On the night of January 7, as winds of 100 miles per hour blew across Eaton Canyon, Southern California Edison’s allegedly faulty transmission lines are believed to have sparked the fire which tore through the Pasadena and Altadena area. The fire burned down more than 9,000 structures, including homes, schools, and businesses, killing nineteen people and leaving thousands more displaced and unhoused.
On the night of the fire, I stood with my neighbors at our apartment building in Pasadena and watched the mountain burn. The air was thick with smoke; flames traveling downward looked like lava. By the next morning, we would learn that the fire had transformed the land in its path into a smoldering moonscape. In the following weeks, the scorched metal car husks piled on top of flatbed trucks looked like they had emerged from an apocalyptic wasteland. The air we breathed was toxic, filled with a mix of lead, asbestos, and other chemicals released from buildings destroyed by the fires.
Tiffany Hearsey
Day laborers with Pasadena Community Job Center clean the inside of an Altadena home that sustained fire damage.
My neighbors and I were lucky. The evacuation warning we received never reached the status of mandatory. While we had only accumulated some smoke and ash in our apartments, the homes of others in the community were now awash in toxic ash and smoke damage—or burned down altogether.
The grief in the community was heavy. Countless people were shell-shocked. But in the days following the fire, a wellspring of hope and resilience emerged. Many volunteers came from near and far to help rebuild, providing comfort and support to those who suffered insurmountable loss.
Tiffany Hearsey
An ‘Altadena Not For Sale’ sign is placed at the ruins of a burned-down house.
As community groups and grassroots organizations quickly sprang up, I began volunteering and documenting acts of kindness and solidarity amid the destruction. Workers from a day-laborer organization called the Pasadena Community Job Center, many of whom are migrants, wore bright orange shirts that read “Solo El Pueblo Salva Al Pueblo” (Only the People Save the People). The job center became a community hub for fire-relief-aid distribution, serving thousands of impacted residents. Joining the job center’s Fire Brigade unit, we removed leaves, branches, tree trunks, and other flammable debris from city streets. The day laborers provided support to the community despite a climate of fear as Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) conducted raids in the weeks following the fire. Migrant worker César Saucedo, a day laborer and Fire Brigade leader said, “We know we are here to rebuild this community.”
A week after the fire, the clear blue sky above us looked like a mirage as leveled homes still smoldered. Rebuilding the community after such a devastating loss will take years. Fears of gentrification loom large in the community of Altadena, where 50 percent of lots were sold off to corporate developers from February 11 to April 30, threatening to erase the city’s working-class and middle-class residents, as well as a thriving Black community that has historically had high rates of home ownership. Renters living in homes that survived the fire have also been impacted. Many came together recently and sued Los Angeles County and the city of Pasadena for failing to require landlords to provide proper cleanup for homes covered in toxic ash. Some renters have also started organizing tenants’ unions.
Altadena resident Brenda Lopez rents an apartment that is now surrounded by lots covered in scattered remains of fire-scarred trees, buildings, and automobiles. She says that though her building at 403 Figueroa Drive also sustained fire damage, it was not adequately cleaned or repaired in the first few months after the fire.
“This is not a nightmare that ended one night,” says Lopez. “This is a nightmare that continues every single day for us.”
Tiffany Hearsey
403 Figueroa Drive tenants were joined by community groups in March to protest unsafe living conditions at their fire-damaged apartment building.
Lopez and her fellow tenants at 403 Figueroa formed a tenants’ union called La Asociación De Inquilinos Unidos 403. They’ve partnered with Pasadena Community Job Center—which cleaned some of the tenants’ apartments—along with the National Day Laborer Organizing Network and other community groups to demand accountability. They’ve also formed a united front with elders at the Mirador, an affordable supportive housing complex for people fifty-five years and older. Residents at the Mirador, which sits directly across the street from 403 Figueroa, have alleged inadequate cleanup and a severe lack of safety measures. In April, they formed a tenants’ union, El Mirador Alliance, calling on the building’s property management company to pay for immediate remediation of their homes. The management companies for both properties have denied the allegations.
“We are asking for treatment that befits the elderly—befits a human being,” said Mirador resident Julie Esnard at a rally in front of the senior living building.
Tiffany Hearsey
Brenda Lopez of 403 Figueroa Drive (left) joins speaker Julie Esnard (center), a resident at the Mirador senior living apartment building, at a rally in May calling for adequate fire cleanup and safety measures.
Many community members who lost homes or businesses have been supporting their neighbors by providing meals and bringing forth music and art that soothes and heals. Soon after Guillermo Lima, chef and owner of Big Grandma’s Kitchen, lost his home in the fire, he began feeding his community. I volunteered with Big Grandma’s Kitchen at the World Central Kitchen site in Altadena, hurriedly boxing meals to try to keep up with the hundreds in line waiting to receive food. With the help of volunteers, Lima and his cook made hundreds of pupusas, fried plantains, and other dishes.
Tiffany Hearsey
Chef and Big Grandma’s Kitchen owner Guillermo Lima prepares pupusas in his food truck to feed residents impacted by the fire.
The community organizing and caretaking that has occurred in the wake of the fire has had impacts beyond meeting people’s immediate needs. After Altadena-based retail hub Rhythms of the Village burned down with its collection of irreplaceable African art, clothing, musical instruments, and cultural relics inside, Emeka Chukwurah—who co-founded the business with his father Onochie, a former bass player for Fela Kuti—says the grief of losing his store was eclipsed by the devastation of his community.
“The day I drove around my community, and I saw it unattended to,” Chukwurah says, “it was like a point of no return, and I drove round and around, and my eyes couldn’t really understand what I was seeing even though I was seeing it in real time.”
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Tiffany Hearsey
Emeka Chukwurah and his father Onochie Chukwurah perform on stage during the Village Spring Festival in Altadena, California.
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Tiffany Hearsey
Artist Shelley Bruce paints a picture during the Village Spring Festival.
In May, the Chukwurahs hosted a festival focused on healing, joy, and unity, featuring a variety of artists, music, and workshops. “We’re in the business of really keeping our community together and just showing how to live as one,” Chukwurah says.
Chukwurah recalls what his father said about the fire’s devastation bringing the community together to rebuild: “Now we have the youth and children seeing us work together like we’ve never worked together before.”