The Brief

The first day of fall semester for a university freshman is often stressful. Not for Vanessa Menera, an 18-year-old who’s the first in her family to attend college.

Last year, she arrived 15 minutes early to her first fall class with an internship and campus job already in tow, plus a mental map of Cal State University Dominguez Hills, a sprawling, nearly 350-acre institution in the Los Angeles area’s South Bay.

The already confident student possessed even more motivation to make the most of her time on campus because of a program she took last summer: The First-Year Experience Summer Program.

“Everything was so easy to me, and I'm really grateful, because I know it was because of that First Year Experience that I was able to do that,” said Menera.

The summer program is one of several strategies Cal State Dominguez Hills seeks to expand as it combats a half-decade enrollment slide that’s unraveling its finances. But it’s not the only approach to fiscal right-sizing. Nor is Cal State Dominguez Hills alone in combatting large drops in its student population.

That’s because the money that the country’s largest public four-year university system needs to properly educate its students isn’t there. Now, California State University is embarking on a detailed, sweeping plan to enroll more students as part of an all-out push to bring much-needed cash to the workhorse system of 22 campuses that educates 471,000 students.

Ten campuses, including Dominguez Hills, saw double-digit enrollment declines in fall of 2025 compared to fall 2020, when the first full academic year of the COVID-19 pandemic began.

The loss of enrollment is a major driver of the financial struggles many of the system’s campuses face. The Cal State’s chancellor’s office says the system is facing a $2.3 billion budget gap in the current academic year. There’s a bright spot, though: Cal State officials say the system overall is on pace this year to beat state enrollment targets for the first time in four years.

People walk past the exterior of the Innovation & Instruction building at Cal State Dominguez Hills in Carson on Feb. 19, 2026. Photo by Zin Chiang for CalMatters Still, a key state lawmaker admonished the system’s under-enrolled campuses for missing its enrollment targets.

“I'm concerned that these campuses may be overfunded,” said Assemblymember David Alvarez, a Democrat from Chula Vista, at a December legislative hearing about Cal State’s finances. He is chairperson of the Assembly’s budget subcommittee on education and a key player in deciding how much state money universities receive. His worry? Other campuses with rising enrollments need the money to educate their ever-growing student body by hiring more professors, tutors and other staff to support students.

The state funds campuses based on how many Californians they enroll; by educating fewer students than what the state pays per student, the campuses are technically collecting more revenue than their enrollment levels would permit. That’s because the state pays schools for the number of California students they’re supposed to enroll, not how many they actually enroll.

By that measure, San Francisco State last year collected close to $50 million more in state dollars than its enrollment levels indicate it should receive — the campus enrolled about 5,300 fewer Californians than state goals stipulated in 2024. Cal State Dominguez Hills was taking about $7 million more. Conversely, Cal Poly Pomona was down about $20 million, because they enrolled 2,500 more students than the state’s target.

California is also eyeing multi-billion-dollar budget deficits, putting even more pressure on lawmakers and school systems to use money wisely.

The Legislature last year required Cal State to submit a report by March 1 detailing how campuses with enrollment struggles plan to attract new students and meet their state targets. Campuses sent their turnaround plans to the system’s chancellor’s office by December.

CalMatters conducted a dozen interviews and issued six records requests for this story.

Spotlight on Cal State Dominguez

Cal State Dominguez Hills’ enrollment is down 20% compared to 2020 and its finances have suffered. As a result, campus officials laid off 38 non-faculty staff and managers in 2025.

The school projects it will lose an additional $8 million this year, cutting deeper into its reserves, which have dwindled from $46 million in 2022 to a projected $10 million this summer.

The campus’ graduation rates fall below the systemwide average. And the campus historically has posted lower retention rates, meaning more students quit after one or two years compared to other campuses in the system. Dominguez Hill’s retention rate has grown in the last year, however.

The school enrolls the highest share of undergraduate students in the system who receive the federal Pell grant for low-income students — 69% compared to a Cal State average of 51%. Systemwide, those Pell students graduate at lower levels than students who don’t receive the grant.

