The Los Angeles City Council on Tuesday signed off on a plan to give financial relief to Palisades fire victims who are seeking to rebuild, endorsing the plan nearly 10 months after Mayor Karen Bass first announced it.
On a 15-0 vote, the council instructed the city’s lawyers to draft an ordinance that would spare the owners of homes, duplexes, condominium units, apartment complexes and commercial buildings from having to pay the permit fees that are typically charged by the Department of Building and Safety during the recovery.
Forfeiting those fees is expected to cost as much as $90 million over three years, according to Matt Szabo, the city’s top budget analyst.
The vote comes at a time of heightened anxiety over the pace of the city’s decisions on the recovery among Palisades fire victims. Bart Young, whose home was destroyed in the fire, told council members said his insurance company will cover only half the cost of rebuilding.
“I’m living on Social Security. I’ve lost everything,” he said. “I’m not asking for special treatment. I’m asking for something fair, and with compassion.”
The ordinance must come back for another council vote later this year.
Bass first announced her support for the permit fee waivers in April, as part of her State of the City address. Soon afterward, she signed a pair of emergency orders instructing city building officials to suspend those fees while the council hammers out the details of a new permit relief program.
That effort stalled, with some on the council saying they feared the relief program would pull funding away from core city services. In October, the council’s budget committee took steps to scale back the relief program.
That move sparked outrage among Palisades fire victims, who demanded that the council to reverse course. Last month, Szabo reworked the numbers, concluding that the city was financially capable of covering all types of buildings, not just single-family homes and duplexes.
Palisades fire victims have spent several months voicing frustration over the pace of the recovery, and the city’s role in that effort.
Last week, the council declined to put a measure on the June 2 ballot that would spare fire victims from paying the city’s so-called “mansion tax” — which is levied on property sales of $5.3 million and up — if they choose to put their burned out properties on the market.
Bass and other elected officials have not released a package of consulting reports on the recovery that were due to the city in mid-November from AECOM, the global engineering firm.
AECOM is on track to receive $8 million to produce reports on the rebuilding of city infrastructure, fire protection and traffic management during the recovery. The council voted in December to instruct city agencies to produce those reports within 30 days.
Bass, during a speech earlier this week, said the city is moving with urgency on the recovery and has “expedited the entire rebuilding process without compromising safety.”
More than 480 rebuilding projects are currently under construction in the Palisades, out of about 5,600, the mayor’s team said. Permits have been issued for more than 800 separate addresses, according to the city’s online tracker.
The council’s vote coincides with growing antagonism between the Trump administration and state and local elected officials over the recovery.
Last week, Trump signed an executive order saying wildfire victims should not have to deal with “unnecessary, duplicative, or obstructive” permitting requirements when rebuilding their homes. On Tuesday, the county supervisors authorized their lawyers to take legal action to block the order, if necessary.
Lee Zeldin, Trumps administrator for the federal Environmental Protection Agency, is scheduled to meet Wednesday with Bass and Supervisor Kathryn Barger in the Palisades to discuss the pace of the recovery. He is also set to hold a news conference with Palisades residents to discuss the roadblocks they are facing in the rebuilding effort.
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