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"slug": "an-economist-who-survived-a-wildfire-is-now-taking-on-californias-insurance-crisis",
"title": "An Economist Who Survived a Wildfire Is Now Taking on California's Insurance Crisis",
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"content": "\u003cp>Three decades ago, Nancy Wallace narrowly escaped death in what was then California’s most destructive wildfire. Since then, the problem of wildfires has gotten much worse, so bad in fact that the state now faces a crisis in its market for home insurance. Solving the insurance crisis is something that’s very much in Wallace’s wheelhouse, and she’s been developing some important ideas and tools to try to fix it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wallace is a professor of finance and real estate at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, and she’s a former adviser to \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef7518929ced10a9f7f06a8c0ea57e929cddb1c954abd77cee9267cd15ad5db2539db1ff2d2b7789f6c0addedd6066e75004\">the U.S. Treasury Department\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75b0c04f222950d350d1e6d7870773b9a3bf30fbf2fd253aa66deda96eb6bbfc8448e9f0e97e5ffa877514308f0c876b1c\">Federal Reserve\u003c/a>. She specializes in identifying and mitigating financial risks in housing markets, and she’s conducted some eye-opening studies on the rising risk of wildfires. She’s working with climate scientists to create forecast models that can help rescue failing insurance markets. And she’s advocating for new insurance schemes and financial products that would help California homeowners retrofit their homes and lower the danger that they’re destroyed by future fires.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Wallace’s expertise in this area is more than just academic. It’s informed by her horrifying experience.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>A story that begins with fire\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>On Oct. 20, 1991, Wallace smelled smoke wafting in the air outside of her home, high in the hills above Oakland, Calif. The day before, a fire had broken out down her street. Firefighters had put it out, but she was now on high alert. The air felt dry. The wind was picking up. And the smell of smoke scared her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wallace grew up in Michigan, never experiencing the danger of wildfires. She and her husband had moved to Oakland a few years earlier when she got a job at nearby UC Berkeley. They scraped together every penny they could and bought a fixer-upper in the Oakland Hills, near the ridgeline of the mountains above the city, surrounded by Monterey pine and eucalyptus trees. They had finished remodeling their home just one month before this fateful day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After smelling smoke, Wallace and her husband grabbed family heirlooms and antiques, important documents, some paintings and clothes, and their cat. They jumped in their car. And that’s when they saw a hurricane of fire engulfing the neighborhood below them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12023795\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1600px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12023795\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-53.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1600\" height=\"1063\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-53.jpg 1600w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-53-800x532.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-53-1020x678.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-53-160x106.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-53-1536x1020.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1600px) 100vw, 1600px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Oakland Hills fire burned thousands of homes and created a dust cloud that could be seen for miles. Picture taken on Oct. 20, 1991. \u003ccite>(San Francisco Chronicle/Hearst Newspapers/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>They turned frantic. When they hit a fork in the road, they hesitated whether to turn right or left. Both directions were being enveloped by flames. Wallace insisted they go right.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Seconds after going right, a car came out of the flames,” Wallace says. “And they said, “If you go up this road, you will die.” They said that power lines had fallen on a truck. A firefighter (who turned out to be Oakland Fire Battalion Chief James M. Riley Jr.) and a passenger he was trying to rescue were both dead, and the truck and power lines were blocking the road. Wallace and her husband were forced to turn around.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At that point our cat shed her fur — literally shed her fur,” Wallace says. “Because the fire was just beating on our car. I thought for sure the car would burst into flames.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They drove the other direction, down a winding, one-lane road through the heart of the inferno. Embers were flying everywhere. Houses and trees were bursting into flames. They saw a motorcyclist on fire. They saw frantic drivers crashing into trees. They saw a heroic policeman — officer John William Grubensky, \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75bce67e527b223b6b74454469a6ee4b5c4d28d4b80c1c74ca9c048c5577e51dda01054a7fea5db647bea7c09420b6d60a\">who would soon die attempting to rescue a family from a burning home\u003c/a> — on a loudspeaker, trying to keep people calm and get them out safely.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wallace and her husband got lucky. Their 6-year-old son was miles away, safe and sound during the whole ordeal. He had spent the night at a friend’s house. They were also lucky, of course, to escape with their lives. On the very same narrow street they had escaped on, vehicles after them got stuck behind a car that crashed, blocking their exit route. “Just on that one street, I think there were five people who died, along with officer Grubensky,” Wallace says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12023797\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1600px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12023797\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-54.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1600\" height=\"1218\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-54.jpg 1600w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-54-800x609.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-54-1020x776.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-54-160x122.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-54-1536x1169.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1600px) 100vw, 1600px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Claremont Hotel in October 1991. \u003ccite>(MediaNews Group/Oakland Tribune/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>About two weeks later, Nancy and her family returned to see what happened to their home. It had turned to ash. “In the middle of this ash was a porcelain bowl,” Nancy says. Porcelain apparently doesn’t burn. “It was just sitting on top of the ash by itself. It was surreal. Everything else was gone.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Oakland Hills fire in 1991 ended up \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75485da7a340229be9c97f0e6420bf14a101443bb7f24e1e272415cbf09f6cfd05138067d7b96668b5ed57ec92aea7a128\">killing 25 people\u003c/a>, injuring 150 others, and destroying \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75ddd648a58c07d66aa9ddc9ec1529a704070de632598dd8b995cc7f99ca0cc8fa046ac848b82a3c3bd9ad1540bef156c9\">around 3,000 homes\u003c/a>. For a long time, it was \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75cf0200df54bf0a3d6ffb6d4f929c601dfc5564db5e40f55c222340b07cef5c051e7e292a3241c323ebbd7261014e0795\">the most destructive fire\u003c/a> in \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef750b1d7065c27ee79c4534ff1929155f236c2f543cf6e8581b18e39ef69b3bc9665b6e08c77eca56ac00c49a9311d8c1ba\">California history\u003c/a>. That is, until the last decade, when California has seen a mind-boggling uptick in even more destructive fires, including \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef753f8019c3c068c3eda0100d6cde825c212e8ef4b717d8666b3f4693739937c96492c750fdef03a0565e5a814432f85d38\">two in LA in recent weeks\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Why California properties got more valuable after fires\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Around five years ago, Wallace recounted her incredible story in the Oakland Hills fire to her former PhD student Carles Vergara-Alert, who was back in Berkeley on a sabbatical as a visiting professor, and two other Berkeley economists, Richard Stanton and Paulo Issler. And it inspired them to study how the rising risk of wildfires was affecting housing markets.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A pretty weird thing seemed to be happening to properties destroyed by fires. Nancy noticed it in her own community. After the fire, people got insurance money and rebuilt their homes. Their homes seemed to get bigger and nicer. And, like elsewhere in the Bay Area, their home values went on a rocket ship to the moon in the decades after the fire. It was like everyone had forgotten that it was still a risky area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Of course, this was just a casual observation about one place. Wallace, Vergara-Alert, Issler, and Stanton decided they wanted to build a comprehensive dataset to see what happened, more systematically, to California housing markets after they were scorched by wildfires.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The dataset they assembled is pretty amazing. After each fire in California, the state’s fire agency, Cal Fire, sends a team of technicians to investigate. They create detailed maps of the burn areas and document, house by house, damages. The economists used this rich data on burn areas between 2001 and 2015, focusing on the houses that burned and the nearby houses that did not. They combined this data with their own comprehensive data on virtually every home in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You might think that property prices of the houses that burned would plummet. I mean, the house is destroyed, nearby parks, trees, hiking trails, and everything else is scorched, and the home’s views become burn zones, at least in the near-to-medium term, before nature and man-made structures come back from the ashes. Even more, you might think that the risks of living in the area would be top of mind for years to come, suppressing demand to live there. But no. Houses continue to be valuable investments in these fire-prone communities. Not only that. The economists find that, between 2001 and 2015, the properties that burned down and got rebuilt were actually significantly more valuable within five years of the catastrophe. Fire actually boosted their property values![aside label=\"Related Stories\" postID=\"science_1994867,science_1993316,news_12022996,news_12019991\"]One sort of obvious reason for this is these rebuilt houses were newer. And they were built to follow a more modern, state-mandated building code, making them more resistant to fire and earthquakes and generally safer. And, just as Wallace had observed in her own neighborhood, these rebuilt houses tended to be bigger.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And, in big wildfires, the houses in whole neighborhoods got built back bigger and better. Because the value of your house is influenced by the value of houses in your neighborhood, that was another boost to property values. Meanwhile, nature recovers — and, Wallace says, it recovers rather quickly in areas with Mediterranean climates — and the amazing beauty of these Californian communities returns.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, fires are obviously devastating in terms of lives lost, people hurt, disruptions to business, and so on. And for people who don’t have insurance, they cause huge financial losses. But — at least in the period the economists study, when, for the most part, there were functioning private insurance markets that offered full coverage and generous payouts — it seems like fires were actually a financial win for the average insured homeowner who lost their home. They were also a win for developers and construction companies, which rebuilt the homes. And they were at least partially a win for municipalities because rebuilt, more valuable homes meant higher property taxes, offsetting the tremendous taxpayer costs of fighting the fire and cleaning up afterwards.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Of course, there was at least one huge financial loser in all of this: insurance companies. They had to foot the massive bill for home reconstructions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In normal insurance markets, that’s fine. People pay premiums, and those premiums are estimated based on the probability of losses. When those losses materialize, the insurance company pays. It’s the whole game.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But, Wallace says, something funky began happening in California’s insurance markets, and the state’s insurance system ended up breaking down.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>How California’s insurance market failed\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>First, the state has had restrictive regulations on what insurance companies can charge. Wallace says that a big force behind that was \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75935a55e5b4f983979ff21aed4f5612ec244a8152bf65baa21a39f957595996452ef222251e6f34859177d743878725d9\">Proposition 103\u003c/a>, which was championed by Ralph Nader. Back in the 1980s, Nader and other consumer activists argued that insurance companies should be strictly regulated when setting their premium rates. This ballot initiative, which was \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef754836c5dd42e63930ebfddf0673a0a63f0485dd58d5d3a6a2a18676baafd08074c8a161053c7dda64fb585a2d85138ad3\">narrowly approved\u003c/a> by California voters in 1988, required insurance companies to get rate hikes approved by the California Department of Insurance, and it introduced a bunch of measures that made rate hikes much harder to impose.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In this post-Prop 103 regulatory scheme, for example, the state prevented insurance companies from using forward-looking estimates of risk — so-called “catastrophe models” — when setting their rates. Consumer advocates saw these kinds of models, which use computers to forecast an uncertain future, as a Trojan horse for price-gouging. The state forced insurers to only use backward-looking estimates of risk. They figured it was more transparent and fair to use hard, verifiable data from the past. The state required insurers to base their premium rates on a 20-year average of historical losses. It also prevented insurers from pricing into their premiums the cost of “reinsurance,” or insurance for insurers — something that insurers sometimes need after extreme weather events require massive payouts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With these and other measures, the California Department of Insurance effectively kept home insurance premiums artificially low. And, Nancy says, that had some big side effects, like incentivizing more people to live in fire-prone areas.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Prices are important, especially for things like where people locate, where houses are built,” Wallace says. Artificially low insurance prices, for example, may have encouraged cities and developers to build neighborhoods closer to the flammable wilderness. In fact, in recent decades, fire-prone areas have seen some of \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef752c85f755d7f54f2bc043d7d1d34258eba8e1c7c1ebf06fc3d30eef1874e17199f85a6715f4d26bab2a33138ba2c2c34d\">the fastest population growth\u003c/a> rates in the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And greater density in fire country may have contributed, Wallace says, to problems like narrow roads prone to traffic jams, making escapes from wildfires — like the one she personally made — much harder. And this increased number of people living in fire-prone areas meant that taxpayers had to invest much more in firefighting and other public services to keep people safe.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For a time, California’s insurance system was maybe workable. Big, destructive fires used to be rarer, so the insurance system didn’t experience as much stress. But, Wallace says, around a decade ago, there was a tipping point where big wildfires started becoming more frequent and more destructive. California has seen hotter temperatures. Droughts have increased. Wind speeds have picked up. And big, destructive fires have become more commonplace.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With climate change, it has started to become clear that the future will not look like the past, and California’s regulations requiring insurers to make pricing decisions based on backward-looking models of risk have started to look pretty dumb.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a free market for insurance, a higher risk for catastrophe would result in higher insurance premiums. But since California regulations prevented that, insurance premiums stayed artificially low. As big fires began demanding big payouts and the specter of more mass destruction loomed larger, insurance companies struggled to make the math work. And so they began fleeing the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The California Department of Insurance is seriously at fault,” Wallace says. “They destroyed the markets.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With no ability to get standard private insurance, many Californians, especially in high-risk areas, were forced onto the state-created insurance plan of last resort, the California FAIR Plan (which is funded by private insurance companies and their policyholders in exchange for these insurers being able to sell property insurance in the state). This plan was not meant to be a permanent solution. It’s a high-risk pool. It’s expensive and it caps insurance payouts, so people with valuable properties, for example, can’t get the full value of their homes insured. (For more on the Fair Plan, listen to \u003cem>The Indicator’s\u003c/em> \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef752def554e017046c68d64e56d9e122b948668defee7f3d98a8ca83c3b48f68959bbd53a4be40108278e4b49a01efa1366\">recent podcast\u003c/a> episode, “\u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75ad3ea8e1c631a94cbfd2f84a8bb2e0bdc5c41cb89b0aa89806246574584a2b7a19e0b2d5d203e970a6f94db4ef3aa9cb\">Who’s on the hook for California’s uninsurable homes?”\u003c/a>)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last year, seeing insurers fleeing their state — and perhaps seeing the studies by Wallace and others — California regulators came to the conclusion that the state’s insurance regulations were unworkable. \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75a5ff1040268ead24f714da3ba14e4b61045ac73f797c9a64f33b8504aa92ce3015cef0a1f782e8d75cca1ae80db21f3b\">California’s insurance commissioner\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75afd08e6ec55b098466c8fb29f8a8aa0de37ff268054db7acdfbb72a833abc449d17eeefb0223deb668d431aec9134f60\">supported by Governor Gavin Newsom\u003c/a>, ended the ban on using forward-looking catastrophe models for setting premiums, giving the green light to the insurance industry to start actually trying to price in the rising risk and cost of wildfires. As part of this deal, insurers have agreed to underwrite more policies in fire-prone areas. Those changes took effect mere weeks ago, just before the outbreak of fires around Los Angeles.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Governor Newsom \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef758d671df0f55cb759f76d79ae6a39676c82aaeb68eff8baa39485a93815c0798ffec35d920f986d03e7419e4b2504f677\">recently touted\u003c/a> the fact that, after these changes took effect, \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75adaa7ecc510b1f002229dc3a5e52b0f0ba21fc0937c8de1d1ff4406e80c380209a180d0e4c2077bb2cae1b115367d0ca\">a private insurer\u003c/a> agreed to insure homes in the town of Paradise, which notoriously burned entirely to the ground in 2018 (listen to \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75923982ac856c35604a589df10ac0713768007a557a138dc8bb106d3a3746a95179e17bd5973a1bde5c377a0be2a53730\">this 2021 \u003cem>Planet Money\u003c/em> episode\u003c/a> about efforts to rebuild the town).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“ I thought that was an absolutely crucial step,” Wallace says of California’s recent reforms to how it regulates insurance markets. “Now we have to get to work and figure out what the true pricing should be.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>What is the right price for living in fire country?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Finding the right price for insurance premiums entails building and refining statistical models that can nail down the risks of wildfires for houses and businesses around the state. The current models, Wallace says, are not good enough. Insurance companies and the government, she says, “literally do not know” what the real risks are. There is quite a bit of uncertainty about, for example, how far fires can spread, which exact homes are the most at risk, and whether big fires in certain places are like 50- or 20- or 10-year events. Inaccurate estimates of fire risks, Wallace says, could result in premiums that are too low, as has been the case for a while in much of California, but also too high in some cases.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And that’s why she and her colleagues at UC Berkeley, and, more specifically, \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef754cff7aad12d66d30529af53e60e7510c3c8be12e3638bfe87ffabe5e31efbdeb49c9b5550a39224ede20bbbf4618d619\">Wallace’s lab\u003c/a> at the Fisher Center for Real Estate and Urban Economics, have been building bridges across disciplines, marshaling the data and intellect of climate scientists, computer scientists, engineers, economists, and more to create high-tech models that can better estimate the risk of wildfires.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And that’s important. As we’ve seen, the costs of fire destruction are enormous. And someone has to pay for it. If homeowners want to continue living in fire-prone areas, Wallace says, they need to bear more of the risk and, in effect, pay higher insurance premiums.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This risk cannot be borne exclusively by insurance companies,” Wallace says. “It’s also got to be borne by homeowners.” Bearing more of that risk would, she says, incentivize homeowners to take more actions to protect their properties (and fight what economists call “moral hazard,” or people’s tendency to not take steps to mitigate risk when they’re insured).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Beyond just accurately pricing wildfire risks, Wallace says, the government and insurance companies should work to incentivize and help homeowners to retrofit older, more flammable homes. Wallace points to \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef7580942e3312338e3342964bed36821bc9734f89f945bfee110ad76ed39d07fe3c7b1d2fd55489311bdd5196c2579778fd\">a study\u003c/a> by economists Patrick Baylis and Judson Boomhower. The economists find that California houses built after the mid-1990s — and, even more, those built after 2008 — are far more likely to survive wildfires. That’s because the state strengthened its building codes during those years, requiring that homes be built with, for example, more fire-retardant siding and roofs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In Paradise, in Sonoma, in Napa, the Woolsey fire, the houses that survive are those with the post-2008 building code requirements,” Wallace says. “The major problem in California is that our [older] housing stock is not built to withstand the embers and the radiant heat of fires.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But updating California’s older housing stock is super expensive. Which is why Wallace wants policymakers and businesspeople to create new home loan programs, which would make it feasible for California homeowners to invest in making their homes more resistant to fire. She believes this could even be a money-making product for financial firms. “If you’re a bank, wouldn’t you like to invest in home loans that make the mortgages that you’re also planning to make safer?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wallace also hopes that, going forward, insurers could offer discounts on home insurance for taking anti-fire measures that lower risks, further incentivizing homeowners to protect their homes and reduce costs. This could be facilitated by technological innovations. For example, Wallace points to a former grad student of hers who actually created an app, \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef753a638d8caa455b595774d9f5ced2a81e82649b882d660f362509fd0d031d668c994a9f0acd398e197f15bb4e72a30e37\">Firebreak\u003c/a>, which helps homeowners identify fire risks around their properties.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>What happens after the fires in the LA hills?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>As Wallace and her colleagues found in their study, for a long time, California homes that were destroyed by fires ended up getting bigger, better, and more valuable. Will the same thing happen again in the LA hills after the latest shocking fires?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wallace suggests that it’s possible this time is different. For one, “We don’t have that insurance market anymore,” Wallace says. “It’s been broken by not allowing firms to price the risk.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Many homes in the LA hills were forced off of private insurance policies that gave them full coverage, and they had to turn to the California FAIR Plan, which caps residential coverage at $3 million. There are a significant number of destroyed homes in the LA hills that were worth more than that. Wallace also points to less affluent neighborhoods, like Altadena, where many homeowners did not have insurance (only people with mortgages are required to have fire casualty insurance). Absent some sort of government help, many fire victims will likely be unable to afford reconstruction. In the wake of natural disasters, construction costs tend to surge because tons of people need to build all at once and there are shortages of everything.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another big cost will be building back better. If the city and state are being sensible, Wallace says, they will make investments in better infrastructure, like a less fire-prone electricity grid and better water systems to fight fires, making it less likely for future fires to break out and spread. Even more, she says, the state should continue mandating that builders of new houses follow the building code that’s proven to be more resilient to fires. “It’s absolutely nonsensical to build back in the same risky way,” Wallace says. (Gov. Gavin Newsom recently issued \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef7510e032185965f148774b9357ac305ff7e327c20e50c1642e00232677078a240787be1e9855470a8a23ef7d9d75f34500\">a vague executive order\u003c/a> on this issue, directing state agencies to waive building regulations to speed up construction, but only those regulations “that can safely be suspended.”)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Because of high costs and more limited insurance coverage and other factors, Wallace says, there may be fewer homes built in the L.A. neighborhoods devastated by fires. And, with higher insurance premiums reflecting the risk for buildings there, these neighborhoods will likely become even more exclusive dens for the rich.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite the current tragic circumstances, however, these burned-down neighborhoods still have a lot going for them. Their views of the ocean and the city are often incredible. Their charred parks and hiking trails will recover. And they’re still close to a legendary metropolis, with a vibrant culture, an incredible economy, and a housing shortage. The land in the L.A. hills is still very valuable.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“L.A. is a major, metropolitan, gateway city of the world,” Wallace says. “And it is not going away.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And whether it’s floods or tornados or earthquakes or wildfires, human beings have a remarkable knack for comfortably living in areas with lots of risk.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wallace expects that, if the state pursues the right path to make these neighborhoods more resilient to future fires and follows through with fixing the state’s broken insurance system, destroyed properties in the LA hills will be rebuilt, insurable in the private market, and they’ll eventually “return to trajectory,” increasing in value like they were in the years preceding the devastation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As for the victims who lost everything in the fires, Wallace, reflecting on her own experience losing her home, advises people to begin creating inventories of the things they lost and working with builders to get real estimates of the costs to rebuild, keeping in mind that construction costs will likely climb as everyone else seeks to rebuild. Such information can be critical for getting adequate payouts. Insurers may provide a vital service, she suggests, but they’re not really your friends.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This first appeared in the Planet Money newsletter. NPR’s \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef753cb9c306d51ac1990911bcebbb0b528f00f65bbeab48dcc02179139055944fdf71b0ce45e6af81dc02169f3fd4392388\">\u003cem>most recent Planet Money episode\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem> has more on the fires in California. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"title": "An Economist Who Survived a Wildfire Is Now Taking on California's Insurance Crisis | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Three decades ago, Nancy Wallace narrowly escaped death in what was then California’s most destructive wildfire. Since then, the problem of wildfires has gotten much worse, so bad in fact that the state now faces a crisis in its market for home insurance. Solving the insurance crisis is something that’s very much in Wallace’s wheelhouse, and she’s been developing some important ideas and tools to try to fix it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wallace is a professor of finance and real estate at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, and she’s a former adviser to \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef7518929ced10a9f7f06a8c0ea57e929cddb1c954abd77cee9267cd15ad5db2539db1ff2d2b7789f6c0addedd6066e75004\">the U.S. Treasury Department\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75b0c04f222950d350d1e6d7870773b9a3bf30fbf2fd253aa66deda96eb6bbfc8448e9f0e97e5ffa877514308f0c876b1c\">Federal Reserve\u003c/a>. She specializes in identifying and mitigating financial risks in housing markets, and she’s conducted some eye-opening studies on the rising risk of wildfires. She’s working with climate scientists to create forecast models that can help rescue failing insurance markets. And she’s advocating for new insurance schemes and financial products that would help California homeowners retrofit their homes and lower the danger that they’re destroyed by future fires.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Wallace’s expertise in this area is more than just academic. It’s informed by her horrifying experience.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>A story that begins with fire\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>On Oct. 20, 1991, Wallace smelled smoke wafting in the air outside of her home, high in the hills above Oakland, Calif. The day before, a fire had broken out down her street. Firefighters had put it out, but she was now on high alert. The air felt dry. The wind was picking up. And the smell of smoke scared her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wallace grew up in Michigan, never experiencing the danger of wildfires. She and her husband had moved to Oakland a few years earlier when she got a job at nearby UC Berkeley. They scraped together every penny they could and bought a fixer-upper in the Oakland Hills, near the ridgeline of the mountains above the city, surrounded by Monterey pine and eucalyptus trees. They had finished remodeling their home just one month before this fateful day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After smelling smoke, Wallace and her husband grabbed family heirlooms and antiques, important documents, some paintings and clothes, and their cat. They jumped in their car. And that’s when they saw a hurricane of fire engulfing the neighborhood below them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12023795\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1600px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12023795\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-53.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1600\" height=\"1063\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-53.jpg 1600w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-53-800x532.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-53-1020x678.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-53-160x106.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-53-1536x1020.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1600px) 100vw, 1600px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Oakland Hills fire burned thousands of homes and created a dust cloud that could be seen for miles. Picture taken on Oct. 20, 1991. \u003ccite>(San Francisco Chronicle/Hearst Newspapers/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>They turned frantic. When they hit a fork in the road, they hesitated whether to turn right or left. Both directions were being enveloped by flames. Wallace insisted they go right.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Seconds after going right, a car came out of the flames,” Wallace says. “And they said, “If you go up this road, you will die.” They said that power lines had fallen on a truck. A firefighter (who turned out to be Oakland Fire Battalion Chief James M. Riley Jr.) and a passenger he was trying to rescue were both dead, and the truck and power lines were blocking the road. Wallace and her husband were forced to turn around.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At that point our cat shed her fur — literally shed her fur,” Wallace says. “Because the fire was just beating on our car. I thought for sure the car would burst into flames.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They drove the other direction, down a winding, one-lane road through the heart of the inferno. Embers were flying everywhere. Houses and trees were bursting into flames. They saw a motorcyclist on fire. They saw frantic drivers crashing into trees. They saw a heroic policeman — officer John William Grubensky, \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75bce67e527b223b6b74454469a6ee4b5c4d28d4b80c1c74ca9c048c5577e51dda01054a7fea5db647bea7c09420b6d60a\">who would soon die attempting to rescue a family from a burning home\u003c/a> — on a loudspeaker, trying to keep people calm and get them out safely.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wallace and her husband got lucky. Their 6-year-old son was miles away, safe and sound during the whole ordeal. He had spent the night at a friend’s house. They were also lucky, of course, to escape with their lives. On the very same narrow street they had escaped on, vehicles after them got stuck behind a car that crashed, blocking their exit route. “Just on that one street, I think there were five people who died, along with officer Grubensky,” Wallace says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12023797\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1600px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12023797\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-54.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1600\" height=\"1218\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-54.jpg 1600w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-54-800x609.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-54-1020x776.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-54-160x122.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-copy-54-1536x1169.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1600px) 100vw, 1600px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Claremont Hotel in October 1991. \u003ccite>(MediaNews Group/Oakland Tribune/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>About two weeks later, Nancy and her family returned to see what happened to their home. It had turned to ash. “In the middle of this ash was a porcelain bowl,” Nancy says. Porcelain apparently doesn’t burn. “It was just sitting on top of the ash by itself. It was surreal. Everything else was gone.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Oakland Hills fire in 1991 ended up \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75485da7a340229be9c97f0e6420bf14a101443bb7f24e1e272415cbf09f6cfd05138067d7b96668b5ed57ec92aea7a128\">killing 25 people\u003c/a>, injuring 150 others, and destroying \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75ddd648a58c07d66aa9ddc9ec1529a704070de632598dd8b995cc7f99ca0cc8fa046ac848b82a3c3bd9ad1540bef156c9\">around 3,000 homes\u003c/a>. For a long time, it was \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75cf0200df54bf0a3d6ffb6d4f929c601dfc5564db5e40f55c222340b07cef5c051e7e292a3241c323ebbd7261014e0795\">the most destructive fire\u003c/a> in \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef750b1d7065c27ee79c4534ff1929155f236c2f543cf6e8581b18e39ef69b3bc9665b6e08c77eca56ac00c49a9311d8c1ba\">California history\u003c/a>. That is, until the last decade, when California has seen a mind-boggling uptick in even more destructive fires, including \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef753f8019c3c068c3eda0100d6cde825c212e8ef4b717d8666b3f4693739937c96492c750fdef03a0565e5a814432f85d38\">two in LA in recent weeks\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Why California properties got more valuable after fires\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Around five years ago, Wallace recounted her incredible story in the Oakland Hills fire to her former PhD student Carles Vergara-Alert, who was back in Berkeley on a sabbatical as a visiting professor, and two other Berkeley economists, Richard Stanton and Paulo Issler. And it inspired them to study how the rising risk of wildfires was affecting housing markets.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A pretty weird thing seemed to be happening to properties destroyed by fires. Nancy noticed it in her own community. After the fire, people got insurance money and rebuilt their homes. Their homes seemed to get bigger and nicer. And, like elsewhere in the Bay Area, their home values went on a rocket ship to the moon in the decades after the fire. It was like everyone had forgotten that it was still a risky area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Of course, this was just a casual observation about one place. Wallace, Vergara-Alert, Issler, and Stanton decided they wanted to build a comprehensive dataset to see what happened, more systematically, to California housing markets after they were scorched by wildfires.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The dataset they assembled is pretty amazing. After each fire in California, the state’s fire agency, Cal Fire, sends a team of technicians to investigate. They create detailed maps of the burn areas and document, house by house, damages. The economists used this rich data on burn areas between 2001 and 2015, focusing on the houses that burned and the nearby houses that did not. They combined this data with their own comprehensive data on virtually every home in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You might think that property prices of the houses that burned would plummet. I mean, the house is destroyed, nearby parks, trees, hiking trails, and everything else is scorched, and the home’s views become burn zones, at least in the near-to-medium term, before nature and man-made structures come back from the ashes. Even more, you might think that the risks of living in the area would be top of mind for years to come, suppressing demand to live there. But no. Houses continue to be valuable investments in these fire-prone communities. Not only that. The economists find that, between 2001 and 2015, the properties that burned down and got rebuilt were actually significantly more valuable within five years of the catastrophe. Fire actually boosted their property values!