April 21, 2025 • 26 mins
Lesson: The Fire Is Over, The Fight Isn’t.
Not every home in Altadena burned to the ground—but that doesn’t mean every family made it home. In Episode 5, we meet Stacie Bolden, whose house survived the Eaton Fire—but remains unlivable. Months later, she’s still locked in a cycle of red tape, adjusting to a new way of life she never saw coming.
We also hear from nationally renowned Civil Rights Attorney Lee Merritt, who grew up nearby in Pasadena. He shares his personal connection to the fire, what community organizing looks like in a time of crisis, and why rebuilding goes far beyond bricks and permits.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
We started this journey by tracing the roots of Altadena,
one of California's first black, middle class neighborhoods. Then we
examined how red lighting shaped its borders trying to keep
black families out. We uncovered the painful truth about evacuation
delays and the lives loss while residents waited for a
warning that came too late, And most recently, we stepped
(00:23):
back to see the broader picture, connecting out to Dina's experience,
to Black Wall Street, to post Katrina, New Orleans, and
to the long history of what happens when disaster meets
systemic neglect. In this episode, we'll focus on what happens
next when the smoke clears, when the headlines fade, when
the systems designed to protect you don't. For decades, insurance
(00:47):
discrimination has quietly shaped the recovery of black neighborhoods, denying claims,
underpaying families, and forcing communities to fight for the help
they've already paid for. The fire may be out, but
for some families in Altadena, the real battle has only
just begun. Across the community, survivors are facing a second
(01:08):
crisis in the weeks after the Eaten Fire, While families
were still picking through the ashes. California's largest home insurer,
State Farm, filed a twenty two percent emergency rate hike.
They said it was needed to offset the rising cost
of the fires. Then, following public outcry, they lowered their
(01:29):
ask to seventeen percent, But for families still displaced, still
waiting for help, the timing felt like a gut punch.
While some policy holders say they've gotten support, many others
described delays, denials, and low ball offers that don't come
close to the cost of rebuilding. And as State Farm
(01:49):
pushes forward with its rate increase, residents are left asking
how can the same company asking for more still be
doing less. The hike was approved on a provisional base,
is pending a judge's final sign off, but for many,
the damage is already done.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
Because it's not.
Speaker 1 (02:06):
Just about higher premiums, it's about trust, and for those
stuck in limbo waiting for answers, that trust feels broken.
We've heard the stories of homes turned to ash, of
families who lost everything in an instant, But what about
the families whose homes didn't burn. That's where Stacy Bolden's
story begins. Stacy lives on the east side of Altadena,
(02:28):
where evacuation orders came early around seven thirty pm. Her
house didn't burn, and from the outside it may look untouched,
but in the inside, it's a different story. Her home
is not safe, and Stacy hasn't lived there since the fire.
She's been displaced now for more than one hundred days,
her son living elsewhere, her routine, her stability, her sense
(02:51):
of home all gone, and for a long time, because
her house was still standing, Stacy didn't even consider herself
a victim.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
But loss doesn't always look like rubble.
Speaker 1 (03:03):
Sometimes it looks like silence, like separation, and a life
that no longer feels like your own. Stacy is living
proof that just because your home did not burn doesn't
mean the fire didn't change everything.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
I Memi Brown, and in this.
Speaker 1 (03:20):
Series you'll hear stories told firsthand by the people who
live them. These are their stories, their memories, and their truths.
This is to out ta Dina with love, Meet Stacy Bolden.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
When I evacuated January seventh, it never occurred to me
that I would not be back in the house in April.
I truly thought I'll be back tomorrow. We'll be back tomorrow.
(03:59):
Because I never it never occurred to me that I
would be involved in a wildfire in that way, because
in my mind, the wildfire would happen up in the
mountain and that you know, it would have to burn
through the whole town.
Speaker 4 (04:19):
This time it did.
Speaker 3 (04:21):
As a person who has a what they call structure
still standing that we were slow to I think get recognition,
and I think we're really kind of I think we're
still kind of waiting for recognition in a way. We've
been slow to get information. And it's not that, you know,
(04:44):
we felt like we were well, let me put it
this way, given the fact that so many people lost
their homes, you know, we we know they were the
people who were the most in need, right they really
needed to have.
Speaker 4 (05:08):
Attention.
Speaker 3 (05:08):
They needed to have that attention because they were in need.
They needed help, they needed resources, and they needed it immediately.
At the same time, we have homes, oh way, don't
have access to that or anything that's in that, so
(05:29):
we also only have what we evacuated with.
