Oct. 7, 2026 7 AM PT <\/p>\n
To the editor: Reading this article brings back more memories of Jan. 7, 2025, (\u201cBotched Altadena evacuations, dysfunction in Pacific Palisades: Long-awaited fire investigation identifies missteps,\u201d<\/a> Oct. 2). Every day I see more articles and opinions online. Sometimes you just want a break.<\/p>\n Bottom line, I cannot put blame on our Sheriff\u2019s Department or the Los Angeles Fire Department. No one knew what would happen that night or could be prepared for it. Our local Sheriff\u2019s Department in Altadena did an incredible job. We have a limited number of officers in Altadena. How could they have been prepared for this?<\/p>\n I live in east Altadena. On Jan. 7, my power flickered at 6:45 p.m. At 7:30 p.m., my neighbors were pounding on my door, telling me to get out. We saw the fire coming. I did not receive an evacuation notice until 10 p.m.; by that time, I was at the Hilton in Pasadena.<\/p>\n It was a horrible tragedy for all. But if you see a fire coming, you need to make plans to get out. It\u2019s not always our Sheriff\u2019s Department\u2019s or Fire Department\u2019s responsibility.<\/p>\n I was displaced for eight months. My home was damaged. Every day we live with this, as most of my immediate neighborhood is gone. We are dealing with burnt lots, messed-up streets and the constant noise and dust from the rebuilds.<\/p>\n Out of the ashes, a garden will grow again. Let\u2019s stop all the blaming and learn from the past.<\/p>\n Mike Bowling, Altadena<\/p>\n ..<\/p>\n To the editor: I get that the laser focus of the Los Angeles Times\u2019 outstanding piece on the new report about local agency failures related to last year\u2019s deadly L.A. fires is exactly that. But I\u2019m dismayed that this long and detailed explanation lacked a single reference to how climate change worsened these fires \u2014 a fact the paper itself has reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n As more journalists and others understand, every reporter is a climate reporter. There is no isolated \u201cclimate beat\u201d as we face down this civilizational crisis. And I\u2019m a giant and vocal fan of the paper\u2019s climate and environment coverage \u2014 it\u2019s part of why I continue to subscribe in print. But as renowned climate and atmospheric scientist Katharine Hayhoe urges<\/a>, we must talk about climate change. We must act too, of course. So please don\u2019t ever, ever leave it out of the conversation.<\/p>\n Zan Dubin, Santa Monica
This writer is a former Los Angeles Times reporter and does media relations for Third Act, a nonprofit for climate and democracy advocates over 60.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Oct. 7, 2026 7 AM PT To the editor: Reading this article brings back more memories of Jan.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":488145,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[5759,847,88694,190623,217,6246,2072,3802,7217,190624,48,52,51,100288,47,50,49,63,224,4739,2637],"class_list":["post-488144","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-altadena","tag-article","tag-blame","tag-climate-beat","tag-day","tag-department","tag-editor","tag-fire","tag-jan","tag-l-a-fire-loss","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-local-agency","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-los-angeles-times","tag-p-m","tag-paper","tag-sheriff"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/488144","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=488144"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/488144\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/488145"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=488144"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=488144"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=488144"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}