The Brief

The LAist newsroom rose to challenge after challenge throughout 2025:’

• When devastating fires hit Southern California in January, our reporters worked around-the-clock to bring life-saving news to people on our website and airwaves — even as colleagues lost homes and our headquarters was inundated by ash and smoke.
• As people took to the streets to protest ICE raids in L.A., our reporters were there again — to explain what we did and didn’t know.
• Over the course of this year, LAist delivered more accountability investigations than ever before and we invested in stories that explored L.A. and Orange County, to bring you a break from what has felt like a relentless news cycle.

As we look back on another year, I asked editors, reporters, producers and hosts to share the stories that stood out to them — and why. I hope you spot some stories that stuck with you, and have the time to explore others you missed.

I’m enormously proud of my team and their dedication to serving Southern Californians. And for readers who already support our independent nonprofit newsroom with financial contributions: Thank you. None of this would be possible without you.

— Megan Garvey | SVP of News, Editor-in-Chief

The fires and their aftermath

Jan. 9, 2025
This was one of the first stories we published that was off the breaking news, and it was successful for weeks because it was so helpful. Jill Replogle updated this relentlessly. To me, this is a prime LAist story — timely, newsy, helpful, inspiring and connected readers to the community.
— Rene Lynch, editor

Jan. 11, 2025
I was able to get a real estate agent on the record saying she encouraged her client to put her second home up for rent at an elevated price days after the fires because "people are desperate."
— David Wagner

Jan. 21, 2025
This segment gave listeners a more clear and concrete vision for what the next year would be like for those who survived the fires and were on track to rebuild. It provided some hope amongst the chaos that rebuilding was possible.
— Payton Seda

Feb. 7, 2025
When I heard the story of how Cupcake, the class pet, survived the Eaton Fire at Pasadena's Don Benito Elementary School, I needed to know how. The answer is a reflection of how a tight-knit community has weathered one of the region's worst natural disasters and what support students will need as they continue to recover.
— Mariana Dale

Feb. 26, 2025
For months, I have been fascinated by the landslide in my own backyard, watching as some homes literally split in two. This story let me go back in time to understand how development and policies of the past are affecting people's lives today and what that means for the future of some of SoCal's prime real estate.
— Yusra Farzan

Feb. 26, 2025
This was a good get, coupled with Frank Stoltze's skill at explaining complex/esoteric topics in ways that are accessible to a broad audience.
— Dana Littlefield, editor

April 3, 2025
California firefighting agencies regularly drop more fire retardant than water when fighting fires throughout the state. However, Cal Fire, the US Forest Service and Perimeter Solutions all refused to tell LAist whether that retardant also contained heavy metals. So, we went out, gathered some on our own and had it tested by researchers at USC. The results may point to one of the reasons why we so often see elevated levels of heavy metals in runoff when rains fall on a recently burned area.
— Jacob Margolis

May 6, 2025
This was a long booking process, but we got the CEO of Edison on AirTalk right when the company was beginning to align with the likelihood the Eaton Fire was their doing.
— Nic Perez

July 14, 2025
I obtained 911 calls via a records request from the home of two victims of the Eaton Fire to better understand how people with disabilities were left behind. The story has been cited by a state commission and used in trainings for emergency managers since.
— Erin Stone

Oct. 20, 2025
I loved the empathetic portrait of an uninsured family determined to rebuild their lives. And Erin Stone took an excellent photo that we used in the lead and really helped the story travel. The radio feature leaned into the main subject's interesting voice. All around great work.
— Matt Ballinger, editor

Oct. 23, 2025
I did a deep dive into what's changed 10 years after the Aliso Canyon gas leak. My story amplified unreported findings that the facility has continued to leak in recent years and highlighted the voices of survivors who continue to work about the aftermath.
— Erin Stone

Oct. 31, 2025
A great example of pre-planning the social as the story was being reported. Joshua Letona was able to go with Aaron Schrank to film these and have a complementary video package ready to publish the same day as the in-depth story.
— Dana Littlefield, editor

Oct. 16, 2025
A state lawmaker told me her new law, clarifying that landlords must address post-fire smoke damage, was in part driven by my reporting on renters struggling to get their homes cleaned.
— David Wagner

Holding officials to account

March 28, 2025
This video takes what is a numbers-focused story and uses graphics and playful text to guide viewers through the info. It earned 325K+ views.
— Kavish Harjai, Brandon Killman

