The Brief

Calling “shotgun” to ride in the front seat may no longer be an option for small-sized California middle and high schoolers.

Citing crash statistics that show small-framed children, regardless of age, are disproportionately hurt in crashes when not in the back seat or using a booster seat, traffic safety advocates are pushing for a controversial bill that would ban teens up to 16 years old from sitting in the front seat if they’re not tall enough.

The bill would require all children younger than 10 to use booster seats and bar all those under 13 from sitting in the front seat. The pending measure also would require children as old as 13 to use a booster seat unless they meet the same size criteria.

Current California law requires children to use booster seats until they turn 8 or reach a height of 4 foot 9 inches, though the California Highway Patrol recommends all children younger than 13 sit in the back.

Last week, the Assembly Transportation Committee voted to advance the new, more restrictive booster rules, Lori Wilson’s Assembly Bill 435, which has support from some child and automotive safety and health care groups. Violators would face tickets of $20 for a first offense and $50 for each subsequent offense.

Wilson, a Democrat representing Suisun City, told the committee she remembers “being a child calling shotgun” so she could ride in the front seat.

But she said alarming numbers of kids are getting hurt or dying in crashes because safety belts and airbags aren’t fitted for their small bodies.

“God forbid something happens, we want our children to be safe,” Wilson told the committee.

Under Wilson’s bill, beginning in 2027, a child would need to pass a “five-step test” to be able to ride in the front seat or move out of a booster seat, depending on the child’s age:

1. Does the child sit all the way back against the seat?

2. Do the child's knees bend comfortably at the edge of the seat?

3. Does the belt cross the shoulder between the neck and arm, resting on the collarbone?

4. Is the lap belt as low as possible, touching the thighs?

5. Can the child stay seated like this for the whole trip?

The CHP, AAA, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the California Department of Public Health, the California Hospital Association, American Academy of Pediatrics and other groups promote the use of the five-step test to determine if a child is ready to use a seat belt instead of a booster seat, according to the bill’s proponents.

Wilson said Louisiana and Minnesota have enacted similar laws.

Another opportunity for racial profiling?

All 12 Democrats on the transportation committee voted to advance the measure, though some, including Rhodesia Ransom of Stockton, had concerns.

Noting that she has “a 23-year-old, height-challenged child whose legs often don’t go over chairs,” Ransom, who is Black, said she was worried the bill would give police an excuse to pull over people of color like her.

Wilson, who’s also a member of the Legislative Black Caucus, acknowledged Ransom had a point.

“A police officer could profile them … and say, ‘I’m going to use the five-point test,’ ” she said. “Hopefully that is rare.”

The four Republicans on the committee did not vote on Wilson’s bill, which counts the same as voting “no.” As CalMatters has reported, the widespread practice of dodging tough votes allows legislators to avoid accountability.

Republican Assemblymember Tom Lackey, a retired CHP officer representing Palmdale, told the committee he worries the bill would be hard to enforce.

“Determining the age of children is very difficult to do when you have no verifying identification at that age level,” he said. “So you’re going to have to trust the parents.”

He added that parents won’t want an officer reaching into their vehicle and touching their child’s thigh to make sure the seat belt is properly fitted.

A child sits in a pick-up truck at a Walgreen’s parking lot in the San Fernando Valley, on July 17, 2021.

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Pablo Unzueta

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CalMatters

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Assemblymember Heather Hadwick, a Republican representing the rural northeastern corner of California, was concerned that Wilson’s bill didn’t address cab-only pickup trucks that many of her constituents drive. Wilson told her not to worry.

“Since this law has been incorporated in other states, I’m positive that we can find a solution,”
Wilson said.

Other ‘nanny state’ bills have failed

San Joaquin Valley Republican David Tangipa, who recently was a tight end on Fresno State University’s football team, asked how a child-sized booster seat would have worked with his large-framed Polynesian family.

“When I was about 12 years old, I was 6 foot and 210 pounds,” he said. “I’m the smallest out of my siblings.”

Jennifer Rubin, an advocate for Safe Kids Greater Sacramento, told Tangipa that he and his siblings would have passed the five-step test earlier because they were tall.

Rubin’s group is a lead supporter of the bill. No group formally opposed it.

The bill now moves to the Assembly Appropriations Committee. Democratic-authored bills rarely fail to advance out of their first committee. But from there, the most controversial bills that become “nanny state” fodder for conservative media can sometimes get watered down or killed.

For instance, last year, Gov. Gavin Newsom stepped in to kill a bill that would have prohibited young children from playing tackle football. Proponents of the legislation said young children suffer too many head injuries playing the sport.

