75% of Pacific Palisades Fire Victims Still Stuck in Temporary Housing
As we approach the one-year mark of the Los Angeles Wildfire disaster, Pacific Palisades is still a wasteland, survivors are sidelined, and broken promises pile up like the debris left behind.
As California Gov. Gavin Newsom gallivants in Brazil with United Nations climate crisis bureaucrats, the Golden State is rapidly approaching a dreadful milestone.
As we head into the holiday, we are nearing the first anniversary of the Los Angeles area wildfires that destroyed Pacific Palisades and Altadena. Sadly, it appears that three-quarters of Pacific Palisades and two-thirds of Altadena residents remain in temporary housing. And time is running out for those whose insurance is covering the cost of renting due to displacement.
Nearly 13,000 homes were lost or damaged in the Eaton and Palisades fires. The Department of Angels, a fire recovery program launched after the fires, surveyed more than 2,300 fire-impacted residents across L.A. County and found that 8 in 10 Altadena residents and 9 in 10 Pacific Palisades residents have not returned home. That includes homeowners and renters whose houses were destroyed and those whose homes are still standing but awaiting remediation and testing for toxins.
Many survivors “are being left behind, while others are spending much of their time and dwindling finances to fight for a sliver of what they lost — and often, coming up short,” the report said. The survey is the third in a series this year.
…Roughly 75% of surveyed Pacific Palisades residents and 67% of surveyed Altadena residents are in temporary housing. Many expect they’ll have to move again in the next few months. The report found that although residents who experienced a total loss have struggled with finding stable housing, residents who experienced structural and smoke or ash damage have had to move more frequently.
For residents who lost their homes in Altadena, Pacific Palisades, Pasadena and Malibu, 22% said they expected to move again within the next six to 12 months and 9% expected to move within the next few months. Of those residents who experienced structural and smoke or ash damage, 19% expected to have to move in the next few months and 18% believed they’d have to move within a year.
Displacement coverage under insurance policies is running out.
🚨 BREAKING: Gavin Newsom and Mayor Karen Bass are being SLAMMED after it was confirmed a whopping 75 PERCENT of Palisades fire victims still live in temporary housing.
Absolutely horrendous. It's been almost A FULL YEAR.
Victims are furious.
Other victims in temporary… pic.twitter.com/CKH2IoHW0t
— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) November 15, 2025
The report cited was prepared by Embold Research in partnership with the Department of Angeles, a grassroots, nonprofit initiative founded in the aftermath of the wildfire disaster to assess community status. Among its many depressing findings is the residents’ complete lack of faith in city and state leaders. Survivors feel abandoned by government agencies and are left to navigate complex recovery processes without adequate guidance or resources.
Reviewing the information presented, I will simply point out that the race of those questioned was highlighted whenever a resident was quoted… as if someone’s skin color made a difference in coping with disaster recovery.
“This entire process has been concerning and filled with bureaucratic red tape. The city is wrong if they think thousands of people who lose everything are going to tolerate this process for several years to come and rebuild. As a community we are on the tilt of a serious crisis. There is no faith in the city or its leaders to guide and solve these problems! Change must come and quickly!” -White woman, 50-64, Pacific Palisades
Alexander Ayling, an award-winning filmmaker and digital content creator, has covered the Southern California recovery efforts. He recently posted a heartbreaking video report that confirms the research findings about the roadblocks being put up by the state and local governments.
“While editing this video and researching, I found out that the city has actually issued fines to the owners of properties destroyed by the wildfires for failure to clear brush from these lots. Imagine losing your home, perhaps after having your insurance canceled and trying to scrape together a plan to salvage what remains of your life, only to have the city hit you with a $750 fine for not cutting the grass enough on your empty dirt lot that was once your dream home.”
He also had a damning assessment of Mayor Karen Bass.
“The mayor, Karen Bass, accidentally sent her phone’s text messages to autodelete after 30 days, which is highly suspect and probably illegal. We’ll never know what her communications were during the early days of the fire, but in my opinion, she and her cronies in the city council and the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power are grossly incompetent and potentially criminally negligent.”
In conclusion, as we approach the one-year mark of the Los Angeles Wildfire disaster, Pacific Palisades is still a wasteland, survivors are sidelined, and broken promises pile up like the debris left behind. Gavin Newsom and Karen Bass have shown us what failed leadership really looks like, with a toxic combination of disastrous policies, civic negligence, and zero accountability.
Only a Christmas miracle will get many Californians back into their homes in time for this holiday season, and I despair that the situation won’t be better at the end of 20206 either.
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Comments
Gee, I cant imagine why housing is so expensive.
Dems going to drag out the rebuilding process for years until land owners capitulate and sell and they can redevelop as non-profit housing projects.
I belive that was the prediction when it was still burning and the liars in charge said no we were all wrong. And the Kool-Aid crowd drinks on.
Third World totalitarian countries do not recover from disasters themselves. They have to have outside countries/agencies do the work and funding for them, because a) those in power do not care what happens to the proles, and b) they hope to skim off the relief funds.. Our country’s Pacific coast fits that mold.
Subotai Bahadur
The effects of the Pacific Palisades and Altadena wildfire extend to at least Texas. Earlier this year I got a bill from my homeowners insurance company: A 37% increase in premium! WTF? A realtor friend told me that the company is trying to recover some of their California losses by raising premiums in Texas. As the policy was about to renew, I canceled it. I don’t have a mortgage, so I decided to self insure. Statistics lies within my skillset and I calculated the risk and loss. Too expensive. I might shop around for a better deal. Basic rule in insurance: don’t insure for a loss you can afford unless the company is under estimating the premium. That happened to me once, and I got a terrific deal because the company was stupid.
What a country we live in. The government and almost everyone else lies to you and tires to cheat. As for the Pacific Palisades and Altadena wildfire, what’s happening is obvious. The California government wants to acquire the land an put in high density cheap housing for their underclass constituents. They hate the white middle class, especially Jews.
Buildings in downtown Portland are selling at 15% of their 2015 value. Without tenants, it is only inevitable that they will go to the city through a tax default. As a conservative, I can only see this as by design. Of course, the city is only upset that these massive devaluations have killed their tax base. Sort of a poetic justice that those who can’t begin to comprehend economics then discover that their grandiose plans (to spend other people’s money) is the first victim.
To Democrats, politics is the art of pretending that the laws of economics are not every but as immutable as the laws of physics. They “solve” problems by pushing their finger into one side of the balloon (e.g., Mamdani’s government grocery stores) and then are flabbergasted! when the other side bulges…, or the entire damn thing just pops.
Of course they are still in temporary housing. Newsome and Bass have been quite clear that their intention is to wait the people out until they can’t afford it anymore, seize the land then place the beach side into a park and build mixed multitenant/section 8 housing on the rest and extend bus lines up there. They have no intention of letting anyone rebuild their homes.
Will California voters wise up and stop electing incompetents? Do they even make the connection?
No and No are the safe answers. Sad
cities run by Democrats are being looted. Must be a coincidence..
My bother’s house still stands–in the Palisades–but he’s n to allowed back in it yet. Smoke damage, etc. He’s currently living in an absurdly expensive apartment in Beverly Hills, but that insurance coverage isn’t going to last.
Didn’t know about the insurance charge bumps her win Alabama to cover the California losses. I’ll have to look into that.
That’s pathetic. They are going to spend 10 years living in trailer in their driveway, only to capitulate and sell to non-profit housing developer who is going to build low income housing project on their family home site.
CA sux.