Commission on Climate Action and Fire-Safe Recovery Issues Final Recommendations
The Blue Ribbon Commission on Climate Action and Fire-Safe Recovery, created in the aftermath of L.A.’s January wildfires, issued its final report on June 20 including more than 50 recommendations urging California lawmakers to establish a new local authority to oversee and coordinate rebuilding efforts.
The independent commission, formed by Los Angeles County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, included representatives of businesses, local government, civic organizations and environmental groups, as well as more than 40 academic experts from UCLA who provided support to the commission and advised members on recovery and rebuilding after disasters.
Commenting in a Los Angeles Times story, Megan Mullin, faculty director of the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation, who led the university team, said, “Without intentional, deliberate leadership by government, and by government that’s accountable to the communities, an unmanaged recovery process will only widen disparities.”
Mullin said that government, “with strong guidance,” can streamline rebuilding in a way that makes these communities more fire-safe, more climate-resilient.
The commission calls for California to create a new authority to oversee rebuilding after the Palisades and Eaton fires and recommends that the new authority coordinate rebuilding with the power to buy land and contract with builders.
The commission also said the proposed “Resilient Rebuilding Authority” would streamline complex recovery efforts and prioritize the return of residents and businesses as neighborhoods are rebuilt in Altadena and Pacific Palisades. Also, the authority would use tax-increment financing and other funding sources to buy fire-razed lots that property owners want to sell and guide the rebuilding process — selecting developers and coordinating construction at scale. Under the recommendations, people displaced by the fires would have first priority for the new homes, according to the recommendations.
The report’s authors say that the approach is designed to “counterbalance the forces that drive displacement and inequality in the aftermath of disasters,” and would avoid a “free-for-all in which investors snap up properties and make new homes unaffordable for displaced people.”
The Times story lists other recommendations by the commission including the following:
- expanding the federal government’s fire debris removal program;
- standardizing soil testing and cleanup;
- ensuring that construction meets “fire-hardened” building standards and that building codes maximize spacing between buildings;
- creating “buffer zones” with appropriate vegetation to reduce fire risks;
- prioritizing additional water storage capacity in neighborhoods, and systems with external sprinklers to douse homes, parks and schools;
- and creating a voluntary program to “shift development from high-risk, constrained, or uninsurable parcels to more suitable sites.”
The story also recalled similar development authorities which were set up to oversee rebuilding in areas devastated by other major disasters including the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, the 1994 Northridge earthquake, the 9/11 attacks and Hurricane Katrina.
“We cannot ignore the importance of climate change in driving this growing fire hazard that’s looming for the Los Angeles region, and actually throughout the Southwest,” Mullin said. “We can make it as easy as possible for people to rebuild, but to rebuild in a way that will leave them more protected going forward.”
Read the full LA Times story.
Read UCLA Newsroom story.
See full recommendations.
Read more on L.A. Fires and UCLA Luskin Research.
