Erin Stone
covers climate and environmental issues in Southern California.
Published October 20, 2023 5:00 AM
Warehouses dominate the Inland Empire
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Jesse Lerner
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Courtesy of Riverside Art Museum
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Top line
The multimedia art exhibit traces the region's complex evolution from citrus groves to military base to vast rows of warehouses, showing their damaging impact on pollution and health.
Why it matters: San Bernardino and Riverside counties have the most concentrated cluster of warehouses in the world, in no small part fueled by our love for fast delivery. They’re also the reason why the area has some of the highest levels of pollution in the nation, causing serious health impacts to the largely Latino communities who live nearby, and contributing significantly to the heating of our planet.
Why now: A theme through the exhibit is the effect on people’s and the environment’s health. But there’s also another consistent thread — the efforts of local community members who have fought, and continue to fight, for a better way.
San Bernardino and Riverside counties have the most concentrated cluster of warehouses in the world, in no small part fueled by our love for fast delivery.
They’re also the reason why the area has some of the highest levels of pollution in the nation, causing serious health impacts to the largely Latino communities who live nearby, and contributing significantly to the heating of our planet.
So how did this happen? The Inland Empire has a long and often untold commercial history, from the forced displacement of Indigenous people to establish a booming citrus industry, to the U.S. military building infrastructure that would lay the foundation for the explosive growth of the logistics industry.
A theme through it all has been largely false promises of good-paying jobs at the expense of people’s and the environment’s health. But there’s also another consistent thread — the efforts of local community members who have fought, and continue to fight, for a better way.
That’s the story that a two-week pop-up art exhibit at the Riverside Art Museum, and online, aims to highlight.
“There isn't an inevitability of where we got to today — decisions were made at each step along the way,” said Cathy Gudis, professor of history at UC Riverside and a co-curator of the project with her students and two environmental justice groups in L.A. and San Bernardino: East Yard Communities for Environmental Justice and the People’s Collective for Environmental Justice.
Multi-colored panels tell stories of environmental injustice from 22 communities across the U.S., Mexico and Colombia.
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Jacob Willson
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Riverside Art Museum
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Called “Climates of Inequality, Stories of Environmental Justice,” the traveling exhibit will go across the world, highlighting 22 communities from the United States, Mexico, and Colombia which face similar challenges and are fighting for change.
The multimedia project takes viewers on a historical journey through a series of significant locations from the ports of L.A. and Long Beach to Southeast L.A. and Commerce, then east into Mira Loma and finally all the way to San Bernardino and Riverside.
Panels from the exhibition
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courtesy of Riverside Art Museum
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“We need to use media and we need to use history and we need to use the experiences of our people to really understand where we need to go,” said Anthony Victoria, a local journalist with NPR-affiliate KVCR and founder of the environmental justice-focused publication The Frontline Observer. He participated in the project and will speak on a panel as part of it.
The point of the exhibit is not just to highlight the history, but to clearly lay out how that history continues to impact the present, said L.A.-based artist Noè Montes, who also participated in the project.
“The land holds the truth of history,” Montes said. “Once we start talking about that and recognizing it, then we will really be making some headway to the resolution, the reparations that are necessary to achieve justice.”
The exhibit showcases voices of community organizers, artists, warehouse workers, researchers and others involved in the ongoing fight against environmental injustice in the area.
Alicia Aguayo grew up in west San Bernardino and is the communications manager for the group People's Collective for Environmental Justice, which advocates for communities impacted by warehousing.
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Tamara Fleming
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Courtesy of Alicia Aguayo
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“We're telling these stories and making sure that they're not forgotten,” said Alicia Aguayo, the communications manager for the San Bernardino-based People's Collective for Environmental Justice. But she says the exhibit isn’t just about the past — it’s about the present and the future.
“It’s also part of us working with the community and making sure that we're educating each other,” Aguayo said. “We don't believe that this has to be the norm. And we believe that it's possible to have other ways of living.”
A brief history of the supply chain
Postcard images of sprawling acres of orange, lemon and lime groves hearken back to a golden era of southern California agriculture, but the reality was not so rosy.
The citrus industry began with the forced displacement of Indigenous tribes at the start of the Spanish mission era — mission padres planted some of the first citrus trees in the Southland. The industry boomed with the arrival of white American settlers enticed to come West, the railroad, and water diversions from the Santa Ana and Colorado Rivers to help the region bloom. The landscape of southern California was forever changed.
A citrus grove in Highland at the base of the San Bernardino mountains circa 1900.
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Courtesy of LA Public Library
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Indigenous Serrano, Luiseño, Gabrielino-Tongva, Cupeño, Chemehuevi, and Cahuilla people were forced to labor in these fields. In the late 1800s, when the railroad came, Chinese workers largely replaced Indigenous workers. Then anti-Chinese racism led to Japanese immigrant workers becoming the bulk of the workforce.
Another wave of anti-immigrant sentiment came after the first World War, forcing many Japanese workers out as well. By the mid-1940s, Latino workers had become the vast majority of that workforce — as they continue to be today in the region. The cheap labor was essential to making the citrus industry bloom, but people of color benefited far less than most white folks in the region who became some of the wealthiest people in the world at the turn of the century.
“It all goes back to that citrus industry — it's been replaced with low paying jobs in warehouses now,” said Yvonne Chamberlain Marquez, who gathered oral histories and did research for the project during her time as a UC Riverside student in Gudis’ class.
The invention of pesticides and other chemicals further helped the citrus industry boom. But citrus wouldn’t remain king forever — with World Wars I and II, the military took over the area because of its proximity and rail connections to both the ports and high desert military bases. The military’s dumping of toxic waste in the region led to some of the nation’s first Superfund sites, with contamination that still plagues the region’s water tables and landscape today.
The military’s arrival also laid the foundation for the logistics industry the region is now infamous for. For example, the city of Mira Loma, which Gudis and Pitzer College professor Brinda Sarathy call “the roots of logistics,” became a stop for goods and supplies being brought from the ports to high desert military bases, as well as Manzanar, where 10,000 Japanese Americans forced from their homes were incarcerated by the U.S. government during World War II.
A guard stands outside the entrance of Manzanar, where 10,000 Japanese Americans were incarcerated during World War II.
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Courtesy of LA Public Library
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After the wars, came baby boomers and the need for a lot more space for a rapidly growing population — suburbia replaced many citrus farms that remained. For a time, the Kaiser steel factory provided union jobs for hundreds of thousands of people in the area, who were able to get their slice of the American Dream — but for the largely Latino and Black workers it came at the expense of coping with daily racism and exploitation.
When the factory and military bases closed in the 1980s, the region’s economic struggles skyrocketed. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the logistics industry saw an opportunity.
Yvonne Chamberlain Marquez conducted research and collected oral histories from local activists and elders while she was a student at UC Riverside for the exhibit.
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Courtesy of Yvonne Chamberlain Marquez
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Marquez, who grew up in Chino during the late 1980s and early 1990s, remembers that, and the false promises of how warehouses would provide the next generation of good jobs and a thriving economy.
“In the nineties, a warehouse job was a good job at one point,” she said, “but then they just popped up and grew so fast and now there's so many people stuck in these low wage jobs with no way out.”
The changes have been especially rapid in the last two decades. Marquez herself watched her community’s landscape go from mostly rural to full of warehouses in a span of less than ten years. Today, one in six workers in the Inland Empire are employed in the logistics industry, including many of the UC Riverside students who worked on this project.
Making space
Marquez said that as someone who grew up poor and returned to school as an adult and single mother later in life, she has often felt like her voice didn’t matter. When she got into UC Riverside, she said she was at one of her lowest points. She joined Gudis’ consumerism history class on a whim — she didn’t expect it to change her life.
But her experience as a student gathering oral histories from local elders and working closely with community activists to put together the Climates of Inequality exhibit changed her life dramatically.
Community members part of San Bernardino-based group the People's Collective for Environmental Justice.
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Courtesy of Alicia Aguayo
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“I was able to see myself in these people who were like me, talked like me, who had the same background that I did,” Marquez said. “They were … so, like, sure of themselves as the experts in what they were talking about and just like seeing them be unapologetic about it was inspiring.”
Marquez hopes the exhibit helps people realize, like she did, that their voices matter too.
