The Brief

The day after the fire broke out in Tustin, some students at Heritage Elementary were given plastic bags to collect and bring home charred pieces of the historic hangar that had floated onto school property, according to several parents.

One parent, who asked to remain anonymous in order to protect her family's privacy, told LAist that on Nov. 8 her fifth-grade daughter brought home a Ziploc bag with a small piece of black debris from the fire.

Her daughter told her she had picked it up with her bare hands. The parent said "the teacher was fully aware."

That same day, air quality authorities reported that debris from the fire contained up to 37% asbestos. The school sits less than a mile from the 7-acre hangar that was destroyed by flames.

The parent said she immediately threw the bag with the fire debris away. The material her daughter had collected, she said, was "paper-light" and easily breakable. Asbestos is most dangerous when the individual fibers are released into the air and can be inhaled and get trapped in the lungs.

A second parent posted a photo on social media of a plastic bag full of large black and gray pieces of debris, according to a screenshot shared with LAist by another parent of a Heritage student. The parent who posted the photo wrote in the post that their son had brought the bag home from Heritage.

In response to an interview request, Heritage principal Courtney Smith referred LAist to district communications officer Rina Lucchese. Lucchese and other Tustin Unified officials have not responded to repeated requests for an interview.

Tustin Unified board member Allyson Muñiz Damikolas told LAist she didn’t have a response to reports from parents about the incident and added that district leaders responded to public health warnings and "reacted to the information as soon as we received it."

The fire debris incident is one of what parents describe as several missteps taken by Tustin Unified School District during its early response to the fire. And this week, as hundreds of students return to Heritage and Legacy Magnet Academy — the two schools closest to the fire that had been closed for testing and cleaning — private test results in adjacent neighborhoods are raising new concerns about toxic fallout from the fire. The findings are heightening concerns among some parents about whether the newly reopened schools are truly safe from potentially toxic fire debris.

The historic hangar in Tustin caught fire in the early hours of Nov. 7. The massive World War II-era wooden hangar was built to house military blimps based in Southern California.

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What happened at Heritage Elementary after the fire

Classes continued as normal at Heritage for two days after the fire began.

A photo shared with LAist by a parent shows Heritage students sitting on the blacktop on campus. It was taken at 8 a.m. on Nov. 8, according to the metadata. Meanwhile, Heritage principal Courtney Smith told parents in emails reviewed by LAist that were sent on Nov. 7 and Nov. 8 that students would remain indoors during recess and lunch. The email on Nov. 8, stated that school leaders continued "to minimize student and staff time outdoors."

In the same Nov. 8 email, she told parents that "the minimal debris that has been found on campus has been safely removed by our custodial staff."

Later that evening, Tustin Unified officials announced that all school campuses would be closed following testing by the South Coast Air Quality Management District (AQMD) that found asbestos in fire debris.

In the days after the fire broke out, asbestos-laden debris was detected at Tustin schools as far away as Hicks Canyon Elementary, which is about three miles from the burn site, and at Tustin High School, which is two miles from the site, according to the county's initial report of the incident to state authorities.

Most schools in the district were reopened by Nov. 15 after receiving clearance from the district-contracted asbestos consultant. Students at Heritage and Legacy were dispersed at schools across the district by grade level until this week.

Tustin school board member Jonathan Abelove, whose district includes Heritage and Legacy, did not respond to an email request for comment. LAist was unable to reach him at several listed phone numbers.

For one parent, regrets and worries

The parent whose daughter brought home fire debris said she regrets sending her two children to Heritage on the two days after the fire broke out. "That's eating us alive to this day," she told LAist in a phone interview.

She said she and her daughter developed a bad cough a week after the fire broke out. The family ended up leaving their Tustin home for a week to stay in Newport Beach in order to limit their exposure to potential toxins while the fire was still heavily burning.

The fire was finally declared extinguished by Orange County fire officials on Dec. 1.

"The saddest part," the parent told LAist, is how distraught her fifth-grader became when she found out that she had been exposed to a potentially dangerous material, asbestos. "She was asking, 'Am I going to get cancer?'" the parent added.

Cranes were needed to safely lower the entrance doors to the hanger, which remained after the rest of the structure went up in flames.

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What did school officials know?