May 6, 2025
LAist pressed for weeks to get officials to reverse their position on disclosing whistleblower complaints. It worked. The records showed alleged financial mismanagement and hiring of unqualified friends. LAist's unearthing of the documents triggered a county investigation.
— Nick Gerda

May 22, 2025
This story demonstrates how combining several reporting methods, including building strong relationships, searching open records and retrieving court documents, come together to form a strong accountability narrative.
— Kavish Harjai

May 25, 2025
An investigation by LAist revealed that hundreds of thousands of tons of construction and demolition debris were illegally dumped at multiple sites. The practice creates significant environmental hazards, and regulatory gaps allowed those responsible to avoid accountability.
— Jacob Margolis

June 9, 2025
LAist's investigative work unearthed one of Orange County's biggest corruption scandals in decades. In requesting the maximum sentence, prosecutors cited Do's attacks on LAist's reporting as showing he was trying to suppress the truth.
— Nick Gerda

Sept. 2, 2025
This story uncovered behind-the-scenes decisions at Santa Ana City Hall happening without notice to the City Council. As a result, working-class families missed out on a much-needed nearly $7M child-care program.
— Destiny Torres

Sept. 10, 2025
This story is quintessential watchdog reporting. We covered protests against federal immigration action as they happened, then stepped back to provide deep reporting context. Our analysis highlighted key gaps in California's laws regarding police use of force.
— Jared Bennett, editor on work by Kahani Malhotra

Sept. 17, 2025
A strong example of watchdog reporting with a close eye for details. Jordan Rynning spotted this item in a public meeting and followed through. The story had immediate impact: Mayor Karen Bass agreed to convene the relevant departments to work toward a solution.
— Jared Bennett, editor

Nov. 6, 2025
This story lays out the city's unlimited financial exposure as host city for the 2028 Olympic Games and runs through the risks, which are being downplayed by L.A.'s city officials.
— Libby Rainey

Nov. 19, 2025
Sometimes government agencies don't answer questions adequately or outright ignore journalists' requests. This story shows how sometimes the information you're after is hiding in plain sight.
— Kavish Harjai

Dec. 9, 2025
Aaron Schrank's thorough reporting allowed him to tell the tale of what happened step by step. He reviewed about 70 emergency plans from residential care facilities so he could accurately explain where the deficiencies were.
— Dana Littlefield, editor

Navigating life in Southern California

April 1, 2025
Larry Mantle is a legend in L.A. journalism for good reason. For the entire 40 years that he’s had a daily radio show in the nation’s second largest market, his approach has been steadfast. While much of the industry moved to a style where the loudest voice in the room wins the day, Larry has continued to make space for context, nuance and civility on topics ranging from intractable world problems to memories of lost music venues in Southern California.
— Megan Garvey, editor

April 9, 2025
Neighborhood council elections don't have great participation in general, but we were the only local news outlet that seemed to have noticed the steep and continuous 10-year decline in voter participation across these elections.
— Brianna Lee

April 28, 2025
This story was an example of the city's short-sightedness and the challenges working parents face in Los Angeles. It also laid bare the city's priorities when child care centers were cut in the new budget.
— Libby Rainey

April 30, 2025
Parents say the process to choose a public school is bewildering. School Game Plan addresses families' top questions in a series of guides. We forged a new partnership with the LA Public Library to distribute 7,000 print editions.
— Mariana Dale

June 27, 2025
This was an in-depth look at a really intriguing and promising idea for involving residents in solving community problems. It offers readers a glimpse of what a different kind of civic participation can look like.
— Brianna Lee

June 27, 2025
Co-reported with CalMatters, this story coupled public records analysis with shoe-leather reporting to explore enforcement in the wake of the Supreme Court’s Grant’s Pass decision. We reported LAPD made 68% more camping arrests in the second half of 2024 than the first.
— Aaron Schrank

Nov. 11, 2025
The education team spent quality time in the field to reveal what goes on inside TK classrooms, leading to a series of insightful stories and a delightful pinwheel radio feature.
— Julia Barajas, Mariana Dale, Elly Yu

Nov. 24, 2025
City and county officials celebrated homelessness declining overall, but that hasn't been the case for families. After the story aired, several LAist listeners reached out to donate to the family, allowing them to move out of state.
— Elly Yu

Immigration

June 10, 2025
This story really shows the power of collaboration. We partnered with the California Newsroom and NPR to produce a powerful narrative showing the human impacts of federal immigration enforcement action.
— Mark Betancourt, Julia Barajas

June 13, 2025
This summer, families risked racial profiling and separation to attend high school graduations. At Maywood High, the salutatorian said marching in protest of the raids was one of her proudest moments.
— Julia Barajas & Mariana Dale

July 23, 2025
This story features an AI-generated version of a corrido (ballad) and draws parallels between the mass deportation of Mexican descent people in the 1930s and what's happening now.
— Julia Barajas

Aug. 5, 2025
Luis Valentan, founder of a nationally known day laborer radio show, moves back to Mexico with his U.S.-born family. Valentan described the difficult decision-making that led to them leaving their longtime home.
— Adolfo Guzman-Lopez

Oct. 3, 2025
We jumped on a tip about an upcoming DHS operation and were one of the first outlets in the nation to verify rumors that the federal government was targeting children in its custody.
— Jordan Rynning

Oct. 9, 2025
It took months to develop sources in order to tell this story. It has since sparked a new policy at county hospitals designed to protect immigrant patients' rights.
— Jill Replogle

Exploring L.A. and beyond

March 13, 2025
Coverage of Ramadan tends to focus on the spiritual aspect. But for a different take, I got to do a fun piece looking at how Muslims come together during the nights to socialize and shop.
— Yusra Farzan

March 21, 2025
It became one of my most meaningful stories of the year. What made it special was the rare chance to write about a home-cooked meal where hospitality and heritage mattered most.
— Gab Chabrán and Yusra Farzan

March 28, 2025
When one of Jackie and Shadow’s chicks died, I wanted to explore how fans were handling the loss. I loved being able to connect with teachers across the country while taking home life lessons about grief.
— Makenna Sievertson

May 18, 2025
One of the first stories where I was able to spend the entire day out in the field on my own. It was a nice road trip and an honor to catch the "lilac legend" Gary Parton at the end of his second career.
— Dañiel Martinez

May 27, 2025
It was a major moment for me, but more importantly, many people told me that it made them appreciate their U.S. citizenship more, something they'd taken for granted before.
— Suzanne Levy

July 24, 2025
Everyone we talked to for this story was so fun and interesting. They are serious about their hobby, and we got some great responses, including a reader who offered "kudos and hurrahs."
— Monica Bushman and Antonia Cereijido

Aug. 30, 2025
I was drawn to telling the mural's story because its message of identity based on working-class solidarity with people of other races and ethnicities is just as relevant now as when it was newly painted.
— Adolfo Guzman-Lopez

Nov. 1, 2025
Came out from a callout where people shared memories of their loved ones. The feedback was people thanking us for creating the space for them to do that.
— David Rodriguez and Gillian Morán Pérez

Nov. 14, 2025
It was fun & challenging to write. I wanted to juxtapose my experience first tasting this snack with the (re)discovery of it in the SGV. I think I landed it.
— Fiona Ng

Dec. 4, 2025
In L.A., it can feel like music venues are closing more than they're opening. Sid the Cat's new venue bucks that trend and features lots of nuggets of music and local history.
— Kevin Tidmarsh

The historic Original Pantry Cafe in downtown Los Angeles is reopening under a new partnership with nonprofit Hope the Mission.

The more than 100-year-old diner on Figueroa Street is expected to open in May or June in collaboration with the North Hills-based organization that provides meals, shelter and services to people experiencing homelessness.

When The Pantry first announced its closure last March, thousands of Angelenos from its loyal multi-generational customer base flocked to the restaurant for one last meal.

But now, the greasy spoon will start serving customers again under a new model. All profits will go toward supporting the unhoused community, according to Ken Craft, founder and CEO.

“This creates an opportunity for people to know 'I'm going to go enjoy an incredible meal at an iconic location in Los Angeles, and it's going to be doing good for the city of Los Angeles,'” Craft told LAist.

What’s new

Hope the Mission isn’t a total stranger to food service.

The organization provides nearly 9,000 meals each day and operates 33 shelters and interim housing sites in the region, including five shelters within a few miles of The Pantry.

One of its mottos is that everybody and everything gets a second chance — the historic diner included.

“It is very symbolic of the work that we do where oftentimes lives get beat down, they get worn out and they feel like their usefulness is done,” Craft said. “And so I look at The Pantry and I say, ‘No, your best years are yet to come.’"

The tagline of The Pantry when it reopens under the new partnership will be “a second serving”, as a nod to that second chance.

