The Brief

The L.A. County Board of Supervisors unanimously passed a motion Tuesday to help address a growing crisis of toxic algae sickening and killing sea life.

Over the last three months, hundreds of pelicans, sea lions, dolphins — and even some whales — have been sickened or killed by domoic acid poisoning, a toxin that occurs naturally in certain types of algae.

Experts say it’s likely Southern California’s worst toxic algae outbreak ever. Not only is the outbreak devastating for the ecosystem, but it can make animals more aggressive, prompting public safety concerns. The crisis has gotten so bad, rescuers are struggling to keep up with the numbers of sick sea animals.

“Year after year after year, having this type of stranding event is a real strain on resources,” said Dave Bader, a marine biologist with the Marine Mammal Care Center in San Pedro.

The nonprofit is the only organization authorized by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association, or NOAA, to respond to distressed marine mammals in L.A. County. That means they’ve been overstretched by the latest toxic boom, leading to a funding gap of about $750,000.

A regional approach

The motion, introduced by supervisors Lindsey Horvath and Janice Hahn, calls for city and county, and other stakeholders to meet within 60 days to discuss a longer-term plan. It also directs staff to identify up to $600,000 for the Marine Mammal Care Center. Horvath’s district has already allocated $100,000 in emergency funds to the rescue and rehabilitation center.

 ”This must be a county-wide effort, as well as a regional effort beyond the county alone,” Horvath said at Tuesday’s board meeting.

About 60% of the strandings the Marine Mammal Care Center responds to are on county beaches. Stressing budget issues, Supervisor Holly Mitchell agreed that coastal cities should also help fund the need.

“ This isn't district specific, but it's also not just county, so the other reason I held the item is to make sure that all of the coastal communities are going to put some skin in the game too,” Mitchell said.

How does the bloom compare with past years?

These devastating blooms generally occur every three to seven years, but we’ve had one every year over the last four years, said Bader of the Marine Mammal Care Center. In recent decades, the blooms have increased in both frequency and severity .

In 2023, L.A. County experienced what was previously the worst domoic acid poisoning event in local history, which led to another marine rescue operating in the county to go bankrupt. Since then, the Marine Mammal Care Center in San Pedro has had to pick up the slack.

“We have an emergency right now, and we're doing our best to manage that, but this isn't about a one-off emergency,” Bader said. “This is something that's happening time and time again, and we need to ... have better resources to be able to respond to these increasing needs.”

Why is this happening?

Bader said the root cause is that climate change is creating conditions for more toxic blooms.

“This should be a wake up call to really get serious about addressing climate change,” Bader said.

Human activity is literally changing the chemistry of the ocean. As we pump more carbon pollution into the atmosphere, the ocean — a carbon sink — is absorbing more carbon dioxide.

“ As carbon dioxide is absorbed into the ocean, it decreases the pH of the ocean,” Bader said. “That’s what ocean acidification is.”

Research is finding that acidification may be good for toxic algae. On top of that, we dump a lot of bad stuff in the ocean, such as fertilizers and other chemical runoff, that creates more nutrients that certain toxic algae thrive on.

 ”What we really need is to recognize that climate change isn't a far away thing,” Bader said. “Its impacts are being felt today.”

The Supreme Court on Tuesday extended an order blocking full SNAP payments, amid signals that the government shutdown could soon end and food aid payments resume.

The order keeps in place at least for a few more days a chaotic situation. People who depend on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program to feed their families in some states have received their full monthly allocations, while others have received nothing.

The order will expire just before midnight Thursday.

The Senate has approved a bill to end the shutdown and the House of Representatives could vote on it as early as Wednesday. Reopening the government would restart the program that helps 42 million Americans buy groceries, but it's not clear how quickly full payments would resume.

The justices chose what is effectively the path of least resistance, anticipating the federal government shutdown will end soon while avoiding any substantive legal ruling about whether lower court orders to keep full payments flowing during the shutdown are correct.

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson was the only one of the nine justices to say she would have revived the lower court orders immediately, but didn't otherwise explain her vote. Jackson signed the initial order temporarily freezing the payments.

Beneficiaries in some states have received their full monthly allocations while in others they have received nothing. Some states have issued partial payments.

How quickly SNAP benefits could reach recipients if the government reopens would vary by state. But states and advocates say that it's easier to make full payments quickly than partial ones.

Carolyn Vega, a policy analyst at the advocacy group Share Our Strength, also said there could be some technical challenges for states that have issued partial benefits to send out the remaining amount.

An urgent need for beneficiaries

In Pennsylvania, full November benefits went out to some people on Friday. But Jim Malliard, 41, of Franklin, said he had not received anything by Monday.

