In 1983, the U.S. Congress allocated more than $42 million for relocation efforts.[22] Nearly all of the residents accepted the government's buyout offers. More than 1,000 people moved out of the town and 500 structures were demolished. By 1990, the census recorded 63 remaining residents.[23]

There is a non-linear relationship between the age structure of vegetation and the intensity of fires. Fifty-year-old trees burn fifty times more intensely than twenty-year-old trees. However, because of the power of influential residents living in the Malibu region, since 1919 the local policy has been one of ‘total fire suppression’. This means

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