The Brief

It’s the day after Thanksgiving. Most people are usually sleeping in, but 79-year-old Don Kehl has two ladders out and is directing his two sons, three grandkids and granddaughter-in-law on how to string up an elaborate Christmas light design.

“None of my family will let me on the roof anymore,” Kehl said, with a smile. “I'm just kind of down here telling them what they did wrong.”

The Kehl family decorates their home to welcome visitors to "Candy Cane Lane" in El Segundo.

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His decor, he said with a bellowing laugh, is “whatever was on sale at Home Depot on the 26th of December last year.”

Kehl lives on East Acacia Avenue in El Segundo, dubbed “Candy Cane Lane” every holiday season. The neighborhood has its own Yelp page and has been decorating as a group for the holidays since 1949. Starting Dec. 9, thousands of visitors will descend to enjoy the holiday light displays. This year, the neighborhood is expecting a bigger crowd, after the street inspired the upcoming holiday film Candy Cane Lane starring Eddie Murphy and Tracee Ellis Ross.

The film will be released on Amazon Prime Video on Dec. 1. You can watch the trailer here.

Kehl thinks the film will bring more visitors, “but that's fine,” he said. “The reason we put these up is to attract people so the more people, the better.”

For the Kehl family, decorating each year is a treasured family tradition that now stretches to three generations. Don Kehl’s two sons, Tom and Russell Kehl, remember when their kids — now in their 20s — were young and would watch them put up lights with their dad.

“It's been fun to watch the kids go from, ‘Can I please go on the roof, can I please go on the roof, can I please go on the roof’ to running the show now,” Russell Kehl said.

Don Kehl instructs his grandson and granddaughter-in-law on how to string the Christmas lights around the window.

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Scott Brunnenkant, who has lived on the street for 34 years, was also busy putting up decorations Friday.

“The movie looks like a lot of fun,” he said, adding that the film’s screenwriter Kelly Younger used to live up the street. “He's a friend of ours, nice guy.”

Scott Brunnenkant with his decorations pulled out of storage ready to be put out.

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In addition to lights around the roof line, Brunnenkant’s decorations also include LED icicles, window garlands with lit-up wreaths and ornaments, fairy lights on the bushes, four electric trains on one side of the yard and teddy bears and elves on the other side.

He knew about the neighborhood’s tradition when he bought the house back in 1989 as the open house was held during Christmastime. Friends ask him all the time if holiday decorations are allowed as part of the HOA, he said.

“And I tell them, oh yeah, it's the Santa clause,” he chuckles. Technically there’s no requirement to participate, but neighbors joke that peer pressure gets just about everyone involved.

A community effort to pay the bills

Brunnenkant said his home’s electricity bill triples during the month of December and because the neighborhood decorates the cul-de-sac at the end of the road, that part of the neighborhood has its own address under Southern California Edison.

The "Candy Cane Lane" plaque.

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“There's a bill that comes with that,” he said, explaining that the neighborhood sets up a Santa tent at the end of the block that takes donations. “Some of that money is used to pay the electric bill for the end of the block and get the Santa suit cleaned and things like that.”

The rest of the money is donated to different causes like St. Jude’s Hospital, said Jennifer Turnbull, another neighbor who has co-chaired the Candy Cane Lane committee for around 15 years.

“It's a labor of love, worth every penny, worth every minute,” Turnbull said. “It's a lot but it brings joy to a lot of people.”

The Turnbull family stands in front of their home on "Candy Cane Lane."

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The neighborhood typically gets about 8,000 visitors on opening night and 3,000 to 4,000 a night through Dec. 25 — the last day of the light show, Turnbull said.

With the movie release, Turnbull said, they are ready for additional visitors. To help things run smoothly, she asks that people use waste bins for trash.

What to expect on opening night

On opening night, Turnball said, people line up behind police barricades at the beginning of the block on California Street. Santa Claus arrives on a fire truck and “Candy Cane Lane” is pitch black.

“He will wave his hand at each street, or each home, screaming Merry Christmas or ho ho ho, and those lights turn on and it's oohs and ahhs all the way ‘till he gets to the cul de sac where his sleigh is,” she said.