It's unclear whether school officials were initially aware of the likelihood of asbestos and other chemicals present in the massive blimp hangar that burned to the ground. But some parents said the district should have erred on the side of caution considering the circumstances.

Building fires are generally more toxic than wildfires because of the widespread, and often unknown, presence of toxic materials in homes and businesses. The hangar was widely touted as one of the largest wooden structures in the world — 180-ft. tall, three football fields long and one football field wide.

It was built in 1942, when asbestos and lead paint were widely used in construction.

Documents on the city of Tustin's website note the extensive use of asbestos-containing materials and lead paint in the building's construction.

According to a 2000 report commissioned by the Navy, asbestos was present in roofing materials, wall panels, pipe insulation and floor tiles. Some of this asbestos was "friable," meaning it breaks or crumbles easily and therefore poses a greater risk of being inhaled, which can cause long-term health consequences.

A 2020 report from the Orange County Grand Jury also noted that hazardous materials, including "asbestos, lead, biological contaminants, and groundwater contaminates," had been identified in the hangar's nearly identical twin hangar, which also sits on the 84-acre former military base in Tustin.

According to Chris Dunne, a Navy spokesperson, samples of treated wood from the hangar had been analyzed in the past and found to contain "detectable concentrations of aluminum, arsenic, boron, barium, calcium, cadmium, cobalt, chromium, copper, iron, potassium, magnesium, manganese, sodium, nickel, phosphorus, lead, silicon, and zinc."

Dunne told LAist the Navy had not communicated directly with the school district about potential public health concerns after the fire broke out. "The city of Tustin is the lead agency for cleanup efforts, interagency coordination, and public communication," Dunne wrote in an email.

Tustin Mayor Austin Lumbard, who has three children at Heritage, told LAist that he didn't know "in an official capacity" that there was asbestos and other toxins in the hangar building until he was alerted to the test results by the South Coast Air Quality Management District on Nov. 8. Still, "we all knew there was something in there," he said.

"I think the community that lives out here was aware that these were constructed in the ‘40s and that there was material used in that construction that potentially is not used now," Lumbard said.

The mayor also said people had wandered onto the property for years. In 2019 firefighters had to rescue a teenager who had climbed onto the roof of the hangar.

Asked whether he was concerned about the school district's initial handling of the fire response, Lumbard said: "I know the school district is taking this very seriously and they're leaning on and relying on information that they're getting from the Navy and from the Orange County Health Care Agency."

Regina Chinsio-Kwong, who heads the county health care agency, told LAist she first learned there could be toxic materials in the burning hangar that could pose a health risk when a consultant for AQMD called her on the evening on Nov. 7.

"I didn't have a full report, it was more of a verbal concern," she said.

Chinsio-Kwong said she had a call with AQMD staff the following morning to better understand the concerns. AQMD issued a smoke advisory on Nov. 7. It wasn't until Nov. 8 that they issued an advisory noting the presence of asbestos in testing results of ash and debris from public areas near the hangar fire.

Jeff Lawrence, whose daughter attends Heritage, emailed district and city officials twice on the morning the fire broke out, urging them to immediately start testing the air and soil for toxins.

The hangar building contains "all sorts of potential hazardous materials raining ash all over our neighborhood," he wrote. In one of the emails, he also excoriated school officials for keeping Heritage open "when you have literally zero idea if it is at all safe."

In an interview with LAist earlier this month, Lawrence said "the county and everyone had these reports,” referring to the Orange County Grand Jury report and documents on the city's website.

“From a logical perspective, as soon as you knew that that thing was burning, [toxic material] was going all over the place," he added.

Lawrence was livid that kids were outside while the fire burned, and that the school allowed kids to touch and take home debris from the fire. He said he blames the school district for not ensuring that students were kept inside and away from potentially toxic material.

"Ultimately, the buck stops with them," he said. "They made the decision to keep these schools open. They did not insist that the principal at [Heritage] keep all the kids inside."

Lawrence said he wished the district had immediately closed Heritage and offered distance learning instead. At nearby Legacy, school officials canceled in-person school when the fire broke out on Nov. 7 and instead held virtual classes.

Public health experts weigh in

LAist reached out to public health experts to better understand the risks associated with asbestos. Richard Castriotta, a pulmonologist at the University of Southern California's Keck School of Medicine, said reports of children handling asbestos and potentially bringing it into their classrooms or homes were "concerning."