Dominguez Hills’ turnaround plan includes a campus goal of enrolling about 800 more students to hit its enrollment target by 2027-28. More students plus planned systemwide tuition hikes and a new student-approved campus fee are projected to generate $25 million in additional money.

To reach its enrollment goals, the campus will lean on approaches that have demonstrated success, including the First Year Experience summer program, which Dominguez Hills started in 2022. Through the program, about a quarter of the freshman class enrolls in up to two free college courses during the summer before fall term. These are all general education courses required for graduation, with an emphasis on teaching students how to study well. The program also engenders a sense of community among students and campus staff.

Other strategies include attracting new students and keeping more of its current students. Another is to re-enroll students who’ve previously dropped out. It’s an approach that’s top of mind for campuses across the state: California is home to about 3.5 million adults with some college credit but no degree. Even a miniscule bump in the students who return to school could eradicate a campus’ enrollment woes.
Another budget-stabilizing effort may mean additional job losses. Campus professors are now meeting regularly to find ways to combine courses and run fewer sections of the same course. This helps the school average more students per course, but it’ll likely mean fewer lecturers — instructors who lack the full-time benefits and job safety of tenured professors.

Systemwide, 63 degree programs were discontinued by the Board of Trustees in 2024.

A student walks up the stairs in the Innovation and Instruction building at Cal State Dominguez Hills in Carson on Feb. 19, 2026. Photo by Zin Chiang for CalMatters Dominguez Hills in February reversed course on terminating six majors, including art history and philosophy. Student advocacy spurred the restoration. The school also determined that cutting individual programs made less sense than reviewing all majors to find other ways to integrate academic programs, said Kim Costino, the school’s interim provost, in an interview.

“Everyone is hopeful that we are going to be able to create a more economically efficient curriculum that serves students better,” said Terry McGlynn during an interview. He is a biology professor at Dominguez Hills who is chair of the academic senate, a faculty group that shapes campus academics.

But “there's clearly going to be some pain involved,” he added.

Summer session to keep students longer

The school cited in its report to the system that expanding the The First Year Experience program is one way to increase enrollment.

The campus spends $635,000 annually to run it. Almost 84% of students in the program advanced to their second year of college in fall 2024 — well above the 66% for students who didn’t sign up for the First Year Experience, according to data the campus shared. For a school desperate to undo its enrollment slide, keeping the students it has — and their tuition dollars — is a key strategy.

Any incoming freshman can enroll in the First Year Experience.

One reason Menera knew the campus so well when fall classes began? An extra-credit assignment for her environmental studies course over the summer required her to identify every vending machine on campus.

Student Vanessa Menera, 18, in the Innovation and Instruction Building at Cal State Dominguez Hills in Carson on Feb. 19, 2026. Photo by Zin Chiang for CalMatters The First Year Experience also features activities that reinforce what students learn, such as a field trip to a museum for an English course led by a guest author whose book the professor assigned to students. For her environmental studies class, Menera said that she carried a trash bag for more than a week to visualize how much waste people accumulate.

The school also awards a $150 scholarship to students who complete a summer-experience course. But for students who work over the summer or help care for family members, that amount alone may not be enough to persuade them to attend the program, said Costino. She ran the summer program until December.

The summer courses are long. Most meet twice weekly for four hours, so a student in two courses is in class for about 16 hours a week. Menera worked anyway that summer, maintaining the job she had during high school at TJ Maxx in Anaheim, some 20 miles from campus. She continues to work now, logging 17 hours a week at a campus convenience store on top of a full academic load. The summer program mentally prepared her for long school and work days, she said.

Costino thinks the program’s growth won’t be in students enrolling the summer before freshman year, but instead in students who earned a D or F in a course their first year and need to make up the class the following summer. While students can presently retake classes, they have to pay for them. Providing free make-up courses that either replace or average out a previous low grade helps the school retain more students who are on academic probation or just lost academic confidence after a bad first year, Costino said.