Speaker 4 (05:35):
The house with the goats is still here.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
It took some time, I think for people to recognize
that piece of it, and eventually people just started kind
of banding together so that we could get information and
(06:05):
share information and also advocate for our homes. It's been
kind of it's just it's been like a learning process
because it took time to come to the realization that,
you know, we're going to have to lean on each
(06:28):
other for a while until the officials can get the
information that we need to be comfortable. And when I
say comfortable, I mean, you know, is it is it
even safe to be here? You know, when will it
be safe to be here? You know, how do we
(06:52):
you know, deal with our insurance companies who are not
really wanting to deal with us. There were just there's
just been a lot of issues that have come up
that people have had questions, and it's you know, it's
taken a little while to get some answers. One of
(07:15):
the things that people are concerned about is soil contamination.
You know, can I dig a garden in my backyard?
Is it safe to do that? So, you know, we're
slowly getting some answers to that. You know, it took
a little time to to you know, be able to
raise my hand and say, well, I'm one of the
(07:35):
people affected by the fire and I would like some
help too. Why can't you just be grateful that your
house didn't burn down. So well, I am grateful. I
am grateful. I'm also spending a lot of money on
gas that I would normally spend. I also have to
go get something to wear because the all my clothes
(07:57):
are in my house and I can't get into my house.
Speaker 4 (08:00):
This is about two blocks up the hill from me.
Speaker 3 (08:02):
I remember being alerted that there was a fire in
Eaton Canyon and that there were cruis un scene, and
we were in a restaurant at the time, and I
think too much of it because they said the cruise
were on scene, And a very short time later a
girlfriend called me to ask if I had evacuated, and
(08:24):
I thought, Okay, the fire just started, why are we
being evacuated. But we finished up our meal and left
the restaurant and we stepped out into the parking lot
and looked up at the mountain and it looked like
a volcano.
Speaker 4 (08:44):
So we knew we had to get.
Speaker 3 (08:46):
You back to the house so that I, you know,
we could gather things together to evacuate. And it was
kind of surreal driving back up to the house because
it was smoky and power was out, so it was
dark and The only lights we had were headlights and smoke,
and we could see flashing lights from emergency vehicles. We
(09:11):
went back and forth with whether or not we really
needed to evacuate because I don't live all that close
to Eaton canyon. You know, this probably isn't actually going
to affect us. It's too far away, it's moving in
the wrong direction. But looked about the sky and thought,
(09:34):
h I don't know, this doesn't look good. So I,
you know, it wasn't really sure what to grab, but
did you know, we grabbed a few things and left.
Speaker 4 (09:46):
This is it's bad.
Speaker 5 (09:49):
This is bad, and there are some fire trucks around,
but there's just not enough.
Speaker 3 (09:58):
And then one I was situated and comfortable, I turned
on the news. It was, you know, being covered, and
they weren't really covering palisades anymore. They were covering Alta Dina,
And I remember looking trying to determine where they were.
(10:19):
You know, does that house look familiar? You know what
street are they on? Because there was no way to
really tell, so just you know, trying to figure out
what was going on. I think I slept for maybe
thirty minutes. I fell asleep, and you know, I was
right back to watching the news. I spent a great
deal of time on the phone with a friend, and
(10:41):
so she and I were on the phone all night,
also trying to figure out what was going on in Altadena, how,
how bad is this fire? Where is this fire? Discussing
different people we knew who had gotten out or didn't
get work. I guess didn't get out when they should
(11:01):
have gotten out and woke up to houses, you know,
filled with smoke, and woke up to their street already
on fire, you know. And I discovered as time went by,
you know, that that was the story for a lot
of people that they had to kind of flee for
(11:22):
their lives with just the clothes that they had on.
We were lucky because they evacuated my part of town early.
Speaker 4 (11:29):
Of them, I hope they will.
Speaker 5 (11:32):
Really, you know, send up the scuper plane or helicopter
so they can drop water on.
Speaker 6 (11:39):
We need that.
Speaker 3 (11:41):
I am on the east side of Altadena. We were
told to evacuate, and it popped up on the phone
and it said to leave, and we got that notice.
I want to say it was around seven. My screenshot
says I captured this on January seventh, at seventh thirty PM.
Speaker 6 (12:01):
This is my neighborhood.
Speaker 4 (12:05):
Above the streets. Alta data has another issue.
Speaker 3 (12:09):
If you live fairly, you know, high up on the
mountain in the foothills, cell phone service is body. So
you know, I know someone who said they never got
an alert on their phone, you know, because they don't
have good cell service. They depend on Wi Fi and
the power was out. So when your power's out, so
is your WiFi. The morning of the eighth, what we
(12:32):
saw was just surreal. There were We got up there
probably around ten thirty or eleven o'clock, and there were
structures still actively burning.
Speaker 4 (12:45):
This is crazy.
Speaker 5 (12:46):
This house has been burning since before we got over here.
And there's two units now three in the fire like
it won't go out, and now the.
Speaker 4 (12:57):
Winds are kicking back up again.
Speaker 3 (13:01):
We didn't have any water pressure because one of the
things I wanted to do was go back and you know,
wet my roof down right, but couldn't do that because
we didn't have any water pressure.
