The Brief

While universities nationwide have made headlines this year for student protests of Israel’s war in Gaza, local community college students haven’t seen the same attention. Geographically specific, often smaller in enrollment, and with many commuters, student gatherings can fly by unnoticed.

And unlike universities, most community colleges do not have big endowments. Their schools also typically don’t have the same high-level research contracts to do work that might benefit the Israeli war effort, which was one cause for the recent University of California academic worker strike. So even if there isn't much action for their colleges to take, for many students, they speak out simply because they are passionate.

Some schools do have money

Pasadena City College does have a nonprofit corporation that raises and receives funds intended for the students at the college.

Staff of The Courier, the college’s online news publication, found that the PCC Foundation holds investments in ExxonMobil, RTX Corp (Raytheon Technologies), and Lockheed Martin.

All three companies aid Israel in the war in Gaza. ExxonMobil provides fuel for Israel’s military, RTX helped create Israel’s Iron Dome Weapon System and makes missiles and bombs, and Lockheed Martin has been providing weapons to Israel for over 20 years.

What the PCC Foundation does with its $60 million — half of which came from a Mackenzie Scott gift in 2021 — has concerned the college’s Anti-War Club, which had its first of many protests last year. The club regularly hosts walkouts, protests, and vigils on and off-campus.

Alex Boekelheide, a spokesperson for Pasadena City College, said the data published by The Courier is outdated, and the current investment holdings are in highly diversified mutual funds, rather than individual stocks.

How students use their voices

For colleges with minimal to no financial ties to the war in Gaza, students still make demands.

At Long Beach City College, protests and one-day altars are set up on campus. Cerritos College’s humanitarian club hosted a protest in early May to inform other students about the war. Santa Monica College offers a Students for Justice in Palestine club and a Students Supporting Israel club. Both clubs have put on events this semester, with no reports of altercations.

At East Los Angeles College, 22-year-old Rin Sanchez hosts protests for students to speak about the war in Gaza. They say that if East L.A. College — the L.A. area's largest by enrollment — can pass a resolution demanding a ceasefire, that carries weight in and of itself.

Sanchez hosted their second event of the semester this spring at the campus’ Free Speech Area. The sophomore wore a white keffiyeh draped around their shoulders, along with watermelon earrings — a symbol now synonymous with solidarity for those in Palestine.

Sanchez grew up hearing their father talk about fleeing El Salvador due to the civil war that lasted 12 years. They stated that even though they never experienced that, they know the pain it can bring to not feel safe in one’s home country.

East Los Angeles College student Karma Aguilar attended a protest this spring to “show up and meet people within the community."

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“I hyper-fixated on Palestine and the history of it,” Sanchez said. “The more I read, especially about Nakba, that's when I got more upset and more radicalized about Palestine. And once I saw that USC and UCLA were doing their encampments, I was like, ‘I'm gonna do my own, but for ELAC.’”

Around 25 community members, professors, and students huddled around Sanchez and their megaphone, as they declared the protest an “open mic night,” urging students to express their opinions to the group.

ELAC student Hassan Tehfi shared that when he and his family were in his hometown in southern Lebanon 18 years ago, Israeli bombs dropped around them. They fled from house to house, every day a near-death experience. After two weeks of running, Tehfi and his family were able to flee to the United States.

“I'm just trying to give everyone an idea on how Palestinian families and children feel every single day, from the day they are born to the day they die,” said Tehfi, a kinesiology major. “I only experienced it for two weeks. And thank God it was only two weeks. I just want everyone to feel for the Palestinian children.”

There is no official club Sanchez represents at East LA College, but they hope to create one later this year.

Second-year student Anthony Gomeztagle said that they were happy students were talking about the war in Gaza.

“I didn’t know there were events happening on community college campuses,” he said.

LAX officials are considering a proposal Tuesday to increase the fees rideshare companies are charged to access the airport.

Currently, rideshare companies like Uber and Lyft generally pass a $4 to $5 airport fee along to their customers. You might see this listed as a line item on your receipt as an “LAX Airport Surcharge.”

But the Los Angeles World Airports Board of Commissioners could vote to increase that fee by as much as $2 to $8 depending on where the rideshare picks you up or drops you off.

The idea behind the proposal is to encourage the use of the long-awaited, much-delayed and over-budget Automated People Mover once it opens and decrease congestion in the central terminal area, the area of the airport that’s also known as the horseshoe.

David Reich, a deputy executive director for the city agency that manages the airport, told LAist that if the proposal is approved, LAX doesn’t plan on increasing the fee until after the Automated People Mover opens, which could be later this year.

The proposed increases

When the Automated People Mover opens, there will be new curb space for drop-off and pick-up. Known as the “ground transport center,” this new curb space will be a 4-minute trip from the terminal area via the Automated People Mover, according to Reich.

LAX-it will shut down as a rideshare and taxi lot once the train opens, Reich said.

If the proposal is approved, getting an Uber or Lyft to and from the ground transport center will come with a $6 airport fee.