An image created by San Bernardino artist Brenda Angels (@basoulcreates) depicts a vision of a thriving economy that runs on local businesses. It was part of the promotion for a local small business event put on by the People's Collective for Environmental Justice
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Courtesy of Alicia Aguayo
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“Once the community is able to see the work that the community has actually done, they're able to see themselves a little bit more and maybe be more inclined to show up to a city council meeting when they don't agree with something, or get involved in civics at some level,” she said.
For local activists like Aguayo, the exhibit illustrates the intertwined natures of art, storytelling and action. She said art is key to how the People’s Collective for Environmental Justice works to humanize the impact of the logistics industry beyond a bottom line, and provide a vision for a better future.
“Oftentimes, these regulators and elected officials look at numbers and they don't think about the stories and the people feeling the impacts and so we do think that this exhibit is crucial,” she said. “Being able to see your experience in a museum I hope feels very validating to community members who've been saying this for years — like this is not new.”
See the exhibit and associated live events
The exhibit runs through Nov. 5 at the Riverside Art Museum. The exhibit is free and open to the public. You can also view the multimedia project online at climatesofinequality.org.
You can see the live events associated with the exhibit here. All the events are free and open to the public.
Upcoming events at the museum include:
Sunday, Oct. 22: 2 – 4 p.m. at Riverside Art Museum Rooftop (Julia Morgan Building) “Climates of Inequality: EJ in the I.E.”
A dialogue with environmental justice organizers from the Inland Empire. Spanish/English translation available. Includes same-day museum admission at Riverside Art Museum. RSVP: ramcheech.ticketapp.org/portal/product/130
Thursday, Nov. 2: 6 p.m. at Riverside Art Museum (Julia Morgan Building) Environmental Justice in the IE: Community-based Practices in Art and Activism
Saturday, Nov. 4: 10 a.m. – noon at Riverside Art Museum (Julia Morgan Building) Teaching “Climates of Inequality” Tour and Workshop.
Limited spaces for high school, college, or university-level teachers interested in bringing regional issues of environmental justice into classrooms. Includes same-day museum admission at Riverside Art Museum. RSVP: ramcheech.ticketapp.org/portal/product/129
Sunday, Nov. 5: 1 p.m. at Riverside Art Museum (Julia Morgan Building) “Cultures of Environmentalism: Read Aloud & Artmaking.”
For this closing day public program, families are invited to learn about, and try their hand at, California Indian basket making while learning about the impacts of environmental change on culturally significant plants with Lorene Sisquoc (Mountain Cahuilla/Fort Sill Apache), curator at Sherman Indian Museum. Also featured are English language and bilingual (English-Spanish) readings of Carole Lindstorm and Michaela Goade's “We Are Water Protectors” (2021 Caldecott Medal Winner), and local artists' books including Timothy Musso's "Chasing the Sun." Art-making is for all ages. Read-out-loud: 3-8-year-olds. RSVP: ramcheech.ticketapp.org/portal/product/136
Ex-state attorney general surged late in gov polls
By Jeanne Kuang | CalMatters
Published June 5, 2026 5:21 PM
Xavier Becerra speaks during an election night event June 2 in Los Angeles.
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Jae C. Hong
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Associated Press
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Topline:
Democrat Xavier Becerra will advance to the November general election in the race for California governor, capping a sudden and dramatic ascent for a career politician who is running on his experience and his willingness to take on President Donald Trump.
The backstory: Becerra, who had lingered in the single-digits in polling, surged in popularity following the political implosion of former frontrunner Eric Swalwell, with establishment Democrats favoring the former Health and Human Services secretary and former state attorney general over former Rep. Katie Porter and the outsider Tom Steyer.
Why it matters: The decision comes at a particularly consequential time for California. Residents face a crushing cost of living, nation-topping gas prices made worse by the war in Iran, wildfire risks that have driven insurance companies out of state, an unstable state budget, impending federal cuts to the state’s expansive health system and an economy dampened by immigration enforcement.
Read on ... for more on the California governor race.
This story was originally published by CalMatters.
Democrat Xavier Becerra will advance to the November general election in the race for California governor, capping a sudden and dramatic ascent for a career politician who is running on his experience and his willingness to take on President Donald Trump.
Becerra, the former state attorney general, has secured nearly 27% of the vote in the June 2 primary, with about two-thirds of votes counted as of Friday afternoon. If elected in November, he would be the first Latino to serve as California governor in more than a century.
