Okay, 100% with you on the inmates being forced to fight fires then being disqualified when they're out, that's a big thing, a fucked up thing, and something that needs to change without delay, no nuance.
But some context for the others:
Regarding the fires as hitting areas with "multimillion-dollar" homes:
Yes, a lot of "multimillion-dollar" homes burned down in Pacific Palisades. So did a lot of homes worth less than a million dollars. So did literally hundreds of trailer homes all up and down the Santa Monica-to-Malibu coast. Those are all gone now too. Those people are homeless too.
Those inmates fought those fires to protect those people too.
And all the businesses that burned down in the "multimllion dollar" Palisades: the people who worked there didn't live there. They live in Van Nuys, and Mid City, and anywhere else they can scrape a room together in this rediculously expensive city. They now no longer have jobs. No incomes. No way to make rent next month.
Not to mention: the Palisades are the very definition of a Boomer Wealth enclave, meaning: you generally don't get rich then move there. They bought those houses in the 50's, and 60's, and 70's, when they cost very little, even by the standards of their time, and have spent decades raising families there. Very few of them, outside of the supposed value of their homes, are anything approaching "multi millionaires".
The Alphabet streets, where I grew up, was primarily the homes of engineers working for Hughes and Raytheon down in El Segundo and Long Beach. Not very many millionaires among them.
The Alphabet streets are now smoke and rubble, indistiguishable in your immediate POV from any hot war zone on earth.
And, you know what? So what if a bunch of them are actually Rich?
Is it any less sad, less traumatic, less horrifying to see a really rich old couple crying in front of the wind-blown ashes of their wedding album, the only place with pictures of 40 years ago, eloping in Reno because their parents wouldn't approve, then putting a down payment on a small bungalo in this small hillside community with the little money they'd managed to save, bringing home first one baby, then another, then throwing birthday parties, graduation parties, weddings...and pictures of those same children, now adults, bringing home the same thing, babies, only now grandchildren, through the same doorway, playing in the same yard, in the same room their mom or dad grew up in...
Watching as, somehow, the American Dream actually became real for them...and then watching it and every trace it ever existed vanishing in, literally hours.
Does it make it more sad and tragic if they're poor?
And it's nice of you to completely ignore the Altadena fire, and the Sunset Fire, and the half dozen others that impacted working class areas.
A whole lot easier to make your "progressive statement about reform" when you can point to the priveledged folks we supposedly are all against. Not so easy to point to a "fellow comrade" as an easy prop for your crusade.
As for the budget bullshit:
The LAFD's budget actually increased $50 million year over year. The debates over specific allocations were putting the rest of the city budget on hold, so they severed those conversations from the primary, and the allocation left in the primary budget was, in fact, less than the previous year...because the balance, plus the new year's increase was now a different financial conversation and allocation. Too many writers are looking for clickbait headlines who either don't live here or don't know how to read actual publicly-available documents.
Even the folks blasting this nonsense are forced to admit that the only "cuts" in the mainline budget were to: new civilian/office hires, the final stages of returning to pre-Covid levels of office admins; and pre-guaranteed overtime per pay period (i.e. even if there are no fires keeping them past their non-OT shift). Those were the debates holding up the final agreement, and not in a yes/no debate either, they were both going to happen, it was over exactly how much was going to happen in 2025. Neither of those things were at play here.
This "controversy" was just a normal Wednesday here. LA city and county governments are writhing snakepits, and absolutely no one says anything unless it puts a knife in someone else's back. First thing Wednesday morning, when we still didn't even know how bad things were, the next slate of mayoral candidates was already all over the local news spewing this bullshit, despite 100% knowing better.
And as for the "water running out" silliness:
1) Most of the Pacific Palisades and Altadena are in/on/at the base of steep hillsides. At a certain point, there's only so much water pressure you can generate against gravity.
2) Ground-based fire fighting i.e. hoses is almost never a primary defense against large-scale brush fires. The flames get 50-100 feet high within seconds, well away from any drivable terrain, let alone roads with a source of water like a hydrant or even a pool, and are being pushed by winds that at their slowest are pushing it 50mph, with gusts up to 80mph. Show me a hose that can do anything against that, assuming you can get one out there.
3) The primary defense against Santa Ana-driven brushfires has always, for the last couple decades, been arial based: helicopters and tanker airplanes dropping immense amounts of water and fire retardant on hot spots and to set fire lines, out in the wilderness where these fires start, with the usually successful goal of stopping it before it reaches homes or businesses.
But the winds were, again, blowing at an average of around 50mph, gusts well up above 80mpg, and fire/heat induced local, randomly-switching wind gusts of up to 100mph.
No one, not even an insane pilot, wants to try flying in weather like that, not when the job description is "get within 50 feet (not yards, feet) of these hillsides", and yet, some incredibly brave pilots tried. And the water and fire retardant aerosolized and blew away. Again, 50+ mph winds.
Also, humidity was well below 20%, generally below 10% in the fire areas, especially with the strong, desert-dry winds basically recycling the entire atmosphere every few seconds. Single-digit humidity...the very air is thermodynamically ripping apart the liquids.
Also also, back to those winds: they grounded not just the helicopters and aircraft dropping water and retardant, they grounded all of the spotter helicopters and aircraft that are really the first line of defense, constantly sweeping over areas, looking for tiny sparks before they get a chance to grow, and calling in the resources to put them out. None of them could be in the air.
LAFD was left with alerts from pre-deployed ground forces, phone reports from residents, satellite heat maps, and -- no joke -- phone videos from aircraft flying way the hell above LA that were being posted to social media.
And, in many cases, by seeing the flames outside their station and realizing the last few people not already suited up and out there would have to evacuate the goddamn FIRE STATION before a FIRE STATION BURNED DOWN.
And one final note: residents, especially in the areas near hilsides with brush, spend a fortune on brush clearance and fireproofing...everything's made out of plaster and concrete...the codes to build anything new in southern California, especially near known fire areas, are absurd.
That helps a lot if a fire is creeping slowly along the ground. That's useless when the sky looks like someone turned a firehose on, only sparks and embers were what was shooting everywhere, soaking everything for hundreds of yards...some of those embers set off massive flare ups over a mile away from the main fires.
There was nothing to stop the flames from ripping down the hillsides and into the neigborhoods and business districts.
Look: a standard large house fire requires 2-3 engines to put out.
Tuesday night, let's say you were in the Palisades, north end, not 10 minutes after the fire hit the northernmost line of buildings.
20 houses are completely engulfed, every one you can see around you in all directions. 20 more have their roofs on fire, and every 45 seconds your radio is barking about a new flare up, blocks away, a tree caught an ember and is going up, raining new embers on three nearby roofs, we need 5 more engines over here STAT...tell me exactly how much additional pressure in the hoses and how many fire engines -- and trained firefighters putting their lives at risk -- would have changed the outcome.
The entire LA government is corrupt as fuck and I'd like to punch that smiling muppet mayor in her glad-handling face. And I went to school with the Resnicks' son, and he's a vastly bigger dick than his parents, which is saying something. I'm not arguing against water rights/hoarding, self-serving politics, or anything else this post is trying to hijack.
But this was a once-in-a-lifetime wind event -- insert Homer's "Worst wind event of your life *so far*" meme, thank you anthropomorphic climate change -- and not something we as a species are equipped to deal with yet.
I call myself left of progressive, and am sympathetic to the arguments you are putting forward.
But do not drape your "hmm, all the clues seem to add up to yet again support my position" antics over the smoking embers of my hometown.
