S1: Hey there , San Diego , it's time for KPBS roundtable. I'm Andrew Bracken. Paid parking took effect for San Diego's Balboa Park this week , but confusion about the new rules and the lack of communication around them left many park visitors frustrated. How the disorder around paid parking has actually led to political disagreement among city leaders as well. Then , this week marks one year since the Palisades and Eaton fires devastated parts of Los Angeles. We take a look at what recovery looks like a year later and some of the challenges that remain. That's ahead on KPBS roundtable. Paid parking took effect in Balboa Park this week , but confusion over its rollout left many park visitors and some city leaders frustrated , arguing the city was unprepared. David Garrick joins me now. He covers City hall for the San Diego Union-Tribune. Hey , David , welcome back to the show.
S2: Hey , thanks for having me.
S1: Great to have you here. So , you know , remind us what went into effect this week at Balboa Park.
S2: A very complex parking paid parking system , the first ever in the history of Balboa Park , with varying tiers and varying rates , and the opportunity for monthly and quarterly and yearly passes. But also you could pay pay for the day.
S1: And one big , you know , piece of that , as you mentioned there , there was like different fees for residents versus non city residents.
S2: It's most 50% in most cases. Some of the passes. It's the long term passes. It's a little different. But daily it's it's 50%. But the big problem was , uh , the city council had requested that they had envisioned people going to the park. And then , if they're a resident , getting to pay less immediately. But the way that the mayor's system rolled it out , you have to go to a portal online. You have to apply to give them your address. It has to be verified. It costs $5. It takes two business days. It's a lot more cumbersome and complicated than the council said that they had envisioned when they requested a discount for city residents , so it created a lot of uproar. Yeah.
S1: Yeah. So it seems like a lot of this caught , you know , folks by surprise.
S2: It was more frustrated , confused , a lot of people frustrating for me that they don't read all of my stories. A lot of people had no idea what was happening , so they showed up and they were clueless. They said , you have to pay to park here now. Uh , a woman who's a regular jogger , she parks over by the the reflecting pond , and she jogs all around and comes back and leaves in her car. And now she realizes she didn't have to pay $10 to do that. So there were some people surprised like that , but there was also a lot of confusion. People had read about or heard about the resident discounts , and when they went to the parking kiosk , there was no evidence that they even existed. There was nothing on the kiosk letting them know. So some of them spent ten , 15 , 20 minutes scrolling through trying to figure out how can I get a discount if I'm a resident , because they were unaware that they had to go to the separate portal and have their address verified.
S1: And this portal ? Yeah. Go ahead.
S2: Well , the city had a scramble on Monday. They were scrambling , putting stickers on all the kiosks about the resident portal so that they could eliminate that confusion. But it didn't happen until partway through the day.
S1: No , I think I was just going to add on , you know , the portal , you know , like you said , a lot of people weren't aware. San Diego dot the permit portal comm , I believe , is the address. So you said , you know , the city responded by kind of getting some messaging up , getting some signage there on the kiosks. But as you said , there's like a lot of details here. Another piece of it is the rates differ depending on where you are in the park.
S2: Right , right. There's three tiers. There's lower inspiration point , which that's way down the hill. That's the place where the solar panels on the south side of Presidents Way. That's 951 spaces , and that's free for three hours. And the city has has pointed that out , that it's not really paid parking. There is a free option if you're willing to stay for less than three hours. Problem is , a lot of folks didn't understand that. And then there's two tiers higher. If you're right , in the central mesa near all the park's biggest attractions , it's more expensive , and then you pay a medium price if you're in between those two. But but on Monday , and I guess part of Tuesday , the the lower inspiration lot did not have signs indicating it was free for three hours. So the only way you would know that is if you read news stories about it , or maybe scoured the city's website. So a lot of folks didn't know , didn't understand how to get there.
S1: Another piece of the confusion a little bit seems to be about the state of enforcement and whether , you know , parking enforcement is happening there.