It’s still unclear who his opponent will be: Returns so far show Republican Steve Hilton most likely to advance with more than 26% of votes counted, though the trailing Democrat Tom Steyer has not conceded and could make up ground in the nearly three million votes that remain to be counted.
California uses a top-two primary system; the two candidates with the most votes advance to the November ballot regardless of party.
The November race could differ dramatically depending on the opponent. If it’s Hilton, Becerra would be heavily favored to win: Democrats in California outnumber Republicans nearly two-to-one, and Hilton is endorsed by Trump, whom Californians disapprove of in high numbers.
If it’s Steyer, California can expect an all-out slugfest between opposing wings of the Democratic Party, supercharged by the hundreds of millions of dollars Steyer has spent from his personal fortune on the primary alone.
While the hedge fund manager-turned-Democratic donor and climate activist has run a progressive campaign and garnered the support of Bernie Sanders surrogates, Becerra is favored by more of the Democratic establishment.
Becerra, who had lingered in the single-digits in polling, surged in popularity following the political implosion of former frontrunner Eric Swalwell, with establishment Democrats favoring the former Health and Human Services secretary and former state attorney general over former Rep. Katie Porter and the outsider Steyer.
It was a surprising and swift ascent for the mild-mannered career politician who was previously part of a crop of lower-polling Democratic candidates that party chair Rusty Hicks was publicly pressuring to drop out of the race.
“Guess what? The underdog stayed in the fight,” Becerra said at an election night rally Tuesday in Los Angeles, calling his near-victory “the everyday miracle of living in a state that regularly makes the improbable seem inevitable.”
The decision comes at a particularly consequential time for California. Residents face a crushing cost of living, nation-topping gas prices made worse by the war in Iran, wildfire risks that have driven insurance companies out of state, an unstable state budget, impending federal cuts to the state’s expansive health system and an economy dampened by immigration enforcement.
David Wagner
covers housing in Southern California, a place where the lack of affordable housing contributes to homelessness.
Published June 5, 2026 3:59 PM
L.A. City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto at a recent news conference.
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Carlin Stiehl
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Getty Images
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Topline:
Nearly three months ago, the Los Angeles City Council voted to fund homelessness prevention programs to the tune of $177 million. Despite approval by Mayor Karen Bass, the funding still has not been cleared by City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto. Now, some city leaders want answers about the delay.
Seeking answers: A motion submitted earlier this week by Councilmember Ysabel Jurado said the “contracts remain unexecuted without explanation.” The motion goes on to say the setback has caused “$17 million ... in emergency rental assistance to sit unused” and has put “services for those at risk of homelessness in jeopardy.”
What’s next: If approved by the full council, Jurado’s motion would call on Feldstein Soto to report back to the council within 30 days about the reasons for the delay. Representatives with the City Attorney’s Office did not respond to LAist’s repeated requests for comment.
Read on … to learn the year-plus backstory on why this tenant aid funding has yet to be disbursed.
Nearly three months ago, the Los Angeles City Council voted to fund homelessness prevention programs to the tune of $177 million. Despite approval by Mayor Karen Bass, the funding still has not been cleared by City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto.
Now, city leaders want answers about the delay.
A motion introduced earlier this week by Councilmember Ysabel Jurado said the “contracts remain unexecuted without explanation.” The motion goes on to say the setback has caused “$17 million ... in emergency rental assistance to sit unused” and has put “services for those at risk of homelessness in jeopardy.”
If passed by the council’s Housing and Homelessness Committee and later approved by the full council, Jurado’s motion would call on Feldstein Soto to report back to the council within 30 days about the reasons for the delay.
Representatives with the City Attorney’s Office did not respond to LAist’s repeated requests for comment.
Tenant aid providers said they’ve entered their third month without funding from the city. They said without an executed contract, legal aid organizations may soon have to lay off staff and stop taking eviction cases.
“The people who are providing the services are all in nonprofit organizations that don't have a great deal of extra funding to cover this contract that isn't being paid,” said Barbara Schultz, housing director at the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles.
How we got here
Feldstein Soto has held up the tenant aid funding since April 2025, when she refused to sign a previously approved five-year funding deal with the Legal Aid Foundation. At the time, she argued the contract should have gone through a competitive bidding process.
