FIRE RECOVERY
OVERVIEW
Over a year after the devastating Palisades Fire that forced over 100,000 individuals to evacuate and destroyed 56.3% of structures in the Palisades leaving tens of thousands of individuals displaced, our community still faces a long road to recovery. The fires not only destroyed structures, but lives were also lost, thousands of our community members remain displaced, and we lost anchoring institutions and small businesses. Our recovery and rebuilding efforts must focus on immediate short-term needs for fire survivors, while also planning for a long term recovery that ensures we rebuild the Palisades back stronger and more resilient.
Too many Palisadians continue to face rebuilding uncertainty. In a recent survey, the Pacific Palisades Community Council found that only 1 in 4 residents have returned to the Palisades, and while ⅔ of the impacted residents surveyed express planning a rebuild, only 13% of single-family homeowners have actually begun reconstruction. Mobile home residents of the Palisades Bowl and Tahitian Terrace only recently got their land cleared. Many renters whose units were destroyed or rendered uninhabitable, including those from the 770 lost rent‑controlled units in Pacific Palisades, remain displaced, often living in temporary housing outside the community and reporting concerns about finding affordable rentals if they do return. The slow, stalled recovery is the result of intertwined financial and regulatory hurdles. Finalizing a rebuild plan is a financial commitment, and without guaranteed insurance payouts, many residents are finding it hard to commit to a build. A PaliBuilds analysis of real-world anonymized data reveals that the differential between insurance estimates and local rebuild budgets was approximately $1.45 million per home. For residents who cannot afford this uncertainty, the path of least resistance has involved waiting to make the decision to rebuild or selling their land to corporate investors.
The impact of the fire continues to reverberate beyond even the residents who lost their homes.. The fires also caused thousands of workers to lose their livelihoods, especially impacting Latino workers. 34% of the jobs were held by Latinos. Most of these occupations and industries, such as service, retail, and manual labor, are not conducive to remote work. The UCLA Labor Center found that 7 out of 10 domestic workers permanently lost their jobs, while 8 out of 10 were negatively financially impacted. The fires impacted an entire ecosystem of housekeepers, nannies, landscapers, restaurant workers and others who have not been at the forefront of our fire response strategy.
The fires also revealed the deep vulnerabilities and short-sightedness in our evacuation planning and emergency response infrastructure. A series of after-action reports commissioned by the City and completed by AECOM reveal that our response to the fires was hindered by outdated policies and procedures, which created ambiguity around evaluation authority, undertrained law enforcement and emergency managers who were not adequately prepared for wildfire response, and resource constraints, such as staffing and equipment shortages, that magnified in light of the fires. Dissemination of information to everyday Angelenos was also inadequate and untimely. Without addressing these fundamental concerns, our work will remain incomplete, and our communities will remain vulnerable to future disasters.
Ultimately, while some progress has been made, many residents workers, particularly seniors, young families, and renters, remain displaced, uninsured, underinsured, and unsure whether they will return, and confidence in the city’s and local government’s capacity to prevent or respond to future disasters continues to be at an all-time low. Palisadians deserve full accountability and stronger leadership from our city government.
Our complex recovery effort requires steady and competent leadership. As Councilmember, in collaboration with and led by the Palisades community, I will ensure my office is prepared to take over our rebuilding and recovery effort on Day 1. I am committed to ensuring Palisadians continue to have a strong champion in City Hall.
RESIDENT-FOCUSED REBUILD AND RECOVERY
It’s crucial that the City address people’s most immediate needs and biggest concerns.
While much of the public conversation has been focused on whether or not residents are rebuilding, for those whose properties were not completely destroyed, the process of repairing and restoring has been just as complicated. Commonly, homeowners who needed to remediate smoke and soot, replace windows and doors, or conduct partial structural repairs found themselves stuck in seemingly endless insurance negotiations.
Insurance gaps, rising construction costs, and concerns about future wildfire risk have made it difficult to determine whether rebuilding is desirable for residents facing that decision. These are most taxing for seniors, who are overwhelmed by the process and fearful that they are susceptible to scams and fraud. Even amongst residents prepared to rebuild, the slow, long process of obtaining building permits and undergoing inspections has been frustrating, especially since the rebuild permit has been accompanied by requirements to double sidewalks and expand public‑right‑of‑way available.
Hire dedicated rebuild navigators:
I would hire trained, dedicated caseworkers to follow each homeowner end-to-end through the rebuild or repair process, coordinating across all relevant city, county, and state agencies. The caseworker would support residents at every stage of the process, they would help residents evaluate whether to repair or rebuild. During the permitting stage, they would assist with applications, documentation, and interdepartmental approvals, ensuring residents are not left to navigate overlapping agencies on their own. In the construction and rebuild stage, caseworkers would check in during inspections, help resolve any compliance issues, and coordinate with contractors or city inspectors to facilitate a smooth rebuild. By serving as a single point of contact, the careworker would help residents feel supported throughout a process.