"We don't really know what a safe level [of asbestos] is," he said.

But, he added, "in order to be dangerous, the asbestos has to be in a form that people can inhale." He said large chunks of asbestos-containing material, if disposed of properly, are less dangerous.

Tustin Unified recently released the results of surface and air testing done in November at Heritage and Legacy that showed no asbestos was detected on either campus. The testing was done in high-traffic areas including the main office and gym at Legacy and the administrative office and several kindergarten classrooms at Heritage.

Orange County Public Health Officer Regina Chinsio-Kwong said her office had also tested for lead at Legacy and Heritage on the heaviest days of smoke and did not detect elevated levels. She said as a whole, the official results from air quality and surface testing in the community nearest to the fire had been "reassuring." (Private testing has shown otherwise, as we explain below.)

In a Dec. 13 letter to Lumbard, the Tustin mayor, and the rest of the city council, Chinsio-Kwong said testing by multiple agencies, including the EPA, "suggests that the main concern for asbestos exposure was from bulk debris while asbestos fibers in the air played a limited role."

Chinsio-Kwong also wrote that environmental experts on the fire's emergency response team had concluded that testing indoor spaces "is not necessary, thanks to reassuring test results from nearby facilities," including public schools, local parks and community centers.

Nevertheless, Tustin officials announced Wednesday evening that they plan to sample soil and interior spaces for toxins from the fire.

"The City appreciates [the O.C. Health Care Agency]’s scientific conclusion that interior residential testing is unnecessary based on the extensive available data," Lumbard said in a news release. "However, in a collective effort to go above and beyond what is required to address lingering community concerns, the City is moving forward with performing exterior soil and interior air/dust sampling for asbestos and lead.”

He said the timing and location of sampling was being developed in consultation with the EPA and would be shared in the coming days.

More than 600 disaster remediation workers have been dispatched to clean up fire debris tainted with asbestos on the former military base and in surrounding neighborhoods.

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John Balmes, an air pollution expert and physician member of the California Air Resources Board, echoed Chinsio-Kwong, saying the reported results from air and surface tests at Tustin schools were "pretty reassuring."

"If they tested several classrooms a week after the fire started when smoke was the highest concentration, that's probably good enough in terms of the schools," he said.

Balmes said the people most likely to be exposed to dangerous, airborne asbestos fibers were the firefighters who responded to the fire, not children attending a nearby school weeks after the fire burnt out.

Disaster experts contracted by the city of Tustin have sealed in place the dust and debris immediately around the former hangar site with an adhesive substance.

Work to take down the hangar doors and adjacent structures — which Chinsio-Kwong had recommended be completed before schools reopened — was finished on Monday, according to the city's latest update.

The Navy announced this week that it had finalized a $6 million contract with a remediation company to clean up and dispose of debris from the fire. But Navy officials said they don’t know when the work will actually start.

“Before we can take action, debris removal plans must be reviewed and approved by state and federal regulatory agencies to ensure the safety of both the community and the environment,” said Gregory Preston, who directs the Navy's base closure program, in a news release.

What happened as students returned to Heritage this week

In an email last week to parents announcing the reopening of Heritage and Legacy, school district officials said both schools would undergo extra cleaning, including of ducts, carpets and rugs, "out of an abundance of caution and in response to potential concerns within our community."

Tuesday was Heritage students’ first day back on campus following a more than month-long closure due to the fire.

During afternoon pick-up, Heritage students streamed out of the school gates carrying handmade ornaments and construction paper Santa Claus cutouts. Ravi Chilakapati, who was picking up his kindergartener and third grader, said he had had some concerns about the school reopening but felt good about the information he had received via school emails detailing extra cleaning that would take place before students returned.

"At least for now, we are happy to be back," he said, adding that the past weeks of dropping off and picking up his kids from far-away school sites was "kind of horrible."

Still, he said he wished school leaders had closed Heritage as soon as the fire broke out. "We would have zero concerns if that had happened," he added.

Peter Thok, who also has two kids at Heritage, said he was "really happy" that the school had reopened and he no longer has to drive his kids to alternative campuses. He said he was satisfied with the school's asbestos testing and cleaning protocols.

