A mom’s plea from Pacific Palisades - Guest Post

A mom’s plea from Pacific Palisades The Fourth of July in Pacific Palisades wasn’t just an event. It felt like a living postcard — marching bands, vintage convertibles with smiling local heroes and floats decorated by every scout troop and neighborhood association. When the parade finally arrived, cheers rippled through the Alphabet Streets neighborhood like waves. As magical as the day itself was, it was the feeling of community that lingered. On Iliff Street, where I grew up, neighbors didn’t just know each other — they felt like family. I can only relive those memories in my mind, because now the Iliff Street I knew is gone. In fact, the entire Alphabet Streets, along with most of my beloved town and childhood home, has disappeared after the Palisades Fire. It feels as though someone redrew the map, not just of the neighborhood, but of my childhood. Nothing in Pacific Palisades will ever be the same, but, every Fourth of July to come, I hope I find myself smiling at the memories. And I need that to remember who I am. The Palisades Fire didn’t have to happen this way. One day, I’ll sit my daughter down — she’s only three now — and try to explain how we lost everything because the people entrusted with protecting us failed to act. I’ll tell my daughter about our mayor, who lacked the foresight to prepare for a disaster we all knew was coming. I’ll explain how our governor allowed the reservoirs to run dry, the fire hydrants to stand useless while firefighters fought valiantly with too little water. I’ll have to make her understand that it wasn’t just a fire that destroyed what we had built — it was a failure of leadership. When I confronted Gov. Gavin Newsom in front of my daughter’s destroyed preschool, I carried with me the weight of every parent he had let down. His response wasn’t one of accountability or compassion — instead, he deflected, mocked and dismissed my concerns. Newsom told me he was “literally on the phone with the president,” but I was able to see that he was literally not even on the phone at all. I have yet to hear from the governor himself, but I hope my daughter will know that her preschool — her little world of safety — was worth fighting for, that she and her friends deserved better and that her mother did everything in her power to demand accountability and transparency from those in power. How do you tell a child the truth when it’s this grim? How do you explain that the people who were supposed to protect us didn’t care enough, didn’t act quickly enough or simply didn’t plan? I’ll tell her that her elected leaders failed her — not to instill bitterness, but to teach her to demand better. I’ll tell her to look for answers beyond party affiliation to solve problems, to ask the hard questions and to hold those in power accountable. I’ll tell her that her grandparents came to this country form Iran over a half-century ago, drawn by the promise of hard work and integrity. They faced their own struggles, but never gave up. That resilience is her legacy, too. The fire I witnessed had no time for me or my feelings. It moved with purpose — relentless, unfeeling and ravenous. As I sat in gridlock for four hours, inching down the hill to safety, the fire raged behind me, a monstrous backdrop of destruction. My daughter wasn’t with me. She had been picked up from preschool by another family — an incredible act of kindness that ensured her safety. But kindness didn’t spare them — the family that took her in also lost its home to the flames. And as I tell her all this, I’ll remind her of something else: resilience. Fires destroy, but they also spark renewal. We’ll rebuild, somehow. We’ll find new ways to live and to thrive. I’ll make sure she knows that while the fire revealed the failures of our leaders, it also revealed the strength of our family and our community. We endured this, and we’ll endure whatever comes next. Because while leadership matters, so does the ability to rise when others let you fall. I’ll hold her close and tell her the truth, even when it hurts. Because the truth is too important to ignore.