Speaker 4 (13:16):
I didn't feel the heat coming off.
Speaker 3 (13:20):
We had units on scene from Riverside and from CalFire
who were in my neighborhood. They were I wanted to
stay outnumbered by the number of structures that were burning.
I remember I spoke to one gentleman who said he
flagged down a truck and the truck sprayed foam on
(13:41):
the side of his house because the house next door
was a blaze, and it's that saved his house.
Speaker 4 (13:47):
No, we still need prayers. Were not out of the
woods yet.
Speaker 3 (13:51):
You know, FEMA came through with hotels for a while.
The difficult thing about the inch insurance companies is, you know,
some of them would only pay for you to stay
at a hotel for like five days, and then you
have to check out, and then you have to check
(14:12):
back into another place.
Speaker 4 (14:15):
I was told that, you know.
Speaker 3 (14:17):
I qualified for a level three cleaning out of four levels.
So that entailed getting my insulation replaced because the attic
is full of ash and soot, and having everything inside
the house hepa vacuumed, having the refrigerator cleaned out, having backyard,
(14:41):
you know, patio furniture cleaned, and having the exterior of
the house pressure washed. We know a little bit more
about the environmental impact of the fire, and so now
the insurance companies are giving the okay to actually having
(15:02):
what's called a pack out, and so they're actually removing
the items from the house and cleaning the walls and
cleaning every item in the house. There's a fire down there.
(15:24):
I used to think of home, as you know, when
I was younger, that wherever my mother was, right, wherever
my mother was, that was home, right, you know, My
my home is in Altadena, but I'm not there. But
I'm also not with my son, so it's like it's
home where he is. I'm not sure that I really
(15:46):
feel that I'm home until he and I, you know,
are back together under one roof, you know. I've you know,
allowed him to just stay at his dad's for the
for the time being because he has you know, a
bed there and a room there. That was kind of the,
(16:08):
I guess, the easier thing to do for him. Because
his father lives in Pasadena, he still can go to school,
you know, without it being a big deal and having
to get up an hour or two earlier as he
would if he was here in Englewood. I am not
(16:28):
from Altadena. I'm from northern California, but I've lived in
Altadena since nineteen ninety seven, and I didn't know anything
about Altadena when I moved there, only that I liked
the location and I liked the neighborhood. Now I know
so much more you know about it. With the fires,
(16:51):
I've like every like a lot of people been learning about,
you know, the history of Altadena and the important role
it's played for so many African American families.
Speaker 4 (17:01):
I had no idea this is the house.
Speaker 5 (17:06):
Behind the car.
Speaker 4 (17:08):
I see it's Mortis.
Speaker 3 (17:09):
Then I was very fortunate, or I am very fortunate. I
belonged to these organizations of African American women who mobilized
very quickly to assess if there were members who were
in need and what that need was, and to make
(17:32):
sure that they were helpful. A lot of people didn't
have that. They didn't know, you know, answers to certain questions.
Whereas Aka had a WhatsApp thread, Jack and Jill had
what we still do, have a WhatsApp thread where information
(17:54):
is being shared on a daily basis. You know, I've
gotten gift cards, have gotten groceries because information was shared
that told me how to get these things. But not
everybody had that.
Speaker 1 (18:11):
Altadena has always been a place of black excellence, a
community that raised doctors, lawyers, educators, and professionals who broke
barriers and built legacies. It's a neighborhood where ambition met opportunity,
where generations of black families proved what was possible. So
when the fire hit, it wasn't just homes that were threatened.
(18:32):
It was history, dignity, and everything this community.
Speaker 2 (18:36):
Had worked so hard to build.
Speaker 1 (18:39):
Nationally Recognized civil rights attorney Lee Merritt knows that legacy
all too well. He went to high school just down
the road in neighboring Pasadena and says the area help
shape the man he is today. When he heard what happened,
he jumped on a flight to LA and went straight
into the heart of Altadena, where the smoke hadn't yet
(18:59):
clear and the need for support was urgent. In those
first few days, Lee met with survivors, teamed up with
local organizers, and offered free legal aid to families trying
to make sense of their losses.
Speaker 2 (19:13):
And as you'll hear from League.
Speaker 1 (19:14):
This wasn't just about legal help. It was also about
protecting the community his family still calls home.
Speaker 2 (19:22):
Meet Lee Merit.
