WeHo knew this house was a fire hazard

Two weeks ago, Public Safety Commissioner Adam Eramian sounded a warning about the abandoned home at 1030 Sierra Bonita Avenue in West Hollywood and the fire hazard it posed to the neighborhood.

“The concern of the neighbors who live directly next door to that property is that there’s a lot of dry rubbish, dry trees, and they’re concerned that anyone who goes in there could start a fire that would lead to the neighboring apartment building that houses, I believe, nine units,” Eramian said during the Nov. 13 meeting.

His dire prediction came true last night as the house went up in white hot flames right as families were celebrating Thanksgiving, scorching its neighboring building.

Video footage shared with WEHOonline by Derrick Sanders shows the intensity of the blaze, and photos taken by WEHOonline today reveal the frightening extent of the damage to the home, its guest quarters and the residential complex next door.

@wehoonline House fire in #weho ♬ September (Dreamy Version) – JU$t

WEHOonline has contacted the City of West Hollywood, the Los Angeles County Fire Department and Chief Drew Smith, who was present at the Public Safety Commission meeting, for information about how the fire started and what steps were taken to address the dangers since Eramian started asking questions two weeks ago. The inquiry process for the Fire Department will likely require a subpoena, a protocol discussed on the department’s website.

“Code Compliance has been on the scene numerous times,” Eramian said during the meeting. “The Sheriff’s Department has been there numerous times. Station 7 has been there numerous times. What can we do to finally mitigate that, so we could have that house locked up, or something could be done to that property at 1030 North Sierra Bonita? Because it’s a constant, daily visit either from the Sheriff’s Department, Code Compliance, security ambassadors, or Fire (Department).”

Eramian was trying to express the urgency of the matter to Danny Rivas, director of the city’s Community Safety Department, who promised action but left doubt as to whether it would lead to a solution. 

Rivas gave Eramian an extended overview of the complicated steps it would take to address the problem, and the implication, intended or not, was that it would be something of a pain in the ass.

“I can definitely check in,” Rivas replied. “I don’t know the status of that case or if we do, in fact, have a code enforcement case, but I’m assuming from what you’re mentioning, if code enforcement staff have been out there, then I would assume that there is an active, ongoing case. You know, vacant properties at times pose a variety of challenges. If a property owner is absentee, if there are issues that do occur intermittently, but if time passes and if it’s just merely a property maintenance-related issue, it sounds like maybe there’s more going on here. But we’ll definitely connect with our code enforcement team and the manager, get staff out there.”

“There is a lengthy administrative process  involved with that. And so that could be anywhere from the city pursuing what’s called a public nuisance abatement process, to having our city prosecutor’s office file a criminal and/or civil complaint on a property, but these take several months of work and documentation to showcase, because ultimately, you’re having to go to a court, and you’re having to prove, right, that the property is, in fact, a nuisance, it’s a potential danger to members of the community, and that we’re allowed to take action, you know, from the different things that I mentioned.”

Unsatisfied with his response, Eramian pressed Rivas for clarity.

“I think what the neighbors want is that property boarded up,” Eramian said. “There was another property across the street from that, at 1021 Sierra Bonita. It’s the same developer, but they finally tore down that property, and it’s all fenced up now, and they used to have a security guard there 24/7, but since the building’s been demolished, there’s no reason to have a security guard there. How do we go about maybe having that developer, the same developer as 1021, get a security guard there, at least fence it up, board it up to prevent any access from the unhoused or anyone from the outside going in there?”

“Our vacant property ordinance does allow us to, you know, order that there be security at different times, even up to 24 hours, seven days a week, but that threshold is difficult to accomplish,” Rivas said. “And so, as I mentioned, not knowing the background, but if there are a lot of confirmed calls for service that we could acquire both from our fire department and from our West Hollywood Sheriff Station, then all of that is helpful information, right, to help justify when the city does make an order. You know, many times when we do require security, it’s contested. It’s appealed by the property owners. And so that goes through a hearing process, and it could even end up in court. So we want to make sure, right, when we do order security, that we have the support, you know, to do so from a legal perspective.”

“And so we’re consulted with, I am consulted with, when it gets to that point from our code enforcement manager, and then we consult with our city attorney’s office as well, just to make sure that we have a strong case, right, in terms of pursuing different elements of that. So we’ll definitely look at that, but having security is by far, when you’re having a lot of trespassing going on, boarding up, or even fencing a property, in my professional experience, does not prevent folks from accessing a property. It really takes having that security there on site to act as that deterrent. But there’s a pretty difficult threshold to kind of meet in order to do so, but we’ll look at that.”

This story is developing.