“Human-caused climate change made the Los Angeles-area fires more likely and more destructive, according to a study”
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“The study — from an international group of 32 climate researchers — shows how climate change fits into the myriad factors that made the multiple blazes one of California’s most destructive and expensive wildfire disasters on record.”
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“The scientists found that low rainfall from October through December is now more than twice as likely compared to the climate that existed before humans began burning fossil fuels such as oil, coal and gas for energy.”
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“the LA fire season is becoming longer, with “highly flammable drought conditions” lasting about 23 more days now than during the preindustrial era.”
https://www.axios.com/2025/01/28/la-fires-cause-climate-change-more-likely
The left needs to be focused on competence in government not identity-based social causes, and the right needs to recognize that competent government requires funding and taxes and leaders who care about the organization’s mission and whose main qualification isn’t loyalty to a politician.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1MB7hx1vc_I
“In some contexts, those policies do make the damage done by wildfires worse. They’ll certainly complicate Los Angeles’ recovery efforts.
But the connection between bad land use, insurance, and environmental regulations and the damage done by the current Los Angeles fires to people and property is more tenuous.
On closer inspection, this appears to be a severe natural disaster with natural causes. Bad public policy has played only a marginal role.”
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“there’s also only so much fuels reduction can do to reduce wildfire risk in the conditions that led to Los Angeles’ current fires: exceptionally strong seasonal Santa Ana winds that reached hurricane levels of intensity.
“If you have strong winds, embers fly away miles ahead of the fire,” says Carmignani. Clearing a few hundred yards here or there can provide firefighters with areas to operate. But it isn’t going to stop the fire from spreading to new areas when winds are that high.
If the four-lane Pacific Coast Highway wasn’t enough of a fire break to prevent beachside Malibu homes from burning down, one wonders what would be.”
https://reason.com/2025/01/14/the-l-a-fires-are-a-natural-disaster-not-a-policy-disaster/
Pistachio Wars With Iran, Slave Labor, and Wildfires: the Absurd American Dystopia of 2025
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qTn_tE_fF8c
“the Los Angeles Times published an excellent editorial on Los Angeles County’s continued and outrageous mistreatment of the city’s “iconic” street-food vendors.
The editorial centers on the county’s failure to implement California’s Safe Sidewalk Vending Act. The much-touted, statewide law, which I touched on after then-Gov. Jerry Brown signed it into law in September 2018, was supposed to decriminalize and legalize street vending for the estimated 10,000 underground food vendors in Los Angeles County—and others across the state. As the Times editors detail, that hasn’t happened in Los Angeles.
“Street vending may be legal in California, but for the vendors selling sliced fruit, tacos and other food items it’s nearly impossible to get a permit to operate without fear of penalty, particularly in Los Angeles County,” reads the lede. They blame “state and county public health regulations for selling food from a street cart [that] remain so complicated, impractical and expensive that the vast majority of vendors have not—and cannot—get permitted.”
Hence, years after the law was passed, L.A. County has only issued permits to around two-percent of the underground vendors who sell there. One of the most onerous requirements to obtain a permit, the Times explains, is the rule that vendors must spend thousands of dollars to buy a needlessly fancy food cart that features “four sink compartments, multiple water tanks for washing cookware and hands, and mechanical exhaust ventilation… which is just not practical for vendors who earn $15,000 a year, on average.””
“What the city is actually doing is outsourcing responsibility for getting people vaccinated to private local businesses. Fines for failure to comply with the law fall not on the unvaccinated people attempting to get into restaurants and movie theaters, but on the businesses that fail to catch them. Fines start at $1,000 (beginning with the second violation) and can reach as high as $5,000 per citation.”
“Five years after Los Angeles voters approved a $1.2 billion bond measure and a countywide sales tax hike to raise another estimated $355 million annually to solve its homelessness problem, there are more people living and dying on the streets than ever before.
Many of these men and women are both frequent targets and perpetrators of violence.
Mayor Eric Garcetti (D), who did not respond to our interview request, has partially blamed this failure on the pandemic, which slowed new housing construction and limited shelter capacity. It’s true that COVID caused a surge in homelessness, but the city’s plan was already failing.”
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“The centerpiece of L.A.’s plan was to spend the $1.2 billion raised through Proposition HHH to build 10,000 supportive housing units over a decade. Even if the government were able to pull that off, it would merely put a dent in the problem in a city where more than 30,000 people are living on the streets and sidewalks according to the 2020 homelessness count.
Five years into the 10-year plan, just 14 projects are in service. Of the promised 10,000 supportive housing units, the city has completed fewer than 700.
It would take more than 30 years to house all of the people currently homeless in L.A. county at that pace, according to a federal court order.”
“Los Angeles politicians’ plan to preserve affordable housing might just end developers’ incentive to ever build more of the stuff in the city.
Last week, the Los Angeles City Council passed a resolution directing city agencies to explore options for freezing rents at privately owned buildings with expiring affordability covenants. These covenants require building owners to keep their rents at below-market rates for a specified period of time, typically 30 to 55 years, in exchange for various government subsidies—including tax credits, low-interest loans, and relief from zoning restrictions.
Covenants covering thousands of these units are set to expire within the next few years, allowing landlords to raise rents to market rate. Lower-income tenants benefiting from affordability restrictions could be faced with unaffordable rent increases.”
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“A rent freeze would be a pretty radical move, particularly when compared to other policies people have floated to preserve affordability covenants. That California Housing Partnership report recommended more subsidies and tax credits to preserve affordable units.
HCIDLA has proposed forgiving building owners’ debt they owe the city in exchange for extending affordability covenants, or, in the case of debt-free buildings, subsidizing owners for forgoing market-rate rents.
All those ideas involve compensating property owners for voluntarily keeping their rents low. Cedillo’s proposal would require them to eat the entire cost of maintaining below-market-rate rents.
That would be a huge disincentive for anyone to ever participate in future affordable housing programs, says Dan Yukelson, executive director of the Apartment Association of Greater Los Angeles.”