Before rebuilding, we should recognize the fires’ tragedies and opportunities

Whatever decisions are made, Los Angeles will never be the same after the wildfires of January 2025. The lives of individuals and communities can change for the better.

Out of all the coverage I’ve seen of the Los Angeles fires, the hardest to watch was a video of an elderly man returning to his home, which had been reduced to a pile of ashes. As he fought back tears, he kept repeating how lucky he was: He had survived, and all he had lost was his house, which was just “stuff.”

I recognize those conflicted feelings all too well from when I lost nearly everything I owned in a fire a few years ago. I was so, so grateful that no one was hurt — yet at the same time I was also deeply distressed about the things I had lost.

In the aftermath of the fire, I explored some of the psychology behind our attachment to our belongings while writing a book, which helped me to accept the fact that yes, I was grieving. The only difference was it wasn’t another person I was grieving; it was part of myself.

One of the more obvious reasons we have strong emotions around our belongings is that they are connected to our memories. Our brains aren’t perfect storage mechanisms but work through hints and context clues to bring back things that happened in the past. My memories were a locked box, and my belongings were the keys.

But memory is malleable too. In my recovery after the fire, I put a lot of effort into organizing the photos I have in cloud storage, to make sure they are accessible and categorized. I had lost plenty of my reminders of the past, so I wanted to make sure I had something to compensate for them.

Recovery from the trauma of losing possessions affects people in very different ways. In writing my book, I spoke to a researcher who had worked with victims of the Camp fire in Butte County in 2018, which at that time was the deadliest wildfire in the history of California.

She noticed that victims tended to fall into three categories. The first group were deeply unsettled by the financial losses they had suffered and responded by collecting as many possessions as they could. In the second group, people sought as much as possible to replace every object that they had owned. If they were given a cuckoo clock on their wedding day, they would go on eBay and find an identical one — then transfer all the symbolic meaning of the original onto the new version.

The final group became extreme minimalists: The trauma of the fire rattled them so badly that they were unable to see the joy of objects again. Even if they could buy facsimiles of lost items, they didn’t want to, as it would never feel the same. On top of that, physical things started to feel flimsy: They were no longer a safe place to keep one’s sense of identity or memory.

Of course, not every single thing we own is good for us. At the most extreme end are people with hoarding disorders, in which feelings of acute distress are channeled into shopping and refusing to throw things away. On the less extreme end, shopping can be a short-lived distraction from our unhappiness.

The fire I went through entirely reshaped my view of what it means to have possessions. As I was starting my life from scratch, the first lesson I learned was that most of the things I had believed were essential in fact weren’t at all. I didn’t need to constantly chase fashions with clothes. I didn’t even need most of the kitchen gadgets I’d bought: If I had a few pans and dishes, a chopping board and a knife, then I could make pretty much anything.

But I learned that, yes, it was necessary to have enough things for a space to feel like home. It was, actually, vital to have framed photographs of my friends and family in my living room. It was essential to have some houseplants in my bedroom. I absolutely did need to have a thick blanket to snuggle under on the sofa. A few well-chosen things can allow us to collect our memories, connect to the people we love most and express key parts of our identity. Together they constitute a home — and as many people in Los Angeles have discovered so painfully this month, few things are more important than that.

Helen Chandler-Wilde is the author of “Lost & Found: Nine Life-Changing Lessons About Stuff From Someone Who Lost Everything.”

The destruction from Los Angeles’ extreme wildfires is unprecedented. Loss to property is estimated in excess of $250 billion and rising, making it the most expensive natural disaster in U.S. history.

The process of rebuilding can never replace the losses suffered by so many. However, Los Angeles will rebuild — and it needs a rebuilding that is scaled to the magnitude of loss. The field of economics teaches us that a few issues are likely to pose barriers to a sufficient response:

• Uncertainty. The numerous families and business owners who have lost their homes and commercial spaces ask a similar set of questions: Should I rebuild? How will I deal with the various government agencies involved and find a contractor? How long will it take before I can move back in? Some of these uncertainties stem from the approval and regulatory processes of the city and state, which raise construction costs and cause delays: It takes an average of almost five years to bring a multifamily project from building permit to certificate of occupancy in the city of Los Angeles. To reduce uncertainty that stems from development approvals, that system must be redesigned and centralized, to shorten and simplify the process.
• Externalities. These are community effects that result from individual economic actions — both positive, such as the vibrancy of restored neighborhoods, and negative, such as the challenges of uneven cleanup or environmental contamination. Among the appealing features of living in Pacific Palisades and Altadena are their community amenities, such as their vibrant culture and clean environment. But these amenities are the result of collective decisions over generations. Without external coordination, no single home or business owner will have the incentive to re-create these valuable places on their own, or mitigate the inevitable environmental problems. Where possible, we must coordinate the overall community impacts of rebuilding. For example, when it comes to environmental remediation, the cleanup effort must be harmonized on a scale that considers whole neighborhoods.
• Construction labor. Replacing the 12,000 structures lost in the fires will represent a drastic increase in L.A.’s housing construction. Unfortunately, the shortage of skilled workers is already a huge impediment to building here. Scaling up the construction industry to meet the surge in demand will be even more difficult. One step that would help would be to create registries for labor resources brought in from outside the region.
• Supply chain. A related challenge is the delivery of construction materials. Any builder or homeowner engaged in renovation can attest that waiting for materials — whether that’s lumber or a refrigerator — causes delays. New demand will be higher than ever before. Any hiccups in the supply chain will create interruptions and uncertainty. Adding to such disruptions will be price increases amplified by increased demand, especially for fire-resistant materials such as concrete and steel. Some of this will be unavoidable, but communities can minimize interruptions by working with “at-scale” home builders in the redevelopment process. These companies specialize in converting large parcels of land to residential developments; in addition to economies of scale, they also benefit from expertise and leverage in acquiring building materials and consumer products.
• Financial burdens. The final economic issue facing rebuilding is its price tag. Some homeowners and business owners have insurance that will help finance reconstruction. In many cases, however, insurance payouts will fall short of the need. Some families may have personal savings to cover the difference, but many will be able to rebuild only by borrowing money. Given current interest rates, this debt will be expensive — for those lucky enough to get loans. Private lenders, state and federal housing finance agencies and local housing trust funds should establish programs providing construction or permanent mortgage loans to fire victims.

It is imperative to keep these fundamental economic forces at the front of our minds as leaders in government, the business community and all other stakeholders begin the recovery effort. There are other hurdles, and there will be many more solutions required, but these are a crucial starting point.

Stuart Gabriel is a professor in the Anderson School of Management at UCLA and director of the Ziman Center for Real Estate. Barney Hartman-Glaser is associate professor of finance at the Anderson School and research director of the Ziman Center.

“The entire Pacific Palisades looks like, unfortunately, Gaza, or one of these war-torn countries where awful things have happened,” remarked Los Angeles local and Oscar-winning actor Jamie Lee Curtis at a recent event for her new movie “The Last Showgirl.” Her now-viral comment has sparked controversy, but Curtis is far from alone in drawing comparisons between devastated L.A. neighborhoods and conflict zones. L.A. County Supervisor Kathryn Barger said that the city, or at least the most affected parts of it, “looks like a war zone,” adding: “You can go blocks where there are no homes.” These analogies are certainly provocative. And although the comparison falls short in some ways, it is also illuminating.

The most obvious way in which Los Angeles does not compare to a war zone is, fortunately, the number of fatalities. At least 28 people have died in the Los Angeles wildfires. In contrast, political scientists generally consider an armed conflict to achieve the status of “war” when the conflict crosses the threshold of 1,000 battle-related deaths. The magnitude of fatalities common in war — with thousands or tens of thousands dead — reminds us of how lucky we are that so many people evacuated safely.

The lesson points in the other direction too. Any loss of civilian life is unacceptable, whether it’s one person or 1,000. As powerfully portrayed in recent obituaries of the people who lost their lives to the wildfire, each individual is a blessing. All people have wondrous stories and lives. It makes the scale of death during wars all the more tragic and makes it all the more imperative that we do everything in our power to ensure that disasters, like the L.A. fires, do not take a similar toll.

The war analogy may spring to mind for observers such as Curtis and Barger not only because of the charred landscape but also because of the indiscriminate nature of wildfire, an echo of some types of warfare. In fact, the weapons of indiscriminate violence, ranging from village burning to aerial bombardment, are designed to replicate the exact effects of the Los Angeles fires against civilian populations. The very aim of brutality in war is to displace communities, destroy infrastructure and break the human spirit.

