When the house burns down, someone has to show up

During the recent congressional hearing on the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s 2027 budget, California Congresswoman Norma Torres asked a straightforward question: When would the administration submit a disaster recovery package for the California wildfire victims who lost their homes in January 2025? HUD Secretary Scott Turner offered no timeline. Instead, he suggested that local leadership bore responsibility for the delay. This answer might have seemed reasonable in a different context, but it lands very differently when spoken to constituents whose homes burned more than four months ago and who are still waiting. I want to be direct about something: Disaster relief is not partisan. The need for shelter transcends politics. And the mortgage industry, which sits at the center of every recovery conversation whether it wants to or not, cannot afford to treat it that way either. The chain reaction nobody planned for The Eaton Fire in Altadena and the Palisades Fire in Pacific Palisades ravaged 59 square miles, displacing thousands of residents and killing an estimated 440 people. Many Americans are still without homes and facing significant difficulty with recover...