Internal emails prove that the office of Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass had been warned of “critical” fire conditions before the Palisades Fire — despite the mayor’s claims that she knew nothing of the danger when she chose to fly to Africa.
Internal emails obtained by the LA Times show that the city’s Emergency Management Department warned the mayor’s team of “damaging winds and elevated fire conditions occurring next week” on January 3 — the day before Bass boarded a plane to attend the inauguration ceremony for the president of Ghana.
One email, which had been sent to more than 100 officials across multiple departments, included an attachment from the National Weather Service with a giant, red flame graphic and a warning of “critical fire conditions,” including 80-mph winds forecast for Jan. 7.
EMD officials also emailed two mayoral aides directly and asked to schedule a “tentative” coordination meeting to discuss the situation.
Yet the warning never reached Bass, who found herself sipping cocktails at a US Embassy party while her city burned 7,500 miles away.
Bass would later pass the blame to Los Angeles Fire Chief Kristin Crowley, whom the mayor sacked last month for her mishandling of the crisis that destroyed thousands of homes and killed 12 people.
In an interview with Fox 11, she accused the chief of “not being able to predict the seriousness” of the situation and said she would never have left the city had the fire department warned her of the danger.
Deputy Mayor Zach Seidl, who saw the emails from the EMD, admitted to the LA Times that he did not inform his boss about the warning before she left the city.
He claimed the EMD’s use of the word “tentative” when scheduling the coordination meeting led him to believe the danger wasn’t all that serious.
The EMD countered that the word “tentative” was regarding the specific meeting time, not the severity of the situation.
When the Times asked why Bass’ staffers didn’t inform her of the fire danger before she flew to Africa, Seidl too tried to pass the buck to Crowley.
“Before other major weather emergencies, the Mayor — or at minimum, the Mayor’s Chief of Staff — has received a direct call from the Fire Chief, flagging the severity of the situation. This time, that call never came,” he said.
But even if Crowley did not warn the mayor’s office, the Emergency Management Department did.
“This windstorm event has the potential to produce life-threatening and destructive wind gusts of 80 to 100 mph,” EMD officials warned in the meeting, which was held on Jan. 6, according to a summary obtained by the Times.