Speaker 6 (19:25):
Outa DNA Pasadena. That region saved my life. I am
from South central LA and I was victim in terms
of my family to a lot of the negative stereotypes
of that, the gang stereotypes, the jail, etc. I think
it has a lot to do with my upbringing. My
father was incarcerated from my earliest memories, and I felt
(19:45):
very much born into sort of like a I don't know,
I felt it, honestly like I was born into the
prison industrial complex in a lot of ways. And because
of that, I've always wanted to work towards freeing our
people from state control, freeing our people from limitations on
our freedom, however they manifest. And that's been an interest
(20:07):
of mine. As I've grew throughout my career, I learned
more about how I might do that. But you know,
my early examples were people like Johnny Copperan, who were
fighting police brutality in LA. All right, all right, I'm
here and past Dina, right around the corner from where
I spent my high school years off a mountain. I'll
give you the address in a second room. Dina is
(20:28):
a community that represents not only wealth, but a rare
black wealth class that my grandmother, my grandmother's husband were
tapped into in a way culturally, communal wise then a
way that I didn't appreciate. I remember going up to
one ten as a kid, and it was like, yo,
you we're going to Granny's house. And they got it.
You know what I'm saying. You know, they have resources,
(20:51):
they have food, and then we'll go back to the
hood and that's where we live and it's far, but
it was an escape to paradise. So because of this
bridge that existed there, that took a kid like me
from South Central and plugged me into the Morehouse community,
plugged me into that HBCU historically black college community, plugged
me even too, the black church community that had institutional
(21:13):
wealth and resources and provided opportunities for me that I
would have never had if I had been siloed in
South Central. There's my beautiful mother, her mom. My mom
is fine, my family is okay. I'm happy to be
out here, back home in Pasadena, and yeah, I just
want to pop out. I just got off the plane.
(21:33):
I'm figuring out where I can plug in. I'm gonna
go visit a family friend of mine who lost his home.
They'll probably come back out and volunteer with me. So
this is true in any community. But you know they
say charity starts at home. I checked on my mama.
You know, that was the first place so I wanted
to see what was going on with mom, because she
seemed to not take it as seriously as all the
(21:55):
reports that I were getting was saying that it was
like she wanted to stay in the house, And so
I went home. I went to my grandmother's house in Pasadena,
and I make sure that the house insulated properly, that
it wasn't actually in the line of fire, which it wasn't,
and got it so that they had clean air and
(22:17):
that could exist in the house. This morning, I am
at Victory Bible Church in Altadena, California. They have set
out to give away tables for clothing items for men,
women and children, serving a breakfast. My grandmother is inside
(22:37):
for worship. I really wanted to just travel around my community,
so I want to go up Colorado, which is a
main thoroughfare, see what was going on. I drove up Lake,
which takes me up to Altadena, the route that I'm
familiar with, which is a little further up the mountain,
and I saw community center that had people with lines
sending outside and it was being organized by a brother
(22:58):
named Brandon Lamar, who I knew from previous organizing work.
I think we had only really tapped in on social media,
but I got to meet him face to face, and
uh yeah, he was busy organizing the community because it
was I think maybe three or four days into the
tragedy into the fires by the time I got there.
And since the fires had began, the community began to
(23:22):
organize itself, and Brandon emerged as a leader in a
voice in the area. The fire I understand, and the
eating areas fifteen percent contained, so we're a long way
before we were fully contained, and in the meantime, the
community is coming together. The first rule was you tap
into people on the ground. You don't come into a
(23:42):
community as a savior, but you got to figure out
what the people on the ground need. And if you're
a part of the community like I am, then it
was just what we need, right. It is the plan.
I have spoken with Pastor John here a legal consultation
for families who have lost items in the fire today,
(24:03):
and that's why I'm asking for attorneys to join with
me to make sure everyone gets proper legal representation. We're
just triaging today getting information what they need. I'm not
sure what they're asking for, but the pastor here asked
me to speak with thirty of his families who lost
items in the fire. So I'm appearing and I'm asking
for my legal colleagues to join me what I was
(24:25):
giving it And so the first concern on the ground
was just providing legal advice for the community at large
about pitfalls to avoid. And then after that, when we
start talking long term, it's figuring out who we're going
to be the partners or institutions that would be present
to oversee a long term progress. You want to talk
(24:48):
to people who have a vested interest in the community. Now,
people who just appeared out of nowhere. If something rubs
you the wrong way about somebody, trust your instincts, back
off of that person, right, People who put unnecessary presh
on you to make this life changing decisions. Right. But
that you know, that is the concern, and that's what
I wanted to be on the ground for. The community
(25:08):
has come together in the area. They are helping the distribution,
dropping items off close water. The work that we're doing
at Victory Bible Church under the leadership of Pastor John
(25:28):
the Cure is he his vision was a legacy land
group right where anyone who was impacted by the eating fire,
if they have a question, if they have a concern,
if they have resources that they need, that is forcing
them out of the community where we go, and the
whole goal is to make sure that the land stays
in the hand of the people who had it before
(25:51):
the fire. And so we need to continue with the
spirit of it's our responsibility to protect that community because
we can solve every problem that a there. We have
the resources within our international community, within our within the
diaspora to solve that any problem that arises there. We
just need to continue to identify as ours and I
(26:11):
think part of that is telling the story, which I'm
glad that we're doing this now, is telling people about it,
giving up people a resource for them to find out
more about the region.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
For more content, including behind the scenes videos, photos, and
exclusive interviews, follow us on social media. You can find
me at Mimi Brown TV on all platforms and follow
too Out to Dina with Love for more stories from
the people who live them. I Mimi Brown. This is
too Out to Dina with Love. See you next time.
