How the disaster exposed divisions in the Eastside
By Laura Anaya-Morga and Andrew Lopez | The LA Local
Published July 2, 2026 11:00 AM
Firefighters assess the remains of the Lineage warehouse that burned for a week and sent smoke into nearby communities.
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Andrew Lopez
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Boyle Heights Beat
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Topline:
In the days following a massive warehouse fire in Boyle Heights, residents in surrounding communities struggled to navigate resources and were turned away at air purifier distributions based on where they lived — then the messaging shifted.
Resident experiences: Althana Ávalos, a 33-year-old Los Angeles Unified School District teacher, closed the windows and doors of her East L.A. home, and her family wore KN95 masks. But it wasn’t enough. They soon began feeling the effects of the smoke: sore throat, eye and skin irritation, nausea and headaches. When she called the office of Councilmember Ysabel Jurado to have an air purifier delivered to her home, she was told she didn’t qualify.
Response: As the fire continued burning, city and county leaders began appearing side by side at press conferences, stressing that government agencies were working collaboratively. Later in the response, public messaging also appeared to shift.
Read on... for more experiences and the response to the fire.
In the days after the Lineage warehouse fire blanketed the Eastside in thick smoke, Althana Ávalos desperately searched for an air purifier for her 9-year-old son with asthma.
The 33-year-old Los Angeles Unified School District teacher closed the windows and doors of her East L.A. home, and her family wore KN95 masks. But it wasn’t enough. They soon began feeling the effects of the smoke: sore throat, eye and skin irritation, nausea and headaches.
When she called the office of Councilmember Ysabel Jurado to have an air purifier delivered to her home, she was told she didn’t qualify.
“I’m sorry,” the person on the phone told her, according to Ávalos. “Due to the address that you’re providing, you are on the other side so you don’t qualify … You belong to the county.”
“Really? This is a disaster,” Ávalos remembers thinking. “My son has asthma. What am I going to do?”
The moment captured what many residents say they experienced for days following the fire: For some seeking help, access to emergency resources often depended less on how close they lived to the fire and more on which side of an invisible border they called home.
A crisis felt across invisible borders
Ávalos lives on the east side of Indiana Street, in unincorporated East Los Angeles, not the city of L.A. Just across the street, on the west side of Indiana, is Boyle Heights, where the Lineage warehouse is located.
Although the warehouse is in Boyle Heights, it sits near the borders of East L.A. and Commerce, separated by short stretches of roads and industrial blocks. Walking a few feet places residents in a different jurisdiction entirely.
Those geographic boundaries shaped who distributed supplies, where residents went for help, and, in some cases, who qualified for resources such as air purifiers.
While Boyle Heights residents are represented by Los Angeles city officials, including Jurado, and L.A. Mayor Karen Bass, residents in unincorporated East L.A. fall under Los Angeles County and are primarily represented by Supervisor Hilda Solis.
Where do you live?
Boyle Heights, highlighted in blue, is within the city of East L.A. and is represented by Councilmember Ysabel Jurado and Mayor Karen Bass.
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Map created within ArcGIS by Andrew Lopez
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The LA Local
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East Los Angeles, highlighted in orange, is an unincorporated community within LA County. It is represented by Supervisor Hilda Solis.
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Map created within ArcGIS by Andrew Lopez
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The LA Local
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Boyle Heights: Highlighted in blue, Boyle Heights is a neighborhood within the city of Los Angeles. Residents are represented by Councilmember Ysabel Jurado and Mayor Karen Bass.
East Los Angeles: Highlighted in orange, East Los Angeles is an unincorporated community in Los Angeles County. Residents are represented by Supervisor Hilda Solis.
Residents search for relief
When the fire broke out on June 17, elected officials responded and posted updates on social media as firefighters battled the blaze.
And when the flames reignited within the building two days later, officials declared local and statewide emergencies while agencies worked to acquire and distribute air purifiers, pass out masks and open up smoke relief shelters across the Eastside.
Antonio Chapa, left, director of field operations for Los Angeles County Supervisor Hilda Solis, distributes air purifiers on Indiana Street in Boyle Heights on June 22, 2026.
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Isaac Ceja
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Boyle Heights Beat
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But residents say accessing those resources wasn’t always straightforward.
Some distribution events required proof of residency. On social media, residents asked whether they qualified for assistance if they lived near the fire. Others were clearing up confusion from commenters about whether their addresses were actually within Los Angeles city limits.
For Ávalos, it was confusing that strict government rules still applied for the neighboring jurisdictions even during a crisis.
