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| Supervisor Solis says Hispanic Heritage Month faces ‘cloud of concern’ due to ICE raids – Daily News | | When the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors vote on Tuesday, Sept. 16 to honor Latino culture and contributions in a motion establishing Hispanic Heritage Month, one supervisor says it will be more than a celebration, it will also be a call to action. [Article] | | by , Los Angeles Daily News. 2025-09-15 | | | | Once-booming Santa Monica faces a dire fiscal crisis. The surprising way it got there - Los Angeles Times | | Santa Monica, long a beacon of economic strength in Southern California, has endured its share of struggles in recent years.
Its once-bustling downtown shopping district has taken a post-pandemic hit, with the Third Street Promenade in need of reinvention and the upscale Santa Monica Place mall about to lose its anchor Nordstrom. Other factors include post-pandemic shifts in the entertainment industry and new tariffs.
But Santa Monica finds itself on the brink of a financial crisis for another, less expected reason as well: Hundreds of millions of dollars in sex abuse settlements.
The city still faces 180 claims of sexual abuse by a former Santa Monica police dispatcher, a scandal that has already cost the city $229 million in settlement payouts. On Tuesday, the city declared itself in fiscal distress, a move that raised concerns among city workers that cuts, and perhaps layoffs, were coming.
“The financial situation the city is dealing with is certainly serious,” said Oliver Chi, city manager for the city, during Tuesday’s City Council meeting. [Article] | | by , Los Angeles Times. 2025-09-15 | | | | Homeless Services Chief to Address Pasadena Rotary on Homelessness Solutions – Pasadena Now | | Katie Hill, chief executive officer of Union Station Homeless Services, will speak at the Rotary Club of Pasadena’s weekly luncheon on Wednesday, Sept. 17, delivering a talk titled “Housing Our Neighbors, One Person at a Time.” The event will be held at The University Club, 175 N. Oakland Ave., with lunch at noon, meeting at 12:30 p.m., and Hill’s presentation scheduled from 1:00 to 1:30 p.m. Admission is $45 at the door. [Article] | | by , . 2025-09-15 | | | | Water bills in L.A. County are rising faster than inflation - Los Angeles Times | | Over the last decade, water bills in Los Angeles County have risen nearly 60% on average, outpacing inflation and adding to financial strain for low-income households, according to a UCLA report.
The researchers compared average costs for the same amount of drinking water in 2015 and 2025, and said the results show that water affordability is an escalating problem in Southern California.
“It is concerning that we have this trend of rates outpacing inflation,” said Edith de Guzman, a cooperative extension water researcher at UCLA’s Luskin Center for Innovation. [Article] | | by , Los Angeles Times. 2025-09-15 | | | | How Nancy Pelosi Quietly Shaped California’s Redistricting Fight - The New York Times | | One Friday in early August, Nancy Pelosi and Gavin Newsom sat together in the historic governor’s mansion in Sacramento and began dialing some of the nation’s wealthiest Democrats for dollars.
Ms. Pelosi, the 85-year-old former House speaker, and Mr. Newsom, the 57-year-old governor of California, have known each other for decades. She has been his mentor, and their circles are so entwined as scions of San Francisco that their families were even blended by marriage at one point.
But this was something entirely new for them both as they raced to raise cash for a fall ballot campaign on redistricting that could shape the 2026 midterms.
Ms. Pelosi would begin with pleasantries, according to three people granted anonymity to discuss private fund-raising calls made that day. Then she would hand the phone to Mr. Newsom to close the deal. The choreography was partly borne of a mindfulness of tangled federal rules about soliciting outsized checks, and partly out of deference to Mr. Newsom.
Well, at least most of the time.
“That’s certainly not enough,” Ms. Pelosi blurted out to one potential contributor who had floated a sizable, but apparently not sizable enough, donation. Everyone burst out laughing, according to two people with knowledge of the tandem fund-raising. “I think we can do better,” she ribbed at another point.
The moment at the mansion provided a glimpse of Ms. Pelosi’s behind-the-scenes role in a redistricting push with national consequences. At President Trump’s behest, Republican-led states, starting with Texas, are moving rapidly to rip up their congressional boundaries and boost G.O.P. chances of keeping control of the House next fall. California represents Democrats’ biggest and best hope for a meaningful counteroffensive.