Re-enrolling students who dropped out

Cal State Dominguez Hills is seeking to expand its efforts to re-enroll students who’ve dropped out. Since 2021 the school has re-enrolled nearly 1,100 such students for fall term through its “Once a Toro, Always a Toro” program, named after the campus mascot.

While these students represent a tiny portion of the campus’ annual enrollment, they lead to instant revenue for the school from tuition and fees. It’s a few extra million dollars for the school, and it costs about $300,000 to $600,000 annually to maintain the re-enrollment program.

Once these students return to Dominguez Hills, most graduate. Data the campus shared with CalMatters show that earlier cohorts of the re-enrolled students have graduation rates of around 50% three years after they return. The numbers grow to about 70% after six years.

The school is now targeting any student who dropped out in the last 15 years or so, said Sabrina Sanders, the program director of Once a Toro.

She maintains a list of 10,000 formerly enrolled students. Annually, about 1,000 apply, around three-quarters are admitted, and roughly 300 to 400 enroll. Some who were admitted don’t enroll for several reasons, including prior low GPAs that make them ineligible for financial aid.

One of the students who returned is Wynette Davis. The 27-year-old is four classes away from finishing her bachelor’s degree in psychology after dropping out two years ago.

Davis transferred to the university from community college in 2022. She was on track to earn her bachelor’s in 2024 and even walked the stage during the spring graduation ceremony, needing just a few more classes that summer to finish her degree. But tragedy struck: Her daughter’s father died in spring 2024, and the shock derailed her academics. That spring and summer, she failed four classes. Davis left as a result.

She tried to re-enroll a year later, but learned she owed the university tuition money and couldn’t qualify for financial aid because her failing grades dropped her below the campus’ threshold for aid eligibility. Davis was ready to give up on earning a bachelor’s until an email from Once a Toro entered her inbox.

A staffer with the program helped Davis receive a waiver for her past-due account balance as long as she promised to pass her classes for the year, Davis said. The staffer also worked with the school financial aid office to reinstate her eligibility for financial aid for her spring classes after her grades improved.

Last fall Davis retook the classes she previously failed, passing them all this time. She’s in two classes this spring and will need two more next fall to earn her bachelor’s degree.

“If it wasn't for the Once a Toro, Always a Toro program, I probably would not have been back in school right now,” Davis said.

Another setback is the changing nature of academic requirements. Students who were gone for a decade may have pursued majors that don’t exist or were heavily altered, so the courses they took toward their majors might not satisfy new requirements. Sanders and the school’s advising teams collaborate with academic department deans to convert the re-enrolling students’ old coursework into the updated expectations for existing majors. Or re-enrolled students pursue an interdisciplinary major that combines old coursework with new.

“There's a sense of shame that comes with dropping out of college and having someone there to kind of put those thoughts and put that inner dialogue to rest” was key, said Stephanie Esquivel, a returning student who re-enrolled in 2022 after leaving the campus her freshman year in 2007.

She credited Sanders with helping her transfer her community college units to her university major. To Esquivel, a team like Once a Toro shows that the campus desires returning students and invests in the social infrastructure to help them, she said.

This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.

A new analysis of alerts sent during the Eaton Fire found “no failure” by emergency officials to issue timely evacuation orders to areas west of Lake Avenue in Altadena.

The timing of alerts to neighborhoods west of Lake, where all but one of 19 deaths in that fire occurred, has been under scrutiny since the January 2025 fire.

The independent report by Citygate Associates was commissioned by the L.A. County Fire Department at the start of this year and was released Monday.

Its conclusions are similar to those of after-action reports from other firms — that officials did the best they could amid unprecedented fire conditions and strained resources.

“While the report provides an honest account of our operations, we recognize that no investigation can truly capture the horror and tragedy residents endured,” said L.A. County Fire Chief Anthony Marrone in a prepared statement. “My focus is to ensure that the lessons learned from the Eaton and Palisades fires are turned into lasting changes that will better protect our residents and neighborhoods into the future.”

Altadena resident Zaire Calvin — whose sister died in the fire and whose own home burned down — said the report feels like another “slap in the face.” He said he wanted to see details on any mistakes that may have been made. But reading the report, he felt blame was once again largely placed on unprecedented fire conditions.

“A  community that's already down, a community that's fighting for their lives, a community that's fighting all of the people trying to take property from them — at some point you just want accountability,” Calvin said.

L.A. County Supervisor Kathryn Barger, who represents Altadena, said in a prepared statement that the “investigation should not be interpreted as dismissing the experiences of residents. Public trust requires both accountability and a willingness to learn from every aspect of a disaster response.”

Citygate Associates, which produced an after-action report on the 2018 Woolsey Fire, used interviews, operational records, dispatch records and internal communications to analyze decisionmaking between 9 p.m. on Jan. 7, 2025, and 6 a.m. the following day.

Some of the main findings include the following:

• With aircraft grounded by  high winds, “Incident Command was forced to fight a fire while blind to its movements.” 
• Evacuation decisions were not based on “race, age or socioeconomics.” 
• “Evacuation planners who created the evacuation zone areas well before the fire tried to use, where possible, major north/south and east/west streets. … Thus, Lake Avenue was a natural, very long street that could be utilized as an anchor for creating evacuation zones.” 
• Other fire timeline reviews cite reports of fire moving westward between 11 p.m. and just before midnight, but Citygate staffers write that strained resources were focused on the eastern front of the fire at that time, which was the direction the fire was initially spreading, and that “fire progression maps … do not show the the Eaton Fire directly impacting western neighborhoods at that time.” 
• The fire initially spread westward more slowly, and did not escalate significantly until early in the morning on Jan. 8.
• Reports of fires before 1 a.m. west of Lake Avenue were likely a result of downed power lines.
• By 2 a.m., radio reports indicated embers were being cast deeper into Altadena. 
• Discussions to expand evacuation orders west started at 2:18 a.m., with evacuation orders being sent to residents west of Lake by 3:25 a.m. 
• The main fire front crossed west of Lake Avenue by about 5:15 a.m. 

Find the full report here. 

Huntington Beach must pay $50,000 for each month it continues to fail to comply with the state’s mandate to zone for more housing, according to a recent court ruling. For several years now, the city has been waging a court battle against the state's order to make way for 40,000 new homes.

The judge ruled that the city should be penalized $10,000 per month going back to January 2025, and then fined $50,000 per month, starting next month, until the city gets a compliant housing element approved.

The backstory

State law requires California cities and counties to plan for enough housing to meet the expected demand over an eight-year time period, including for low-income housing. Huntington Beach, citing its independence as a charter city, has fought its most recent housing allocation all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court, which declined to review the case last year.

Does the state require cities to actually build that many homes?

No. Cities are not required to actually build housing, but rather to make sure their zoning and land use codes accommodate the amount of housing assigned to them through what’s known as the Regional Housing Needs Assessment (RHNA).

What does the city say?

In a statement, Casey McKeon, the city’s mayor, said the city “strongly opposes these penalties and will continue fighting for the rights of our residents and for the principle of local control against ongoing efforts by the Attorney General to centralize land use authority in Sacramento.”

Is Huntington Beach an outlier?

Yes. Huntington Beach is an outlier in its aggressive fight against the state housing mandates. More than 90% of California’s 539 jurisdictions are in compliance with the state requirement to plan for the amount of housing assigned to them through the latest RHNA cycle.

What’s next?

The city recently posted draft revisions to its housing plan — for the first time since 2021. That’s significant because the city’s efforts to come into state compliance have been paused for years.

One complication with compliance: Huntington Beach residents voted to require any major changes to the city’s zoning, including its state-mandated housing plan, to be put up for a public vote. That could mean more delays in coming into state compliance, and consequently, more fines, at a time when the city is facing a budget crunch.

During a press conference following a shooting at the San Diego Islamic Center, San Diego Police Department Chief Scott Wahl confirmed three adult victims at the center and the two suspects are dead.

