Many failures of 2025 still not resolved

After year of survival, 2026 will be about building for residents, a reckoning for others.

- BY TIMES STAFF

L.A. COUNTY has issued rebuilding permits for fewer than one-fifth of the homes destroyed by the Eaton fire last year in Altadena.

In the year after fire swept through Altadena, man and nature have camouflaged the destruction, to some extent.

The burned husks of thousands of homes have been flattened. Weeks of record rainfall have left empty lots a shimmering green. Parts of Altadena now resemble a rural town, with scattered houses separated by vast swaths of open space canopied by trees that somehow survived the fire.

In Pacific Palisades too, hills that flames turned brown are now back to green. Everything feels so wet and lush this January that it’s hard to imagine that a fire in the same month, a year ago, could have caused so much misery.

But it did, and 2026 is going to be a pivotal year.

Last year, the focus was on survival—finding temporary places to live, clearing lots, deciding whether to stay or go — while holding government officials accountable. This year will be about building up again, as well as political reckoning.

Government credibility

Many fire survivors are haunted by what-ifs.

If the Los Angeles Fire Department had fully pre-deployed engines in the Palisades, could homes and lives have been saved? If firefighters hadn't been ordered to leave a New Year’s Day fire before all the embers were extinguished, would flames have flared up on the same spot amid hurricane-force winds on Jan. 7, 2025?

In Altadena, if government officials had sent out timely evacuation alerts to west Altadena residents, if fire trucks had swarmed the area earlier, would 18 people have died?

The LAFD has promised a host of reforms, including maximum deployments on high-fire-risk days and more thorough mop-ups to better ensure fires are completely out.