerable communities in the state of California. A few months back we announced the completion of all 35 of those high profile projects. We stated a few months ago that there were a number of those projects that were not due to be completed for over a decade. We were able to get them done a little over one year. We are committed to doubling down on those efforts. And that is exactly the spirit of the partnership that we advanced this memorandum of understanding with the U.S. Forest Service to basically double the commitment in terms of annual number of acreage that are managed more efficiently and effectively in partnership with the state of California. The goal is to get to a million acres a year. We recognize that's not a stretch goal. That is the first goal of what we hope are subsequent announcements to go even farther and to do even more because we recognize we're going to have to do more. But it was a significant milestone, a significant step forward because the U.S. Forest Service in the state of California had not entered into any similarly placed commitments in the past. And so it's a positive development. It's a good sign it comes with real resources from the federal government and it forces us to step up our efforts as the federal government does the same. And so it's again one of we hope many announcements that we'll be making over the course of many the next number of months and we certainly hope over the next few years. Is there money committed in that MOU or is it just sort of a pledge? This is what we want to do. Now there's resources committed by the federal government that come from a recent bill that the president of the United States signed going back what a couple of weeks ago. And that bill comes with the name of the great outdoors. Yeah, the great outdoors act. So substantive goes from the provisions, the great outdoors act. This memorandum understanding will allow us actual resources. So it's more than just a piece of paper. It's not just symbolic. It's substantive and it's also substantive in a different way that it allows us to really prioritize together. The most impactful projects where we're not just doing things in parallel track. We're now doing things real partnership and greater sense of urgency and intentionality. Okay, thank you. This is from I'll throw in a coronavirus question. This is from Mackenzie Mays at Politico. It looks like the Sacramento area school where your children attend has received a waiver from the state to open. Do you plan to send your children back to the campus when they reopen or they're going to continue with distance learning? Well, let me I'll let you know after I process that with my wife. I know better to answer that question without caucusing with with the leadership in the house. Fair enough. Sorry, bear with me a second. This is from Curtis Ming at CBS 13 in Sacramento. When the power is cut, so is the normal lines of communication. People in a fire's path may not have access to phones, TV or internet. Those who do have cell service may only have a signal until the cell's backup generator runs out of fuel. As these fires become more common, what are you doing to make sure those in remote communities have access to critical communication when they need it most? I'd refer the question or two, the work that the California Public Utilities Commission did last year, the work that we did collectively, the state legislature myself to work with all three of the largest investor owned utilities in the state of California, not least of which PG&E with new processes, new protocols, new expectations to make sure that we are being much more responsive to the needs of vulnerable communities, particularly rural and remote parts of the state as it relates to any de-entertization, what is referred to as PSPS. Those protocols have been changed, they have been advanced, they're more targeted, they're more limited and they come with resources that not only the IOUs are responsible for, but the resources we put up in the state of California to create new resource centers, cooling centers to provide for backup generation, to provide for support for vulnerable communities, to provide for resources to address precisely the concerns that were raised in that question. Also would note we continue to work with the largest telecommunication firms in this state to require new backup generation as it relates to their polls, to their SMS systems, to their telecommunication network. And we'll continue to do more in that space, we made a little progress, we have more work to do in that space. I want to just compliment the extent it's important. Senator McGuire and others, Jim Wood, that have been very active in this space, supporting northern communities here in the state of California and really trying to hold everybody, private, public sector, accountable for delivering on all of the above. Were you satisfied with how PG&E handled the PSPS from the other night? I'm getting an after-action report, so I'll be able to more substantively answer that question with more nuance and specific information. Broad strokes, the impacts of the PSPS were more modest in terms of length and more modest in terms of scope than likely they would have been a year ago, pursuant to the new rules and regulations, the 72-hour notification, et cetera, that was put into place based upon the new rules that we established legislatively, executively, and through the California Public Utilities Commission. At first look, I was more satisfied, but I cannot claim to be firmly satisfied until I get the details which are forthcoming and will provide it to me very shortly. Another question from me. In regard to all that you've done in the last two years, I believe the legislature has appropriated something like a half billion dollars for more equipment, more personnel for Cal Fire, and yet the theme of the last few weeks we keep hearing is we're stretched too thin. We don't have enough. We're hoping, you know, we hope they send the cavalry from Montana or whatever. Has the state just simply not done