We started this journey by tracing the roots of Altadena,
one of California's first black, middle class neighborhoods. Then we
examined how red lighting shaped its borders trying to keep
black families out. We uncovered the painful truth about evacuation
delays and the lives loss while residents waited for a
warning that came too late, And most recently, we stepped
(00:23):
back to see the broader picture, connecting out to Dina's experience,
to Black Wall Street, to post Katrina, New Orleans, and
to the long history of what happens when disaster meets
systemic neglect. In this episode, we'll focus on what happens
next when the smoke clears, when the headlines fade, when
the systems designed to protect you don't. For decades, insurance
(00:47):
discrimination has quietly shaped the recovery of black neighborhoods, denying claims,
underpaying families, and forcing communities to fight for the help
they've already paid for. The fire may be out, but
for some families in Altadena, the real battle has only
just begun. Across the community, survivors are facing a second
(01:08):
crisis in the weeks after the Eaten Fire, While families
were still picking through the ashes. California's largest home insurer,
State Farm, filed a twenty two percent emergency rate hike.
They said it was needed to offset the rising cost
of the fires. Then, following public outcry, they lowered their
(01:29):
ask to seventeen percent, But for families still displaced, still
waiting for help, the timing felt like a gut punch.
While some policy holders say they've gotten support, many others
described delays, denials, and low ball offers that don't come
close to the cost of rebuilding. And as State Farm
(01:49):
pushes forward with its rate increase, residents are left asking
how can the same company asking for more still be
doing less. The hike was approved on a provisional base,
is pending a judge's final sign off, but for many,
the damage is already done.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
Because it's not.
Speaker 1 (02:06):
Just about higher premiums, it's about trust, and for those
stuck in limbo waiting for answers, that trust feels broken.
We've heard the stories of homes turned to ash, of
families who lost everything in an instant, But what about
the families whose homes didn't burn. That's where Stacy Bolden's
story begins. Stacy lives on the east side of Altadena,
(02:28):
where evacuation orders came early around seven thirty pm. Her
house didn't burn, and from the outside it may look untouched,
but in the inside, it's a different story. Her home
is not safe, and Stacy hasn't lived there since the fire.
She's been displaced now for more than one hundred days,
her son living elsewhere, her routine, her stability, her sense
(02:51):
of home all gone, and for a long time, because
her house was still standing, Stacy didn't even consider herself
a victim.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
But loss doesn't always look like rubble.
Speaker 1 (03:03):
Sometimes it looks like silence, like separation, and a life
that no longer feels like your own. Stacy is living
proof that just because your home did not burn doesn't
mean the fire didn't change everything.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
I Memi Brown, and in this.
Speaker 1 (03:20):
Series you'll hear stories told firsthand by the people who
live them. These are their stories, their memories, and their truths.
This is to out ta Dina with love, Meet Stacy Bolden.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
When I evacuated January seventh, it never occurred to me
that I would not be back in the house in April.
I truly thought I'll be back tomorrow. We'll be back tomorrow.
(03:59):
Because I never it never occurred to me that I
would be involved in a wildfire in that way, because
in my mind, the wildfire would happen up in the
mountain and that you know, it would have to burn
through the whole town.
Speaker 4 (04:19):
This time it did.
Speaker 3 (04:21):
As a person who has a what they call structure
still standing that we were slow to I think get recognition,
and I think we're really kind of I think we're
still kind of waiting for recognition in a way. We've
been slow to get information. And it's not that, you know,
(04:44):
we felt like we were well, let me put it
this way, given the fact that so many people lost
their homes, you know, we we know they were the
people who were the most in need, right they really
needed to have.
Speaker 4 (05:08):
Attention.
Speaker 3 (05:08):
They needed to have that attention because they were in need.
They needed help, they needed resources, and they needed it immediately.
At the same time, we have homes, oh way, don't
have access to that or anything that's in that, so
(05:29):
we also only have what we evacuated with.
Speaker 4 (05:35):
The house with the goats is still here.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
It took some time, I think for people to recognize
that piece of it, and eventually people just started kind
of banding together so that we could get information and
(06:05):
share information and also advocate for our homes. It's been
kind of it's just it's been like a learning process
because it took time to come to the realization that,
you know, we're going to have to lean on each
(06:28):
other for a while until the officials can get the
information that we need to be comfortable. And when I
say comfortable, I mean, you know, is it is it
even safe to be here? You know, when will it
be safe to be here? You know, how do we
(06:52):
you know, deal with our insurance companies who are not
really wanting to deal with us. There were just there's
just been a lot of issues that have come up
that people have had questions, and it's you know, it's
taken a little while to get some answers. One of
(07:15):
the things that people are concerned about is soil contamination.
