LA Times reporter Liam Dillon assesses the damage now that the fires are fully contained. Torched editor Alissa Walker explains how the 2028 Olympics might impede rebuilding efforts. This episode was produced by Avishay Artsy, edited by Amina Al-Sadi, fact-checked by Laura Bullard, engineered by Andrea Kristinsdottir, and hosted by Sean Rameswaram. Transcript at vox.com/today-explained-podcast Support Today, Explained by becoming a Vox Member today: http://www.vox.com/members Flea, Chad Smith, Anthony Kiedis, and John Frusciante of Red Hot Chili Peppers perform at the LA28 Olympic Games Handover Celebration. Photo by Kevin Mazur/Getty Images for LA28. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Chapter 1: What happened at the Grammys regarding Los Angeles firefighters?
Donald Trump was not at the Grammys last night. Beyonce was. She won country album of the year. Lady Gaga was too. She shouted out trans rights. Alicia Keys was there. She shouted out DEI. Chapel Roan won best new artist and shouted out health care. Shakira showed up and shouted out immigrants. But no one got more shout outs than the firefighters in Los Angeles, the city that hosted the show.
An all-star band opened the Grammys with a cover of I Love L.A. by Randy Newman. The host, Trevor Noah, was asking for donations all night when Cowboy Carter won Album of the Year. It was Los Angeles Firefighters who finally got to hand our queen the prize she's been after for all these years.
Cowboy Carter. Beyonce.
Los Angeles fires are finally fully contained. We're going to ask what comes next on Today Explained.
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Chapter 2: What are the immediate challenges after the Los Angeles fires?
This has been our family home. And everything is a total loss. This looks like the apocalypse.
This is like a toxic waste site, these two areas. I mean, in the air, you have lead, asbestos. I mean, I saw a photo of someone posted of their bike totally vaporized, right? Doesn't exist anymore. And that, you know, the metals from that go into the air. So you have these heavy metals that have been measured miles downwind from the fires of
Ammunition, propane tanks, pesticides, car batteries, really bad stuff. And so I think this first challenge that you have is clearing out this toxic area.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers recently told residents it could take 18 months just to clear the debris before owners even begin to rebuild. That timeline leaving many families in limbo.
We can't move forward until our properties are cleaned.
And that, you know, caused a lot of consternation from people who want to try to rebuild their homes, obviously much faster than that.
How are people going to live in that timeline? How do people's loss of use cover them when they're still paying their mortgages, when they're now paying rents on top of it? Please don't kill our spirit. We just want to go home. That's it. We just want to rebuild and we want to go home.
That estimate's now been revised to a year, but still a really long time just for this sort of first stage of the rebuilding effort.
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Chapter 3: How long will it take to clear debris after the fires?
So you said the Army Corps of Engineers. So does that mean this is going to be a federal effort? Is the federal government funding this effort?
Right. So there's a lot of questions and challenges about the role of the federal government, particularly under the Trump administration and congressional leaders as well, tying aid to changes in unrelated California policy.
I want to see two things in Los Angeles, voter ID so that the people have a chance to vote. And I want to see the water be released and come down into Los Angeles and throughout the state. Those are the two things. After that, I will be the greatest president that California has ever seen.
But these sorts of strings, you know, may well function as a potential concern for how quickly and how comprehensively some of the rebuilding efforts may go.
Chapter 4: What role does the federal government play in rebuilding efforts?
What about local government? What about state government? How can they be expediting this process for people right now?
So California Governor Gavin Newsom, L.A. Mayor Karen Bass, the County Board of Supervisors, all of these groups and individuals have passed rules trying to cut regulations that would block or slow down rebuilding.
California leads the nation in environmental stewardship. I'm not going to give that up. But one thing I won't give into is delay.
Red tape, bureaucracy, all of it must go.
And, you know, these rules or these waivers, you know, get rid of or at least attempt to various permitting and environmental rules, particularly for homeowners who would like to kind of rebuild their house exactly as it was before or slightly larger. Another question when it comes to the rebuilding effort is, you know, many of these homes built
a half century ago or a century ago, today's fire codes in California are some of the strictest fire codes in the country for new builds. In some cases, that may make rebuilding more expensive, but that could make these houses, you know, much safer to live in.
And I think it's still unclear exactly under what kind of fire code or fire regime or building code that people are going to either want or need to rebuild their houses to. And of course, that affects the cost of it and whether in some cases they'll actually rebuild.