Jennifer Turnbull wraps Christmas lights in front of her home. Her display features thousands of lights.

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Turnbull’s home is one of the houses decorated with thousands of lights, she said, and Looney Tunes characters, all custom and made by hand.

Storage issues

Richard and Judy Doukakis, who have lived on “Candy Cane Lane” since 1986, begin decorating their home for Christmas after Halloween ends. They don’t decorate for Halloween because they just don’t have room for decorations, Richard Doukakis said.

Just some of Richard and Judy Doukakis' Christmas decor in storage.

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“There's probably 75 boxes,” Richard Doukakis said — of their Christmas decor — stored in multiple closets, the attic and the garage.

“I bought him a storage shed last year for Christmas, so that's helped,” Judy Doukakis said. “But storage is a problem.”

Richard and Judy Doukakis in the storage shed Judy bought Richard last Christmas to house some of their Christmas decor.

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New this year: Custom made Bluey characters

That did not stop them from ordering custom made Bluey characters decked out in holiday fare for this year’s holiday decorations.

The custom Bluey decor Richard and Judy Doukakis ordered for their holiday display.

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“I thought it'd be nice. It's so popular. My grandkids love it. So I had somebody make me those characters so they're going to be on my lawn now,” Richard Doukakis said.

Bill and Debra Mitchell also custom make their decor. Their blue front door is flanked by two candy canes on either side. After spotting them in a mail order catalog, the couple decided they could make them cheaper, so they did.

Bill Mitchell stands beside two candy canes he custom made with his wife Debra.

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Over the years, they have also made penguins and flamingos which will come out in the next few days leading up to opening day.

Back when the pair moved into the neighborhood in 1995, they didn’t know about the tradition.

“Right before it happened. I met a friend down the street and she said, ‘What are you doing for ‘Candy Cane Lane?’ And I said, ‘We know nothing about it,’” Debra Mitchell said. “And then he pops up with, ‘Oh, that explains the big manger animals, farm animals, that were in the garage when we looked at the house.’”

And they have been decorating it ever since.

Robert Mueller, the ex-FBI director and former special counsel who led the high-profile investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election and possible obstruction of justice by President Trump, died Friday at 81.

"With deep sadness, we are sharing the news that Bob passed away" on Friday night, his family said in a statement Saturday shared with NPR. "His family asks that their privacy be respected."

This is a breaking story and will be updated.

Copyright 2026 NPR

At the Koreatown Senior and Community Center, people were used to seeing Keum-soon Lee arrive early. When she didn’t show up for the 11 a.m. group harmonica class at the center last Friday, people took notice. 

“She would always be there first,” said conductor Eun-young Kim. “If she couldn’t come, she would tell me ahead of time. This time, I didn’t receive any messages from her. I thought, something isn’t right.”

Kim tried calling and sending messages. She didn’t get a response.

Members of the center later learned that Lee, 73, was critically injured in a hit-and-run crash while biking home in Koreatown after attending early morning prayer at her church. She died in a hospital March 13 from her injuries, according to the Los Angeles Police Department.

“I was shocked,” said Jin-soon Baek, who has played with Lee for years. “We’ve been friends for a long time. We ate together, practiced together. She was like a sibling to me.

“She was so hardworking. Always the first one there to sign in for class. She’d walk ahead of me and I’d follow behind. That’s how it always was.”

Baek, who is in her 80s, said the two also shared something more personal: Both had cancer.

“I had cancer years ago, and she was going through treatment recently,” Baek said. “We understood each other.”

In January, Lee played with the harmonica ensemble at an LA Kings game. Lee spoke with a journalist about undergoing surgery and chemotherapy, and what the group meant to her. 

“I think I’ve almost fully recovered,” Lee told journalist Chase Karng at the hockey game. “Even while receiving chemotherapy, I felt encouraged when I heard that I could perform here.”

At the Koreatown Senior and Community Center, people were used to seeing Keum-soon Lee arrive early. When she didn’t show up for the 11 a.m. group harmonica class at the center last Friday, people took notice.

Lee was born in 1952 in South Korea and immigrated to the United States in 1998. She was an elder at Saehan Presbyterian Church in Pico Union and is survived by her husband, Sang-rae Lee, and son, Young-jo Lee.