Malliard is a full-time caretaker for his wife, who is blind and has had several strokes this year, and his teenage daughter, who suffered severe medical complications from surgery last year.

That stress has only been compounded by the pause in the $350 monthly SNAP payment he previously received for himself, his wife and daughter. He said he is down to $10 in his account and is relying on what's left in the pantry — mostly rice and ramen.

"It's kind of been a lot of late nights, making sure I had everything down to the penny to make sure I was right," Malliard said. "To say anxiety has been my issue for the past two weeks is putting it mildly."

The political wrangling in Washington has shocked many Americans, and some have been moved to help.

"I figure that I've spent money on dumber stuff than trying to feed other people during a manufactured famine," said Ashley Oxenford, a teacher who set out a "little food pantry" in her front yard this week for vulnerable neighbors in Carthage, New York.

SNAP has been the center of an intense fight in court

The Trump administration chose to cut off SNAP funding after October due to the shutdown. That decision sparked lawsuits and a string of swift and contradictory judicial rulings that deal with government power — and impact food access for about 1 in 8 Americans.

The administration went along with two rulings on Oct. 31 by judges who said the government must provide at least partial funding for SNAP. It eventually said recipients would get up to 65% of their regular benefits. But it balked last week when one of the judges said it must fund the program fully for November, even if that means digging into funds the government said need to be maintained in case of emergencies elsewhere.

The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to pause that order.

An appeals court said Monday that full funding should resume, and that requirement was set to kick in Tuesday night before the top court extended the order blocking full SNAP payments.

Congressional talks about reopening government

The U.S. Senate on Monday passed legislation to reopen the federal government with a plan that would include replenishing SNAP funds. Speaker Mike Johnson told members of the House to return to Washington to consider the deal a small group of Senate Democrats made with Republicans.

President Trump has not said whether he would sign it if it reaches his desk, but told reporters at the White House on Sunday that it "looks like we're getting close to the shutdown ending."

Still, the Trump administration said in a Supreme Court filing Monday that it shouldn't be up to the courts.

"The answer to this crisis is not for federal courts to reallocate resources without lawful authority," Solicitor General D. John Sauer said in the papers. "The only way to end this crisis — which the Executive is adamant to end — is for Congress to reopen the government."

After Tuesday's ruling, Attorney General Pam Bondi posted on social media: "Thank you to the Court for allowing Congress to continue its swift progress."

The coalition of cities and nonprofit groups who challenged the SNAP pause said in a court filing Tuesday that the Department of Agriculture, which administers SNAP, is to blame for the confusion.

"The chaos was sown by USDA's delays and intransigence," they said, "not by the district court's efforts to mitigate that chaos and the harm it has inflicted on families who need food."
Copyright 2025 NPR

WASHINGTON — Flight disruptions are likely to continue even after the government reopens , airlines and aviation regulators warned, as airlines canceled scores of flights on Tuesday.

The Federal Aviation Administration ordered airlines to reduce air traffic at 40 of the nation's busiest airports, with cuts still ramping up to 10% of flights by Friday. The agency has been dealing with persistent staffing shortages of air traffic controllers , who are required to work without pay during the shutdown, which is now the longest in U.S. history at 42 days and counting.

This past weekend, the FAA reported staffing shortages at dozens of facilities, prompting the agency to slow air traffic to relieve pressure on air traffic controllers who did show up to work. On Tuesday, airlines canceled more than 1,200 flights, according to the aviation tracking site FlightAware .

The situation seemed to be improving somewhat on Tuesday, according to Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, with only a handful of FAA facilities reporting staffing shortages. But Duffy said that air traffic restrictions would remain in place until regulators are satisfied that staffing is back to normal levels.

"We're going to wait to see the data on our end before we take out the restrictions in travel," Duffy said during a press conference at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport. "But it depends on controllers coming back to work."

Even when those restrictions are lifted, it may take several days for airlines to return to normal operations.

"It's gonna take a bit to unwind," said former FAA administrator Randy Babbitt in an interview with NPR's All Things Considered.

"The airplanes are in the wrong cities and so forth. They're going to have to sort all that out as well. So a good deal of the responsibility will be the carriers getting their schedules and the aircraft and personnel back in the right positions to resume normal flying," Babbitt said.

U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said Tuesday that airlines may have to "stop flying" if Congressional lawmakers don't vote to end the government shutdown.

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Seth Wenig

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AP

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An aviation industry trade group, Airlines for America, also warned that it will take time for carriers to get back to normal.

"Airlines' reduced flight schedules cannot immediately bounce back to full capacity right after the government reopens. It will take time, and there will be residual effects for days," the group said in a statement.