Newsom also killed proposed legislation last year by San Francisco Democratic Sen. Scott Wiener that originally would have required “speed governors” to be installed in any new car in California. The devices would have blocked motorists from driving more than 10 mph over the speed limit. The bill was amended to have cars make a “brief, one-time visual and audio signal to alert the driver each time they exceed the speed limit,” according to the bill’s analysis.

Newsom vetoed that bill in September, saying the federal government is responsible for implementing such regulations, not California.

Asked last week about the teen booster seat bill, Newsom spokesperson Daniel Villaseñor declined to comment, saying the governor doesn’t typically comment on pending legislation.

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

Last year’s fires not only destroyed homes and businesses, but also critical infrastructure, such as water delivery systems. Rebuilding that infrastructure is particularly challenging in unincorporated areas such as Altadena, which is primarily served by three tiny, private water companies.

The Las Flores Water Company is one of them — the company lost its two reservoirs in the Eaton Fire. And it has only about 1,500 customers, 75% of whom lost their homes in the fire.

“So we're basically running the company off of 25% of the revenue that we used to have,” John Bednarksi, president of the company’s board, told LAist.

The company is presenting its plans to address that shortfall at a meeting tonight. But rumors about the purpose of the meeting have been spreading online.

Bednarski said that to keep from going bankrupt, the company is proposing charging customers an extra $50 a month for the next five years, or they can pay the lump sum of $3,000 and the company will pay them back interest at the end of the five-year period. The charges will apply only to households with existing water service. As others rebuild and connect to the system, the charge will kick in.

The company is also looking to consolidate with one of the three other private Altadena water suppliers, Lincoln Avenue Water Company, which serves about 5,000 homes and businesses. The water companies have applied for funding from the State Water Resources Control Board to study whether they can merge.

L.A. County Supervisor Kathryn Barger, whose district includes Altadena, has publicly supported the idea.

“We have to keep the lights on at the company and keep the water company serving water because that's a primary utility for people,” Bednarski said. “But I also think that as we start rebuilding, we want to build back better than we were before.”

The company will present its final bill charge proposal and discuss consolidation with residents tonight. The proposals will not be voted on until a later date, Bednarski said.

Lack of public funds

Another challenge with rebuilding private water companies is that they are ineligible for state and federal funds that public utilities have access to, said Greg Pierce, senior director of the Luskin Center for Innovation at UCLA and lead author of reports on the damage to water systems after the fires and how water systems can rebuild more resiliently.

“These systems really have been on their own,” Pierce said.

That largely means the costs to rebuild will fall on customers. Consolidation, he added, can lower costs over the long term.

But the $3,000 charge over five years has “come as a big shock” to many residents, said Morgan Z Whirledge, who lost his home in the Eaton Fire and was recently elected to the Altadena Town Council.

“This is an added layer of burden,” he said. “ This comes at a really inopportune time for people in this recovery process.”

Still, Whirledge said he understands the need to keep the company solvent and sees consolidation as a good long term solution.

“ I'm hoping that ultimately Altadena is going to be better served in the future, better served with stronger water infrastructure,” Whirledge said.

The big picture

Overall, the fires caused more than $2 billion in damage to infrastructure overseen by L.A. County — excluding the costs of restoring these small water companies, said Anish Saraiya,  director of Altadena recovery for Barger’s office. And, he added, the total budget for the county Public Works Department, which serves all of L.A. County, is around $5 billion,

“Ultimately their pathway to restoration and recovery is going to be one that's going to require help from both state and federal governments,” Saraiya said.

But federal funding in particular has lagged — the Trump administration has still not approved nearly $40 million in recovery funds requested by Gov. Gavin Newsom last February. Some of that funding could flow to these small water companies, something Barger advocated for, Saraiya said.

“It is paramount that the county gets that funding,” Saraiya said. “It is going to take that kind of scale of assistance to help us rebuild this community.”

In the past, state and federal funding has been essential, though slow, to rebuild water systems after fires. For example, the Northern California town of Paradise was destroyed by the 2018 Camp Fire, but it did not receive state funds to help rebuild its Irrigation District until 2020, and federal funds did not come until 2022.

As L.A. County waits for funding to come through, officials are looking for other ways to fund infrastructure. The county recently established an Enhanced Infrastructure Financing District. The same type of district has also been established for unincorporated areas affected by the Palisades Fire.

Such districts allow the county to dedicate a portion of future property tax revenue to rebuild infrastructure. It also allows the county to take out bonds or loans to finance the rebuild.

“ The next step for us is to build out the infrastructure plan and then also pursue the financing side of it to be able to generate revenues, either through bonds or through other creative financing strategies to get us the money we'd need,” Saraiya said, “ because these districts don't generate revenue until development starts to occur and homes are rebuilt.”

