What happens when you can't afford to evacuate?

I’ve lived in Los Angeles’ Koreatown neighborhood since I moved to the city in 2017. As a person who lives in L.A., I’m used to the fire season. It’s sad to see images of the city on fire, but it’s rare that they have much impact on my life. However, the combined Eaton and Palisades fires that are currently ravaging the city have brought up a lot of feelings for me around safety and how money and resources affect decision-making.

Tuesday night, the fires had begun, but things were still slow-moving for the most part. Shortly before midnight, my wife’s father sent a message telling her and her sisters that the Eaton Fire was getting close to his home in Sierra Madre, about 20 miles away from our neighborhood. He decided to evacuate to Monrovia, in the San Gabriel Valley, where his partner lives. We felt comfortable going to bed knowing that he was going to be OK.

As we lay in bed, I suggested that we should think about making go-bags, just in case. But as we talked, I began to think about the logistics of what packing up and leaving our apartment would look like. My wife and I have an 11-year-old son. We also have five pets: two cats, a dog and two guinea pigs. The bigger pets have carrying cases, but it can be a real challenge to get them into the carriers. And could we even get the guinea pigs out? I couldn’t carry them in their cage; it’s too cumbersome and would take up the entire back seat of our car.

Thankfully, the idea of a go-bag was pretty abstract when we went to sleep. But when we woke up at around 7 on Wednesday morning, we saw that more friends had begun leaving their homes. My wife warned that it smelled like smoke as soon as she walked out of our front door, so I told my son to make sure he wore a mask any time he was going to be outside at school.

Around noon, we received a message from his school telling parents that the school was closing immediately, following decisions by the school district. Around 5 p.m., it was decided that school wouldn’t be held on Thursday. As of Thursday afternoon, we were still waiting to hear about plans for Friday.

While I made dinner, my wife came into the kitchen, telling me that Runyon Canyon was on fire. We have a friend who lives close to Runyon, so I immediately texted her. Minutes later, I received a text back: “Runyon on fire. Forced evacuation. Packing.” My heart dropped.

We began to worry more. It would take some pretty strong winds to blow the fire our way, and there’s really no imminent threat of fire where we live — but should we pack anyway? Anything could happen. We decided it would be in our best interest to throw a few bags together.

But then, where would we go? The people we would normally stay with both had to evacuate. Additionally, the safest places are easily an hour or more away. On top of that, we couldn’t really afford to stay at a place that would accommodate our whole crew.

Ultimately, the Sunset Fire was put out before we could finish deliberating about packing more bags. We were lucky enough not to have to leave.

But what about people in similar circumstances to us who do have to leave?

According to a Bank of America survey reported by CNBC, nearly half of Americans said they are living paycheck to paycheck. I work as a freelance writer, and my wife is an arts administrator at our son’s school. We don’t have a lot of money for sudden expenses like a hotel room or an Airbnb. And while Airbnb is offering free temporary housing to those displaced by the fires, we wouldn’t feel right taking space from people who are in far worse situations than we are. We could probably swing one night, but anything more could seriously affect our finances for the rest of the month. I’m sure most Angelenos are in the same boat, afraid of how these fires will affect their immediate finances, even if they don’t lose anything.

We’re hearing a lot of stories about people who are smartly evacuating when they’re being told to leave. But not many people are talking about the sacrifices they’re making in the name of safety. Los Angeles County has been setting up places for people to seek shelter, and even animal drop-off shelters. It’s encouraging to see the city looking out for its citizens that way, and everyone who needs those resources should absolutely be using them. Sadly, I can’t help but think about what gets left behind: pets, cherished items, even people, because people don’t have enough resources to bring them along.

According to a YouGov poll released on X, 33% of Americans said they could definitely afford to leave their homes if they were forced to evacuate. That is an alarming reality: Less than half of the Americans polled were confident they could afford to leave. Nearly 24% believe that leaving is an unlikely possibility, even if it were only for a few days. One mom of six children with four dogs tearfully shared on TikTok that she could not afford to leave her Florida home during Hurricane Milton because she couldn’t afford an Airbnb to hold her large brood.

I have seen people sharing information on social media about what needs to be in your go-bag. A lot of the items are easy things to come by: a first-aid kit, a flashlight, batteries. But other things, like many gallons of water per person and days’ worth of nonperishable food items, are not always feasible if you don’t have a lot of storage space. And with grocery costs being what they are, people may not have the luxury of buying food items that they don’t have an immediate need for. Nonperishables with high nutritional value are expensive; you don’t want to let them go bad due to lack of use.

Safety is always the most important thing when making decisions about when to leave. But people have to be realistic about costs. How many people can afford thousands for a hotel room? How much gas can you get when you have only $100 and 40 miles to drive to safety? We’re all just trying to do the best with what we have. Offering people grace is going to go a lot further than judgment.