Mr. Newsom is asking voters to approve a ballot measure to amend the state constitution, which currently prohibits partisan gerrymandering, in order to allow for new maps that would give Democrats five additional seats — a bid to effectively cancel out Texas.
Ms. Pelosi is not the face of the redistricting fight in California. That role clearly belongs to Mr. Newsom.
Nor was Ms. Pelosi at the forefront of designing the state’s new proposed voting lines or massaging the considerable egos in the California delegation. Those tasks fell chiefly to Representative Zoe Lofgren, the state delegation chair, and Representative Pete Aguilar, the House Democratic Caucus chair. [Article] | | by , . 2025-09-15 | | | | Caltrans to start work on $4.5 million curve warning sign project | | The California Department of Transportation plans a $4.5 million project to add and replace curve warnings signs along highways that pass through Shasta County, Siskiyou County and other parts of the North State.
Construction begins Monday, Sept. 15 on Caltrans District 2's Curve Warning Signs Project. Workers will place new curve warning signs and replace old signs, relocating them if necessary, Caltrans said in an announcement issued Wednesday.
Motorists will encounter one-way traffic control at various locations with up to 5-minute delays between 7 a.m. and 5 p.m. weekdays on highways 32, 36, 44, 70, 89, 139, 147 and 299, according to the announcement.
Caltrans asked drivers to slow down and drive carefully in and around construction areas, follow speed limit reductions and allot extra time for travel delays. [Article] | | by , Redding Record Searchlight. 2025-09-15 | | | | Several car wash employees detained by federal agents in Long Beach – NBC Los Angeles | | An immigration enforcement operation Saturday surprised employees and customers at a car wash in Long Beach, resulting in seven detainments, according to the general manager of the business. [Article] | | by , KNBC Los Angeles. 2025-09-15 | | | | Instead of juvenile hall receivership, LA County wants powers to get rid of protected staff – Daily News | | The Los Angeles County Probation Department wants a judge to reject the state’s proposed takeover of its juvenile facilities and to instead grant the agency its own powers to “slash through staffing and regulatory knots” preventing it from addressing an ongoing staffing shortage, according to court filings. [Article] | | by , Los Angeles Daily News. 2025-09-15 | | | | It's not just UCLA. UC president warns of Trump push into all campuses and hospitals - Los Angeles Times | | The University of California’s top leader warned Monday that the federal government’s $1.2-billion fine and sweeping proposals to remake UCLA are “minor in comparison” to what could hit the entirety of the nation’s premier university system of campuses, hospitals and clinics.
“As we consider the unprecedented action against UCLA, it is important to keep in mind that the federal government is also pursuing investigations and actions in various stages against all 10 UC campuses,” UC President James B. Milliken said in a Monday letter. “So, while we are first focused on the direct action involving UCLA, we must also consider the implications of expanded federal action.”
The “investigations and actions” range from Trump administration allegations of the illegal use of race in admissions — at Irvine, Berkeley and San Francisco campuses — to civil rights complaints lodged with the Department of Education by Jewish and other community members at UCLA, Davis, San Diego and Santa Barbara campuses. There is also a UC-wide investigation alleging the system discriminates against Jews in hiring, retention and promotion.
Milliken said “the threat that looms” could lead to further layoffs, budget reductions, federal grant suspensions and cuts to the university, California’s second largest employer.
He released his message after The Times on Monday published in an article detailing a wide-ranging 28-page settlement proposal the government sent to UCLA last month. In addition to the fine, the Department of Justice seeks to drastically overhaul campus practices on hiring, admissions, sports, scholarships, discrimination and gender identity.
UC has not agreed to the proposal, which represents the government’s first volley as it seeks to overhaul many of UCLA’s policies and culture to adhere to President Trump’s conservative higher education agenda.
Students, faculty, staff and campus unions are pushing UC to fight back against the Trump administration. Milliken’s Oakland-based office and the governing board of regents is negotiating with federal officials.