The line of cars stretched a quarter-mile down Sierra Madre Villa Avenue in Pasadena. For hours, they inched into the parking lot, where volunteers filled trunks with bottled water, produce, diapers, toothbrushes — and, on this particular Saturday during the December holiday season, toys.

Pasadena Church became a distribution hub when the Eaton Fire began — and never stopped.

“People respond to crises… So everybody responded, all of the companies, all of the agencies, they all tried to do something. And then the resources started shifting,” Pastor Kerwin Manning of Pasadena Church said. “After a couple of months, all of the hype died down… It became apparent that those of us who were remaining were in it for the long haul.”

Cars line up outside Pasadena Church as Pastor Kerwin Manning and volunteers distribute food to families during a community distribution in December.

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Erin Rode

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The LA Local

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A year after the Palisades and Eaton fires, many Angelenos are still struggling to afford food and other basic necessities. An October survey of 2,335 fire survivors commissioned by the Department of Angels found that 27% of those with incomes under $50,000 and 22% of those earning between $50,000 and $99,999 have had to cut back on food.

Around half of those surveyed are making up the difference by “blowing through their savings and taking on debt,” Angela Giacchetti, head of communications at the Department of Angels told The LA Local. “And that’s not good, but there’s a smaller percentage, but an alarming number of survivors who are experiencing even worse outcomes… People are going without food. They’re skipping meals. They’re skipping medical care, they’re taking on extra jobs to make ends meet, they’re falling behind on their bills.”

For many families, that tradeoff has become impossible. Before the Eaton Fire, “We had a place to stay, so if we had to spend our last money on food, then that was fine,” Danielle Valdes said at a recent “Come Get Some Event” by local non-profit Home of Kings and Queens, which runs a free weekly farmer’s market for Eaton Fire victims. Now, the family is juggling paying rent while trying to stretch their insurance money as far as possible so that “it can go towards housing or getting our way back to Altadena.”

Local non-profit Home of Kings and Queens runs a free weekly farmer’s market for Eaton Fire victims.

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Erin Rode

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The LA Local

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For most people impacted by the fires, there is a significant gap between what was lost and what insurance and other aid has covered. A January survey from the Department of Angels found that 60% of survivors face a gap in coverage of at least $100,000, and for more than half of respondents, that amount exceeds their annual household income.

When it comes to these more severe hardships, “the disparity between white and nonwhite survivors is large,” according to the January survey. Black and Latino survivors are two to three times as likely as white survivors to have cut back on food or experienced other forms of severe hardship, such as falling behind on rent, mortgage, or utility bills, relying on food assistance, or experiencing homelessness. Single parents and renters are also experiencing these challenges at higher rates.

For Alexa Rodriguez, losing her family’s Altadena apartment of 17 years pushed them over the edge. Rodriguez landed in a Pasadena apartment with her two teenage children after the fire, but now pays $800 more a month. As a renter, she didn’t receive insurance money for temporary housing, and has struggled to piece together financial support. “To get back on your feet it might take a year or two, the first month I did get help, but since then I’ve been on my own,” Rodriguez said, who takes the bus to the Home of Kings and Queens’ distributions every week.

In the weeks after the fires, events like those at Pasadena Church were a common scene. Brandon Lamar, founder of Project Passion, said he once counted more than 30 separate distribution events in the area on a single Saturday.

Now, the weekly events at Pasadena Church (a collaborative effort with Project Passion and other partners) are among the few remaining regular distribution events for people impacted by the Eaton Fire. Lamar calls it “the longest-lasting distribution hub in our community.” Project Passion also offers an appointment-only free store every Monday and Tuesday.

“People told us early on that this might change in the long haul, because when people get settled and things of that nature, but what we’ve started to see is that the need has actually increased, but the donations have decreased,” Lamar said.

Some national organizations that were on-the-ground immediately after the fires have moved on. FEMA ended its in-person presence in October (although virtual support is still available). And some local groups that pivoted to provide support after the fires have also returned to their usual focus areas. The remaining food distributions are mostly run by residents of the fire-impacted communities, according to Giacchetti.

As direct aid has slowed, some have also turned to longstanding food programs. Foothill Unity Center, which offers six weekly food distribution events for residents across 12 foothill communities (including Altadena and Pasadena), saw about six times as many people in 2025 versus 2024, according to Julie Swayze, director of advancement and institutional giving at the nonprofit.

Foothill Unity Center offers six weekly food distribution events for residents across 12 foothill communities, including Altadena and Pasadena.

