In summary
Some schools destroyed years ago in the Sonoma and Butte fires are just now reopening. The long, expensive process of rebuilding in LA may eat up much of the money voters approved in November for school repairs statewide.
It’ll be a while before Los Angeles can fully assess the damage to its schools from this recent spate of fires, but a few things already seem certain: rebuilding will take a long time, it will be expensive, and it may sap the statewide fund for school repairs.
At least a dozen schools in the Los Angeles area have been damaged in the fires, including at least five that were destroyed completely. Thousands of students and school staff have lost their homes, and countless families are grappling with major disruptions to their day-to-day lives.
“The pain of being evacuated, losing your home, or having family and friends who have been impacted. … it’s just so devastating,” said Debra Duardo, Los Angeles County Superintendent of Schools. “At so many districts in our county, the superintendent themselves has been evacuated, or 50% of the staff has been evacuated. And meanwhile they’re all trying to help their students.”
In Pacific Palisades, fires destroyed two elementary schools and extensively damaged Palisades Charter High School. Fires in Pasadena and Altadena destroyed three elementary schools. Several others in greater Los Angeles remain closed because they’re in evacuation zones or have been damaged.
Students at those schools have been reassigned to other campuses, are learning online or are waiting for conditions to improve so they can return to class.
For many students, it will be a long wait. Even with loosened regulations, rebuilding a school could take years as officials piece together a hodgepodge of funding sources: insurance money, private grants and donations, local bonds, lawsuit settlement money and state and federal funds. Some districts will have plenty of funding options, while others will struggle to find enough revenue.
In the meantime, some will have immediate expenses such as procuring portable classrooms and hiring mental health counselors to help students, staff and families cope with trauma. Large districts such as Los Angeles Unified can reallocate resources quickly, but smaller districts and charter and private schools face more obstacles.
Big demand for Prop. 2 funds
Proposition 2, the $10 billion school construction bond approved by voters in November, will be a big help for schools that need to rebuild or make costly repairs, or even buy portables.
The state allocates the money to schools with the highest need, and then on a first-come, first-served basis. There’s already a big backlog of schools that have applied for money, and it’s likely that schools gutted by fire will get priority over those with less urgent needs, said Rebekah Kalleen, a legislative advocate for the Coalition for Adequate School Housing.
That means some schools will miss out. Because California’s fund for school repairs had been empty for a while, there’s a long list of schools with critical repair needs. Throughout the state, students are attending schools with leaky roofs, lead pipes, unsafe electrical systems and broken air conditioning. Schools in low-income and rural areas are most affected, because they have less ability to raise money through local bonds.
Helio Brasil, superintendent of Keyes Union School District south of Modesto, said he has empathy for those dealing with buildings destroyed or damaged by the fires in Los Angeles, but he worries about his own district’s needs. The 1,000-student district, which primarily serves low-income students whose parents work in the nearby agricultural fields, desperately needs money to replace the 40-year-old roof, upgrade the electric wiring and make other safety improvements.
“We understand the moral imperative to support the devastated districts first, but the reality is that districts like ours cannot be left behind in the process.”
Helio Brasil, superintendent of Keyes Union School District
“There is a growing concern that Prop. 2 funds will be quickly depleted, leaving smaller districts like Keyes struggling to address our own long-term facility needs,” Brasil wrote in an email. “We understand the moral imperative to support the devastated districts first, but the reality is that districts like ours cannot be left behind in the process.”
Brasil and other superintendents are asking for the state to balance the needs of schools affected by fires with those that aren’t, and provide extra money if possible. Gov. Gavin Newsom last week promised to chip in an extra $1 million from the state’s general fund for schools damaged by fire.
‘Like a bomb had gone off’
The post-fire experience in Sonoma and Butte counties provides a preview of what lies ahead in Los Angeles. Thousands of homes and numerous schools were destroyed in a spate of fires from 2017-20, leaving residents to resurrect entire communities.
“Those first few weeks were surreal, almost primordial. It was like a bomb had gone off,” said Andrew Bailey, head of Anova Center for Education, a private school in Sonoma County that serves special education students enrolled in public schools. Anova was destroyed in the 2017 Tubbs Fire, leaving its 125 students without a campus.
There was no school at all for three weeks while staff hunted for classroom space at other locations. Eventually they brought in portables and launched an ambitious fundraising campaign to pay for a new school. Last week, the new school finally opened — more than seven years after the fire.
“It was miraculous that we were able to do this,” Bailey said. “It was incredibly hard work, but now the headwinds have dissipated and our kids now have a great new school.”
Attending school at a hardware store
In Paradise, a Butte County town which was nearly entirely destroyed in the 2018 Camp Fire, the school district is still recovering. Four school sites were destroyed and nine were extensively damaged. A big obstacle in rebuilding, school officials said, was not knowing how many students to expect. More than 80% of the town burned down, and it was unclear how many residents planned to move back. Enrollment in Paradise Unified dropped from 3,500 before the fire to 1,500 in 2019. It’s now up to 1,700.
Although the state was helpful, the paperwork and funding process took time, Superintendent Tom Taylor said. Meanwhile, students attended school any place officials could find space: other school districts, some 20 miles away; warehouses; even a hardware store. (The store was cleared of merchandise. Students ate lunch at the check-out counter.)
The district has so far spent $155 million to rebuild campuses, but needs $150 million more to fix everything that needs fixing, Taylor said. The district is hoping to break ground on Paradise Elementary School, one of the schools that was completely destroyed.
“There were a few years where all staff worked harder than we ever have. Long days, seven days a week, no time off,” Taylor said. “We’re still not done. … But our staff understands that schools are the center of a community, and we want our schools to help lead the return of the town.”
Prioritizing mental health
In some ways, Los Angeles schools will have it a bit easier than those in Sonoma and Butte. The state now has well-established disaster relief protocols, and there are plenty of experts who can advise. Because of COVID-19, most schools already have distance learning systems in place and robust social-emotional support for students.
Support for mental health – for staff as well as students – is a crucial piece of recovery, school officials in Sonoma and Butte said.
In Sonoma County, schools learned early on how to screen students for anxiety. They also created partnerships with local nonprofits and health clinics, and the County Office of Education trained teachers to lead class discussions and otherwise support students who felt traumatized by the fires.
“In situations like this, you’re never going to have enough money for one-to-one counseling for everyone who needs it,” said Mary Champion, a school psychologist with the Sonoma County Office of Education. “That’s why it’s so important to train educators, to take some of the pressure off clinicians.”
Tyson Dickinson, director of the office’s Department of Behavioral Health and Well-Being, said districts in Los Angeles should expect the recovery process — beyond the replacement of buildings — to take a long time. Sonoma County’s last major fire was in 2020, and it’s still never far from residents’ minds.
“Any time it’s windy, warm and dry, any time there’s smoke, you can see the stress building,” Dickinson said. “From August through January everyone is on edge. It’s just a different world now.”