The devastation in Southern California is far-reaching: more than 40,000 acres burned, 15,700 structures destroyed and at one point nearly 200,000 people under evacuation orders. Those numbers can’t convey the harms to the communities flung apart and the potential generational wealth loss among Black and Latino families in Altadena especially. The fires underscore both the destructive power of our changing climate and, when one hears the “war zone” comparison, the cruel consequences of deploying weapons in this manner.

The war analogy also offers us lessons about what we are to expect about the aftermath of the present emergency in Los Angeles. If the academic scholarship on legacies of violence teaches us anything, it is that violent threats change us as people and may even rewire our psychology. When people feel uncertain about and threatened by their environment, they tend to show higher support for conservatism. Liberal lawmakers in California, already in the hot seat, should work to address constituents’ existential fears to avoid losing power to political hardliners who would tend to undermine our already fragile environmental policies.

There is a silver lining in the aftermath of traumatic events such as wars and wildfires. Researchers studying post-conflict societies have found that some communities emerge stronger, more resilient and more politically active. Facing a shared threat and working together to meet it inspires deeper in-group ties. Even after the threat dissipates, these community bonds inspire individuals to be more involved in their communities and to be more engaged in political activities, including voting. These effects are historically persistent and can last across multiple generations.

To realize this potential legacy of engagement and resilience, it is incumbent on all Angelenos to be there for one another and to rebuild the social foundation for our communities with altruism. Now is not the time for greed or finger-pointing but rather the time to show up for one another, to provide mutual aid. So many Angelenos have already sprung into action in ways never seen before, with pop-up donation drives, fundraising for affected families’ GoFundMe pages and free meal services.

In the face of an emergency so destructive that it recalls war, we also must empathize with those who have grappled with armed conflict and heed their lessons well beyond our current crisis.

Katherine Irajpanah, a PhD candidate in the department of government at Harvard University, is a fellow with the United States Institute of Peace and the Department of Defense’s Minerva Research Initiative.

Los Angeles has a tremendous amount of infrastructure work ahead as it recovers from the recent wildfires. Although these projects pose challenges, they also present an opportunity — to plan and to build infrastructure right.

Having spent much of our careers designing and building complex urban infrastructure projects in Los Angeles and elsewhere, we are well aware of the extraordinary amounts of time, money and disruption inherent in these types of undertakings. At the core of this problem is always the added cost and time required to mitigate construction impacts upon everyday civic life, while relocating, removing and replacing outdated utilities and other existing urban infrastructure. Building the downtown L.A. subway, for instance, was akin to building a basement underneath a house after the house was already constructed and people were living in it.

By contrast, tragically, much of the Pacific Palisades area has become a “greenfield”: an undeveloped, unoccupied site. We should take full advantage of this terrible situation by designing and by rapidly building the underground portions of new, next-generation, critical infrastructure now. This work should be completed before the reconstruction of fire-damaged residential, commercial and civic buildings begins. All of this work can be done in phases.

City leaders should set a goal of making Pacific Palisades a global model of resilience against future disasters. (This also should be considered for the fire-damaged Altadena area, which is outside the city.) While the cleanup of the Palisades is underway and before a single new building permit is issued, the city should establish a blue-ribbon panel of government and private-sector leaders and experts to:

• Objectively review and reassess current development plans.
• Evaluate and identify deficiencies in all current infrastructure including water supply, water storage, water distribution, sewer, power, cell service, internet service, gas lines, streets, sidewalks, electrical lines, etc.
• Recommend improvements to current plans that will modernize all new infrastructure to meet the demands of today as well as those of an unknown future in full consideration of the unique challenges of L.A.’s varied topography and weather patterns.

This panel should seek input from outside experts on current best practices as well as input from our tech companies and academia on the use of emerging new technologies such as smart lighting and security systems, advanced construction materials and techniques, the Internet of Things, AI-based technologies and more.

As the panel makes its recommendations, it should incorporate a mix of housing types into the new plan that:

• Reflect market demands.
• Keep density levels safe and defensible considering local topography.
• Retain the character and community appeal that has made the Palisades such a vibrant and desirable place to live and work.