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Erin Rode

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The LA Local

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Many fire survivors are “likely to face years of deficits” before they can recover financially, according to the Department of Angels report. A year after the fire, Manning and Lamar believe they’re seeing increasing need.

Finding new work, rebuilding a home or securing housing all takes time, Manning said, complicated by factors like paying higher rent or running out of insurance for temporary housing. That’s why he believes in supporting people through the “middle passage” of recovery. When members of his congregation ask how much longer the church’s parking lot will be a food distribution hub, he gives a one-word answer: “Until.”

Oscar nominations are out, kicking off seven weeks of conversations about what the Academy got right (and wrong) today and predictions about what voters might still get wrong during the awards on March 15.

Here's what struck me when the lists were announced this morning.

Sinners dominated, followed by One Battle After Another 

Before this year, no movie had ever gotten more than 14 Oscar nominations. Three films — All About Eve, Titanic and La La Land — shared the top spot. This year, Ryan Coogler's brilliant vampire story Sinners bested that by two, landing 16 nominations. If it had been 15, you could argue that the new category honoring best casting (in which Sinners, yes, was nominated) was the difference. But with 16, that's a straight-up record-breaker. Of course, nomination numbers do not always equal wins, let alone wins for a big category like best picture.

One Battle After Another, with 13 nominations, is also formidable on numbers alone. But Sinners was nominated in every category in which it was competing, which is a stunning accomplishment. Since each branch of the Academy votes on its own nominees (and everyone votes for best picture nominees), that suggests that the film has strong support across every single group of Oscars voters. And it's fair to ask: If every element of a movie is top-notch, from its design to its performances to its script to its music, how does it not deserve to be best picture?

Non-English language features continued their strong showing

Four non-English language acting performances were nominated this year, three from Norway's drama Sentimental Value (Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas, Renate Reinsve and Stellan Skarsgård) and one from the Brazilian political thriller The Secret Agent (Wagner Moura). That's a record. Both of those films were nominated for best picture as well, which continues the pattern from recent years of non-English-language films like Parasite, I'm Still Here, Emilia Pérez, Drive My Car and others earning nominations in the top category. Consider this: 10 such best picture nominations happened between 1938 and 2017; 12 have now happened between 2018 and 2026. (On the other hand, it's worth noting that the highly-regarded Korean movie No Other Choice from filmmaker Park Chan-wook was shut out, disappointing its many supporters.)

F1 overperformed

The car-racing movie F1, which felt a lot like a promotional film for F1 racing itself, received what will be, for some, an eyebrow-raising best picture nomination in addition to nominations for editing, sound and visual effects. Both the Broadway drama Blue Moon and Iranian thriller It Was Just An Accident received original screenplay nominations, Blue Moon landed a lead actor nomination for Ethan Hawke, and It Was Just An Accident was nominated for best international feature (for France, which submitted it); neither appeared on the best picture list. People really like cars going vroom vroom, apparently.

New Avatar and Wicked stories lost steam 

The first Avatar received nine Oscar nominations; the second, Avatar: The Way of Water, received four; this morning, the third, Avatar: Fire and Ash, received only two, for costume design and visual effects. A year ago, Wicked received 10 nominations; this year, Wicked: For Good received zero. Avatar: Fire and Ash still made a mountain of money and Wicked: For Good made plenty, but the one-two punch of big box office and awards sparkle has worn off for both.

Diane Warren is Diane Warren, now and forever

The least-surprising possible news on Oscar nomination morning is a nomination for Diane Warren, who received her 17th nod, this time for the song "Dear Me" in the documentary Diane Warren: Relentless. She has never won — except for an honorary award in 2022 — which perhaps makes her the Susan Lucci of best original song, in honor of the All My Children actress nominated 21 times for a Daytime Emmy for playing Erica Kane. But one fact should be foremost in the mind: Susan Lucci eventually won. Yes, it took until her 19th nomination, but it happened. This year, Warren is nominated for a song she wrote for a documentary about herself; wouldn't it be fun if this were her year? If not, she should not lose heart, because let's be real: She will be nominated again next year.

Copyright 2026 NPR

Jen Egan is still dealing with the aftermath of the Palisades Fire that damaged the home of her 83-year-old father, Paul, last January.

That has meant more than a year of going back and forth with State Farm, which has assigned three different claims adjusters to their case. Egan also hired a public adjuster to help her navigate the process, who she says has been a “saving grace.”

Egan and her father have received some payouts and are preparing to make repairs to the home. But this week, they received an estimate for compensation that falls tens of thousands of dollars short of what Egan said they have already paid out of pocket to address a brush violation issued by the fire department, and to conduct soil testing.

