5 years after the Woolsey Fire, most Ventura County homes not yet rebuilt

Pam Davison and Larry Koch pulled beach chairs over to a window for their first dinner back after a deadly wildfire took their home of 33 years.

A few beds and a gifted couch sat in a pile on the floor of their rebuild as they ate cold cuts and watched the sun set over the Santa Monica Mountains. It was a view they had loved for decades — one that turned an eerie red as the Woolsey Fire raged.

On Nov. 8, 2018, the blaze started on the old Santa Susana Field Laboratory property near Simi Valley as Santa Ana winds gusted. In a matter of days, the fire burned close to 97,000 acres in Ventura and Los Angeles counties. Three people died and more than 1,600 structures were destroyed, mostly homes, from Oak Park to Malibu.

Roughly 130 homes were lost in Ventura County. Five years later, a third have been rebuilt.

Reasons why some lots stayed empty run the gamut.

Residents faced insurance shortfalls or decided to sell and move elsewhere. They battled steep competition from thousands trying to rebuild statewide, including hundreds of local residents who lost homes in the Thomas Fire a year earlier. Others got mired in construction costs, permitting or disaster assistance programs.

Koch and Davison credit their insurance agent and a chance meeting with a contract attorney in getting an early start. The attorney recommended a contractor and architect. Covered through the California Fair Plan, a last resort insurance, their agent had updated their policy year after year, giving them nearly enough to rebuild.

"I owe her big time," Koch said.

Construction on the new house started within a year. A modern design and steel frame replaced the geodesic home. The number of bedrooms, square footage and footprint stayed roughly the same — requirements for an expedited rebuilding process.

Around 2 ½ years after the fire, Koch and Davison returned to the spot they love in the mountains off Yerba Buena Road.

Dozens of empty lots remain 5 year after Woolsey Fire

Most of the 1,643 structures lost in the Woolsey Fire were in Los Angeles County, including hundreds of homes in Malibu.

The vast majority of the residential damage locally was in remote areas of the coastal Santa Monica Mountains and more urban communities of Oak Park, Bell Canyon, a gated community near the edge of the county, and the city of Thousand Oaks.

City and county records show:

• In unincorporated areas of the county, an initial damage assessment showed 94 homes were lost. Officials issued 55 building permits for residential properties as of this week. Of those, 27 have been completed.

• In Thousand Oaks, the city lost homes and other structures to both Woolsey and Hill fires, which started the same day. Of the 36 homes destroyed, nearly half had been rebuilt within five years, Planning Manager Stephen Kearns said. The first home was completed in September 2020.

• Most of the other residential properties in the city were in the rebuilding process as of this month. Five property owners had yet to seek a building permit.

In Thousand Oaks, the North Ranch neighborhood took one of the biggest hits. After the fire, city officials assigned planners as well as building and safety personnel to each homeowner, Kearns said.

Rules generally allowed some exemptions from local policies, but all rebuilds have to meet current building codes, including those designed to better protect against fires.

Some owners reported long disputes over insurance or other financial issues such as steep costs for hillside construction. But many of the still empty lots have been sold, said Winston Wright, a county planning manager. Sky-rocketing real estate prices in 2020 may have pushed some to sell.

Some of the wildfire survivors, however, are still working to rebuild, he said. Typically, those who lost homes in remote areas of the Santa Monica Mountains faced additional challenges compared to those in more urban communities, Wright said.

Some struggled with insurance, construction costs or access issues such as poor roads or damaged creek crossings, he said.

'Taxing everything we had'

Less than a year before Woolsey, the largest fire in modern state history burned through Ventura and Santa Barbara counties. The Thomas Fire erupted in drought-stressed brush north of Santa Paula on Dec. 4, 2017. Two people died in the blaze that burned nearly 282,000 acres in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties, destroying 1,063 structures, mostly homes.

Over the next four years, seven other California fires would grow bigger than Thomas. Woolsey didn't make that list but became one of the most destructive fires in the state.

“We had hit multiple years of drought and heat and then had extended periods of wind,” Ventura County Fire Chief Dustin Gardner said. “The fires were just burning at speeds and intensities statewide. They were taxing everything we had.”

Around 20 minutes before Woolsey broke out, another blaze ignited a few miles east of Camarillo in Hill Canyon. Stoked by Santa Ana winds, flames jumped Highway 101 in minutes and trapped drivers in their cars. The fire raced into neighborhoods in nearby Camarillo Springs and Dos Vientos and headed toward CSU Channel Islands.

The first report of the Woolsey Fire came in at 2:24 p.m. That first night, Hill became the lesser concern as Woolsey pummeled its way into Oak Park, a suburban community near the Ventura-Los Angeles county line.

"It came down with such intensity," Gardner said.

The fire front stretched to the size of Oak Park, he said. Firefighters had little time to fight flames directly, he said. They rushed from one spot to the next, pulling people out of the way.

The blaze later spread into Los Angeles County. By early the next morning, it had jumped Highway 101, picking up even more steam as flames ran toward Malibu and the coast.

