The Brief

After a decade of work, the Tule River Tribe has released nine beavers into the nation’s reservation in the foothills of California’s southern Sierra Nevada mountains. The beavers are expected to make the landscape more fire and drought resistant. Beaver dams trap water in pools, making the flow of water slower so the surrounding ecosystem can reap the benefits of the moisture while making it more difficult for forest fires to start. They can also help a forest heal after a fire by rehydrating the area.

“We’ve been through numerous droughts over the years,” Kenneth McDarmet said, who is a Tule River tribal member and former councilman. “It’s going to be wonderful to watch them do their thing.”

Around 80% of the Tule River Reservation’s drinking water comes from the Tule watershed. Because the area is so important for the health of the community, the tribe has been preparing the area since 2014, building manmade dams to help the new beavers adapt more quickly.

Temperatures worldwide are expected to get hotter, increasing drought and creating conditions that make wildfires bigger and more deadly. In California, some of the worst wildfires on record have happened in the last five years partly due to drought. In 2020, three fires burned almost a million acres in the Sierra Nevada Forest, and in 2021 a wildfire burned an additional 1.5 million acres. Bringing beavers back may offer a break.

Prior to colonization, the North American beaver population was estimated to be around 200 million. But in the 1800’s, beavers were hunted for their pelts by settlers, decimating the population, while farmers and landowners viewed — and still view them — as pests. Today, the beaver population is estimated to be about 12 million.

But in recent years there has been a growing interest in traditional ecological knowledge from tribes, and the beaver has become celebrated as an ecological engineer.

In 2022, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, or CDFW, secured funding for the Beaver Restoration Program, a program designed to restore the beaver population and support conservation efforts. In 2023, the CDFW recognized beavers as a keystone species, an animal that affects other animals on the landscape like bison or bees, and thus influences the ecosystem in major ways. Their absence typically has negative effects on the landscape and its interconnected ecosystems.

Today, the CDFW program partners with tribes, non-profit organizations, land-owners, and state and federal entities to restore beaver populations and habitats in an effort to improve climate change, drought, and wildfire resilience in California.

“We expect better habitat conditions for native critters on the land,” said Krysten Kallum, a public information officer with the CDFW. “It creates a refuge for plants and wildlife.”

More water means more plants that can attract other types of animals to the area. The CDFW expects to see better habitat development for amphibians like the western pond turtles, southern mountain yellow-legged frogs, and southwestern willow flycatchers, which will help increase biodiversity.

McDarment, of Tule River, said that tribal pictographs show beavers living in the area, and it’s good to see them here again.

“My hope is to have beaver throughout the reservation,” he said.

This story first appeared on The LA Local.

The South Coast Air Quality Management District will hold a public hearing Wednesday to consider ordering additional measures to reduce odors during cleanup of the Lineage warehouse fire site. 

The hearing begins at 9:30 a.m. and will include public testimony. Community members can participate in person, by Zoom or by phone.

Since July 12, the South Coast AQMD has received nearly 4,000 odor complaints that inspectors have traced back to the cold-storage warehouse, according to a petition for an abatement order filed against Lineage. If granted, the order would require the company to, among other things, power wash and disinfect concrete flooring once all solid waste is removed from the second freezer on the eastern half of the facility.

The hearing board will consider the petition at Wednesday’s meeting. 

Between July 12 and July 30, South Coast AQMD issued 19 violations to Lineage, alleging the company created a public nuisance by releasing odors that affected nearby residents, according to the notices of violation. The agency alleges that Lineage violated South Coast AQMD Rule 402 and California Health and Safety Code section 41700, which can lead to civil penalties ranging from $1,000 to $75,000 per day.

Lineage has said it is working to mitigate the rancid smells coming from its warehouse as it hauls away dozens of truckloads of waste.

“We are using a variety of approaches to minimize the effects, including: physical barriers (StormWrapper), applying a bleach solution in and around the building, running mist deodorizing systems around the site, and applying deodorizers directly to the debris to reduce odors as much as possible during that period,” according to Lineage’s website. “It will get better as the cleanup progresses.”

At a July 9 forum, Lineage Chief Operations Officer Jeff Rivera said the company was aiming to complete the cleanup within 45 days, a deadline set by L.A. Mayor Karen Bass. 

