Thousands of homes were destroyed in the Palisades Fire. Fees should be waived for those who are rebuilding because of reasons beyond their control.
Palisades residents think building /permit fees have been waived for Palisades Fire rebuilding. NO, they are just suspended until the L.A. City Council approves Mayor Karen Bass’ Executive Order No. 7 to waive fees.
To go to the City Council, first it had to pass the Ad Hoc Committee on L.A. Recovery, which it did on June 23. It also has to pass the Budget and Finance Committee, but has not yet been scheduled.
After going through both committees, it goes before the full council. The City Council will be in recess from July 2 through July 29, making it unlikely anything will happen with the waiver before August.
Bass’ April 25 order read “City departments shall continue to process building permits associated with the repair or reconstruction of single-family structures and duplexes damaged or destroyed as a result of the January 2025 Wildfires and suspend the collection of the fees associated with those permits while Council considers the adoption of an ordinance waiving the fees. Waiver of the payment of suspended fees is contingent upon adoption of a fee waiver ordinance.”
Yesterday, June 23, the Ad Hoc Committee for LA Recovery voted 3-0 to advance the proposed ordinance, with Councilmembers Traci Park, Hugo Soto-Martínez, and Tim McOsker voting in favor. Councilmembers Monica Rodriguez and Adrin Nazarian were absent from the vote.
The three members heard a report from the City Administrator office that if fees were waived, the city would lose $86 million. When the Administrator was questioned if the ordinance included all fire rebuilds. Yes. But the estimate only considered waiving permit fees for like-for-like construction.
He was asked if the loan and (percentage 3.3%) were included in the $86 million the city would have to take. It was not.
The committee was told the fee waiver order, if approved, would “sunset” on January 7, 2027.
Traci Park asked, “Do you have to break ground or complete construction by then?”
Tim McOsker verified a person would have to have a complete application ready for the issuance of a permit by that date and that the free waiver was only for people who owned the property (not developers).
Hugo Soto-Martinez admitted that “building is not my level of expertise. What fees are included?”
He was told there are school fees, linkage, energy surcharge, building plan, disability, green building fee, city planning surcharge, management surcharge . . .
“It seems there are well over 10 fees,” he said. “Are they all in one department?”
No, there are City fees outside of Building and Safety, such as public works, and that there are at least 10 different department fees, none of which were included in the $86 million. Basically, the cost to waive fees could be much higher.
“Does insurance cover those fees?” Soto-Martinez asked. “There might be a possibility of [homeowner] insurance paying all, some or none of the fees.”
He wondered if the City could recover insurance money in the future, but was told an analysis of insurance had not been done. Hewas told “people are required to sign a waiver that if they get insurance they will give it to the city.”
“Have we waived fees for other fires?” Soto-Martinez asked.
Yes, for the Northridge and La Tuna/Creek Fires, but was told that FEMA paid the building fees. For the Palisades Fire, FEMA is not reimbursing the cost of the fees/waivers.
“I know we have fiscal concerns,” Park said. “But the last thing we should be doing is charging households to rebuild their homes when they lost their homes for reasons beyond their control.”
The three voted to adopt the ordinance, which is also in the budget committee, but added they’d like the following information:
- An analysis of the cost to the City if the City waives all fees, not just for like-to-like rebuilds.
- For the City Administrative Officer to look at the possibility of insurance picking up some costs as well as looking for other sources of money.
- A list of homes that are either under insured or not insured and of those, the number of households that fall into low or moderate area median income
- For the Dept. of Building and Safety to report back with the number of households every six months who had received a permit.
To listen to the ad hoc committee meeting go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xuFqjnxUkFw
(Editor’s note: As a cost comparison, the week-long riots cost the city an estimated $30 million. City Council today just allocated $17 million more for police overtime for July for possible unrest.)
Like so many aspects of our representatives’ responses, they hope we will not look too closely. Thank you for keeping us up to date.
Many of my fellow grounders are under the impression building permit fees have been waived not just collection suspended. It would be great to know all the fees associated with a rebuild as we, like our representatives, have no idea of how many different fees have been piled on to the building entitlement process. From the consumer side, many are under the illusion that our government is transparent. It appears the City of LA learned from budget airlines that putting on fees for previously ‘free services’ is a huge revenue generator that does not carry the same burden as a tax when in fact these ‘fees’ are taxes.
