The Brief

The L.A. County Board of Supervisors Tuesday approved a $700,000 settlement with LAist correspondent Josie Huang, who was arrested and injured by sheriff’s deputies while covering a 2020 protest in Lynwood. The settlement includes a requirement that the L.A. County Sheriff's Department re-train deputies on the rights of journalists.

In a legal claim against the county, Huang alleged deputies detained her without legal justification and used unjustified force because she was gathering news in a public place, according to the settlement.

Huang’s arrest drew widespread criticism from elected leaders and journalism organizations at the time. Deputies had claimed she interfered with their arrest of a protester. The district attorney’s office refused to file charges and a judge later found her factually innocent.

“This settlement upholds the rights of journalists and helps ensure that what happened to me won’t happen to other reporters,” Huang said in a statement. “My arrest was traumatic, but I hope that some good can still come of this experience.”

The settlement includes two mandated reforms at the sheriff’s department:

• A requirement that the LASD provide deputies with watch briefings on press rights before patrol assignments, like protests, in which they are likely to come into contact with members of the news media
• A requirement that the LASD issue written guidance to all employees on the law and policies governing their interactions with members of the news media.

Those laws include SB98, which protects journalists’ rights to cover demonstrations. Its passage was spurred in part by Huang’s arrest.

Supervisor Hilda Solis, who in 2021 introduced a motion in support of the state bill, said in a statement on Tuesday that she "was grateful that the bill was eventually signed into law in 2021 by Governor Gavin Newsom and that members of the press have more safeguards to continue to cover critical stories for our communities.”

Settlement 'sends a strong message'

“This settlement sends a strong message and, importantly, holds officials accountable for what happened to our client,” said Katie Townsend, deputy executive director and legal director for the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, which represented Huang, along with the law firm Gibson, Dunn and Crutcher.

Townsend said it would help prevent unlawful arrests of journalists in the future.

Susan Seager, a UC Irvine law professor who specializes in press freedom, called the settlement “a huge win,” but was skeptical the reforms would change the behavior of deputies.

“I’m just cynical about the deputies out in the field treating reporters any differently than they have in the past,” said Seager, who has represented journalists in court. “I see settlement of lawsuits handled by the county counsel’s office and I don’t know how much the sheriff’s department really takes it to heart.”

Of the training, she said, “I’d like to see how good it is.”

The LASD issued a statement that did not directly address the settlement.

"There was a thorough internal investigation into this incident and the appropriate administrative action was taken," the department said. "We understand the role of the media during newsworthy events and make every effort to accommodate them with a designated press area and appropriate access."

County Supervisor Kathryn Barger issued a statement after she voted to approve the settlement.

“Reporters have rights that undeniably must be protected, and our County has processes in place to ensure members of the press are protected and supported," she said. "I am hopeful that this settlement brings some sense of closure to Ms. Huang and the press community at large.”

Will the settlement change police behavior?

UCLA law professor Joanna Schwartz has written about how large monetary payouts in police misconduct cases don’t always lead to changes in police behavior. In her writing, she notes the amounts are often small compared to a county’s overall budget.

But she said the Huang settlement may be different.

“It's a somewhat unique case,” she said. “When it comes to using force against reporters, it seems like a pretty bright line for the department to draw that this is not the right conduct to engage in.”

At the same time, law enforcement abuse of journalists in L.A. is not uncommon, said Adam Rose, who is press rights chair at the Los Angeles Press Club.

“While most police-press interactions are pretty routine, our region's two biggest agencies (LASD and LAPD) have disturbing legacies of abusing press rights,” he said. “This is just one moment from decades of well-documented misconduct.”

Rose said he knew of at least nine lawsuits filed by L.A. journalists against LASD or LAPD for police brutality since 2020, the year George Floyd was murdered by Minneapolis police and street protests exploded.

Huang’s settlement is one of the largest in the nation to an individual reporter whose rights were violated while covering the 2020 protests.

In settling the case, the county admitted no wrongdoing.

“I would like to see some acknowledgement of wrongdoing — not just money,” said Christina Bellantoni, director of USC Annenberg’s Media Center. “It's so important that young journalists learning how to do this aren’t worried they are going to be violently hurt when doing their job.”

Huang echoed the sentiment in her statement, albeit for all journalists.