"They took extra precautions, which is good," he said.

But he echoed Chilakapati in saying he thought the school should have been closed during the first two days of the fire.

"That's when the fire was raging the most," he said. "That's when it felt like we had the most debris in our house so for sure, it should have been closed."

Heritage students returned to campus on Dec. 19, more than a month after a fire broke out and consumed a massive World War II-era hangar less than a mile away.

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Thok and Chilakapati were both unaware that students at Heritage were allowed to bring home debris from the fire until they were asked about it by LAist.

Thok said, across the board, communication and direction from local authorities has been poor throughout the fire response.

"You could've had guidance that let the teachers know and the parents know what not to do and what we can do," he said.

Nearby homes test positive for asbestos and lead

Sean Storm, who has a child at Legacy and another at Heritage, told LAist he was concerned that authorities hadn't done enough testing at the schools and hadn't tested for a full range of heavy metals. He also said he and other parents would like to see the results of the lead testing Chinsio-Kwong said her department had done at the schools in November. "I just want to know it's safe," he said.

On Wednesday, Storm shared with LAist and school and district officials the results of testing done earlier this month in his neighborhood, which is across from the hangar burn site and about a mile from Heritage. The tests, conducted by AQS Environmental Services and paid for by a local homeowners association, found asbestos and lead in all 20 samples of suspected fire debris collected from buildings throughout the community.

Federal public health officials say even low levels of exposure to lead can damage children's health and development.

Storm also shared testing ordered by his insurance company and conducted on the inside and exterior of his home that showed lead levels in soot on his windowsills exceeded the EPA’s lead hazard levels in dust by at least 14 times.

The testing also found elevated levels of arsenic and barium. The report recommended that the family move out "until all cleaning is completed."

The EPA is monitoring air quality around the perimeter of the former military base and in multiple locations in the surrounding community.

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The test results left Storm uneasy. If his home less than a mile from the burn site wasn’t safe to occupy, he wondered how the school could be safe for kids.

"Were the tables power washed and clean?" he asked. "There are gazebos that cover the picnic tables [students] eat off of. Was that cleaned? I just want to know …is the school truly, actually clean?"

Tustin’s fire clean up costs over $45 million so far

Balmes, the air pollution expert, said public health officials could do additional testing of outside areas on local school campuses for arsenic and lead, the two heavy metals initially detected in smoke plumes from the fire, to "assuage parents' fears." "That's not unreasonable," he said.

Balmes added that the rain this week should wash away much of the remaining ash and soot from the fire in the community, significantly reducing people's likelihood of exposure.

According to the latest update from Tustin officials, work to remove potential asbestos-containing fire debris from homes near the former hangar is about 85% complete. In a news release earlier this week, city spokesperson Stephanie Najera said Tustin’s clean up costs for the fire total over $45 million.

The Navy owns the property where the fire took place and has committed $11 million to the clean-up thus far.

Najera said the total cost of recovering from the disaster could exceed $100 million.

President Trump once insisted he had "nothing to do with Project 2025," the right-wing policy plan that became a key flashpoint during the presidential campaign.

The Democrats tried to turn the 900-page Heritage Foundation-led blueprint to remake the government into a political boogeyman, and succeeded to some degree, but it wasn't enough to win the election.

A year later, many of the policies have been implemented, from cracking down on immigration to dismantling the Department of Education.

"A lot of the policies from Day 1 to the last day and in between that the administration has adopted are right out of Project 2025," said Rob Bonta, the attorney general of California, who has used Project 2025 to prepare legal papers against the administration.

Concerns about the project started to bubble up over the spring of 2024, but really caught fire a few months later when actress Taraji P. Henson singled out Project 2025 while hosting the BET awards.

"Pay attention. It's not a secret. Look it up!" she said, speaking directly into the camera during the show. "They are attacking our most vulnerable citizens. The Project 2025 plan is not a game."

'Ridiculous'

Then-candidate Trump tried to dismiss the hysteria, calling the ideas "ridiculous" — and claiming he did not know who was behind it — even though key people involved in developing the plans served in his first administration.
And when it was clear the firestorm would not go away, Trump went on the attack against those allies who wrote the playbook.

"They're a pain in the a--," said Chris LaCivita, a senior adviser to the Trump campaign, who tore into the organizers of Project 2025 at an event hosted by CNN and Politico during the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee.