You know, can I dig a garden in my backyard?
Is it safe to do that? So, you know, we're
slowly getting some answers to that. You know, it took
a little time to to you know, be able to
raise my hand and say, well, I'm one of the
(07:35):
people affected by the fire and I would like some
help too. Why can't you just be grateful that your
house didn't burn down. So well, I am grateful. I
am grateful. I'm also spending a lot of money on
gas that I would normally spend. I also have to
go get something to wear because the all my clothes
(07:57):
are in my house and I can't get into my house.
Speaker 4 (08:00):
This is about two blocks up the hill from me.
Speaker 3 (08:02):
I remember being alerted that there was a fire in
Eaton Canyon and that there were cruis un scene, and
we were in a restaurant at the time, and I
think too much of it because they said the cruise
were on scene, And a very short time later a
girlfriend called me to ask if I had evacuated, and
(08:24):
I thought, Okay, the fire just started, why are we
being evacuated. But we finished up our meal and left
the restaurant and we stepped out into the parking lot
and looked up at the mountain and it looked like
a volcano.
Speaker 4 (08:44):
So we knew we had to get.
Speaker 3 (08:46):
You back to the house so that I, you know,
we could gather things together to evacuate. And it was
kind of surreal driving back up to the house because
it was smoky and power was out, so it was
dark and The only lights we had were headlights and smoke,
and we could see flashing lights from emergency vehicles. We
(09:11):
went back and forth with whether or not we really
needed to evacuate because I don't live all that close
to Eaton canyon. You know, this probably isn't actually going
to affect us. It's too far away, it's moving in
the wrong direction. But looked about the sky and thought,
(09:34):
h I don't know, this doesn't look good. So I,
you know, it wasn't really sure what to grab, but
did you know, we grabbed a few things and left.
Speaker 4 (09:46):
This is it's bad.
Speaker 5 (09:49):
This is bad, and there are some fire trucks around,
but there's just not enough.
Speaker 3 (09:58):
And then one I was situated and comfortable, I turned
on the news. It was, you know, being covered, and
they weren't really covering palisades anymore. They were covering Alta Dina,
And I remember looking trying to determine where they were.
(10:19):
You know, does that house look familiar? You know what
street are they on? Because there was no way to
really tell, so just you know, trying to figure out
what was going on. I think I slept for maybe
thirty minutes. I fell asleep, and you know, I was
right back to watching the news. I spent a great
deal of time on the phone with a friend, and
(10:41):
so she and I were on the phone all night,
also trying to figure out what was going on in Altadena, how,
how bad is this fire? Where is this fire? Discussing
different people we knew who had gotten out or didn't
get work. I guess didn't get out when they should
(11:01):
have gotten out and woke up to houses, you know,
filled with smoke, and woke up to their street already
on fire, you know. And I discovered as time went by,
you know, that that was the story for a lot
of people that they had to kind of flee for
(11:22):
their lives with just the clothes that they had on.
We were lucky because they evacuated my part of town early.
Speaker 4 (11:29):
Of them, I hope they will.
Speaker 5 (11:32):
Really, you know, send up the scuper plane or helicopter
so they can drop water on.
Speaker 6 (11:39):
We need that.
Speaker 3 (11:41):
I am on the east side of Altadena. We were
told to evacuate, and it popped up on the phone
and it said to leave, and we got that notice.
I want to say it was around seven. My screenshot
says I captured this on January seventh, at seventh thirty PM.
Speaker 6 (12:01):
This is my neighborhood.
Speaker 4 (12:05):
Above the streets. Alta data has another issue.
Speaker 3 (12:09):
If you live fairly, you know, high up on the
mountain in the foothills, cell phone service is body. So
you know, I know someone who said they never got
an alert on their phone, you know, because they don't
have good cell service. They depend on Wi Fi and
the power was out. So when your power's out, so
is your WiFi. The morning of the eighth, what we
(12:32):
saw was just surreal. There were We got up there
probably around ten thirty or eleven o'clock, and there were
structures still actively burning.
Speaker 4 (12:45):
This is crazy.
Speaker 5 (12:46):
This house has been burning since before we got over here.
And there's two units now three in the fire like
it won't go out, and now the.
Speaker 4 (12:57):
Winds are kicking back up again.
Speaker 3 (13:01):
We didn't have any water pressure because one of the
things I wanted to do was go back and you know,
wet my roof down right, but couldn't do that because
we didn't have any water pressure.
Speaker 4 (13:16):
I didn't feel the heat coming off.
Speaker 3 (13:20):
We had units on scene from Riverside and from CalFire
who were in my neighborhood. They were I wanted to
stay outnumbered by the number of structures that were burning.