“Journalists in Los Angeles County should be able to record police activity in public without fear of unlawful arrest,” she said. “As the public’s eyes and ears, we must be able to cover protests and document how law enforcement responds to those protests.”

In a statement, LAist Executive Editor Megan Garvey praised Huang's focus on press freedoms.

"From the time Josie was released from jail, her top concern was doing everything she could to make sure what happened to her didn't happen to another journalist doing their job," Garvey said. "And that started in the car ride home, when we were able to start looking through what she'd recorded on her phone during the arrest."

Details of the 2020 incident

Huang, an award-winning journalist, was leaving a news conference by then-Sheriff Alex Villanueva when she started using her phone to film a group of deputies arresting a protester. A deputy ordered her to back away.

“Without giving her time to comply, deputies aggressively tackled Huang to the ground, causing her injury,” according to a statement from the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. Huang suffered multiple injuries, including scrapes and bruises to her knees, ankle and face, as well as emotional distress.

In a draft complaint, her lawyers wrote that “the force used was wildly out of proportion to that needed to effectuate the arrest of Ms. Huang, who, at 5’5 and 122 lbs., was far smaller than the multiple deputies who tackled her, posed no physical threat, and had not committed any crime.”

Huang’s phone fell to the ground. Two deputies stepped on it. The phone survived and was recovered by a fellow journalist. It documented much of what happened.

“Law enforcement tried to destroy evidence rather than preserve it,” said Michael Dore of Gibson, Dunn and Crutcher. “And then the former sheriff made false claims about Ms. Huang’s reporting work that the evidence refuted.”

Among other things, Villanueva said Huang never identified herself as a reporter. Huang’s video captures her shouting that she is a reporter. She was also wearing a lanyard with her press credential.

But the department continued to tweet false statements about Huang.

“LASD’s false Twitter posts were retweeted thousands of times, prompting a flood of racist and misogynistic slurs and threats directed at Ms. Huang and her family,” the draft complaint states.

A memo to the board of supervisors from the county’s litigation cost manager recommending approval of the settlement contained only the deputies’ account of what happened. The memo said the deputies involved were retrained, but makes no mention of discipline, which typically is confidential.

This story first appeared on Long Beach Post.

After 32 years in uniform and a career punctuated by declining murders, spiking traffic deaths and challenges retaining officers, Long Beach Police Chief Wally Hebeish announced Wednesday that he will retire in December.

Hebeish, who began his career in 1994 with the Orange County Sheriff’s Department and joined the Long Beach Police Department a year later, stepped into the limelight in 2021 when he replaced then-Chief Robert Luna, who went on to become the LA County Sheriff.

Hebeish declined a request to comment on Wednesday. In a characteristically terse and formal statement, he thanked the department that he described leading through “some of the most challenging times we have faced in modern law enforcement.”

In a separate statement sent by department spokesperson Allison Gallagher, Hebeish said he had been “contemplating and planning my retirement for some time,” and wanted to see through the department’s newest round of academy cadets and a tough budget year before leaving. “It’s been a rewarding [five] years as Chief and I’m proud of everything the Department has accomplished,” the statement said.

A spokesperson for Mayor Rex Richardson did not respond to a request for comment. In a social media post Wednesday, Richardson praised Hebeish, saying his legacy is one of “leadership, progress, and a deep commitment to our community and the men and women who serve it.”

“Wally Hebeish has always been a public servant focused on keeping people safe and a person of high integrity,” said Rep. Robert Garcia, who served as mayor when Hebeish first became chief. “Long Beach has been lucky to have had him as Chief, and I’m thankful to have worked with him.”

City Manager Tom Modica said the outgoing chief led the department through a “transformative period in modern policing” and did so with “integrity, compassion and an unwavering commitment” to the public. “We thank Chief Hebeish for his decades of public service and wish him the best in his retirement,” Modica said. “As we begin the search for our next Chief of Police, we will build on the strong foundation he leaves behind.”

Modica said the city plans to hire a recruitment firm in the next two weeks to begin a national search he hopes to finish by early next year. Candidates will be screened through the city’s human resources department and undergo interviews with a community panel, a technical panel and city department directors. The final choice will ultimately be made by Modica.

The city manager will also be creating a “community input process;” the city will announce something in the next couple of weeks.

Gerrit DeJongh of the Long Beach Police Officers Association said the union wants a chief with experience at a department of similar size who is “level-headed and fair-minded.”