On Tuesday afternoon, a coalition of UC unions and faculty organizations will hold a protest at UC San Francisco before the kickoff of a two-day board of regents meeting, the trustees’ first public convening since the UCLA crisis unfolded. [Article] | | by , Los Angeles Times. 2025-09-15 | | | | California home values drop $106 billion to $10.8 trillion – San Gabriel Valley Tribune | | Here’s a smidgen of good news for California house hunters: Mild discounting is underway.
My trusty spreadsheet peeked at a Zillow report tracking total home values for the year ending in June and the pandemic era — February 2020 through June 2025. Zillow totaled all of its price estimates for every state and the nation. Mortgage liabilities were not deducted from those valuations. [Article] | | by , San Gabriel Valley Tribune. 2025-09-15 | | | | SB 79 Passes Assembly, Still Needs Senate “Concurrence” Before the Governor’s Desk - Streetsblog California | | Earlier this evening (Thursday, September 11), the State Assembly passed Senate Bill 79, the Abundant & Affordable Homes Near Transit Act, introduced by Senator Scott Wiener (D-SF), by a 41-17 vote. Because of amendments made after the Senate first passed the legislation, SB 79 still requires a concurrence vote from that body, which is widely expected to happen before the legislative session ends on Saturday. [Article] | | by , . 2025-09-15 | | | | Go inside LA’s old General Hospital before it turns from a spooky Art Deco time capsule into new housing | LAist | | “The plan is to really assess those historic elements that we want to preserve and sort [of] take it into a new opportunity. And then, whatever remains to see how we can maximize housing, how we can maximize services, workforce development, workforce housing,” Soto said.
The idea is to repurpose space in this more than one-million-square-foot building to make way for 800 units or more of housing, about a third of which would be affordable.
Urban planner James Rojas grew up in Boyle Heights. He said a lot of people he’s known over the years were born here.
For him, the massive building is an important part of the eastside landscape.
“I think it’s great that they’re preserving that building because it’s such an icon from the 1930s,” he said.
One of L.A.’s most prominent examples of the Art Deco style, the hospital was designed by the Allied Architects’ Association of Los Angeles, which also designed downtown’s Hall of Justice. [Article] | | by , . 2025-09-15 | | | | How can a pink dye job improve water quality in Santa Monica Bay? - Los Angeles Times | | Over the next two weeks, surfers and beachgoers in Santa Monica may spot waves that have a pink, fluorescent hue — but officials say not to worry.
The luminous, pink color spreading across the Santa Monica Bay is from a temporary, nontoxic dye that researchers are using to study how ocean circulation might contribute to the bay’s poor water quality.
The project kicked off Monday morning, as researchers with UCLA and the Bay Foundation discharged the first of four batches of the pink dye near the Santa Monica Pier.
“By following where the dye goes, we will better understand how the breakwater changes the environment around it, providing insight into Santa Monica beach’s poor water quality,” Isabella Arzeno-Soltero, an assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering at UCLA and a researcher on the project, said in a statement.
Although the pink dye on Monday didn’t appear to create many “bright pink waves,” as researchers warned might be the case, additional bouts of the fluorescent rhodamine water tracer dye will be released later this month. [Article] | | by , Los Angeles Times. 2025-09-15 | | | | The immigration raids are crushing L.A.'s fire recovery and California's economy - Los Angeles Times | | The crew had just poured a concrete foundation on a vacant lot in Altadena when I pulled up the other day. Two workers were loading equipment onto trucks and a third was hosing the fresh cement that will sit under a new house.
I asked how things were going, and if there were any problems finding enough workers because of ongoing immigration raids.
“Oh, yeah,” said one worker, shaking his head. “Everybody’s worried.”
The other said that when fresh concrete is poured on a job this big, you need a crew of 10 or more, but that’s been hard to come by.
“We’re still working,” he said. “But as you can see, it’s just going very slowly.”
Eight months after thousands of homes were destroyed by wildfires, Altadena is still a ways off from any major rebuilding, and so is Pacific Palisades. But immigration raids have hammered the California economy, including the construction industry. And the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling this week that green-lights racial profiling has raised new fears that “deportations will deplete the construction workforce,” as the UCLA Anderson Forecast warned us in March.
There was already a labor shortage in the construction industry, in which 25% to 40% of workers are immigrants, by various estimates. As deportations slow construction, and tariffs and trade wars make supplies scarcer and more expensive, the housing shortage becomes an even deeper crisis.