\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>One sort of obvious reason for this is these rebuilt houses were newer. And they were built to follow a more modern, state-mandated building code, making them more resistant to fire and earthquakes and generally safer. And, just as Wallace had observed in her own neighborhood, these rebuilt houses tended to be bigger.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And, in big wildfires, the houses in whole neighborhoods got built back bigger and better. Because the value of your house is influenced by the value of houses in your neighborhood, that was another boost to property values. Meanwhile, nature recovers — and, Wallace says, it recovers rather quickly in areas with Mediterranean climates — and the amazing beauty of these Californian communities returns.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, fires are obviously devastating in terms of lives lost, people hurt, disruptions to business, and so on. And for people who don’t have insurance, they cause huge financial losses. But — at least in the period the economists study, when, for the most part, there were functioning private insurance markets that offered full coverage and generous payouts — it seems like fires were actually a financial win for the average insured homeowner who lost their home. They were also a win for developers and construction companies, which rebuilt the homes. And they were at least partially a win for municipalities because rebuilt, more valuable homes meant higher property taxes, offsetting the tremendous taxpayer costs of fighting the fire and cleaning up afterwards.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Of course, there was at least one huge financial loser in all of this: insurance companies. They had to foot the massive bill for home reconstructions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In normal insurance markets, that’s fine. People pay premiums, and those premiums are estimated based on the probability of losses. When those losses materialize, the insurance company pays. It’s the whole game.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But, Wallace says, something funky began happening in California’s insurance markets, and the state’s insurance system ended up breaking down.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>How California’s insurance market failed\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>First, the state has had restrictive regulations on what insurance companies can charge. Wallace says that a big force behind that was \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75935a55e5b4f983979ff21aed4f5612ec244a8152bf65baa21a39f957595996452ef222251e6f34859177d743878725d9\">Proposition 103\u003c/a>, which was championed by Ralph Nader. Back in the 1980s, Nader and other consumer activists argued that insurance companies should be strictly regulated when setting their premium rates. This ballot initiative, which was \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef754836c5dd42e63930ebfddf0673a0a63f0485dd58d5d3a6a2a18676baafd08074c8a161053c7dda64fb585a2d85138ad3\">narrowly approved\u003c/a> by California voters in 1988, required insurance companies to get rate hikes approved by the California Department of Insurance, and it introduced a bunch of measures that made rate hikes much harder to impose.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In this post-Prop 103 regulatory scheme, for example, the state prevented insurance companies from using forward-looking estimates of risk — so-called “catastrophe models” — when setting their rates. Consumer advocates saw these kinds of models, which use computers to forecast an uncertain future, as a Trojan horse for price-gouging. The state forced insurers to only use backward-looking estimates of risk. They figured it was more transparent and fair to use hard, verifiable data from the past. The state required insurers to base their premium rates on a 20-year average of historical losses. It also prevented insurers from pricing into their premiums the cost of “reinsurance,” or insurance for insurers — something that insurers sometimes need after extreme weather events require massive payouts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With these and other measures, the California Department of Insurance effectively kept home insurance premiums artificially low. And, Nancy says, that had some big side effects, like incentivizing more people to live in fire-prone areas.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Prices are important, especially for things like where people locate, where houses are built,” Wallace says. Artificially low insurance prices, for example, may have encouraged cities and developers to build neighborhoods closer to the flammable wilderness. In fact, in recent decades, fire-prone areas have seen some of \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef752c85f755d7f54f2bc043d7d1d34258eba8e1c7c1ebf06fc3d30eef1874e17199f85a6715f4d26bab2a33138ba2c2c34d\">the fastest population growth\u003c/a> rates in the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And greater density in fire country may have contributed, Wallace says, to problems like narrow roads prone to traffic jams, making escapes from wildfires — like the one she personally made — much harder. And this increased number of people living in fire-prone areas meant that taxpayers had to invest much more in firefighting and other public services to keep people safe.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For a time, California’s insurance system was maybe workable. Big, destructive fires used to be rarer, so the insurance system didn’t experience as much stress. But, Wallace says, around a decade ago, there was a tipping point where big wildfires started becoming more frequent and more destructive. California has seen hotter temperatures. Droughts have increased. Wind speeds have picked up. And big, destructive fires have become more commonplace.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With climate change, it has started to become clear that the future will not look like the past, and California’s regulations requiring insurers to make pricing decisions based on backward-looking models of risk have started to look pretty dumb.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a free market for insurance, a higher risk for catastrophe would result in higher insurance premiums. But since California regulations prevented that, insurance premiums stayed artificially low. As big fires began demanding big payouts and the specter of more mass destruction loomed larger, insurance companies struggled to make the math work. And so they began fleeing the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The California Department of Insurance is seriously at fault,” Wallace says. “They destroyed the markets.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With no ability to get standard private insurance, many Californians, especially in high-risk areas, were forced onto the state-created insurance plan of last resort, the California FAIR Plan (which is funded by private insurance companies and their policyholders in exchange for these insurers being able to sell property insurance in the state). This plan was not meant to be a permanent solution. It’s a high-risk pool. It’s expensive and it caps insurance payouts, so people with valuable properties, for example, can’t get the full value of their homes insured. (For more on the Fair Plan, listen to \u003cem>The Indicator’s\u003c/em> \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef752def554e017046c68d64e56d9e122b948668defee7f3d98a8ca83c3b48f68959bbd53a4be40108278e4b49a01efa1366\">recent podcast\u003c/a> episode, “\u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75ad3ea8e1c631a94cbfd2f84a8bb2e0bdc5c41cb89b0aa89806246574584a2b7a19e0b2d5d203e970a6f94db4ef3aa9cb\">Who’s on the hook for California’s uninsurable homes?”\u003c/a>)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last year, seeing insurers fleeing their state — and perhaps seeing the studies by Wallace and others — California regulators came to the conclusion that the state’s insurance regulations were unworkable. \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75a5ff1040268ead24f714da3ba14e4b61045ac73f797c9a64f33b8504aa92ce3015cef0a1f782e8d75cca1ae80db21f3b\">California’s insurance commissioner\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75afd08e6ec55b098466c8fb29f8a8aa0de37ff268054db7acdfbb72a833abc449d17eeefb0223deb668d431aec9134f60\">supported by Governor Gavin Newsom\u003c/a>, ended the ban on using forward-looking catastrophe models for setting premiums, giving the green light to the insurance industry to start actually trying to price in the rising risk and cost of wildfires. As part of this deal, insurers have agreed to underwrite more policies in fire-prone areas. Those changes took effect mere weeks ago, just before the outbreak of fires around Los Angeles.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Governor Newsom \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef758d671df0f55cb759f76d79ae6a39676c82aaeb68eff8baa39485a93815c0798ffec35d920f986d03e7419e4b2504f677\">recently touted\u003c/a> the fact that, after these changes took effect, \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75adaa7ecc510b1f002229dc3a5e52b0f0ba21fc0937c8de1d1ff4406e80c380209a180d0e4c2077bb2cae1b115367d0ca\">a private insurer\u003c/a> agreed to insure homes in the town of Paradise, which notoriously burned entirely to the ground in 2018 (listen to \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef75923982ac856c35604a589df10ac0713768007a557a138dc8bb106d3a3746a95179e17bd5973a1bde5c377a0be2a53730\">this 2021 \u003cem>Planet Money\u003c/em> episode\u003c/a> about efforts to rebuild the town).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“ I thought that was an absolutely crucial step,” Wallace says of California’s recent reforms to how it regulates insurance markets. “Now we have to get to work and figure out what the true pricing should be.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>What is the right price for living in fire country?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Finding the right price for insurance premiums entails building and refining statistical models that can nail down the risks of wildfires for houses and businesses around the state. The current models, Wallace says, are not good enough. Insurance companies and the government, she says, “literally do not know” what the real risks are. There is quite a bit of uncertainty about, for example, how far fires can spread, which exact homes are the most at risk, and whether big fires in certain places are like 50- or 20- or 10-year events. Inaccurate estimates of fire risks, Wallace says, could result in premiums that are too low, as has been the case for a while in much of California, but also too high in some cases.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And that’s why she and her colleagues at UC Berkeley, and, more specifically, \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef754cff7aad12d66d30529af53e60e7510c3c8be12e3638bfe87ffabe5e31efbdeb49c9b5550a39224ede20bbbf4618d619\">Wallace’s lab\u003c/a> at the Fisher Center for Real Estate and Urban Economics, have been building bridges across disciplines, marshaling the data and intellect of climate scientists, computer scientists, engineers, economists, and more to create high-tech models that can better estimate the risk of wildfires.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And that’s important. As we’ve seen, the costs of fire destruction are enormous. And someone has to pay for it. If homeowners want to continue living in fire-prone areas, Wallace says, they need to bear more of the risk and, in effect, pay higher insurance premiums.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This risk cannot be borne exclusively by insurance companies,” Wallace says. “It’s also got to be borne by homeowners.” Bearing more of that risk would, she says, incentivize homeowners to take more actions to protect their properties (and fight what economists call “moral hazard,” or people’s tendency to not take steps to mitigate risk when they’re insured).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Beyond just accurately pricing wildfire risks, Wallace says, the government and insurance companies should work to incentivize and help homeowners to retrofit older, more flammable homes. Wallace points to \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef7580942e3312338e3342964bed36821bc9734f89f945bfee110ad76ed39d07fe3c7b1d2fd55489311bdd5196c2579778fd\">a study\u003c/a> by economists Patrick Baylis and Judson Boomhower. The economists find that California houses built after the mid-1990s — and, even more, those built after 2008 — are far more likely to survive wildfires. That’s because the state strengthened its building codes during those years, requiring that homes be built with, for example, more fire-retardant siding and roofs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In Paradise, in Sonoma, in Napa, the Woolsey fire, the houses that survive are those with the post-2008 building code requirements,” Wallace says. “The major problem in California is that our [older] housing stock is not built to withstand the embers and the radiant heat of fires.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But updating California’s older housing stock is super expensive. Which is why Wallace wants policymakers and businesspeople to create new home loan programs, which would make it feasible for California homeowners to invest in making their homes more resistant to fire. She believes this could even be a money-making product for financial firms. “If you’re a bank, wouldn’t you like to invest in home loans that make the mortgages that you’re also planning to make safer?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wallace also hopes that, going forward, insurers could offer discounts on home insurance for taking anti-fire measures that lower risks, further incentivizing homeowners to protect their homes and reduce costs. This could be facilitated by technological innovations. For example, Wallace points to a former grad student of hers who actually created an app, \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef753a638d8caa455b595774d9f5ced2a81e82649b882d660f362509fd0d031d668c994a9f0acd398e197f15bb4e72a30e37\">Firebreak\u003c/a>, which helps homeowners identify fire risks around their properties.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>What happens after the fires in the LA hills?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>As Wallace and her colleagues found in their study, for a long time, California homes that were destroyed by fires ended up getting bigger, better, and more valuable. Will the same thing happen again in the LA hills after the latest shocking fires?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wallace suggests that it’s possible this time is different. For one, “We don’t have that insurance market anymore,” Wallace says. “It’s been broken by not allowing firms to price the risk.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Many homes in the LA hills were forced off of private insurance policies that gave them full coverage, and they had to turn to the California FAIR Plan, which caps residential coverage at $3 million. There are a significant number of destroyed homes in the LA hills that were worth more than that. Wallace also points to less affluent neighborhoods, like Altadena, where many homeowners did not have insurance (only people with mortgages are required to have fire casualty insurance). Absent some sort of government help, many fire victims will likely be unable to afford reconstruction. In the wake of natural disasters, construction costs tend to surge because tons of people need to build all at once and there are shortages of everything.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another big cost will be building back better. If the city and state are being sensible, Wallace says, they will make investments in better infrastructure, like a less fire-prone electricity grid and better water systems to fight fires, making it less likely for future fires to break out and spread. Even more, she says, the state should continue mandating that builders of new houses follow the building code that’s proven to be more resilient to fires. “It’s absolutely nonsensical to build back in the same risky way,” Wallace says. (Gov. Gavin Newsom recently issued \u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef7510e032185965f148774b9357ac305ff7e327c20e50c1642e00232677078a240787be1e9855470a8a23ef7d9d75f34500\">a vague executive order\u003c/a> on this issue, directing state agencies to waive building regulations to speed up construction, but only those regulations “that can safely be suspended.”)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Because of high costs and more limited insurance coverage and other factors, Wallace says, there may be fewer homes built in the L.A. neighborhoods devastated by fires. And, with higher insurance premiums reflecting the risk for buildings there, these neighborhoods will likely become even more exclusive dens for the rich.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite the current tragic circumstances, however, these burned-down neighborhoods still have a lot going for them. Their views of the ocean and the city are often incredible. Their charred parks and hiking trails will recover. And they’re still close to a legendary metropolis, with a vibrant culture, an incredible economy, and a housing shortage. The land in the L.A. hills is still very valuable.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“L.A. is a major, metropolitan, gateway city of the world,” Wallace says. “And it is not going away.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And whether it’s floods or tornados or earthquakes or wildfires, human beings have a remarkable knack for comfortably living in areas with lots of risk.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wallace expects that, if the state pursues the right path to make these neighborhoods more resilient to future fires and follows through with fixing the state’s broken insurance system, destroyed properties in the LA hills will be rebuilt, insurable in the private market, and they’ll eventually “return to trajectory,” increasing in value like they were in the years preceding the devastation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As for the victims who lost everything in the fires, Wallace, reflecting on her own experience losing her home, advises people to begin creating inventories of the things they lost and working with builders to get real estimates of the costs to rebuild, keeping in mind that construction costs will likely climb as everyone else seeks to rebuild. Such information can be critical for getting adequate payouts. Insurers may provide a vital service, she suggests, but they’re not really your friends.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This first appeared in the Planet Money newsletter. NPR’s \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://click.nl.npr.org/?qs=f4ba191b448cef753cb9c306d51ac1990911bcebbb0b528f00f65bbeab48dcc02179139055944fdf71b0ce45e6af81dc02169f3fd4392388\">\u003cem>most recent Planet Money episode\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem> has more on the fires in California. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "paradise-burned-in-2018-rebuilding-it-offers-a-look-at-whats-ahead-for-la",
"title": "Paradise’s Recovery From the Camp Fire Holds Lessons for LA",
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"headTitle": "Paradise’s Recovery From the Camp Fire Holds Lessons for LA | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>You get a glimpse of the road ahead for Los Angeles after its wildfires by looking at a town that has already traveled it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In late 2018, the Camp Fire destroyed about 11,000 homes in Paradise, Calif. and killed 85 people. The mountain town in the Sierra Nevada foothills is still recovering.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One person working on Paradise’s revival is Jenn Goodlin. She grew up there, and six years ago, she was living out of state, as almost her entire hometown burned to the ground.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I felt so helpless in Colorado. Like, how many Target gift cards can I send, right?” Goodlin said, speaking to NPR’s \u003cem>Morning Edition\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A visit to Paradise later on made it clear to Goodlin that the best way to help Paradise was to move back and build a home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12023495\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 160px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-thumbnail wp-image-12023495\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-1-copy-8-160x213.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"160\" height=\"213\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-1-copy-8-160x213.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-1-copy-8.jpg 600w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 160px) 100vw, 160px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jen Goodlin, executive director of the Rebuild Paradise Foundation, poses with a mural depicting a sunset from handprints of local children, at Paradise Community Park in November 2024. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Jen Goodlin)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“Dragged my family along, my four children and my husband and said, ‘how about we leave our great life and move to a burnt-down town and live in a trailer for two and a half years?'” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She volunteered, helping people get food or sheds to store their tools. Then she took a job as executive director of the Rebuild Paradise Foundation, which finds money to help with rebuilding.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While most people never have to build a custom home in their lives, suddenly a town of thousands \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2023/11/08/1209471739/a-california-town-wiped-off-the-map-by-wildfire-is-still-recovering-five-years-o\">needed funding and knowledge of the basic, bureaucratic hurdles of construction\u003c/a>. The foundation would write people checks to pay for surveys, architecture and engineering fees and permit fees.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Septic was hit heavily, very expensive,” Goodlin said. \u003ca href=\"https://krcrtv.com/news/local/sewer-project-on-hold-for-town-of-paradise\">Without a sewer system\u003c/a>, Paradise relies on septic tanks. “We wanted to ease that burden.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Goodlin said the foundation has a library of floor plans pre-approved by the town and county to help residents break ground more quickly. She said almost 200 new homes have relied on those floor plans.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Many residents run into roadblocks with insurance companies that hesitate to cover homes in the so-called “wildland-urban interface” that is prone to fires. To make homes more resilient and more insurable, the foundation gave residents vouchers for gravel to lay down in the 5 feet surrounding their homes.[aside label=\"Related Stories\" postID=\"forum_2010101908557,news_12015150,news_12021661\"]The nitty gritty of building and hardening homes has translated to growth. The \u003ca href=\"https://dof.ca.gov/forecasting/demographics/estimates/e-4-population-estimates-for-cities-counties-and-the-state-2021-2024-with-2020-census-benchmark/\">California Department of Finance\u003c/a>, which estimates populations in the state, said Paradise grew from fewer than 5,000 people in 2020 to nearly 11,000 in 2024. That’s still far from \u003ca href=\"https://dof.ca.gov/forecasting/demographics/estimates/e-4-population-estimates-for-cities-counties-and-the-state-2011-2020-with-2010-census-benchmark-new/\">a pre-Camp Fire population\u003c/a> of more than 26,000 in 2018.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>From the ground in Paradise, Goodlin has seen more\u003cstrong> \u003c/strong>young families and children in town, noting that the Paradise Unified School District \u003ca href=\"https://krcrtv.com/news/local/cedarwood-elementary-in-magalia-unveils-upgraded-27-million-campus-ahead-of-school-year\">opened a new elementary school\u003c/a> last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Goodlin’s advice for people in Los Angeles who talk of rebuilding homes is to take it one step at a time. She hopes Paradise’s story can be a survival guide for Altadena and Pacific Palisades.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We are here. Like, we have gone through it — similar but different,” she said. “How can we help you now? People came to our side as well. But that’s now our job.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This article was edited by Obed Manuel.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>You get a glimpse of the road ahead for Los Angeles after its wildfires by looking at a town that has already traveled it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In late 2018, the Camp Fire destroyed about 11,000 homes in Paradise, Calif. and killed 85 people. The mountain town in the Sierra Nevada foothills is still recovering.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One person working on Paradise’s revival is Jenn Goodlin. She grew up there, and six years ago, she was living out of state, as almost her entire hometown burned to the ground.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I felt so helpless in Colorado. Like, how many Target gift cards can I send, right?” Goodlin said, speaking to NPR’s \u003cem>Morning Edition\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A visit to Paradise later on made it clear to Goodlin that the best way to help Paradise was to move back and build a home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12023495\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 160px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-thumbnail wp-image-12023495\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-1-copy-8-160x213.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"160\" height=\"213\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-1-copy-8-160x213.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/npr.brightspotcdn-1-copy-8.jpg 600w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 160px) 100vw, 160px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jen Goodlin, executive director of the Rebuild Paradise Foundation, poses with a mural depicting a sunset from handprints of local children, at Paradise Community Park in November 2024. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Jen Goodlin)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“Dragged my family along, my four children and my husband and said, ‘how about we leave our great life and move to a burnt-down town and live in a trailer for two and a half years?'” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She volunteered, helping people get food or sheds to store their tools. Then she took a job as executive director of the Rebuild Paradise Foundation, which finds money to help with rebuilding.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While most people never have to build a custom home in their lives, suddenly a town of thousands \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2023/11/08/1209471739/a-california-town-wiped-off-the-map-by-wildfire-is-still-recovering-five-years-o\">needed funding and knowledge of the basic, bureaucratic hurdles of construction\u003c/a>. The foundation would write people checks to pay for surveys, architecture and engineering fees and permit fees.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Septic was hit heavily, very expensive,” Goodlin said. \u003ca href=\"https://krcrtv.com/news/local/sewer-project-on-hold-for-town-of-paradise\">Without a sewer system\u003c/a>, Paradise relies on septic tanks. “We wanted to ease that burden.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Goodlin said the foundation has a library of floor plans pre-approved by the town and county to help residents break ground more quickly. She said almost 200 new homes have relied on those floor plans.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Many residents run into roadblocks with insurance companies that hesitate to cover homes in the so-called “wildland-urban interface” that is prone to fires. To make homes more resilient and more insurable, the foundation gave residents vouchers for gravel to lay down in the 5 feet surrounding their homes.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The nitty gritty of building and hardening homes has translated to growth. The \u003ca href=\"https://dof.ca.gov/forecasting/demographics/estimates/e-4-population-estimates-for-cities-counties-and-the-state-2021-2024-with-2020-census-benchmark/\">California Department of Finance\u003c/a>, which estimates populations in the state, said Paradise grew from fewer than 5,000 people in 2020 to nearly 11,000 in 2024. That’s still far from \u003ca href=\"https://dof.ca.gov/forecasting/demographics/estimates/e-4-population-estimates-for-cities-counties-and-the-state-2011-2020-with-2010-census-benchmark-new/\">a pre-Camp Fire population\u003c/a> of more than 26,000 in 2018.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>From the ground in Paradise, Goodlin has seen more\u003cstrong> \u003c/strong>young families and children in town, noting that the Paradise Unified School District \u003ca href=\"https://krcrtv.com/news/local/cedarwood-elementary-in-magalia-unveils-upgraded-27-million-campus-ahead-of-school-year\">opened a new elementary school\u003c/a> last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Goodlin’s advice for people in Los Angeles who talk of rebuilding homes is to take it one step at a time. She hopes Paradise’s story can be a survival guide for Altadena and Pacific Palisades.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We are here. Like, we have gone through it — similar but different,” she said. “How can we help you now? People came to our side as well. But that’s now our job.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This article was edited by Obed Manuel.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>Reeling from destructive wildfires, including \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/north-america-us-news-business-paradise-wildfires-720e09a42e8942ed8bac91b4bcf85b3c\">the deadliest\u003c/a> in California history, state lawmakers in 2020 passed new requirements for clearing combustible materials like dead plants and wooden furniture within 5 feet of homes in risky areas.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The rules were set to take effect on Jan. 1, 2023. But as \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/los-angeles-wildfires-southern-california-212389bfba69f39baaf72579f1644ddd\">Los Angeles grapples with blazes\u003c/a> that have destroyed thousands of homes in what \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/california-wildfires-natural-disasters-losses-insurance-recovery-d2f24e44d75503118643151eaee947fb\">could be the costliest\u003c/a> natural disaster in U.S. history, the regulations still haven’t been written. The state Board of Forestry and Fire Protection has no firm timeline for completing them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s frustrating at every level of government,” said Democratic state Sen. Henry Stern, who was part of a group of lawmakers who authored the legislation. “I feel like a failure on it, being quite frank.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Most of the neighborhoods ravaged by the Palisades Fire are in areas that must follow state requirements to keep the immediate surroundings of their homes free of combustible materials and would be subject to the new rules because they are deemed at highest fire risk by the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. The fire, driven by \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/los-angeles-wind-wildfires-climate-change-weather-42b55ae1e66b56a6375300e448f01946\">hurricane-force winds\u003c/a> that \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/california-wildfires-embers-spread-9d2eff9cac9d355f906ea5f63ace1957\">spread embers by air\u003c/a>, destroyed at least 5,000 structures across areas including Pacific Palisades, Malibu and Topanga Canyon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under the latest proposal, existing homes would have three years to comply with the regulations, so it’s not clear how many homes would have been saved. But clearing the immediate area around homes likely would have made some difference, several experts said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We feel really strongly that it would” have made a difference in some cases based on previous research, said Steve Hawks, a former state firefighter who now works for an insurance industry research group that supported the law. “There’s no guarantees, of course, particularly when you have a high intensity wildfire like these.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So-called defensible space laws require homeowners in fire-prone places to keep the area immediately around their homes free of landscaping and other materials that could catch fire. California already enforces some of the most stringent defensible space laws in the West. The state began requiring homeowners in high-risk areas to clear flammable materials within 30 feet of their houses in the 1960s and then expanded the rules to include areas within 100 feet of structures in 2006.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The latest measure creates a new “ember-resistant” zone, dubbed “zone zero,” that bars things like brush, wooden fencing, furniture, sheds and mulch within 5 feet of homes. The idea is to clear all materials that could catch fire from flying embers carried by winds and spread to the structure. State officials and researchers said embers are responsible for 90% of structures destroyed by wildfire.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The zone-zero law passed with bipartisan support after California experienced record-breaking fires in 2017 and 2018, including a fire that wiped out the town of Paradise, destroying more than 17,000 structures and killing 85 people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Homes have a much better chance of surviving a wildfire when homeowners follow defensible space requirements and various home-hardening recommendations like using vent covers to keep out flying embers, said Yana Valachovic, a fire scientist with the University of California’s Cooperative Extension in Humboldt and Del Norte Counties. She is helping CalFire survey the LA fires’ destruction this week.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m hesitant to put a number factor on exactly how much greater survival rate we’ll get,” she said. “But, you know, we have to do everything to push the equation.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022934\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022934\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2192423304.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"737\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2192423304.jpg 1024w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2192423304-800x576.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2192423304-1020x734.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2192423304-160x115.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A firefighter sprays water on a house to protect it from the Eaton Fire in the Altadena neighborhood of Pasadena, Los Angeles County, on Jan. 8, 2025. \u003ccite>(Nick Ut/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The Board of Forestry and Fire Protection said it’s still in “the pre-rulemaking phase” while it finds money to alleviate the potential costs under the new requirements. State officials said in a November meeting that the draft language likely won’t be considered by the board until late this year, though CalFire has already encouraged homeowners to take up the practice on \u003ca href=\"https://readyforwildfire.org/prepare-for-wildfire/defensible-space/\">its website\u003c/a>. The agency recommended the adoption of zone zero requirements as part of a report on fire strategies requested by Gov. Gavin Newsom in 2019.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lawmakers last year also passed legislation to extend the deadline to comply — from one year to three years — for existing homes once the regulations are adopted. Some cities and homeowners are already taking on the practice voluntarily.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There are many facets to consider as part of this complex process,” Edith Hannigan, executive officer of the board, said in a statement to The Associated Press. “This topic remains a priority for the Board of Forestry and Fire Protection, and staff aims to have a draft proposal to present to the Board as soon as is feasible.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On Friday, state officials told The Associated Press that Newsom has planned to direct $25 million to help homeowners create zone zero areas and follow other defensible space requirements in \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/california-billions-2025-budget-gov-newsom-trump-419a6f75bfbfed26a76fe21870ac37e6\">his budget proposal\u003c/a> unveiled last week. The money will come from \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/california-budget-deficit-bonds-climate-schools-348b9d64e0813355620bf26056cf0bba\">a $10 billion bond\u003c/a> approved by voters in 2024 to pay for climate change initiatives.[aside label=\"Related Stories\" postID=\"news_12021911,news_11787162,news_11786957,news_11711140\"]Some of the most effective strategies include clearing dead vegetation and debris off a structure’s roof and out of gutters and replacing bark with pea gravel, said Kimiko Barrett, who authored \u003ca href=\"https://headwaterseconomics.org/natural-hazards/retrofitting-home-wildfire-resistance/\">a 2024 study\u003c/a> looking at the costs for retrofitting existing structures in California. Replacing wooden fencing could cost more, but it also helps better protect a home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The cost of not doing anything could be far, far greater,” Barrett said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Zone zero discussions have been underway for the past decade, and the idea isn’t always popular. Stern, the state senator who also lost his home in another Los Angeles fire in 2018, said he struggles to convince his family to follow the practice. His parents dismissed his advice like clearing out the rosemary bush next to their home as minor things, Stern said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What I don’t know is whether people are going to see that as a headache,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>U.S. Rep. Laura Friedman, a Democrat who led the effort to pass the zone-zero law in 2020 as a state Assembly member, said the implementation “shouldn’t have taken years and years.” She then deferred questions to the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I hope that the state acts with the urgency that the issue and these guidelines deserve,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under the latest draft, the rules would immediately apply to new homes and allow existing buildings three years to comply.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Reeling from destructive wildfires, including \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/north-america-us-news-business-paradise-wildfires-720e09a42e8942ed8bac91b4bcf85b3c\">the deadliest\u003c/a> in California history, state lawmakers in 2020 passed new requirements for clearing combustible materials like dead plants and wooden furniture within 5 feet of homes in risky areas.