How to attend the hearing

In person: South Coast AQMD Headquarters, Hearing Board Room, 21865 Copley Drive, Diamond Bar, CA 91765

Zoom: https://aqmd.zoomgov.com/j/1617214661 (Meeting ID:  161 721 4661)

Telephone: 1-669-216-1590  (Meeting ID:  161 721 4661)

Webcast: http://www.aqmd.gov/home/news-events/webcast

Instructions on how to participate via video or teleconference can be found here. The agenda can be found here.

How to report odors

The South Coast AQMD urges residents to call 1-800-CUTSMOG if they’re dealing with odors and to file a complaint every day so the agency can track the severity.

Anyone in the area can report odors, the agency said.

After receiving complaints, an inspector is sent to confirm the odor. People can call every day that they’re experiencing odors, and a public nuisance citation is issued after inspectors can confirm six complaints. People filing a complaint are required to provide their first and last name, location address and contact information in order to confirm the smell.

Starting this fall, 56 students from East Los Angeles College will use surplus apartment-style housing at Cal State L.A. in a first-ever partnership to address housing insecurity.

“ It's a natural marriage, a partnership, because many of our students from East Los Angeles College tend to attend Cal State L.A., and the neat part about this is that not only are they going to be housed at Cal State L.A., they will be provided with the resources typically given to Cal State students,” said Alberto Román, chancellor of the Los Angeles Community College District.  “But more importantly, they're on campus and they can begin to see themselves as potential Cal State students.”

More than 50% of Los Angeles area community college students have declared they’re housing insecure, prompting a three-pronged approach by the Los Angeles Community College District to lease the excess rooms from Cal State L.A.

The partnership is for five years. By the third year, Román said the plan is to have 120 community college students housed at Cal State L.A. The partnership, as well as LACCD’s new plans to build and buy housing units close to community college campuses, is being funded by Measure LA.

“We at LACCD, which is the largest community college system in the country, have been grappling with this for a long time as we've seen L.A. deal with a housing crisis, with a housing affordability crisis, and we've seen so many of our students be affected by housing insecurity or the lack of housing,” said Sara Hernandez, board president of the Los Angeles Community College District.

It’s a moral issue for the district to ensure students have housing, she added, but also “an issue of enrollment.”

“ If people can't afford to live in Los Angeles, especially young people, then they are not going to be able to utilize the community college system, meaning our enrollment goes down,” Hernandez said.  

Other ways LACCD is addressing housing

Román said the LACCD is also exploring a housing partnership with California State University, Dominguez Hills to house community college students on their campus.

And through funding received from Measure LA, the LACCD is also embarking on a project to build housing on land they own at Pierce College and City College.

“ We will also look at procuring properties close to our colleges that could serve as dorms and are within walking distance of the college,” Román said. “ We have also put out a bid for property acquisition, meaning that we invite folks who may have properties available for housing to bid on that and to make them available to us.”

In 2022, voters approved Measure LA, which allowed the LACCD to issue a $5.3 billion bond, financed by a new property tax, to improve infrastructure and job training facilities across its nine colleges. Around $500 million was earmarked for housing.

The district’s goal,  Román said, was to fully pay for and provide housing for 1,500 to 2,000 students.

Two years out from the Olympic and Paralympic Games, Los Angeles officials say security requirements could displace hundreds of unhoused people living around competition venues during the summer of 2028. But there's no plan for how those people will be relocated, where they'll go, or who will pay for it.

Los Angeles has one of the largest unsheltered populations in the nation, which as of the latest count rose to 49,002 unsheltered people countywide. That includes people living near prominent Olympics locations like the Venice Beach Boardwalk, Sepulveda Basin and Exposition Park.

The Metro L.A. area, which includes venues Crypto Arena, Peacock Theater and the Convention Center, saw its unsheltered population increase by about 20% this year.

Security requirements could kick people out

Exactly how many people might be forced out around venues is not yet clear. The plans will come down to security perimeters — zones around event sites established by the U.S. Secret Service.

Brandon Dean, the chief of special operations for the L.A. County Sheriff's Department, told LAist security perimeters will be divided into "red" zones directly around venues where people and vehicles will be screened before entering, and "yellow" zones marking a larger outer perimeter. Dean said he expected that unhoused people would be able to remain in yellow areas, but not red zones.

