Wearing a bright orange Ridge Construction T-shirt and work boots, Jon Hornback stood in the middle of a construction site in Paradise — just a foundation and wood framing.
“Where we stand right now is in the middle of a kitchen slash dining room, living room area of a residence of a local person who lives here in town, a businessman,” Hornback said.
The home was destroyed by the Camp Fire, which broke out a year ago and became the deadliest and most destructive wildfire in California history, killing 85.
It almost completely leveled the town of Paradise, which now faces a variety of roadblocks to recovery, from polluted drinking water to damaged septic systems. There’s also a shortage of construction workers to rebuild businesses and homes like this one.
It’s a challenge Hornback is facing as he tries to rebuild this and one other home in Paradise. Hornback says two projects are all his company, Ridge Construction, can handle, because so many laborers and tradespeople were displaced due to the fire. Some 23% of construction workers in Butte County lived in Paradise and neighboring Magalia, which was partially destroyed by the fire, according to the Chico Builders Association.
“And so, you know, they’ve not come back,” Hornback said. “And so consequently, those people that we would have had maybe some pool to pull from — your manpower, laborers, skilled tradespeople — are not here.”
It’s difficult to quantify how many construction laborers work in Butte County, said Kate Leyden, executive director of the Chico Builders Association. But she does know, anecdotally, that there was a labor shortage before the fire, when there were around only 1,000 new homes built in the whole county each year. Nearly 14,000 homes burned in the Camp Fire.
“So we’re pretty sure we don’t have the right number of workers,” Leyden said.
To help connect contractors with workers, the Chico Builders Association is helping to build a database of tradespeople and their skills.
“And then when a general contractor is looking for a plumber, ideally he or she will be able to look up the plumbers in this directory and give him a call and see if they’re available to help,” Leyden said.
