Advice from Katie Arrington
Program Manager
Recovery and Resiliency Division | Office the County Administrator | Boulder, Colorado
January 14, 2025
| < BACK | DOWNLOAD AS PDF |
I’m going to not overload this first communication with too much information, but just start with the basics, which is applicable if your house is damaged or destroyed. If your house was damaged or smoke impacted you don’t want to move back in, until you’ve connected with an industrial hygienist (I’ll find some for California – local governments may hire them as a resource for residents).
1. Call your insurance company and find out what your ALE (additional living expenses) coverage is and how long it goes for. Essentially this is the coverage that puts you in short and long-term housing during your recovery.
2. Secure your long-term housing. The housing market will be stretched with this many losses, so getting in somewhere as soon as possible is important. Having a place to go, will help with your overall mental health stability, especially if you have kids.
3. There will likely be a disaster assistance center or DAC set up once the fires are more under control. FEMA will be there. Please go and register with FEMA, registering with FEMA whether or not you need FEMA funds is critical—other funding sources including low interest loans for rebuilding will likely require proof of a FEMA registration.
4. United Policy holders (a non-profit) in California has a wealth of information and is a long-term trusted partner with many local governments. Here’s an additional link for registering for their Disaster Recovery information newsletter. You’ll get invited to a webinar happening at the end of the month which will be really useful.
5. Do not go home and look for precious items at your property. There are national nonprofits who specialize in sifting through debris, in a safe manner and as soon as I hear which ones are coming to LA, I’ll send the information.
6. You will get more information than you ever knew what to do with. You will forget it. You will ask the same questions a dozen times. Try not to be hard on yourself if this happens. Whether you are adequately resourced or under resourced this is major trauma and my experience is that information has to be communicated many times in different methods in order for it to sink in.
This is the immediate stuff. If you have specific additional questions let me know by writing to support@arica.org; otherwise I’ll continue to send additional information, especially as I hear more about what is going on locally.