California wildfires could be leaving deeper inequality in their wake

Kyle Kucharski hugs his partner Nicole Perri as they stand on the ruins of their house destroyed by the Palisades Fire in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of Los Angeles, California on January 10, 2025. | Photo by Cecilia SANCHEZ / AFP

ALTADENA, Calif. — The sight of celebrity mansions and movie landmarks reduced to ashes can make it seem like the wildfires roaring through the Los Angeles area affected a constellation of movie stars.

But a drive through the charred neighborhoods around Altadena shows that the fires also burned through a remarkable haven for generations of Black families avoiding discriminatory housing practices elsewhere. They have been communities of racial and economic diversity, where many people own their own homes.

Some now fear the most destructive fires in California’s history have altered that for good. Recovery and rebuilding may be out of reach for many, and pressures of gentrification could be renewed.

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A hillside smolders as the Palisades fire grows near the Mandeville Canyon neighborhood and Encino, California, on January 11, 2025. The Palisades Fire, the largest of the Los Angeles fires, spread toward previously untouched neighborhoods January 11, forcing new evacuations and dimming hopes that the disaster was coming under control. | Photo by Patrick T. Fallon / AFP

Samantha Santoro, 22, a first-generation college student at Cal Poly Pomona, remembered being annoyed when the initial news coverage of the wildfires focused more on celebrities. She and her sister, who attends UC Berkeley, worry how their Mexican immigrant parents and working-class neighbors who lost their homes in Altadena will move forward.

“We don’t have like, ‘Oh, I’ll just go to my second home and stay there,'” Santoro said.

The landlord of their family’s two-bedroom house with a pool had never increased the $1,650 rent, making it possible for the Santoros to affordably raise their daughters. Now, they’re temporarily staying with a relative in Pasadena. The family has renters insurance but not much else.

“I think it’s hard to believe that you have nothing,” Santoro said, through tears, thinking of her parents. “Everything that they ever worked for was in that house.”

Altadena had been a mix of tiny bungalows and magnificent mansions. The community of 42,000 includes blue-collar families, artists, entertainment industry workers and white-collar ones. About 58% of residents are non-white, with one-fourth of them Hispanic and nearly a fifth Black, according to Census data.

During the Civil Rights era, Altadena became a rare land of opportunity for Black Americans to reach the middle class without the discriminatory practices of denying them access to credit. They kept homes within the family and helped others to flourish. Today, the Black home ownership rate there is at 81.5%, almost double the national rate.

That’s impressive considering 92% of the 15,000 residences in Altadena are single-family homes, according to the 2023 Census American Community Survey. The median income is over $129,000. Just over 7% of residents live in poverty.

Victoria Knapp, chair of the Altadena Town Council, worries that the fires have irreparably changed the landscape for these families.

“Someone is going to buy it and develop who knows what on it. And that is going to change the character of Altadena,” Knapp said, adding that those with fewer resources will be disproportionately hurt.

A burned-out car and home reduced to rubble by the Palisades Fire is seen in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, on January 12, 2025. US officials warned “dangerous and strong” winds were set to push deadly wildfires further through Los Angeles residential areas January 12 as firefighters struggled to make progress against the flames. | Photo by Frederic J. Brown / AFP

The family of Kenneth Snowden, 57, was one of the Black families able to purchase a home in 1962. That house, as well as the one Snowden bought almost 20 years ago, are both gone.

He is challenging state and federal officials to help all fire-affected communities fairly because “your $40 million home is no different than my $2 million home.”

Snowden wants the ability to acquire home loans with 0% interest. “Give us the ability to rebuild, restart our lives,” he said. “If you can spend billions of dollars fighting a war, you can spend a billion dollars to help us get back where we were at.”

A police officer inspects destroyed vehicles left along Sunset Boulevard during the January 7 evacuation from the Palisades Fire, in Los Angeles, California on January 12, 2025. | Photo by Frederic J. BROWN / AFP

Shawn Brown lost not only her home but also the public charter school she founded in Altadena. She had a message for fellow Black homeowners who might be tempted with offers for their property: “I would tell them to stand strong, rebuild, continue the generational progress of African-Americans.”

She and other staff at Pasadena Rosebud Academy are trying to raise money to rebuild while looking at temporary sites in churches.

But even some churches have burned. At Altadena Baptist Church, the bell tower is pretty much the only thing still standing.

The Rev. George Van Alstine and others are trying to help more than 10 church members who lost homes with needs like navigating insurance and federal aid. The pastor is worried the fires will lead to gentrification, with Black parishioners, who make up half the congregation, paying the price.

“We’re seeing a number of families who are probably going to have to move out of the area because rebuilding in Altadena will be too expensive for them,” he said.

The 32-year-old photographer Daniela Dawson, who had been working two jobs to meet the $2,200 rent for her studio apartment, fled the wildfires with her Hyundai SUV and her cat, Lola. She lost almost everything else, including thousands of dollars of photography gear.

She did not have renter’s insurance. “Obviously now I’m thinking about it. Wish I had it,” she said.

Dawson plans to return to Arizona, where she lived previously, and regroup. But she likely won’t be returning to Altadena.