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The rules were set to take effect on Jan. 1, 2023. But as \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/los-angeles-wildfires-southern-california-212389bfba69f39baaf72579f1644ddd\">Los Angeles grapples with blazes\u003c/a> that have destroyed thousands of homes in what \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/california-wildfires-natural-disasters-losses-insurance-recovery-d2f24e44d75503118643151eaee947fb\">could be the costliest\u003c/a> natural disaster in U.S. history, the regulations still haven’t been written. The state Board of Forestry and Fire Protection has no firm timeline for completing them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s frustrating at every level of government,” said Democratic state Sen. Henry Stern, who was part of a group of lawmakers who authored the legislation. “I feel like a failure on it, being quite frank.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Most of the neighborhoods ravaged by the Palisades Fire are in areas that must follow state requirements to keep the immediate surroundings of their homes free of combustible materials and would be subject to the new rules because they are deemed at highest fire risk by the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. The fire, driven by \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/los-angeles-wind-wildfires-climate-change-weather-42b55ae1e66b56a6375300e448f01946\">hurricane-force winds\u003c/a> that \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/california-wildfires-embers-spread-9d2eff9cac9d355f906ea5f63ace1957\">spread embers by air\u003c/a>, destroyed at least 5,000 structures across areas including Pacific Palisades, Malibu and Topanga Canyon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under the latest proposal, existing homes would have three years to comply with the regulations, so it’s not clear how many homes would have been saved. But clearing the immediate area around homes likely would have made some difference, several experts said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We feel really strongly that it would” have made a difference in some cases based on previous research, said Steve Hawks, a former state firefighter who now works for an insurance industry research group that supported the law. “There’s no guarantees, of course, particularly when you have a high intensity wildfire like these.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So-called defensible space laws require homeowners in fire-prone places to keep the area immediately around their homes free of landscaping and other materials that could catch fire. California already enforces some of the most stringent defensible space laws in the West. The state began requiring homeowners in high-risk areas to clear flammable materials within 30 feet of their houses in the 1960s and then expanded the rules to include areas within 100 feet of structures in 2006.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The latest measure creates a new “ember-resistant” zone, dubbed “zone zero,” that bars things like brush, wooden fencing, furniture, sheds and mulch within 5 feet of homes. The idea is to clear all materials that could catch fire from flying embers carried by winds and spread to the structure. State officials and researchers said embers are responsible for 90% of structures destroyed by wildfire.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The zone-zero law passed with bipartisan support after California experienced record-breaking fires in 2017 and 2018, including a fire that wiped out the town of Paradise, destroying more than 17,000 structures and killing 85 people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Homes have a much better chance of surviving a wildfire when homeowners follow defensible space requirements and various home-hardening recommendations like using vent covers to keep out flying embers, said Yana Valachovic, a fire scientist with the University of California’s Cooperative Extension in Humboldt and Del Norte Counties. She is helping CalFire survey the LA fires’ destruction this week.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m hesitant to put a number factor on exactly how much greater survival rate we’ll get,” she said. “But, you know, we have to do everything to push the equation.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022934\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022934\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2192423304.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"737\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2192423304.jpg 1024w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2192423304-800x576.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2192423304-1020x734.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2192423304-160x115.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A firefighter sprays water on a house to protect it from the Eaton Fire in the Altadena neighborhood of Pasadena, Los Angeles County, on Jan. 8, 2025. \u003ccite>(Nick Ut/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The Board of Forestry and Fire Protection said it’s still in “the pre-rulemaking phase” while it finds money to alleviate the potential costs under the new requirements. State officials said in a November meeting that the draft language likely won’t be considered by the board until late this year, though CalFire has already encouraged homeowners to take up the practice on \u003ca href=\"https://readyforwildfire.org/prepare-for-wildfire/defensible-space/\">its website\u003c/a>. The agency recommended the adoption of zone zero requirements as part of a report on fire strategies requested by Gov. Gavin Newsom in 2019.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lawmakers last year also passed legislation to extend the deadline to comply — from one year to three years — for existing homes once the regulations are adopted. Some cities and homeowners are already taking on the practice voluntarily.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There are many facets to consider as part of this complex process,” Edith Hannigan, executive officer of the board, said in a statement to The Associated Press. “This topic remains a priority for the Board of Forestry and Fire Protection, and staff aims to have a draft proposal to present to the Board as soon as is feasible.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On Friday, state officials told The Associated Press that Newsom has planned to direct $25 million to help homeowners create zone zero areas and follow other defensible space requirements in \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/california-billions-2025-budget-gov-newsom-trump-419a6f75bfbfed26a76fe21870ac37e6\">his budget proposal\u003c/a> unveiled last week. The money will come from \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/california-budget-deficit-bonds-climate-schools-348b9d64e0813355620bf26056cf0bba\">a $10 billion bond\u003c/a> approved by voters in 2024 to pay for climate change initiatives.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Some of the most effective strategies include clearing dead vegetation and debris off a structure’s roof and out of gutters and replacing bark with pea gravel, said Kimiko Barrett, who authored \u003ca href=\"https://headwaterseconomics.org/natural-hazards/retrofitting-home-wildfire-resistance/\">a 2024 study\u003c/a> looking at the costs for retrofitting existing structures in California. Replacing wooden fencing could cost more, but it also helps better protect a home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The cost of not doing anything could be far, far greater,” Barrett said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Zone zero discussions have been underway for the past decade, and the idea isn’t always popular. Stern, the state senator who also lost his home in another Los Angeles fire in 2018, said he struggles to convince his family to follow the practice. His parents dismissed his advice like clearing out the rosemary bush next to their home as minor things, Stern said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What I don’t know is whether people are going to see that as a headache,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>U.S. Rep. Laura Friedman, a Democrat who led the effort to pass the zone-zero law in 2020 as a state Assembly member, said the implementation “shouldn’t have taken years and years.” She then deferred questions to the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I hope that the state acts with the urgency that the issue and these guidelines deserve,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under the latest draft, the rules would immediately apply to new homes and allow existing buildings three years to comply.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/gavin-newsom\">Gov. Gavin Newsom\u003c/a> signed an executive order suspending environmental review processes for victims looking to rebuild after the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/wildfire\">Los Angeles wildfires\u003c/a> destroyed over 40,000 acres of land and more than 12,000 structures.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The decision, which effectively waives the California Environmental Quality Act and the California Coastal Act, comes as a surprise in a state that boasts some of the strictest building regulations and environmental review processes. California has received criticism for the difficulty of getting building projects approved, a process that is also notoriously expensive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under the order Newsom signed Sunday, state and local agencies are directed to help the residents of Los Angeles and Ventura Counties by expediting processes that would hinder reconstruction. They have also been tasked with identifying additional building codes that can be safely suspended.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When the fires are extinguished, victims who have lost their homes and businesses must be able to rebuild quickly and without roadblocks,” Newsom said in a Sunday \u003ca href=\"https://www.gov.ca.gov/2025/01/12/governor-newsom-signs-executive-order-to-help-los-angeles-rebuild-faster-and-stronger/\">press release\u003c/a>. “The executive order I signed today will help cut permitting delays, an important first step in allowing our communities to recover faster and stronger.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The environmental safety restrictions that govern construction projects are an obstacle for anyone looking to build in the state. Legislators have also expanded regulations aimed at \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12021125/la-fires-renew-debate-over-prescribed-burns-and-fire-preparedness-in-california\">improving fire and earthquake resilience\u003c/a> in fire-prone neighborhoods. These requirements, like installing sprinkler systems and external water tanks, can be cost-prohibitive for homeowners.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12021322\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12021322\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-055.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-055.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-055-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-055-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-055-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-055-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-055-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The remains of a house in Altadena, California, after the Eaton Fire swept through the area northeast of Los Angeles, California, on Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Some state residents have also questioned why the process for rebuilding was not streamlined after other wildfires. Republican Assemblymember David Tangipa, who represents the Central Valley, said that wildfire victims are still recovering from the Creek Fire in 2020 in a \u003ca href=\"https://x.com/DavidTangipa/status/1878470719161700812\">social media post\u003c/a> and called on the state government to address the disparity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Matt Sedlar, a climate analyst at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, said the issue is more complex than simply rebuilding. He said he’s worried that Newsom’s order may come with unintended consequences.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“CEQA review is something that’s been a thorn in the side of many housing advocates because a lot of localities use that to hold up development,” Sedlar said. “My concern is that there’s a bullet point that directs state agencies to identify additional permanent requirements, including provisions of the building code, that can safely be suspended to accelerate rebuilding.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sedlar noted that in areas like Los Angeles County, a high risk of wildfires necessitates resiliency measures when it comes to rebuilding.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12021263\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12021263\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-043.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-043.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-043-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-043-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-043-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-043-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-043-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Buildings are destroyed along Fair Oaks Avenue in Altadena, California, after the Eaton Fire swept through the area northeast of Los Angeles, California, on Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“It wouldn’t make a whole lot of sense to rebuild as things were before because that’s the opposite of adaptive resilience,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The focus instead should be on mitigating the costs associated with making these neighborhoods safer, whether that’s through state or federal assistance, according to Sedlar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the United States, experts and state officials are working together to find solutions that account for rising building costs, environmental safety and the need for hardened homes. In 2006, Florida legislators introduced \u003ca href=\"https://mysafeflhome.com/\">My Safe Florida Home\u003c/a>, a program that distributes funds to applicants looking to improve the resiliency of their homes against natural disasters like hurricanes. The program is wildly popular.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_12022375 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild2-1020x827.jpg']\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis allocated $200 million to the program in July, funding ran out in less than 10 days, according to \u003ca href=\"https://www.fox13news.com/news/part-my-safe-florida-home-program-runs-out-funding-2-weeks-after-applications-open\">news reports\u003c/a>. Because applications were divided into five groups based on need, only lower-income applicants aged 60 were eligible for consideration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Given California’s large population size, Sedlar said, the state would face similar difficulties in creating a grant program that covers all interested homeowners.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s a huge risk of wildfire throughout the state,” Sedlar said. “How do you allocate enough money to cover everyone? Obviously, there are areas that are less susceptible to fires — urban fires, wildfires — than others, but it’s still going to be extremely competitive.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since the wildfires broke, several conservative politicians, pundits and donors have spread misinformation and criticized state leaders, alleging that inept policymaking led to disaster. President-elect Donald Trump’s comments have caused some state officials to \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12021435/trumps-misinformation-la-fires-fuels-concerns-over-future-disaster-aid-california\">worry over how a Trump administration may affect future federal aid\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Republican Congressional leaders have touted the idea of \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12022111/republican-leaders-push-conditions-disaster-relief-california-wildfire-victims\">placing conditions\u003c/a> on federal assistance for California wildfire victims. At a Monday press conference, House Speaker Mike Johnson claimed, without evidence, that state and local officials were complicit in the scope of the fires.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12021951\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12021951\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/CAWildfireSchoolAP.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1328\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/CAWildfireSchoolAP.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/CAWildfireSchoolAP-800x531.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/CAWildfireSchoolAP-1020x677.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/CAWildfireSchoolAP-160x106.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/CAWildfireSchoolAP-1536x1020.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/CAWildfireSchoolAP-1920x1275.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A firefighter studies the charred remains of St. Mark’s School, a preschool and K-6 grade school on Altadena Drive, on Friday, Jan. 10, 2025, in Altadena, California. \u003ccite>(Chris Pizzello/AP Photo)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Johnson and other conservatives have also suggested that federal assistance be made contingent upon California Democrats agreeing to raise the national debt ceiling, an issue that Trump has been vocal about in the past.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What do we need to do to reduce the risk and make the Pacific Palisades buildable again?” said Bill Jackson, who leads the San Francisco Republican Party. “Our national governments are not piggy banks for communities that do not have a realistic approach toward sustaining themselves and defending themselves in the event of a natural disaster.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California leaders have introduced several proposals to address fire mitigation. On Monday, Newsom \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12021941/newsom-expands-special-session-speed-up-los-angeles-wildfire-relief-funds\">expanded the special session\u003c/a> that began in December to include $1.5 billion for fire preparedness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The California Department of Insurance also introduced plans for a statewide home-hardening grant program that would fund projects such as installing fire-resistant roofs and defensible spaces.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Making homes and communities safer from wildfires needs to be a top priority for our state,” Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara said during a press conference last week. “Looking forward, I will also work with the state Legislature and the Governor’s Administration to support my proposal to provide consumers with home hardening grants.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "After L.A. wildfires scorched 40,000 acres and 12,000 structures, Gov. Gavin Newsom suspended environmental reviews to speed up rebuilding and reduce costly delays.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/gavin-newsom\">Gov. Gavin Newsom\u003c/a> signed an executive order suspending environmental review processes for victims looking to rebuild after the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/wildfire\">Los Angeles wildfires\u003c/a> destroyed over 40,000 acres of land and more than 12,000 structures.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The decision, which effectively waives the California Environmental Quality Act and the California Coastal Act, comes as a surprise in a state that boasts some of the strictest building regulations and environmental review processes. California has received criticism for the difficulty of getting building projects approved, a process that is also notoriously expensive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under the order Newsom signed Sunday, state and local agencies are directed to help the residents of Los Angeles and Ventura Counties by expediting processes that would hinder reconstruction. They have also been tasked with identifying additional building codes that can be safely suspended.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When the fires are extinguished, victims who have lost their homes and businesses must be able to rebuild quickly and without roadblocks,” Newsom said in a Sunday \u003ca href=\"https://www.gov.ca.gov/2025/01/12/governor-newsom-signs-executive-order-to-help-los-angeles-rebuild-faster-and-stronger/\">press release\u003c/a>. “The executive order I signed today will help cut permitting delays, an important first step in allowing our communities to recover faster and stronger.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The environmental safety restrictions that govern construction projects are an obstacle for anyone looking to build in the state. Legislators have also expanded regulations aimed at \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12021125/la-fires-renew-debate-over-prescribed-burns-and-fire-preparedness-in-california\">improving fire and earthquake resilience\u003c/a> in fire-prone neighborhoods. These requirements, like installing sprinkler systems and external water tanks, can be cost-prohibitive for homeowners.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12021322\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12021322\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-055.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-055.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-055-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-055-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-055-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-055-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-055-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The remains of a house in Altadena, California, after the Eaton Fire swept through the area northeast of Los Angeles, California, on Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Some state residents have also questioned why the process for rebuilding was not streamlined after other wildfires. Republican Assemblymember David Tangipa, who represents the Central Valley, said that wildfire victims are still recovering from the Creek Fire in 2020 in a \u003ca href=\"https://x.com/DavidTangipa/status/1878470719161700812\">social media post\u003c/a> and called on the state government to address the disparity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Matt Sedlar, a climate analyst at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, said the issue is more complex than simply rebuilding. He said he’s worried that Newsom’s order may come with unintended consequences.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“CEQA review is something that’s been a thorn in the side of many housing advocates because a lot of localities use that to hold up development,” Sedlar said. “My concern is that there’s a bullet point that directs state agencies to identify additional permanent requirements, including provisions of the building code, that can safely be suspended to accelerate rebuilding.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sedlar noted that in areas like Los Angeles County, a high risk of wildfires necessitates resiliency measures when it comes to rebuilding.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12021263\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12021263\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-043.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-043.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-043-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-043-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-043-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-043-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/240109-CAWindStorm-043-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Buildings are destroyed along Fair Oaks Avenue in Altadena, California, after the Eaton Fire swept through the area northeast of Los Angeles, California, on Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“It wouldn’t make a whole lot of sense to rebuild as things were before because that’s the opposite of adaptive resilience,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The focus instead should be on mitigating the costs associated with making these neighborhoods safer, whether that’s through state or federal assistance, according to Sedlar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the United States, experts and state officials are working together to find solutions that account for rising building costs, environmental safety and the need for hardened homes. In 2006, Florida legislators introduced \u003ca href=\"https://mysafeflhome.com/\">My Safe Florida Home\u003c/a>, a program that distributes funds to applicants looking to improve the resiliency of their homes against natural disasters like hurricanes. The program is wildly popular.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis allocated $200 million to the program in July, funding ran out in less than 10 days, according to \u003ca href=\"https://www.fox13news.com/news/part-my-safe-florida-home-program-runs-out-funding-2-weeks-after-applications-open\">news reports\u003c/a>. Because applications were divided into five groups based on need, only lower-income applicants aged 60 were eligible for consideration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Given California’s large population size, Sedlar said, the state would face similar difficulties in creating a grant program that covers all interested homeowners.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s a huge risk of wildfire throughout the state,” Sedlar said. “How do you allocate enough money to cover everyone? Obviously, there are areas that are less susceptible to fires — urban fires, wildfires — than others, but it’s still going to be extremely competitive.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since the wildfires broke, several conservative politicians, pundits and donors have spread misinformation and criticized state leaders, alleging that inept policymaking led to disaster. President-elect Donald Trump’s comments have caused some state officials to \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12021435/trumps-misinformation-la-fires-fuels-concerns-over-future-disaster-aid-california\">worry over how a Trump administration may affect future federal aid\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Republican Congressional leaders have touted the idea of \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12022111/republican-leaders-push-conditions-disaster-relief-california-wildfire-victims\">placing conditions\u003c/a> on federal assistance for California wildfire victims. At a Monday press conference, House Speaker Mike Johnson claimed, without evidence, that state and local officials were complicit in the scope of the fires.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12021951\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12021951\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/CAWildfireSchoolAP.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1328\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/CAWildfireSchoolAP.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/CAWildfireSchoolAP-800x531.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/CAWildfireSchoolAP-1020x677.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/CAWildfireSchoolAP-160x106.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/CAWildfireSchoolAP-1536x1020.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/CAWildfireSchoolAP-1920x1275.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A firefighter studies the charred remains of St. Mark’s School, a preschool and K-6 grade school on Altadena Drive, on Friday, Jan. 10, 2025, in Altadena, California. \u003ccite>(Chris Pizzello/AP Photo)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Johnson and other conservatives have also suggested that federal assistance be made contingent upon California Democrats agreeing to raise the national debt ceiling, an issue that Trump has been vocal about in the past.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What do we need to do to reduce the risk and make the Pacific Palisades buildable again?” said Bill Jackson, who leads the San Francisco Republican Party. “Our national governments are not piggy banks for communities that do not have a realistic approach toward sustaining themselves and defending themselves in the event of a natural disaster.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California leaders have introduced several proposals to address fire mitigation. On Monday, Newsom \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12021941/newsom-expands-special-session-speed-up-los-angeles-wildfire-relief-funds\">expanded the special session\u003c/a> that began in December to include $1.5 billion for fire preparedness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The California Department of Insurance also introduced plans for a statewide home-hardening grant program that would fund projects such as installing fire-resistant roofs and defensible spaces.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Making homes and communities safer from wildfires needs to be a top priority for our state,” Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara said during a press conference last week. “Looking forward, I will also work with the state Legislature and the Governor’s Administration to support my proposal to provide consumers with home hardening grants.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"title": "Why Does California Keep Putting Homes Where Fires Burn?",
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"content": "\u003cp>In 1955, the Ventu Park wildfire tore through the canyons above Malibu, burning nearly 14,000 acres and eight homes. The same area saw two large fires burn hillsides and homes over the next three years. There were two in the 1970s, one in the ’80s and three in the ’90s. This century, those hills saw the Woolsey fire, one of the most destructive burns in California history. The Franklin fire, which scorched the hills just last month, has now been overshadowed by the firestorm that followed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With the Palisades Fire still ripping through that same fire corridor last weekend, Gov. Gavin Newsom vowed to rebuild — and quickly. He signed an \u003ca href=\"https://www.gov.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/EO-N-4-25-Rebuilding-Final-signed.pdf\">executive order (PDF)\u003c/a> suspending environmental laws that might delay reconstruction and ordered the state’s housing agency to identify building codes that could stand in the way of recovery. His administration, he told NBC News, was in the midst of \u003ca href=\"https://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-press/video/gov-newsom-says-he-s-organizing-a-marshall-plan-to-reimagine-l-a-2-0-after-wildfires-229081157656\">putting together a “Marshall Plan”\u003c/a> for post-fire reconstruction.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The impulse to restore all that the fires have stripped away may be a basic human one, and it’s certainly good politics for Newsom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But to many ecologists, economists and other experts on California wildfire risk, the vow to rebuild is part of a familiar California cycle as predictable as the Santa Anas: We keep putting homes in the path of the flames.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The biggest thing to note about these fires in LA is that none of this is surprising,” said Erica Fischer, an Oregon State University professor who studies wildfire impacts on buildings and public infrastructure.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Between 1990 and 2020, \u003ca href=\"https://silvis.forest.wisc.edu/data/wui-change/\">nearly 45% of the homes built in California\u003c/a> has broken ground in what researchers and firefighters call the \u003ca href=\"https://silvis.forest.wisc.edu/maps-data/wildland-urban-interface/\">wildland-urban interface\u003c/a>: the hillsides, ravines and canyons where the furthest frontier of residential development meets and merges with the state’s forests, scrublands and grasses. That’s despite the fact that this area makes up less than 7% of all the land in the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a particularly risky place to reside. Of all the structures destroyed by wildfire between 1985 and 2013, \u003ca href=\"https://www.fs.usda.gov/nrs/pubs/jrnl/2019/nrs_2019_kramer_001.pdf\">more than 80% (PDF)\u003c/a> were in that fire-prone zone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>No matter the other precautions a homeowner or local government might take, “you’re still taking a gamble when you place a new development out in an extraordinarily fire-prone environment,” said Alexandra Syphard, an ecologist at the Conservation Biology Institute who studies how land-use decisions affect wildfire risk.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Simply by the law of numbers, the more people you have in an area like that, the higher your likelihood that one of those people will start a fire and the higher the likelihood that that fire is going to reach a house,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022617\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022617\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_28-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_28-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_28-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_28-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_28-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_28-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A fireplace remains standing from a home that was burned down by the Eaton Fire in the Altadena and Pasadena area on Jan. 8, 2025. \u003ccite>(Jules Hotz for CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Once the smoke clears, rebuilding in the same place, often in the same way, is the historic norm. A \u003ca href=\"https://www.fs.usda.gov/nrs/pubs/jrnl/2021/nrs_2021_kramer_001.pdf\">study of 28 catastrophic blazes\u003c/a> across California between 1970 and 2009 found that nearly 60% of all the destroyed buildings were replaced within six years. The study also found “no consistent trend,” suggesting that the homes or communities were rebuilt in a way more likely to resist future fire.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some argue that California doesn’t have the luxury not to build (and rebuild) in fire country. Though the state has a chronic and worsening wildfire crisis, something that rears into public consciousness a few weeks out of every year, it also has a chronic housing crisis caused by a severe shortage of homes. For many Californians and lawmakers, that’s a 365-day concern.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You really hate to take areas off the table for building homes,” said Judson Boomhower, a UC San Diego environmental economist. “We know that we don’t build enough homes. At the same time, you want to make sure that you’re building those homes in a way that’s responsible and safe.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the urban fringes, the trade-off between housing and fire risk can be a profoundly difficult one to navigate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Miriam Greenberg, an urban sociologist at UC Santa Cruz who studies housing and population growth in California’s wildland-urban interface, said she’s watched the \u003ca href=\"https://santacruzlocal.org/2024/12/05/graham-hill-housing-proposal-challenges/\">debate play out in her own backyard\u003c/a>. “You see at the city council meetings, young people going to these meetings and saying, ‘you know what, I would rather that it weren’t so dangerous. But housing is housing.’ And we need housing,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Greenberg has argued that academics and policymakers need to see residential expansion into the state’s most fire-prone areas as yet another reflection of California’s affordability crisis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“People are looking to the (wildland-urban interface) as one of the only places that has capacity for housing,” she said. Though the wildland-urban interface includes toney enclaves of wealth like Pacific Palisades, it also features some of the more affordable real estate left in the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Over the last few years a handful of state lawmakers have proposed sharp limits on whether and how homes can be built in high risk areas. None have become law.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Fire-hardened homes\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>In 2020, then-state Sen. Hannah-Beth Jackson \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200SB182\">introduced a bill\u003c/a> that would have required local governments to impose building code, brush management and road design standards on new homes and subdivisions built in areas deemed by \u003ca href=\"https://osfm.fire.ca.gov/what-we-do/community-wildfire-preparedness-and-mitigation/fire-hazard-severity-zones/fire-hazard-severity-zones-maps-2022\">CalFire to be at high risk\u003c/a>. The bill passed both the Assembly and Senate only to be vetoed by Newsom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Wildfire resilience must become a more consistent part of land use and development decisions,” the governor wrote at the time. “However, it must be done while meeting our housing needs.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Two years later, Sen. Henry Stern, a Democrat from Calabasas whose district includes Malibu, authored a bill that would have \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202120220SB55\">imposed severe restrictions\u003c/a> on construction in fire country in exchange for allowing higher, denser development in low-risk areas. Assemblymember Chris Ward, a San Diego Democrat, introduced a \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.digitaldemocracy.org/bills/ca_202320240ab68\">bill in 2023\u003c/a> with a similar trade-off: Fewer restrictions on dense urban development coupled with fresh limits on growth in the wildland-urban interface.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Both bills died without a vote. Both faced stiff opposition from the state building industry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dan Dunmoyer, president of the California Building Industry Association, a trade group representing the state’s home builders, said blocking development in these areas is not only counterproductive from an affordability perspective, it’s unnecessary.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>New homes built to current California code “are completely different from the homes in Altadena that were built in the ‘20s and ‘30s,” he said. “We know that we can build master planned communities with hardened homes and hardened neighborhoods that don’t burn.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Buildings can in fact be fire-hardened, if not entirely fire-proofed. That’s often the reason that every California inferno has its share of \u003ca href=\"https://x.com/ChasenGreg/status/1877478755091767732?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1877478755091767732%7Ctwgr%5Eb3bcffafc969834d3532b4f8c38c66cb5579b7ad%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.buzzfeed.com%2Fmjs538%2Fpalisades-house-survives-fire\">miracle houses\u003c/a>: the rare single structure seemingly untouched by flame and surrounded by the ashes and smoldering foundations of neighboring homes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since 2008, any new homes built in a high-risk zone are saddled with a wide array of state-set construction requirements that specify the shape and composition of a building’s roof to the siding material that can be used to the vent covers needed to keep wind-surfing embers from wafting into a house.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“No other state has as many wildfire requirements in place or direction on what communities have to include in their general plans,” said Molly Mowery, executive director of the Community Wildfire Planning Center, a nonprofit that works with jurisdiction across the West to plan for fires.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022618\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022618\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_CM_18-copy-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_CM_18-copy-1.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_CM_18-copy-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_CM_18-copy-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_CM_18-copy-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_CM_18-copy-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Smoke from the Eaton Fire fills the sky in La Cañada Flintridge on Jan. 8, 2025. Hills and canyons are critically dry. \u003ccite>(Jules Hotz for CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The Board of Supervisors of Los Angeles County is considering a new Community Wildfire Protection ordinance that would codify and enhance some of these same statewide requirements. It would apply in many of the areas that are currently burning or under evacuation order. But the rules would only apply to future development, not the homes already there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That underscores a statewide problem: “We have all these homes that were built in places with pretty high fire risk during a period in which we weren’t thinking as much about the risk and during which the risk may actually have been less than it is now because we know scientifically that the climate is making this worse,” said Boomhower from UC San Diego.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fire-hardening entire communities at once is prohibitively expensive for most localities, even if it’s the only way to effectively protect a neighborhood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The mitigation for wildfires is very similar to how we think about mitigation for infectious disease,” said Fischer from Oregon State University. “If one person gets vaccinated out of the whole town, it’s not really going to make much of a difference.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Lawsuits and insurance\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>While lawmakers have been loath to out-and-out limit development in the most flammable corners of the state, the courts have occasionally stepped in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Environmental preservationists, anti-development activists and even the state’s attorney general have turned to the California Environmental Quality Act to block construction projects.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The act requires governments to study and publicly report the environmental consequences of a development before approving it. In October, a \u003ca href=\"https://law.justia.com/cases/california/court-of-appeal/2024/a165677.html\">California appellate court\u003c/a> held that wildfire risk is one of those consequences that may deserve special consideration.[aside label=\"Related Stories\" postID=\"news_12021019,news_12017886,news_12022439\"]Phillip Babich, a real estate attorney, said he expects to see community groups opposed to nature-adjacent developments demanding “more disclosure, more effort in dealing with wildfire risks” as a result of the ruling.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Newsom’s executive order has foreclosed that option in Los Angeles.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That leaves a final check on whether homes are constructed in fire-prone areas: Insurance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For years, private insurers have been in a \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/housing/2023/05/state-farm-california-insurance/\">slow-motion withdrawal\u003c/a> from California, citing, in part, the state’s increasingly severe wildfire threat and state regulations that prevent them from charging premiums high enough to profitably cover it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A recent \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/economy/2025/01/la-fires-california-insurance/\">raft of state regulatory changes\u003c/a> is aimed at enticing insurers back. That may mean that homeowners who have been shuttered from the market will now have the \u003cem>option\u003c/em> to buy insurance — but at a price they can’t afford.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That, ultimately, is how insurance markets are supposed to work, said Victoria Xie, a Santa Clara University economist. When insurance companies refuse to cover an area or will only do so at sky-high rates, that’s a strobing, red light that the risk of residing in such a location is very real and very high.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Maybe households need financial incentives or some sort of help that allows them to make that move,” she said. Because the best long-term outcome is “obviously for us all to instead of frequently fighting these fires and having unaffordable rates to just stay out of these areas.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That would be a painful transition. But it isn’t likely to happen just yet: Last week, Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara \u003ca href=\"https://www.cbsnews.com/losangeles/news/california-insurance-commissioner-moratorium-southern-california-homeowners/\">banned insurance companies\u003c/a> from canceling policies or dropping customers in any of the zip codes that have been burned by the Los Angeles fire for the next year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Levi Sumagaysay contributed to this story.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "The L.A. fires expose California’s difficult road to navigate between disaster risk and solving the state’s housing crisis.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>In 1955, the Ventu Park wildfire tore through the canyons above Malibu, burning nearly 14,000 acres and eight homes. The same area saw two large fires burn hillsides and homes over the next three years. There were two in the 1970s, one in the ’80s and three in the ’90s. This century, those hills saw the Woolsey fire, one of the most destructive burns in California history. The Franklin fire, which scorched the hills just last month, has now been overshadowed by the firestorm that followed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With the Palisades Fire still ripping through that same fire corridor last weekend, Gov. Gavin Newsom vowed to rebuild — and quickly. He signed an \u003ca href=\"https://www.gov.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/EO-N-4-25-Rebuilding-Final-signed.pdf\">executive order (PDF)\u003c/a> suspending environmental laws that might delay reconstruction and ordered the state’s housing agency to identify building codes that could stand in the way of recovery. His administration, he told NBC News, was in the midst of \u003ca href=\"https://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-press/video/gov-newsom-says-he-s-organizing-a-marshall-plan-to-reimagine-l-a-2-0-after-wildfires-229081157656\">putting together a “Marshall Plan”\u003c/a> for post-fire reconstruction.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The impulse to restore all that the fires have stripped away may be a basic human one, and it’s certainly good politics for Newsom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But to many ecologists, economists and other experts on California wildfire risk, the vow to rebuild is part of a familiar California cycle as predictable as the Santa Anas: We keep putting homes in the path of the flames.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The biggest thing to note about these fires in LA is that none of this is surprising,” said Erica Fischer, an Oregon State University professor who studies wildfire impacts on buildings and public infrastructure.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Between 1990 and 2020, \u003ca href=\"https://silvis.forest.wisc.edu/data/wui-change/\">nearly 45% of the homes built in California\u003c/a> has broken ground in what researchers and firefighters call the \u003ca href=\"https://silvis.forest.wisc.edu/maps-data/wildland-urban-interface/\">wildland-urban interface\u003c/a>: the hillsides, ravines and canyons where the furthest frontier of residential development meets and merges with the state’s forests, scrublands and grasses. That’s despite the fact that this area makes up less than 7% of all the land in the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a particularly risky place to reside. Of all the structures destroyed by wildfire between 1985 and 2013, \u003ca href=\"https://www.fs.usda.gov/nrs/pubs/jrnl/2019/nrs_2019_kramer_001.pdf\">more than 80% (PDF)\u003c/a> were in that fire-prone zone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>No matter the other precautions a homeowner or local government might take, “you’re still taking a gamble when you place a new development out in an extraordinarily fire-prone environment,” said Alexandra Syphard, an ecologist at the Conservation Biology Institute who studies how land-use decisions affect wildfire risk.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Simply by the law of numbers, the more people you have in an area like that, the higher your likelihood that one of those people will start a fire and the higher the likelihood that that fire is going to reach a house,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022617\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022617\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_28-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_28-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_28-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_28-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_28-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_28-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A fireplace remains standing from a home that was burned down by the Eaton Fire in the Altadena and Pasadena area on Jan. 8, 2025. \u003ccite>(Jules Hotz for CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Once the smoke clears, rebuilding in the same place, often in the same way, is the historic norm. A \u003ca href=\"https://www.fs.usda.gov/nrs/pubs/jrnl/2021/nrs_2021_kramer_001.pdf\">study of 28 catastrophic blazes\u003c/a> across California between 1970 and 2009 found that nearly 60% of all the destroyed buildings were replaced within six years. The study also found “no consistent trend,” suggesting that the homes or communities were rebuilt in a way more likely to resist future fire.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some argue that California doesn’t have the luxury not to build (and rebuild) in fire country. Though the state has a chronic and worsening wildfire crisis, something that rears into public consciousness a few weeks out of every year, it also has a chronic housing crisis caused by a severe shortage of homes. For many Californians and lawmakers, that’s a 365-day concern.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You really hate to take areas off the table for building homes,” said Judson Boomhower, a UC San Diego environmental economist. “We know that we don’t build enough homes. At the same time, you want to make sure that you’re building those homes in a way that’s responsible and safe.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the urban fringes, the trade-off between housing and fire risk can be a profoundly difficult one to navigate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Miriam Greenberg, an urban sociologist at UC Santa Cruz who studies housing and population growth in California’s wildland-urban interface, said she’s watched the \u003ca href=\"https://santacruzlocal.org/2024/12/05/graham-hill-housing-proposal-challenges/\">debate play out in her own backyard\u003c/a>. “You see at the city council meetings, young people going to these meetings and saying, ‘you know what, I would rather that it weren’t so dangerous. But housing is housing.’ And we need housing,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Greenberg has argued that academics and policymakers need to see residential expansion into the state’s most fire-prone areas as yet another reflection of California’s affordability crisis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“People are looking to the (wildland-urban interface) as one of the only places that has capacity for housing,” she said. Though the wildland-urban interface includes toney enclaves of wealth like Pacific Palisades, it also features some of the more affordable real estate left in the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Over the last few years a handful of state lawmakers have proposed sharp limits on whether and how homes can be built in high risk areas. None have become law.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Fire-hardened homes\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>In 2020, then-state Sen. Hannah-Beth Jackson \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200SB182\">introduced a bill\u003c/a> that would have required local governments to impose building code, brush management and road design standards on new homes and subdivisions built in areas deemed by \u003ca href=\"https://osfm.fire.ca.gov/what-we-do/community-wildfire-preparedness-and-mitigation/fire-hazard-severity-zones/fire-hazard-severity-zones-maps-2022\">CalFire to be at high risk\u003c/a>. The bill passed both the Assembly and Senate only to be vetoed by Newsom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Wildfire resilience must become a more consistent part of land use and development decisions,” the governor wrote at the time. “However, it must be done while meeting our housing needs.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Two years later, Sen. Henry Stern, a Democrat from Calabasas whose district includes Malibu, authored a bill that would have \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202120220SB55\">imposed severe restrictions\u003c/a> on construction in fire country in exchange for allowing higher, denser development in low-risk areas. Assemblymember Chris Ward, a San Diego Democrat, introduced a \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.digitaldemocracy.org/bills/ca_202320240ab68\">bill in 2023\u003c/a> with a similar trade-off: Fewer restrictions on dense urban development coupled with fresh limits on growth in the wildland-urban interface.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Both bills died without a vote. Both faced stiff opposition from the state building industry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dan Dunmoyer, president of the California Building Industry Association, a trade group representing the state’s home builders, said blocking development in these areas is not only counterproductive from an affordability perspective, it’s unnecessary.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>New homes built to current California code “are completely different from the homes in Altadena that were built in the ‘20s and ‘30s,” he said. “We know that we can build master planned communities with hardened homes and hardened neighborhoods that don’t burn.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Buildings can in fact be fire-hardened, if not entirely fire-proofed. That’s often the reason that every California inferno has its share of \u003ca href=\"https://x.com/ChasenGreg/status/1877478755091767732?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1877478755091767732%7Ctwgr%5Eb3bcffafc969834d3532b4f8c38c66cb5579b7ad%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.buzzfeed.com%2Fmjs538%2Fpalisades-house-survives-fire\">miracle houses\u003c/a>: the rare single structure seemingly untouched by flame and surrounded by the ashes and smoldering foundations of neighboring homes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since 2008, any new homes built in a high-risk zone are saddled with a wide array of state-set construction requirements that specify the shape and composition of a building’s roof to the siding material that can be used to the vent covers needed to keep wind-surfing embers from wafting into a house.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“No other state has as many wildfire requirements in place or direction on what communities have to include in their general plans,” said Molly Mowery, executive director of the Community Wildfire Planning Center, a nonprofit that works with jurisdiction across the West to plan for fires.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022618\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022618\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_CM_18-copy-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_CM_18-copy-1.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_CM_18-copy-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_CM_18-copy-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_CM_18-copy-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/010824_Eaton-Fire_JH_CM_18-copy-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Smoke from the Eaton Fire fills the sky in La Cañada Flintridge on Jan. 8, 2025. Hills and canyons are critically dry. \u003ccite>(Jules Hotz for CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The Board of Supervisors of Los Angeles County is considering a new Community Wildfire Protection ordinance that would codify and enhance some of these same statewide requirements. It would apply in many of the areas that are currently burning or under evacuation order. But the rules would only apply to future development, not the homes already there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That underscores a statewide problem: “We have all these homes that were built in places with pretty high fire risk during a period in which we weren’t thinking as much about the risk and during which the risk may actually have been less than it is now because we know scientifically that the climate is making this worse,” said Boomhower from UC San Diego.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fire-hardening entire communities at once is prohibitively expensive for most localities, even if it’s the only way to effectively protect a neighborhood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The mitigation for wildfires is very similar to how we think about mitigation for infectious disease,” said Fischer from Oregon State University. “If one person gets vaccinated out of the whole town, it’s not really going to make much of a difference.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Lawsuits and insurance\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>While lawmakers have been loath to out-and-out limit development in the most flammable corners of the state, the courts have occasionally stepped in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Environmental preservationists, anti-development activists and even the state’s attorney general have turned to the California Environmental Quality Act to block construction projects.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The act requires governments to study and publicly report the environmental consequences of a development before approving it. In October, a \u003ca href=\"https://law.justia.com/cases/california/court-of-appeal/2024/a165677.html\">California appellate court\u003c/a> held that wildfire risk is one of those consequences that may deserve special consideration.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Phillip Babich, a real estate attorney, said he expects to see community groups opposed to nature-adjacent developments demanding “more disclosure, more effort in dealing with wildfire risks” as a result of the ruling.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Newsom’s executive order has foreclosed that option in Los Angeles.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That leaves a final check on whether homes are constructed in fire-prone areas: Insurance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For years, private insurers have been in a \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/housing/2023/05/state-farm-california-insurance/\">slow-motion withdrawal\u003c/a> from California, citing, in part, the state’s increasingly severe wildfire threat and state regulations that prevent them from charging premiums high enough to profitably cover it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A recent \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/economy/2025/01/la-fires-california-insurance/\">raft of state regulatory changes\u003c/a> is aimed at enticing insurers back. That may mean that homeowners who have been shuttered from the market will now have the \u003cem>option\u003c/em> to buy insurance — but at a price they can’t afford.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That, ultimately, is how insurance markets are supposed to work, said Victoria Xie, a Santa Clara University economist. When insurance companies refuse to cover an area or will only do so at sky-high rates, that’s a strobing, red light that the risk of residing in such a location is very real and very high.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Maybe households need financial incentives or some sort of help that allows them to make that move,” she said. Because the best long-term outcome is “obviously for us all to instead of frequently fighting these fires and having unaffordable rates to just stay out of these areas.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That would be a painful transition. But it isn’t likely to happen just yet: Last week, Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara \u003ca href=\"https://www.cbsnews.com/losangeles/news/california-insurance-commissioner-moratorium-southern-california-homeowners/\">banned insurance companies\u003c/a> from canceling policies or dropping customers in any of the zip codes that have been burned by the Los Angeles fire for the next year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Levi Sumagaysay contributed to this story.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"title": "'The Crisis Is Here': LA Fires Could Exacerbate California's Homelessness Problem",
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"content": "\u003cp>Jennielynn Holmes stood in the middle of a makeshift evacuation center when the scope of the crisis hit her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Surrounded by thousands of people who had just fled the Tubbs Fire, which burned through Santa Rosa in 2017, Holmes realized many of these people would soon be added to the area’s already extensive caseload of unhoused clients.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is the group of people (that) is one crisis away from entering homelessness,” thought Holmes, who helps lead the area’s homelessness response as CEO of Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Santa Rosa. “And the crisis is here.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/environment/wildfires/2025/01/la-fires-size-mapped/\">multiple wildfires\u003c/a> continue to incinerate homes and displace tens of thousands of people in Los Angeles County, experts worry about the long-term effects the fires will have on the state’s already dire homelessness crisis. In other parts of California burned by past wildfires, communities are still dealing with the fallout years later.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>People who had too little or no insurance on their homes, or who rented, sometimes end up on the street when their home burns and they can’t find another place to live.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it’s not just people whose homes burn down that feel the pain. Renters in undamaged buildings get evicted because their landlord raises rents to take advantage of refugees’ desperation — or because the landlord lost another home in the fire and needs to move into their rental unit.[aside label=\"Related Stories\" postID=\"news_12021019,news_12022375,news_12022057\"]And when a community loses thousands of homes at once when they already have a housing shortage, prices go up across the board, displacing even more people. To make the situation worse, each fire threatens to raise already sky-high home \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/economy/2025/01/la-fires-california-insurance/\">insurance rates\u003c/a>, making rebuilding or buying a new home even more prohibitively expensive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As climate change leads to hotter and drier seasons in California, these \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/explainers/california-wildfire-season-worsening-explained/\">wildfires\u003c/a> have become more unpredictable and extreme. Each new, devastating fire sets the state back in its fight against homelessness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s really putting a strain on all of California at this point,” said Matt Plotkin, who helped lead recovery efforts for the 2018 Camp Fire in Butte County as head of what is now the Camp Fire Collaborative, before landing in his current role as director of equity and advocacy for United Way of Northern California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The fires in Los Angeles County have burned more than 40,000 acres, killed at least 24 people and damaged or destroyed an estimated 12,000 homes and other structures — a loss sure to further exacerbate the housing shortage in a county that already has more than \u003ca href=\"https://www.lahsa.org/documents?id=8170-los-angeles-county-hc2024-data-summary\">75,000 homeless residents\u003c/a>. While much of the attention around the current fires has been on destruction in the wealthy enclave of \u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/12/us/palisades-wildfires.html\">Pacific Palisades\u003c/a>, experts say the rich won’t be the only ones affected.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>An analysis of three past California wildfires sheds some light on what might happen once the smoke clears in Los Angeles County.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Camp Fire\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>After the 2018 \u003ca href=\"https://www.fire.ca.gov/incidents/2018/11/8/camp-fire/\">Camp Fire\u003c/a> destroyed much of the rural town of Paradise in Butte County, thousands of evacuees poured into Chico, about 15 miles away. Now, more than six years later, the Sacramento Valley city still feels the effects.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We are still dealing with people being now, unfortunately, chronically houseless due to the Camp Fire,” Plotkin said. “The impact, I would not use the word ‘impacted’ because that is past tense. I would say it is still current, present. So I still say ‘impact.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Paradise lost about 15,000 homes in the fire. So far, only about 2,900 single-family homes and 550 multi-family units have been rebuilt, according to Mayor Steve Crowder. The loss had a large ripple effect. After the fire, vacancy rates in Butte County dropped to 1% or less, according to the county’s 2023 homeless point-in-time count \u003ca href=\"https://www.buttehomelesscoc.com/uploads/1/1/7/5/117500423/2023_pit_executive_summary.pdf\">report (PDF)\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022442\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022442\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/100119_Paradise_AW_CM_019-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/100119_Paradise_AW_CM_019-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/100119_Paradise_AW_CM_019-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/100119_Paradise_AW_CM_019-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/100119_Paradise_AW_CM_019-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/100119_Paradise_AW_CM_019-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A worker walks among the debris at Evergreen Mobile Home Park in Paradise on Oct. 1, 2019. Nearly eleven months after the Camp Fire, California Recycle and other agencies are still working to remove wildfire debris from the area. \u003ccite>(Anne Wernikoff for CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The fire also made life more difficult for people who were already homeless in Paradise. Before the fire, the town had a few homeless shelters operated by local churches. Those are all gone now, Crowder said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Immediately after the fire, Paradise passed an ordinance allowing survivors to live in trailers or RVs on their burned-out properties while they rebuild. It was supposed to be a temporary measure, but, in many cases, rebuilding took years as people waited for slow-moving insurance, federal funds and money from a settlement with PG&E to reach them. About 100 trailers remain — and some have no sewage hookup, creating unsanitary conditions, Crowder said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The town soon will have to figure out how to remove those trailers and try to find permanent housing for their occupants, he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>CZU Lightning Complex\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The 2020 CZU Lightning Complex, made up of multiple fires sparked by lightning strikes, destroyed nearly 700 homes in Santa Cruz County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Four years later, only about a third of those residences were being rebuilt, according to a 2024 Santa Cruz County Civil Grand Jury \u003ca href=\"https://www.santacruzcountyca.gov/Portals/0/County/GrandJury/GJ2024_final/2024-6_CZU_Report.pdf\">report (PDF)\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For several years, people displaced either directly or indirectly by the fires showed up at homeless service provider Housing Matters asking for help, said the nonprofit’s Chief Initiatives Officer Tom Stagg. While no one collected comprehensive data on how many people became homeless specifically because of the fire, the anecdotal evidence was everywhere, he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I remember definitely seeing an increase in RVs that people were staying in in town for up to two years after the fire,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The CZU fires tore through rural communities in the Santa Cruz Mountains, including the San Lorenzo Valley, which used to be an affordable refuge for people priced out of other areas, Stagg said. Losing homes there has made the region’s affordable housing crisis even worse, he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022443\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022443\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/SJM_BoulderCreekCZU_082320_01-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/SJM_BoulderCreekCZU_082320_01-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/SJM_BoulderCreekCZU_082320_01-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/SJM_BoulderCreekCZU_082320_01-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/SJM_BoulderCreekCZU_082320_01-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/SJM_BoulderCreekCZU_082320_01-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Burned cars in the rubble of a home during the CZU Lightning Complex Fire, near Boulder Creek, on Aug. 23, 2020. \u003ccite>(Aric Crabb/Bay Area News Group)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In addition, people burned out of the Santa Cruz Mountains — or trying to escape the threat of fire there — moved into the city of Santa Cruz, stressing the city’s housing market and bringing down the vacancy rate, said Robert Ratner, director of Santa Cruz County’s Housing for Health.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s common for people to migrate after a fire, traveling to places where they have friends and family or where they believe they can find affordable housing. That fact makes every California wildfire a regional — even statewide — event. Even before the CZU fires, Stagg’s team saw people end up homeless in Santa Cruz after being displaced from Paradise by the Camp Fire.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s difficult to track exactly how many people are made homeless by a fire, but as fires increasingly ravage California, some communities are interested in trying.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Santa Cruz County did not conduct a homeless census in the year after the CZU fires. Later counts asked participants about the primary reason they became homeless, listing natural disaster as an option. Few people ever chose that answer, but Ratner thinks that may be because there are so many combined factors that lead to homelessness. For example, someone might be displaced by a fire, but it’s ultimately their economic insecurity that prevents them from finding a new place to live.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wording the question differently might produce better data, Ratner said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It feels like something we need to start asking about so we can get better information,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some rural counties in the far north of the state, where wildfires are frequent, already ask. In 2023, nearly a quarter of Siskiyou County’s 507 homeless residents said they were homeless as a result of fire, according to the county’s most recent \u003ca href=\"https://files.cityofredding.gov/Document%20Center/Departments/Housing/NorCal%20COC/PIT/Reports/2023%20NorCal%20CoC%20PIT%20Report.pdf\">point-in-time count (PDF)\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Tubbs Fire\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>After the 2017 \u003ca href=\"https://www.fire.ca.gov/incidents/2017/10/8/tubbs-fire-central-lnu-complex/\">Tubbs Fire\u003c/a> burned through Napa and Sonoma counties in the Bay Area’s wine country, local service providers saw a spike in homelessness about a year and a half later, Holmes said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Immediately after the fire, money and other aid from FEMA, the local and state government, and philanthropic organizations poured in. Many people were able to live doubled or tripled-up with friends or family for a period of time. But when the money ran out, and those cramped living situations became unsustainable, people found themselves out on the street.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a situation that could repeat in Los Angeles County, Holmes said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s incredibly challenging because you’re dealing with a huge new homeless population,” she said. “People who lost their homes are now technically homeless. So with already a crazy amount of people experiencing homelessness, particularly in Southern California, and now you add on potentially tens of thousands more.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022444\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022444\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/011425-Tubbs-Fire-JH-AP-01-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1046\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/011425-Tubbs-Fire-JH-AP-01-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/011425-Tubbs-Fire-JH-AP-01-copy-800x534.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/011425-Tubbs-Fire-JH-AP-01-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/011425-Tubbs-Fire-JH-AP-01-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/011425-Tubbs-Fire-JH-AP-01-copy-1536x1025.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">In this Oct. 13, 2017, file photo, a row of chimneys stand in a neighborhood devastated by the Tubbs Fire near Santa Rosa, Sonoma County. In an order dated July 12, 2021, Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Mary Strobel ruled that California Insurance Commissioner Richard Lara has the power to order the state’s ‘Insurer of last resort’ to offer more options for homeowners who can’t buy traditional coverage because they live in areas threatened by wildfires. \u003ccite>(Jae C. Hong/AP Photo)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>After the Tubbs Fires, the Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Santa Rosa (the organization Holmes runs) created a disaster case management team with up to 20 case managers and wrote a disaster case management playbook. The organization thought it would be a temporary program. But the fires continued, and it’s now become a permanent fixture.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For several years following the fire, Sonoma County included fire-related questions in its annual \u003ca href=\"https://sonomacounty.ca.gov/Microsites/Permit%20Sonoma/Documents/Archive/Misc/2018_HomelessCensusReport.pdf\">homeless point-in-time count (PDF)\u003c/a>. The year after the disaster, more than a third of homeless survey respondents said their previous housing or sleeping location had been affected by the fire in some way — including 12% who said it had been burned or otherwise destroyed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The county also surveyed people who were housed to determine how many people might be at risk of becoming homeless. The survey found about 7% of Sonoma County households had someone living with them temporarily in the year after the fire. Using that data, the researchers estimated that 21,482 people were living temporarily doubled-up. Of those, nearly 40% said they were living that way because they lost their housing as a direct result of the fire. An additional 11% said they lost their housing because their landlord moved in or the rent increased because of the fire.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The city of Santa Rosa has \u003ca href=\"https://santarosa.maps.arcgis.com/apps/dashboards/07e39ea4077c42a883430a9f60103bc2\">permitted\u003c/a> 3,220 new residential units since the 2017 fire, according to city data. That includes more than 370 affordable units, said Megan Basinger, the city’s director of housing and community services.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’ve seen more restricted units come online since the fire than I think we’ve ever seen,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As Los Angeles County starts to think about rebuilding, no one is watching with more empathy than those who have been through it before, Holmes said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We just feel so much for what’s going on down there because we know what it feels like,” she said, “to watch a community you love just be taken away so quickly.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "As wildfires continue to incinerate homes and displace tens of thousands of people in L.A. County, experts worry about the long-term effects the fires will have on the state’s already dire homelessness crisis.",
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"title": "'The Crisis Is Here': LA Fires Could Exacerbate California's Homelessness Problem | KQED",
"description": "As wildfires continue to incinerate homes and displace tens of thousands of people in L.A. County, experts worry about the long-term effects the fires will have on the state’s already dire homelessness crisis.",