While the Palisades recovery plan is being developed, the city should update local building codes to ensure that all reconstructed buildings meet the latest resilience standards.

To keep recovery moving forward, city leaders should augment government construction professionals with outside consultants who have expertise in managing large, complex infrastructure projects and keeping them to a tight schedule. The use of accelerated contracting methods with performance incentives similar to those that resulted in reopening the damaged I-10 freeway in record time after the Northridge earthquake in 1994 also should be considered.

And finally, state and local leaders must identify every possible funding source for these improvements to help mitigate financial impacts on homeowners, renters and business owners. In addition to federal assistance, the state, county and city should reallocate existing funds to this effort from less important and less urgent programs and projects. Among other sources, the county should tap into the recently approved Proposition A half-cent sales tax revenues.

All of these steps will help to address the critical infrastructure needs of thousands of impacted residents — and will minimize the number and severity of future disasters.

Nick Patsaouras is a former president of the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power and a former board member of L.A. Metro. Edward McSpedon is a former chief engineer of L.A. Metro and the chief executive of Infrastructure Delivery Strategies.

The devastating fires in the Pacific Palisades and Altadena neighborhoods, which have claimed at least 28 lives and displaced tens of thousands of Angelenos, come at a moment when the region cannot afford to lose even one unit of housing. By 2029, Los Angeles will need to have built 456,000 units — including 182,200 units for low-income renters — to make up for the past 50 years of underproduction, and we are only a small fraction of the way there.

The rebuilding process for burned areas is an opportunity to make big strides toward this goal. Hundreds of billions of dollars will be spent on recovery. Some of that will be public money, and it should be spent wisely — not used for short-term or low-impact projects. Public dollars should go toward solutions that will address the root causes of both the climate and housing crises.

So how can Los Angeles invest in housing that is affordable but also centers the health of the planet and its inhabitants? One answer has just recently taken shape: Last month, the Los Angeles City Council approved guidelines for Measure ULA that include a new “social housing” program for the city. Measure ULA, which voters passed in November 2022, applies a “mansion tax” to property sales over $5 million. It is generating the hundreds of millions of dollars per year we need to create housing and ensure it is both affordable and carbon-neutral. Some of that revenue should be directed toward areas affected by the fires, including Pacific Palisades.

Social housing — an umbrella term for units that are not part of the private market, including public housing — is meant to serve renters of different economic backgrounds. It is publicly funded, permanently affordable and community controlled. In addition to its crucial role in solving the affordability crisis, an expansive social housing program for Los Angeles would enable large-scale decarbonization to also make a dent in the climate crisis.

Buildings contribute 43% of the city’s greenhouse gas emissions. But decarbonizing buildings is expensive, and recent efforts have demonstrated that many property owners are reluctant to invest in the changes necessary to shift to a zero-carbon economy. This is especially true of rental housing. Small mom-and-pop landlords may not have the resources to invest in energy efficiency measures, while corporate landlords may resist upgrades that eat into their profit margins. When decarbonization retrofits do happen, cost burdens are often passed on to renters, which causes displacement and eviction for those who cannot bear a rent increase. This leads to a patchwork of progress, rather than a consistent and coordinated effort to decarbonize building stock.

But Los Angeles has an opportunity to fund and regulate its social housing through a centralized system that could guarantee green building standards, drive decarbonization and deliver climate and economic benefits.

Around the world, social housing has become the standard-bearer for large-scale, publicly funded building decarbonization efforts. In Vienna, where 2 million people — more than 60% of Austria’s population — live in social housing, the government has launched an ambitious plan to make the city’s century-old social housing stock carbon-neutral by 2050, and it is well on its way. In Milan, the Italian government is building the country’s first zero-carbon affordable housing complex, which will provide 400 units for families and 300 units for students as well as acres of public green space. And in Egypt, the National Social Housing Program aims to build 25,000 green units by 2026.

We should take these examples to heart, especially as the city moves to streamline construction in fire-affected areas. Los Angeles must rebuild — and we should not lose sight of our affordability and climate crises in the process, because they are intertwined. We need an equitable and sustainable approach to housing all Angelenos that will stop exacerbating the very conditions that led to these fires in the first place.

Chelsea Kirk is director of policy and advocacy at the nonprofit Strategic Actions for a Just Economy.