The scene up in #Paradise itself is just shocking. Photos just don’t do it justice. There’s a lot of talk about the “restorative” power of fire, but what we’ve seen was *anything* but.... 
Last night, Butte County Sheriff Kory Honea declared that the official search for more human remains was “complete.” They won’t say what this means for the remaining 190 people missing.
We were out yesterday on what may have been the last “official” search, as workers/anthropologists combed through the wreckage, searching for the tiniest of human remains -- bones that could be smaller than an inch -- buried in an carpet of white, wet, and potentially toxic ash.
Tonight on @newshour, we’ll have a broadcast report on this difficult, painstaking search, produced with @juliepercha and @jasonlel
Residents will be allowed back into parts of Paradise next week. But they’ll be under boil-water advisories, there are still air-quality concerns. And for those whose homes have been reduced to ash, some might not be allowed to live on-site because it’s still considered unsafe.
At a community meeting last night, residents also expressed a lot of concern about looting, but police say there haven’t been that many reported incidents so far.
In Chico and surrounding towns, housing is SCARCE. 1000s of evacuees are still living in shelters, hotels, apartments and tents. There was a 3% rental vacancy rate in the area *before* the fire and it’s now near zero. Bidding wars are starting for available houses.
The Red Cross is running the biggest shelter for evacuees in the nearby town of Gridley. It’s a huge help, packed with donated food and clothes, but obviously it’s not a long-term solution for people. And there are lots of fears about another outbreak of norovirus.
Imagine you’ve lost your birth certificate, the deed to your house, your proof of insurance… not to mention that your home and everything in it is a carpet of ash, and your town is un-liveable for the foreseeable future. What would you do?
All schools in #Paradise were either destroyed or badly damaged, displacing several thousand kids. Classes are supposed to start up again on Monday from the Christmas break.
A first-grade teacher in Chico told us how she was preparing for an influx of newly-displaced 6 year-olds to arrive Monday. These kids can’t just pick up like nothing happened, she said. “They’ve all been through some trauma. We can’t ignore that.”
A local chaplain/grief counselor described the deep, emotional anguish everyone’s experiencing. “The world doesn’t feel like a safe place anymore. We haven’t processed that yet.”
An elderly man, sitting in his truck with his wife and dog in a hotel parking lot, said they and their son had both lost their homes in Paradise. They didn’t know where they’d go. “We kinda feel like we’re cursed,” he said before he drove off.
One last video vignette: it’s like this on nearly every street in Paradise today:
