Rick Caruso on California’s Collapse: Broken Leadership, LA Wildfire Failures & the Fix

Summary

• Caruso’s wildfire case is that competency—not ideology—could have saved the Palisades. His team pre-positioned private firefighters, water trucks, and retardant two days before the Palisades fire, then saved its village and surrounding block while lending equipment and water to the Los Angeles Fire Department. His maxim: “What’s predictable is preventable.”
• Jason argued the Palisades fire was “completely preventable,” or at minimum that its damage could have been significantly mitigated. Caruso said the fire department was never pre-deployed and thought a fire at the same location seven days earlier had not been extinguished, but instead smoldered and reignited before the winds arrived; the largest reservoir was unfilled, and hydrants stopped supplying water.
• The recovery now faces an execution bottleneck. After roughly 7,000 homes were lost, rebuilding remains slow because of permitting red tape; Caruso’s emblematic example is that city plan checkers still work from home instead of being deployed to a Palisades construction trailer.
• Caruso sees California’s political dysfunction as a mix of incompetence, institutional stagnation, and weak voter accountability. Sacks blamed a one-party machine; Caruso emphasized public apathy, offices treated as lifetime careers, and highly motivated ideological extremes whose ideas “may be well-intended” but have produced poor results.
• He credited Gavin Newsom with waiving CEQA and Coastal Commission constraints but said the state must go much further. Altadena, Malibu, and the Palisades need new water systems and underground power lines, requiring state action and federal financial help; Caruso warned that political name-calling will not secure that money.
• Caruso’s private-sector doctrine is to turn customer experience—and even apparent liabilities—into durable assets. The Grove’s trees, water, flowers, music, and trolley follow a company mission to “bring joy and enrich people’s lives”; at the Rosewood Miramar, a train others considered disqualifying became an amenity celebrated with a trackside bar and bell.
• His public-safety platform combines zero tolerance for encampments and street drug sales with housing, addiction, and mental-health services. He called Los Angeles’s reported $900,000 cost per person removed from the streets evidence of massive waste, backed secure borders and shutting down drugs, yet said any federal interference in Los Angeles should be a “very, very last resort” and did not support it here—local leaders should empower police to enforce existing laws.

Deep dive

1. Private readiness exposed public-system failure

• Caruso said his first leadership decision was simply to remain in Los Angeles: “I stayed in town.” Lessons from protecting the Rosewood Miramar construction site taught his team to bring in private firefighters, water trucks, and retardant so municipal crews could remain focused on homes.
• The Palisades village was built with noncombustible materials and no open vents for embers; Caruso said about 90% of Palisades and Altadena homes burned “from the inside out.” His resources were stationed two days before the fire, after warnings of catastrophic winds.
• The team saved the village and its block, then loaned equipment and water to LAFD when hydrants failed. Caruso thought the fire from seven days earlier had smoldered and reignited before the winds, while crews were not pre-deployed and the largest reservoir was unfilled.

2. Rebuilding is stuck in an accountability vacuum

• Months after approximately 7,000 homes were lost, Caruso’s progress report was blunt: “Not enough.” He blamed city and county red tape for making rebuilding slower than it should be.
• His sharpest example: plan checkers have remained at home since COVID. A competent mayor, he argued, would put ten of them in a Palisades construction trailer “where the people need you.”
• Caruso diagnosed “incompetence” compounded by stagnation: officials unequipped for difficult decisions freeze, urgency disappears, and decision-making stops.
• Sacks blamed California’s one-party political machine; Caruso offered a different emphasis—apathetic voters, offices treated as lifetime careers, and ideological extremes that reliably mobilize. “We don’t hold our elected officials accountable.”

3. Recovery needs state power, not opportunistic rezoning

• Caruso said he did not believe zoning should be changed on the backs of people who lost their homes and businesses. Any broader planning debate should happen in an orderly fashion; the immediate obligation is restoring communities and convincing residents that government “has got your back.”
• He credited Newsom for waiving CEQA and Coastal Commission constraints, but wants state authority used to rebuild water systems and underground power across Altadena, Malibu, and the Palisades. He said the federal government should help financially and warned that political “name-calling” is a poor way to build a relationship for bringing billions of dollars into California.
• Asked whether he would run for mayor or governor, Caruso said either office could be effective and hinted, “I may give that a try.” He did not choose between them.

4. Consumer empathy is Caruso’s operating doctrine

• Caruso described his company’s business as bringing “joy” and enriching lives. That mission grants permission to build what competitors overlook: outdoor spaces with trees, water, flowers, music, and the Grove’s trolley.
• At the Rosewood Miramar, skeptics saw a passing train as fatal to a five-star resort. Caruso made it an amenity, placing a bar beside the tracks where guests ring a bell and celebrate its arrival.
• His public-sector benchmark follows the same logic: if California is the world’s fourth-largest economy, as elected officials often say, residents should experience top-tier housing, schools, safety, business opportunity, and quality of life. “Then act like it.”

5. Public order requires enforcement without defaulting to federal force

• Caruso’s homelessness position pairs no street encampments with housing and treatment. Los Angeles, he said, spends $900,000 per person removed from the streets; he would redirect wasted billions toward organizations with strong records of providing housing, mental-health services, and addiction treatment.
• He backed secure borders and shutting down drugs “100%,” arguing that a livable city cannot simultaneously tolerate open street dealing.
• A resident told him that Sepulveda Basin encampments had booby traps, including tripwires and homemade bombs; one firefighter reportedly lost an ear. Caruso rejected the mayor’s description of cleanup as complicated: “You go in there and clean it up. Period. Full stop.”
• Caruso distinguished federally governed Washington, D.C., from Los Angeles or Chicago and did not support National Guard intervention locally. His preferred answer is accountable leadership that authorizes—and demands—that police enforce the law.