Police said the suspects were found dead in the vehicle nearby. They were 17 and 19 years old. The motivation behind the shooting is unknown at this time.

Wahl said in 28 years, this is the most dynamic and impressive response he's seen in policing with help coming from agencies all over the county.

Imam of the Islamic Center of San Diego Taha Hassane said the center stands in solidarity "with all of the families in our community here and all the mosques and places of worship" in San Diego.

"This is something that we never expected, and I would also like to thank all the people who contacted us from all over the country and overseas to offer their condolences."

San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria was also present at the news conference.

"We will do anything it takes to make sure you feel safe in this city," Gloria said.

In a statement, the Council on American-Islamic Relations-San Diego Executive Director Tazheen Nizam said:

“We strongly condemn this horrifying act of violence at the Islamic Center of San Diego. Our thoughts are with everyone impacted by this attack. No one should ever fear for their safety while attending prayers or studying at an elementary school. We are working to learn more about this incident and we encourage everyone to keep this community in your prayers."

The active shooter situation was reported at 11:43 a.m. at ICSD in the 7000 block of Eckstrom Avenue in Clairemont, according to SDPD.

The department is asking people to avoid the area.

A reunification location for those impacted by the incident has been established at 4125 Hathaway Street.

According to our news partner ABC 10News, authorities shut down northbound and southbound Interstate 805 at Balboa Avenue due to the law enforcement activity.

The San Diego Unified School District confirmed several campuses were placed on lock down. SDUSD spokesperson James Canning said lockdowns are gradually being lifted but schools closest to the Islamic Center will be the last to have their lockdowns lifted.

The Islamic Center is the largest mosque in San Diego County. The center holds five daily prayers.

In California’s upcoming June primary election, you’ll have the opportunity to cast your ballot for any of the candidates for governor, regardless of which party you’re registered with. The top two vote-getters advance to the general election.

Known as a “jungle primary,” this system is different from how most states handle their primary elections.

This year, Democrats raised the alarm that two Republican gubernatorial candidates may move to the general election, locking out Democrats despite outnumbering Republican registered voters almost two to one. That’s because the crowded field of Democratic candidates threatens to split the party’s vote. Until recently, multiple polls have shown the two Republicans, former Fox News host Steve Hilton and Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, polling at the top of the race.

Driven in part by these concerns, critics of the top-two primary have now filed a ballot initiative that would repeal this system and return California to party-based primaries, potentially as early as 2030.

But how does this top-two arrangement work? Why does California do things this way? And what are the chances of voters choosing between two GOP candidates for governor in November?

How does California’s top-two primary system work?

In a traditional closed primary, such as in presidential races, voters can only choose among candidates from their own party: That is, say, registered Democrats could only vote for Democratic candidates.

But in a top-two primary, all candidates from all parties appear on a single ballot open to any registered voter. The two candidates with the most votes in that primary then move on to the general election, even if they’re from the same party.

Kim Alexander, president and founder of the California Voter Foundation, said this is an even bigger concern for third parties in the state.

“One of the unfortunate byproducts” of California’s jungle primary system, Alexander said, is how “it’s really shut out a lot of minor parties from the general election and they run the risk of being kicked off the ballot altogether.”

“Because if you don’t have candidates appearing on ballots at a certain pace, then you can’t remain an official party,” she said.

Does this really mean Californians might not get a Republican vs. Democrat race for governor in November?

That’s correct: Under the top-two primary system, the November contest could be an intraparty fight.

That scenario has worried many California Democrats. With seven top Democrats crowding the field, there’s a risk of fracturing their party’s vote. Meanwhile, if enough Republican voters back both Hilton and Bianco to push them both into the top two, California could be locked into an all-Republican general election for governor.

Steve Hilton, Republican gubernatorial candidate for California, left, and Tom Steyer, Democratic gubernatorial candidate for California, fist-bump prior to a gubernatorial debate at KRON Studios in San Francisco, California, on April 22, 2026. California will hold its primary election on June 2, where the top two finishers advance to the general election in November regardless of party affiliation. (Jason Henry/Nexstar via Bloomberg)In March, state Democratic Party Chair Rusty Hicks urged politicians in his party to take a hard look at the viability of their campaigns and drop out before the filing deadline.