"Look, I think that in the perfect world, from their perspective, they would love to drive the issue set, but they don't get to do that," he added.

Yet days after winning, Trump tapped Russell Vought, an architect of Project 2025, to lead the Office of Management and Budget — considered the nerve center of the White House. Other contributors followed.
Trump soon unleashed a flurry of orders reshaping the government, many of which were outlined in Project 2025.

"As of today, it will henceforth be the official policy of the United States government that there are only two genders, male and female," he said during his inaugural address.

Trump ended diversity, equity and inclusion programs. He launched massive immigration enforcement and took the first steps to overhaul the federal workforce.

Bonta, the attorney general of California, said Project 2025 defined Trump's first year back in office. The country's 23 Democratic attorneys general studied Project 2025, consulted with each other and, he said, prepared a response for every potential action should it be taken.

"The existence of Project 2025 was the Trump administration telling us exactly what they were going to do and sending it to us in writing," Bonta said.

Bonta has filed or joined lawsuits that have successfully blocked Trump's policies requiring states like California to join his immigration crackdown, freeze of domestic federal funding and layoffs at agencies such as the U.S. Department of Education.

The White House dismissed concerns about Project 2025, calling them irrelevant theories from Beltway insiders.

"President Trump is implementing the agenda he campaigned on and that the American people voted for," said Abigail Jackson, a White House spokeswoman.

Jackson said the president focused on implementing the agenda he campaigned on — lowering gas prices, accelerating economic growth and securing the border.

Fueling controversy

Trump may have actually fueled the controversy by rejecting Project 2025 during the campaign, said Tevi Troy, a presidential historian and former White House aide to George W. Bush.

"I would say that Project 2025 was largely standard conservative fare, but with a bit more of a MAGA flavor than previously."

Troy sees little difference between what the Heritage Foundation did with Project 2025 and what think tanks on the left and right have been doing for years compiling policy proposals for incoming presidents.

He pointed to the personnel and policy ideas of the Hoover Institution that helped shape the George W. Bush administration and the Center for American Progress' influence on the Obama administration.

"If the Trump campaign had leaned into it and said, 'sure, this is an agenda that has been put out as a think tank. This happens all the time. We will look at them in due time when the election is over,' " said Troy. "By criticizing and disavowing Project 2025, it suddenly became more radioactive."

Paul Dans, the director of Project 2025, says he never took the attacks personally, which he chalked up to political calculus. 

He likened watching the president sign executive orders and directives that first came across his desk to being an animator who watches his or her sketchbook come to life on the big screen.

"I believe the proof is in the pudding," said Dans, who also served in the first Trump administration. "Every day that President Trump rolls out another Project 2025 item, it's really an endorsement of our work, myself and the work of thousands of patriots who came together."

Dans is now highlighting that work in a run for the Senate, against Trump-ally, Republican Lindsey Graham.

Trump did eventually embrace Project 2025 during the shutdown fight last fall.

He boasted of meeting with "Russ Vought, he of PROJECT 2025 Fame," while threatening to dismantle federal agencies.

"I can't believe the Radical Left Democrats gave me this unprecedented opportunity," he said.

Copyright 2026 NPR

President Trump says his controversial push for U.S. control of Greenland comes after he failed to win the Nobel Peace Prize last year, adding he no longer feels obliged to think only of peace.

In a message to Norway's prime minister Jonas Gahr Støre on Sunday night, Trump criticized the European country for not giving him the prize.

"Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace, although it will always be predominant, but can now think about what is good and proper for the United States of America," Trump said in the message.

"The World is not secure unless we have Complete and Total Control of Greenland," Trump added.

The message was reported by PBS NewsHour, and was later confirmed by Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre in a statement.

Gahr Støre said he received the message on Sunday in response to a text he and Finland's President Alexander Stubb had sent to Trump, in which they had conveyed opposition to Trump's proposed tariff increases on eight European countries over the recent Greenland dispute.

In their message to Trump, according to The New York Times, which received a copy of the exchange from the Norwegian prime minister's office, Gahr Støre and Stubb wrote: "We believe we all should work to take this down and de-escalate — so much is happening around us where we need to stand together."

The pair suggested a joint call.

