The burned buildings have been cleared from Palisades Elementary, now input from parents is needed for the next steps of rebuilding.
SCHOOLS:
Los Angeles Unified School District will hold a Palisades Community at Large Town Hall at 6 p.m. on Wednesday, April 23 via Zoom. District representatives will provide the latest updates on rebuilding efforts and share resources.
The school district plans to continue to gather input and recommendations for the charter schools (Palisades Elementary, Marquez Elementary and Palisades High School).
Participants will be able to ask questions and offer comments in the Zoom’s Q&A feature.
The Zoom link is https://lausd.zoom.us/j/86418598418 and the meeting id is 864 1859 8418.
PACIFIC PALISADES COMMUNITY COUNCIL:
The Pacific Palisades Community Council will meet at 6 p.m. via Zoom on Thursday, April 24. (The link can be found at https://pacpalicc.org) An outreach analyst of the California Department of Insurance Rob Obedoza will discuss insurance issues impacting Palisadians after the fire. Residents are urged to bring questions related to insurance.
DWP will present plans for this scattergood steam plant by LAX.
Also on the agenda is the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power who will provide information about a “scattergood” generating station modernization plan of the electricity- generating plant near El Segundo and LAX. In February 2023, the LA city council unanimously approved an $800 million plan to convert the plant from natural gas to hydrogen. The refitted plant will provide base load during periods of high demand or emergencies as part of city plans to run on 100% renewable energy by 2035.
Residents would also like to hear about more about underground plans for electricity. Where is the DWP with its plans? In a webinar, Rick Caruso said that Parsons had developed plans and would share them with DPW.
The Board will also consider hiring NORC at the University of Chicago, to measure Pacific Palisades residents’ preferences and priorities for recovery & rebuilding. To view the proposal: https://pacpalicc.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/pdfhandler.ashx_.pdf There was no mention of the cost of a survey.
Hopefully there will also be some answers from Hagerty Consulting regarding the questions posed at the last Community Council meeting.
As for undergrounding power lines, Caruso said the cost was estimated at around one billion dollars. Where in the world does anybody think that money is coming from? . Even financed over thirty years, it’s not an insignificant amount per parcel. And the estimate doesn’t include the cost of undergrounding lines for Frontier, Spectrum, AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon. Nor does it likely include the cost of individual hookups. Further complicating funding is that the DWP may face substantial costs if the issue of two empty reservoirs is found to be a factor in the town burning for three days.