S2: I asked a spokesperson for the mayor how long that might last. They've been reluctant to set a date because they don't want to be held to a date , but it sounds like that's going to last for about a month. But I understand folks feel uncertain because they don't see it on the signs , and they don't feel they don't want to risk leaving their car. I've been assured the mayors that they're not going to issue citations , but it's not. It's not really in writing other than in the memo , he said.
S1: You mentioned that memo. I want to come back to that. But first , you know , this move in Balboa Park , it's part of a wider city effort here to , you know , increase revenue amid some budget challenges. Right. We saw some of this implemented late last year. How has the rollout gone in other parts of this ? You know , other parts of the city ? I think downtown , we saw some some new parking changes. Yeah.
S2: Yeah. They're for special events. They've all faced backlash , which it's not surprising. No one really wants to pay more , but it's been notable backlash. I mean , you don't have many people saying this seems really smart and I know why the city needs the money , but it's annoying. It's more like , this is dumb , repeal this. This is dumb. Repeal this. And there's people threatening to do ballot initiatives to try to to get these things repealed. So there's a lot of backlash.
S1:
S2: So I feel like you could argue that Ella Rivera and Lee got what they wanted. But I think as you point with the politics , I think they also wanted to point out that they were frustrated that this has been handled chaotically. They called it haphazard. They said it was not ready for prime time. I think they were really criticizing the way it was laid out.
S1: And then that leads to , you know , Mayor Gloria's response. Tell us more about that. Yeah.
S2: Yeah. Well , I mean , the mayor's response , he accused them of playing politics. He said , this is obviously an unpopular political move , but you can't hide behind , you know , blaming me. He deflected blame and pointed out that the council had been haggling and changing the policy. And throughout the fall , the council had made several requests for different , you know , elements of the policy to be adjusted. And he says that that made it hard for his staff to put it in place effectively quickly , because it was it was a movable target throughout the entire fall.
S1: You know , this comes as city is facing these budget challenges. I think I mentioned it earlier.
S2: It's really it's only about $3 million this year in a $2.2 million , $2.2 billion budget. The deficit is somewhere between 100 and 200 million , depending on all the things you include and don't include. So this is really a drop in the bucket. Now , you could argue that if it was out for a full year , it might be 12 or 13 million. Uh , well , the fiscal year runs through July , and we're only starting this one here in mid-January. So. But even even at 12 or 13 million , I think some critics would argue maybe there are other ways the city could find revenue.
S1:
S2: It was only two days worth of numbers , but they said they think 23,000 in daily fees and then over 100,000 in those long term monthly or quarterly permits. So and the mayor used that as an argument to say , hey , maybe this was laid out a little chaotically , but it's gaining acceptance. People are embracing it. Let's give it time as we work out the kinks. That was sort of his approach in response to the argument that it was haphazard and chaotic and let's get rid of it , or let's not enforce it.
S1: So back to this little , you know , political back and forth. We've seen this in the last year or so. The mayor and the city council not always agreeing on , on , you know , approaches to policy here. How do you see that shaping , you know , with this issue in parking and where it goes from here ? No.
S2: And for years we thought if we had only if we had an all Democratic city hall or I guess all Republican city hall , that was it wasn't divisive. But now we have nine Democrats on the city council , all nine and a Democratic mayor. And it seems like things are more acrimonious than ever. Maybe , maybe we have short memories , but it sort of seems that way. It does seem like there's a lot , a lot of turbulence. Well , they've got a big budget coming up. And , you know , they used a lot of things last year to close the gap. Uh , a trash fee , a lot of other things that are that were not repeatable. So it's going to be a really tough budget season. And it'll be interesting to see how it turns out. Yeah.
S1: Yeah. On that. The city council returns to work Monday right after a holiday break. Yeah. What else are you expecting ? Obviously this , you know , parking picture. You know , the parking questions. You'll you'll continue following. But what else is going to rise to the top , you think ? Yeah.
