Rebuild:LA
When the firestorms of January 2025 raged through the Pacific Palisades and Altadena, they left nearly 30 people dead and historic destruction in their wake. Recovery will be a long, uphill road and rebuilding will take years and dedicated planning. This podcast takes a deep dive into the circumstances that led to the fires, how people can prepare for future wildfires - which are inevitable - and how Angeleños can come together to rebuild our beautiful city.
Rebuild:LA is the proud winner of the 2025 Award of Excellence from the Communicator Awards!
Episodes
31 episodes
Rebuild:LA Episode 031 - Scenes from MySafe:LA’s Wildfire Fair
MySafe:LA's Wildfire Fair took place this past Sunday at the Autry Museum of the American West in Los Angeles. Our non-profit organized the event to help residents have a one-stop solution to finding wildfire information and products. The fair ...
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Season 2
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Episode 31
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18:01
Rebuild:LA Episode 030 - A Fire Retardant You Could Drink with M-Fire’s Silvio Lanzas
Our guest this week is Silvio Lanzas, the former Fire Chief for the City of Glendale, and the current Chief Operating Officer for the fire retardant manufacturer M-Fire. The company produces and applies a product called AF31 that is water-based...
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Season 2
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Episode 30
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39:35
Episode 029: UPDATED! Rebuild:LA - Delay, Deny, Discourage, and Underpay with Joy Chen of the Eaton Fire Survivors' Network
Five months after the Eaton Fire came charging out of the wildland and destroyed much of the historic city of Altadena, there are still hundreds of families who haven’t been able to return home or start the long process of recovering. This week...
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Season 2
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Episode 29
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42:54
Rebuild:LA Episode 028 - Saving Whole Neighborhoods from Wildfire with Fire Aside's Jason Brooks
In this week’s Episode host Cameron Barrett interviews software developer Jason Brooks who took his experience surviving the Tubbs Fire that destroyed Santa Rose in 2017, as inspiration to design an app that has helped more than a million peopl...
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Season 2
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Episode 28
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39:22
Rebuild:LA Episode 027 - The Hard Truth About Zone Zero with Dr. Travis Longcore
In 2020 California passed AB 3074, which established Zone Zero - an ember-resistant zone within five feet of homes in High and Very High Fire Severity Zones (HFHSZ and VHFHSZ). The law was never implemented because the State Board of Forestry a...
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Season 2
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Episode 27
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49:41
Episode 026: Rebuild:LA - Rebuilding Our City in a Changing Climate with Probable Futures Founder Spencer Glendon, Part II
This week’s guest is a thought leader and non-profit founder Spencer Glendon, who we met last week in part one of our discussion on how climate change is making our lives riskier, and forcing us to rethink where and how we live. The Palisades a...
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Season 2
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Episode 26
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29:47
Episode 025: Rebuild:LA - Rebuilding Our City in a Changing Climate with Probable Futures Founder Spencer Glendon, Part I
This week’s guest is a thought leader taking on the daunting task of teaching people about climate change and how best to adapt to it. Spencer Glendon is the founder of Probable Futures, a non-profit that is helping businesses and communities u...
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Season 2
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Episode 25
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32:59
Rebuild:LA Episode 024 - Saving Homes from Wildfire One Assessment at a Time with MySafe:LA’s Dante Cornejo
Dante Cornejo is MySafe:LA’s wildfire coordinator for Los Angeles County and is host Cameron Barrett’s guest this week. Dante has done assessments on hundreds of homes as part of his work, evaluating the wildfire risk of residences all over the...
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Season 2
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Episode 24
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43:40
Rebuild:LA Episode 023 - Rebuilding Community One Park at a Time with LA Rec and Parks' Brenda Aguirre
When the Palisades Fire ripped through Los Angeles, the Department of Recreation and Parks got to work on myriad fronts. Park Rangers, who are actually trained in wildland firefighting, battled dozens of smaller spot fires in parks all over the...
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Season 2
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Episode 23
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42:41
Rebuild:LA Episode 022 - Post-Traumatic Growth with Dr. Veronica Viesca
Months after the Palisades and Eaton Fires swept through Los Angeles County, many people are still struggling emotionally. So much so, that California Assemblymember John Harabedian has introduced legislation that would require insurance compan...
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Season 2
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Episode 22
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30:57
Rebuild:LA Episode 021 - We Were At The Limit of Our Aircraft with Pascal Duclos
For 30 years, the aerial firefighters of Quebec have had an agreement with California. When we call for help, they come. Pascal Duclos is the Chief Pilot of an elite firefighting force called the Quebec Scoopers. They fly a unique aircraft, the...
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Season 2
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Episode 21
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31:51
Rebuild:LA Episode 020 - I Knew My Home and My Town Were in Danger with Survivor Jon Brown - Part II
The second half of our conversation with Jon Brown brings him out of the ashes of the Palisades Fire, and right into a property fight with the owners of the mobile home park where he lived with his wife and two young kids. The Palisades Bowl wa...
