One hundred days after wildfire swept through Pacific Palisades, Altadena and parts of Malibu, local, state and federal leaders gathered on Friday afternoon at Will Rogers State Beach to outline the scale of the devastation and the scope of the response.
The press conference, led by State Senator Ben Allen and framed by the charred hills behind the Palisades Bowl mobile home park, featured a parade of high-level speakers. But beneath the usual declarations of resilience, the message was more pointed: rebuilding is underway, but hard policy work lies ahead to ensure no community is left behind.
“We’ve got a long way to go,” Allen said, standing beside residents still unable to access the remains of their homes. “There’s been enormous progress, but also enormous gaps. And we have to close them, fast.”
Mayor Karen Bass described the city’s wildfire recovery as “the fastest in modern California history,” citing a permitting process that kicked off just 57 days after the fires, compared to 123 days after the Camp Fire in 2018. She also noted that the Palisades branch library, destroyed in the fire, was cleared for rebuild in just six days, down from the original 30-day estimate.
Yet speed hasn’t solved everything. Thousands remain displaced, traffic chokes the Pacific Coast Highway and for many residents, the trauma hasn’t passed.
“Recovery is months ahead of schedule,” Bass said, adding, “But every day someone can’t return home is a day too long.”
Councilmember Traci Park, who introduced more than 50 legislative motions in the wake of the fire, said the city is still grappling with infrastructure shortfalls, insurance delays and the ongoing lack of access to some of the hardest-hit properties.
“We know this isn’t abstract,” she said, adding, “This is real. It’s homes, it’s schools, it’s the fabric of daily life and it’s not going to be rebuilt overnight.”
Senator Sasha Renée Pérez, whose district includes Altadena and Pasadena, outlined a suite of bills aimed at preventing displacement, closing legal loopholes and preserving affordable housing. Among them are:
SB 610 – co-authored with Allen, this will cap rent hikes in mobile home parks post-disaster and require swift debris removal by landlords.
SB 658 – the “Community Preservation Act” would give nonprofits and public entities the first right to purchase fire-damaged land before outside investors can swoop in.
SB 293 – if passed by the Senate Appropriations Committee, the “Generational Homeowner Protection Act” would help families preserve inherited property by extending the time to update title records, critical for maintaining eligibility for aid and tax relief.
“Altadena is not for sale,” Perez said, pushing back against concerns that fire-hit neighborhoods could be targeted by speculators. “We will not let Wall Street turn our pain into profit.”
California Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara detailed a grim but predictable pattern: thousands of claims, spotty fulfillment and a system ill-prepared for modern megafires. His office has logged 38,000 claims since the fires, with just over $12 billion paid to date.
Lara is backing several bills, including:
SB 495 – the “Eliminate the List Act” would require insurers to pay full contents coverage without demanding survivors itemize every lost possession.
SB 547 – this will extend non-renewal protections to commercial properties and multifamily housing.
AB 597 – would cap public adjuster fees at 15 percent to prevent gouging of survivors.
“Wildfire survivors should not be re-traumatized by bureaucracy,” Lara said. “We need to get them paid, quickly and fairly.”
For residents like John Brown who is the Palisades Bowl Community Partnership Co-Chair, legislative change can’t come fast enough. Standing beside fellow survivors, Brown shared a deeply personal account of life before and after the fire. His community of mobile home owners still faces locked gates, legal limbo and a landlord unwilling to cooperate with recovery efforts.
“We were homeowners but not landowners,” Brown told the gathered assembly of guests and television news crews. “Now, we can’t even sift through the ashes of our lives without asking permission.”
Allen is sponsoring SB 749, which would give residents in mobile home parks the first right to buy land if owners opt to sell or redevelop. Nonprofits would be next in line, preventing what he called “insult on top of injury.”
The bill follows weeks of reported inaction and opacity from park ownership, despite hundreds of displaced residents left with nowhere to go.
“There’s been talk of turning this site into temporary worker housing for the rebuild,” Brown said. “We’re not temporary, this is our home. Or it was.”
The air quality aftermath was another flashpoint. Senator Allen was also joined by National Stewardship Action Council Executive Director Heidi Sanborn, who is sponsoring SB 501. This would require manufacturers to create disposal plans for toxic household products. Improper storage of cleaners, batteries and chemicals in homes contributed to dangerously high levels of lead and chlorine in the air following the fire. The bill is scheduled for a hearing in the Senate Judiciary Committee on April 22, 2025.
“If we don’t act, we’ll breathe this in again,” Allen said.
Sanborn pointed to data from LA County showing that despite spending $14 million annually on household hazardous waste collection, as much as 80 percent still goes unmanaged.
The scope of the rebuilding effort is staggering. According to LA County Assessor Jeff Prang, 14,000 properties were damaged or destroyed. His office has already processed over $8 billion in tax assessment reductions, with total impact expected to hit $20 billion.
But it’s not just about speed, Allen emphasized. It’s about fairness.
“The fires revealed deep weaknesses in our laws, our systems and our planning,” he said. “This is our chance to get it right, not just for today, but for whatever comes next.”