"Norway's position on Greenland is clear. Greenland is a part of the Kingdom of Denmark, and Norway fully supports the Kingdom of Denmark on this matter," Gahr Støre said. "We also support that NATO in a responsible way is taking steps to strengthen security and stability in the Arctic."

Gahr Støre also pointed out that while President Trump claimed that Norway "decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize," the government of Norway is not responsible for the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize. The Nobel Peace Prize has been awarded by a five member Norwegian Nobel Committee since 1901.

The Danish navy's inspection ship HDMS Vaedderen sails off Nuuk, Greenland, on Sunday.

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The Peace Prize, which was last awarded to Venezuela's opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, is also awarded for the previous year. That means the most recent prize was awarded for 2024, before President Trump commenced his second term of office. Machado gave Trump her prize last week as a symbolic thank you for his recent actions in Venezuela.

In a phone interview with NBC News on Monday, Trump again claimed that the Norwegian government has control over the Nobel Peace Prize. "Norway totally controls it despite what they say," he said. Trump also said he would follow through on his threats to impose further tariffs. When asked whether he would use force to seize Greenland, the president replied: "No comment."

The European Union is set to hold an emergency summit on Thursday, in which attendees will discuss how to respond to the threats. In a statement on social media, the EU's foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said the bloc had "no interest to pick a fight" but would "hold our ground."

Trump's message to Gahr Støre comes as tensions rise between Europe and the United States over the status of Greenland, an autonomous territory of the Kingdom of Denmark that is strategically important and rich in resources.

On Monday, the World Economic Forum said officials from Denmark would not be attending the meeting in Davos, Switzerland, this week. "We can confirm that the Danish government will not be represented in Davos this week," a spokesperson, Alem Tedeneke, told NPR.

On Sunday, in a collective rebuke to President Trump, the leaders of Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden and the United Kingdom issued a joint statement condemning recent U.S. tariff threats. The eight countries, which are all members of NATO, said that Trump's proposed tariffs "undermine transatlantic relations and risk a dangerous downward spiral."

On Saturday night, President Trump had written on his Truth Social social media platform that he would impose tariffs on imports from the countries, after they had deployed limited military personnel to Greenland to participate in a Danish-led Arctic exercise known as 'Arctic Endurance.'

Trump said America would levy a 10% tariff on goods from the eight countries starting on Feb. 1, which would rise to 25% on June 1, and remain in place "until such time as a Deal is reached for the Complete and Total purchase of Greenland" by the United States.

The open dispute comes after weeks of increasingly assertive U.S. rhetoric regarding Greenland, in which Trump has repeatedly said that Greenland is strategically vital to U.S. national security, citing its location and untapped mineral deposits.

In his text message, Trump questioned Denmark's right to claim Greenland. "Denmark cannot protect that land from Russia or China, and why do they have a 'right of ownership' anyway? There are no written documents, it's only that a boat landed there hundreds of years ago, but we had boats landing there, also," Trump said.

Trump made similar comments last week, saying "the fact that they had a boat land there 500 years ago doesn't mean that they own the land," drawing mirth on social media, with comedians like Jon Stewart noting on The Daily Show "how do you think we got our land?"

Copyright 2026 NPR

The Martin Luther King Jr. Day holiday weekend is typically busy for the Inner City Youth Orchestra of Los Angeles. On Monday, the orchestra finished its third performance of the weekend at the California African American Museum, which included a musical rendition of the civil rights leader’s seminal “I Have a Dream Speech.”

It was flautist Tionna LeSassier’s first time playing with the orchestra on the federal holiday. Tionna said she began playing flute when she was 12.

“I feel really relieved that I was able to accomplish such a big performance for a really big holiday,” Tionna, who has been playing flute for more than two years, said. “I cannot believe I’m here playing with these amazing musicians.”

The orchestra’s performance, which included pieces like “We Shall Overcome” and the “Afro-American Symphony,” capped off the museum’s annual “King Day” celebration.

The event is held on the federal holiday that honors the legacy of the Baptist preacher whose nonviolent protests and eloquent speeches helped shift American attitudes about race in the 1960s and beyond and lead to landmark Civil Rights legislation.

Earlier in the day, museumgoers listened to and reflected on a recording by the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. from 1967. Nearly 60 years later, event participants said, the words still feel fresh.