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Season 1
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Episode 20
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36:44
Rebuild:LA Episode 019 - I Knew My Home and My Town Were in Danger with Survivor Jon Brown - Part I
Jon Brown is one of the 400 residents of the Pacific Palisades Bowl Mobile Home Park that no longer has a neighborhood to go home to. All 170+ homes are gone, flattened by the Palisades Fire. Jon joins host Cameron Barrett for a two-part conver...
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Season 1
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Episode 19
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33:38
Rebuild:LA Episode 018 - The Recovery Bible with Author Sean Scott
Cameron Barrett’s guest this episode of Sean Scott, a contractor by trade, and the author of a book you want to get on your shelf as soon as possible. The Red Guide to Recovery is a spiral bound Bible for homeowner who is navigating a ...
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Season 1
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Episode 18
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39:59
Rebuild:AL Episode 017 - Like Driving Through a Volcano with Jessica Fernandez and Pastor Anthony McFarland
So much has been written and said about the Palisades Fire, that it sometimes is confounding how the “other” fire that burned through a community in LA County in early January, goes unmentioned. The Eaton Fire started within hours of the Palisa...
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Season 1
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Episode 17
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51:07
RebuildLA Episode 016 - Can a Beacon Box Save Your Neighborhood From Wildfire with Jim Kniss
Jim Kniss makes his living flying over wildfires, making GIS and infrared maps for firefighters. It's all pretty cutting edge technology. But what he's most passionate about is a little more old school. He's working to get Beacon Boxes into rur...
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Season 1
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Episode 16
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34:40
Rebuild:LA Episode 015 - Where the Next Destructive Wildfire Will Be with NASA’s Dr. Chris Potter
Dr. Chris Potter calls it VERM, or vegetation ember index. He’s an earth scientist at NASA’s Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley, and he’s developed a new mapping product that shows VERM areas. And VERM areas are those places most vulnerable...
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Season 1
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Episode 15
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39:27
RebuildLA Episode 014 - Disasters Are Going to Keep Happening with Bright Harbor's Joel Wish
Monday, March 31, 2025 (an extended date) is an important deadline if you’ve been effected by the Eaton or Palisades fires. That’s when you have to register for FEMA benefits if you’ve had losses. It’s also the deadline to register for SBA loan...
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Season 1
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Episode 14
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45:37
Rebuild:LA Episode 013 - The City Failed Us with Survivor Sue Pascoe
Sue Pascoe, her husband, and their two dogs evacuated the Palisades Fire on January 7, 2025 with a couple of overnight bags and the dogs' food bowls. They'd evacuated plenty of times before. This would be like the last few times. They'd be back...
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Season 1
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Episode 13
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47:07
Rebuild:LA Episode 012 - Build Back Better with Alexis Rivas of Cover
Nearly two months after wildfires swept through the communities of Pacific Palisades and Altadena, the dust and ash have settled. People are now taking stock of what they have and whether they’ll be able to rebuild. Can they afford what they on...
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Season 1
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Episode 12
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48:45
Rebuild:LA Episode 011 - Can We Out-Think Wildfires with the NFPA's Michele Steinberg
The National Fire Protection Association has been creating fire code in American since the late 1800's. We have the NFPA to thank for fire sprinklers in apartment buildings and fire doors in high rise buildings. In the 1980's, the NFPA realized...
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Season 1
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Episode 11
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46:41
Rebuild:LA Episode 010 - Are The Kids Alright with Chloe Canton
5,000 Los Angeles school children were affected by the Palisades and Eaton Fires. That's a lot of kids who either lost their homes, or their schools, or both. Cameron Barrett asks licensed children and family therapist Chloe Canton to help expl...
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Season 1
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Episode 10
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33:43
Rebuild:LA Episode 009 - A Particularly Dangerous Situation with Rich Thompson from the NWS
Rich Thompson is an incident meteorologist (IMET) with the National Weather Service, which means he predicts weather during disasters to help first responders during the active phase of an incident. He was on the ground during the Palisades Fir...
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Season 1
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Episode 9
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34:17
Rebuild:LA Episode 008 - Rebuilding LA for All of LA with Councilmember John Lee
Councilmember John Lee of Los Angeles' CD #12 sits down with Cameron Barrett to talk about his district's recovery efforts in the wake of the January fires, how he plans on managing the independent investigation into the Palisades Fire as the h...
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Season 1
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Episode 8
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26:15
Rebuild:LA Episode 007 - The Ripple Effects of the Fires with Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez
Eunisses Hernandez is the Councilmember representing District #1 in the City of Los Angeles. Her constituents live miles from both the Palisades and the Eaton Fires. No one in Council District #1 lost a home to fire. But many have lost jobs, em...
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Season 1
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Episode 7
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25:36