But the nostalgic draw of the diner is not lost on Craft.

The Original Pantry Cafe in 1979.

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William Reagh

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Los Angeles Photographers Photo Collection

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The Original Pantry Cafe, on the northwest corner of Figueroa and 9th streets, in 1978.

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Security Pacific National Bank Photo Collection

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Courtesy L.A. Public Library

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He said Hope the Mission is going to honor the history and legacy of the space (logo and several layers of flooring included) while giving it a new lease on life.

The organization’s chefs have been working on an updated menu. Craft said it’ll include some of the classic food customers came to love, including pancakes and hash browns, along with a new dessert line and some healthier options.

The overall goal is to replicate the feeling people had when they ate at The Pantry decades ago, with the same style and much of the same staff, while the diner evolves into the next philanthropic chapter. Craft said he wants to make sure The Original Pantry Cafe gets back on the map.

“Not only will you get an amazing meal and a wonderful experience, you're going to be actually investing back into the community,” he said.

The counter was full on The Pantry's last day open in March 2025.

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Dañiel Martinez

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LAist

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The scene on the last day of The Pantry's operation in March 2025.

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Dañiel Martinez

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LAist

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Officials are working to reopen The Pantry between May 1 and June 1, Craft said. All the business’ profits will go toward supporting people experiencing homelessness through Hope the Mission’s shelters, services and meal programs.

What’s old

Kurt Petersen, the co-president of UNITE HERE Local 11, the union representing the restaurant’s workers, told LAist they’ve come to an agreement with Hope the Mission so that all the staff who lost their jobs when The Pantry closed will be able to return to their previous positions.

Petersen said the union also reached an agreement that will provide free family health insurance, legal services and training funds for those workers.

“The folks who've been there 10, 20, 30, 40 years — they're really listening to them about what this needs to be in order to be a beloved institution going forward for Angelenos, “ he said.

“At the same time, they have some thoughts about how it should be run and hopefully the marriage of those two concepts will bring The Pantry forward so that it'll be open another 100 years,” Petersen continued.

José Moran, who worked at The Pantry for more than 45 years, told LAist he’s excited to start serving Angelenos again.

José Moran said he's "very happy" to be going back to work at The Pantry.

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Courtesy UNITE HERE Local 11

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“I feel great, I feel very happy,” Moran said. “I never thought I was going to work again there.”

Moran described the restaurant staff as a “family” — both figuratively and literally. His brother, Jesus, also worked at The Pantry a little longer than José.

Moran said he’s been missing his brother since they stopped seeing each other every day when the diner closed. But now, they’re both looking forward to coming back to the greasy spoon.

José and Jesus Moran were both servers at The Pantry for more than 45 years. José Moran said they're both looking forward to returning for the reopening.

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Courtesy UNITE HERE Local 11

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How we got here

The diner shut its doors last year after more than a century of serving breakfast staples.

The owner at the time, the Richard J. Riordan Administrative Trust, told LAist’s media partner CBS LA that the restaurant was never profitable and that selling the property would help keep the foundation’s charitable mission. The trust took over ownership after former L.A. Mayor Richard Riordan, who bought the restaurant in 1981, died a few years ago.

But UNITE HERE Local 11 said the trust abruptly closed the diner after staff insisted that any new owners must protect their jobs and honor the union.

Kurt Petersen, the co-president of UNITE HERE Local 11, said the staff who lost their jobs when The Pantry closed will be able to return to their previous positions.

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Courtesy UNITE HERE Local 11

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“I saw some of the guys crying, and because, you know, we all got families and we have to support them,” Moran said. “I know how they were feeling, because I was feeling too the same. At the beginning, that was very sad.”

Last September, the union announced a “landmark agreement” with the new owner, Leo Pustilnikov, who’s also a real estate developer.

Petersen said because the staff fought for their jobs with the support of residents and city officials, they are now going back to work with an operator and owner who share the mission that The Pantry needs to be one of the great restaurants in Los Angeles.

“So this is all good news,” Petersen said. “and God knows we need good news right now.”

Pustilnikov told the Los Angeles Times last fall that he planned to reopen The Pantry on New Year’s Eve, pending the necessary permits and licenses. Petersen said there were some delays when a car crashed into the building shorty after.

The restaurant’s website still reads “temporarily closed” as of Thursday.

Pustilnikov didn’t immediately respond to LAist’s request for comment.