I remember I spoke to one gentleman who said he
flagged down a truck and the truck sprayed foam on
(13:41):
the side of his house because the house next door
was a blaze, and it's that saved his house.
Speaker 4 (13:47):
No, we still need prayers. Were not out of the
woods yet.
Speaker 3 (13:51):
You know, FEMA came through with hotels for a while.
The difficult thing about the inch insurance companies is, you know,
some of them would only pay for you to stay
at a hotel for like five days, and then you
have to check out, and then you have to check
(14:12):
back into another place.
Speaker 4 (14:15):
I was told that, you know.
Speaker 3 (14:17):
I qualified for a level three cleaning out of four levels.
So that entailed getting my insulation replaced because the attic
is full of ash and soot, and having everything inside
the house hepa vacuumed, having the refrigerator cleaned out, having backyard,
(14:41):
you know, patio furniture cleaned, and having the exterior of
the house pressure washed. We know a little bit more
about the environmental impact of the fire, and so now
the insurance companies are giving the okay to actually having
(15:02):
what's called a pack out, and so they're actually removing
the items from the house and cleaning the walls and
cleaning every item in the house. There's a fire down there.
(15:24):
I used to think of home, as you know, when
I was younger, that wherever my mother was, right, wherever
my mother was, that was home, right, you know, My
my home is in Altadena, but I'm not there. But
I'm also not with my son, so it's like it's
home where he is. I'm not sure that I really
(15:46):
feel that I'm home until he and I, you know,
are back together under one roof, you know. I've you know,
allowed him to just stay at his dad's for the
for the time being because he has you know, a
bed there and a room there. That was kind of the,
(16:08):
I guess, the easier thing to do for him. Because
his father lives in Pasadena, he still can go to school,
you know, without it being a big deal and having
to get up an hour or two earlier as he
would if he was here in Englewood. I am not
(16:28):
from Altadena. I'm from northern California, but I've lived in
Altadena since nineteen ninety seven, and I didn't know anything
about Altadena when I moved there, only that I liked
the location and I liked the neighborhood. Now I know
so much more you know about it. With the fires,
(16:51):
I've like every like a lot of people been learning about,
you know, the history of Altadena and the important role
it's played for so many African American families.
Speaker 4 (17:01):
I had no idea this is the house.
Speaker 5 (17:06):
Behind the car.
Speaker 4 (17:08):
I see it's Mortis.
Speaker 3 (17:09):
Then I was very fortunate, or I am very fortunate. I
belonged to these organizations of African American women who mobilized
very quickly to assess if there were members who were
in need and what that need was, and to make
(17:32):
sure that they were helpful. A lot of people didn't
have that. They didn't know, you know, answers to certain questions.
Whereas Aka had a WhatsApp thread, Jack and Jill had
what we still do, have a WhatsApp thread where information
(17:54):
is being shared on a daily basis. You know, I've
gotten gift cards, have gotten groceries because information was shared
that told me how to get these things. But not
everybody had that.
Speaker 1 (18:11):
Altadena has always been a place of black excellence, a
community that raised doctors, lawyers, educators, and professionals who broke
barriers and built legacies. It's a neighborhood where ambition met opportunity,
where generations of black families proved what was possible. So
when the fire hit, it wasn't just homes that were threatened.
(18:32):
It was history, dignity, and everything this community.
Speaker 2 (18:36):
Had worked so hard to build.
Speaker 1 (18:39):
Nationally Recognized civil rights attorney Lee Merritt knows that legacy
all too well. He went to high school just down
the road in neighboring Pasadena and says the area help
shape the man he is today. When he heard what happened,
he jumped on a flight to LA and went straight
into the heart of Altadena, where the smoke hadn't yet
(18:59):
clear and the need for support was urgent. In those
first few days, Lee met with survivors, teamed up with
local organizers, and offered free legal aid to families trying
to make sense of their losses.
Speaker 2 (19:13):
And as you'll hear from League.
Speaker 1 (19:14):
This wasn't just about legal help. It was also about
protecting the community his family still calls home.
Speaker 2 (19:22):
Meet Lee Merit.
Speaker 6 (19:25):
Outa DNA Pasadena. That region saved my life. I am
from South central LA and I was victim in terms
of my family to a lot of the negative stereotypes
of that, the gang stereotypes, the jail, etc. I think
it has a lot to do with my upbringing. My
father was incarcerated from my earliest memories, and I felt
(19:45):
very much born into sort of like a I don't know,
I felt it, honestly like I was born into the
prison industrial complex in a lot of ways. And because
of that, I've always wanted to work towards freeing our
people from state control, freeing our people from limitations on
our freedom, however they manifest. And that's been an interest
(20:07):
of mine. As I've grew throughout my career, I learned
more about how I might do that. But you know,
my early examples were people like Johnny Copperan, who were
fighting police brutality in LA. All right, all right, I'm
here and past Dina, right around the corner from where
I spent my high school years off a mountain. I'll
give you the address in a second room. Dina is
(20:28):
a community that represents not only wealth, but a rare
black wealth class that my grandmother, my grandmother's husband were
tapped into in a way culturally, communal wise then a
way that I didn't appreciate. I remember going up to
one ten as a kid, and it was like, yo,
you we're going to Granny's house. And they got it.
