Preparedness

Three wildfires broke out in northern Los Angeles County on Thursday, the worst of which was threatening at least 1,500 homes in Leona Valley, near Palmdale. Some structures have been lost to the so-called Crown fire, officials said, but they will not be able to determine whether those were homes or outbuildings on the many ranches in the area until sometime Friday. Capt. Sam Padilla, a spokesman for the Los Angeles County Fire Department, said the Crown fire has burned nearly 6,000 acres and there was zero containment.

For all the attention generated by the massive earthquakes in Haiti and Chile, experts in California remain skeptical that residents of this quake-prone region are any better prepared for the inevitable Big One. California saw a rise in quake awareness and retrofitting after the state recorded a series of major temblors over seven years: Whittier in 1987, Loma Prieta in 1989 and Northridge in 1994. But there hasn't been a devastating temblor in the state since the Northridge quake, and experts are concerned that quake preparedness may have declined in recent years.

Cuba has agreed to resume talks with the Obama administration on legal immigration of Cubans to the United States and direct mail service between the countries, a State Department official said. The communist government notified the U.S. on Saturday that it had accepted a recent administration overture to restart the immigration talks, suspended by President George W. Bush after the last meeting in 2003. Cuba also expressed a willingness to cooperate with the U.S. on fighting terrorism and drug trafficking, and on hurricane disaster preparedness.

The long, narrow room in Kenneth Moravec's basement looks like a food bank. Floor-to-ceiling shelves are lined with canned fruits and vegetables, dried or powdered herbs, spices and drinks, along with drums of pasta, rice, wheat and other grains. Each is labeled with its contents and the date of purchase or when it was home-canned, usually right out of Moravec's garden. "Right now I have about a six-year supply of food," said Moravec, whose e-mail tag line reads, "If you fail to prepare, you prepare to fail."

For a disaster as predictable as this week's wildfires, there was far too little of the kind of long-term readiness required to prevent or minimize the worst of the damage. At the federal level, millions of dollars have been cut from fire protection for communities abutting wilderness, money that could have been used, for example, to clear brush. A June report by the U.S.

washington -- The ability to detect a biological attack quickly or even a naturally occurring outbreak of influenza is years behind schedule because of a lack of leadership by the Homeland Security Department, according to a new audit. Although President Bush ordered the national surveillance program in 2004 to detect biological threats and ensure a rapid response, the program "is falling short of its objectives," wrote Homeland Security Inspector General Richard L. Skinner.

Conceding that Los Angeles has taken inadequate steps to prepare for a natural disaster or terrorist attack, a city panel Monday recommended a nearly 50% boost in staffing to plan for catastrophes. The City Council's Public Safety Committee endorsed a plan to increase the staff of the city's Emergency Preparedness Department from 17 to 25 people, including six new emergency coordinators to plan for and develop training for disaster responses.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's proposed $400-million investment in pandemic flu and disaster preparedness -- by far the largest amount any state has devoted to the cause -- would vault California from a laggard to a national leader in one stroke, healthcare experts said Friday. "This is the first state in the nation taking these kinds of steps," said Dr. Jack Lewin, chief executive of the California Medical Assn.

Top aides to President Bush looked at ways they might deal with a possible smallpox attack, a drill that included reviewing some lessons from the response to Hurricane Katrina. White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said there was no evidence a smallpox attack was imminent. The drill was one in a series of exercises the administration is holding to look at preparedness for potential public-health disasters. Officials held a similar drill in December on pandemic flu.