City employees replace wooden slats along the boardwalk after a sand berm and section of the boardwalk wood boards were washed out along the Peninsula in Long Beach on July 29, 2026.
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Thomas R. Cordova
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Long Beach Post
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Topline:
As Hurricane Genevieve batters the Southern California coast with heavy swells this week, Long Beach city crews are busy reinforcing protective sand berms and taking extra precautions along vulnerable beachfronts ahead of elevated tides and a regional high surf advisory.
Why now: The worst will come at night, officials say. Forecasts show lunar tides will crest over 6 feet and waves will range 4 to 5 feet high on Wednesday and Thursday between 9 and 11 p.m. It will then taper down through Saturday, with waves expected to drop down to 2 to 4 feet.
More details: Nighttime crews will be on standby during the peak tides, while daytime staffers will spend the morning on frontloaders, reinforcing the sand berms along the Peninsula that forms Alamitos Bay and staging plywood along vulnerable parts of its boardwalks known to flood.
Read on... for more on how the city of Long Beach is preparing for high tides.
As Hurricane Genevieve batters the Southern California coast with heavy swells this week, Long Beach city crews are busy reinforcing protective sand berms and taking extra precautions along vulnerable beachfronts ahead of elevated tides and a regional high surf advisory.
The worst will come at night, officials say. Forecasts show lunar tides will crest over 6 feet and waves will range 4 to 5 feet high on Wednesday and Thursday between 9 and 11 p.m.
It will then taper down through Saturday, with waves expected to drop down to 2 to 4 feet.
Nighttime crews will be on standby during the peak tides, while daytime staffers will spend the morning on frontloaders, reinforcing the sand berms along the Peninsula that forms Alamitos Bay and staging plywood along vulnerable parts of its boardwalks known to flood.
A truck brings in sand to rebuild a berm that was washed away on part of the Peninsula in Long Beach on Wednesday, July 29, 2026.
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Thomas R. Cordova
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Long Beach Post
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The swell is elevated but manageable, local officials say, noting the breakwater and Catalina Island naturally absorb a lot of the wave energy coming from Genevieve, now a Category 4 storm, which continued its stretch across the Eastern Pacific this week.
“We’re planning like we’ve always done,” said Marine Safety Chief Gonzalo Medina, adding: “I don’t foresee anything being different about this one in particular, but Mother Nature is highly unpredictable, especially at sea.”
The city’s primary defense efforts are centered on a narrow strip of oceanfront homes along the Peninsula between 62nd and 69th places, which is exposed to swells that pass through the gap outside the breakwater and jetty that juts from the Alamitos Bay channel.
Dozers were seen early Wednesday, rebuilding a 40-yard stretch of the large sand berm — typically maintained at 7 to 8 feet high — after overnight waves breached a section on Tuesday and knocked over the raised line of plywood.
Kelly Armstrong, a city beach superintendent, said night crews will remain deployed over the next three days to fortify the beach as needed.
The expected tides are elevated but slightly lower than the three previously seen this summer, he said, with waves that were several feet higher. Prior events this summer did not result in any property damage or injuries.
A greater worry, officials say, is the frequency of high tides that trample through the city’s sand walls and flood streets, as changing ocean dynamics and El Niño conditions spurred by climate change create taller and warmer tides — above predictions this season, according to the National Weather Service.
A tractor with a front loader rebuilds the sand berm at the end of the peninsula in Long Beach on Wednesday, July 29, 2026.
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Thomas R. Cordova
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Long Beach Post
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“The tides that we’re seeing now, we did not see in the past,” Todd Leland, manager of the city’s Marine Bureau, told LAist. “We used to not have to build berms year-round. We’d only have to do it on an occasional basis here on the peninsula.”
The city spends about $1 million annually trucking sand six days a week from the wider western beaches back to the Peninsula to replace what waves wash away.