A spokesperson for the Secret Service told LAist that the agency hasn’t yet determined the exact areas that will need heightened security. But early conversations indicate they could be expansive. Carter Hewgley, chief strategy officer for L.A. County’s Department of Homeless Services and Housing, said his office had been told to plan for perimeters as wide as a mile.

" By our current needs assessment, there's about 1,600 unsheltered people that are in the areas around the projected venues that could be impacted," Hewgley said.

Hewgley said plans are likely to change as the Olympics get closer. Still, the number lays out the scope of the challenge for Los Angeles, where homelessness is an endemic crisis despite billions of dollars spent combatting the problem. Since 2016, one year before L.A. secured the bid to host the 2028 Olympics, homelessness in the city is up 59%.

No single authority for addressing homelessness

To address homelessness around Olympic venues on a tight timeline, officials at the cash-strapped city and county say they need money and a road map. Both don't yet exist. The Secret Service is in charge of security, but there is no single authority coordinating or responsible for addressing homelessness during the Olympics.

Gita O’Neill, interim CEO of the embattled Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, told the city council ad-hoc committee on the Olympics recently that organizers should establish an interagency task force to manage how homelessness would be handled ahead of and during the Games.

City Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson has also introduced a motion at city council requesting a report on how L.A. plans to clear encampments around Olympic locations. That motion also asks for details on locating housing for people and how the city can recover costs.

"If we've got a place where we know there's an encampment and we know there's going to be an activity there, how do we do encampment resolution? How do we make sure it's done in a humane way? And how do we make sure it's paid for?" Harris-Dawson told LAist.

Meanwhile, critics say emerging plans for unhoused people during the Olympics are short-sighted, when Los Angeles needs to prioritize permanent rather than temporary housing.

 "We always see with big events this kind of enhanced enforcement," said John Raphling, an organizer with the Los Angeles Community Action Network, a group that advocates for people experiencing homelessness. "And it's never made up for with an enhanced effort to actually solve the problem… through keeping people in their permanent homes and developing more affordable housing and preserving the existing affordable housing."

Funding is unclear

In 1984, the last time L.A. hosted the Olympics, police officers on horseback scattered people living on the streets of Skid Row ahead of the Games. One police captain told the L.A. Times it was an effort to "sanitize" the city.

L.A. officials this time around say they're committed to clearing encampments and people only if they can offer them at least temporary housing. But as of this month, there is no additional funding for such a project.

That means local officials are seeking funds for the Olympics specifically.

Carter Hewgley, with L.A. County, said officials have applied for nearly $93 million in state funding for "encampment resolution" around Olympic venues. He said that some of that money would follow the county's Pathway Home model, which clears encampments and brings individuals into interim housing. Hewgley said funds would also go towards direct financial assistance to help move people out of interim housing to create more space for an influx of new people that may be coming from around sports venues.

" We are signaling to the state that this is a large event with large impacts and consequences and will require a large amount of resources," Hewgley said.

City officials are also asking private Olympics organizing committee LA28 to help pick up the tab. According to an agreement with the city, Olympics organizers are expected to pay for Games-related city services that go beyond what's "normal and customary."

But a recent human rights report produced by LA28 deferred to city officials on homelessness. That strategy document, submitted to the City Council, said that LA28 would coordinate with local officials and providers who will be supporting unhoused people impacted by the Olympics. It also pledged to notify authorities as early as possible if an unhoused person needs to be relocated due to the Games.

City Councilmember Katy Yaroslavsky, who chairs the budget and finance committee, questioned LA28's senior human rights advisor Julieta Valls Noyes about those plans at a recent council committee meeting.

 "Will LA28 ensure that the city or homelessness outreach organizations have the resources to engage unhoused residents who may be living inside a venue area or security perimeter?" Yaroslavsky asked. "Because, you know, we're not going to be able to do this on top of what we're already doing without help."

Noyes responded saying that she believed the mass displacement of unhoused people that has occurred at past Olympics would not be as much of an issue for Los Angeles because organizers are relying on existing facilities rather than building new ones.

Others aren't so sure. Randall Kuhn, a UCLA professor who runs a monthly survey of Los Angeles County's unhoused population, said he's worried about parts of downtown that are dense with tents and people being caught up in Olympics security plans.

