How the LA fires could exacerbate California’s homelessness crisis

Jennielynn Holmes stood in the middle of a make-shift evacuation center when the scope of the crisis hit her.

Surrounded by thousands of people who had just fled the Tubbs Fire that burned through Santa Rosa in 2017, Holmes realized many of these people would soon be added to the area’s already extensive caseload of unhoused clients.

“This is the group of people (that) is one crisis away from entering homelessness,” thought Holmes, who helps lead the area’s homelessness response as CEO of Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Santa Rosa. “And the crisis is here.”

As multiple wildfires continue to incinerate homes and displace tens of thousands of people in Los Angeles County, experts worry about the long-term effects the fires will have on the state’s already dire homelessness crisis. In other parts of California burned by past wildfires, communities are still dealing with the fallout years later.

People who had too little or no insurance on their homes, or who rented, sometimes end up on the street when their homes burn and they can’t find other places to live.

But it’s not just people whose homes burn down who feel the pain. Renters in undamaged buildings get evicted because landlords raise rents to take advantage of refugees’ desperation — or because landlords lost another home in the fire and need to move into rental units.