Voices

“Wham! All of a sudden it was on us.”

--Curtis Reese, a homeless man who escaped rising waters that engulfed his encampment on the Ventura River bottom.

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“That mountain is going to move. . . . And when it does, I’m going to be ready.”

--Mike Mauna of Thousand Oaks, as he stacked sandbags to protect his house on Asta Avenue from a steep hillside behind it.

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“All my little girl has said today is ‘wa-wa, wa-wa.’ ”

--Anna Mendoza, describing her 20-month-old daughter’s reaction after the pair fled from the Ventura River bottom.

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“Along with the flooding, the strawberries are getting hit hard, the celery’s getting hit hard, the leaf lettuce is getting hit hard. We were in pretty good shape until midnight, when the hard rain started coming down.”

--Earl McPhail, Ventura County’s agricultural commissioner, on the extent of damage to the county’s crops.

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“The thing is, in Ojai we are vulnerable to many things--fire, floods. . . . We haven’t had any pestilence yet, but maybe the Medfly will get here. We are pretty conditioned to emergencies.”

--Nina V. Shelley, a city councilwoman in Ojai, which was heavily damaged by the rash of storms.

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“I lost $1,500. I had it buried. I couldn’t get to where it was at. I was worried about my dog. The money can be replaced--the dog can’t.”

--Rick Wells, a homeless man rescued from the Ventura River bottom.

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“We are probably going to have to head back and stay in a hotel in Ventura. There is nothing else a lawyer can do in the rain.”

--Brad Peugeot, a Los Angeles attorney who was turned back on his way to Santa Barbara because of flooding on the Ventura Freeway.

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“When we left, the water was coming down like a sheet. It was just a wall.”

--Jennifer Preudhomme, who fled her Casitas Springs home for a shelter at Ventura’s De Anza Middle School.

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“I never thought it would rain like this in California. It’s amazing.”

--Mark Dexter, a Phoenix-based truck driver who was stranded in Ventura.

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“January has not been our month.”

--Lois Guy of Santa Paula, who was evacuated with her family to a Red Cross shelter. Last January, they lost their home in the San Fernando Valley to the Northridge earthquake.

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“We’ve all lived here awhile. Neighbors help neighbors, that’s what it takes.”

--Harvey Hooten, 46, of Live Oaks Acres, pausing for a beer after a morning of sandbagging homes threatened by the Ventura River.

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“It’s going to happen again and again and again, because the county doesn’t want to spend the bucks for proper drainage.”

--Pete Gutierrez, a resident of El Rio, as he loaded sandbags to protect his garage from a stream of water.

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“It’s a mess. I’ve never seen anything like that.”

--Roger Guest, a trucker from Newbury Park, who was driving through Ventura County from Bakersfield when he was stopped by flooding on California 126.