When the 2003 Cedar fire destroyed more than 300 homes in Scripps Ranch, residents there banded together to negotiate with insurance companies, make deals with custom home builders and lobby the city for flexibility on permits.
The tragedy also strengthened community bonds, with families who didn’t lose homes hosting families that did for weeks at a time, and bunco and happy hour groups forming among new friends who had barely known each other before the blaze.
In the hours after the homes were destroyed, community leaders set up what they called a one-stop shop in the neighborhood‘s community center to help neighbors deal with something that had seemed unimaginable in the upscale city neighborhood.
There was information on insurance coverage, city regulations for rebuilds, estimated costs to demolish smoldering remains still on people’s lots, and finding a builder who could replace their home competently and quickly.
Community leaders also negotiated a truck route with demolition and construction companies to help preserve quality of life during the four years it would take the rebuild the lion’s share of the 312 homes that were destroyed.
Dealing with tragedy and adversity brought the community together like never before, residents say.
“People came out of the woodwork to help each other,” said Bob Ilko, head of the Scripps Ranch Civic Association. “It was amazing.”
Top, Pinecastle Street in Scripps Ranch in 2003 after the Cedar Fire and bottom, in 2023.
(John Gibbins, Nelvin C. Cepeda/The San Diego Union-Tribune)
Julie Robinson, who had lived in the neighborhood for five years before the fire destroyed her family’s home, marveled at the change.
“I feel like all the supporters picked us up and carried us through the hardest times,” she said. “Some people brought coffee over, and others let us use their shower.”
She and many residents who lost their homes were forced to live dual lives for a few years — renting homes in nearby Poway or Mira Mesa with insurance money, driving their children to school in Scripps Ranch, visiting their old addresses near daily to deal with demolition, design and construction.
Some neighbors were nice enough to let the Robinsons’ dog live with them so it could stay in a familiar neighborhood. When a retired couple whose house had survived left town to see relatives in Texas for six weeks, they let the Robinsons stay in their house.
For everyone who had to rebuild, Ilko said a key success was successfully lobbying the city to allow residents to self-declare that their foundations had been destroyed beyond repair. That made it easier for them to start fresh and build homes that were larger or positioned differently.
Still, residents were urged to choose designs that would blend smoothly into the community, much of which had been built in the early 1980s. “You can go down the street now and say ‘that one is old, and that one is rebuilt,’” said Ilko. “But we really worked hard with the homeowners’ association to get them to blend in, and I think we were mostly successful.”
Bob Ilko stands in front of the only home on Pinecastle Street that did not burn during the 2003 Cedar Fire. The fire burned 312 homes in the Scripps Ranch community.
(Nelvin C. Cepeda/The San Diego Union-Tribune)
In the process of rebuilding, the neighbors truly became more than just neighbors.
“We started a bunco group, because we got to know each in the whirlwind of meeting with contractors, lawyers and the city and all the stuff you had to know,” Robinson said. “We started to bring snacks and then drinks, and we just enjoyed being with each other.”
Later, when their new houses were being built, they would schedule roaming happy hours in the neighborhood. And when the Robinsons, who were underinsured, had to cover the final stages of the rebuild with insurance money they got for their furniture, their neighbors donated more furniture than they could ever need.
“I felt like I was in college again,” she said. “We had a kitchen table in avocado green and Jetson’s chairs.”