S2: Well , on that note , I mean , there's been talk about adding park pay parking at beaches and Mission Bay Park. And that was another one that would probably generate more money than than Balboa Park. But a lot of the council members , after seeing how the Balboa Park parking has been laid out , they're like , maybe we should just bail on that other one , because , I mean , it's just if it's going to turn out to be this much of a mess and create this much of a backlash from the public , that maybe it's not the right move. Uh , but on the other hand , what are you going to cut if they're if they don't generate new revenue we're talking about maybe library branches are open fewer hours. Uh , you know , elimination of some parks programs , recreation centers might have fewer hours. You know , key city services might have to be cut. So that's why the council has this urge to try to find new revenue. It's not because they're trying to hurt people. It's because they want to avoid making cuts that are going to damage people's lives.
S1: Something to follow David Garrick. He covers City hall for the San Diego Union Tribune. Thanks so much for joining us today , David.
S2: Thanks for having me.
S1: Up next , we take a look back at the Los Angeles fires and what recovery looks like one year on. That's ahead on roundtable. Welcome back to KPBS roundtable. I'm Andrew Bracken. One year ago , the Palisades and Eaton fires forever changed Los Angeles lives and neighborhoods. This week , many parts of L.A. are marking the anniversary by highlighting community resilience and the ongoing challenges of rebuilding. I'm joined now by Libby Rainey. She's a reporter with LAist. Libby , welcome to roundtable.
S3: Hi , Andrew. Thank you so much for having me.
S1: Thank you so much for joining us. I mean , one year ago. Take us back there.
S3: Um , I remember I'm in our newsroom today , and I was , you know , here on the day that the fire sparked January 7th , 2025. And we were all day covering the spread of the Palisades Fire. There was a real sense of nervousness and and anxiety because not only were we covering the fire , but , you know , there were these whipping winds throughout Los Angeles. So everybody was very unnerved , very worried. And I really have this distinct memory of I was producing our local , our local show , All Things Considered at the time , and I was driving out of the studio when I heard on our radio that the fire had sparked in Eaton Canyon , the fire that would , you know , turn into the Eaton Fire that would devastate Altadena. And I just remember turning my car around , driving back into the studio , and we kept on reporting about what was happening. But it was a time of great fear and confusion. And then , you know , what really sticks with me is , is that for days on end , we kind of continued in that state as an entire county , you know , fires continued to spark. People were incredibly overwhelmed , fearful people were people were learning that they had lost their homes , that they had lost everything that was happening in our newsroom. So it's really remarkable. People keep saying , we can't believe it's been a year. And then on the other hand , as these things go , it also feels like it's been a million years since these fires changed LA. So it's it's a it's a very , very significant anniversary here.
S1: And you know , kind of as you mentioned , your own studio there is not too far from Altadena. Right. And much of your focusing , much of your reporting is focused on the Eaton Fire , which , you know , really hit Altadena hard. How would you describe that community before the fire ? Yeah.
S3: So as you said , our studios are in Pasadena , which is just a bit south of Altadena , which is an incredibly special community , was still is in this in this phase of rebuilding. But yeah , Altadena before the fires , you know , it was a historic haven for black families who had been redlined out of other neighborhoods. It was a space for a town for many multi-generational families. So it's not unusual to talk to people who not only lived in Altadena themselves , but had a brother or sister around the block , or a grandparent living with them , or in another home around the corner. You know , a place for a lot of working class families , Latino families , artists , all types of people living together , you know , just there in the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains and just , you know , so many blocks of beautiful , special places for this community that were lost in these fires. So , you know , I have a million memories. I grew up in South Pasadena , not too far away. Altadena has always been a really special place and just so devastating.
S1: Can you paint a picture of , you know , a little bit of how it's changed and what it looks like ? Yeah.
S3: This is one of the most remarkable things to , you know , myself , but also a number of our reporters , of course , in the weeks after the fires were driving throughout the Palisades and also in Altadena , just assessing the damage and even having been there multiple times myself in those first weeks. It really was so unbelievable. I still almost can't believe. You know , when you see , you know , what was a block of homes and anybody can imagine it. I mean , imagine your own neighborhood suddenly gone in an instant. So that's what we were seeing. And of course , there was the immense amount of debris , all the damage and what Altadena looks like now. I was there a couple of weeks ago , driving through , doing a story on rebuilding. And the real thing for people to know is that most of Altadena has not been rebuilt yet. So we're really what we what we see when we go up to Altadena. And , you know , there are a lot of people around checking on their lots or , you know , some people who have returned home. But you really see , you know , a lot of vacant lots still maybe overgrown with flowers or weeds. And then , you know , there are these signs of hope that people have been talking about. So , you know , a home here or there that's been built the sounds of construction , but it really is a landscape that's still just completely , drastically transformed by what happened there just a year ago.
