Foreword: After the Fires
The following is the foreword to After the Fires: Stories of Connection, Hope, and Resilience from the 2025 L.A. Wildfires, a collection of stories from youth, adults, and seniors in the Altadena, Pasadena, and Palisades communities.
In January 2025, as we were preparing to announce the recipients of our annual LISTEN scholarship, the active L.A. wildfires forced our team to pause. We immediately took action to ensure staff was supported through Slack messages of goodwill, email threads with community resources, and personal check-ins. One of our team members and his family were evacuated during the Palisades Fire. One of our board members lost her home in the Eaton Fire.
The impact of this moment was felt deeply. As we comforted staff, loved ones, and ourselves, it became clear that it was our duty to find a way to support the Los Angeles communities we serve. We designed a project to deliver our story-based social connection and wellness programming at no cost, with the ultimate goal of collecting those stories for the publication of this book.
As adults navigate the overwhelming financial, legal, and governmental challenges of disaster recovery, youth are often left out of the conversation in moments like these. This project was designed to intentionally support and encourage young people to reflect on and share their experiences.
Impacted communities were understandably cautious in the immediate aftermath. A flurry of resources existed, but few centralized spaces were available to access them. Relief coalitions, government agencies, and individual organizations hastily tried to align to support displaced communities.
Our initial impulse was to join the cacophony of support by reaching out to schools via cold emails. While well-intentioned, this formal approach lacked the nuance required for community building in a time of crisis. We needed to truly learn the community before we could serve it.
We connected with dozens of other nonprofits supporting affected communities. We attended local performances and joined community meetings to hear directly from residents. We met with over 20 organizations to learn how they were serving the area and to explore ways to combine efforts to maximize our impact. These steps brought us into the Eaton Fire Collaborative's Children, Youth, & Family committee, where organizations serving youth across Pasadena and Altadena were coalescing to provide unified support.
Listening to the community in real time prompted us to pivot. Instead of our traditional model of delivering in-classroom workshops, we offered full-day weekend workshops at our Storytelling Center in Highland Park, where students and families could share a meal and connect. We brought our programming directly into the communities, partnering with Palisades Charter High School and several Boys & Girls Clubs across the county, including Malibu, Santa Monica, and Pasadena to serve middle and high school students.
Our facilitators brought warm hearts and trauma-informed training to help these young people process the fires in ways tailored to their age group. Many students shared that this was their first time processing the wildfires since they occurred.
We hosted youth from across the Pasadena Unified and La Cañada Unified School Districts at our Storytelling Center. Students were quiet at first, but as the day progressed, they opened up to one another, connected over shared emotions, and discovered new pathways to healing through each other's experiences.
At Pasadena Village, we worked with senior citizens from the community to process their experiences from their specific lens. While not every story can fit within these pages, the impact of this work extends far beyond what can be captured in a single book.
After engaging with over 175 participants across the Pasadena, Altadena, and Palisades communities, we know the work is far from over. The timeline for recovery is uncertain and non-linear. At The PLUS ME Project, we believe that every individual is a living story. Stories change, grow, and transform continuously, and we are honored to continue supporting these communities long after this book is published.
Join us on Saturday, September 26, from 3 to 5 p.m. at The Maxwell House in Pasadena to celebrate the launch of After the Fires. Student authors will read their stories and sign copies of the book. Admission and food are free.