enough? No, look, you have 14,000 lightning strikes between August 15th and August 18th. Dry lightning strikes. You have a heat dome over the entire west coast of the United States that precipitates at world record breaking temperatures in your state. Those are conditions that even the most abundant and well resourced into the extreme agencies still would be overwhelmed by. So that's the challenge. Look, we provided substantially more money and ongoing support to Cal Fire this year, baseline money. This supplemental of over 72 million dollars for those seasonal firefighters that couldn't have happened at a better time. And I just noted all 858 were hired. We have more suppression technology we've ever had in the past. And what I mean by that is light our technology, access to Pentagon information from satellites, the ability to access now technology that is part of our new procurement of helicopters, these new blackout helicopters that are finally starting to roll in access to other tools of technology as it relates to drones and wildfire and infrared cameras that we did not have in our possession that were distributed as broadly as they have been this year. All of that's happened in the last year and a half. We'll continue to do more. We'll continue to provide more resources, more personnel, more predictive technology. We have incredible partnership on wire, wildfire monitoring and wildfire prediction technology based upon weather that allows us to prevent the spread of fires based upon the pre-distribution and pre-deployment personnel technology that we didn't have a year ago that we have today that also will help with our firefighter suppression. So a lot of progress, just simply not enough, and that's why we're here talking in the terms we should around a climate emergency, a climate crisis that needs to enliven all of us in this nation where this nation has a responsibility to lead the world and to address. And I'm told this is the last question. It's from Lorraine Dekter. I hope I'm pronouncing that correctly from Action News Now in Chico Redding. What other plans do you have in Butte County today? Any other meetings or actions taking place? Yeah, we'll be touring around. I hope I've been a familiar face up here in Butte County, certainly from the ravages, the wildfires that we're experienced here after the campfire and some of the subsequent removal of debris and rebuilding efforts. We've tried to be here for the community the extent possible in terms of our support of property tax, property tax support, school system support, supplementing some of the economic losses in this area. I just want to express, if I could, and thank you for this question, the opportunity to express what I should have from the outset of this conference. And that is my deep respect and empathy for the human element and the impact that the last three years, that impact of all of these emergencies have had cumulatively on this community from the campfire alone to the spillway issues to hear once again the PTSD that people are struggling with and suffering with the emotional impact. I won't ever forget going to the first day of school up here in Paradise, the community surrounding Paradise, where the teacher told me on that first day of school that the kids had seemed some fog outside their windows and literally a number of the kids broke down emotional because they thought the fog represented the smoke related to the aftermath of the Paradise fire. That PTSD is real. That impact on children in particular is overwhelming and so my respect, my empathy for everybody suffering this community in particular and that's one of the reasons specifically I wanted to come back up here today to lay claim to an appreciation but also a responsibility to be supportive not throughout this current crisis but to be here as I said two years ago a year ago and I'll say it again for the long haul to make sure we're here as part of the recovery and making sure we're here part of building a more resilient community and doing more to prevent these fires in the future. And so with that let me just again express my gratitude to all of those leaders not only here in the Butte community but the surrounding communities throughout the state of California addressing these historic wildfires. I expect real progress in the next number of days. Weather conditions are more favorable. Some of these larger complexes we are making tremendous progress. I expect as well some of the air quality to begin to improve in the next number of days, measurably improve in the next number of days and you should expect in return the efforts in this state to be doubling down in terms of prevention, suppression strategies and long-term solutions that are foundational and fundamental for our fate and future not only as it relates to wildfire resiliency but the fate and future of our health and our economy and that's the address addressing the issue head on of climate change and addressing climate denialism which just also needs to be addressed head on and I'll close with one final statement. I heard from Jared Bloomfald he said something about changing light bulbs and the only thing that came into my mind is we can't just change light bulbs we also need to change leadership and I don't mean that just as a knock don't just assume I'm just taking a cheap shot from a top-down federal prism I mean that across the spectrum they're still in denial and they're leading the charge of keeping you protected and keep you healthy and safe and they're in denial about climate change they're not truly I think position to be the kind of leaders that we need for your community, for the state and our nation into the future this is that serious and it requires a seriousness of purpose a seriousness of understanding a seriousness of consciousness around science and mother nature and the realities of the world that we're living in I just want to conclude with that and again thank everybody for being here and thank you all those of you that may still be tuned in for the privilege of your time take care everybody