S1: And I think something even , you know , one story you reported on was how some fire survivors there have actually turned to buying housing materials in bulk. Can you tell us more about that strategy and what that tells you about the community there ? Yes.
S3: So this was something that I learned through talking to a number of fire survivors who have been organizing together. And that's something that's really noteworthy about , you know , this recovery is the way that community members are coming together and trying to collectively come up with solutions. So , uh , the big challenge for most people who haven't started the rebuilding process , or even those who have , is the cost of rebuilding , of course. And people you know either aren't getting enough from their insurance , or maybe we're underinsured or don't know how much they're going to get from insurance. These are all things that delay people's ability to rebuild. So the thing that this group of fire survivors that I talked with are really talking about in depth is the idea of doing bulk purchasing on certain goods and services to help get costs down. A lot of this is still sort of speculative for these survivors at this point in time , and that's because they're still at the beginning phases. But one way that some people have already done this is for land surveying , which is , you know , when you have somebody come out and assess the land before you build , that's something that many , many survivors needed to do. Pretty soon after the fires. And so some of these folks banded together and they were really able to knock prices down. Like one person told me , an individual quote was something like $5,000. And after doing it with his neighbors , it was $1,700 a pop. So we're talking about huge cost savings. And what it takes is a high , high level of community engagement and community collaboration. And that really stood out to me. And speaking to folks in Altadena because they were saying , we have to work together to get back. This is the only way , and we're really willing to do what it takes. It doesn't mean it's easy , but they've been trying out all these things and I think it's definitely something I'm interested in continuing to follow is , you know , it moves from land surveying to things like , you know , building materials for a , for a house or an entire set of homes.
S1: And we know , I mean , obviously the cost of housing is always , you know , such , you know , a big issue and that comes into it. And so like , you know , other reporting you did you recently reported on fire survivors in Altadena and their experiences with homelessness. You know , you spoke with one. You know , she thinks she runs a Pasadena shelter door of Hope Megan Katagiri. She hears a little of what she told you.
S4: The cliff is coming. Families are running out of family , resources , savings , all of that kind of thing. And so they're going to be experiencing homelessness into 2026.
S1: So tell us more about the picture there and what you're seeing in Altadena. Yeah.
S3: Yeah. This is one of the most devastating stories that I've covered in the past year , because we're talking about people who , you know , were housed on January 6th , Had a place to lay their heads with their families , and since being displaced by this disaster , um have been pushed into homelessness. So , yeah , that was making Turgeon. The shelter she runs in Pasadena is called door of Hope. When I spoke to her , I believe that was in December. There were ten families who had lost their homes who were living in the shelter. But yeah , she was saying , you know , inevitably more people are going to come there. And something that she talked about that I thought was super important is , you know , the big thing you'll hear when you hear about fire recovery in Los Angeles or frankly , most recoveries from huge fires like this is , you know , insurance fights with insurance , the gaps in insurance. And what she was telling me is , you know , there are also families in Altadena who , you know , weren't in so-called traditional housing where they might have insurance. So , you know , you could think of many examples living with relatives , sharing a house with another family , not being formally on a lease. These were people who also were more likely to not have savings. So this is the type of crisis that these families are now facing. And it's not just families. I interviewed one man who had just moved to Altadena right before the fire , and he lost so much in the fires. You know , he lost his apartment , he lost his savings , and he's been living in his car. So these are the stories that are just just so heartbreaking for people who have already lost so much to now be struggling to find stable housing. And as you referenced , Andrew , a lot of that has to do with just the astronomical cost of living. And , you know , if you think about if a family's been living somewhere , paying a pretty low rent , maybe they've been there for ten years. I mean , the housing market is tight. It was tight before the fires , and it's certainly hard to find affordable rent now. So that's what families are facing. And unfortunately , a lot of the people I spoke to who are experts on this said it's not going to get any better as we get further out from the fires , because there are still families who are really at the beginning of their own recovery.