City officials responded by putting out a request for proposals. They ultimately selected the Legal Aid Foundation, along with several other tenant rights groups, to receive funding set aside for rent relief, tenant education, enforcement of the city’s tenant anti-harassment ordinance and programs that provide free attorneys to tenants facing eviction.
Much of the funding for these homelessness prevention programs comes from the city’s Measure ULA, also known as the L.A. “Mansion Tax.” That tax is now facing potential elimination from a statewide November ballot measure from the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association.
The city attorney’s tenant rights track record
Feldstein Soto has frequently clashed with tenant rights advocates.
She previously attempted to remove the word “right” from the city’s “Right To Counsel” ordinance, which supplies free eviction defense attorneys to qualified tenants.
Feldstein Soto also has faced criticism for not prosecuting more landlords accused of rent gouging in the wake of the 2025 Palisades and Eaton fires.
She also was accused of failing to defend the rights of tenants at the high-rise apartment complex Barrington Plaza, who went to court to successfully fight wrongful evictions from landlord company Douglas Emmett, which donated to a campaign opposing Feldstein Soto’s opponent in the 2022 election.
Feldstein Soto launched an audit of the Legal Aid Foundation last year. So far, no findings have been released.
Schultz said the organization has provided all the financial and administrative documentation requested by the L.A. Housing Department related to the contracts.
Why it matters for renters
The Legal Aid Foundation is the lead contractor for the city’s eviction defense funding, but the money is shared with other legal aid organizations as well.
Elena Popp, who leads the Eviction Defense Network, said her small team of lawyers can’t continue to take on tenant cases until funding is approved.
“We're contemplating layoffs effective June 15 unless we can raise the part of the money that is our budget from the city,” Popp said. “If we lay people off, then tenants won't be served.”
Anna Urena, a paralegal with the Eviction Defense Network, says her organization would normally do intake for about 300 tenants per month.
“We're not taking on new cases. We're not representing new people right now because we don't know what's going to happen,” she said. “We really cannot leave our tenants behind.”
What’s next?
Jurado’s motion has not yet been scheduled for a vote in the council’s Housing and Homelessness Committee.
Based on her third-place showing so far in the June primary election results, it appears Feldstein Soto will not be L.A.’s city attorney much longer. Popp said Feldstein Soto’s lame duck status doesn’t bode well for the contract getting signed soon.
“She now has no incentive to sign, and pressure on her will not get her to sign,” Popp said. “If that happens and the City Council doesn't take charge of this, maybe hire outside counsel to get the approval, then we won't see any money until the new city attorney comes in.”
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Millions of people are about to pack stadiums across the U.S., Canada and Mexico for the World Cup, starting June 11. Public health officials have been working to ensure the health and safety of the masses of fans they're expecting at the 104 matches across 16 cities through mid-July.
L.A. Co Health Department prepares: In Los Angeles, which is hosting eight games, risk-assessment teams will monitor the surroundings for chemical exposures and biological threats. In L.A., diminished federal assistance means the health department is counting on existing staff to do the extra work. "Most of our staff are not taking vacations during the month of the World Cup because they'll need to work -– we'll be obviously accruing overtime costs," says Barbara Ferrer, the L.A. county health director.
Diminished federal presence: Ferrer hopes these events will help authorities see that public health is key to public safety — and worth investing in. On the federal level, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which serves as the nation's public health agency, has a muted presence this year. The current Trump administration has pushed thousands of workers out of the CDC workforce and tampered politically with some of its functions. Other governmental groups that would typically be involved, such as the National Security Council's biosecurity group, the Office of Pandemic Preparedness and Response Policy, and the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response, have been disbanded, left vacant or don't have permanent .
Millions of people are about to pack stadiums across the U.S., Canada and Mexico for the World Cup, starting June 11.
Public health officials have been working to ensure the health and safety of the masses of fans they're expecting at the 104 matches across 16 cities through mid-July.
In the U.S., World Cup preparations are coming in a time of a diminished federal health presence and funding. It's upped the workload for host city health departments, as they're also strapped for federal funding.
Nevertheless, World Cup host city health officials say they're prepared for the many challenges that come with large-scale celebrations and gatherings.