The senior center, where Lee was a fixture and known as a reliable friend, has designated March 20 as a day of mourning.

On Friday, Lee’s church held a funeral service, where members of the harmonica ensemble performed the hymn, “Nearer My God to Thee,” in her memory.

“I usually don’t attend funeral services, but I had to come for hers,” said Alice Kim. “Whenever I came to church, I would see her watering the grass, bent over, and she would smile and say, ‘You’re here, Alice,’ and hand me the Sunday bulletin.”

In her eulogy, elder Gyu-sook Lee said the sudden loss has hit the congregation hard.

“She always greeted everyone with a warm smile,” she said. “She was the kind of person who always stepped forward first to do the hard work that no one else wanted to do. And when she took something on, she saw it through to the end.”

At the Koreatown Senior and Community Center, people were used to seeing Keum-soon Lee arrive early. When she didn’t show up for the 11 a.m. group harmonica class at the center last Friday, people took notice.

“She still had so many years ahead of her,” Baek said. “She was younger than us. Full of hope. It feels like it should have been me instead.”

According to police, Lee was riding through a crosswalk when a white Dodge Ram truck turning right struck her around 6:40 a.m. near Olympic Boulevard and Vermont Avenue. The driver briefly stopped, then drove away, authorities said.

Investigators found the truck and are looking into whether the driver was impaired on drugs or alcohol. The truck was seized and there was no information about the driver.

Kim, the conductor, said Lee was the first person to reach out to her when she started to lead the ensemble in September. 

“She sent me a message saying thank you for coming,” Kim said. “She was such a special person to me.” 

At Friday’s service, speaker after speaker described Lee as someone who was a light in every community she was part of. 

“The way she served the church behind the scenes became a lesson in faith for all of us. There isn’t a single part of this church that hasn’t felt her touch. Her warmth, her love, her dedication — I can still feel it,” Gyu-sook Lee said.

When Gilbert Lindsay became the first Black person elected to Los Angeles City Council in 1963, it gave the residents of the predominantly Black District 9 someone who understood the challenges they faced living in South Central. 

This area was the center of Black political power in LA because it was one of the few places in the city Black people were allowed to live and thrive due, in part, to housing restrictions. For the next 63 years, voters in this district — which includes historic South Central, Exposition Park and a small portion of downtown Los Angeles — consecutively chose a Black representative. 

That will end with Curren D. Price Jr., the current District 9 councilmember who can’t run again due to term limits. 

Twelve candidates announced campaigns in February to replace Price. Of them, six candidates have qualified to be on the June 2 primary election ballot, none of whom are Black. They include: Estuardo Mazariegos, Elmer Roldan, Jorge Hernandez Rosas, Jorge Nuño, Martha Sánchez and Jose Ugarte. 

The list is a reflection of the demographic shift of the area, but candidates also told The LA Local that it shows the strength of the district’s Black-Latino political coalition. And with the civil rights gains since the 1960s, while some locals are concerned that issues facing Black voters won’t get the attention they need, others who live in the district said they’re less concerned with what their representative looks like. Instead, they said they want someone who listens and gets things done. 

“As long as you do good in the community, we’re going to be happy,” said Dennis Anya, who works on Central Avenue and has lived in the district for nearly 40 years.

What the demographic shifts in District 9 mean for the June election

The upcoming election comes as the demographics have changed in District 9 and South LA. The Black population in South Los Angeles was 81% in 1965, according to a special census survey from November 1965 of South and East LA. 

As of 2021, District 9, specifically, is about 78% Latino and 13% Black, according to LA City Council population demographic data taken that year as part of a redistricting effort. 

Officials have predicted the district’s shift for years. Former City Councilmembers Kevin De León and Nury Martinez discussed the district’s future in the leaked 2021 audio — checkered with racist remarks — that the LA Times reported in 2022.“This will be [Price’s] last four years,” De Leon said at one point in the conversation, the transcript of which the LA Times published in full. “That eventually becomes a Latino seat.” 

Erin Aubry Kaplan, a writer and columnist who traces her family’s roots to South Central, told The LA Local that because District 9 has historically voted for a Black candidate, there is some anxiety amongst Black voters about losing Black representation in Los Angeles. 