The union supports a nationwide search, he said, but believes the department has “phenomenal internal candidates as well.” “If the city manager wants to have a discussion or wants the [union’s] opinion on it, I’d be happy to offer it,” DeJongh added.

Born in Cairo and raised in North Long Beach, Hebeish became the city’s first Arab American and Muslim to lead the department. After joining in 1995, he worked in criminal intelligence, investigations, patrol and internal affairs, and later served as chief of staff, deputy chief of the Support and Patrol bureaus and assistant chief, a post he took in 2019.

He became acting chief in 2021 while Luna, then the chief, recovered after being struck by a truck while crossing a street. Hebeish was appointed to the top job in December of that year.

Commanding a department of 800 sworn officers and another 1,200 employees, Hebeish took over the post amid intense pressure on police departments nationwide following the murder of George Floyd in 2020. Meanwhile, the instability of the pandemic led to a spike in murders around the country. Like many departments, Long Beach grappled with new expectations of its police leaders and a need to rebuild public trust against challenges to retain officers.

In Long Beach, it was a balancing act with some success. Hebeish touts a citywide decline in murders, particularly fatal shootings, during his tenure. He said the city saw year-over-year reductions in shootings and, in 2025, its first recorded year without an officer-involved shooting.

He credited a High Crime Focus Team, created in 2024, which directs patrols to the places where violent crime, illegal firearms and quality-of-life complaints occur most often, with helping to reduce gun violence. He also lobbied for funding for a Real Time Crime Center, established a program for drones that back up police, launched a public online crime dashboard and instituted a yearly accountability report.

City officials and the department also point to its largest academy class on record, the opening of a new police academy, creation of a Neighborhood Safety Bike Team and expansion of its team that handles nonemergency calls.

DeJongh is especially proud of the department’s Wellness Division and its Community Services Bureau, which Hebeish helped lead while assistant chief. The program, he explained, watches for traumatic officer-involved incidents and refers them to counseling. It came about shortly after a string of officer suicides rocked the department.

“I cannot help but to think or believe that the experiences and the trauma they experienced on this job played into their decision to take their own lives,” he said. “You can only help but wonder, you know, could we even save just one of them if we had something like this in place at the time?”

But Hebeish leaves a department that has long suffered high vacancy rates, which has slowed response times. An August 2024 analysis of city data by the Post found 155 vacancies, about one in five officers. For all but the highest-priority calls, officers were taking more than 20 minutes longer to respond than they had three years earlier, the analysis found.

While dealing with a shortage of officers, the department announced it would stop responding to many minor noninjury crashes to focus on priority calls. Questions remain over how the department has handled traffic safety enforcement, as the city recorded 53 fatal traffic collisions in 2025 — the most in over a decade and surpassing the city’s homicide count that year.

Fatalities continue to climb into 2026, reaching more than 40 traffic deaths as of mid-October.

Public trust in the city police department continues to be an issue, as well, as criticisms are regularly slung at the department during city council meetings over the department’s handling of homelessness and the federal immigration raids that have continued throughout Long Beach over the past year.

The city’s Office of Police Oversight, established in 2022, has also urged the department to improve how it deals with the families of those killed by police and witnesses to shootings, following the 2024 killing of Brandon Boyd. The oversight commission has previously questioned whether internal investigations are handled in a timely manner and asked the department to review policies for when officers respond to domestic violence calls.

Countries are not doing enough to cut emissions that cause climate change, according to a new report from United Nations scientists. And the United States is a big part of the problem.

The U.S. sticks out as the only major economy where planet-warming pollution increased dramatically last year, the report notes.

Among the world's largest emitters of greenhouse gases, the U.S. was tied last year with Russia for the most emissions per capita. China emits significantly more total greenhouse gases each year than the U.S., but has more than four times the population.

Overall, global emissions were basically the same last year as they were the previous year.

U.S. emissions grew because of increased electricity demand, as well as Trump administration policies that support the burning of fossil fuels. The Trump administration has ordered coal-fired power plants in the U.S. to stay open longer than planned, rolled back fuel-efficiency standards for vehicles and ended tax credits for solar and wind projects.

Those policies have made the U.S. an outlier when it comes to escalating greenhouse gas emissions, says Inger Andersen, the executive director of the U.N. Environment Programme.

"Right now, everybody is scrambling a little bit regarding energy security," Andersen says, pointing to global oil and gas disruptions stemming from the wars in Ukraine and Iran.