"We've been focusing on expecting the expected" — issues related to weather, health and human behavior, says Dr. Marcus Plescia, district health director for Fulton County, Georgia, which includes Atlanta.
Planning for the event is ongoing, says Dr. Philip Huang, director of Dallas County Health and Human Services in Texas. "To be able to begin preparations a year out is a luxury for us, compared to a lot of the situations that we deal with," he says.
"We call Atlanta 'Hotlanta' for a reason"
For public health departments, the World Cup is a big deal –- but they're well prepared for the biggest challenges.
Summer heat, for instance. "We call Atlanta 'Hotlanta' for a reason," says Georgia's Dr. Plescia, "It's going to be hot and humid here -– so heat-related injuries are going to be an issue."
Atlanta is hosting eight World Cup matches and the team from Uzbekistan. At downtown Centennial Olympic Park, a month-long fan festival is expected to draw some 15,000 people a day. Cooling stations will offer air-conditioning and hydration.
Then there's feeding the crowds. "The biggest lift for us and for all health departments is that our environmental health workers have to inspect all of the food vendors — and there will be a whole lot of food vendors," Plescia says.
Inspectors will check every day to ensure the facilities are in working order and the food is safe to eat. "We want to make sure that people feel confident that they can go out to eat and have a good time –- and they don't have to worry about getting food poisoning," Plescia says.
When lots of people gather, germs tend to spread. "We're worried about sexually transmitted infections because there's going to be a lot of people here and it's going to be a festive atmosphere," Plescia says. "And then we're worried about things maybe we wouldn't have been worried about as much before, particularly measles." Measles is highly contagious among those who haven't been vaccinated, and there have been 30 U.S. outbreaks this year.
Dallas is hosting nine World Cup matches — the most of any city. The health department is stepping up disease surveillance in wastewater, expanding sites and covering more area, says Dr. Huang, the county health authority. Beyond looking for typical threats like influenza and COVID, they're also testing for "whatever might appear" through genomic sequencing, he says.
They're also broadening mosquito surveillance –- setting insect traps and testing for pathogens they can spread. "We always test for West Nile virus," Huang says, "But we're also increasing our testing for dengue, chikungunya and Zika because of all the [incoming] international travel."
Medical staff are also looking out for symptoms of Ebola or hantavirus, due to outbreaks.
Keeping track of which diseases are circulating means they'll be able to alert hospitals and the public quickly if they see a spike. "It's a lot of things we normally do but certainly more enhanced," Huang says.
They're also preparing health tips for the public in different languages: Wear a hat and sunscreen and hydrate when it's hot out. Bug spray and long sleeves help prevent mosquito bites. Stay home if you're sick. "It's the same messages [we always share], but it's really concentrated because we've got so many people coming during a hot period of time in Dallas," Huang says.
"Most of our staff are not taking vacations"
The World Cup finals are jointly hosted by New York and New Jersey on July 19.
Officials have been running practice simulations to prepare for outbreaks and mass casualty events. "We plan for the worst case scenario and go through it before it actually happens," says Dr. Alister Martin, New York City's health commissioner.
They've also set up "incident command" to "divert resources from normal stuff so that we can manage any potential emergencies," Martin says, adding that the operation will continue through much of the summer, for other big events planned in New York, including America's 250th anniversary, Pride month and the Puerto Rican Day parade.
In Los Angeles, which is hosting eight games, including the U.S. opening match versus Paraguay, risk-assessment teams will monitor the surroundings for chemical exposures and biological threats.
In L.A., diminished federal assistance means the health department is counting on existing staff to do the extra work. "Most of our staff are not taking vacations during the month of the World Cup because they'll need to work -– we'll be obviously accruing overtime costs," says Barbara Ferrer, the L.A. county health director.
And much of their regular work, like routine food inspections, gets put aside. "I know it would be easier if we weren't in a resource constrained environment," Ferrer says. "But I want to provide assurance that even in a resource constrained environment, we're well prepared."
Ferrer says they've successfully planned and managed other events of national significance, like the 2022 Super Bowl. "This work isn't new to us," she says, adding that staff are making great efforts "to make sure this is a joyous time in L.A. county and [that] we're all safe."
This year's experience will better prepare Los Angeles to host other events, she says — like the 2027 Super Bowl and the 2028 Summer Olympics.
