My family has been in the Inland Empire of California for multiple generations. Both my maternal and paternal grandparents moved out west from Georgia and Missouri, respectively, in search of better work opportunities in California. My grandfather, specifically, settled down in Fontana, where he raised my mom and her siblings, who then had me and my siblings, in that same city of Fontana.
Located about 50 miles east of Los Angeles, Fontana started off as a player in the agriculture business in the late 1920s, but its true claim to fame is as a mecca for steel on the West Coast, with this export being the pride of the city. It is at one of these steel mills that my grandfather worked and was able to raise a family of six. However, every year, there also occurs a spectre that haunts the city.
The Santa Ana winds are a meteorological event that occur typically every fall and winter in the SoCal and Baja California region. They arise as a result of a high-pressure system from the Great Basin region compacting with the low-pressure system of the California coast, causing winds that sometimes reach up to 100mph.
These are the same winds that caused the Los Angeles wildfires at the onset of 2025, and plagued the city by killing 30 people, destroying 18,000 structures (both commercial and residential) and devouring over 39,000 acres in the greater Los Angeles area. As mentioned in Episode 1 of Electric Futures, Season 2, it is believed that the Eaton Fire was caused by a power line downed by the winds.
Lytle Creek during the January 2025 wildfires taken by Terrence Cline.
Fontana is currently dealing with some of the most intense rolling blackouts as power companies shut down their grids to avoid responsibility for any wildfires. This has become a normal thing for the city as well as those who live, work, and play in the Inland Empire. Childhood birthdays ruined, Christmases and light shows cancelled due to the winds. Sharp upticks in vehicle accidents and traffic collisions. It can often ruin holiday get-togethers, disrupt traffic through fallen semi trucks, increase illnesses, and generally make the city less pleasant to live in for sometimes months at a time.
As someone who plans to be a homeowner one day, I look at my home town with possible consideration. For what it’s worth, there is a lot to love. A safe community, great public schools, and a fighting spirit that shows the world that, like it or not, we’re here and we’re here to stay. However, I would not be telling the truth if I said I didn’t want my property value to increase exponentially over time, as well as be a medium for generational wealth to my future children. It is sometimes difficult to imagine how I could achieve that with the city dealing with threats of wildfires nearly three months out of the year, but knowing the Inland Empire’s fighting spirit, I know this is a dream that can come to fruition.
It is this experience that gave me a great perspective on the second season of Electric Futures. The Menifee community of Shadow Mountain illustrates exactly the type of technology needed to elevate the Inland Empire to greater heights for homebuyers and future generations. As the area faces these challenges, I am excited to see how the cities will plan to overcome them, and look forward to potentially communicating these strategies to the greater public as a journalist and producer.
I hope that the Inland Empire will one day become a model for other places in the world to combat issues caused by climate change and other crises.
Spencer Cline is the associate producer for Electric Futures podcast.