Long Beach is nearing an awarded contract to commence a $14.5 million dredging project that, if approved, should start in late October and extend the beach out by 260 feet using 415,000 cubic yards of sand from the entrance channel of Alamitos Bay.
In the meantime, local life along the waterfront carried on largely as normal on Wednesday.
More than 600 youth aged 9 to 17 arose early in the morning to take part in the Ironguard race — a two-mile swim around the Long Beach Pier and a 4-mile run. It went off without a hitch, Medina said.
Jordan Rynning
has been following this case for months, including interviewing the man at the center of allegations.
Published October 31, 2026 7:00 AM
Michael Angel Alvarez, 41, spoke with LAist on Sept. 16, 2026, about the federal body armor case against him being dismissed.
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Jordan Rynning
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LAist
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Topline:
The L.A. County District Attorney’s office dropped its felony body armor charges against Michael Angel Alvarez earlier this week. Alvarez was sentenced to time served on a lesser charge — a probation violation. He served more than 100 days in jail earlier this year while awaiting trial.
Most serious claims haven’t materialized: Though federal prosecutors made headlines claiming in court documents and on social media that Alvarez was “leading a violent street gang, while claiming to be a gang interventionist for the City,” they have not filed charges related to those claims.
The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office dropped its felony body armor charges against Michael Angel Alvarez on Wednesday. Alvarez was sentenced to time served on a lesser charge — a probation violation. He had served more than 100 days in jail earlier this year while awaiting trial.
Why Alvarez’s arrest made headlines: Alvarez was working as a city-contracted peace ambassador in MacArthur Park when he was arrested by federal agents in May. Federal and county prosecutors each brought felony charges against him, claiming he was in possession of body armor as a violent felon.
Bill Essayli, who leads the U.S. Attorney’s office in L.A., pointed to the case on social media to criticize city officials for allowing taxpayer money to be “shelled out to a convicted gang murderer.”
About his criminal record: Judges in federal and state court have now dismissed prosecutors’ felony charges against Alvarez, after U.S. District Judge Anne Hwang found on Sept. 9 that Alvarez did not have a violent felony conviction. Alvarez was 15 when he committed a gang-related murder. He was tried and convicted as an adult in 2002. After a change in state law increased the age at which minors could be sentenced as adults to 16, Alvarez’s case was sent back to juvenile court, and he was released in 2024. At that point, he had served more than 20 years.
A federal judge ruled Tuesday, Oct. 7 that Republican Bill Essayli is not legally serving as the top U.S. prosecutor in Los Angeles.
The ruling is the latest roadblock to the Trump administration’s effort to extend handpicked acting U.S. attorneys beyond the 120-day limit set by federal law. The strategy was designed to bypass confirmation by the U.S. Senate — something that generally requires a degree of bipartisan support.
Essayli “is unlawfully serving as a ‘de facto’ United States Attorney,” U.S. District Judge J. Michael Seabright wrote.
The order won’t take effect until the court rules on the government’s motion for a stay pending appeal. Essayli said he doesn’t agree with the court’s order. He said the president and Attorney General “have every right to select supervisors within the Justice Department.”
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Mariana Dale
explores and explains the forces that shape how and what kids learn from kindergarten to high school.
Published October 31, 2026 5:00 AM
Myrna Velasco (left) performs as Dolores Huerta in “¡Sí Se Puede!” at Boyle Heights City Hall on April 2, 2026.
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Carlin Stiehl
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LAist
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Topline:
An all-ages play about the life of Dolores Huerta and other under-told stories of the farmworker labor movement is back on tour in Los Angeles.
The backstory: Center Theatre Group commissioned ¡Sí Se Puede! from Eliana Pipes in March 2025 and it debuted in L.A. this spring. “There's this perception that farm work was only done by men,” Pipes said. “There were women on the fields, there were women on the picket lines, and there were women in leadership in the United Farm Workers movement.”
An all-ages play about the life of Dolores Huerta and other under-told stories of the farmworker labor movement is back on tour in Los Angeles.
