Before there was a program, there was a phone call. The Marina Fire Department reached out to ask if we could help residents who were losing their homeowner’s insurance and could not afford the fire abatement work required to keep it. We said yes. That job became the reason the PM Community Commitment Program exists.
The property at 1012 Benito Ave had been left largely abandoned. Overgrown vegetation had taken over the lot, and poison oak had spread close enough to neighboring homes to put nearby families, including those with small children, at risk. The city had red-tagged the property. Residents were facing the loss of their homeowner’s insurance with no clear path to fix it on their own.
The Fire Department needed a landscaping company willing to donate the work. Paolo said yes without hesitation.
The scope of the job was significant. The property had years of unchecked growth, overgrown trees, ivy, and dense brush that had wrapped around structures and spread across the lot. Our crew went in with the equipment and the hours needed to bring it back to a safe, defensible condition.
Every load of debris came out in our own dumpster. Every corner of that property was addressed. The crew worked through dense overgrowth, cleared the areas posing fire risk to the surrounding homes, and left the property in a condition that met city and fire department requirements.
Seeing what that one job meant, not just for the homeowner but for the whole block, was what pushed Paolo to formalize the effort. If the Fire Department was reaching out because the need was real, there had to be a structured way to answer it.
That structure became the PM Community Commitment Program.