“I knew I belonged to the East L.A. area. It didn’t hit me that in, you know, in this case of emergency, or in this situation, they were going to be asking,” said Ávalos.
Community groups filled the gaps
Henry Perez, executive director of InnerCity Struggle, said his organization repeatedly heard about people running into the same issue of being turned away at distribution sites.
“It’s extremely frustrating and infuriating,” Perez said. “To be told that they couldn’t get the air purifier because of where they lived on the dividing line, that is just heartbreaking.”
Henry Perez, executive director of InnerCity Struggle, speaks at a press conference on Thursday, June 25, 2026.
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Steve Saldivar
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The LA Local
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As demand for clean air grew, groups including InnerCity Struggle, Proyecto Pastoral, the East L.A. Walking Club and The Maravilla Community Advisory Committee, as well as individual volunteers, organized their own distributions, regardless of jurisdictions.
Meanwhile, Ávalos’ family continued searching for relief as their conditions worsened.
On Saturday, June 20, they went to the smoke relief shelter at City Terrace Park. During a visit to the shelter, Sen. Durazo stepped inside to talk to families.
After explaining how she was turned away from receiving an air purifier, Durazo, upset by the situation, called on one of her team members to help get one, Ávalos said. A few hours later, the air purifier had been personally delivered to her at the shelter.
State and local elected officials, including Durazo, Assemblymembers Mark Gonzalez and Jessica Caloza, and U.S. Rep. Jimmy Gomez, also spent time in the affected neighborhoods sharing updates and connecting residents with resources.
Ávalos wasn’t the only resident who described frustration over jurisdictional divides.
Martin Ramirez, who owns N&M Auto Repair on the corner of Union Pacific Avenue and Indiana Street, said he tried to get an air purifier for his business from Our Lady of Victory Church in East L.A. but was turned away because his business address put him in Commerce.
Officials emphasize unity as the response evolves
As the fire continued burning, city and county leaders began appearing side by side at press conferences, stressing that government agencies were working collaboratively.
First District Supervisor Hilda Solis speaks at a press conference at the City Terrace Park Smoke Respite Center and is joined by Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and Council District 14 Councilmember Ysabel Jurado.
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Photo courtesy of First District Supervisor Hilda Solis
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Later in the response, public messaging also appeared to shift.
At a press event on Thursday, June 25, Bass pushed back when asked by a local reporter about the miscommunication between county and city departments.
“First of all, I know the two of us here, the three of us here, we’re not going to put up with jurisdictional divide,” Bass said. “People can go to the county for help and if the resources…happen to be on the city side, the bottom line is that if the people of this community need help, we’re going to do everything we can to get it there.”
Around the same time, in a social media post promoting purifier distribution on Friday, June 26, Hilda Solis wrote that aid was “open to adjacent communities.”
A community resource center that opened up in Boyle Heights over the weekend presented a similar shift, stating services were open to “residents and businesses of Boyle Heights and nearby communities.”
Still, some residents said the changing guidance added to the confusion.
In written statements to Boyle Heights Beat, both Jurado and Solis acknowledged the challenges residents faced along the Boyle Heights and East L.A. border.
“Emergency doesn’t recognize jurisdictional boundaries, but government often does,” Jurado said.
A plume of smoke billows out of a Boyle Heights warehouse on Saturday, June 20.
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Isaiah Murtaugh
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The LA Local
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Jurado said city departments and county agencies are now coordinating around air quality monitoring, debris and food waste removal, traffic and hauling plans, water runoff protections, public health resources, and community outreach.
Solis shared a similar sentiment, stating that although the county stayed in close communication with the city on emergency response from day one, it had become streamlined by day seven.
“By the end of the first week, that included broader resource distributions, expanded health services, planning for the Community Resilience Center, and connecting residents, workers, and small businesses with recovery resources,” Solis said.
What residents want to see change
Perez of InnerCity Struggle said officials should use the Lineage fire as a lesson before the next disaster.
“This isn’t going to be the last environmental crisis or, just, emergency crisis and they need to recognize that there are certain parts of the city and the county that border one another,” Perez said. “What we want our elected leaders to really learn from this experience is that preparedness is critical.”
One of the biggest lessons Councilmember Jurado said she learned through the process was that environmental emergencies “require neighborhood-level preparedness” before disaster strikes.
“In future emergencies, residents should not have to chase government for information. Government needs to show up where people already are: at their doors, at trusted community organizations, at schools, churches, clinics, recreation centers, and neighborhood gathering places,” Jurado said.
For residents like Ávalos who live along the city-county lines, the fire reinforced how a divide in resources — from health care and law enforcement to services like trash and public works — can shape access to help.
“If something like this were to happen again … I don’t think that [where you live] should matter,” Ávalos said.
Cato Hernández
reports on issues that impact daily life in Southern Californians, including the courts.
Published July 24, 2026 3:56 PM
The Stanley Mosk Courthouse
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Rich Fury
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Getty Images
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Topline:
Are L.A. County Superior Court judges setting higher bail for Latino defendants? Some court-watchers say yes, according to a new report.
What does it cover? Between January and November 2025, La Defensa’s Court Watch LA volunteers observed 140 random criminal cases that included felonies and misdemeanors.
What did they find? The report details multiple findings, including that defendants who appeared to be Latino had an average bail amount more than 15 times higher than white defendants.
How accurate is this? This is a sample from over 200,000 cases. It’s based on human observation, so the organizers acknowledged that there are gaps. But they’ve asked the court to share its own data, which they say they have not received.
Read on…. to see the L.A. County Superior Court’s response.
A criminal justice watchdog is calling into question whether Latinos in the L.A. County Superior Court get a fair shot at bail.
The new report from the nonprofit La Defensa, which advocates for reform in the legal system, analyzes a sample of pretrial decisions from 2025 which had been documented by community court-watching volunteers.
One of the key findings was that defendants who were perceived to be Latino had an average bail amount of $157,700 — more than 15 times higher than white defendants and nearly three times higher than Black defendants.
Studies show that inability to pay bail can affect defendants’ livelihoods and their ability to defend themselves, according to the Vera Institute of Justice.
“ Most families — no matter what they did, no matter what they sold — cannot actually purchase that person’s freedom to give them the fighting chance to go against the state,” Titilayọ Rasaki, La Defensa’s state policy and legal affairs director.
The L.A. County Superior Court says it’s following the law on bail requirements and that the findings are missing context because observation is limited.
How court-watching works
La Defensa’s Court Watch LA program is a community-led effort to document and hold the courts accountable. They train volunteers to go in and observe cases.
The volunteers take notes on the charges, the judge’s conduct and the person’s criminal history, if it comes up. That then gets analyzed against publicly available case information and state law. Programs like this exist in several other cities around the country.
For the latest report, La Defensa volunteers observed 140 felony and misdemeanor criminal cases, chosen at random, between January to November 2025.
Judicial accountability lead Bryanna Siguenza explained how she decided where to send the volunteers.
“ I choose a department, specifically ones that are pretty busy, have high case loads, and are arraignment and pretrial,” she said.
What watchers saw
Racial disparities in pretrial settings have been researched at local, state and national levels, but La Defensa’s findings are based entirely on human observation, Siguenza said.
The volunteers are trained to listen for important details that come up in proceedings, but they may not always get the full story behind the charges, like a defendant’s criminal history.
L.A. County Superior Court spokesperson Rob Oftring said the report needs more context.
“Many of the report’s findings, for example, do not appear to account for charge severity or criminal history, both of which are legally significant factors in any release decision…” he wrote in a statement.
La Defensa did not include in its report what charges had been filed in the cases observed. However, according to the report, comparable charges still had disproportionate bail outcomes that “couldn’t be explained by charge severity alone.”
The severity of charges legally informs bail decisions. The Superior Court is required to have standard bail amounts based on the crime, which judges have discretion to adjust.
State law also requires judges to weigh issues like public safety in bail decisions, as well as the defendant’s ability to post bail. According to the volunteers’ observations, the judges considered the latter in just a quarter of cases when setting bail.
Oftring said the court has taken steps to reduce money bail’s usage as allowed by law.
“Bail at arraignment is set only after both the defense and prosecution have been heard and the judge has weighed the specific facts of the case,” his statement read.
The limits of the findings
Oftring said the court values the role organizations like Court Watch LA play in keeping the justice system accountable, but that the sample size of the researchers used in their report is too small to draw any definitive conclusions.
Roughly 272,000 criminal cases took place during that time period, according to Oftring.
Representatives from La Defensa said they know the report is only a snapshot of the system, and that human observation has its limits.
That’s why in November, they requested 10 years of de-identified data to analyze whether bail outcomes differ across judges, courthouses and demographic groups. Rasaki said they haven’t received it.
“ We would say release the data … by all means, we want to partner. We want to analyze,” she said.
Oftring told LAist they are working on several projects that “provide data-informed scrutiny of how the court operates.”
Lucas Brady Woods
covers the weather and disasters, among other climate and science topics.