The show's extension had been announced prior to the news that Huerta died Wednesday, Oct. 28., at her Bakersfield home. She was 96 years old.
“There's this perception that farm work was only done by men,” said playwright Eliana Pipes. “There were women on the fields, there were women on the picket lines, and there were women in leadership in the United Farm Workers movement.”
Center Theatre Group commissioned ¡Sí Se Puede! from Pipes in March 2025 and it debuted in L.A. this spring.
CSULA seeks memories from underground music scenes
Adolfo Guzman-Lopez
is an arts and general assignment reporter on LAist's Explore LA team.
Published October 31, 2026 5:00 AM
CSULA is seeking memorabilia from LA's underground music scenes for its research archives.
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Courtesy Special Collections and Archives, University Library, California State University, Los Angeles.
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Topline
There’s a whole world of underground Southern California music history that’s hidden in storage boxes — photos, fliers, cassettes and other memorabilia. Research librarians at the California State University, Los Angeles are holding a community archive event on Nov. 5 to ensure the cultural memory of L.A.’s underground music scenes are preserved for future generations.
Why it matters: The memorabilia are the physical remnants of the supportive L.A. communities built around music and enjoyment. But many of these objects languish out of sight, and run the risk of being lost, along with the memories attached to them.
Why now: For four years, archive staff have held an annual day to receive ephemera from the public. They're doing it again on Thursday, Nov. 5.
Read on… to hear how goth, rockabilly and other underground clubs in L.A. inspired the head archivist.
Right around the year 2000, there was a club night in Hollywood called Clockwork Orange. Fans of The Smiths, Depeche Mode, Bauhaus and other bands came for the DJ’s mix of their favorite songs but also for a vibe that welcomed people regardless of race, ethnicity or sexual and gender identity.
“I was a pretty shy person, and so that was a place where I could sort of be myself and express myself,” said Azalea Camacho, a regular there in those days.
She had just graduated from Workman High School in the City of Industry and was also clubbing at rockabilly music nights in Rosemead and goth club nights in downtown L.A.
Camacho said there was lots of memorabilia from those times, such as photos taken in and outside the clubs, ticket stubs and promotional fliers. They're the physical remnants of those supportive communities built around music and enjoyment, but many of them languish in shoeboxes and storage units, at risk of being lost — along with the memories attached to them.
Cal State LA has hosted Sounds of the Underground Archive for the last four years. It's an opportunity for people to donate their underground music scene memorabilia.
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Courtesy Special Collections and Archives, University Library, California State University, Los Angeles
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“I think the danger is maybe those stories are not being told, or people don't know about the story,” she said.
Keeping stories alive
More than two decades later, Camacho is now in a position to make sure those stories are kept alive. She’s head of special collections and archives at the university library at California State University, Los Angeles.
Four years ago, she and library staff created an annual day for area residents to donate or digitize memorabilia for their Sounds of the Underground Archive. This year it's on Thursday, Nov. 5. They’ll accept physical donations, but they’ll also have a scanner to digitize printed material, so people can keep items that are precious to them.
SOUNDS OF THE UNDERGROUND ARCHIVE
Date: Thursday, Nov. 5 Time: 2 p.m. – 5 p.m. Location: Cal State LA Library Community Room, 5151 State University Drive, Los Angeles
Camacho is hoping this year will bring in a bumper amount of memorabilia. It's taken time to get the word out, she said.
“From the actual community archiving day [we’ve collected] maybe 100 or less than 100 items. … It's not a lot,” she said.
She said they're on the lookout for a wide range of mementos, including:
Fliers
Handbills
Zines
Newsletters
Posters
Set lists
Photographs (prints, negatives or digital files)
Cassette tapes, CDs, or vinyl records
Ticket stubs
Wristbands
Band merchandise (stickers, buttons, patches, T-shirts)
DIY press kits or liner notes and correspondence (letters, emails, messages related to music scenes)
Venue or collective ephemera (membership cards, schedules, announcements and more)