You know what I'm saying. You know, they have resources,
(20:51):
they have food, and then we'll go back to the
hood and that's where we live and it's far, but
it was an escape to paradise. So because of this
bridge that existed there, that took a kid like me
from South Central and plugged me into the Morehouse community,
plugged me into that HBCU historically black college community, plugged
me even too, the black church community that had institutional
(21:13):
wealth and resources and provided opportunities for me that I
would have never had if I had been siloed in
South Central. There's my beautiful mother, her mom. My mom
is fine, my family is okay. I'm happy to be
out here, back home in Pasadena, and yeah, I just
want to pop out. I just got off the plane.
(21:33):
I'm figuring out where I can plug in. I'm gonna
go visit a family friend of mine who lost his home.
They'll probably come back out and volunteer with me. So
this is true in any community. But you know they
say charity starts at home. I checked on my mama.
You know, that was the first place so I wanted
to see what was going on with mom, because she
seemed to not take it as seriously as all the
(21:55):
reports that I were getting was saying that it was
like she wanted to stay in the house, And so
I went home. I went to my grandmother's house in Pasadena,
and I make sure that the house insulated properly, that
it wasn't actually in the line of fire, which it wasn't,
and got it so that they had clean air and
(22:17):
that could exist in the house. This morning, I am
at Victory Bible Church in Altadena, California. They have set
out to give away tables for clothing items for men,
women and children, serving a breakfast. My grandmother is inside
(22:37):
for worship. I really wanted to just travel around my community,
so I want to go up Colorado, which is a
main thoroughfare, see what was going on. I drove up Lake,
which takes me up to Altadena, the route that I'm
familiar with, which is a little further up the mountain,
and I saw community center that had people with lines
sending outside and it was being organized by a brother
(22:58):
named Brandon Lamar, who I knew from previous organizing work.
I think we had only really tapped in on social media,
but I got to meet him face to face, and
uh yeah, he was busy organizing the community because it
was I think maybe three or four days into the
tragedy into the fires by the time I got there.
And since the fires had began, the community began to
(23:22):
organize itself, and Brandon emerged as a leader in a
voice in the area. The fire I understand, and the
eating areas fifteen percent contained, so we're a long way
before we were fully contained, and in the meantime, the
community is coming together. The first rule was you tap
into people on the ground. You don't come into a
(23:42):
community as a savior, but you got to figure out
what the people on the ground need. And if you're
a part of the community like I am, then it
was just what we need, right. It is the plan.
I have spoken with Pastor John here a legal consultation
for families who have lost items in the fire today,
(24:03):
and that's why I'm asking for attorneys to join with
me to make sure everyone gets proper legal representation. We're
just triaging today getting information what they need. I'm not
sure what they're asking for, but the pastor here asked
me to speak with thirty of his families who lost
items in the fire. So I'm appearing and I'm asking
for my legal colleagues to join me what I was
(24:25):
giving it And so the first concern on the ground
was just providing legal advice for the community at large
about pitfalls to avoid. And then after that, when we
start talking long term, it's figuring out who we're going
to be the partners or institutions that would be present
to oversee a long term progress. You want to talk
(24:48):
to people who have a vested interest in the community. Now,
people who just appeared out of nowhere. If something rubs
you the wrong way about somebody, trust your instincts, back
off of that person, right, People who put unnecessary presh
on you to make this life changing decisions. Right. But
that you know, that is the concern, and that's what
I wanted to be on the ground for. The community
(25:08):
has come together in the area. They are helping the distribution,
dropping items off close water. The work that we're doing
at Victory Bible Church under the leadership of Pastor John
(25:28):
the Cure is he his vision was a legacy land
group right where anyone who was impacted by the eating fire,
if they have a question, if they have a concern,
if they have resources that they need, that is forcing
them out of the community where we go, and the
whole goal is to make sure that the land stays
in the hand of the people who had it before
(25:51):
the fire. And so we need to continue with the
spirit of it's our responsibility to protect that community because
we can solve every problem that a there. We have
the resources within our international community, within our within the
diaspora to solve that any problem that arises there. We
just need to continue to identify as ours and I
(26:11):
think part of that is telling the story, which I'm
glad that we're doing this now, is telling people about it,
giving up people a resource for them to find out
more about the region.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
For more content, including behind the scenes videos, photos, and
exclusive interviews, follow us on social media. You can find
me at Mimi Brown TV on all platforms and follow
too Out to Dina with Love for more stories from
the people who live them. I Mimi Brown. This is
too Out to Dina with Love. See you next time.
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