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In an instant, Altadena residents lost both businesses and homes – Jobsmaa.com

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Gary Meyers' house burned to the ground last week The Eaton fire broke out. So is the North Lake Avenue pet store she bought from her uncle 20 years ago.

The double loss of her home and Steve's pets She has been a part of her entire life leaving two poles of society in mourning.

“That's the thing: There's nobody there,” Meyers, 56, said. “If my pet store survives, I can't stay in business because nobody lives there. Everybody's gone.”

Eaton was destroyed by fire Over 14,000 acres. Entire neighborhood blocks Altadena has been wiped out. And while the number of destroyed structures continues to climb into the thousands, the total extent of damage is still unknown.

More than 42,000 people live in the unincorporated city above Pasadena. Unlike the rest of Los Angeles County, where it's not uncommon for residents to travel miles between home and work, many Altadenans live and work in the pristine hillside community. Data shows nearly 10,500 residents will do so by 2023, according to Supervisor Kathryn Barker's office.

The fire left many residents struggling with questions of how to rebuild while housing, income and community are uplifted.

Janet Lee's parents' house was destroyed by fire. Nearby, a fire engulfed the street where their beloved restaurant had served the community since the 1980s. As neighboring establishments crumbled to the ground, Fair Oaks Burger – The Lees' “American Dream” has somehow survived since they immigrated from South Korea.

A photo of a family

Janet Lee, left, says her family's restaurant, Fair Oaks Burger, is their “American dream.” It's one of the few restaurants standing, but with much of the community destroyed, she wonders who will return.

(Courtesy of Janet Lee)

This is one of the few remaining area restaurants.

But by Lee's count, 80% of the restaurant's customers lost their homes in the Altadena fire. It even claimed the lives of regulars in the long run.

She wonders who will return to keep the business going if the restaurant is able to reopen.

“How do you rebuild when your entire community is in shambles?” Lee, 52, started working in restaurants as a teenager.

“I hope people stay.”

Altadena Hardware A staple in the community for over 80 years, it has been owned by the Orlandini family for the past 15 years. The houses of parents and brothers, now occupying this place, Saved from fire. But their shop is gone – and this has affected the staff as well.

Rob Orlandini, 38, said the store's future is clear — they will rebuild. How and when remains uncertain.

“This is my livelihood, this is my brother's livelihood,” he said. “You pour every bit of yourself into your business and then one morning it's gone, it's just crazy.”

A photograph of the burnt building

Altadena Hardware Eaton was destroyed by fire. (Colin Shalby/Los Angeles Times)

(Colin Shalby/Los Angeles Times)

Many of the burned businesses and schools were owned or staffed by local residents, whose homes were also destroyed. residents who operate landscaping and day care businesses; Rancho's longtime dive bar owners; The staff at Venice's Pizza, where loyal customers were regulars.

A fundraising campaign was started asking for help. But a week after the fire, many people with deep ties to the community were stuck in a state of suspension, zoomed out of their ability to return to the scene to survey the aftermath and map out their next steps.

Angel Ponca, 45, called it a “dream” to move to Altadena, where she and her husband have been raising their daughter since 2018. In the community located at the foot of the hills, Bonka's morning routine includes going to her daughter's primary school. Where she also worked.

Her home on Raymond Avenue was an unofficial annex of the historic Pasadena Waldorf School community, she said. Her family's doors were always open to hospitality.

Now both places are gone.

“My daughter lost her school campus, she lost her home,” Ponca said, adding that the devastation “is so far away and so close to home at the same time.”

Ponca, herself and her retired husband, Filed an insurance claim The school is evaluating how to stay open without housing and the K-8 campus, where at least a dozen employees lost their homes. The high school and preschool campus, not far away, thanks teachers and families who put out the fire.

For now, the family is living in a long-stay hostel, unsure of what will happen next.

Tiffany Hockenhull, 38, had a terrifying escape from the Altadena home once owned by her grandparents in the 1960s. Hours earlier, as the fire grew, his brother had evacuated to a home on Calcitta Drive — which seemed safer than where he lived to the east. Then the fire jumped to the west and rained down a “basketball-sized volcano” on her street, destroying nearly every home — including hers.

“I've never run for my life like that before,” she said in disbelief. “It's something I'd never wish on my worst enemy.”

Lost home three weeks after mother's death.

Nearby, the elementary school where he taught as head coach also burned down. Without that income the school is closed. She didn't know when she would be able to return Eliot Arts Magnet AcademyHeavily damaged by fire. For now, she's taking time to process things, hoping her community will be restored.

“Once this healing process has begun and it's going to be rebuilt,” he said. “You know, when we heal we can rebuild.”

A photo of a burned building in Altadena

People stop at a scene of burned businesses on North Lake Avenue in Altadena.

(Christina House/Los Angeles Times)

Bruce Steele loved his bees. They had distinct personalities, as one might say of a beloved pet. For decades, the beekeeper of 40 years watched them and talked to them as he worked.

Last week, a fire destroyed 185 of his beehives throughout the Altadena area, including those in his home. He and his wife lived there for more than 25 years, running a bee pollination and honey-making service in a modest farmhouse in the middle of an oak grove.

Steele, 75, is heartbroken after losing his comfort zone and his beekeeping business twice. He's in the early stages of evaluating how to reintegrate, but he can't imagine his life without his bees — a lifelong passion that has been his main source of income for years.

“I'm determined at this point to continue it. I can't really see myself not doing it,” he said.

“It's a mountain to climb.”


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