Is there a government that LA\u2019s fire victims can depend upon?<\/p>\n
Probably not. Which is why they should demand the creation of a government of their own.<\/p>\n
A year after the Palisades and Eaton fires savaged Southern California, LA is still burning \u2014 with frustration and anger. At revelations about the failures to prevent fires. And at the myriad problems of the fire recovery.<\/p>\n
To be fair, all levels of government have done extraordinary things in the fires\u2019 aftermath, from fast lot clean-ups to streamlining of building permits. Yet it\u2019s not enough. Fire victims say they feel fundamentally on their own \u2014 to deal with silos within LA\u2019s feuding city and county governments, to find assistance from a large menu of state programs, to handle unscrupulous lawyers and contractors, and to battle with an insurance industry that offers uneven service and low-ball reimbursements.<\/p>\n
If only there were some sort of government that could focus 24\/7 on nothing else but post-fire recovery and repair.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Good news: There is. It\u2019s called the Climate Resilience District.<\/p>\n
CRDs can do two big things. First, as planning entities, these climate districts allow communities to collaborate on climate-related projects. Second, as governments, they can levy taxes, conduct referenda, sell bonds, and apply for grants to fund such projects.\u00a0<\/p>\n
CRDs are local governments created by other local governments. A city, a county, or one of California\u2019s nearly 3,400 special districts can form a CRD.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Just like fires and floods, CRDS cross political boundaries. Districts may include multiple municipalities or counties. As climate change worsens, this flexibility could make CRDs a particularly useful method of designing, funding, and managing environmental risks and disasters.<\/p>\n
The idea of delineating new districts or areas for climate projects is not a California invention. Localities in other countries have done this, more or less formally, for a decade or more. China has its \u201csponge cities\u201d, Germany its eco-districts, and Holland its \u201cclimate-proof\u201d neighborhoods.<\/p>\n
California, however, was the first place to empower local communities by\u00a0 law to authorize such climate governments for themselves. This came after years of advocacy by the Sacramento nonprofit CivicWell and after slow local recoveries from major Northern California wildfires like 2017\u2019s Tubbs fire (in Sonoma County) and 2018\u2019s Camp fire (which destroyed Paradise).<\/p>\n
In 2022, state Sen. Bill Dodd, representing the Wine Country, sponsored SB 852, to establish rules for creating and running CRDs. The law authorized these districts to pursue various revenue sources, including tax-increment financing, benefit assessment fees, voter-approved supplemental property taxes, state and federal grants, and private donations. The bill defined \u201celigible projects\u201d for CRDs as addressing sea-level rise, extreme heat, extreme cold, drought, flooding, and, of course, wildfire.<\/p>\n
Dodd\u2019s legislation also made the Sonoma County Regional Climate Protection Authority, a pre-existing body, the state\u2019s first CRD. Officials say the district already has successfully fostered collaboration on climate plans, since it includes the Sonoma County government, eight cities, and the town of Windsor on its governing board. But the CRD has been slower to produce revenues. The district has explored various tax plans, but polling, and California\u2019s two-thirds requirement for approving local taxes, has so far discouraged the district from asking voters to fund their mitigation and adaptation plans.<\/p>\n
Other communities have considered establishing CRDs, but Sonoma\u2019s district remained the state\u2019s only one \u2014 until fires swept through LA<\/p>\n
The problems of recovery have made CRDs appealing for Southern Californians, Los Angeles County\u2019s government, and state Sen. Sasha Renee Perez, who sponsored legislation to ease the creation of new fire recovery district.\u00a0<\/p>\n
LA County has taken steps to set up CRDs in two places. In November, the Board of Supervisors approved the creation of the Unincorporated Santa Monica Mountains Wildfire Disaster Recovery Financing District to cover county areas burned in the Palisades fire. It\u2019s also expected to cover Malibu. An Altadena climate district received preliminary approval in October.<\/p>\n
Unfortunately, neither county-authorized district includes the neighborhood of Pacific Palisades, which is part of the city of Los Angeles, but a third CRD could be created there. (The LA city council is considering a study of a CRD).\u00a0<\/p>\n
Dividing up the fire areas into three districts is not ideal. One larger CRD would offer LA\u2019s fire recovery efforts more capacity, more coordination, and potentially more money. A combined district might also have more political leverage to demand better performance from insurance companies and the state\u2019s ineffective insurance commissioner.<\/p>\n
But the real test will be whether residents and fire victims can take charge of these new climate districts themselves, instead of deferring to powerful local elected or appointed officials. People will need to be unified and unapologetically aggressive in using all of the authority of CRDS to raise revenues and carry out plans.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It\u2019s the best chance for those most affected by the LA fires to determine the future of their communities for themselves.<\/p>\n
Joe Mathews writes the Connecting California column for Z\u00f3calo Public Square and is founder-publisher of Democracy Local.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Is there a government that LA\u2019s fire victims can depend upon? Probably not. Which is why they should…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":110853,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[7,13900,59444,3002,48,52,51,47,50,49,9282,445,534,1839,3628],"class_list":{"0":"post-110852","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-california","9":"tag-camp-fire-2018","10":"tag-capital-regional-district","11":"tag-insurance","12":"tag-la","13":"tag-la-headlines","14":"tag-la-news","15":"tag-los-angeles","16":"tag-los-angeles-headlines","17":"tag-los-angeles-news","18":"tag-malibu","19":"tag-natural-environment","20":"tag-pacific-palisades","21":"tag-palisades-fire","22":"tag-sonoma-county"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110852","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=110852"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110852\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/110853"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110852"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110852"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110852"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}