How to get involved

Hope the Mission is also launching a fundraising campaign with opportunities for the community to support The Pantry’s reopening.

There are various donation levels, with people giving $100,000 or more getting the chance to name a drink or item from the menu. Craft said they’ve already had a few takers.

Gifts of $50,000 or more will get to sponsor a booth at the diner, with the donor's name or business displayed on the table.

People who donate $5,000 or more will have their name permanently displayed on a sign inside The Pantry.

“We're looking to the business community and people that love L.A. to partner with us in helping to make sure that it's a successful launch,” Craft said.

You can learn more here.

Monterey Park voters will decide in June whether to ban data centers citywide, setting up a potential legal battle with the developer behind a proposed project.

The City Council on Wednesday unanimously approved placing a measure on the June ballot that would ask voters to amend the city’s General Plan to prohibit the facilities.

The council, also by unanimous vote, directed staff to begin drafting a city ordinance banning data centers ahead of the June election that could potentially take effect before then. It also extended a 45-day moratorium on data center development to January 2027.

City Attorney Karl Berger said the multi-prong approach would give Monterey Park the strongest legal footing.

“I like the belt, suspenders and girdle approach to most things just to make sure that everything's buckled down,” Berger said.

The council votes come after months of mounting resident outrage over a proposal to build a 250,000-square-foot data center in a business park — a project they fear would bring high energy use, noise and limited economic benefit.

Many said they did not learn about the project until the end of last year through word-of-mouth and social media, and faulted city leaders for failing to properly inform them.

Developer HMC StratCap has threatened litigation over the council’s moves toward banning data centers.

On Wednesday, before the council voted, Bryan Marsh, an HMC StratCap executive, gave public comment to boos from the audience, saying the company purchased the land in December 2024 after the “city provided assurances about the viability of data center development.”

He urged the city to work with the company on finding “alternative land uses” for the property.

“Forcing a ballot proposition with a special election in June 2026 severely degrades our ability to work together,” Marsh said.

The council appeared unmoved. Berger, the city attorney, said the developer currently does not appear to have a legally vested project.

There is an application on file, he said, but no public hearing has been scheduled. Berger added he had been authorized by the council to initiate litigation against HMC StratCap if the company were to file suit.

Opponents of the data center rejoiced over Wednesday’s votes and expressed relief that they had mobilized against the project before HMC StratCap’s application had advanced any further.

“The City Council has listened and is listening,” said Hrag Balian, a resident who helped found the group No Data Center in Monterey Park! “ I feel very optimistic that data centers are going to be banned from Monterey Park in the foreseeable near future.”

A group in South Pasadena gathered Wednesday to urge their city council to end its contracts with Flock Safety, the controversial surveillance company that operates AI-powered automated license plate readers in thousands of communities across the U.S., including many in California.

The small town has 27 Flock cameras that monitor the cars that come and go in the community of around 25,000 people — one of the highest densities in the region, according to the mayor. That information is temporarily stored in a database that's shared with law enforcement agencies across the state.

The South Pasadena City Council is now taking a deeper look at its contracts with Flock, after reports that some local law enforcement agencies in Southern California illegally shared license plate reader data with federal immigration agents. Those included the Riverside County Sheriff’s Office, which South Pasadena shares its data with.

"I’m deeply concerned for the safety of our community. Flock has proven to be careless with our data," Olivia Ramirez, a South Pasadena resident, told the city council in public comment Wednesday. “Continuing to work with Flock will erode public trust and, as a consequence, will harm public safety.”

The speakers are part of a growing movement, as residents across California push local law enforcement and city governments to reconsider their ties with the Flock over concerns about surveillance and how their data could be used in the federal government's mass deportation campaign.

How other communities are responding

Santa Cruz killed its contract with Flock in January following reports that the city's data was accessed by agencies outside of California and shared with ICE. Last month, Mountain View Police Department shut off its Flock cameras after an audit found that federal agencies had accessed its data in 2024. Other local governments in the Bay Area have followed suit.

The Oxnard Police Department also suspended its use of Flock license plate readers last week, after an audit revealed that data from the city's cameras was made available to federal law enforcement agencies between February and March of 2025 through a "nationwide query" setting, against the city's wishes and state law. A California law prohibits sharing license plate reader data with agencies outside of the state.

Flock acknowledged the incident in a blog post this week, saying that out-of-state law enforcement agencies' access to some of its camera networks was "inadvertent" and it was not possible in some cases to determine the cause.