This bureaucracy is irreparably bloated, living off our hard earned money siphoned off in the form of taxes, fees, and penalties. Here the City of LA is quibbling over 10s of millions after spending billions on homeless people who don’t pay into the system. Talk about the ticks of society!
Given that FireAid collected $100 million, putting some of that money into paying for rebuilding is a direct way for the funds to be targeted to people directly impacted by the total failure of our fire and disaster infrastructure we were told was ‘bravely on the job” and risking “life and limb to save us”. PFFT Let’s be thankful we don’t depend upon them in crisis! Oh yeah, they suck at their jobs while thinking they are exceptional.
So where is the accountability? Where is the after action reporting?
To put the “$86 million loss” in perspective, the cost to the city to process the permits is the cost of the building and other departments staff. If the staff gets the job done during their 9 to 5 schedule without overtime, there is no incremental cost. They are being paid either way.
If “self certification” and the AI application designed to do an architectural review (archistar.ai) that Caruso is promoting are effective, the building and other departments will learn to operate more efficiently which is an unanticipated benefit going forward.
Attempts to capture the permit fees from insurance companies is equally wrong. If this money is taken from the ‘dwelling’ allocation, it isn’t available to put into the rebuild and since we are all underinsured, it effectively becomes an out of pocket to the homeowner.
The city is forfeiting an $86 million “equivalent value” which shouldn’t be hard to do. Only greed and desperation would prompt our elected officials to charge the fire victims.
Important to note that the city would not lose $86 million. They have already received these fees when we paid for them the first time when we initially built or remodeled our homes. None of us chose this! They would be not losing 86 million. They would be gaining an additional 86 million from our devastating and life changing loss from the fire. Shame on them.
I don’t need to research the past positions of Hugo Soto-Martinez to know that he’s an advocate of rent control and is blaming a housing shortage for the homeless problem in LA. And yet he has absolutely no idea what the costs to get a permit in LA are let alone the cost of construction and other soft costs. It’s just developers “greed” that is the problem. Not the outrageous position of the City to collect fees at every opportunity. How do they not already know we’re all under insured and as a result insurance is not picking up the fees?
Dear Sue, I am a 45-year resident of PacPal with a burned down house that serves a 3-generational family. I am so confused by whether or not to file for suits regarding the fire. The family especially the grandchildren are so traumatized by what happened.
Should I join a suit? Some sue dWP, some sue the state? I heard that if I received an SBA loan, I could lose if if I sue bec. All are govt funds. I’d like to recover some funds for the kids but can’t lose my loan. What to do? Who to ask? Is there someone on top of the issues I could ask?
Thanks, Gayle
Gayle,
Contact a lawyer now (I have a story on the website with several names). Ask them those questions. Most of the lawsuits have deadlines, some have stopped taking clients. You could join one than always drop out.
Sue
@Jim Conlon raises valid concerns about the $86 million allocated to departments for permit processing. I believe any payments of fees should be contingent on demonstrated improvements in departmental policies and workflows.
Having worked in Los Angeles’ design and construction industry for years, I’ve seen firsthand the inefficiencies of the current system, which involves multiple departments, applications, internal handoffs, hearings, and inspections. A recent departmental presentation revealed that a single project requires 17 internal support groups and 22 interdepartmental handoffs, leading to a 60-week approval timeline, with only three weeks of actual processing time. Streamlining this convoluted process should be a prerequisite for any payment on fire rebuild fees.
Without reform, inefficiencies will worsen, and lead times will grow. Pre-fire backlogs were already unacceptable, and departments are unprepared to handle the additional demands of metro improvements, the 2035 carbon-free goal, LAWA upgrades, port enhancements, and the Olympics. These agencies are not scaling to manage their existing workload, let alone the increased demands.
To address this, I think the only viable option is an independent third-party entity to oversee fire rebuild permitting. The city is already overwhelmed and lacks the capacity to handle these critical projects efficiently.