Frustration builds in California

CHICO, Calif. — It’s been 12 days since Christina Taft started the frantic search for her mother, Victoria, who refused to evacuate their Paradise home as flames neared, and six days since she gave authorities a cheek swab to identify remains that are likely her mother’s.

She still hasn’t received confirmation that her mother is dead, and says she’s been frustrated by what she feels is a lack of communication from Butte County officials.

“They said they found remains, they didn’t say her remains. They won’t confirm it to me the whole time,” Taft said Monday.

With 79 people killed in California’s deadliest wildfire in at least a century, there are still 700 names on the list of missing. That’s down considerably from the 1,300 that it had been, but the figure is inexact, progress has been slow and the many days of uncertainty are adding to the stress.

More than a dozen people are marked as “unknowns,” without first or last names. In some cases, names are listed twice or more times under different spellings. Others have been confirmed dead, and their names simply haven’t been taken off yet.

Butte County Sheriff Kory Honea has said he released the rough and incomplete list in hopes that people would contact authorities to say they are OK. He has called it “raw data” compiled from phone calls, emails and other reports.

“My view on this has been that I would prefer to get the information out and start working to find who is unaccounted for and who is not,” Honea said Monday. “I would put progress over perfection.”

He said his office was working with the Red Cross to account for people entering and leaving shelters. Evacuees are also helping narrow the list, sometimes by chance.

Robert James Miles, who lost his Paradise trailer in the blaze, was staying at a shelter