The post also said that Flock had strengthened its protections, including by excluding federal agencies from national and statewide lookup networks, and implementing guardrails that keep California agencies from accepting or initiating data sharing with federal agencies or out of state entities.

"Flock sincerely regrets the confusion and mistrust this has created within several communities," the blog post reads. "Flock takes full accountability for this situation, and has made changes and improvements to significantly enhance agency ability to effortlessly comply with applicable laws, regulations, and community norms that govern information sharing."

That wasn't good enough for Sam Gurley, who rallied with his neighbors in South Pasadena on Wednesday night.

“It isn't until they get caught that they say, 'Hey, I know that this is a law in California. We got caught, let's fix it,'" said Gurley, who said he became alarmed when he learned that Flock cameras were deployed. " Now that I have a better understanding of how the system, the city use and share this data with each other, I'm more terrified than I've ever been."

How Flock works

Flock has contracts with more than 5,000 law enforcement agencies around the nation that use its cameras and license plate readers. The cameras are sometimes attached to street poles — including one on Fair Oaks Avenue in South Pasadena near the entrance to the 110 Freeway, where cars streamed by the nondescript camera under a small solar panel on Wednesday evening.

There are 27 Flock cameras installed around the city of South Pasadena.

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Libby Rainey

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LAist

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Flock cameras "continuously scan and record images" of vehicles' license plates numbers, color, and make, according to a report put together by city staff in South Pasadena. The cameras record the date, time and GPS location every time a car passes by. According to Flock's website, the cameras also pick up other identifying features of cars, like stickers and roof racks.

The technology automatically cross references license plate numbers with law enforcement databases and alerts the police department if it detects a vehicle connected with a criminal investigation, according to the report.

Flock's database also allows law enforcement agencies to search the location of vehicles outside of their own city. Flock stores the data for 30 days and then automatically deletes it, although cities can adjust the length of time they retain the data. Flock emphasized to NPR that cities control how the data they collect is shared.

Law enforcement agencies have hailed the technology for helping them locate suspects and stolen vehicles. At a February city council meeting, South Pasadena Sergeant Andy DuBois called the Flock cameras a "force multiplier" for officers trying to solve crimes.

" It allows agencies to share relevant information in a secure and regulated way. By participating in this network, we benefit from broader technological coverage without needing to add additional staffing," DuBois said.

Nick Hidalgo, senior staff attorney with ACLU of Northern California who has done work on automated license plate readers for years, called the technology a "dragnet.”

"What they are collecting is a person's location — because any license plate information can be connected very easily to a driver," he said. "You can capture a ton of information about where a person lives, works, etc. We're talking about truly sensitive information here."

A deeper look at the law

In California, state law SB 34 prohibits agencies from sharing information gathered by automated license plate readers with out-of-state and federal agencies. Police departments also must keep a record of their queries of the system. Another state law, SB 54, limits California law enforcement agencies from assisting with immigration enforcement.

In 2023, the state's attorney general Rob Bonta issued two bulletins to state and local law enforcement on complying with those laws when using automated license plate reader data.

"The majority of California law enforcement agencies collect and use images captured by ALPR cameras, but few have appropriate usage and privacy policies in place," a press release from Bonta's office said at the time.

Last year, Bonta sued the city of El Cajon in San Diego County, saying it had shared data from its system of Flock automated license plate reader cameras with more than 100 out-of-state law enforcement agencies. The mayor of that city responded with defiance, saying it shares data with other states because "crime doesn't stop at the border."

Flock Safety says that it does not work with ICE or any agency within the Department of Homeland Security. It also emphasizes that it is local agencies that own the data that their cameras collect, not Flock.

South Pasadena faces a deadline

The city of South Pasadena pays around $83,000 annually for two contracts with Flock – one which sunsets this month, on March 19. The council has until March 18 to decide whether or not to auto-renew the contract for two more years.

If the city decides to terminate the contract, it will have to repay a federal grant of around $45,000 it used to install 14 cameras. The city could also decide to end its second contract with Flock before its March, 2027 end date. That would cost the city a $6,500 termination fee, but it would receive a refund for the unused days of service, according to a city report.

South Pasadena Mayor Sheila Rossi told LAist that she's concerned about Flock's system and reports about data being shared out of the state of California. She also told the city council in February that South Pasadena had a far higher density of cameras than many surrounding communities, saying it reached "the category of surveillance."

South Pasadena says it's implementing changes to its camera policies, including requiring monthly audits of how the system is queried and requiring agents that search the data include a case number.