And we're mostly talking here about people who own their property, who own their homes. But, of course, there's a lot of concern for renters. We know Los Angeles has notoriously, some would say criminally high rent. Right. I can't imagine the fires are helping us.
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Chapter 5: How are local governments addressing rebuilding regulations?
No, and that's just one of the issues, I think, what you're finding in the immediate aftermath of these fires is kind of insane bidding wars. I mean, 30 families we've reported looking through one rental home in over a 10-minute period, right? What? Also, very widespread reports of price gouging.
I've been quoted maybe $5,000. Some of my friends have talked to people and they said $6,000 plus. And then one girl told me somebody was charging $8,000 a month.
And these are for tiny one-bedroom apartments?
One-bedroom apartments, yes.
The gouging is out of control already. I'm seeing things double. I'm seeing rentals in Oxnard for $25,000 a month.
And you mentioned that there's attention on permits and clearing out toxic materials, but is any government, state, local, federal paying attention to the renting crisis?
So there is a California state law that says you cannot raise advertised rents more than 10% above what they were before a natural disaster certainly includes these fires. And so the state attorney general, Rob Bonta, has tried to sort of marshal an effort to deal with this.
We have multiple criminal investigations right now that are moving towards prosecution, arrests, holding people accountable. These are crimes. People can go to jail for up to a year and be slapped with a $10,000 criminal fine as well.
He's encouraged people to report examples, sent warning letters to more than 650 landlords and hotel operators around Southern California. And he's even, at this point, criminally charged two people, real estate agents, for violating, allegedly violating these price gouging laws. And he sort of hopes these efforts will have at least a deterrent effect on what's been going on in the market.
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Chapter 6: What are the implications of the 2028 Olympics on rebuilding?
Chapter 7: How has the rental market changed after the fires?
And you could see videos on social media that people were posting in the days after the fire.
what's up guys it's christina your price gouging landlord's worst nightmare here to report another property uh whose rent was raised since the fire started i scroll down to the bottom to look at the rental history and oh look um this listing was increased by 2500 a month on the second day of the devastating fires um that is a price gouge they are obviously trying to take advantage of people who have lost their homes and need a place to stay um this is my spreadsheet that i'm keeping
People videoing themselves going on Zillow, finding an example of a listing that increased its rent by more than 10 percent, telling people how to report them. And there was even one group of activists led by the L.A. Tenants Union, which has crowdsourced a list that came up with more than 1,300 possible examples of rent gouging, again, in this just sort of few weeks since this fire.
This isn't the first time Los Angeles has seen one of these destructive wildfires. I think a lot of people will remember a couple of fires in Malibu, at least. What do those fires tell us about how rebuilding might go? I mean, are we going to get 100% back to where we were, 50%, 125%?
So I think it's really variable in these wildfire responses in California, even within California, but also around the country. I mean, you look at the recent fire in Maui and there have been reports that have come out that only after 18 months, only three homes have been rebuilt.
It's sad. It's disappointing. Because so much time has gone by.
Yeah, a year and a half later, town of Lahaina has not moved forward. In terms of a percentage, are any of the businesses up and running? Zero businesses, zero.
A closer example you referenced in Malibu, there was a fire in 2018 that destroyed roughly 400 homes in Malibu and more in the surrounding area. But less than half of them in Malibu have been rebuilt and we're six years on. But you also have some stories of things getting done faster.
You know, there was a big fire in Northern California wine country, a city called Santa Rosa in 2017, 3,000 homes burned. And then 80% was rebuilt within three years. And so it can be really circumstantial in terms of, you know, what happens where and why. You know, in Santa Rosa, for instance, the neighborhood that came back the quickest was in Flatland.
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Chapter 8: What lessons can be learned from past fire rebuilding efforts?
I mean, the Olympics in LA will be the largest peacetime gathering in the history of the world. What an opportunity to bring the world to a revitalize and a new Los Angeles.
And so these events, not just the Olympics in 2028, but we have World Cup events in LA in 2026. Super Bowl is coming to LA again. And so these mega events are at the least kind of putting timelines on things that absent them may not exist for rebuilding efforts. And so at a base level, people are saying LA is going to be showcased in not just nationally, but worldwide.
in many events over the coming years. And you want every building effort that shows that resiliency and that recovery to show the world that you can do it. And I think that is certainly a challenge given the timeline here that folks are looking at and facing.
Liam Dillon, LATimes.com. In a minute on Today Explained, we're going to try and figure out if Los Angeles can rebuild and get ready for what some are calling the largest peacetime gathering in the history of the world, if they can do those two things at the same time.
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