S1: I mean , yeah , there's just so much there.
S3: It's a huge point of conversation , particularly in Altadena. We talked earlier about the specialness of this community and like the historic , the historic sense of this community and how so many people , you know , when you talk to individuals who are fire survivors. And my colleagues and I have talked to so many people , they say I really am committed to coming back , but there's a difference between really wanting to make it back and actually being able to , and something that fire survivor advocates and fire survivors themselves , who are their best advocates , um , are saying is what that means is we need a quick recovery. Like we can't be waiting for years and years to get back , because for people who are on the edge , that's what's going to make the difference. And they say exactly that. They don't want to see an Altadena that is , you know , bought by developers and sold by developers. They want to see families return. And I think what we're seeing a year in is , is it's really a question mark , how many people are going to be able to do that. And so much of it depends on on how quickly people are going to be able to get the financial resources together to do that.
S1: I want to turn to this community resilience piece of this. You have a recent story you did on just showing some of the strong bonds and community engagement happening there in Altadena. Can you talk about that ? And yeah , tell us more about that and how it's playing a role in community morale. Yeah.
S3: Yeah. So I've as we've been discussing , talked to a lot of different fire survivors , different organizations and individuals. And something that really is a common theme is people have really banded together through this crisis. So the example , the story you're talking about is , um , you know , Altadena for for those who don't know , is not actually its own city. It's unincorporated LA County. That means its representation is at the L.A. County Board of Supervisors. Kathryn Barger is the representation represent a representative for Altadena. But Altadena does have this , you know , small local representation called the Altadena Town Council. And I was doing my story on bulk rebuilding , and I was talking to one of my sources on that , and he said , well , actually , I just wanted to tell you I'm a new town council member. And he said , and something that's really incredible is we had doubled the participation in our super local elections this year , even though , you know , almost our entire community is displaced. And I thought that was really , really an amazing thing to hear because this is , again , a hyper local election. You can't vote online , you can't mail in. People have to show up , you know , at the library or the grocery store and vote. And more people than ever came. And through reporting on that story , I went to the Altadena Town Council's final meeting of 2025 , and it was hugely emotional. People were crying. They were hugging each other and they were talking about how through this , all they had really tried to stick together and work together. And another sign of this kind of community cohesion that I think has stuck out to not just me , but a lot of people that are reporting on Altadena is I spoke to this , um , one fire survivor named Michael Tequila , and he is a block captain. Block captains are a sort of system that's been introduced in other in the wake of other big fires as well , where , you know , basically people in different neighborhoods sort of step up as a community leader. They correspond with their neighbors and also other block captains. So Michael Tassilo is a block captain in his neighborhood. And we were walking around looking at just all these empty lots , and he told me that I'm going to get the exact number wrong. But basically , out of the more than 100 neighbors that he had , he said only two had sold. And , you know , we're only a year out. And as we keep emphasizing , like that's really the beginning of the fire recovery process , we're looking at years until full recovery , but that really struck me and he said he said that's because this was a tight knit community before the fires. And it's even tighter now. And I was yeah , all these all these little glimpses of hope and these glimpses of people , you know , holding their hand out to their neighbor and saying , like , I want you to recover with me. Has it's been really moving.
S1: You know , we began this conversation with you , reflecting on your own experience , you know , not being far , not growing up far from Altadena.
