The 2025 California wildfires exposed significant shortcomings in the implementation of wildfire-adapted land use policies and the application of fire-resilient architectural and urban design principles. This Brief Communication examines four key constraints on progress: stakeholder awareness and capacity building; the absence or inadequacy of incentives; and governance barriers, such as regulatory fragmentation, misalignment between agencies, and insufficient integration of risk into spatial planning processes. The text emphasises the need for coherent, cross-sectoral policy frameworks that foster adaptive capacity at multiple scales, enhance compliance with and enforcement of building codes, and align risk reduction with long-term sustainability and climate resilience objectives.