Published July 24, 2026 3:44 PM
Experts continue to warn about dangerous rip currents and surf at Southern California beaches. Always swim near a staffed lifeguard tower, and never turn your back to the waves.
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Mario Tama
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Getty Images
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Topline:
The National Weather Service has issued a heat advisory for much of Southern California through Monday. Some places are also under more severe heat warnings.
The details: Highs in the San Fernando Valley, San Gabriel Valley and other inland areas of L.A. County are expected to range from the mid-90s to about 105 degrees. Downtown Los Angeles and much of Orange, Ventura and Santa Barbara counties will get up to the lower 90s. Parts of the Inland Empire could get up to 108 degrees and the Coachella Valley could hit 120.
Wildfire risk: Forecasters warn that fire danger will be elevated through at least Monday, driven by heat, dry vegetation and low humidity levels away from the coast. Despite some extra moisture in the air over the last several weeks, there hasn’t been enough to actually produce rain.
Read on … to learn more about why the heat is so persistent.
Southern Californians are in for yet another scorching weekend.
The National Weather Service has issued a heat advisory for much of the region through Monday, with temperatures expected to hit their peak on Sunday.
Highs in the San Fernando Valley, San Gabriel Valley and other inland areas of L.A. County are expected to range from the mid-90s to about 105 degrees. Downtown Los Angeles and much of Orange, Ventura and Santa Barbara counties will get up to the lower 90s. Beaches will also be hot — in the lower 80s.
Moving farther east, things get really toasty. Forecasters have issued a more severe extreme heat warning for parts of the Inland Empire, where temperatures could get up to 108 degrees, and for the Coachella Valley, where they could hit 120.
Humidity will likely also continue to add to the discomfort, but will be concentrated in areas closer to the coast, where it will keep nighttime temperatures relatively warm and make it more difficult to cool down. Inland areas will feel drier.
Those who are most at-risk from the heat are people who work or spend time outside, people without access to air conditioning and those who are either over 65 or young children.
Making sense of heat forecasts
Southern Californians are no strangers to hot weather in the summer, but heat waves are getting hotter, longer and more frequent as the climate changes.
So you should know the words forecasters use to describe these weather events — and the risks they pose.
Heat advisory: Advisories are issued when temperatures are expected to be hot enough to cause discomfort and potentially lead to heat-related illnesses, especially for more vulnerable populations like young children and the elderly.
Extreme heat watch: Watches are essentially forecasts for upcoming periods of extreme heat. Forecasters say heat watches often cover wide areas and will be revised into more focused warnings and advisories as conditions become clearer over time. Watches are a good time to prepare for extreme heat.
Extreme heat warning: Warnings are issued when heat levels are or will likely become extremely dangerous. Under extreme heat warnings, it's a good idea to avoid strenuous outdoor activity, stay hydrated and help loved ones and pets stay cool.
Forecasters are also warning of dangerous rip currents and swells along the coast this weekend.
If you’re headed to the beach to beat the heat, as many Southern Californians likely are, they recommend staying out of the water or, if you do go swimming, stay in front of lifeguards. It’s also a good idea to avoid jetties and tidal rocks.
We are looking at very warm temps across the Southland over the next few days, with inland areas expected to climb above 100°F. If you're planning to visit the beach, be aware that a series of southerly swells will impact south-facing beaches through the weekend. (1/3) pic.twitter.com/AI5uLmFeaO
This weekend will also come with a high risk of wildfires.
Forecasters warn that fire danger will be elevated through at least Monday, driven by heat, dry vegetation and low humidity levels away from the coast.
Despite some extra moisture in the air over the last several weeks, there hasn’t been enough to actually produce rain. Without precipitation, and under consistently high temperatures, plants will continue to dry out and become fuel.
“We have humidity, but it's not reaching the saturation point. Therefore, we won't have a cloud. We won't have precipitation,” said Rong Fu, an atmospheric scientist at UCLA who specializes in weather patterns and wildfires.
Fu said a system of high atmospheric pressure sitting over the Western U.S. is pushing warm, dry air across the Sierra Nevada from inland deserts and into Southern California.
That can generate what’s known as downslope wind. Those winds plus the already dry conditions align to create some especially dangerous fire weather.
One spark can easily turn into a large blaze, and humans are the most common cause of wildfires in Southern California, according to the U.S. Forest Service.
People can accidentally start wildfires in a range of ways, including throwing a lit cigarette into dry brush or dragging a chain behind a vehicle, creating sparks. One of the most common human causes is improperly extinguished camp fires.
Lightning can also start wildfires but is unlikely under current weather conditions. Southern California has seen minimal thunderstorms this summer.
