President Biden visits Beach Town, California
Capitola, The Gulf Observer: President Joe Biden walked along the splintered boardwalk of this picture-postcard California beach town Thursday and heard from business owners struggling to repair damage to their shops after deadly storms caused devastation across the region and killed more than 20 people statewide.
Biden toured a gutted seafood restaurant and the badly flooded Paradise Beach Grille, not far from the collapsed Capitola Pier and the brightly painted pink, orange and teal shops that were all boarded up following the storms. Walls were crumbling, debris scattered everywhere and floors swept away by raging waters.
Paradise Beach Grille Owner Chuck Maier told Biden that water had gushed up from the floor and swamped his business on Monterey Bay not far from Santa Cruz. “No kidding,” Biden exclaimed.
“You don’t feel it until you walk the streets,” Biden said later from nearby Seacliff State Park, speaking about how bad the damage was and blaming climate change for the severity of the weather. “If anybody doubts the climate is changing, they must have been asleep for the last couple of years.”
Flanked by first responders, California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Federal Emergency Management Agency Administrator Deanne Criswell, the president highlighted the damage from the punishing rains, powerful winds, floods and landslides. He warned climate change would create more extreme weather.
Biden has already approved a major disaster declaration for the state, freeing additional federal resources for recovery efforts. Hours before the visit, he raised the level of federal assistance available even higher.
More than 500 FEMA and other federal personnel have been deployed to California to support the emergency operations. Thousands of bystanders gathered for the president’s visit and cheered him as he toured the boardwalk.
Newsom praised the fast federal response, but warned the threat remains high in a state that just a few years ago suffered devastating drought and is now facing record rainfall.
“The scale and scope of these floods is hard to understand unless you get out, and that’s why I couldn’t be more grateful to the president for taking the time to come out again.”