Ensure rebuilding is an option to all homeowners:
People wrongly assume that every homeowner in the Palisades is able to afford the rebuild. That is simply not the case. Some longtime homeowners bought decades ago at much lower prices and now have limited cash reserves or less robust insurance coverage. These homeowners should not be displaced or forced to sell their property to investors due to financial barriers. I will introduce direct financial assistance, in the form of forgivable loans and grants, for all households to rebuild
Adopt tools to expedite the rebuilding process:
I will support and explore policies and partnerships that expedite rebuilding options, including pre-approved prefab and modular home designs for faster ministerial approval, as well as bulk-purchase contracts for key materials like heat pumps, solar panels, and fire-resistant products to reduce costs for residents.
Ensure a high-quality rebuild through unionized labor:
I will push the City Council to encourage union labor on publicly funded and incentivized rebuild projects so we can harness the higher productivity, higher quality, lower risk of delays, and more predictable costs that come with a unionized, skilled workforce
Promote rebuilding strategies that improve affordability:
I will encourage building ADUs by waiving or reducing local impact fees, permit fees, utility connection fees, and parcel tax adjustments for Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs). I will also work closely with residents to assuage their concerns about property taxes, clarifying that building an ADU does not increase their property tax rate as assessed by LA County. In the short term, ADUs are a place where homeowners can live while rebuilding the primary residence or provide housing to displaced friends and families. In the long term, ADUs increase housing supply, create naturally lower-cost rental units for community members and workers, and encourage multi-generational living
Advocate for insurance reforms:
I will advocate for statewide insurance reforms to protect homeowners from predatory practices, such as excessive premium increases after wildfire events, claim denials for reasonable fire- or smoke-related damages, and policies that underinsure properties in high-risk areas. At the same time, I will push for additional incentives for fire-resilient rebuilding, including Class A fire-rated roofs, ember-resistant vents, non-combustible defensible space, and clean energy systems
Ensure renters are also able to return:
I will ensure that residents of rental communities, including Palisades Bowl and Tahitian Terrace, have the support they need to return to their homes once repairs or rebuilds are complete. In the aftermath of the fires, I helped advocate for temporary tenant protections to ensure renters were not displaced. I supported SB 610, which requires landlords to remediate fire‑damaged properties and guarantees that tenants can return to their homes at the same pre‑disaster rent once the unit is safe, closing critical gaps in disaster housing protections and I will continue this work in office.
CARE FOR EVERYONE IMPACTED BY THE FIRES
It's important to understand the full impact of the Palisades Fire on the livelihoods and economic stability of affected communities. Affected communities, including domestic workers, manual laborers, and small business owners, deserve to receive the resources and support they need to recover as well, especially as these very groups are now also under attack from federal immigration policy.
Build a displaced worker registry:
I will work with worker centers and community organizations to create a voluntary registry of all workers disrupted by the Palisades fire, including those who did not file for state-administered Unemployment Insurance.This gives the city an opportunity to directly share rebuild-related job openings and training programs with impacted workers, modeled after California clean‑energy workforce initiatives, where job training slots were prioritized for displaced fossil fuel workers
Ensure safety for workers rebuilding:
I will ensure that all workers participating in the Palisades rebuild have the proper protection and training, including providing the necessary personal protective equipment for potentially hazardous work-sites. I will ensure clear, multilingual safety materials are available to workers, and I will work with city agencies, contractors, and labor partners to regularly monitor worksites and ensure compliance to safety standards.
Support every Palisades business:
In my Economy for All platform, you can read about my support for policies to strengthen all small businesses, including access to recovery grants, technical assistance, and streamlined permitting. In the Palisades, specifically, I will prioritize restoring economic activity in high-traffic commercial areas like the Palisades Recreation Center, being rebuilt, and Sunset Blvd, while making sure no business is left behind, and the Palisades has an opportunity to maintain its unique character.
SUPPORTING A CLIMATE RESILIENT LONG TERM RECOVERY PLAN
As rebuilding begins, residents face mounting pressure to recover quickly while also preparing for future climate-driven disasters. This moment presents a critical question: whether to rebuild using outdated, polluting infrastructure that leaves communities vulnerable, or to embrace safer, more sustainable solutions. Without strong policies from leadership, residents, especially those with limited resources, risk being locked into systems that endanger health, raise long-term costs, and leave communities more exposed to future climate risks. Experts, such as AECOM, have provided guidance on how to best adapt our land-use policies in response to climate-change. As city leaders it is our prerogative to implement these recommendations with fidelity and success. Now is the time to rebuild stronger, with clean energy, fire-resilient design, water-smart landscaping, and a deep commitment to long-term community safety and equity and research shows that residents impacted are willing to make this trade-off.
Implement improvements identified by LADWP:
I will work closely with the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) to implement improvements they have identified in their one-year update, with a focus on actualizing underground construction of utility infrastructure. Historically, undergrounding was considered a local improvement, which is why it requires a majority of property owners on the street to sign a petition to form an underground utility district, and agree to share in the cost. This logic is outdated and does not apply to wild-fire prone areas. In fire-prone areas, undergrounding is a public safety investment that reduces liability risk and costs city-wide. Therefore, I will work with LADWP to diversify funding sources so that the cost of necessary improvements such as undergrounding are not placed primarily on homeowners. In the long-term, I will support the implementation of a five-year Capital Investment Plan that recognises energy improvement such as grid hardening and undergrounding as capital priorities.
