Wildfires have destroyed around 90 square miles of area around Pacific Palisades, Pasadena and other communities in the Los Angeles and San Diego areas. Over 16,000 buildings have been destroyed, with hundreds of thousands of people forced to evacuate or placed under evacuation orders.

The monetary value of all such damage and carnage will be in the hundreds of billions of dollars. Yet this may only represent material losses. What cannot be recouped are the many intangibles, such as family heirlooms and historically significant structures that can never be restored.

And there are many losses flying under the radar that deserve attention.

When every building on a street has been burned down, restoring a community involves more than just rebuilding the homes and structures. It also means bringing people together to rebuild the community that they shared with their neighbors. The cost of such efforts far exceeds the cost of the buildings alone. Given that some of these people may not have had fire insurance. Many lots will be sold to developers, who will rebuild their neighborhoods in perhaps unimaginable ways.

What makes this disaster so daunting is that there are homes standing mostly intact or with no damage........

© The Hill