Despite the geopolitical upheaval, "several G20 members have shown sustained emissions reduction," she notes.

That includes the European Union, which has invested heavily in energy-efficient appliances and renewable electricity sources such as wind and solar, partly in reaction to Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

The U.S. is pulling out of U.N. climate work

The Trump administration has withdrawn from the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement, and is working to remove the U.S. from all U.N. climate work, arguing the international system imposes unfair burdens on Americans. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency now says greenhouse gases do not pose a threat to human health and welfare, reversing its previous position.

The new report includes a statement from the U.S. government, saying the U.S. "does not endorse or agree with its analysis or conclusions, and has not provided comments to this report." The U.S. State Department did not respond to NPR's questions.

The new report, which is compiled annually by an international group of scientists, comes less than a month before global climate talks kick off in Turkey. World leaders will gather to discuss how to speed investments in clean energy and how to pay for the costs of dealing with climate change. The Trump administration will not participate in those talks.

Still, whether or not American leaders formally participate in international climate efforts, the effects of America's reliance on oil, gas and coal are being felt around the world, the U.N. warns. Burning fossil fuels releases carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, trapping extra heat that warms the entire planet. The effects of all that pollution are felt globally.

The Earth is about 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit (1.5 degrees Celsius) warmer on average than it was in the mid-1800s, according to the World Meteorological Organization. That warming is driving widespread disasters, from deadly heat waves and floods to more intense storms and wildfires.

"All countries, especially the big emitters, must do more," says U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. "Every fraction of a degree matters."

The Earth is on track for 5 degrees Fahrenheit of warming this century

Right now, the planet is on track for upwards of 5 degrees Fahrenheit (2.8 degrees Celsius) of warming this century, which would cause catastrophic impacts, such as massive sea level rise and the mass extinction of plants and animals, the report warns.

The U.N. Paris Climate agreement sets a goal of limiting warming to well below 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit (2 degrees Celsius), in the hopes of avoiding such cataclysms.

This is the first year the annual report has acknowledged that even lower targets are now out of reach. However, it finds it is still possible to keep warming below 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit, if global greenhouse gas emissions fall by about 25% in the next decade.

But countries are currently lagging far behind that goal.

Under the Paris agreement, about two thirds of countries have submitted formal, up-to-date plans for cutting their greenhouse gas emissions. If they all follow through on those plans, it would reduce emissions by about 15% in the next decade — far less than the 25% needed.

Copyright 2026 NPR

At Chopin Noodle House in Monterey Park's Atlantic Times Square, the dining room is small. But there's still room for a baby grand piano.

If you’re lucky, you might catch owner Zi Yang playing for customers as they work through bowls of Lanzhou beef noodle soup. A few feet away, cooks pull a fresh batch of noodles by hand, made to each diner’s preferred thickness.

The traditional beef noodle soup at Chopin Noodle House in Monterey Park comes with clear broth, chili oil, sliced beef, leeks, and cilantro.

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Gab Chabrán

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LAist

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Noodles are pulled by hand to order at Chopin Noodle House.

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Gab Chabrán

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LAist

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Pianists turned chefs 

Yang and his wife, Mimi Song, are both former piano teachers who met through music.

After moving from China to the U.S., they hoped to make a living teaching piano, but it didn’t pay the bills. So they turned to another love: noodles.

Co-founders Mimi Song (left) and Zi Yang, both former piano teachers, have grown Chopin Noodle House to five locations.

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Courtesy Chopin Noodle House

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The couple opened the first Chopin Noodle House in Catonsville, Maryland, in 2023. They later expanded to Southern California, starting in Chino, and opened in Monterey Park in March. The chain now has five locations in Maryland, Virginia and Southern California.

When I visited, Yang stepped out from behind the counter, sat down at the baby grand and played Frédéric Chopin’s Waltz in C-sharp minor, its soft, rolling melody filling the small dining room. A group of diners in the corner looked up from their bowls of noodles, watched and cheered when he finished.

The restaurant name comes from the Polish composer. “We both love Chopin,” Yang said.

The Lanzhou connection

Yang is from Lanzhou, the capital of Gansu province in northwest China, and the birthplace of the signature beef noodle soup.

“I was born in Lanzhou, a city along China’s ancient Silk Road,” he writes on the restaurant’s website. “Every morning, the streets fill with the scent of beef broth and the rhythm of pulled noodles slapping the counter.”