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"nprByline": "\u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/author/marisa-kendall/\">Marisa Kendall\u003c/a>, CalMatters",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Jennielynn Holmes stood in the middle of a makeshift evacuation center when the scope of the crisis hit her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Surrounded by thousands of people who had just fled the Tubbs Fire, which burned through Santa Rosa in 2017, Holmes realized many of these people would soon be added to the area’s already extensive caseload of unhoused clients.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is the group of people (that) is one crisis away from entering homelessness,” thought Holmes, who helps lead the area’s homelessness response as CEO of Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Santa Rosa. “And the crisis is here.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/environment/wildfires/2025/01/la-fires-size-mapped/\">multiple wildfires\u003c/a> continue to incinerate homes and displace tens of thousands of people in Los Angeles County, experts worry about the long-term effects the fires will have on the state’s already dire homelessness crisis. In other parts of California burned by past wildfires, communities are still dealing with the fallout years later.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>People who had too little or no insurance on their homes, or who rented, sometimes end up on the street when their home burns and they can’t find another place to live.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it’s not just people whose homes burn down that feel the pain. Renters in undamaged buildings get evicted because their landlord raises rents to take advantage of refugees’ desperation — or because the landlord lost another home in the fire and needs to move into their rental unit.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>And when a community loses thousands of homes at once when they already have a housing shortage, prices go up across the board, displacing even more people. To make the situation worse, each fire threatens to raise already sky-high home \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/economy/2025/01/la-fires-california-insurance/\">insurance rates\u003c/a>, making rebuilding or buying a new home even more prohibitively expensive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As climate change leads to hotter and drier seasons in California, these \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/explainers/california-wildfire-season-worsening-explained/\">wildfires\u003c/a> have become more unpredictable and extreme. Each new, devastating fire sets the state back in its fight against homelessness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s really putting a strain on all of California at this point,” said Matt Plotkin, who helped lead recovery efforts for the 2018 Camp Fire in Butte County as head of what is now the Camp Fire Collaborative, before landing in his current role as director of equity and advocacy for United Way of Northern California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The fires in Los Angeles County have burned more than 40,000 acres, killed at least 24 people and damaged or destroyed an estimated 12,000 homes and other structures — a loss sure to further exacerbate the housing shortage in a county that already has more than \u003ca href=\"https://www.lahsa.org/documents?id=8170-los-angeles-county-hc2024-data-summary\">75,000 homeless residents\u003c/a>. While much of the attention around the current fires has been on destruction in the wealthy enclave of \u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/12/us/palisades-wildfires.html\">Pacific Palisades\u003c/a>, experts say the rich won’t be the only ones affected.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>An analysis of three past California wildfires sheds some light on what might happen once the smoke clears in Los Angeles County.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Camp Fire\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>After the 2018 \u003ca href=\"https://www.fire.ca.gov/incidents/2018/11/8/camp-fire/\">Camp Fire\u003c/a> destroyed much of the rural town of Paradise in Butte County, thousands of evacuees poured into Chico, about 15 miles away. Now, more than six years later, the Sacramento Valley city still feels the effects.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We are still dealing with people being now, unfortunately, chronically houseless due to the Camp Fire,” Plotkin said. “The impact, I would not use the word ‘impacted’ because that is past tense. I would say it is still current, present. So I still say ‘impact.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Paradise lost about 15,000 homes in the fire. So far, only about 2,900 single-family homes and 550 multi-family units have been rebuilt, according to Mayor Steve Crowder. The loss had a large ripple effect. After the fire, vacancy rates in Butte County dropped to 1% or less, according to the county’s 2023 homeless point-in-time count \u003ca href=\"https://www.buttehomelesscoc.com/uploads/1/1/7/5/117500423/2023_pit_executive_summary.pdf\">report (PDF)\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022442\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022442\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/100119_Paradise_AW_CM_019-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/100119_Paradise_AW_CM_019-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/100119_Paradise_AW_CM_019-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/100119_Paradise_AW_CM_019-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/100119_Paradise_AW_CM_019-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/100119_Paradise_AW_CM_019-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A worker walks among the debris at Evergreen Mobile Home Park in Paradise on Oct. 1, 2019. Nearly eleven months after the Camp Fire, California Recycle and other agencies are still working to remove wildfire debris from the area. \u003ccite>(Anne Wernikoff for CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The fire also made life more difficult for people who were already homeless in Paradise. Before the fire, the town had a few homeless shelters operated by local churches. Those are all gone now, Crowder said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Immediately after the fire, Paradise passed an ordinance allowing survivors to live in trailers or RVs on their burned-out properties while they rebuild. It was supposed to be a temporary measure, but, in many cases, rebuilding took years as people waited for slow-moving insurance, federal funds and money from a settlement with PG&E to reach them. About 100 trailers remain — and some have no sewage hookup, creating unsanitary conditions, Crowder said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The town soon will have to figure out how to remove those trailers and try to find permanent housing for their occupants, he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>CZU Lightning Complex\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The 2020 CZU Lightning Complex, made up of multiple fires sparked by lightning strikes, destroyed nearly 700 homes in Santa Cruz County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Four years later, only about a third of those residences were being rebuilt, according to a 2024 Santa Cruz County Civil Grand Jury \u003ca href=\"https://www.santacruzcountyca.gov/Portals/0/County/GrandJury/GJ2024_final/2024-6_CZU_Report.pdf\">report (PDF)\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For several years, people displaced either directly or indirectly by the fires showed up at homeless service provider Housing Matters asking for help, said the nonprofit’s Chief Initiatives Officer Tom Stagg. While no one collected comprehensive data on how many people became homeless specifically because of the fire, the anecdotal evidence was everywhere, he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I remember definitely seeing an increase in RVs that people were staying in in town for up to two years after the fire,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The CZU fires tore through rural communities in the Santa Cruz Mountains, including the San Lorenzo Valley, which used to be an affordable refuge for people priced out of other areas, Stagg said. Losing homes there has made the region’s affordable housing crisis even worse, he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022443\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022443\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/SJM_BoulderCreekCZU_082320_01-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/SJM_BoulderCreekCZU_082320_01-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/SJM_BoulderCreekCZU_082320_01-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/SJM_BoulderCreekCZU_082320_01-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/SJM_BoulderCreekCZU_082320_01-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/SJM_BoulderCreekCZU_082320_01-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Burned cars in the rubble of a home during the CZU Lightning Complex Fire, near Boulder Creek, on Aug. 23, 2020. \u003ccite>(Aric Crabb/Bay Area News Group)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In addition, people burned out of the Santa Cruz Mountains — or trying to escape the threat of fire there — moved into the city of Santa Cruz, stressing the city’s housing market and bringing down the vacancy rate, said Robert Ratner, director of Santa Cruz County’s Housing for Health.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s common for people to migrate after a fire, traveling to places where they have friends and family or where they believe they can find affordable housing. That fact makes every California wildfire a regional — even statewide — event. Even before the CZU fires, Stagg’s team saw people end up homeless in Santa Cruz after being displaced from Paradise by the Camp Fire.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s difficult to track exactly how many people are made homeless by a fire, but as fires increasingly ravage California, some communities are interested in trying.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Santa Cruz County did not conduct a homeless census in the year after the CZU fires. Later counts asked participants about the primary reason they became homeless, listing natural disaster as an option. Few people ever chose that answer, but Ratner thinks that may be because there are so many combined factors that lead to homelessness. For example, someone might be displaced by a fire, but it’s ultimately their economic insecurity that prevents them from finding a new place to live.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wording the question differently might produce better data, Ratner said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It feels like something we need to start asking about so we can get better information,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some rural counties in the far north of the state, where wildfires are frequent, already ask. In 2023, nearly a quarter of Siskiyou County’s 507 homeless residents said they were homeless as a result of fire, according to the county’s most recent \u003ca href=\"https://files.cityofredding.gov/Document%20Center/Departments/Housing/NorCal%20COC/PIT/Reports/2023%20NorCal%20CoC%20PIT%20Report.pdf\">point-in-time count (PDF)\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Tubbs Fire\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>After the 2017 \u003ca href=\"https://www.fire.ca.gov/incidents/2017/10/8/tubbs-fire-central-lnu-complex/\">Tubbs Fire\u003c/a> burned through Napa and Sonoma counties in the Bay Area’s wine country, local service providers saw a spike in homelessness about a year and a half later, Holmes said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Immediately after the fire, money and other aid from FEMA, the local and state government, and philanthropic organizations poured in. Many people were able to live doubled or tripled-up with friends or family for a period of time. But when the money ran out, and those cramped living situations became unsustainable, people found themselves out on the street.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a situation that could repeat in Los Angeles County, Holmes said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s incredibly challenging because you’re dealing with a huge new homeless population,” she said. “People who lost their homes are now technically homeless. So with already a crazy amount of people experiencing homelessness, particularly in Southern California, and now you add on potentially tens of thousands more.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022444\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022444\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/011425-Tubbs-Fire-JH-AP-01-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1046\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/011425-Tubbs-Fire-JH-AP-01-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/011425-Tubbs-Fire-JH-AP-01-copy-800x534.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/011425-Tubbs-Fire-JH-AP-01-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/011425-Tubbs-Fire-JH-AP-01-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/011425-Tubbs-Fire-JH-AP-01-copy-1536x1025.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">In this Oct. 13, 2017, file photo, a row of chimneys stand in a neighborhood devastated by the Tubbs Fire near Santa Rosa, Sonoma County. In an order dated July 12, 2021, Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Mary Strobel ruled that California Insurance Commissioner Richard Lara has the power to order the state’s ‘Insurer of last resort’ to offer more options for homeowners who can’t buy traditional coverage because they live in areas threatened by wildfires. \u003ccite>(Jae C. Hong/AP Photo)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>After the Tubbs Fires, the Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Santa Rosa (the organization Holmes runs) created a disaster case management team with up to 20 case managers and wrote a disaster case management playbook. The organization thought it would be a temporary program. But the fires continued, and it’s now become a permanent fixture.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For several years following the fire, Sonoma County included fire-related questions in its annual \u003ca href=\"https://sonomacounty.ca.gov/Microsites/Permit%20Sonoma/Documents/Archive/Misc/2018_HomelessCensusReport.pdf\">homeless point-in-time count (PDF)\u003c/a>. The year after the disaster, more than a third of homeless survey respondents said their previous housing or sleeping location had been affected by the fire in some way — including 12% who said it had been burned or otherwise destroyed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The county also surveyed people who were housed to determine how many people might be at risk of becoming homeless. The survey found about 7% of Sonoma County households had someone living with them temporarily in the year after the fire. Using that data, the researchers estimated that 21,482 people were living temporarily doubled-up. Of those, nearly 40% said they were living that way because they lost their housing as a direct result of the fire. An additional 11% said they lost their housing because their landlord moved in or the rent increased because of the fire.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The city of Santa Rosa has \u003ca href=\"https://santarosa.maps.arcgis.com/apps/dashboards/07e39ea4077c42a883430a9f60103bc2\">permitted\u003c/a> 3,220 new residential units since the 2017 fire, according to city data. That includes more than 370 affordable units, said Megan Basinger, the city’s director of housing and community services.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’ve seen more restricted units come online since the fire than I think we’ve ever seen,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As Los Angeles County starts to think about rebuilding, no one is watching with more empathy than those who have been through it before, Holmes said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We just feel so much for what’s going on down there because we know what it feels like,” she said, “to watch a community you love just be taken away so quickly.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"title": "Many in Pacific Palisades Were Not Wealthy. After Fire, Can They Rebuild?",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Los Angeles — \u003c/strong>Many Pacific Palisades locals, current and former, have been following the \u003ca href=\"https://www.facebook.com/kent.steffes.5\">Facebook feed of 56-year-old Kent Steffes\u003c/a>. He lives in nearby Brentwood now and hasn’t lost his home, but perhaps that’s given him the emotional bandwidth to share more effectively with others what’s happened to their old neighborhood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Overlooking the Pacific Ocean like its neighbors Malibu and Santa Monica, Pacific Palisades is an affluent neighborhood by any measure. It’s home to celebrities like Arnold Schwarzenegger, Reese Witherspoon and Tom Hanks. Median home values often exceed $3 million. Luxury homes sell for tens of millions. But many of the families who’ve lost their homes are not fabulously wealthy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What most people don’t know is that a lot of the homes are owned by people who can’t afford to live here anymore. They won’t be able to rebuild,” Steffes said. That’s because many family members can’t afford to buy the homes they own at the current market rate. “They couldn’t afford to get a mortgage on it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Along with his 20-year-old daughter, Katharine Steffes, who also attended Palisades High (partially burned), we toured the neighborhood as it lay smoking. “All my friends live here,” the sophomore at the University of Notre Dame said. “I don’t know if this place will ever be the same.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kent Steffes’ family moved to the Pacific Palisades highlands in 1973 when he was 5. His dad, an engineer at Hughes Aircraft Co., bought a home for $75,000, which would be around $533,000 in today’s dollars. The house had five bedrooms, although many homes built in “Pali” in the 1960s and ’70s featured two or three bedrooms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022381\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022381\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild1.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"768\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild1.jpeg 1024w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild1-800x600.jpeg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild1-1020x765.jpeg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild1-160x120.jpeg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">“What most people don’t know is that a lot of the homes are owned by people who can’t afford to live here anymore. They won’t be able to rebuild,” said Kent Steffes, 56, who grew up in Pacific Palisades. \u003ccite>(Rachael Myrow/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“You were always outside biking or riding skateboards around town,” said Steffes, who grew up to win the inaugural beach volleyball gold medal at the \u003ca href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_Summer_Olympics\">1996 Summer Olympics\u003c/a> in \u003ca href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlanta\">Atlanta\u003c/a>. He works in finance now. “There was always someplace to explore and have fun and plenty of friends to do it with. We ran out of the house in the morning and didn’t come home until the street lights came on.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But as the decades passed, the neighborhood grew wealthier. By the time Steffes was in his 30s, many modest three- to four-bedroom homes were giving way to “McMansions,” double the size, on the same small lots. Big or small, the original owners aged and died and passed on their homes to their children, as Kent Steffes’ parents did. “We just sold that home last year for $2.5 million.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Because of \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11711689/40-years-on-how-does-proposition-13-impact-the-california-dream\">Proposition 13\u003c/a>, passed in 1978, family members who inherited properties were essentially given the original property tax rate. Steffes’ parents paid about $4,000 in property taxes. Steffes said the people who bought the house last year pay about $37,500.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In addition to the much higher tax rate, a lot of insurance plans cover only the value of the house as it is, not the cost to rebuild according to modern building codes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So they’ll say, ‘Hey, your house is worth $300,000,’” Steffes said hypothetically. “But it’ll cost you $1 million to rebuild that same thing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nancy Wallace, a real estate professor at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, \u003ca href=\"https://newsroom.haas.berkeley.edu/research/the-situation-is-dire-why-prof-nancy-wallace-researches-wildfire-risk/\">lost her own home\u003c/a> to the Oakland Hills fire of 1991. She’s now considered an expert in price modeling and wildfire “mispricing,” as she puts it, in the insurance market.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022382\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1216px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022382\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild3.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1216\" height=\"912\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild3.jpg 1216w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild3-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild3-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild3-160x120.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1216px) 100vw, 1216px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Marquez Charter Elementary School was destroyed in the Palisades fire, erasing cherished childhood memories for countless individuals. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Kent Steffes )\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“Insurance adjusters are not your friends,” she said. “They’re not there to sympathize. They’re there to minimize the payout of their company. It might be dressed up with nice words, but that is the challenge that you’re facing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Due in large part to \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12020835/southern-california-fires-could-be-most-expensive-us-history\">climate-change-driven wildfires\u003c/a>, hundreds of thousands of Californians have lost their insurance policies altogether in 2024. This has forced many homeowners to turn to the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/science/1992401/homeowners-insurance-market-stretched-even-thinner-as-2-more-companies-leave-california\">California FAIR Plan\u003c/a>, a state-mandated insurance market of last resort, which often provides more expensive and limited coverage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>State Farm, the largest insurer group in California,\u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/california-wildfire-insurance-e31bef0ed7eeddcde096a5b8f2c1768f\"> announced a halt\u003c/a> to new homeowner insurance policies in the state in 2023 and began canceling or non-renewing policies for tens of thousands of properties in 2024.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_12021911 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_Oakland-Fires_DMB_01810_qed-1020x680.jpg']\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, a spokesman told KQED State Farm still insures 250,000 homes and “As of Tuesday, Jan. 14, we’ve begun to process over 6,700 home and auto claims, already putting tens of millions of dollars back into customers’ hands. We are prepared to address the growing number of claims expected as residents return and assess damage.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Allstate paused the sale of homeowners insurance policies for new customers in 2022. “We continue to offer coverage to most existing homeowners insurance customers,” an Allstate spokesperson wrote KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Based on Wallace’s analysis, about 1 million California homes are in high- or very high-risk areas, with 2 million to 4.5 million more in vulnerable wildland-urban interface zones. The time it takes to rebuild a home after a wildfire varies significantly depending on the severity of the damage, availability of contractors, and compliance with updated building codes, but Wallace estimates it could take up to four years to rebuild a home destroyed by a wildfire.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Four years is a lifetime for many people,” she said but noted the incentives in the current system are to rebuild, and for those with the money to rebuild, build back bigger and more expensively. That’s if they have insurance policies that will meet the demand now.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Given \u003ca href=\"https://abcnews.go.com/Business/los-angeles-fire-losses-reach-30-billion-insurers/story?id=117653563\">how expensive\u003c/a> the Palisades Fire is expected to be, Wallace warned the California insurance market could fail because many insurance policies are too generous given the actual risks, and the state insurance commissioner’s office has only recently begun to allow the industry to adjust for the changing reality.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>All these factors exacerbate the trend toward gentrification in Pacific Palisades and neighborhoods like it, meaning home ownership in those places is becoming infeasible for any but the most wealthy Californians.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ultimately, Wallace said, many homeowners in Pacific Palisades will choose to do what she did after the Oakland Hills fire took her home: move out of the neighborhood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "Although the Palisades Fire affected a largely affluent area, many families who lost their homes were longtime residents who would not be able to afford to recreate what they had before.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Los Angeles — \u003c/strong>Many Pacific Palisades locals, current and former, have been following the \u003ca href=\"https://www.facebook.com/kent.steffes.5\">Facebook feed of 56-year-old Kent Steffes\u003c/a>. He lives in nearby Brentwood now and hasn’t lost his home, but perhaps that’s given him the emotional bandwidth to share more effectively with others what’s happened to their old neighborhood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Overlooking the Pacific Ocean like its neighbors Malibu and Santa Monica, Pacific Palisades is an affluent neighborhood by any measure. It’s home to celebrities like Arnold Schwarzenegger, Reese Witherspoon and Tom Hanks. Median home values often exceed $3 million. Luxury homes sell for tens of millions. But many of the families who’ve lost their homes are not fabulously wealthy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What most people don’t know is that a lot of the homes are owned by people who can’t afford to live here anymore. They won’t be able to rebuild,” Steffes said. That’s because many family members can’t afford to buy the homes they own at the current market rate. “They couldn’t afford to get a mortgage on it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Along with his 20-year-old daughter, Katharine Steffes, who also attended Palisades High (partially burned), we toured the neighborhood as it lay smoking. “All my friends live here,” the sophomore at the University of Notre Dame said. “I don’t know if this place will ever be the same.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kent Steffes’ family moved to the Pacific Palisades highlands in 1973 when he was 5. His dad, an engineer at Hughes Aircraft Co., bought a home for $75,000, which would be around $533,000 in today’s dollars. The house had five bedrooms, although many homes built in “Pali” in the 1960s and ’70s featured two or three bedrooms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022381\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022381\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild1.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"768\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild1.jpeg 1024w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild1-800x600.jpeg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild1-1020x765.jpeg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild1-160x120.jpeg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">“What most people don’t know is that a lot of the homes are owned by people who can’t afford to live here anymore. They won’t be able to rebuild,” said Kent Steffes, 56, who grew up in Pacific Palisades. \u003ccite>(Rachael Myrow/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“You were always outside biking or riding skateboards around town,” said Steffes, who grew up to win the inaugural beach volleyball gold medal at the \u003ca href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_Summer_Olympics\">1996 Summer Olympics\u003c/a> in \u003ca href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlanta\">Atlanta\u003c/a>. He works in finance now. “There was always someplace to explore and have fun and plenty of friends to do it with. We ran out of the house in the morning and didn’t come home until the street lights came on.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But as the decades passed, the neighborhood grew wealthier. By the time Steffes was in his 30s, many modest three- to four-bedroom homes were giving way to “McMansions,” double the size, on the same small lots. Big or small, the original owners aged and died and passed on their homes to their children, as Kent Steffes’ parents did. “We just sold that home last year for $2.5 million.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Because of \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11711689/40-years-on-how-does-proposition-13-impact-the-california-dream\">Proposition 13\u003c/a>, passed in 1978, family members who inherited properties were essentially given the original property tax rate. Steffes’ parents paid about $4,000 in property taxes. Steffes said the people who bought the house last year pay about $37,500.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In addition to the much higher tax rate, a lot of insurance plans cover only the value of the house as it is, not the cost to rebuild according to modern building codes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So they’ll say, ‘Hey, your house is worth $300,000,’” Steffes said hypothetically. “But it’ll cost you $1 million to rebuild that same thing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nancy Wallace, a real estate professor at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, \u003ca href=\"https://newsroom.haas.berkeley.edu/research/the-situation-is-dire-why-prof-nancy-wallace-researches-wildfire-risk/\">lost her own home\u003c/a> to the Oakland Hills fire of 1991. She’s now considered an expert in price modeling and wildfire “mispricing,” as she puts it, in the insurance market.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022382\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1216px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022382\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild3.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1216\" height=\"912\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild3.jpg 1216w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild3-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild3-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/PacificPalisadesRebuild3-160x120.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1216px) 100vw, 1216px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Marquez Charter Elementary School was destroyed in the Palisades fire, erasing cherished childhood memories for countless individuals. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Kent Steffes )\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“Insurance adjusters are not your friends,” she said. “They’re not there to sympathize. They’re there to minimize the payout of their company. It might be dressed up with nice words, but that is the challenge that you’re facing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Due in large part to \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12020835/southern-california-fires-could-be-most-expensive-us-history\">climate-change-driven wildfires\u003c/a>, hundreds of thousands of Californians have lost their insurance policies altogether in 2024. This has forced many homeowners to turn to the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/science/1992401/homeowners-insurance-market-stretched-even-thinner-as-2-more-companies-leave-california\">California FAIR Plan\u003c/a>, a state-mandated insurance market of last resort, which often provides more expensive and limited coverage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>State Farm, the largest insurer group in California,\u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/california-wildfire-insurance-e31bef0ed7eeddcde096a5b8f2c1768f\"> announced a halt\u003c/a> to new homeowner insurance policies in the state in 2023 and began canceling or non-renewing policies for tens of thousands of properties in 2024.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, a spokesman told KQED State Farm still insures 250,000 homes and “As of Tuesday, Jan. 14, we’ve begun to process over 6,700 home and auto claims, already putting tens of millions of dollars back into customers’ hands. We are prepared to address the growing number of claims expected as residents return and assess damage.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Allstate paused the sale of homeowners insurance policies for new customers in 2022. “We continue to offer coverage to most existing homeowners insurance customers,” an Allstate spokesperson wrote KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Based on Wallace’s analysis, about 1 million California homes are in high- or very high-risk areas, with 2 million to 4.5 million more in vulnerable wildland-urban interface zones. The time it takes to rebuild a home after a wildfire varies significantly depending on the severity of the damage, availability of contractors, and compliance with updated building codes, but Wallace estimates it could take up to four years to rebuild a home destroyed by a wildfire.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Four years is a lifetime for many people,” she said but noted the incentives in the current system are to rebuild, and for those with the money to rebuild, build back bigger and more expensively. That’s if they have insurance policies that will meet the demand now.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Given \u003ca href=\"https://abcnews.go.com/Business/los-angeles-fire-losses-reach-30-billion-insurers/story?id=117653563\">how expensive\u003c/a> the Palisades Fire is expected to be, Wallace warned the California insurance market could fail because many insurance policies are too generous given the actual risks, and the state insurance commissioner’s office has only recently begun to allow the industry to adjust for the changing reality.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>All these factors exacerbate the trend toward gentrification in Pacific Palisades and neighborhoods like it, meaning home ownership in those places is becoming infeasible for any but the most wealthy Californians.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ultimately, Wallace said, many homeowners in Pacific Palisades will choose to do what she did after the Oakland Hills fire took her home: move out of the neighborhood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "why-a-push-to-make-san-franciscos-north-beach-a-historic-district-has-housing-advocates-worried",
"title": "Why a Push to Make San Francisco's North Beach a Historic District Has Housing Advocates Worried",
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"headTitle": "Why a Push to Make San Francisco’s North Beach a Historic District Has Housing Advocates Worried | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>A local preservationist group in North Beach on Wednesday is hoping to make its case to city officials to designate the neighborhood as a historic district — a move San Francisco housing advocates say would make it all but impossible to build new housing there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The San Francisco Historic Preservation Commission will hear comments from the public about the proposal. It has until the end of the month to present its recommendation to the state’s Historical Resources Commission, which is expected to vote on it and other nominations in early February.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"https://nesfc.org/portfolio-items/north-beach-survey/\">Northeast San Francisco Conservancy\u003c/a>, a neighborhood group, applied for the designation \u003ca href=\"https://citypln-m-extnl.sfgov.org/Commissions/HPC/1_15_2025/Commission%20Packet/2024-011152CRV.pdf\">in June\u003c/a> and is hoping the move will help preserve roughly a dozen blocks of North Beach, mostly along Columbus Avenue, Powell Street, Stockton Street and Broadway. The area includes several iconic sites, such as Washington Square Park, City Lights Bookstore, the Old Spaghetti Factory Cafe and Saint Francis of Assisi Church.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022237\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022237\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00193.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00193.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00193-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00193-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00193-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00193-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00193-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Saints Peter and Paul Church and apartment buildings in North Beach, on Monday, Jan. 13, 2025. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“North Beach has an amazingly rich history,” said Nancy Shanahan, a historian with the Northeast San Francisco Conservancy and wife of former Supervisor Aaron Peskin, whose district included North Beach.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, housing advocates warn that if the group is successful, more than 600 buildings within that area would be exempt from certain state housing laws. It’s a tactic that’s become increasingly common in recent years as \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11943154/they-asked-for-this-california-sues-huntington-beach-for-flouting-laws-meant-to-ease-housing-crisis\">state officials have levied stricter laws\u003c/a> on cities and counties, requiring them to plan for a record number of new homes. The move in North Beach follows \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/housing-nimby-historic-baywood-18450990.php\">Baywood in San Mateo\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.sgvtribune.com/2024/08/17/former-montebello-seminary-deemed-eligible-for-historic-registry-in-spite-of-owners-opposition/?clearUserState=true\">Montebello\u003c/a> near Los Angeles and \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27JKQs1hRzI&t=5712s&ab_channel=CityofSanDiegoPublicHearings\">North Florence Heights\u003c/a> in San Diego, all of which have sought the same designation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022236\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022236\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02319.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02319.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02319-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02319-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02319-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02319-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02319-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">An apartment window looks out above Columbus Cafe on Green Street in North Beach on Monday, Jan. 13, 2025. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“When you’re talking about turning an entire neighborhood into a historic district with the goal of making it harder — impossible — to build any housing there, that’s very concerning,” said State Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Along with enjoying special property tax benefits and opportunities for more funding, historic districts have stricter rules for how developers can retrofit or redevelop buildings to preserve the architecture and historic character of the district. To keep up with those stringent standards, developers often have to spend more on projects, meaning the resulting building is either expensive or never gets built.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>San Francisco is home to a \u003ca href=\"https://data.sfgov.org/Geographic-Locations-and-Boundaries/Map-of-Historic-Districts/y75h-nbt2\">handful of historic districts\u003c/a> recognized by the state and national register, including parts of Russian Hill, Golden Gate Park, Jackson Square and the Presidio, but the city itself plays a minor role in designating these districts as “historic.” Instead, it’s up to the \u003ca href=\"https://ohp.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=1067\">State Historical Resources Commission\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022230\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022230\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_05549_duo.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1339\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_05549_duo.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_05549_duo-800x536.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_05549_duo-1020x683.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_05549_duo-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_05549_duo-1536x1028.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_05549_duo-1920x1285.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">(Clockwise from top left) A for-rent sign on Jasper Place, apartment numbers on Bannam Place, pedestrians on the corner of Krausgrill Place and Filbert Street, and a man carries drycleaning on Green Street in North Beach on Monday, Jan. 13, 2025. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>This centralized process \u003ca href=\"https://ohp.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=21371\">dates back to the early 1900s\u003c/a>, but housing advocates, including Wiener, argue these designations are increasingly being “weaponized” to slow new housing or prevent it altogether. Anyone who wants to designate a particular area as a “historic district” — and can afford to pay architectural experts and historians to draft an application — can simply submit their nomination to the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The problem here is that you have people who do not want to see any new housing built in North Beach not going to City Hall to have the conversation, but going to a state body and asking them to short-circuit local conversations,” Wiener said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022231\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022231\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02875.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02875.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02875-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02875-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02875-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02875-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02875-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Pedestrians and cafe-goers mix along Columbus Avenue in North Beach on Monday, Jan. 13, 2025. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Shanahan refutes that interpretation: “This is not a maneuver to block new housing from being built in North Beach,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, Woody LaBounty of San Francisco Heritage, a local historic preservation advocacy group and proponent of the plan, said the state’s increasing zeal in ensuring new housing gets built across California does play a role in his support for the proposal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s especially important now because so many of these state housing production bills try to basically get outside of local control,” he said. “This is a great way to take another look at this before you just tear down this building to build a larger building because there’s something special here that probably should be preserved.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022235\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022235\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00439.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00439.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00439-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00439-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00439-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00439-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00439-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A pedestrian crosses Union Street in North Beach on Monday, Jan. 13, 2025. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Last year, the Legislature \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240AB2580\">passed a law\u003c/a> requiring cities to report historic districts to the state’s housing department to monitor how those designations impact the city’s ability to address housing needs.[aside label=\"Related Stories\" postID=\"news_12017695,news_12018617,news_12017713\"]The state’s housing department has tasked San Francisco with making room \u003ca href=\"https://abag.ca.gov/sites/default/files/documents/2021-12/Final_RHNA_Allocation_Report_2023-2031-approved_0.pdf#page=28\">for more than 82,000\u003c/a> new homes and apartments by 2031, and city officials have consistently made it clear that all neighborhoods should expect to “\u003ca href=\"https://default.sfplanning.org/plans-and-programs/planning-for-the-city/housing-element/2014_Housing_Element_Part_II_DRAFT.pdf\">accept their fair share of affordable housing\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Jane Natoli, San Francisco Organizing Director of pro-housing group YIMBY Action, said that when affluent neighborhoods like North Beach try to exempt themselves from housing laws, it puts a larger burden on other neighborhoods with fewer resources to plan for more housing, and it can make those historic neighborhoods more expensive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think most people can reasonably agree that there are historic resources that we want to save, but when we paint with too wide a brush, it becomes just another tool to obstruct housing and make it harder to live in California,” she said. “Then who can appreciate the history? Who gets to enjoy that historic neighborhood if they can’t afford to live in it or near it?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022232\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022232\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00789.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00789.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00789-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00789-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00789-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00789-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00789-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A dilapidated building on Union Street and Columbus Avenue in North Beach on Monday, Jan. 13, 2025. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>LaBounty agreed that it’s not fair that, usually, only affluent neighborhoods like North Beach and Saint Francis Wood in San Francisco or Baywood in San Mateo, can afford to go through the lengthy and expensive process of getting designated as a historic district. However, he said that disparity was only a sign there should be more support from local and state governments to assist less affluent communities who want to document their historic sites.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For us, it’s not about freezing things; it’s about managing change, and we can all work together to do that,” he said. “I think that people who want more housing and the people who want to save special places — we can work together to get more housing into these neighborhoods and save the places that everybody loves.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022234\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022234\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_03525.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_03525.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_03525-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_03525-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_03525-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_03525-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_03525-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A garage, painted in the national colors of Italy, faces out on Vallejo Street on the corner of Margrave Place in North Beach on Monday, Jan. 13, 2025. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Editor’s Note: This story has been updated to include a correction. An earlier version of the story misidentified former Supervisor Aaron Peskin as a current elected official. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfZ-ZKtuSHdeWqxooQwfEcr-oiOpdpJcf2RLZInU7aqjjQlRQ/viewform?embedded=true\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "A growing number of cities and neighborhoods are seeking historic district designation by the state. But with that designation comes more barriers to new housing.",
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"title": "Why a Push to Make San Francisco's North Beach a Historic District Has Housing Advocates Worried | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>A local preservationist group in North Beach on Wednesday is hoping to make its case to city officials to designate the neighborhood as a historic district — a move San Francisco housing advocates say would make it all but impossible to build new housing there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The San Francisco Historic Preservation Commission will hear comments from the public about the proposal. It has until the end of the month to present its recommendation to the state’s Historical Resources Commission, which is expected to vote on it and other nominations in early February.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"https://nesfc.org/portfolio-items/north-beach-survey/\">Northeast San Francisco Conservancy\u003c/a>, a neighborhood group, applied for the designation \u003ca href=\"https://citypln-m-extnl.sfgov.org/Commissions/HPC/1_15_2025/Commission%20Packet/2024-011152CRV.pdf\">in June\u003c/a> and is hoping the move will help preserve roughly a dozen blocks of North Beach, mostly along Columbus Avenue, Powell Street, Stockton Street and Broadway. The area includes several iconic sites, such as Washington Square Park, City Lights Bookstore, the Old Spaghetti Factory Cafe and Saint Francis of Assisi Church.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022237\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022237\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00193.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00193.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00193-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00193-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00193-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00193-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00193-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Saints Peter and Paul Church and apartment buildings in North Beach, on Monday, Jan. 13, 2025. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“North Beach has an amazingly rich history,” said Nancy Shanahan, a historian with the Northeast San Francisco Conservancy and wife of former Supervisor Aaron Peskin, whose district included North Beach.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, housing advocates warn that if the group is successful, more than 600 buildings within that area would be exempt from certain state housing laws. It’s a tactic that’s become increasingly common in recent years as \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11943154/they-asked-for-this-california-sues-huntington-beach-for-flouting-laws-meant-to-ease-housing-crisis\">state officials have levied stricter laws\u003c/a> on cities and counties, requiring them to plan for a record number of new homes. The move in North Beach follows \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/housing-nimby-historic-baywood-18450990.php\">Baywood in San Mateo\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.sgvtribune.com/2024/08/17/former-montebello-seminary-deemed-eligible-for-historic-registry-in-spite-of-owners-opposition/?clearUserState=true\">Montebello\u003c/a> near Los Angeles and \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27JKQs1hRzI&t=5712s&ab_channel=CityofSanDiegoPublicHearings\">North Florence Heights\u003c/a> in San Diego, all of which have sought the same designation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022236\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022236\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02319.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02319.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02319-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02319-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02319-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02319-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02319-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">An apartment window looks out above Columbus Cafe on Green Street in North Beach on Monday, Jan. 13, 2025. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“When you’re talking about turning an entire neighborhood into a historic district with the goal of making it harder — impossible — to build any housing there, that’s very concerning,” said State Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Along with enjoying special property tax benefits and opportunities for more funding, historic districts have stricter rules for how developers can retrofit or redevelop buildings to preserve the architecture and historic character of the district. To keep up with those stringent standards, developers often have to spend more on projects, meaning the resulting building is either expensive or never gets built.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>San Francisco is home to a \u003ca href=\"https://data.sfgov.org/Geographic-Locations-and-Boundaries/Map-of-Historic-Districts/y75h-nbt2\">handful of historic districts\u003c/a> recognized by the state and national register, including parts of Russian Hill, Golden Gate Park, Jackson Square and the Presidio, but the city itself plays a minor role in designating these districts as “historic.” Instead, it’s up to the \u003ca href=\"https://ohp.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=1067\">State Historical Resources Commission\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022230\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022230\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_05549_duo.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1339\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_05549_duo.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_05549_duo-800x536.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_05549_duo-1020x683.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_05549_duo-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_05549_duo-1536x1028.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_05549_duo-1920x1285.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">(Clockwise from top left) A for-rent sign on Jasper Place, apartment numbers on Bannam Place, pedestrians on the corner of Krausgrill Place and Filbert Street, and a man carries drycleaning on Green Street in North Beach on Monday, Jan. 13, 2025. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>This centralized process \u003ca href=\"https://ohp.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=21371\">dates back to the early 1900s\u003c/a>, but housing advocates, including Wiener, argue these designations are increasingly being “weaponized” to slow new housing or prevent it altogether. Anyone who wants to designate a particular area as a “historic district” — and can afford to pay architectural experts and historians to draft an application — can simply submit their nomination to the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The problem here is that you have people who do not want to see any new housing built in North Beach not going to City Hall to have the conversation, but going to a state body and asking them to short-circuit local conversations,” Wiener said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022231\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022231\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02875.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02875.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02875-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02875-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02875-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02875-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_02875-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Pedestrians and cafe-goers mix along Columbus Avenue in North Beach on Monday, Jan. 13, 2025. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Shanahan refutes that interpretation: “This is not a maneuver to block new housing from being built in North Beach,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, Woody LaBounty of San Francisco Heritage, a local historic preservation advocacy group and proponent of the plan, said the state’s increasing zeal in ensuring new housing gets built across California does play a role in his support for the proposal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s especially important now because so many of these state housing production bills try to basically get outside of local control,” he said. “This is a great way to take another look at this before you just tear down this building to build a larger building because there’s something special here that probably should be preserved.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022235\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022235\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00439.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00439.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00439-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00439-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00439-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00439-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00439-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A pedestrian crosses Union Street in North Beach on Monday, Jan. 13, 2025. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Last year, the Legislature \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240AB2580\">passed a law\u003c/a> requiring cities to report historic districts to the state’s housing department to monitor how those designations impact the city’s ability to address housing needs.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The state’s housing department has tasked San Francisco with making room \u003ca href=\"https://abag.ca.gov/sites/default/files/documents/2021-12/Final_RHNA_Allocation_Report_2023-2031-approved_0.pdf#page=28\">for more than 82,000\u003c/a> new homes and apartments by 2031, and city officials have consistently made it clear that all neighborhoods should expect to “\u003ca href=\"https://default.sfplanning.org/plans-and-programs/planning-for-the-city/housing-element/2014_Housing_Element_Part_II_DRAFT.pdf\">accept their fair share of affordable housing\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Jane Natoli, San Francisco Organizing Director of pro-housing group YIMBY Action, said that when affluent neighborhoods like North Beach try to exempt themselves from housing laws, it puts a larger burden on other neighborhoods with fewer resources to plan for more housing, and it can make those historic neighborhoods more expensive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think most people can reasonably agree that there are historic resources that we want to save, but when we paint with too wide a brush, it becomes just another tool to obstruct housing and make it harder to live in California,” she said. “Then who can appreciate the history? Who gets to enjoy that historic neighborhood if they can’t afford to live in it or near it?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022232\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022232\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00789.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00789.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00789-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00789-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00789-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00789-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_00789-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A dilapidated building on Union Street and Columbus Avenue in North Beach on Monday, Jan. 13, 2025. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>LaBounty agreed that it’s not fair that, usually, only affluent neighborhoods like North Beach and Saint Francis Wood in San Francisco or Baywood in San Mateo, can afford to go through the lengthy and expensive process of getting designated as a historic district. However, he said that disparity was only a sign there should be more support from local and state governments to assist less affluent communities who want to document their historic sites.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For us, it’s not about freezing things; it’s about managing change, and we can all work together to do that,” he said. “I think that people who want more housing and the people who want to save special places — we can work together to get more housing into these neighborhoods and save the places that everybody loves.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022234\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022234\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_03525.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_03525.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_03525-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_03525-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_03525-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_03525-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250113_North-Beach_DMB_03525-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A garage, painted in the national colors of Italy, faces out on Vallejo Street on the corner of Margrave Place in North Beach on Monday, Jan. 13, 2025. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Editor’s Note: This story has been updated to include a correction. An earlier version of the story misidentified former Supervisor Aaron Peskin as a current elected official. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cdiv class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__shortcodes__shortcodeWrapper'>\n \u003ciframe\n src='https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfZ-ZKtuSHdeWqxooQwfEcr-oiOpdpJcf2RLZInU7aqjjQlRQ/viewform?embedded=true?embedded=true'\n title='https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfZ-ZKtuSHdeWqxooQwfEcr-oiOpdpJcf2RLZInU7aqjjQlRQ/viewform?embedded=true'\n width='760' height='500'\n frameborder='0'\n marginheight='0' marginwidth='0'>\u003c/iframe>\u003c/div>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"title": "Altadena Was Home to a Diverse, Vibrant Community. The Fires May Have Destroyed That",
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"content": "\u003cp>The sight of celebrity mansions and \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/landmarks-destroyed-california-wildfires-135b5d227f3ea1b5b9f877b48e3bbdb9\">movie landmarks\u003c/a> reduced to ashes can make it seem like the wildfires roaring through the Los Angeles area affected a constellation of movie stars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But a drive \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/los-angeles-wildfires-southern-california-c5826e0ab8db965cb2814132ff54ee6f\">through the charred neighborhoods\u003c/a> around Altadena shows that the fires also burned through a remarkable haven for generations of Black families avoiding discriminatory housing practices elsewhere. They have been communities of racial and economic diversity, where many people own their own homes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some now fear the most destructive fires in California’s history have altered that for good. Recovery and rebuilding may be out of reach for many, and the pressures of gentrification could be renewed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Samantha Santoro, 22, a first-generation college student at Cal Poly Pomona, remembered being annoyed when the initial news coverage of the wildfires focused more on celebrities. She and her sister, who attends UC Berkeley, worry how their Mexican immigrant parents and working-class neighbors who lost their homes in Altadena will move forward.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We don’t have like, ‘Oh, I’ll just go to my second home and stay there,’” Santoro said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The landlord of their family’s two-bedroom house with a pool had never increased the $1,650 rent, making it possible for the Santoros to affordably raise their daughters. Now, they’re temporarily staying with a relative in Pasadena. The family has renters insurance but not much else.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think it’s hard to believe that you have nothing,” Santoro said, through tears, thinking of her parents. “Everything that they ever worked for was in that house.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Altadena had been a mix of tiny bungalows and magnificent mansions. The community of 42,000 includes blue-collar families, artists, entertainment industry workers and white-collar ones. About 58% of residents are non-white, with one-fourth of them Hispanic and nearly a fifth Black, according to Census data.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022064\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022064\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2193297850.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"683\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2193297850.jpg 1024w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2193297850-800x534.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2193297850-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2193297850-160x107.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A view of burned Altadena Church and Chevron gas station as greater Los Angeles fire continue, in Altadena, Los Angeles County, on Jan. 13, 2025. \u003ccite>(Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>During the Civil Rights era, Altadena became a rare land of opportunity for Black Americans to reach the middle class without the discriminatory practices of denying them access to credit. They kept homes within the family and helped others to flourish. Today, the Black homeownership rate there is at 81.5%, almost double the national rate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s impressive, considering 92% of the 15,000 residences in Altadena are single-family homes, according to the 2023 Census American Community Survey. The median income is over $129,000. Just over 7% of residents live in poverty.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Victoria Knapp, chair of the Altadena Town Council, worries that the fires have irreparably changed the landscape for these families.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Someone is going to buy it and develop who knows what on it. And that is going to change the character of Altadena,” Knapp said, adding that those with fewer resources will be disproportionately hurt.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The family of Kenneth Snowden, 57, was one of the Black families able to purchase a home in 1962. That house, as well as the one Snowden bought almost 20 years ago, are both gone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He is challenging state and federal officials to help all fire-affected communities fairly because “your $40 million home is no different than my $2 million home.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Snowden wants the ability to acquire home loans with 0% interest. “Give us the ability to rebuild, restart our lives,” he said. “If you can spend billions of dollars fighting a war, you can spend a billion dollars to help us get back where we were at.”[aside label=\"Related Stories\" postID=\"news_12022028,news_12021954,news_12021019\"]Shawn Brown lost not only her home but also the public charter school she founded in Altadena. She had a message for fellow Black homeowners who might be tempted with offers for their property: “I would tell them to stand strong, rebuild, continue the generational progress of African-Americans.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She and other staff at Pasadena Rosebud Academy are trying to raise money to rebuild while looking at temporary sites in churches.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But even some churches have burned. At Altadena Baptist Church, the bell tower is pretty much the only thing still standing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Rev. George Van Alstine and others are trying to help more than 10 church members who lost homes with needs like navigating insurance and federal aid. The pastor is worried the fires will lead to gentrification, with Black parishioners, who make up half the congregation, paying the price.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re seeing a number of families who are probably going to have to move out of the area because rebuilding in Altadena will be too expensive for them,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The 32-year-old photographer Daniela Dawson, who had been working two jobs to meet the $2,200 rent for her studio apartment, fled the wildfires with her Hyundai SUV and her cat, Lola. She lost almost everything else, including thousands of dollars of photography gear.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She did not have renter’s insurance. “Obviously, now I’m thinking about it. Wish I had it,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dawson plans to return to Arizona, where she lived previously and regroup. But she likely won’t be returning to Altadena.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Tang reported from Sunnyvale, California. Kelleher reported from Honolulu. Associated Press deputy director Kim Johnson in Chicago, graphics artist Philip Holm in New York and data reporter Angeliki Kastanis in Los Angeles contributed to this report.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>The sight of celebrity mansions and \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/landmarks-destroyed-california-wildfires-135b5d227f3ea1b5b9f877b48e3bbdb9\">movie landmarks\u003c/a> reduced to ashes can make it seem like the wildfires roaring through the Los Angeles area affected a constellation of movie stars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But a drive \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/los-angeles-wildfires-southern-california-c5826e0ab8db965cb2814132ff54ee6f\">through the charred neighborhoods\u003c/a> around Altadena shows that the fires also burned through a remarkable haven for generations of Black families avoiding discriminatory housing practices elsewhere. They have been communities of racial and economic diversity, where many people own their own homes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some now fear the most destructive fires in California’s history have altered that for good. Recovery and rebuilding may be out of reach for many, and the pressures of gentrification could be renewed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Samantha Santoro, 22, a first-generation college student at Cal Poly Pomona, remembered being annoyed when the initial news coverage of the wildfires focused more on celebrities. She and her sister, who attends UC Berkeley, worry how their Mexican immigrant parents and working-class neighbors who lost their homes in Altadena will move forward.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We don’t have like, ‘Oh, I’ll just go to my second home and stay there,’” Santoro said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The landlord of their family’s two-bedroom house with a pool had never increased the $1,650 rent, making it possible for the Santoros to affordably raise their daughters. Now, they’re temporarily staying with a relative in Pasadena. The family has renters insurance but not much else.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think it’s hard to believe that you have nothing,” Santoro said, through tears, thinking of her parents. “Everything that they ever worked for was in that house.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Altadena had been a mix of tiny bungalows and magnificent mansions. The community of 42,000 includes blue-collar families, artists, entertainment industry workers and white-collar ones. About 58% of residents are non-white, with one-fourth of them Hispanic and nearly a fifth Black, according to Census data.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12022064\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12022064\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2193297850.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"683\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2193297850.jpg 1024w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2193297850-800x534.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2193297850-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2193297850-160x107.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A view of burned Altadena Church and Chevron gas station as greater Los Angeles fire continue, in Altadena, Los Angeles County, on Jan. 13, 2025. \u003ccite>(Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>During the Civil Rights era, Altadena became a rare land of opportunity for Black Americans to reach the middle class without the discriminatory practices of denying them access to credit. They kept homes within the family and helped others to flourish. Today, the Black homeownership rate there is at 81.5%, almost double the national rate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s impressive, considering 92% of the 15,000 residences in Altadena are single-family homes, according to the 2023 Census American Community Survey. The median income is over $129,000. Just over 7% of residents live in poverty.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Victoria Knapp, chair of the Altadena Town Council, worries that the fires have irreparably changed the landscape for these families.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Someone is going to buy it and develop who knows what on it. And that is going to change the character of Altadena,” Knapp said, adding that those with fewer resources will be disproportionately hurt.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The family of Kenneth Snowden, 57, was one of the Black families able to purchase a home in 1962. That house, as well as the one Snowden bought almost 20 years ago, are both gone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He is challenging state and federal officials to help all fire-affected communities fairly because “your $40 million home is no different than my $2 million home.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Snowden wants the ability to acquire home loans with 0% interest. “Give us the ability to rebuild, restart our lives,” he said. “If you can spend billions of dollars fighting a war, you can spend a billion dollars to help us get back where we were at.”\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Shawn Brown lost not only her home but also the public charter school she founded in Altadena. She had a message for fellow Black homeowners who might be tempted with offers for their property: “I would tell them to stand strong, rebuild, continue the generational progress of African-Americans.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She and other staff at Pasadena Rosebud Academy are trying to raise money to rebuild while looking at temporary sites in churches.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But even some churches have burned. At Altadena Baptist Church, the bell tower is pretty much the only thing still standing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Rev. George Van Alstine and others are trying to help more than 10 church members who lost homes with needs like navigating insurance and federal aid. The pastor is worried the fires will lead to gentrification, with Black parishioners, who make up half the congregation, paying the price.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re seeing a number of families who are probably going to have to move out of the area because rebuilding in Altadena will be too expensive for them,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The 32-year-old photographer Daniela Dawson, who had been working two jobs to meet the $2,200 rent for her studio apartment, fled the wildfires with her Hyundai SUV and her cat, Lola. She lost almost everything else, including thousands of dollars of photography gear.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She did not have renter’s insurance. “Obviously, now I’m thinking about it. Wish I had it,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dawson plans to return to Arizona, where she lived previously and regroup. But she likely won’t be returning to Altadena.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Tang reported from Sunnyvale, California. Kelleher reported from Honolulu. Associated Press deputy director Kim Johnson in Chicago, graphics artist Philip Holm in New York and data reporter Angeliki Kastanis in Los Angeles contributed to this report.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://ternercenter.berkeley.edu/blog/california-housing-laws-that-go-into-effect-in-2025/\">Sixty new housing laws\u003c/a> will go into effect in California this year, including several that apply to renters and landlords, placing new rules on evictions, security deposits and “junk fees.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And while tenant advocates welcome the changes, they’re warning that renters need to be aware of their rights in order for the laws to be truly effective.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There is a huge power imbalance between landlords and tenants statewide,” said Sam Beckett, directing attorney for tenants’ rights at Centro Legal de la Raza, an East Bay nonprofit. “These laws represent important, significant developments toward counteracting that imbalance and preventing the exploitation of tenants.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In an effort to protect tenants while also sparing small landlords from extra costs, many of the laws target landlords who own multiple properties and include exceptions for those who own fewer than 15 units. But Debra Carlton, executive vice president for state and government affairs for the California Apartment Association, said more regulations often mean more expenses for landlords.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The more regulations you place on the rental housing industry,” she said, “the more landlords exit.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Keep reading for some of the 2025 laws that impact renters and landlords:\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240AB2747\">Credit reporting\u003c/a>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Credit scores can play a big role in whether a prospective tenant gets accepted for an apartment. However, it can be hard to build good credit without a long credit history and consistent payment of debts, \u003ca href=\"https://www.consumerfinance.gov/ask-cfpb/how-do-i-get-and-keep-a-good-credit-score-en-318/\">among other factors\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>AB 2724, which goes into effect in April, aims to give tenants the \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240AB2747\">opportunity to build their credit scores\u003c/a> by allowing them the option of reporting their rent payments to a credit reporting agency. Landlords are now required to report the payments for tenants who opt in but are also allowed to pass on any related costs to the tenant. The law only applies to landlords who rent out more than 15 units.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We always work to exempt small landlords, and we were successful with that one,” Carlton said. “We try, number one, to make it so that it’s at least beneficial by way of the tenant and doesn’t cost the owner any more money.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[ad fullwidth]\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240AB2347\">Eviction notices\u003c/a>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Starting this month, if a tenant receives an eviction notice, they \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240AB2347\">now have 10 days to respond\u003c/a>, as opposed to five days, thanks to AB 2347.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In an effort to protect landlords from lengthy and costly court proceedings, the new law also requires the tenant’s lawyer to file certain motions by the day before the court hearing.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240AB2801\">Security deposits\u003c/a>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Sometimes, when a tenant moves out of their apartment, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12005287/landlord-security-deposit-california-renters-law-notice\">their landlord will hold onto a security deposit\u003c/a> to pay for professional cleaning services and even to cover normal wear-and-tear. AB 2801, which goes into effect in April, \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240AB2801\">prohibits landlords from keeping security deposits\u003c/a> to pay for professional cleaning or other maintenance services, unless it’s necessary to repair significant damage to the unit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Betty Gabaldon, an organizer with tenants’ rights group East Bay Alliance for a Sustainable Economy, welcomes the change. When she recently left an apartment after five years, she said her landlord refused to return her security deposit and told her she would also have to pay for professional carpet cleaning and new paint for the walls.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gabaldon protested and eventually got her deposit back. AB 2801 would tighten the rules around when landlords can keep security deposits and could prevent renters like Gabaldon from having to protest these kinds of charges after moving out. However, she warns, tenants still need to be aware of their rights and ready to hold their landlords accountable. She noted some renters might hesitate out of fear of retaliation or dealing with the sometimes laborious process of contesting a charge.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was lucky that I sent the letter, and I was able to exercise my rights, but not a lot of people are lucky,” Gabaldon said. “These laws are there, but people need to start exercising them for [the laws] to work.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When the California Apartment Association first learned about this bill, Carlton said her organization was concerned that landlords would have little recourse if a tenant did destroy an apartment. The law specifies that property owners must take photographs and send an itemized statement along with a written explanation of the cost of repairs and cleaning.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Take pictures of the unit, then take pictures when the tenant takes possession, and then take pictures of the unit when the tenant exits and when you’ve done [repair and cleaning] work,” she said — adding that such photos would be necessary if a landlord has to go to small claims court. “If [landlords] have to go to small claims court, they’re going to have to show them to the judge.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240AB2493\">Junk fees and application fees\u003c/a>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Two new California laws follow promises from \u003ca href=\"https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2023/10/11/biden-harris-administration-announces-broad-new-actions-to-protect-consumers-from-billions-in-junk-fees/\">federal\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/economy/2024/12/california-banking-new-laws-2025/\">state\u003c/a> governments to crack down on junk fees — \u003ca href=\"https://www.whitehouse.gov/cea/written-materials/2024/03/05/the-price-isnt-right-how-junk-fees-cost-consumers-and-undermine-competition/\">costs “that are mandatory but not transparently disclosed to consumers\u003c/a>,” according to the White House. Last year, the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12006174/the-feds-sued-a-major-corporate-landlord-heres-what-it-means-for-renters\">Federal Trade Commission sued Invitation Homes\u003c/a>, the country’s largest corporate landlord of single-family homes, for illegally charging tenants such fees.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID='news_12019437']\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>SB 611 goes after “convenience” fees, pet fees, guest-related fees and others that landlords might charge, which are sometimes hidden from tenants until they look closely at their monthly bill. Starting in April, landlords now have to be transparent about the maximum amount of money a tenant could be charged for certain services.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>AB 2493 regulates application or screening fees that landlords charge prospective tenants to cover the cost of background checks and other data collection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The new law, already in effect, makes it clear that landlords can only charge screening fees to applicants who are being seriously considered, and they must refund the screening fee to anyone who didn’t get accepted. In an effort to prevent discrimination against applicants, landlords also have to accept the first qualified applicant who applies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Carlton said she understands why tenants want to fight for their rights and why landlords want to fight against more regulation but that this tension might not exist if there was enough housing to match demand. Until that need is met, she said both tenants and landlords will make sure they are being treated fairly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I don’t think we’d see as many of these bills if we had enough housing for everybody,” she said. “I think that’s our biggest challenge.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>What other housing questions do you have for KQED?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Housing is one of the most crucial — and contentious — issues in the Bay Area, and here at KQED, we have a whole team dedicated to exploring \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/housing\">stories about housing affordability\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As part of our work, we also want to bring you explainers and guides about housing in the region, offering practical advice and insight for renters, homeowners and unhoused folks on a wide range of housing situations. We also want you to send us your story ideas and tips, share your personal experience with housing in the Bay Area or volunteer to be one of the KQED readers and listeners we consult about housing stories.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>So tell us: What housing question should we answer next?\u003c/strong>\u003cbr>\nYou can use the comment box below to submit your question about housing in the Bay Area or California more widely. Or, maybe there’s a housing program you want explained or investigated. Whatever’s on your mind, use the Google Form below to talk to us. The information you provide here will be shared with the folks who work on KQED’s housing coverage, and we may follow up with you directly through the contact details you provide. (We’ll never share your information outside of KQED without your permission.) We won’t be able to reply to everyone who submits a question, but what you tell us will make our reporting stronger on KQED.org, KQED Public Radio and our social media channels.\u003cbr>\nhttps://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfZ-ZKtuSHdeWqxooQwfEcr-oiOpdpJcf2RLZInU7aqjjQlRQ/viewform?embedded=true\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240AB2347\">Eviction notices\u003c/a>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Starting this month, if a tenant receives an eviction notice, they \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240AB2347\">now have 10 days to respond\u003c/a>, as opposed to five days, thanks to AB 2347.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In an effort to protect landlords from lengthy and costly court proceedings, the new law also requires the tenant’s lawyer to file certain motions by the day before the court hearing.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240AB2801\">Security deposits\u003c/a>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Sometimes, when a tenant moves out of their apartment, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12005287/landlord-security-deposit-california-renters-law-notice\">their landlord will hold onto a security deposit\u003c/a> to pay for professional cleaning services and even to cover normal wear-and-tear. AB 2801, which goes into effect in April, \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240AB2801\">prohibits landlords from keeping security deposits\u003c/a> to pay for professional cleaning or other maintenance services, unless it’s necessary to repair significant damage to the unit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Betty Gabaldon, an organizer with tenants’ rights group East Bay Alliance for a Sustainable Economy, welcomes the change. When she recently left an apartment after five years, she said her landlord refused to return her security deposit and told her she would also have to pay for professional carpet cleaning and new paint for the walls.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gabaldon protested and eventually got her deposit back. AB 2801 would tighten the rules around when landlords can keep security deposits and could prevent renters like Gabaldon from having to protest these kinds of charges after moving out. However, she warns, tenants still need to be aware of their rights and ready to hold their landlords accountable. She noted some renters might hesitate out of fear of retaliation or dealing with the sometimes laborious process of contesting a charge.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was lucky that I sent the letter, and I was able to exercise my rights, but not a lot of people are lucky,” Gabaldon said. “These laws are there, but people need to start exercising them for [the laws] to work.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When the California Apartment Association first learned about this bill, Carlton said her organization was concerned that landlords would have little recourse if a tenant did destroy an apartment. The law specifies that property owners must take photographs and send an itemized statement along with a written explanation of the cost of repairs and cleaning.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Take pictures of the unit, then take pictures when the tenant takes possession, and then take pictures of the unit when the tenant exits and when you’ve done [repair and cleaning] work,” she said — adding that such photos would be necessary if a landlord has to go to small claims court. “If [landlords] have to go to small claims court, they’re going to have to show them to the judge.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240AB2493\">Junk fees and application fees\u003c/a>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Two new California laws follow promises from \u003ca href=\"https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2023/10/11/biden-harris-administration-announces-broad-new-actions-to-protect-consumers-from-billions-in-junk-fees/\">federal\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/economy/2024/12/california-banking-new-laws-2025/\">state\u003c/a> governments to crack down on junk fees — \u003ca href=\"https://www.whitehouse.gov/cea/written-materials/2024/03/05/the-price-isnt-right-how-junk-fees-cost-consumers-and-undermine-competition/\">costs “that are mandatory but not transparently disclosed to consumers\u003c/a>,” according to the White House. Last year, the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12006174/the-feds-sued-a-major-corporate-landlord-heres-what-it-means-for-renters\">Federal Trade Commission sued Invitation Homes\u003c/a>, the country’s largest corporate landlord of single-family homes, for illegally charging tenants such fees.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>SB 611 goes after “convenience” fees, pet fees, guest-related fees and others that landlords might charge, which are sometimes hidden from tenants until they look closely at their monthly bill. Starting in April, landlords now have to be transparent about the maximum amount of money a tenant could be charged for certain services.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>AB 2493 regulates application or screening fees that landlords charge prospective tenants to cover the cost of background checks and other data collection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The new law, already in effect, makes it clear that landlords can only charge screening fees to applicants who are being seriously considered, and they must refund the screening fee to anyone who didn’t get accepted. In an effort to prevent discrimination against applicants, landlords also have to accept the first qualified applicant who applies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Carlton said she understands why tenants want to fight for their rights and why landlords want to fight against more regulation but that this tension might not exist if there was enough housing to match demand. Until that need is met, she said both tenants and landlords will make sure they are being treated fairly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I don’t think we’d see as many of these bills if we had enough housing for everybody,” she said. “I think that’s our biggest challenge.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>What other housing questions do you have for KQED?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Housing is one of the most crucial — and contentious — issues in the Bay Area, and here at KQED, we have a whole team dedicated to exploring \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/housing\">stories about housing affordability\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As part of our work, we also want to bring you explainers and guides about housing in the region, offering practical advice and insight for renters, homeowners and unhoused folks on a wide range of housing situations. We also want you to send us your story ideas and tips, share your personal experience with housing in the Bay Area or volunteer to be one of the KQED readers and listeners we consult about housing stories.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>So tell us: What housing question should we answer next?\u003c/strong>\u003cbr>\nYou can use the comment box below to submit your question about housing in the Bay Area or California more widely. Or, maybe there’s a housing program you want explained or investigated. Whatever’s on your mind, use the Google Form below to talk to us. The information you provide here will be shared with the folks who work on KQED’s housing coverage, and we may follow up with you directly through the contact details you provide. (We’ll never share your information outside of KQED without your permission.) We won’t be able to reply to everyone who submits a question, but what you tell us will make our reporting stronger on KQED.org, KQED Public Radio and our social media channels.\u003cbr>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cdiv class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__shortcodes__shortcodeWrapper'>\n \u003ciframe\n src='https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfZ-ZKtuSHdeWqxooQwfEcr-oiOpdpJcf2RLZInU7aqjjQlRQ/viewform?embedded=true?embedded=true'\n title='https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfZ-ZKtuSHdeWqxooQwfEcr-oiOpdpJcf2RLZInU7aqjjQlRQ/viewform?embedded=true'\n width='760' height='500'\n frameborder='0'\n marginheight='0' marginwidth='0'>\u003c/iframe>\u003c/div>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"headTitle": "Yes, Price Gouging During LA Fires Is Illegal — and Here’s How You Can Report It | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>Updated 9:20 a.m. Friday\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12021150/where-to-donate-help-los-angeles-wildfire-eaton-fire-palisades-pasadena\">The devastating wildfires\u003c/a> continuing to rage through Los Angeles County have claimed at least 10 lives so far according to officials, \u003ca href=\"https://www.latimes.com/california/live/pacific-palisades-fire-updates-los-angeles\">destroyed over 9,000 buildings\u003c/a> and forced around 180,000 people to flee their homes under mandatory \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11834901/fire-evacuation-what-actually-happens-and-how-can-you-plan\">evacuation orders\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And as a huge number of people displaced by the Palisades, Eaton, Hurst, Lidia and Sunset fires now try to meet their basic needs — including shelter, food and water, medical supplies and gasoline — California Attorney General Rob Bonta has issued a reminder that price gouging during disasters like this remains illegal in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jump straight to:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"#price-gouging-definition\">What counts as price gouging?\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"#how-to-report-price-gouging\">How can I report price gouging during the L.A. fires?\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>California defines price gouging as \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/consumers/pricegougingduringdisasters#1C\">when sellers try “to take unfair advantage of consumers\u003c/a> during an emergency or disaster by greatly increasing prices for essential consumer goods and services.” During the L.A. wildfires, this might look like hotels charging more than their usual rates for evacuees seeking a room or a grocery market, hugely increasing the price of bottled water.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The state’s Department of Justice is now urging people to report any examples of price gouging they see and warns that sellers found to be violating this law can be prosecuted, fined and imprisoned. So if you’re an L.A. County resident who’s been forced to evacuate their home right now — or you have loved ones in the region you want to ensure aren’t being taken advantage of — keep reading for what you need to know about spotting price gouging, and how to report it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>When do price gouging laws come into effect?\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The state’s law against price gouging under Penal Code Section 396 kicks in when a statewide or local state of emergency is declared — \u003ca href=\"https://www.gov.ca.gov/2025/01/07/governor-newsom-proclaims-state-of-emergency-meets-with-first-responders-in-pacific-palisades-amid-dangerous-fire-weather/\">which happened on Tuesday\u003c/a>, as announced by Gov. Gavin Newsom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>These protections can last well beyond the initial outbreak of a disaster situation: The Office of the Attorney General says that they \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/consumers/pricegougingduringdisasters#3C\">“generally apply for 30 days after a declaration of emergency\u003c/a>, although for reconstruction services and emergency cleanup services,\u003ca href=\"https://www.caloes.ca.gov/office-of-the-director/policy-administration/legal-affairs/price-gouging/\"> protections apply for 180 days after a declaration of emergency.\u003c/a>”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://dcba.lacounty.gov/newsroom/during-emergency-report-suspected-price-gouging/\">L.A. County also has its own laws against price gouging\u003c/a>, which similarly remain in effect for 30 days until after an emergency declaration (in this case, Feb. 6) and 180 days for contractor-related services.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca id=\"price-gouging-definition\">\u003c/a>What kind of price rise is considered ‘gouging’ under the law?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>In a nutshell, sellers don’t have to be outright doubling their prices to be regarded as participating in price gouging. In fact, “California law generally prohibits charging a price that exceeds, by more than 10%, the price a seller charged for an item before a state or local declaration of emergency,” Bonta said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12021342\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-12021342\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2189976029-800x534.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"534\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2189976029-800x534.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2189976029-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2189976029-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2189976029.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">California Attorney General Rob Bonta speaks to the press at the offices of Asian Americans Advancing Justice in Los Angeles on Dec. 17, 2024. \u003ccite>(Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>That means if a local store owner was selling a case of bottled water for $10 before Jan. 7 but hiked the price to $13 on Jan. 8, that 30% price rise would generally be regarded as gouging.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And if a seller only began selling an item \u003cem>after \u003c/em>an emergency declaration, “the law generally prohibits charging a price that exceeds the seller’s cost of the item by more than 50%,” the Department of Justice said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You can \u003ca href=\"http://percentagecalculator.net\">use an online tool like PercentageCalculator.net\u003c/a> to calculate the percentage rise in the cost of an item.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>Do price gouging laws only apply to L.A. County right now?\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Actually, no — despite the state’s price gouging law being brought into effect by \u003ca href=\"https://www.caloes.ca.gov/office-of-the-director/policy-administration/legal-affairs/price-gouging/\">specific emergency declarations for individual disasters around California\u003c/a>, these protections aren’t restricted to the city or county where that emergency is taking place.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As well as applying to L.A. County, \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/consumers/pricegougingduringdisasters#7C\">the law “is intended to prevent price gouging elsewhere\u003c/a> in the state where there is increased consumer demand as a result of the declared emergency,” the Office of the Attorney General said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The specific example it gives: “If a fire in San Diego County causes residents to evacuate to neighboring Imperial County, hotels in Imperial County may not raise rates by more than 10% to take advantage of the increase in demand for lodging.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>What kinds of purchases do the price gouging laws apply to?\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>According to the Department of Justice, the price gouging law applies to people who sell food, emergency supplies, medical supplies, building materials, gasoline and hotel rooms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it also applies to:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>Repair or reconstruction services.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>Emergency cleanup services.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>Transportation.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>Freight and storage services.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>You can \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/consumers/pricegougingduringdisasters#5C\">see more examples of goods that are subject to the price gouging law\u003c/a>. There \u003cem>are \u003c/em>exceptions to the law, the Department of Justice said: “For example, [if] the price of labor, goods, or materials has increased for the business.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>Do price gouging laws cover rental properties?\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Yes, and there are also \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/consumers/pricegougingduringdisasters#8C1\">specific protections around price gouging for rental housing\u003c/a>, which apply to services like Airbnb and VRBO. For example, the law also prohibits a landlord from evicting a tenant and “then re-renting the property at a rate that the landlord would have been prohibited from charging the evicted tenant under the price gouging statute.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Airbnb is currently partnering with 211 LA to offer\u003ca href=\"https://news.airbnb.com/airbnb-org-offers-temporary-housing-to-people-impacted-by-the-los-angeles-wildfires/\"> free accommodation to people displaced by the fires in L.A\u003c/a>., although 211 LA warns that due to high demand, you could be waiting a while to get a response. \u003ca href=\"https://211la.org/LA-Wildfires\">Apply for free accommodation through Airbnb and 211 LA here.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca id=\"how-to-report-price-gouging\">\u003c/a>If I think I’ve been a victim of price gouging during the L.A. wildfires — or if I spot it in the wild — what can I do?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>First, make sure you keep all your records and receipts — which may also include taking time-stamped photos of price labels if necessary. The Los Angeles County Department of Consumer and Business Affairs also recommends comparing those prices to pre-emergency declaration prices “and in areas not affected by the disaster.” You could \u003ca href=\"http://percentagecalculator.net\">use an online tool like PercentageCalculator.net\u003c/a> to calculate the percentage rise in the cost of an item to see if you may indeed have been a victim of price gouging.[aside label=\"Related Stories\" postID=\"news_12021150,news_12021107,news_12021203\"]Then, Bonta urged anyone who spots or experiences price gouging to “immediately” file a complaint with the Office of the Attorney General at \u003ca href=\"http://oag.ca.gov/report\">oag.ca.gov/report\u003c/a> or by calling 800-952-5225. The online form requires giving your full contact details. You can also contact your local police department or sheriff’s office, Bonta said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sellers who are found to be violating California’s price gouging statute can be subject to criminal prosecution and could be imprisoned for one year in county jail — and/or a fine of up to $10,000. “Violators are also subject to civil enforcement actions, including civil penalties of up to $2,500 per violation, injunctive relief, and mandatory restitution,” the Department of Justice said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You can also \u003ca href=\"https://dcba.lacounty.gov/newsroom/during-emergency-report-suspected-price-gouging/\">file a complaint to the Los Angeles County Department of Consumer and Business Affairs (DCBA)\u003c/a> using their online complaint form or by phone at 800-593-8222.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bear in mind that the attorney general’s office said it \u003cem>can’t \u003c/em>give you legal advice or represent individuals, although it may “on behalf of the public” investigate or prosecute a person who’s been price gouging.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The attorney general’s office said that “if you believe that you might have a claim for price gouging, you might consider contacting an attorney to explore your options.” You can \u003ca href=\"http://www.calbar.ca.gov\">find a referral to a lawyer through the State Bar\u003c/a> or \u003ca href=\"http://www.lsc.gov\">find a free legal aid office near you\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A spokesperson for Bonta’s office could not comment on whether the Department of Justice had already received any complaints from the public about price gouging during the L.A. fires due to the possibility of eventual investigations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>Updated 9:20 a.m. Friday\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12021150/where-to-donate-help-los-angeles-wildfire-eaton-fire-palisades-pasadena\">The devastating wildfires\u003c/a> continuing to rage through Los Angeles County have claimed at least 10 lives so far according to officials, \u003ca href=\"https://www.latimes.com/california/live/pacific-palisades-fire-updates-los-angeles\">destroyed over 9,000 buildings\u003c/a> and forced around 180,000 people to flee their homes under mandatory \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11834901/fire-evacuation-what-actually-happens-and-how-can-you-plan\">evacuation orders\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And as a huge number of people displaced by the Palisades, Eaton, Hurst, Lidia and Sunset fires now try to meet their basic needs — including shelter, food and water, medical supplies and gasoline — California Attorney General Rob Bonta has issued a reminder that price gouging during disasters like this remains illegal in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jump straight to:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"#price-gouging-definition\">What counts as price gouging?\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"#how-to-report-price-gouging\">How can I report price gouging during the L.A. fires?\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>California defines price gouging as \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/consumers/pricegougingduringdisasters#1C\">when sellers try “to take unfair advantage of consumers\u003c/a> during an emergency or disaster by greatly increasing prices for essential consumer goods and services.” During the L.A. wildfires, this might look like hotels charging more than their usual rates for evacuees seeking a room or a grocery market, hugely increasing the price of bottled water.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The state’s Department of Justice is now urging people to report any examples of price gouging they see and warns that sellers found to be violating this law can be prosecuted, fined and imprisoned. So if you’re an L.A. County resident who’s been forced to evacuate their home right now — or you have loved ones in the region you want to ensure aren’t being taken advantage of — keep reading for what you need to know about spotting price gouging, and how to report it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>When do price gouging laws come into effect?\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The state’s law against price gouging under Penal Code Section 396 kicks in when a statewide or local state of emergency is declared — \u003ca href=\"https://www.gov.ca.gov/2025/01/07/governor-newsom-proclaims-state-of-emergency-meets-with-first-responders-in-pacific-palisades-amid-dangerous-fire-weather/\">which happened on Tuesday\u003c/a>, as announced by Gov. Gavin Newsom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>These protections can last well beyond the initial outbreak of a disaster situation: The Office of the Attorney General says that they \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/consumers/pricegougingduringdisasters#3C\">“generally apply for 30 days after a declaration of emergency\u003c/a>, although for reconstruction services and emergency cleanup services,\u003ca href=\"https://www.caloes.ca.gov/office-of-the-director/policy-administration/legal-affairs/price-gouging/\"> protections apply for 180 days after a declaration of emergency.\u003c/a>”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://dcba.lacounty.gov/newsroom/during-emergency-report-suspected-price-gouging/\">L.A. County also has its own laws against price gouging\u003c/a>, which similarly remain in effect for 30 days until after an emergency declaration (in this case, Feb. 6) and 180 days for contractor-related services.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca id=\"price-gouging-definition\">\u003c/a>What kind of price rise is considered ‘gouging’ under the law?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>In a nutshell, sellers don’t have to be outright doubling their prices to be regarded as participating in price gouging. In fact, “California law generally prohibits charging a price that exceeds, by more than 10%, the price a seller charged for an item before a state or local declaration of emergency,” Bonta said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12021342\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-12021342\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2189976029-800x534.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"534\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2189976029-800x534.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2189976029-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2189976029-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/GettyImages-2189976029.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">California Attorney General Rob Bonta speaks to the press at the offices of Asian Americans Advancing Justice in Los Angeles on Dec. 17, 2024. \u003ccite>(Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>That means if a local store owner was selling a case of bottled water for $10 before Jan. 7 but hiked the price to $13 on Jan. 8, that 30% price rise would generally be regarded as gouging.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And if a seller only began selling an item \u003cem>after \u003c/em>an emergency declaration, “the law generally prohibits charging a price that exceeds the seller’s cost of the item by more than 50%,” the Department of Justice said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You can \u003ca href=\"http://percentagecalculator.net\">use an online tool like PercentageCalculator.net\u003c/a> to calculate the percentage rise in the cost of an item.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>Do price gouging laws only apply to L.A. County right now?\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Actually, no — despite the state’s price gouging law being brought into effect by \u003ca href=\"https://www.caloes.ca.gov/office-of-the-director/policy-administration/legal-affairs/price-gouging/\">specific emergency declarations for individual disasters around California\u003c/a>, these protections aren’t restricted to the city or county where that emergency is taking place.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As well as applying to L.A. County, \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/consumers/pricegougingduringdisasters#7C\">the law “is intended to prevent price gouging elsewhere\u003c/a> in the state where there is increased consumer demand as a result of the declared emergency,” the Office of the Attorney General said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The specific example it gives: “If a fire in San Diego County causes residents to evacuate to neighboring Imperial County, hotels in Imperial County may not raise rates by more than 10% to take advantage of the increase in demand for lodging.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>What kinds of purchases do the price gouging laws apply to?\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>According to the Department of Justice, the price gouging law applies to people who sell food, emergency supplies, medical supplies, building materials, gasoline and hotel rooms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it also applies to:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>Repair or reconstruction services.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>Emergency cleanup services.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>Transportation.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>Freight and storage services.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>You can \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/consumers/pricegougingduringdisasters#5C\">see more examples of goods that are subject to the price gouging law\u003c/a>. There \u003cem>are \u003c/em>exceptions to the law, the Department of Justice said: “For example, [if] the price of labor, goods, or materials has increased for the business.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>Do price gouging laws cover rental properties?\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Yes, and there are also \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/consumers/pricegougingduringdisasters#8C1\">specific protections around price gouging for rental housing\u003c/a>, which apply to services like Airbnb and VRBO. For example, the law also prohibits a landlord from evicting a tenant and “then re-renting the property at a rate that the landlord would have been prohibited from charging the evicted tenant under the price gouging statute.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Airbnb is currently partnering with 211 LA to offer\u003ca href=\"https://news.airbnb.com/airbnb-org-offers-temporary-housing-to-people-impacted-by-the-los-angeles-wildfires/\"> free accommodation to people displaced by the fires in L.A\u003c/a>., although 211 LA warns that due to high demand, you could be waiting a while to get a response. \u003ca href=\"https://211la.org/LA-Wildfires\">Apply for free accommodation through Airbnb and 211 LA here.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca id=\"how-to-report-price-gouging\">\u003c/a>If I think I’ve been a victim of price gouging during the L.A. wildfires — or if I spot it in the wild — what can I do?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>First, make sure you keep all your records and receipts — which may also include taking time-stamped photos of price labels if necessary. The Los Angeles County Department of Consumer and Business Affairs also recommends comparing those prices to pre-emergency declaration prices “and in areas not affected by the disaster.” You could \u003ca href=\"http://percentagecalculator.net\">use an online tool like PercentageCalculator.net\u003c/a> to calculate the percentage rise in the cost of an item to see if you may indeed have been a victim of price gouging.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Then, Bonta urged anyone who spots or experiences price gouging to “immediately” file a complaint with the Office of the Attorney General at \u003ca href=\"http://oag.ca.gov/report\">oag.ca.gov/report\u003c/a> or by calling 800-952-5225. The online form requires giving your full contact details. You can also contact your local police department or sheriff’s office, Bonta said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sellers who are found to be violating California’s price gouging statute can be subject to criminal prosecution and could be imprisoned for one year in county jail — and/or a fine of up to $10,000. “Violators are also subject to civil enforcement actions, including civil penalties of up to $2,500 per violation, injunctive relief, and mandatory restitution,” the Department of Justice said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You can also \u003ca href=\"https://dcba.lacounty.gov/newsroom/during-emergency-report-suspected-price-gouging/\">file a complaint to the Los Angeles County Department of Consumer and Business Affairs (DCBA)\u003c/a> using their online complaint form or by phone at 800-593-8222.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bear in mind that the attorney general’s office said it \u003cem>can’t \u003c/em>give you legal advice or represent individuals, although it may “on behalf of the public” investigate or prosecute a person who’s been price gouging.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The attorney general’s office said that “if you believe that you might have a claim for price gouging, you might consider contacting an attorney to explore your options.” You can \u003ca href=\"http://www.calbar.ca.gov\">find a referral to a lawyer through the State Bar\u003c/a> or \u003ca href=\"http://www.lsc.gov\">find a free legal aid office near you\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A spokesperson for Bonta’s office could not comment on whether the Department of Justice had already received any complaints from the public about price gouging during the L.A. fires due to the possibility of eventual investigations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "in-fresno-one-of-californias-toughest-new-camping-bans-comes-into-focus",
"title": "In Fresno, One of California's Toughest New Camping Bans Comes Into Focus",
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"headTitle": "In Fresno, One of California’s Toughest New Camping Bans Comes Into Focus | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>On a foggy morning in early December, Fresno police Sgt. Steven Jaquez scanned the city streets for tents, shopping carts, strewn belongings, and their owners.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>From behind the wheel of his patrol car, he pointed out a small group of mostly men sitting on the sidewalk drinking beers with bags and carts around them. As soon as they spotted him, they scrambled to their feet.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They know there’s a good chance, ‘if I don’t get up and I don’t get moving, those cops are probably going to arrest me,'” said Jaquez, who supervises the department’s police team that responds to complaints about homeless encampments.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since the Supreme Court \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2024/06/28/nx-s1-4992010/supreme-court-homeless-punish-sleeping-encampments\">\u003cu>empowered local governments to crack down\u003c/u>\u003c/a> on homeless encampments in June, at least 40 jurisdictions around California have enacted new laws or toughened existing ones, according to the National Homelessness Law Center.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.huduser.gov/portal/sites/default/files/pdf/2023-AHAR-Part-1.pdf\">\u003cu>The state is ground zero (PDF)\u003c/u>\u003c/a> for the nation’s homelessness crisis and NHLC says California’s new tally of camping bans is higher than any other state in the nation. Advocates for homeless people say that \u003ca href=\"https://librarystage.municode.com/ca/fresno/ordinances/code_of_ordinances?nodeId=1310244\">\u003cu>Fresno’s law\u003c/u>\u003c/a> is among the toughest in the state: banning camping, sitting or lying on public property anytime, anywhere.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12017616\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12017616\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-39-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1332\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-39-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-39-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-39-BL-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-39-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-39-BL-1536x1023.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-39-BL-1920x1279.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Members of the Fresno Police Department’s Homeless Assistance Response Team (HART) speak with Shannon Thom, an unhoused resident, in Fresno on Dec. 3, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>City officials say the law is crafted to incentivize people to choose rehab by offering substance abuse treatment in lieu of arrest for violating the law — a misdemeanor punishable with up to a year in jail, a fine of up to $1,000 or both.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Enough is enough,” Fresno City Councilmember Miguel Arias said in late September on \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12005898/fresno-rolls-out-one-of-californias-most-aggressive-camping-bans\">\u003cu>the day the law went into effect\u003c/u>\u003c/a>. “It’s time for them to get the help or expect to go through withdrawals in a county jail.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://docs.google.com/viewer?url=https%3A%2F%2Ffiles.hudexchange.info%2Freports%2Fpublished%2FCoC_PopSub_CoC_CA-514-2023_CA_2023.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cu>Only a subset of\u003c/u>\u003c/a> unhoused people in the area report being chronic substance users, according to data collected by the federal government. And city officials say they’re also trying to provide housing and services to people who don’t use drugs – but resources are limited.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The new policies in Fresno and across the state mark a dramatic shift from the pandemic, when the \u003ca href=\"https://nlihc.org/resource/cdc-advises-against-clearing-homeless-encampments-if-alternate-housing-not-available\">\u003cu>CDC advised encampments should be left in place\u003c/u>\u003c/a>. And as the number of people experiencing homelessness has spiked in the state — growing to more than \u003ca href=\"https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/ahar/2023-ahar-part-1-pit-estimates-of-homelessness-in-the-us.html\">\u003cu>181,000 at last count\u003c/u>\u003c/a>\u003cu> \u003c/u>— voters have \u003ca href=\"https://www.ppic.org/blog/overwhelming-majorities-are-concerned-about-homelessness-support-many-policies-to-address-it/\">\u003cu>in turn become increasingly impatient\u003c/u>\u003c/a> for \u003ca href=\"https://www.latimes.com/homeless-housing/story/2021-12-01/la-voters-are-frustrated-impatient-over-persistent-homelessness-crisis\">\u003cu>a change from the status quo\u003c/u>\u003c/a>. Now, the reality of this new paradigm in Fresno is beginning to take shape.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘We really don’t know where to go’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The day after the law went into effect in September, a homeless man named Amado Real was sitting with his friends on the sidewalk in front of a boarded-up building near downtown Fresno when police officers with the Homeless Assistance Response Team rolled up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They told Real and the others they had to leave because of the new law, and offered to take them to a homeless services provider downtown.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Real and his girlfriend refused — Real later said because they feel it’s chaotic and dangerous down there, and they felt safer staying where they were.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We really don’t know where to go,” Real said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12017614\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12017614\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-27-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1332\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-27-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-27-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-27-BL-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-27-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-27-BL-1536x1023.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-27-BL-1920x1279.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Members of the Fresno Police Department’s Homeless Assistance Response Team (HART) stand near a group of unhoused residents after their camp was cleared in Fresno on Dec. 3, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>That same sentiment was echoed by a number of homeless people in Fresno, though others said they had positive experiences getting services. A spokesperson for the city said that they’ve cleaned up an encampment around the service-provider to make it safer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Real is exactly the kind of person city leaders say they’re targeting with the new law — a longtime heroin addict who has been living on the streets for over four years. Real said he grew up in Fresno and spends much of his time in the neighborhood where he was raised.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Three days into the crackdown, police had already told him to move along at least three times. He couldn’t sit in front of the boarded up building, in a gas station parking lot, or, just a couple minutes later, stand on the sidewalk around the corner.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s like I don’t have any rights anymore,” the 59-year-old said. “I can’t even walk in my own neighborhood. I can’t even sit down. I can’t even be alive.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This is the kind of “\u003ca href=\"https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article292931589.html\">\u003cu>tough love\u003c/u>\u003c/a>” leaders in Fresno have said they hope will force people to get off the streets. But three months after the law went into effect, Real wasn’t any closer to getting clean or housed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Like other people living unsheltered in the city, he had found a way to camp out of public view and make do with fewer things, a change many business owners and residents welcome.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12017613\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12017613\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-23-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1332\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-23-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-23-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-23-BL-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-23-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-23-BL-1536x1023.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-23-BL-1920x1279.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">An unhoused person packs a cart of their belongings after Officer Omar Khan, a police officer with the Homeless Assistance Response Team (HART), speaks with them about clearing the area in Fresno on Dec. 3, 2024, while Public Utilities Department employees begin to discard of items. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Mayor Jerry Dyer said the law is making a difference. “Behavior is changing for the better,” he said. “We’re still utilizing compassion and being humane in the way we approach people, but now there’s the accountability.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By mid-December, a police spokesperson said they’d arrested more than 300 people. They also said only 15 people had accepted the treatment offer so far.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Real had predicted that kind of reluctant response. He said he’s been to rehab three times, and even started training as a drug counselor before he relapsed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You can’t force somebody into rehab. It’s not going to work,” he said. “I know that from experience.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘The true long-term solution is housing’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>People arrested under the law can be offered the option of completing a six-month drug treatment program to avoid the arrest appearing on their criminal record, according to police training documents. But \u003ca href=\"https://docs.google.com/viewer?url=https%3A%2F%2Ffiles.hudexchange.info%2Freports%2Fpublished%2FCoC_PopSub_CoC_CA-514-2023_CA_2023.pdf\">\u003cu>only about a third \u003c/u>\u003c/a>report being chronic substance users.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://siepr.stanford.edu/publications/policy-brief/homelessness-california-causes-and-policy-considerations\">\u003cu>Research\u003c/u>\u003c/a> finds homelessness is caused by an interplay of both personal and structural factors; trauma, mental illness, discrimination and incarceration make people more vulnerable to ending up on the streets. Drug addiction can be a contributing factor, but experts say it’s the \u003ca href=\"https://homelessness.ucsf.edu/our-impact/studies/california-statewide-study-people-experiencing-homelessness\">\u003cu>precarity caused by\u003c/u>\u003c/a> poverty and high housing costs that drives widespread homelessness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Between 2017 and last year, rents in Fresno County for a typical two-bedroom apartment increased more than 40%, \u003ca href=\"https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/fmr/fmrs/FY2017_code/select_Geography.odn\">\u003cu>according to the federal government\u003c/u>\u003c/a>. During that time, the number of unhoused people in Fresno and the neighboring county \u003ca href=\"https://www.hudexchange.info/programs/coc/coc-homeless-populations-and-subpopulations-reports/?filter_Year=2023&filter_Scope=CoC&filter_State=CA&filter_CoC=CA-514&program=CoC&group=PopSub\">\u003cu>more than doubled\u003c/u>.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12017615\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12017615\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-56-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1332\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-56-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-56-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-56-BL-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-56-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-56-BL-1536x1023.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-56-BL-1920x1279.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Gary Briggs, an unhoused resident in the Mayfair neighborhood of Fresno, moves a cart of items he was allowed to keep after the Homeless Assistance Response Team (HART) cleared his camp on Dec. 3, 2024, while carrying a kitten named Snowflake. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Officials emphasize that police and outreach workers regularly offer to connect people with housing and other services before they make an arrest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But in Real’s case, he said it hasn’t led to actually being housed. Outreach workers have helped him sign up for a spot on the waitlist at an emergency shelter four times, he said, but he hasn’t followed up with them, and they haven’t followed up with him. He doesn’t have a phone, a watch, or a permanent address.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And despite efforts to provide more shelter beds and services, the city struggles to match demand. Dyer said Fresno spends about $15 million on shelter services per year, which helped fund about 1,400 year-round emergency shelter and transitional housing beds. And there were \u003ca href=\"https://fresnomaderahomeless.org/point-in-time\">\u003cu>nearly as many people\u003c/u>\u003c/a> sleeping in them, \u003ca href=\"https://files.hudexchange.info/reports/published/CoC_HIC_CoC_CA-514-2023_CA_2023.pdf\">\u003cu>according to federal data (PDF)\u003c/u>\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, there were another 1,800 people \u003ca href=\"https://fresnomaderahomeless.org/point-in-time\">\u003cu>living unsheltered on Fresno’s streets\u003c/u>\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Based on our outreach, 90% of the unhoused are already waiting for services,” said Fresno civil rights and criminal defense attorney Kevin Little. “So it’s really a meaningless law to give them a choice between being arrested and seeking services that they already are waiting for.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With the help of volunteers, Little said he has been interviewing unhoused people affected by the camping ban and preparing to file a lawsuit against the city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He argued the law is leaving unhoused people worse off without actually solving anything, warning these arrests can set off a cascade of negative consequences that only further entrench people into homelessness — an \u003ca href=\"https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0003122419872671\">\u003cu>assertion\u003c/u>\u003c/a>\u003ca href=\"https://bmcpublichealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12889-022-13227-4\">\u003cu>supported\u003c/u>\u003c/a> by \u003ca href=\"https://housingmatters.urban.org/research-summary/criminalizing-homelessness-creates-instability-unhoused-people\">\u003cu>research\u003c/u>\u003c/a>.[aside label=\"Related Stories\" postID=\"news_12005898,news_12009058,news_12005474,news_12018466\"]Jail booking logs in Fresno show the majority of people arrested on public camping charges are only held in custody for a matter of hours, just long enough to be processed. But advocates for the unhoused, and unhoused people themselves, say they can lose most of their belongings in the process and get separated from friends and pets.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to the city, 51 people arrested on charges of public camping were prosecuted by the City Attorney’s Office by mid-December. Most of those cases were still working their way through the system; eight had been dismissed, and 17 defendants hadn’t shown up to court, likely earning them warrants for failing to appear.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dyer dismissed concerns that the arrests are ineffectual, saying the camping ban is just one part of the city’s broader strategy to address homelessness, which includes investing in shelter and affordable housing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The true long-term solution is housing with services,” Dyer said, adding that he also sees a role for enforcement. “I do believe that it’s the necessary accountability that’s going to cause people to change behavior over the long run. And it is something that the people of Fresno expect.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.hcd.ca.gov/planning-and-community-development/housing-element-implementation-and-apr-dashboard\">Housing and Community Development Department shows\u003c/a> that Fresno completed some 780 low-income housing units between 2019 and last year, and a spokesperson for the city said hundreds more are in the works.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019473\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1999px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019473\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-85-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1999\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-85-BL.jpg 1999w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-85-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-85-BL-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-85-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-85-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-85-BL-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1999px) 100vw, 1999px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Juan Rodriguez, an unhoused resident sits on G Street near the Poverello House in Fresno on Dec. 3, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>Mixed feelings among residents\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>In interviews, residents expressed mixed feelings about the law. Some business owners said they relied on unhoused people as customers, others said they were glad to see police respond more quickly to complaints.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As Sgt. Jaquez worked his way around the city, following reported complaints from alley to sidewalk to overpass, more than one person approached him to express their gratitude for his team’s work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Among them was Devonta Mayberry, who uses an electric wheelchair. He told Jaquez the clear sidewalks have transformed his ability to get around his neighborhood, and made his daughter feel safer walking around.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Y’all finally getting this stuff cleaned up,” he said. “They’re doing drugs out here and then it’s babies right here. All we can do is call for help.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You hit me up on 311 if you have problems,” Jaquez said, referring to Fresno’s non-emergency phone number that connects residents to city services. “We’re trying to return neighborhoods back to people who live in the neighborhoods.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the roughly 25 years since he began work as a police officer in Fresno, Sgt. Jaquez said he has watched tent encampments take over parts of the city. After three years working with the department’s homelessness response team, he said he’s proud of his work cleaning up some of the larger camps. But even he doesn’t see this as a solution.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Just moving them right now does not solve this problem,” he said. “But it gives a couple of hours, and then we’ll come back another time and deal with it again.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "California has more camping bans than any other state. Advocates for homeless people say Fresno's law is among the toughest, banning camping, sitting or lying on public property anytime, anywhere. ",
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"title": "In Fresno, One of California's Toughest New Camping Bans Comes Into Focus | KQED",
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"headline": "In Fresno, One of California's Toughest New Camping Bans Comes Into Focus",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>On a foggy morning in early December, Fresno police Sgt. Steven Jaquez scanned the city streets for tents, shopping carts, strewn belongings, and their owners.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>From behind the wheel of his patrol car, he pointed out a small group of mostly men sitting on the sidewalk drinking beers with bags and carts around them. As soon as they spotted him, they scrambled to their feet.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They know there’s a good chance, ‘if I don’t get up and I don’t get moving, those cops are probably going to arrest me,'” said Jaquez, who supervises the department’s police team that responds to complaints about homeless encampments.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since the Supreme Court \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2024/06/28/nx-s1-4992010/supreme-court-homeless-punish-sleeping-encampments\">\u003cu>empowered local governments to crack down\u003c/u>\u003c/a> on homeless encampments in June, at least 40 jurisdictions around California have enacted new laws or toughened existing ones, according to the National Homelessness Law Center.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.huduser.gov/portal/sites/default/files/pdf/2023-AHAR-Part-1.pdf\">\u003cu>The state is ground zero (PDF)\u003c/u>\u003c/a> for the nation’s homelessness crisis and NHLC says California’s new tally of camping bans is higher than any other state in the nation. Advocates for homeless people say that \u003ca href=\"https://librarystage.municode.com/ca/fresno/ordinances/code_of_ordinances?nodeId=1310244\">\u003cu>Fresno’s law\u003c/u>\u003c/a> is among the toughest in the state: banning camping, sitting or lying on public property anytime, anywhere.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12017616\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12017616\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-39-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1332\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-39-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-39-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-39-BL-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-39-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-39-BL-1536x1023.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-39-BL-1920x1279.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Members of the Fresno Police Department’s Homeless Assistance Response Team (HART) speak with Shannon Thom, an unhoused resident, in Fresno on Dec. 3, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>City officials say the law is crafted to incentivize people to choose rehab by offering substance abuse treatment in lieu of arrest for violating the law — a misdemeanor punishable with up to a year in jail, a fine of up to $1,000 or both.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Enough is enough,” Fresno City Councilmember Miguel Arias said in late September on \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12005898/fresno-rolls-out-one-of-californias-most-aggressive-camping-bans\">\u003cu>the day the law went into effect\u003c/u>\u003c/a>. “It’s time for them to get the help or expect to go through withdrawals in a county jail.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://docs.google.com/viewer?url=https%3A%2F%2Ffiles.hudexchange.info%2Freports%2Fpublished%2FCoC_PopSub_CoC_CA-514-2023_CA_2023.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cu>Only a subset of\u003c/u>\u003c/a> unhoused people in the area report being chronic substance users, according to data collected by the federal government. And city officials say they’re also trying to provide housing and services to people who don’t use drugs – but resources are limited.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The new policies in Fresno and across the state mark a dramatic shift from the pandemic, when the \u003ca href=\"https://nlihc.org/resource/cdc-advises-against-clearing-homeless-encampments-if-alternate-housing-not-available\">\u003cu>CDC advised encampments should be left in place\u003c/u>\u003c/a>. And as the number of people experiencing homelessness has spiked in the state — growing to more than \u003ca href=\"https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/ahar/2023-ahar-part-1-pit-estimates-of-homelessness-in-the-us.html\">\u003cu>181,000 at last count\u003c/u>\u003c/a>\u003cu> \u003c/u>— voters have \u003ca href=\"https://www.ppic.org/blog/overwhelming-majorities-are-concerned-about-homelessness-support-many-policies-to-address-it/\">\u003cu>in turn become increasingly impatient\u003c/u>\u003c/a> for \u003ca href=\"https://www.latimes.com/homeless-housing/story/2021-12-01/la-voters-are-frustrated-impatient-over-persistent-homelessness-crisis\">\u003cu>a change from the status quo\u003c/u>\u003c/a>. Now, the reality of this new paradigm in Fresno is beginning to take shape.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘We really don’t know where to go’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The day after the law went into effect in September, a homeless man named Amado Real was sitting with his friends on the sidewalk in front of a boarded-up building near downtown Fresno when police officers with the Homeless Assistance Response Team rolled up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They told Real and the others they had to leave because of the new law, and offered to take them to a homeless services provider downtown.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Real and his girlfriend refused — Real later said because they feel it’s chaotic and dangerous down there, and they felt safer staying where they were.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We really don’t know where to go,” Real said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12017614\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12017614\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-27-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1332\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-27-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-27-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-27-BL-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-27-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-27-BL-1536x1023.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-27-BL-1920x1279.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Members of the Fresno Police Department’s Homeless Assistance Response Team (HART) stand near a group of unhoused residents after their camp was cleared in Fresno on Dec. 3, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>That same sentiment was echoed by a number of homeless people in Fresno, though others said they had positive experiences getting services. A spokesperson for the city said that they’ve cleaned up an encampment around the service-provider to make it safer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Real is exactly the kind of person city leaders say they’re targeting with the new law — a longtime heroin addict who has been living on the streets for over four years. Real said he grew up in Fresno and spends much of his time in the neighborhood where he was raised.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Three days into the crackdown, police had already told him to move along at least three times. He couldn’t sit in front of the boarded up building, in a gas station parking lot, or, just a couple minutes later, stand on the sidewalk around the corner.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s like I don’t have any rights anymore,” the 59-year-old said. “I can’t even walk in my own neighborhood. I can’t even sit down. I can’t even be alive.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This is the kind of “\u003ca href=\"https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article292931589.html\">\u003cu>tough love\u003c/u>\u003c/a>” leaders in Fresno have said they hope will force people to get off the streets. But three months after the law went into effect, Real wasn’t any closer to getting clean or housed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Like other people living unsheltered in the city, he had found a way to camp out of public view and make do with fewer things, a change many business owners and residents welcome.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12017613\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12017613\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-23-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1332\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-23-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-23-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-23-BL-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-23-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-23-BL-1536x1023.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-23-BL-1920x1279.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">An unhoused person packs a cart of their belongings after Officer Omar Khan, a police officer with the Homeless Assistance Response Team (HART), speaks with them about clearing the area in Fresno on Dec. 3, 2024, while Public Utilities Department employees begin to discard of items. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Mayor Jerry Dyer said the law is making a difference. “Behavior is changing for the better,” he said. “We’re still utilizing compassion and being humane in the way we approach people, but now there’s the accountability.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By mid-December, a police spokesperson said they’d arrested more than 300 people. They also said only 15 people had accepted the treatment offer so far.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Real had predicted that kind of reluctant response. He said he’s been to rehab three times, and even started training as a drug counselor before he relapsed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You can’t force somebody into rehab. It’s not going to work,” he said. “I know that from experience.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘The true long-term solution is housing’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>People arrested under the law can be offered the option of completing a six-month drug treatment program to avoid the arrest appearing on their criminal record, according to police training documents. But \u003ca href=\"https://docs.google.com/viewer?url=https%3A%2F%2Ffiles.hudexchange.info%2Freports%2Fpublished%2FCoC_PopSub_CoC_CA-514-2023_CA_2023.pdf\">\u003cu>only about a third \u003c/u>\u003c/a>report being chronic substance users.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://siepr.stanford.edu/publications/policy-brief/homelessness-california-causes-and-policy-considerations\">\u003cu>Research\u003c/u>\u003c/a> finds homelessness is caused by an interplay of both personal and structural factors; trauma, mental illness, discrimination and incarceration make people more vulnerable to ending up on the streets. Drug addiction can be a contributing factor, but experts say it’s the \u003ca href=\"https://homelessness.ucsf.edu/our-impact/studies/california-statewide-study-people-experiencing-homelessness\">\u003cu>precarity caused by\u003c/u>\u003c/a> poverty and high housing costs that drives widespread homelessness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Between 2017 and last year, rents in Fresno County for a typical two-bedroom apartment increased more than 40%, \u003ca href=\"https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/fmr/fmrs/FY2017_code/select_Geography.odn\">\u003cu>according to the federal government\u003c/u>\u003c/a>. During that time, the number of unhoused people in Fresno and the neighboring county \u003ca href=\"https://www.hudexchange.info/programs/coc/coc-homeless-populations-and-subpopulations-reports/?filter_Year=2023&filter_Scope=CoC&filter_State=CA&filter_CoC=CA-514&program=CoC&group=PopSub\">\u003cu>more than doubled\u003c/u>.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12017615\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12017615\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-56-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1332\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-56-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-56-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-56-BL-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-56-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-56-BL-1536x1023.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-56-BL-1920x1279.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Gary Briggs, an unhoused resident in the Mayfair neighborhood of Fresno, moves a cart of items he was allowed to keep after the Homeless Assistance Response Team (HART) cleared his camp on Dec. 3, 2024, while carrying a kitten named Snowflake. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Officials emphasize that police and outreach workers regularly offer to connect people with housing and other services before they make an arrest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But in Real’s case, he said it hasn’t led to actually being housed. Outreach workers have helped him sign up for a spot on the waitlist at an emergency shelter four times, he said, but he hasn’t followed up with them, and they haven’t followed up with him. He doesn’t have a phone, a watch, or a permanent address.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And despite efforts to provide more shelter beds and services, the city struggles to match demand. Dyer said Fresno spends about $15 million on shelter services per year, which helped fund about 1,400 year-round emergency shelter and transitional housing beds. And there were \u003ca href=\"https://fresnomaderahomeless.org/point-in-time\">\u003cu>nearly as many people\u003c/u>\u003c/a> sleeping in them, \u003ca href=\"https://files.hudexchange.info/reports/published/CoC_HIC_CoC_CA-514-2023_CA_2023.pdf\">\u003cu>according to federal data (PDF)\u003c/u>\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, there were another 1,800 people \u003ca href=\"https://fresnomaderahomeless.org/point-in-time\">\u003cu>living unsheltered on Fresno’s streets\u003c/u>\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Based on our outreach, 90% of the unhoused are already waiting for services,” said Fresno civil rights and criminal defense attorney Kevin Little. “So it’s really a meaningless law to give them a choice between being arrested and seeking services that they already are waiting for.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With the help of volunteers, Little said he has been interviewing unhoused people affected by the camping ban and preparing to file a lawsuit against the city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He argued the law is leaving unhoused people worse off without actually solving anything, warning these arrests can set off a cascade of negative consequences that only further entrench people into homelessness — an \u003ca href=\"https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0003122419872671\">\u003cu>assertion\u003c/u>\u003c/a>\u003ca href=\"https://bmcpublichealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12889-022-13227-4\">\u003cu>supported\u003c/u>\u003c/a> by \u003ca href=\"https://housingmatters.urban.org/research-summary/criminalizing-homelessness-creates-instability-unhoused-people\">\u003cu>research\u003c/u>\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Jail booking logs in Fresno show the majority of people arrested on public camping charges are only held in custody for a matter of hours, just long enough to be processed. But advocates for the unhoused, and unhoused people themselves, say they can lose most of their belongings in the process and get separated from friends and pets.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to the city, 51 people arrested on charges of public camping were prosecuted by the City Attorney’s Office by mid-December. Most of those cases were still working their way through the system; eight had been dismissed, and 17 defendants hadn’t shown up to court, likely earning them warrants for failing to appear.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dyer dismissed concerns that the arrests are ineffectual, saying the camping ban is just one part of the city’s broader strategy to address homelessness, which includes investing in shelter and affordable housing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The true long-term solution is housing with services,” Dyer said, adding that he also sees a role for enforcement. “I do believe that it’s the necessary accountability that’s going to cause people to change behavior over the long run. And it is something that the people of Fresno expect.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.hcd.ca.gov/planning-and-community-development/housing-element-implementation-and-apr-dashboard\">Housing and Community Development Department shows\u003c/a> that Fresno completed some 780 low-income housing units between 2019 and last year, and a spokesperson for the city said hundreds more are in the works.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019473\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1999px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019473\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-85-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1999\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-85-BL.jpg 1999w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-85-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-85-BL-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-85-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-85-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241203-FresnoCampingBan-85-BL-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1999px) 100vw, 1999px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Juan Rodriguez, an unhoused resident sits on G Street near the Poverello House in Fresno on Dec. 3, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>Mixed feelings among residents\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>In interviews, residents expressed mixed feelings about the law. Some business owners said they relied on unhoused people as customers, others said they were glad to see police respond more quickly to complaints.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As Sgt. Jaquez worked his way around the city, following reported complaints from alley to sidewalk to overpass, more than one person approached him to express their gratitude for his team’s work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Among them was Devonta Mayberry, who uses an electric wheelchair. He told Jaquez the clear sidewalks have transformed his ability to get around his neighborhood, and made his daughter feel safer walking around.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Y’all finally getting this stuff cleaned up,” he said. “They’re doing drugs out here and then it’s babies right here. All we can do is call for help.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You hit me up on 311 if you have problems,” Jaquez said, referring to Fresno’s non-emergency phone number that connects residents to city services. “We’re trying to return neighborhoods back to people who live in the neighborhoods.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the roughly 25 years since he began work as a police officer in Fresno, Sgt. Jaquez said he has watched tent encampments take over parts of the city. After three years working with the department’s homelessness response team, he said he’s proud of his work cleaning up some of the larger camps. But even he doesn’t see this as a solution.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Just moving them right now does not solve this problem,” he said. “But it gives a couple of hours, and then we’ll come back another time and deal with it again.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"info": "Possible is hosted by entrepreneur Reid Hoffman and writer Aria Finger. Together in Possible, Hoffman and Finger lead enlightening discussions about building a brighter collective future. The show features interviews with visionary guests like Trevor Noah, Sam Altman and Janette Sadik-Khan. Possible paints an optimistic portrait of the world we can create through science, policy, business, art and our shared humanity. It asks: What if everything goes right for once? How can we get there? Each episode also includes a short fiction story generated by advanced AI GPT-4, serving as a thought-provoking springboard to speculate how humanity could leverage technology for good.",
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