Both the state Assembly and Senate are expected to vote Thursday, Jan. 23, on an approximately $2.5 billion aid package as initial funding to jumpstart recovery efforts related to the Southern California wildfires.
Two wildfire-related bills, included as part of the legislature’s special session, were introduced on Monday, a week after Gov. Gavin Newsom proposed immediate funding to help Los Angeles County fire victims. The funding would help pay for services ranging from shelters for those who have lost their homes and debris removal to expediting the rebuilding of residential homes and damaged schools.
This initial $2.5 billion, if approved, would expedite recovery efforts. However, legislators have made it clear that more funding and other actions will be needed in the future.
“Given the scale of the devastation, it will be a massive undertaking to rebuild these communities. So today, we are acting with urgency to deliver emergency aid, but this is only the first of many actions that will be required,” Assembly Budget Chair Jesse Gabriel, D-Encino, said during a hearing Wednesday.
The first bill, ABX1-4/SBX1-4, would provide up to $1.5 billion to fund fire response and recovery. The money could help pay for expenses such as evacuating and sheltering displaced individuals; removing household hazardous wastes; remediating post-fire hazards such as flooding and debris flow; conducting air quality, water or other environmental tests; and expediting recovery.
The second bill, ABX1-5/SBX1-3, would appropriate money for the following:
• $4 million for the county of Los Angeles, as well as the cities of L.A., Malibu, Pasadena and other local governments, if needed, to expedite the rebuilding of residential homes by providing additional resources to speed up the planning review and building process.
• $1 million to assist the Los Angeles and Pasadena school districts, as well as charter schools within those districts, to rebuild and recover damaged facilities.
• Up to $1 billion for other disaster-related responses.
Legislators intend to seek reimbursement from the federal government for at least some of the funding.
Senate Budget Chair Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, who introduced the two special session wildfire bills along with Gabriel, said during a Wednesday hearing in the upper chamber that in the coming weeks, the legislature will work with the governor’s office “as additional needs emerge and will continue to invest in making our state more resilient in the face of our changing climate.”
In proposing additional aid for fire victims last week, Newsom expanded the ongoing special legislative session, which had already been called, to include discussions about wildfire-related funding. The special session, running concurrently with the regular session, was initially meant to discuss “Trump-proofing” California against potential actions by new President Donald Trump.
Democratic legislative leaders also recently unveiled a $50 million state funding proposal to address the Trump portion of the special session: $25 million to legal aid services that support immigrants facing deportation and other risks, plus another $25 million to the California Department of Justice to pay for potential state lawsuits against the Trump administration.
There were initial concerns from Republicans about linking disaster aid to other bills that would challenge the new president’s administration, but Newsom clarified that he did not intend for the two issues to be tied together.
And since the wildfire aid bills aren’t locked with the “Trump-proofing” measures, Chris Micheli, a veteran lobbyist in Sacramento who also teaches at McGeorge School of Law at the University of the Pacific, doesn’t expect strong resistance from legislators on either side of the aisle to the wildfire-related funding.
“Wildfire recovery is a bipartisan issue,” said Micheli. “I don’t anticipate that there is opposition to spending money to help people rebuild their lives.”
On Wednesday, Republican Assemblymember Heath Flora of Lodi, who has served as a volunteer firefighter, said wildfires are an issue many in the legislature have talked about for years and that he was encouraged by the conversations now taking place.
“I’m encouraged by the bipartisanship. … Right now, more than ever, we have an elected body that understands what we’re talking about and what we need to deal with as a state,” Flora said.
But there are still concerns that disaster aid for California has become a political issue at the federal level, where Trump and some Republican members of Congress have suggested that such aid should come with conditions.
Newsom, who often spars with Trump, has urged the president not to politicize disaster relief. He and other elected officials representing the L.A. area have invited Trump to Southern California to visit areas that have burned.
The president, who has criticized the state’s policies on forest management and water supplies, is expected to travel to Southern California on Friday.
The wildfires that have swept through the Palisades, Altadena and other parts of L.A. County have so far destroyed or damaged over 17,000 structures, according to estimates from Cal Fire and the Angeles National Forest. At least 28 people have died from the fires.