1 less person to rescue

The day after the fire started, Carol De La Sotta inched along Pacific Coast Highway in a crush of traffic, her dog BeBe in the back of her car. Earlier, she had left her Ventura County home in the Santa Monica Mountains to help friends in Malibu as the fire headed their way.

They were relocating horses when the fire swept closer. In the madness that followed, she lost track of her friends and couldn't get a cell connection. She could feel the heat of the fire on her face and hear the roar of the flames. She had to try to leave.

“I'll be one less person and one less animal that they have to rescue,” she remembers thinking.

She made it to a friend's place in Redondo Beach hours later and found out Woolsey had turned back toward Ventura County and her home of close to 20 years. The next day, she found out her house was gone.

“I lost everything I own except for my car and my dog," she said.

She stayed with friends or rented rooms as she worked with the county and a state program for wildfire survivors. After two years without success, she bought an RV using a home line of credit she had before the fire. She towed it to her property off Yerba Buena Road and moved in with BeBe.

Five years after the fire, they still live in the RV.

Disaster assistance runs out

De La Sotta had no insurance money. Her policy lapsed just days before the fire because of a mix up with billing dates, she said. She found out after her home burned down. Disaster assistance funds helped her pay rent initially but eventually ran out.

In 2020, she lost her job as a graphic artist as the coronavirus pandemic shut businesses.

Early on, a representative from the state program told her everything would be taken care of since she hoped to rebuild a manufactured home. But that was years ago, she said.

She is now on her sixth caseworker and has repeatedly submitted the same bundle of documents with each new request. She got an email recently asking her to send them again, this time for an eligibility counselor.

Last week, she sat in a chair in the RV. BeBe flopped down on another as the Santa Anas howled outside. After years and several soil reports, her county building permit application was finally approved, she said.

She won't celebrate yet. After few ups and many downs since the fire, she wants to hold the permit in her hand before she believes it is true.

Starting over at 92

Mildred Himelfarb lived at the top of a canyon in the Santa Monica Mountains for 50 years before the Woolsey Fire.

She moved there with her husband from Van Nuys after their kids went to college. Over the years, they planted dozens of fruit trees and cared for animals big and small. Her husband later passed away. In the late 1990s, her daughter, Elaine, and her granddaughter moved into their own bungalow on the property.

It was her granddaughter who insisted they leave — smoke from the Woolsey Fire still in the distance. They packed two cars with pets, a few photo albums, passports and medications and drove down the canyon to a Malibu coffee shop. They thought they would be back.

A couple of hours later, the entire area was evacuated.

Mildred, 92 at the time, her daughter, granddaughter and her granddaughter’s boyfriend squeezed into one car with a dog, two cats and two tortoises in their 70s. They stayed together, leaving the other car behind in the parking lot, as they fled south with hundreds of others through black clouds of smoke.

With both homes lost, they moved from spot to spot after the fire, spending time with family out of state and at a house in Thousand Oaks. Mildred later moved to Arizona to live near her son and daughter-in-law until she decided what to do next.

A couple of years ago, she decided to sell the Malibu property that sits just on the other side of the Ventura County line.

“I'm almost 100 years old,” she said. “I don't think rebuilding was an option.”

She decided she would stay in the rural town in Arizona. When the insurance money came through, she decided to build a home there — a place with a lovely view, she said, but no steep, canyon roads. She moved in this spring.

'It's all gone'

Davison and Koch moved back in 2021. But it didn't feel like home.

All of the things they had collected — keepsakes from trips, family heirlooms, their daughters' trophies and mementos — were lost in the fire.

“We were so settled for 30 years into a home we created and filled with memories,” Davison said. “It’s all gone now."

Without those same memories, it no longer felt like home, she said.

She drove down the canyon five years ago with a few framed photos and family paintings in a box. At the time, she thought she was being extra cautious. Koch left later in the Porsche he bought in 1972 as flames reached nearby homes. He grabbed a computer and a heavy sculpture on his way out.

Within hours, the fire blackened hillsides and left behind thick, smoldering ash throughout their rural community. Their home burned to the ground.

They have since built a house much more hardened against fire, Koch said. They love it from the huge, thick windows to the open floor plan. Their grandchildren call it a castle.

Over the past two years or so, they gradually filled the rooms. Now, as they walk through the house, they point to a couch from their daughter, a loveseat given to them by a neighbor, and a new trundle bed grandkids pile into during visits.

They talk about their first family Thanksgiving, one held by candlelight after the power went out, and how a drizzly day pushed dozens inside during Koch’s 80th birthday party in September.

A few reminders of the fire stayed. A barbecue grill survived with a few scorch marks and a missing wheel. Part of a melted car engine — a hardened, silver stream of sorts — decorates the front garden.

The family paintings are back on the walls and the sculpture Koch grabbed sits near the staircase. On a new kitchen table, a stuffed animal left behind by a grandchild hugs a candle.

“It’s just now becoming home,” Davison said.

Cheri Carlson covers the environment for the Ventura County Star. Reach her at cheri.carlson@vcstar.com or 805-437-0260.

This article originally appeared on Ventura County Star: Most Ventura County homes burned in Woolsey Fire not rebuilt