“I would hope that whoever wins, will carry the interest of Black folk forward,” she said.

Manuel Pastor, a USC professor and co-author of “South Central Dreams: Finding Home and Community in South LA,” told The LA Local that traditionally, voters are older. While District 9 is now home to a younger, immigrant community, they may not vote at the same rate as older generations, and undocumented residents are ineligible to vote.  

Pastor said it’s likely for this reason that the current District 9 candidates are not emphasizing being Latino but are modeling their campaigns after other city leaders and focusing on Black-Latino solidarity. 

“Just because the demographics have changed, doesn’t mean that the voting population has changed,” Pastor said.  

Here’s what the candidates say about the transformation of District 9

Chris Martin, one of the two Black candidates who campaigned for the seat but did not qualify for the ballot, said he believes the city’s Black elected officials should have supported Black candidates in the race. Martin said he will challenge the city clerk’s decision on his nomination petition in court. 

“The story of Black political power in the city of Los Angeles is dying,” Martin said. “I felt like I had a good chance of keeping it alive.” 

When Gilbert Lindsay became the first Black person elected to Los Angeles City Council in 1963, it gave the residents of the predominantly Black District 9 someone who understood the challenges they faced living in South Central.

Michelle Washington, the other Black candidate who also did not qualify, did not respond to a request for comment.Price, the current District 9 councilmember, endorsed his deputy Jose Ugarte in the race and wrote in a statement that this election is about solidarity. 

“As a Black man who has served a majority-Latino district, I know that progress in South Central has always come from Black and Brown families moving forward together,” Price wrote. “We’ve had to fight harder for housing, safety, opportunity and the basic investments every neighborhood deserves. And when we’ve made gains, it’s because we stood united.”  

Five of the six candidates who qualified for the ballot told The LA Local that not having a Black candidate on the ballot doesn’t diminish the place of the district’s Black community. (Candidate Jorge Hernandez Rosas did not return requests for comment.) 

“It has always been a Black community and will always be a Black community. This isn’t about a passing of the baton or one community taking over another. It’s about building a solidarity movement,” Estuardo Mazariegos said. 

Elmer Roldan, who carries endorsements from LA Mayor Karen Bass and City Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson, said the district needs a councilmember who won’t leave anyone behind.“We have to avoid at all costs contributing to Black erasure and Black displacement,” Roldan said.

Ugarte said that the major quality of life problems — like dirty streets and broken street lights — affecting the neighborhood’s Black and brown communities haven’t changed since he was a child living in the district. 

“The same issues are still here,” he said. 

Here’s what happens next

If you haven’t registered to vote and you want to receive a vote-by-mail ballot, you must register to vote by May 18.

Results from the primary election will be certified by July 2. If no candidate receives more than 50% of the vote, the top two candidates will move on to the general election on Nov. 3, according to the City Clerk’s website. 

The winner of District 9 will begin a four-year term Dec. 14.

The L.A. County Medical Examiner has released the cause of death for Emily Beutner, the daughter of former LAUSD Superintendent Austin Beutner.

The 22-year-old died from the effects of a combination of drugs, including two linked to the opioid known as kratom — mitragynine and 7-hydroxymitragynine — according to the statement released by the medical examiner Friday.

A county health official told our partner CBS L.A. that kratom products are sometimes sold as natural remedies but are illegal and unsafe.

The other two substances cited as causes of death were quetiapine and mirtazapine — the former is an antipsychotic medication, and the latter is used to treat depression, according to the Mayo Clinic.

The former Loyola Marymount University student was found alone and suffering from medical distress by L.A. County Fire Department personnel shortly after midnight in a field by a highway in Palmdale on Jan. 6. She was transported to a hospital and pronounced dead soon after.

After his daughter's death, Beutner dropped out of the L.A. mayoral race.

The Medical Examiner said the manner of death was ruled a suicide.

Resources

If You Need Immediate Help

• If you or someone you know is in crisis and need immediate help, call the Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 988 or go here for online chat.

If you or someone you know is experiencing a crisis, you can dial the mental health lifeline at 988.

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