Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt filed a lawsuit against Los Angeles and its Department of Water and Power (LADWP) this week, blaming the city for the damage that destroyed their home during the Palisades wildfire.
The couple were two of nearly two dozen plaintiffs in the suit, filed in Los Angeles on Tuesday and obtained by Rolling Stone. They claimed that the city and the DWP mismanaged the community’s water supply, pointing to press reports on the empty Santa Ynez Reservoir and empty fire hydrants.
“LADWP and City of Los Angeles had a duty to properly construct, inspect, maintain and operate its water supply system,” the suit said. “The Palisades Fire was an inescapable and unavoidable consequence of the water supply system operated by LADWP and City of Los Angeles as it was planned and constructed. The system necessarily failed, and this failure was a substantial factor in causing Plaintiffs to suffer the losses alleged in this Complaint.”
The suit claimed that the LADWP “made the conscious decision to operate the water supply system with the reservoir drained and unusable as a ‘cost-saving’ measure.” Reps for the LADWP and L.A. City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto didn’t immediately respond to Rolling Stone’s request for comment.
The fires have led to significant scrutiny toward city leadership about resources and funding for the Fire Department.
Along with the Eaton fire in Altadena, the Palisades fire quickly became one of the deadliest and most expensive wildfires in the history of California. The plaintiffs did not include a monetary amount in their complaint for damages, but they are asking for the cost of repair for their homes as well as damages for loss of use and loss of wages.
This isn’t the first lawsuit over the Los Angeles fires. Southern California Edison was sued last week over claims of negligence for failing to maintain power lines before the Eaton Fire started. In years past, victims of the 2017 North Bay fires and the 2018 Camp fire sued Pacific Gas & Electric, claiming the deadly blazes were the result of officers and board member’s actions. The utility company reached a $117-million settlement agreement in 2022.
The Palisades fire itself destroyed thousands of homes, including those of celebrities including Montag and Pratt, Paris Hilton, Jamie Lee Curtis, and Billie Crystal among others. After Montag and Pratt lost their home, fans started to rally in support, buying copies of her 15-year-old album Superficial and landing it atop the iTunes chart.
“Thank you for the overwhelming love and support of my music and really rallying behind us in this devastating time and making it such a blessing,” Montag said on TikTok after the download spike started. “Thank you for helping support us, helping build us back up, helping to encourage us, give us that hope and faith and excitement in such a dark, dark time.”
From Rolling Stone US