“California’s leadership on the world stage is significantly harder if a Democrat is not elected as our next Governor,” Hicks wrote in an open letter.

None of the contenders heeded his plea.

However, the likelihood of Republicans shutting Democrats out of the November election has decreased since President Donald Trump endorsed Hilton in April. A clear front-runner could unify Republican voters behind Hilton and open the door for a Democrat to claim the second spot in the runoff.

Plus, the most recent Emerson poll now shows former Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra in the lead with 19% of likely voters for the first time in the race. Hilton and Democrat Tom Steyer are tied for second with 17%.

Becerra’s surge came after former East Bay Rep. Eric Swalwell — who was regarded as a front-runner for the gubernatorial primary — exited the race last month amid sexual assault and misconduct allegations.

Why does California have this top-two system?

Historically, California required a two-thirds vote in the Legislature to pass the state budget instead of a simple majority vote.

In 2009, Democrats needed to court Republican votes to pass the state budget. Then-state Sen. Abel Maldonado, a Republican, agreed to vote yes — but only if the Legislature put a measure on the ballot to create the top-two primary system.

Voters approved that measure, Proposition 14, in 2010, amending the state constitution.

Then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger backed the measure as a way to transform state politics, forcing candidates to appeal to voters across party lines and ultimately boost more moderate politicians.

“He liked to talk about living in a post-partisan political climate,” Alexander said. “He liked the idea of candidates having to appeal to more voters than just voters of their own party, and to face competition.”

The system was also designed to give more influence to California’s no party preference voters, who make up 23% of registered voters in the state, just behind Republicans at 25%.

Which political offices in California are decided using this system?

The top-two primary applies to “voter-nominated” offices: governor and other statewide positions like lieutenant governor, attorney general, secretary of state, state treasurer, state controller, insurance commissioner and state board of equalization members.

It also covers state Senate and Assembly seats and U.S. congressional offices.

The jungle primary system does not apply to presidential elections, local and nonpartisan offices such as city council, school boards, judges, district attorneys or the superintendent of public instruction.

Which other states use this system?

Washington state was the first to adopt a top-two primary for congressional and state-level elections in 2004, but not for governor.

Unlike California, Washington allows write-in candidates in the general election — a safety valve for scenarios where one party is locked out.

A handful of other states use variations of the system. Nebraska’s legislature is nonpartisan, so it uses a top-two primary for state legislative races.

Louisiana uses a majority-vote system for statewide executive offices, state legislative seats and local offices. If a candidate receives a majority of the vote in the primary, they win outright. If not, there is a second round of voting with the top two vote-getters in November.

Alaska adopted a top-four primary in 2020 for state executive, state legislative and congressional races. An effort to repeal the state’s top-four primaries was narrowly defeated by voters in 2024 but will be on the ballot again this year.

If I’m a ‘no party preference’ voter, can I even vote in the California primary?

Yes: Any registered voter, including those with no party preference, can vote for any candidate in voter-nominated races like the governor’s contest.

The top-two primary system draws no distinction based on a voter’s party registration.

Are there any efforts to get rid of California’s jungle primary?

Driven in part by concerns that Democrats could be locked out of this year’s governor’s race, a new ballot initiative seeks to repeal California’s top-two primary system.

Democratic strategist Steven Maviglio filed the initiative, called “Undo the Top Two,” with the attorney general on May 8.
He called the jungle primary a “failed experiment.”

“The prospect of having to vote for a candidate who’s not from your party in November has really woken up a lot of voters in the state about the dangers of the top-two primary,” Maviglio said. “The chance that a Democrat would have to choose between Chad Bianco or Steve Hilton is sending a chill up the spine of a lot of Democrats.”

However, even if successful, Maviglio’s initiative won’t impact the 2026 election — since he hopes to place the measure on the 2028 ballot, with any changes taking effect no earlier than the 2030 elections.