She is growing more frustrated. “No one’s asking for a new jacuzzi,” Egan said. “We want my father to be able to return to a safe and habitable home.”

Stories like the Egans’ are all too common after last year’s deadly Los Angeles County fires. State Farm says it has paid $5 billion so far on more than 13,500 claims. But survivors express frustration over insurers’ poor and delayed communication.

State Farm customer Rebecca McGrew has no outstanding complaints about her claims after her Altadena home burned down — except that she was “drastically under-insured by hundreds of thousands of dollars.” Many others like her have realized — too late — that their insurance payouts won’t cover all of their rebuilding costs.

Survivors and community organizations that have formed after the fires have asked their local and state elected officials for help in dealing with these varied issues. Some of the bills introduced in response to survivors’ experiences include attempts to address the transparency and timeliness related to insurers’ handling of fire claims.

More stringent requirements for insurers

Senate Bill 876 is a wide-ranging bill that seeks to make various amendments to the state’s insurance code. They include getting insurance companies to share their disaster-recovery plans with the insurance department; doubling penalties from $5,000 to $10,000 for each violation of fair claims practices during declared emergencies; and requiring insurers to notify policyholders within five days when they’re assigned a new adjuster.

In addition, the legislation, proposed by new Senate Insurance Committee Chair Steve Padilla and sponsored by Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara:

• Expands policy limits for required payments for additional living expenses by 100% in case of a total loss. 
• Requires upfront, cash-value payments be made within 30 days of a contract to buy or rebuild a home. 
• Requires insurers to offer extended and guaranteed replacement cost coverage when writing policies.
• Applies building-code upgrade coverage at the time of a rebuild.  

“People need a sense, particularly when they face tragedy, that the underwriters they’ve relied on and paid into for decades, will want to help and not get in the way (of recovery),” said Padilla, a Democrat from Chula Vista, in an interview with CalMatters.

He acknowledged that the insurance industry will have objections to his bill, but said the companies know that they need to provide adequate coverage for the health of the insurance market.

Padilla is right about the industry’s opposition. “It appears these measures would worsen the current affordability and availability crisis for Californians just as we are starting to implement the Commissioner’s Sustainable Insurance Strategy to restore a healthy and competitive market,” said Seren Taylor, vice president at Personal Insurance Federation of California, in an email.

Lara’s strategy, which went into effect last January just days before the L.A.-area fires, aims to get insurance companies to start writing policies in the state again, especially in areas at high risk of fires. Many insurers had pulled back from the state in the past few years, complaining of increasing fire risks and state regulations that they said slowed down their ability to match prices to those risks.

Tornadoes and drones

Meanwhile, Senate Bill 877 would require insurance companies to provide claims-related documents to policyholders within 15 days. Co-authored by Democratic Sens. Sasha Renée Pérez of Pasadena and Ben Allen of El Segundo, the legislation would also require insurers to disclose changes to repair estimates, who approved them and why.

Senate Bill 878 would require insurers to pay interest of 20% annually if they fail to meet deadlines for claims payments. The bill, also written by Pérez and Allen, will compel companies to submit to the state’s insurance department a report, signed by a corporate officer under penalty of perjury, that shows the company’s compliance with prompt payments requirements.

In the Assembly, lawmakers plan to introduce bills that will “continue to make sure we have oversight (of insurers),” said Assemblymember Lisa Calderon, the Los Angeles-area Democrat who also chairs the Assembly Insurance Committee, in an interview. She said she expects bills to address strengthening and modernizing the FAIR Plan, as well as mitigation efforts for natural disasters.

She mentioned that California has to deal with fires, floods, earthquakes and, last year, something rare: “Last year, we had two small tornadoes in urban Los Angeles. I can’t remember another year when it’s happened.”

A large housing development near Pittsburg on Sept, 2, 2021.

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Anne Wernikoff

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CalMatters

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Calderon is trying again to regulate insurers’ use of drone images by introducing Assembly Bill 1559. Her similar effort last year passed the Assembly and made it through some Senate committees but ultimately didn’t advance. This year’s bill would require companies to notify consumers about when they plan to take aerial images of their properties; ban insurers from ending coverage based on drone images taken more than 180 days before sending notice of that decision to policyholders; and require companies to provide the images to policyholders, allowing them to dispute accuracy and to take action if needed before having their policies terminated.

“We’ve been hearing from consumers that they’ve been blindsided by these images that were inaccurate,” she said. “I believe homeowners should have the right to request an in-person inspection.”

She also intends to introduce legislation to implement recommendations from a forthcoming report about the California Wildfire Fund that she expects to include provisions related to the availability and affordability of property insurance in the state.

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