"What do they intend to do? What is the plan?" Kuhn said. "Is there an intention to provide any kind of genuine pipeline of care, a genuine pipeline to permanent housing? Or is this just gonna be sweeps that just push people just outside the perimeter?"

Kuhn's working on including questions about how people are feeling about the Olympics in his monthly survey. But two years out, he says many people living on the streets in L.A. are just focused on survival.

The Boyle Heights warehouse fire — and the stench of millions of pounds of rotting food that followed — spoiled summer break for neighborhood kids.

“ Summer's been like a worst nightmare because we couldn't be going outside,” said Noah, a 9-year-old student at Eastman Elementary. It’s one of eight schools serving thousands of students within a mile of the cold storage warehouse that burned in June.

The ongoing clean-up has also added a layer of anxiety and complication for parents at the start of the new school year.

Los Angeles Unified said in a statement Friday that the current plan is for students to return to their home campuses on Aug. 12, the first day of school. The district said staff conducted a “deep, thorough cleaning,” installed new air conditioning filters and air purifiers at affected campuses and that environmental testing is ongoing.

LAUSD superintendent Andrés Chait said in July that Boyle Heights summer school participation dropped after the relocation of four programs in response to the fire. The district declined to provide enrollment and attendance figures for the programs and instead instructed LAist to file a public records request for the information.

Marcela Chagoya is a special education history teacher at  Stevenson College and Career Prep, a middle school within a mile of the fire. She said some of her students relocated to temporary housing or moved in with extended family to escape the stench.

“ I always get excited every single year to see how much [students] grew over the summer,” Chagoya said. “But my concern really this time around is, are all my kiddos gonna come back?”

Some families LAist spoke with said they are ready to send their children back to school.

Ivett Dominguez’s son Diego will start second grade at Eastman next week after a summer spent inside watching TV and playing video games instead of going to baseball practice, swimming and playing at the park.

“I’m confident that it’ll be a good year for them, even if they’re not outside on the playground,” Dominguez said in Spanish.

[“ Confío que a lo mejor va a ser un buen año para ellos aunque no estén afuera del patio.”]

She said she feels like the school is safe, in part because of the new air purifiers.

But others, including Noah’s grandmother Brenda Wenger, said they haven’t decided whether to send children to class on the first day. Wenger said she attended one of the district’s recent webinars about the clean-up, but wants to see the campus for herself.

“ I'm gonna take my Clorox wipeys and I'm gonna look and see if it's been cleaned up or not,” Wenger said.

‘Mom, we’re going to die’

The fire began on June 17.

Dominguez, who lives about five blocks away, said when the air was thick with smoke her son Diego told her, “Ma, we’re going to burn. Ma, we’re going to die. We have to leave.”

[“ Ma, nos vamos a quemar. Ma, nos vamos a morir. Tenemos que irnos.”]

Dominguez said she reassured him that the firefighters would get the blaze under control. The L.A. Fire Department declared the fire "knocked down" a week later on June 24.

Ivette Dominguez and her son Diego live about five blocks from the Lineage warehouse. Dominguez said constantly running an air purifier has contributed to an electric bill that's more than tripled to about $170 per month.

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Mariana Dale/LAist

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The warehouse stored approximately 88 million pounds of food. What didn’t burn decayed in the summer heat and attracted hordes of flies and rodents to the area. Lineage, the company that owns the warehouse, said that as of Monday night, it has removed about 80% of the food waste.

The South Coast Air Quality Management District (AQMD) has received more than 3,900 complaints about rotting meat and other food odors associated with the clean-up since July 12 and has cited the company 22 times for violating public nuisance rules.

Myrna Silva and her two children live one block from the warehouse. She said her daughter, who will soon start middle school, didn’t attend summer school or play in the park after the fire. Even walking their dog, nicknamed Don Goyo, has become challenging.

“As soon as they go out … they come running back in, because of the smell, because of the mosquitoes, because of the flies,” Silva said.

[“ Apenas salen … entran corriendo, porque el aroma, porque los zancudos, porque las moscas.”]

In recent days, the family has experienced stomach pains and diarrhea. Silva said she’s also concerned about how staying inside all summer has impacted her children’s mental health.