“When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, economic exploitation and militarism are incapable of being conquered,” King said in “The Three Evils of Society,” his keynote address at the National Conference on New Politics in Chicago.

Cameron Shaw, executive director of the Exposition Park museum, told LAist on Monday that the speech has “incredible relevance to the political and social moment and what we’re going through as a people today.”

In a brief discussion after the speech, one attendee spoke about the need to interrogate racism as a systematic ill, not just as one-off acts, and another commented on the importance of standing up to injustice.

Shaw says the museum’s celebration on Martin Luther King Jr. Day has evolved over the last several years, but one of the main throughlines she sees is the continued message of “speaking truth to power.”

“When we celebrate Dr. King today, we celebrate all of the folks past and present who have been brave enough to speak truth to power,” Shaw said. “That is something we truly need.”

Monday’s event also featured a faux stained glass workshop inspired by an exhibition the museum has on display about architect Amaza Lee Meredith.

The museum’s King Day event was one of several celebrating the Civil Rights leader this weekend in L.A.

In South L.A., an annual parade drew thousands of people, with a march concluding in Leimert Park. "It was a wonderful and powerful tribute to Dr. King’s memory to march down MLK Boulevard alongside so many friends and community members in the historic Leimert Park neighborhood," L.A. Mayor Karen Bass said in a statement.

A report of a stabbing marred the end of the event. Bass' statement said city officials were investigating and ensuring people got home safe. She added that "Los Angeles has zero tolerance for this type of violence."

Italian fashion designer Valentino died Monday at his Roman residence. He was 93. His foundation announced his death on Instagram.

Dubbed an "international arbiter of taste" by Vogue, notable women wore his designs at funerals and weddings, as well as on the red carpet. He dressed the likes of Audrey Hepburn and Jackie Onassis, as well as modern stars, including Anna Wintour to Gwyneth Paltrow and Zendaya.

The image of style and lavish living, Valentino's signature features included crisp suits and a "crème brûlée" complexion — due to his fervor for tanning. He was heavily inspired by the stars he saw on the silver screen and had a lifelong fixation with glamour.

"I love a beautiful lady. I love a beautiful dog. I love a beautiful piece of furniture. I love beauty. It's not my fault," he said in The Last Emperor, a 2008 documentary about him.

In the world of haute couture, Valentino embraced sophistication, elegance and traditional femininity through his dresses and trademarked a vibrant red hue. His work embodied romance, luxury and an aristocratic lifestyle.

He was born Valentino Garavani and named after the silent movie star Rudolph Valentino. A self-described spoiled child, the designer acquired a taste for the expensive from a young age; his shoes were custom-made, and the stripe, color and buttons of his blazers were designed to his specifications.

His father, a well-to-do electrical supplier, and his mother, who appreciated the value of a well-made garment, catered to their young son's refined palate and later supported his fashion endeavors, sending him to school and financing his early work.

Growing up in the small town of Voghera, Italy, he learned sewing from his Aunt Rosa in Lombardy. After high school, he moved to Paris to study fashion and take on apprenticeships.

Valentino owed much of his success to his former lover and business partner, Giancarlo Giammetti. The two met in a café on the famed Via Condotti in Rome in 1960, where Valentino had opened his first couture studio.

They founded Valentino Company the same year, and its first ready-to-wear shop opened in Milan in 1969. Together, the pair built a fashion empire over five decades.

They separated romantically when Valentino was 30 but remained business partners and close friends. Valentino knew little about business and accounting before meeting Giammetti; together, they formed two parts of a whole — Giammetti the business mind, and Valentino the creative force.

"Valentino has a perfect vision of how a woman should dress," Giammetti told Charlie Rose in 2009. "He looks for beauty. Women should be more beautiful. His work is to make women more beautiful."

They sold the Valentino company in 1998 for nearly $300 million. It made $1.36 billion in revenue in 2021, according to Reuters.

Even after his retirement in 2008, he couldn't completely leave fashion behind and continued to design dresses for opera productions.

Once the fashion world became more accessible to the public, millions of aspiring fashionistas bought jeans, handbags, shoes, umbrellas and even Lincoln Continentals with his gleaming "V" monogram. By the peak of his career, Valentino's popularity would rival that of the pope's in Rome.

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