Incentivize an electric-energy transition in the rebuild:
As a councilmember, I will incentivize an electric rebuild by updating build codes to require sufficient capacity for 100% electric homes, solar + storage, heat pumps, induction stoves, electric water heaters, and high-MERV air filters. To lower the costs of electrification, I will push the city to establish local rebates and fee-waivers for electrification, solar, battery storage, ADUs, and all-electric appliances.In addition to reducing fire-risk, electrification reduces rebuilding time and utility costs.
Update zoning policies to reflect Wildland-Urban Interface (WUI) standards:
As we rebuild, we owe it to residents to examine whether current land-use designations and density allowances are appropriate in the highest-risk zones and establish criteria for voluntary managed retreat from extremely vulnerable parcels of land (parcels that repeatedly burn or pose unacceptable risk in the case of sea level rising). We can use zoning tools such as conditional overlays, hazard-driven land designations, and transfer of development rights to steer future development to safer locations. While some of these land-use protections were introduced under the Mayor’s ED9 in response to the fire, we must ensure they are not limited to short-term emergency measures and instead embedded in how we steward our land.
Improve vegetation management:
In areas like the Palisades, which feature exposed residential neighborhoods, it’s important to coordinate vegetation management across individual property boundaries. There are industry-standard practices we can apply in the Palisades to prevent future disasters. These include introducing green buffers between residential properties, introducing low-flammability vegetation covers on critical fire control features such as ridgetops and access corridors, removing fire-prone invasive species like eucalyptus and flammable ornamental grasses, ensuring consistent brush clearance, and ensuring proper hydration practices. As a council member, it will be my responsibility to secure consistent funding sources for ongoing vegetation management. I will explore state-administered wildfire prevention grants, joint-funded vegetation management programs (VMPs), and even tax-based ones that have been successful in Northern California.
Enhance water supply and system reliability:
I will explore the feasibility of requiring construction and maintenance of alternative water sources such as community-scale water-storage facilities, rainwater catchment systems, bioswales to absorb stormwater runoff back into the ground, and even privately owned water assets. It’s equally as important to ensure that emergency responders can access our city's assets in the event of an emergency. I will work to install real-time pressure tracking to ensure water availability and prevent dry hydrants while sharing real-time data with firefighters, install remote-controlled isolation valves to prevent system-wide pressure degradation, and invest in additional fire equipment such as hydrants and super scoopers.
INCREASE COMMUNITY SAFETY AND PREPAREDNESS
Residents have made it clear that safety is their primary concern. Nearly all residents view the creation of evacuation routes and a coordinated emergency response as essential to their decision. Of note, the city’s emergency communication system was not multilingual at the time of the fires, which left thousands of residents without the direction they needed to get to safety. It’s imperative we restore community trust, and ensure that we do not allow chaos to reign the next time there is a large or small fire event. The recently published AECOM logistics and traffic management recommendations can be positioned not just as steps to a coordinated rebuild process but also as permanent emergency readiness infrastructure.
Strengthen fire-response capacity:
I will work with LAFD to increase our fire response capacity, including a formal feasibility assessment for the addition of a new station in Brentwood.
Encourage community-driven fire-safety planning:
I will ensure Ready Your LA Neighborhood (RYLAN) training offered by the City of Los Angeles Emergency Management Department is more available to residents by expanding the locations and times where it is offered, supporting virtual/hybrid formats of delivery, and incentivizing participation. I will also provide families with emergency packs for their cars and homes, equipped with radios that allow for communication when internet and cell service is not available.
Reinforce emergency evacuation routes:
I will coordinate with other city departments (LAFD, LADOT, BOE, LADWP, and others) to understand and invest in optimal evacuation infrastructure to ensure Palisades residents have pathways to egress. This includes building engineered evacuation corridors, along with dedicated emergency access lanes to guarantee first responders can enter even as residents leave without delay, and where possible, we will create redundant routes so that no one relies on a single road, or route,to safety. I will also complement the creation of community-specific safety plans with regular evacuation drills, especially in fire-severity zones
Create multi-lingual channels for communication:
I will commission a feasibility study to identify gaps and redundancies in the city’s current emergency messaging systems, to understand how best to streamline alerts, ensure multilingual coverage, and coordinate communication from city agencies so that residents receive clear information from one-specific source during any emergency.
Implement an inter-departmental emergency response center:
The AECOM Plan recommends establishing a Special Interest Group (SIG) to provide standing, cross-departmental coordination, coordination decision-making, and unified oversight of the Palisades rebuild. I will not only advocate for the creation of such a body, but I will also study its long-term viability to determine whether it makes sense to establish it as a permanent entity for emergency preparedness and management.