The FAA argues the flight restrictions are necessary to keep the system safe while fewer air traffic controllers are showing up to work during the government shutdown. Some of those controllers have taken on second jobs during the shutdown, and many have called in sick.

But to the Trump administration's critics, the move appears to be about more than just safety. Some Democrats argue that the cuts were a political ploy to raise the pressure to end the government shutdown.

Secretary Duffy rejected that charge on Tuesday, saying the administration was responding to real concerns from pilots and mounting concerns about increasing loss of separation between aircraft.

And he warned of even bigger disruptions ahead if lawmakers do not vote to end the shutdown .

"You may find airlines that stop flying, full stop," Duffy said in Chicago. "You might have airlines that say, we're going to ground our planes, we're not going to fly anymore. That's how serious this is."
Copyright 2025 NPR

Los Angeles billboard culture is memorable, to say the least.

Our attorney billboards have inspired Hollywood . Creative STD prevention ads have reminded people about safety in weirdly direct ways. Even upside down “ Call Jacob ” and “ hate vegans ” billboards have left a confusing impression.

In a world of drab advertisements, every so often the cream of the crop rises to the top. LAist 89.3’s AirTalk unpacked some of those iconic memories recently. Here’s what listeners shared.

Billboards for music

Billboard for Beatles Abbey Road record circa 1969 on the Sunset Strip.

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Courtesy Robert Landau

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Robert Landau, photographer and author of Rock ‘N’ Roll Billboards of the Sunset Strip , has spent years documenting these scenes. He says you have to be clever to plant a seed in drivers’ minds in only a few seconds.

“ We’re such a car-oriented culture that we take this advertising form of billboards and maybe raise it to an art form,” he told host Austin Cross.

One that he remembers vividly is the Beatles’ Abbey Road billboard in 1969.

He said this period was about rock ‘n’ roll music. The bands he listened to were depicted on what he called artistic, almost non-commercial billboards on the Sunset Strip.

“[It created] almost a drive through gallery at that time,” he said.

Tommy Wiseau’s “The Room”

Sam, a listener from Atwater Village, called to share one billboard that lives rent free in his mind.

“ If you traveled in Hollywood on Highland, anytime in the early two thousands,” he said, “you saw the billboard for the Tommy Wiseau movie The Room.”

The billboard was up for years and had little information about what it was actually about. A black-and-white Wiseau stared down passersby next to directions to call a number on the billboard to “RSVP.” (To the movie? A meeting? Who knew.)

It became a sort of local mystery while the movie reached cult-like status .

The Angelyne campaigns

Another one L.A. won’t soon forget is model Angelyne’s plethora of billboards that have dotted the skyline for decades. Yes, decades .

Michael in Studio City said he’s always found the billboard queen entertaining. They’re known for being bright pink and showing Angelyne, usually in a suggestive or sultry pose, alongside just her name.

“I was confused about what necessarily she was going for other than notoriety,” he said.

We could go on forever about L.A.’s hodgepodge of excellent billboards. What’s one that sticks out to you? Send your thoughts to chernandez@laist.com and we may follow up.

This  story was originally published by Boyle Heights Beat on Tuesday.

Residents of Boyle Heights and East Los Angeles are invited to join Metro’s community working group to provide input on a series of projects aimed at decreasing pollution and improving streets for pedestrians and cyclists.

The effort is part of the Long Beach-East Los Angeles Corridor Mobility Investment Plan, a $4 billion initiative that includes more than 200 projects and 15 programs that prioritize transit, walking, biking, safety and cleaner air.

It spans 18 cities and three unincorporated communities from Long Beach to East LA along the I-710 corridor. The plan includes an initial $743 million from the previously canceled I-710 freeway expansion project.

Who can join

The working group will be made up of 30 people who will represent their community by serving a two-year term. Working group members may be eligible for compensation at a rate of $150 per meeting, earning up to $4,300 per Metro fiscal year, according to Metro .

“We want residents, community members, family members, students, mothers, fathers, grandmas that can come and represent their community … to help us set the priorities,” said Patrick Chandler, a Metro spokesperson.

Chandler said the hope is working group members then can inform their neighbors, “so they are aware of what their concerns are.”

“We know that especially for Boyle Heights, with the East LA interchange … we want to go in a direction that is equitable, that is community driven,” he added.

How to apply

Applications are due Nov. 14 and can be completed online in Spanish or English . To request a paper application, you can email 710corridor@metro.net. Selected members will be notified in December.

Frequently asked questions about the project are available in English and Spanish . To learn more, visit: metro.net/lb-ela-cp-hub.