S3: On the night that the fire broke out in Altadena. My family had our dearest family friends who lived in Altadena evacuate to my parents house in South Pasadena , and they lost their home in the fire and I , you know , interviewed somebody for a different story. And we we got to talking and it turns out they were my family , friends , neighbors. So I think , you know , we're local reporters , right ? We're local journalists. And I think these are the moments where you realize that it's really part of your vocation , not just to be reporting on the story , but it's really , you know , reporting from within the community. I think , you know , we had colleagues here in this newsroom who lost their homes , and it's provided us additional context , the ability to go deeper to find more sources. And I think also just , you know , to really think , think more deeply about how we can tell this story in its complexity and how we can share just the emotional , the range of emotional experiences. So it's it's been very moving for me on an individual level , I think for all of us in the newsroom. And it also , you know , means we really , really need and want to get this story right and we want to continue to stay on it because as we have this kind of up close look at what's happening. We can see that one year is is really , as I keep saying , just the start of the journey for these families and for these individuals. And we want to make sure that they aren't forgotten.
S1: I've been speaking with Libby Rainey reporter with LAist. Libby , thanks so much for sharing your your , you know , reminiscence and your experience with us.
S3: Thank you so much for having me.
S1: Coming up , even for homes that were left standing after last year's LA fires , many residents returned to smoke infested homes. More after the break. You're listening to KPBS roundtable. Welcome back to KPBS roundtable. I'm Andrew Bracken. We've been talking about Alta Dina's road to recovery. One year after the Eaton fire destroyed thousands of homes there. But for homes that did survive the flames. Smoke damage is another story. An investigation by The New York Times finds that some insurers are driving families back into homes that are contaminated by smoke. I'm joined now by New York Times reporters Rukmini Callimachi and Blackie Magliozzi. Rukmini , welcome to the show. To both of you. Rukmini , I'll start with you. Your reporting centers on one family in particular , the Van Ness family. Their homes survived the fire in Altadena. What has the past year been like for them ? Yes.
S5: Thank you for having me , Andrew. So Jeff and Kathleen Van Ness , I think , are our representative of what thousands of other homeowners in both Altadena and the Pacific Palisades are going through when their homes survived the flames , but not the smoke. So in the last year , they asked their insurer to test the house for toxins. There was a back and forth. The insurance delayed. Eventually it was tested. And despite the fact that there was that there were elevated levels of lead found in places like the attic. Their insurer deemed that essentially a superficial cleanup was enough and cut off the family's payments for their hotel , which forced them to return back to the house in August. That is when we met Jeff and Kathleen and their two children , Sylvia , who's age six , and Milo , who are age nine. The times paid for a professional to retest their house , and we found alarming levels of of things like lead , which is a known neurotoxin , 27 times the EPA limit in the kitchen , and then and then other bad things like beryllium , cadmium , chromium , etc. in the attic of their house. But beyond that , the times was able to connect the family to researchers at Mount Sinai who tested the family's hair , showing that that every member of the family was exposed to these metals the week that they returned back to the house. And as just one data point among many. Little Silvia , a little girl who's age six , had ten times the normal level of arsenic in her hair. Her brother had five times the normal level of lead.
S1: So black. I mean , what is. You know , the presence of all these toxins.
S6: Um , it is easier to show that they've been exposed , um , um , rather than like , say , some sort of potential health outcome. Um , what we do know is that some of these chemicals are neurotoxins and carcinogens and , uh , you know , do affect like , development. So , um , you know , something like lead is like a very well known thing , uh , in terms of the health effects long term on , like , children. It's pretty well-established that that has very severe consequences on young children like Milo and Sylvia. Um , so yeah , I'm not a healthcare professional , so I'm a reporter.
S1: Yeah , absolutely. I mean , then there the family's story reflects what many families are going through. And you spoke to many other families.
S6: I mean , we actually had them fill out a survey and , um , over and over again , a lot of them were going through what Jeff and Kathleen were going through , um , you know , fighting with their insurance to just listen to the the fact that they had third party tests in their hands that said there was chemistry , uh , with toxins , uh , being detected in their homes. And , uh , you know , that's just that's that's what got us starting to report on us , like , almost immediately after the fire.
S1: And , Rukmini , you know , you mentioned that the Vanessa family moved back into their home after their insurance insurer said it was okay to do so. Right. You're reporting right ? Finds that California insurers began trying to limit payouts for smoke damage more than a decade ago. Tell me about that trend. Yes.