“Our kids will go to school frustrated,” Silva said. “They’re going to go into school stressed out. And what worries me is the reaction that all the children are going to have together. Some will adapt. Others won’t.”

[“ Nuestros hijos van frustrados a la escuela. Aan a entrar estresados a la escuela. Y lo preocupante es la reacción que van a tener todos los niños en conjunto. Algunos se van a acoplar. Otros no.”]

Silva said she’s more confident sending her son to Garfield High School because it’s farther from the site of the fire. But she worried about sending her daughter to Stevenson, which is within the 1-mile radius.

“I hope the district makes the best decisions so the kids are OK,” Silva said. “But I’m very worried about how a lot of children are going to react, because they’re under so much stress right now.”

[“Ojalá el distrito tome las mejores decisiones para que los niños estén bien. Pero me preocupa bastante el cómo van a reaccionar muchos niños, porque traen mucho estrés ahorita.”]

How is LAUSD cleaning and testing Boyle Heights schools? 

LAUSD classes start two days before L.A. Mayor Karen Bass’s deadline for Lineage to clean up the remaining food waste.

District leaders said in a July 29 webinar that their goal is for students to return to a school day that is “as normal as possible.” There will be at least two more webinars with information about schools near the warehouse before the first day of classes.

The district also has a family hotline at (213) 443-1300.

“To date, no local, state, or federal agencies have issued specific guidelines or mandates directing the District's response to the Lineage fire,” a district spokesperson wrote in a statement to LAist in response to questions about campus cleaning and testing.

Instead, the district reviewed environmental monitoring data, consulted with UCLA and USC environmental health researchers and reflected on past post-fire practices.

The district’s response to the Lineage fire has included:

• Inspecting and replacing air-conditioning filters with those rated MERV-13, an indicator of the filter’s ability to trap small particles
• Deep cleaning, including by washing walls and furniture, waxing floors and pressure-washing outdoor areas and playground equipment
• Placing air purifiers with carbon charcoal filters in all classrooms

Carlos Torres, who leads the district’s Office of Environmental Health and Safety, said the district monitored air quality during and after the fire and facilitated the South Coast Air Quality Management District’s installation of additional air-monitoring equipment at Eastman Elementary and Stevenson Middle Schools.

“We have enough information to show that our schools are safe,” Torres said. Additional testing is ongoing and results will be posted on the district’s website before school starts, Torres said. The district has said laboratory results from air and surface samples will be published online in early August. Those results had not been posted as of Monday afternoon.

Several people, including members of the teacher’s union and area Board Member Rocío Rivas, have called on the district to also conduct soil testing.

Boyle Heights is one of several East and Southeast L.A. communities with persistently high levels of lead linked to the former Exide battery recycling facility.

A district spokesperson wrote in a statement to LAist that the district has conducted “extensive dust wipe samples.”

“Soil sampling is a more general type of sampling, whereas dust wipe sampling enables us to detect the presence of toxins that may be present following an industrial fire,” the statement read.

It’s unclear whether the dust wipe results are available for public review.

Gilberto Martinez, executive director of region operations, said principals will have the discretion to bring students inside during recess and mealtimes if foul odors arise.

“ I'm feeling kind of scared and nervous because... what if we're not going to be able to play outside,” said Aiden, Noah’s brother and fellow student at Eastman Elementary. “We’re just going to be trapped inside just learning?”

Myrna Silva and her daughter Getzetmany stand in front of InnerCity Struggle, a local nonprofit that's provided resources, including air purifiers, to residents living nearby the warehouse fire site.

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Jill Johnston, an associate professor of environmental and occupational health at UC Irvine, said while unfortunate for students like Aiden, limiting outdoor activity when strong odors are present is the right call.

“There are bad smells, which are a nuisance. But there are also toxic chemicals that are in the air,” said Johnston, who has been working with Boyle Heights community groups to understand the effects of the fire. “Many of these are linked to nausea, to headaches, to adverse respiratory outcomes.”

Johnston said she was pleased to see that nearby schools are equipped with air purifiers that have carbon-based filters, which can remove odor-causing compounds from the air. Johnston said schools need to minimize how much outdoor air is getting inside for the filters to work well.

“The big test is: can kids go into the school and it be a refuge from all the odors that are outside?” Johnston said. “If so, then that's pretty effective.”