“Maybe 80% of the people eat it for breakfast or lunch,” he told me.

Before opening the restaurant, he returned to China for a crash course in its creation.

“I went back to learn how to pull the noodles and how to make the very delicious beef noodle soup,” he said.

The piano started as a practical idea.

“We saw that restaurant life would be so boring, so we decided to put a piano in our restaurant. So sometimes if there’s no customer, we can practice the piano,” Yang said.

What’s in the bowl

The most popular order is the traditional beef noodle soup ($14.99). It's made from beef bones and beef shank.

Diners choose from eight noodle styles, from extra-thin to extra-wide, plus knife-sliced and gluten-free rice noodles. The bowl follows what the restaurant calls Lanzhou’s five signature elements: clear beef broth, white radish, red chili oil, green cilantro and leek, as well as golden hand-pulled noodles topped with thinly sliced beef.

For sipping alongside the noodles, order the eight treasures tea, known in Lanzhou as san pao tai. It’s served in a lidded bowl called a gaiwan and brewed with green tea, dried red dates, goji berries, longan, raisins, rose petals, chrysanthemum and rock sugar. You use the lid to keep the fruit and leaves in place as you drink. It’s naturally sweet, a nice counterpoint to the chili oil.

An open bench

Anyone who visits is welcome to play the piano. Yang said they’ve had everyone from kids learning to play to professional musicians, including members of the San Gabriel Valley Symphony.

Some of the players are so good that Yang admits he’s now a little shy about taking his turn.

“I’m afraid to play because they are so good,” he said.

Longer droughts, more extreme heat, greater wildfire risk and more beach erosion: A new state-commissioned report finds that climate change is likely to reshape the Southern California landscape and way of life.

The study, which comes as part of California’s fifth statewide climate change assessment, includes more detailed models than previous reports.

“What we want to highlight with this report is not how doom and gloom everything is, but just to look at climate change in the L.A. area as something that is inevitable, but which we can adapt to, and in particular, protect the most vulnerable,” said UCLA climate researcher Jesse Norris, the lead author of the report focused on Los Angeles.

Sea level rise and beach erosion

If the recent stories of beach and coastline erosion have you concerned, buckle up. The report notes local coastal erosion rates are expected to triple by 2050.

Citing past research, the authors also note that coastal flooding is expected to quickly intensify in the mid-2030s and become a yearly event by the mid-21st century.

Between one-third and two-thirds of the region’s beaches are expected to be lost in the next 75 years.

Researchers found that in L.A. County, about 1,700 housing units are at risk of being permanently inundated. But if sea levels rise by 3.3 feet — which is possible by 2100 — 9,000 units would be at risk of being permanently flooded.

And if sea levels rise by 6.6 feet, which researchers described as an “extreme” scenario, flooding could be widespread during a 100-year wave event. In this scenario, large swaths of urban L.A. and Orange counties could be flooded, though it’s important to note the projections don’t account for any future infrastructure that may be built.

Extreme heat

Temperatures are expected to rise 4 degrees Fahrenheit between 2041 and 2070 — adding to the 4 degrees of warming that have already happened since 1900.

Researchers say those effects are more pronounced in inland areas, which are also projected to see more days of extreme heat. The average hottest day of the year is expected to rise to 115 degrees by midcentury.

Microclimates play a role

Most of the hazards predicted in the report will be familiar to Southern Californians, even as the effects are expected to intensify and become more common during climate change.

“It was quite striking to see how much more vulnerable certain locations are than others to different climate hazards,” Norris said. “In particular, the more inland areas being far more vulnerable to the increase in extreme heat, mountain communities being far more vulnerable to the impacts of extreme rain and flooding as well as reduced snowpack, and coastal areas being obviously far more vulnerable to the impacts of rising seas.”

Planning

Norris stressed that planning for these effects can be undertaken now. One example: increasing tree cover to mitigate heat.

“A lot of inland cities are thinking very seriously about increasing their tree canopies, increasing the ability for people to have shade as they're going about their business,” Norris said.

Norris highlighted the importance of protecting the most vulnerable in these situations, including people experiencing homelessness and those who work outdoors, and ensuring access to air conditioning and cooling centers.

Norris also said continuing and improving initiatives like active wildfire management, water management and coastal adaptation will be vital in the years to come.