In August of 2021, after one full week of school, our small but mighty school house in Grizzly Flats California was turned to ash and rubble in the Caldor Fire.

After the fire, Grizzly Flats residents as well as many surrounding communities were displaced all over California and some in other states. We all remained evacuated for 18 days or more depending on where the fire was still burning. The fire wasn't contained until October 21st, 2021. If you've lived in a disaster zone, you can imagine what the following days and weeks were like.

Many people banded together to assist our community. We were able to serve as a hub for the distribution of needed basic items and gift cards as well as a toy drive. We met with our insurance company who told us we would put the school back and everything would be fine and easy.

It hasn't been easy. It started with the cleanup efforts. For six months we had phone meetings with state employees, federal employees, local government, and insurance, all telling us it was someone else's responsibility to clean up the debris from the site. Once that was ironed out, we hired an architect and met with various groups who told us everything we had to have to put back the school. Building a school means following building code, safety code, education code and putting it in a nice package that the Division of the State Architect (DSA) will ultimately hopefully approve. We put our package together and sent it onto insurance and we were immediately told to halt the process while our building and site development were reviewed. The new school building was designed to meet Title 5 and Title 22 requirements; however, the insurance company disputes the requirements to meet Title 5 and we have been volleying ever since. The cost of our project is estimated to reach $9M and our insurance at this time will cover $3.9M leaving us quite short.

We have exhausted State and Federal Grant opportunities. We have a grant available for $350k and another possibility to qualify for a $2.5M grant, which still leaves us short. We have reached out to our Senator and our Congressman and our local government representatives for help. We will now need to reach out to our community members near and far to help us put back our school, and give our students what they deserve.

Rebuild Walt Tyler Elementary School

Insurance and grant funding are not enough