‘Fire Country,’ the new TV show about Cal Fire, is a hit. Just not with Cal Fire.” And he continued: “As an organization that grew rapidly on the strength of its good will and a genuine desire to bring the community together, we should do everything we can to make Fire Country an even bigger success.”
**This was a time when there were two competing versions of the new show. One version was that Fire Country is an authentic grassroots approach to solving wildfire. Another version was that Fire Country is a propaganda hit-piece for the Cal Fire organization. The show’s executives chose the latter approach when they presented the show’s new name to Cal Fire. The original title for the show was ‘Cal Fire—Live from the Country.’**
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### _Cal Fire’s Plan to Save the Golden Gopher_
In March 2016, the California Legislature passed Proposition 65, a voter-approved measure that would prohibit smoking and electronic devices in restaurants, workplaces, and bars. The bill also barred indoor smoking for most indoor workplaces. The bill passed with all but one vote. The only vote against the bill was from then–U.S. Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, who said that he was voting “no” because he didn’t like the idea of banning smoking in bars.
Cal Fire is a powerful lobbyist for the restaurant industry. In 2015, Cal Fire spent more than $5 million lobbying the state legislature in support of Proposition 65.
Cal Fire’s plan is to pass one of the world’s most restrictive workplace smoking bans. But Cal Fire has been in conflict with firefighters, who are members of the U.S. military and are in constant danger of injury, and the firefighters’ union that represents more than 40,000 career firefighters and police officers.
Cal Fire had hoped to pass Proposition 65 as a state initiative in 2016, but then-state Attorney General Xavier Becerra threatened to sue the organization. So Cal Fire agreed to instead pursue a statewide ballot-initiative campaign.
**I asked Cal Fire’s vice president for communication, James McDonough, why the organization didn’t pass Proposition 65, which could have been easily accomplished. “I don’t have an answer to that,” he said. “The people in the Legislature have been the ones