The new normal?
Heatwaves in the summer and fall are obviously not new for Southern California, but they are getting worse.
Much of the heat currently blanketing the region is being driven by the high-pressure system, which traps warm air and compresses it against the ground, heating it even further. Forecasters say it’s likely to stay that way through the end of July.
But high-pressure systems like this one usually don’t stick around this long.
“For this pattern to linger almost two weeks — yeah, I would say, from a climatological point of view — that's pretty unusual,” Fu said.
One major driver of the change, Fu said, is climate change: As the climate warms, this kind of “anomalous” high pressure system will become stronger and more frequent.
And one consequence of hotter and longer heatwaves, is extended elevated periods of risky fire weather.
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Julia Barajas
covers what Angelenos need to know and the essential news of the day.
Published July 24, 2026 3:00 PM
A LAHSA Commission meeting held on Friday, on April 25, 2025.
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Samanta Helou Hernandez
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LAist
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Topline:
The Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority Commission unanimously approved a $496 million budget for the 2026-27 fiscal year, moments before the agency released its annual homeless count.
Why it matters: The agency's new budget, approved today, is down 40% compared to $829 million approved last year. The drop accounts for L.A. County’s move away from the agency — along with fewer dollars from the state. The agency’s budget is now 73% funded by the city of L.A. At the same time, homelessness in L.A. is up. New numbers show the population of people living outdoors in the city grew by7.9% between early 2025 and 2026.
What does the money do: In addition to the annual tally,the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority uses federal, state, county, and city dollars to provide a range of services — everything from safe places to park for people who live in their cars to permanent housing placement.
Who’s on the commission? LAHSA is governed by a 10-member commission that is half appointed by L.A. Mayor Karen Bass, and half appointed by each of the five county supervisors. Bass has served on the commission since appointing herself to it in fall 2023.
The backstory: The embattled agency, which has been at the forefront of the region’s response to homelessness for more than three decades, is currently fighting for survival. Following a series of harsh audits and a judge’s rebuke of LAHSA’s spending and management, L.A. County supervisors pulled funding from the agency. LAHSA is also in the middle of a court battle with the Trump administration, which is seeking to cut its access to hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funds.
The Pio Pico - Koreatown Branch Library in Koreatown is one of several cooling centers recommended by the city.
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Gary Coronado
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The LA Local
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Topline:
While a late July heatwave baking Los Angeles is expected to break by Monday, a new heatwave could be following close behind next week.
More details: Temperatures will linger in the high 80s and low 90s in downtown and the surrounding neighborhoods, including Koreatown, Pico Union and Westlake. The National Weather Service projects temperatures will peak on Sunday afternoon. Meteorologist Bryan Lewis with the National Weather Service said residents can expect more humidity than usual.
Stay cool: During hot weather, the beach is an immediate go-to for folks that want to stay cool, but Lewis warns against this as the surf will be extra choppy. Here's some places to beat the heat.
Los Angeles will be under a heat wave advisory until Monday evening as temperatures show no signs of letting up over the weekend.
Temperatures will linger in the high 80s and low 90s in downtown and the surrounding neighborhoods, including Koreatown, Pico Union and Westlake.
The National Weather Service projects temperatures will peak on Sunday afternoon. Meteorologist Bryan Lewis with the National Weather Service said residents can expect more humidity than usual.
While dense, urban centers have more concrete and see more vehicle traffic, downtown and the surrounding areas will not be the hottest locations during this heatwave in the Southland, as the Antelope Valley will be under an extreme heat advisory over the weekend.
During hot weather, the beach is an immediate go-to for folks that want to stay cool, but Lewis warns against this as the surf will be extra choppy.
The Pacific Coast will see large swells “coming up from tropical systems off the coast of Mexico,” Lewis said. “We are issuing a beach hazard statement that’ll be in effect through at least the weekend [which] may be extended.”
While the weather is expected to cool down on Monday, forecasts show that another heatwave could develop by the end of next week.
Councilmember Heather Hutt’s office recommends residents to rest in shade or a building with air conditioning and to stay hydrated with plenty of water.
Residents should also:
Cool down at a public library, recreation facility, senior center or other public air-conditioned building
Check up on relatives and neighbors, especially if they have pre-existing health conditions
Young children and pets should never be left unattended in vehicles under any circumstances
When possible, reschedule strenuous activities to early morning or evening
Wear lightweight and loose-fitting clothing when possible
To reduce risk during outdoor work, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration recommends frequent rest breaks in shaded or air-conditioned environments and staying hydrated
