Located in Santa Ynez, The Ballard hotel is offering free rooms to first responders and firefighters responding to the Lake Fire.
“Right now, I’ve got fire personnel staying upstairs," said Rodnee Stillwell, Associate Director of Taskforce and Training for the Kirkwood Collection, The Ballard. "They are able to check in early. Luckily, we are not quite as busy, obviously, due to the fires.”
Other hotels are following suit by offering discounted rates.
“We have five different properties here in the area and all five are offering discounts for evacuees and firefighters,” said Chris Bartholomew, Hotel Manager, The Sideways Inn.
While some fire personnel are staying in these rooms, hundreds if not thousands more are sleeping elsewhere.
“Most of our personnel stay either in their tents or choose to go into what are called our mobile sleep trailers. Our mobile sleep trailers are very, very large semi-tractor-trailer looking things that have all the creature comforts,” explained Marc Peebles, Public Information Officer, Interagency Incident Management Team.