Councilmembers in February also raised the idea of reducing their system's data retention to less than 30 days. The state of New Hampshire requires law enforcement agencies to delete automated license plate reader data after three minutes if it does not yield a hit with criminal investigations.

Rossi said the council will look into options including contracting with other automated license plate readers and canceling one of the city contracts with Flock.

" Cities have a responsibility to make sure the safeguards around these tools keep pace," she said.

Susan Seager, a First Amendment lawyer and South Pasadena resident, said she wants the cameras gone, period.

" I don't trust Flock and I don't trust our federal government, and I want to be able to trust our local police department," she said. "I don't think our little small city should be part of that surveillance state."

Los Angeles' regional homeless services agency revealed last month that it’s behind on paying tens of millions of public dollars to homeless services providers currently operating shelters and other services for unhoused Angelenos.

Leaders at the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, or LAHSA, said the agency currently owes more than $50 million to service providers for services they’ve already provided. Several LAHSA contractors told LAist they’re taking on debt to maintain operations while awaiting payments.

Now, the city of L.A. and L.A County are investigating the causes of LAHSA’s cashflow problems and pushing to get those contractors paid.

The agency’s finance team blames the payment delays on a variety of factors, including LAHSA’s own outdated policies, disorganized workflows and low morale among staff.

They also point to local bureaucracies, especially within city government, which LAHSA said has failed to pass along tens of millions in public funds meant for providers.

Starting Thursday, the county’s auditor-controller is launching a review of LAHSA’s financial operations. The audit is expected to conclude this month, officials said. County supervisors also approved a motion this week asking staff to come up with a plan to speed up late payments to county-funded providers.

Officials from the city of L.A. said the Los Angeles Housing Department, City Administrative Officer's Office and LAHSA are working together to expedite the contracting and payments processes on the city side.

This budget year, which ends June 30, LAHSA is responsible for doling out nearly $700 million in city, county and state and federal dollars to the local organizations it contracts with to provide homeless services.

LAHSA’s latest payments crisis comes as L.A.’s lead homelessness agency has been under heightened scrutiny for more than a year, after an L.A. County audit and federal court-ordered review found widespread financial mismanagement.

County officials cited LAHSA’s oversight problems when they voted last April to shift more than $300 million in funds away from the agency next budget year and oversee the funds itself within a new homelessness department.

“LAHSA does not have the staffing or expertise to pay its bills,” Supervisor Lindsey Horvath said in a statement. “These failures have destabilized providers and eroded public trust — and they must end.”

Now, the L.A. City Council is weighing moving the city’s roughly $300 million away from the troubled agency soon, too.

Some officials are calling for serious reforms at LAHSA's finance department. L.A. City Councilmember Monica Rodriguez told LAist the delayed payments aren’t an isolated incident, but a symptom of the agency’s broken governance structure.

“When the City routes hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars through a joint authority without directly negotiating and contracting with providers, accountability becomes blurred and finger-pointing replaces responsibility,” Rodriguez said in a statement.

LAHSA’s finances

Providers raised the same concerns about late LAHSA payments nearly two years ago, and officials promised to make changes.

L.A. County began issuing quarterly advance payments to LAHSA to pay homeless service providers ahead of time, officials said, instead of weeks or months later. The city started doing the same thing for many of its LAHSA contracts.

Janine Trejo, LAHSA’s chief financial officer, was instrumental in developing the new advanced payment model, according to the agency.

But that fix, which was meant to speed up payments, is now a bottleneck. The advance-payments system has become administratively burdensome for overworked and undertrained staff, LAHSA officials said. And the agency failed to release many of those advances to providers on time this year.

“Having an advanced model is great for the providers, but it’s extremely difficult for LAHSA,” said Gita O’Neill, the agency's interim CEO, in a public meeting last week.

In December, LAHSA put a new plan in place for contracts, which O’Neill said “will prevent the avalanche of invoices” next budget year. She said LAHSA is working to identify consultants to help the agency modernize how it issues and recoups advances, submits cash requests to funders and disperses checks.

“We're actually gonna go through it with an outside firm and make sure it works,” O’Neill said last week at a LAHSA Commission meeting. “Not just fixing the tools, but actually checking the process to see if we can make it better, since it's my understanding that this happens year after year at LAHSA and it can't continue. We aren't just gonna put a band-aid on it.”