Ferrer hopes these events will help authorities see that public health is key to public safety — and worth investing in.
Less of a federal presence
On the federal level, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which serves as the nation's public health agency, has a muted presence this year.
"Usually, the CDC is a visible lead when we have international events in the United States, particularly across the country, versus just in a single state," says Dr. Debra Houry, former chief medical officer for the CDC who resigned last year.
The current Trump administration has pushed thousands of workers out of the CDC workforce and tampered politically with some of its functions, such as setting vaccine policy and publishing scientific papers. The agency's scientists rarely speak directly with the public anymore; their messages are filtered through politically appointed leadership.
Other governmental groups that would typically be involved, such as the National Security Council's biosecurity group, the Office of Pandemic Preparedness and Response Policy, and the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response, have been disbanded, left vacant or don't have permanent leaders, Houry says.
The diminished federal presence serves as the backdrop for the World Cup.
Emily Hilliard, press secretary for the Department of Health and Human Services which oversees the CDC and ASPR, wrote in an email response to NPR: "HHS and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) are actively coordinating with state, local, and global partners to ensure public health and safety during FIFA World Cup 2026 and enhance any measures, as needed."
Localities have found that the federal presence islate in coming, and not as coordinated as it may have been in the past, says Lori Freeman, CEO for the National Association of County and City Health Officials, which represents health departments.
Freeman says the CDC started holding coordination calls and issuing some guidance a few months ago –- long after host cities started their own preparations. She notes: "When it comes to merging public health, emergency response and preparedness, that is an area we worry constantly about because the federal government is the agency that must manage across state jurisdictions between and among states."
Some have stepped up to fill perceived gaps. For instance, Georgetown University has set up a Health Security Operations Center to track infectious diseases and send out daily reports, to inform places expecting an influx of travelers throughout the World Cup.
Copyright 2026 NPR
Manny Valladares
is always looking for the next tasty bite to feature on "AirTalk" Food Friday on LAist 89.3.
Published June 5, 2026 2:57 PM
O'Brien's Irish Pub's menu includes a full Irish breakfast and an Irish coffee.
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Courtesy Willy O'Sullivan
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Top line:
If you’re looking a great place to watch the upcoming World Cup on the Westside of L.A. — particularly if you can’t break the bank for a ticket — there’s O’Brien’s Irish Pub in Santa Monica. The owner sat down with Larry Mantle, host of AirTalk, to discuss sports, authentic Irish cuisine and quality Guinness.
What you'll find at the Irish pub:
1. Most notably, an Irish coffee. The alcoholic drink contains coffee and Irish whisky and is topped off with cream. 2. Quality Guinness. The pub keeps a short beer tap line — meaning it goes from keg to glass quickly — and cleans the tap line every two weeks. 3. Potato skins, banger sandwich and full Irish breakfast
The ultimate O'Brien's experience: St. Patrick's Day, obviously. Otherwise, any day when you can sit down for the full Irish breakfast and coffee.
If you’re looking for a great place to watch the upcoming World Cup on L.A.'s Westside — particularly if you can’t break the bank for a ticket — there’s O’Brien’s Irish Pub in Santa Monica.
Owner Willy O'Sullivan sat down with Larry Mantle, host of AirTalk, to discuss how the pub has managed to maintain its customer base, while others — like Brennan's and Britannia Pub — have had to close their doors. He says it all comes down to partnerships with local sports fans, trivia nights and maintaining their authentic Irish pub food and brews.
About the owner
A native of Cork City, the second-largest city in Ireland, O'Sullivan arrived stateside in 1987. He opened the pub in 1994, and as interest in soccer has grown, he's built a community around European football matches, especially after subsequent World Cups. Along the road, he's also built a following for New York sports teams.
The ultimate O'Brien's experience
St. Patrick's Day, obviously.
But ... any other day he'd recommend coming in for the Irish breakfast with a coffee in hand or "the best Guinness in Southern California," in his words.
How he ensures quality Guinness
Because Guinness is the pub's signature drink, he's made sure to give it a short beer tap line, meaning it goes from keg to glass quickly. He also makes sure to clean the tap line every two weeks to ensure quality.
Cost: Potato skins cost $18; banger sandwich costs $19; and the Irish breakfast costs $23.
What should we try next?
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