S5: Yes. So about a decade ago , when when these large scale fires began , what California insurers initially tried to do is they tried to insert language in , in policy documents that essentially excluded smoke damage from , from what could be paid out. Those exclusions have essentially been struck down in court as recently as a as a big court settlement in , I believe , July of last year , in the summer of last year. And what what the experts that we've spoken to including two former California insurance commissioners , have said what has happened in the wake of that is now that they are on the hook to pay the smoke damage. What they've done instead is what experts and scientists allege is a kind of science for hire strategy , a manipulation of the science where they they hire contractors who either refuse to test for some of these toxins or test for only a small number of them. And who then , based on those results , come back and say to the family , you know , what you need to do is just a kind of superficial clean up science. Scientists are starting to say , in greater and greater numbers that these kind of urban conflagrations that we saw with the Eaton Fire and the Palisades Fire , where you don't just have wild , you know , wild land burning , you don't just have vegetation and trees , but you have Teslas with their with their lithium batteries and with the beryllium inside their starters. You have solar panels with hexavalent chromium. You have homes that were built before 1978 that may have been repainted , but still have a coat of lead paint underneath it , that these fires give off these toxic gases that penetrate the very fiber of the home. I'm not just talking about like the surfaces , like the floor , etc. they literally enter the cavities , the the beams , the walls , the plaster , the , um , even the marble. Uh , and what they are saying is that in order for these homes to be properly remediated , these surfaces need to be stripped. You're talking about a gut renovation , which obviously is extremely expensive. And so you now have a battle of the of the experts , the insurance elected experts who kind of predictably come to the conclusion that you can just mop this up. And then the independent experts that that increasingly are being hired by homeowners who are saying , wait a second , uh , beryllium is this deeply dangerous toxin ? No , it can't just be mopped up.
S1: Well , so there's yeah. So there is this larger debate here.
S5: They created a task force , the Smoke and remediation Task Force , that I believe has 13 , you know , commission members. They are supposed to come up with their recommendations in the next couple of months of what the guidelines should be. But a troubling thing that that we at The New York Times have reported on , and also our colleagues at the San Francisco Chronicle have reported on , is that it appears that this very task force is heavily staffed with , with essentially pro insurance contractors , the very people who signed off on the report telling Jeff and Kathleen Van Ness and their two little kids to go back into a lead contaminated house , or the people that are on this commission and that are that are shaping these recommendations. So there's a level of , um , distrust , I would say , among homeowners and , and frankly , fear of for consumer advocates and , and , and people in public health that this very body that is supposed to create these new standards might have , might have been hijacked by the industry that is trying to save money in the process.
S1: And how are the witnesses doing right now ? Rukmini.
S5: I suspect that Jeff and Kathleen might be listening to this very this very , uh , show. Um , I they've been in their home since , uh , since August. Uh , they've , they've done , you know , kind of a Herculean effort to clean up their own house beyond what the insurer did. The insurer paid , I think , around $25,000 to strip the insulation in the attic and to do some Hepa vacuuming things of that nature. Jeff has taken it upon himself to repaint every room in the house. Uh , they've thrown away most of their soft goods , you know , their their couch , their mattresses , their clothes. And Jeff is involved in what he , I think would describe himself as a kind of obsessive cleaning ritual where every day he mops and cleans and wipes and vacuums. Um , thankfully , the family , uh , seems to be healthy. Uh , but of course , uh , you know , these carcinogens and neurotoxins are known to develop over time.
S1: And Blacky , this story was a follow up to another piece where you actually spent more than 100 hours inside toxic homes. Tell me. Tell me what you found. You know how.