And it’s not just deportations that matter, but the threat of them, says Jerry Nickelsburg, senior economist at the Anderson Forecast. If undocumented people are afraid to show up to install drywall, Nickelsburg told me, it “means you finish homes much more slowly, and that means fewer people are employed.”
Now look, I’m no economist, but it seems to me that after President Trump promised the entire country we were headed for a “golden age” of American prosperity, it might not have been in his best interest to stifle the state with the largest economy in the nation.
Especially when many national economic indicators aren’t exactly rosy, when we have not seen the promised decrease in the price of groceries and consumer goods, and when the labor statistics were so embarrassing he fired the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics and replaced her with another one, only to see more grim jobs numbers a month later. [Article] | | by , Los Angeles Times. 2025-09-15 | | | | The 2028 Olympics will bring a huge security operation to Los Angeles. Critics worry it'll leave a police state | LAist | | When the Olympics and Paralympics come to town in 2028, they'll bring a massive security operation with them. [Article] | | by , . 2025-09-15 | | | | Funding Fears: New report warns of effects money cuts have on homelessness services | News | ladowntownnews.com | | On Sept. 11, a report developed on behalf of HOPICS, LA Family Housing, The People Concern, PATH, St. Joseph’s Center and Union Station Homeless Services warned of devastating effects to service providers supporting the thousands of homeless in the county, as well as the individuals themselves. [Article] | | by , . 2025-09-15 | | | | A popular L.A. sheriff touted reforms in a troubled system. Then a young FBI agent showed up - Los Angeles Times | | When Leah Marx began visiting Men’s Central Jail in downtown Los Angeles in 2010, it did not immediately raise alarm among the people who ran it. Most of the time, jailers just looked at her federal ID and let her in without asking why she was there. If they did, she said she was investigating a human trafficking case. It was a good-sounding story. Believable. Perfect to deter further questions.
Marx was in her late 20s, just beyond her rookie year at the FBI. She had been sitting at her desk when her supervisor handed her a letter from an inmate alleging jailers were brutalizing people in their custody. It was different from other letters. It had details.
Now she and her FBI colleagues were at the jail conducting secret interviews, trying to separate fact from rumor. The L.A. County Sheriff’s Department ran the jails. With a daily population of 14,000 inmates or more, it was the nation’s largest jail system, and had been known for years as a cauldron of violence and dysfunction.
The agency was in the hands of a would-be reformer, Sheriff Lee Baca. He’d promised transparency. He’d won praise for his ambitious inmate education program. But stories persisted of violent and corrupt jailers, of deputy gangs, of an institutional culture so entrenched it resisted all efforts to root it out.
Marx seemed an improbable federal agent (at first, even to herself). She had been getting a master’s degree in social work when someone suggested she try the FBI. She did not know they hired people like her.
She was new to L.A., and living alone with her dog. As she gathered inmate stories, she made it a point to emphasize that their charges were irrelevant to her.
“I think they started to believe that I was there to actually hear what was going on,” she told The Times.
Inmates were telling her versions of the same story. A jailer would assault an inmate while yelling “Stop resisting,” then charge the inmate with assault on a police officer. [Article] | | by , Los Angeles Times. 2025-09-15 | | | | The California redistricting measure cites Texas, highlighting the partisan stakes | NPR | | The California ballot measure that will ask voters whether they approve a new congressional map created by Democrats, temporarily working around the state's independent redistricting commission, specifically mentions Texas Republicans' new districts in the measure's title.
It's a sign of how unique this ballot push is. [Article] | | by , . 2025-09-15 | | | | Can a pink dye help control bird poop at the pier? Santa Monica gives it a try | LAist | | On a recent Thursday, there were only a handful of people wading, swimming, or body boarding in the ocean just north of the Santa Monica pier. [Article] | | by , . 2025-09-15 | | | | Complex may be renamed | Local News | avpress.com | | The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday will consider a motion introduced by board Chair Kathryn Barger to rename the Castaic Sports Complex to the Ryan M. Clinkunbroomer Castaic Sports Complex. [Article] | | by , . 2025-09-15 | | |
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