Fitch Mountain will soon be getting two fire hazard signs, one on N. Fitch Mountain Road and one on S. Fitch Mountain Road, thanks to Eagle Scout Bryce Turbeville, who in recent years has been creating fire hazard signs for local Citizens Organized to Prepare for Emergencies (COPE) groups.
Turbeville’s Fitch Mountain sign effort has been a collaboration between the City of Healdsburg, Fitch Mountain COPE, CalFire, Northern Sonoma County Fire District and the Boy Scouts. The signs will be used for community and visitor notifications of “Red Flag Warnings,” fire danger and other special notifications.
In the last few years, Turbeville has created, with the help of several community members, six fire hazard signs.
The first sign was installed on Mill Creek Road and was part of his Eagle Scout project in early 2020. After achieving the rank of Eagle Scout in February 2020, Turbeville created a sign for the Northeast Geyserville COPE group and two for the West Dry Creek COPE group.
He said other communities saw the first sign and liked the way it looked, so he thought he’d make more and the additional projects grew from there.
“I enjoy building them. They are kind of something that I’ve done in my free time and the people I build them for also enjoy them,” Turbeville said.
The first Fitch Mountain sign is located at the curve where Powell Avenue turns into N. Fitch Mountain Road. The other sign will be erected on S. Fitch Mountain Road.
Each sign will have a fire hazard dial showing the different levels of fire danger and a red message board for displaying other notifications such as Red Flag Warnings.
“Those (the Fitch Mountains signs) were supposed to be included in my original Eagle project, but just the approvals for all that took a really long time and they’ve been waiting for the signs for over two years now and it finally happened this year. They were very relieved to have them in finally,” Turbeville said.
For the Fitch Mountain COPE and homeowners association, the signs are a big deal in terms of emergency preparedness and awareness.
“From a COPE perspective, it’s huge. To come up the hill and see a sign that has copenorthernsonomacounty.com on it and Fitch Mountain and the fire awareness information, that is huge. It’s the culmination of five, six years of work of really trying to get our community engaged and educated about emergency preparedness, not only fire but for other emergencies as well, so it is really exciting for us to have those,” said Priscilla Abercrombie, board chair of Northern Sonoma County COPE.
Abercrombie was previously a community leader for the Fitch Mountain COPE and her husband, Pat Abercrombie, is currently the president of the Fitch Mountain Homeowners Association.
Pat Abercrombie said the signs are like “having a portal above the north and the south side of the mountain that indicates you are entering an area, a special area, that you need to take responsibility for when you visit.”
Healdsburg Fire Department Division Chief/Fire Marshal Linda Collister said she’s happy to see the signs get done.
Collister said she believes the signs will make a difference safety wise, especially when visitors — who may not be familiar with the area’s fire danger — come to stay or visit the Russian River for the day.
Fitch Mountain has numerous vacation home rentals and day-use visitors, so the area gets a lot of out-of-towners in the summer time during the height of fire season. Now, with the help of the signs, visitors will be made aware of the conditions and that Fitch Mountain is a high fire danger area.
Assembling the signs
Getting each component of the two signs made was a team effort between several local organizations, according to Marshall Turbeville, Bryce’s father and the Northern Sonoma County Fire District chief.
“The wood material came from a local mill on the coast that was a great supporter, Stewarts Point Woodworks. The remainder was another great local business, Healdsburg Signs, who worked on the design and made all the other components. Martin Dreiling, a local architect, and former Troop 21 scoutmaster did the original design,” Marshall Turbeville said. “Wes Brubacher, a former Geyserville volunteer firefighter, provided technical advice, tools, and was the most critical component of making the signs happen. All these folks helped with all six signs that Bryce has been part of. Community volunteers, scouts and firefighters also provided labor on the installation days, painting, organizing and filling in where needed.”
Bryce Turbeville echoed Marshall Turbeville’s comments and said Brubacher has been a big help.
“He’s helped me tool-wise and expertise-wise with all of the signs. And I’ve had scouts who helped me with my original project continue to help me through all of these and Healdsburg Signs has helped a ton,” he said.
The Abercrombies said Fitch Mountain COPE community leader Rhonda Bellmer also played an integral role in helping to get the signs completed.
Bellmer helped clear the sign sites of excess dirt with Pat Abercrombie and also painted the wording on the signs. Collister said a City of Healdsburg engineer has also been a big help with the project.
“Ben Kagayama, a city engineer, was instrumental in getting the signs approved for vehicle safety along the roadway. It’s been a true community project,” Collister said.
For Priscilla Abercrombie, the collaborative effort between COPE and various businesses and groups really shows the community spirit of togetherness which is what COPE is all about, coming together to better prepare for disasters.
“This organization has been really lucky to be able to collaborate with all kinds of governmental organizations, nonprofits, businesses, etc. to make our community better prepared and this is a good example of how that works well. We’re just really grateful for all the people that have stepped up to make it happen,” Priscilla Abercrombie said.
The base, frame and fire hazard dial for the signs are up and Turbeville said he expects the signs to be completely finished within the next month or so.
When Healdsburg Signs completes the other signage elements Fitch Mountain COPE will pick them up and will be able to start using the signs.
While Turbeville won’t be in Healdsburg to see the signs be officially completed — he’s currently attending the University of Montana where he studies forestry and fire management — he’s happy to see the project come to fruition.
