Mountain Fire survivors continue to rebuild, projected to take years
VENTURA COUNTY, Calif.—It’s a long road ahead for Luis “Tigre” Villanueva, who has already lived through five fires.
He lost his home in the Thomas fire, and now he's mustering up the courage to rebuild yet again— This time from the Mountain Fire, which burned around 20,000 acres and destroyed hundreds of structures in Ventura County last month.
“To recover ourselves is difficult. Everything is expensive. I went the other day to Costco to buy a pants for me, for my boy, for my wife, a pair of shoes and t shirts, underwear, And I pay almost $500 for that,” said Tigre.
Tigre set up a Go Fund Me to start raising money, and non-profit Upper Ojai Relief is doing its part to help.
“The fire has gone through, but this is where the emotions really start to set in. And things become very real when you're missing just those things that we all take take for granted. I mean, you go into your kitchen and you know exactly where your spoon is, your favorite spoon to go get the soup out. And these people don't even have a kitchen to go into, let alone a table to break bread around. So it's really sad,” said Upper Ojai Relief Co-Founder Trevor Quirk.
The non-profit raised more than $10,000 for Mountain Fire victims over the weekend and hosted a free Thanksgiving event for families to dine and shop, but it doesn't fully restore what was lost.
“I am going to pray for my family. I'm going to pray for the people who are losing their homes, too,” said Tigre.