Even once the Automated People Mover opens, you will still be able to get rides directly to and from the curbs along the horseshoe, but they will come with a $12 fee.

The proposed increases would also apply to taxi and limousine services, which currently operate under a slightly different fee structure than rideshare companies.

The increased fees are expected to generate as much as $100 million in the first year the Automated People Mover is usable, according to a report to the board.

Why the different fees for the different locations?

In a report to the board, Reich said the Automated People Mover represents a "significant investment” that aims to “fundamentally reshape how vehicles move through the airport.”

The idea behind having a higher fee for direct access to the curbs along the horseshoe is to encourage “use of new, high-capacity infrastructure” and preserve central terminal access for trips “that most require it.”

Uber is trying to fight the increases

Uber is trying to mobilize the public to fight the proposed fee increases.

“Raising the LAX rideshare fee from $5 to $12 at the curb would punish travelers, working families, and seniors who depend on affordable, reliable transportation,” Danielle Lam, the head of local California policy for Uber, said in a statement.

On Monday, Uber sent an email to passengers who recently used the rideshare service, urging them to write to city officials to “stop this massive fee hike.”

Lyft has not responded to a request for comment.

Ten state lawmakers who are members of the L.A. County delegation sent a letter on Monday to the board expressing their “strong opposition” to the proposed increases.

“Many Angelenos rely on a mix of options, including rideshare services and friends or family dropping off loved ones,” the legislators wrote in the letter. “Managing congestion cannot realistically rely on steep fee increases for certain transportation options.”

Eight of the 10 legislators who signed the letter have received campaign contributions from Uber or Lyft, according to an LAist analysis of state campaign contribution data.

Other ways to access the airport

Now is probably a good time to remind folks that there are other ways to get to the airport that don’t involve rideshares, taxis or even lifts from families and friends.

The FlyAway bus offers regularly scheduled rides from the airport to Union Station in downtown L.A. and Van Nuys. You can see the schedules here. 

Last year, the countywide transportation agency unveiled the LAX/Metro Transit center, which is accessible from the C and K rail lines and several bus routes. For now, an LAX shuttle is bringing travelers from the station to the airport. It will be one of the stops on the Automated People Mover once it opens.

The Newport Beach City Council is considering demolishing part of its quirky, beloved sculpture garden in Civic Center Park to make way for a new police station.

The city has been trying to figure out how to replace its aging police headquarters for years. It bought a property in 2022 with that intent. But an ad hoc City Council committee decided, controversially, it might be better to instead build a new station on the parkland next to city hall.

What’s so great about the sculpture garden?

The sculpture garden is a “museum without walls” treasured by art and nature lovers alike. It houses the quirky and once-controversial “Bunnyhenge,” included on the popular Atlas Obscura travel guide. Opponents of putting a new police headquarters on park grounds say it would compromise the environment, and decimate the sculpture garden.

What do supporters of the new station idea say?

Supporters say the current police station, built in 1973, is long overdue for an upgrade, and that the police force needs more space for things like servers to store digital evidence. The council ad hoc committee that studied the issue says the Civic Center parkland makes the most sense for a new building because the city already owns the land, and it would consolidate the city’s main services in one place.

Is it a done deal?

Far from it. The City Council is holding a study session Tuesday to present the plan publicly and gather input. If the council decides to go forward, the next step would be to hire a consultant to design the building and get started on an environmental impact report.

Here’s how to learn more and weigh in:

A new exhibit in L.A. — Vehicles of Expression: The Craft of the Skateboard — arrives this weekend, highlighting the cultural impact, history and artistry of handmade skateboards.

It’s the latest exhibit at Craft in America Center, a museum and library that highlights handcrafted artwork.

Todd Huber, skateboard historian and founder of the Skateboarding Hall of Fame, said before 1962, it wasn’t possible to buy a skateboard in a store.

“Skateboarding started as a craft,” Huber said on AirTalk, LAst 89.3’s daily news program. “Somewhere in the 50s until 1962, if you wanted to sidewalk surf, as they called it, you had to make your own out of roller skates.”

What to expect

Emily Zaiden, the director and lead curator of the Craft in America Center based in Los Angeles, told LAist’s AirTalk the exhibit was tricky to curate.

“What we wanted to do was focus on both the history and then expand into how this has been an object that people have interpreted in so many different ways since the very beginning,” Zaiden said.

Artists who craft skateboards not only think of design, but also of the features that give riders the ability to do tricks, such as wheelies and kickflips.

“The ways that people have constructed boards, engineered boards, design boards … people are really renegade, which I think is really the spirit of skateboarding overall,” Zaiden said. “This very independent, out-of-the-box approach and making boards that allow them to do all kinds of wacky tricks and do all kinds of things that no one imagined possible physically with their body, but through the object of the board.”

Know before you go

The exhibit at Craft in America Center opens to the public on Saturday. Admission is free. The museum is open from noon to 6 p.m., Tuesday through Saturday.