Lindsay City Council is demolishing Valley Pure’s fire hazard
Lindsay City Council waits for Valley Pure to sell their damaged building before amending their conditional use permit to prevent future fires
LINDSAY – The city council postponed the assessment of a local dispensary’s conditional use permit until the completed sale of 108 West Honolulu. The old building is across the street from old buildings that burnt down in 2021.
The Lindsay City Council is anticipating a meeting to discuss the upcoming amendment of Valley Pure’s conditional use permit (CUP). Valley Pure agreed in their original CUP that one of the conditions of them opening up shop in Lindsay was that they must sell their building on West Honolulu to the city.
The city wants to buy the property because the existing structure at that address is across the street from older buildings on the corner of Honolulu and Elmwood that did not have internal fire suppression measures and burnt to the ground. The two story building is old and now considered a safety hazard.
“It’s right across the street from where we had a fire almost two years ago now. And we’ve purchased other properties that were affected by the fire.” Joe Tanner, City Manager, said.
According to a press release issued by the city of Lindsay in June, the fire started on June 11, 2021 after someone called in the fire at just after 2 a.m. The release stated that the fire was at Cumbias Accessories at 122, E. Honolulu. The first unit arrived minutes after the fire was called in and saw the entire building was engulfed in flames.
Almost half a city block burned to the ground in Lindsay. Several businesses went up in flames in the matter of hours. The culprit to blame was a free standing refillable swamp cooler plugged into a multiplex power strip.
Other units such as Tulare County Fire Department, Porterville Fire Department, Tulare Fire Department and the Visalia Fire Department aided in putting out the fire.
Lt. Nicholas Nave stated that the fire started with the water cooler overheating, but once the fire was ignited flames spread through crawlspaces and walls shared by the businesses on the corner of Honolulu and Elmwood Avenue. Nave added that the building lacked sprinklers intended to help quell flames.
Now, almost two years later, Lindsay is negotiating with Valley Pure to acquire one of the buildings that caught fire. The city will amend Valley Pure’s CUP after the sale of the property is finalized but until then, city council is waiting to finish negotiations with the dispensary.
The council met on May 9 but decided not to discuss the item since the purchase was still under negotiation. After the purchase of the property the council will discuss details of the purchase and how to amend the CUP moving forward.