O’Neill acknowledged the agency is in deep crisis.

“LAHSA has been structured for decades as the entity that takes the blame,” O’Neill said. “Political incentive has always been to point at LAHSA rather than to address structural issues.”

Janine Trejo, LAHSA's Chief Financial Officer, speaks at a LAHSA Commission meeting on April 25, 2025.

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Samanta Helou Hernandez

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LAist

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The blame game

Last month, LAHSA finance deputy Janine Lim told the commission overseeing the agency that delayed payments were partly caused by the city of L.A. not passing along funds.

LAHSA Commission member Amy Perkins, also a policy deputy for county Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, pressed Lim on why the agency had not raised an alarm.

“Providers are submitting invoices for work they've completed for the city of Los Angeles and you don't have that money, and you are not calling out that as a 911?” Perkins said. “That feels like a 911 to me.”

Lim said she had informed providers consistently that LAHSA was waiting on payments from the city — more than $40 million as of last week.

Contracts for the Inside Safe program, which moves people from encampments into shelter, had the longest delays, Lim said. That program is funded quarterly, making payments more complicated.

“ Government funding, I think as we know, is some of the toughest dollars to manage,” Lim said.

Several homeless services providers told LAist that the wait is typically longer for city-funded contracts, because there are more departments and offices involved.

“What may take the County a few days or a week to approve, can take considerably longer at the City level,” said Kelvin Driscoll, CEO of HOPICS, in a written comment. “The City has a much more complex process that can, and has, caused delays for months in both finalizing contracts as well as funding.”

City pushes back

City officials acknowledged the need to streamline their processes, but said LAHSA was slow to finalize contracts for the current budget year.

The city of L.A. executed its eight contracts with LAHSA in September, a few months after the budget year had already started. It then took LAHSA until this February to finalize 160 subcontracts with the providers, city officials said.

“While there is certainly room to move faster on the city side, most of the delay this year in contracting was at LAHSA,” L.A. City Councilmember Nithya Raman told LAist.

Matt Szabo, L.A.’s city administrative officer, said the city has already given LAHSA more money than it has asked for when it comes to advances.

“The City has disbursed more than $138 million to LAHSA in advance-payments this year, far in excess of what we have been billed for to date,” Szabo told LAist in a statement.

Raman, who chairs the council’s homelessness committee, said the overdue payments are unacceptable.

“I do not think the city should sign any new contract with LAHSA for next fiscal year until LAHSA has an outside, qualified accounting firm in place to process its payments and cashflow,” Raman said.

Meanwhile, L.A. Mayor Karen Bass blamed the City Council for contributing to the delays.

During this year’s budget process, the council voted to move half of all funding for shelter beds into the city’s unappropriated balance, to allow for more spending flexibility and oversight. That decision has caused severe payment delays this budget year, the mayor’s office said.

“Mayor Bass is exploring all available options to improve this system, including reevaluating the cost-reimbursement model, advocating for a multi-year budget, and working with the city council to keep all homelessness funding outside of the unappropriated balance,” a Bass spokesperson told LAist.

The Housing Department administers LAHSA’s city-funded homelessness contracts. The department did not immediately respond to questions about the delayed payments.

Large trash piles and sprawling homeless encampment in downtown Los Angeles Sept. 25, 2025.

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Allen J. Schaben

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Los Angeles Times via Getty Images

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What’s next? 

The evaluation by the Auditor-Controller’s Office will focus on the agency’s delayed processing of invoices and its failure to draw down available funds in time to pay scheduled advance payments to some county-funded providers last month.

Acting County CEO Joe Nicchitta sent a letter notifying LAHSA of the review last week.

“ Why this happened, I think, remains unclear,” Nicchitta told county supervisors this week. “We all agreed that a review of LAHSA’s policies, procedures, and financial records relating to the advances was warranted and necessary to make sure that we understood what was happening.”

County officials are expected to return to the Board of Supervisors with a financial analysis and corrective action plan next month.

In July, L.A. County will start managing its homelessness funds directly, through the Department of Homeless Services and Housing, instead of relying on LAHSA.

LAHSA is still expected to manage $340 million in homelessness dollars for the city of L.A. next budget year. But the future of that arrangement is uncertain, as city officials consider withdrawing from the troubled agency.

After an L.A. City Council committee discussed options at a meeting Wednesday, Bass released a statement urging the council not to withdraw funding from LAHSA without a plan in place.

“We need to continue putting people and services first,” Bass said.