S6: Yeah , like you said , more than 100 hours , uh , shadowing hygienists , uh , going into these homes , uh , before they were remediated , uh , you know , to take samples and , uh , that was that was all in an effort to try to understand just exactly what an industrial hygienist does. And , you know , how they come to the conclusions they do. Uh , you know what we found , uh , by getting our hands on as many , um , you know , hygienist reports as we could. And again , uh , we did that both just by talking to people on the ground , but then also through a survey where we had over 500 verified standing home survivors. You know , hand us things like , uh , their , their reports , uh , their hygienist reports. What we found was that basically , it's kind of rare that you have a hygienist that tests , like , significantly. Like , sometimes you get a test that's just like one wipe per room. And , you know , smoke is not a uniform thing. It might affect it might infiltrate , like , you know , one side of the house or one side of a room and not the other. And so there's a lot of subjectivity as to where you could , where you decide to sample in order to , you know , um , to , to , you know , potentially bias a test , uh , very easily , like if you swab something vertically versus horizontally or and I'm not saying I'm just saying that , uh , very often the tests that most homeowners get are just testing for char ash may be led in asbestos as well. Um , and , you know , it's , it's it's considered , uh , going above and beyond if they test or something like , uh , you know , another set of , uh , heavy metals , which are called Cam 17. But , you know , it's not just metals. I mean , you know , one hygienist that we followed , uh , found like examples of cyanide , uh , you know , diffused into the walls , uh , the drywall or the couch. Um , so , you know , this is there's just a lot of chemistry that isn't being tested for. And that just once again , points to the fact that there's , like , no standards that anyone's really like. And everyone has for homes. You know , we have workplace standards , but even those are very limited. And we have no standards for what what we're supposed to do to remediate a home or test the home. And , uh , that's kind of the central thing I think is very important here. There there is a set of , uh , you know , hygienists that , uh , have put out guidelines through the American Industrial Hygiene Association. Uh , and that basically treats these guidelines as standard. But those standards are not. They're not actual standards. They often are citing non peer reviewed material. They're citing their own work that are just like white papers. Uh yeah. And insurance companies are , you know , also citing these things as uh , the rationale for rejecting like people's claims.
S5: So yeah , in the case of , in the case of Jeff and Kathleen's home , they're insured by farmers , which is the second largest , uh , home insurance. California. Yeah. And , um , and , uh , among the kind of just kind of shocking things we found is in the families a settlement letter where they're told you're going to get this amount of money , you know , to do these kind of repairs. Uh , they have an entire section where they lay out their belief on what the science is. This is an official farmers document on farmers letterhead. And there's and they say in their Scientific studies plural have shown blah blah blah blah blah that these things can be essentially , you know , cleaned through. Through household cleaning methods. Through mopping , etc.. And we studied that section. There's a single footnote that refers to a quote study. We went down the rabbit rabbit hole to try to find what the study was. And we discovered that it existed only on the private website of a remediation type company. Um , and once we finally were able to get a copy of this so-called study , it was I'm not exaggerating. It's three pages long , with most of most of it being pictures , graphics. Right ? Um , the the author of the so-called study himself said , it's not a study , it's just a what did he say ? He called it a.
S6: Research summary.
S5: A research summary. And and the thing is that , you know , of course , most homeowners don't have , you know , the resources that we have to even look into this. Um , but , uh , but once you start following what they claim as the , the science , you end up , you end up , you know , kind of at the bottom of an empty can very quickly. This is what , um , David Michaels , who's the longest serving administrator of OSHA , described in our story as science for hire. And it's been happening for decades , since before the tobacco litigation. Um , apparently , I think in the 1930s , uh , the sugar industry started to hire their own scientists to try to disprove that sugar causes cavities or to or to poke holes into that idea. Then later , with tobacco , you know , the scientists were out there trying to claim that smoking doesn't cause cancer. And then , you know , to bring it to California. Uh. What happened ? What happened in Hinkley , California , with the hexavalent chromium ? The famous Erin Brockovich movie. Um , it's it's the it's the same playbook. It's , uh , the same the same sort of roster of scientists. Uh , you know , in air quotes that get hired to put out things that look scientific but that , in fact , are , are just , um , are not in the interest of public health.
S1: We're going to have to leave it there. Thank you so much for sharing more about your reporting. I've been speaking with New York Times reporters Rukmini Callimachi and Blackie Magliozzi. Roundtable was produced by Ashley Rush , technical producer Brandon Truffaut. Um , you can always listen to KPBS roundtable anytime as a podcast. Thanks so much for listening and have a great weekend.
