The Brief

At Venice High School, students now report to their sixth-period class for the first 10 minutes of the day. They stow their phones in portable metal cases with a clear, locking door.

And retrieve them at the final bell.

The new schedule is part of the Westside high school’s strategy to keep 2,300 students away from their phones, smartwatches, earbuds and other personal technology during the school day.

Dean of students David Galley said about 70 phones were confiscated outside of classrooms on the first day of the new policy.

“The kids we caught, they were all very, ‘Oh my fault. I won't do it again,’” Galley said. “They handed [the phones] over. It was very peaceful.”

The Los Angeles Unified School District Board voted in June to expand the district’s existing phone ban to include lunch and passing periods (“bell to bell”), and the policy took effect Tuesday.

The district reported no major disruptions in the first week, though educators LAist contacted said several schools are still waiting on their equipment.

The district set aside $7 million to purchase lockers (like those used at Venice High), pouches and other devices to store phones. A district spokesperson said in a statement that about half of schools chose to rely instead on the “honor system” and require students to keep their phones turned off and in their backpacks.

Not a cellphone in sight in math teacher Charles Styrbicki's Venice High classroom.

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David Galley walks the Venice High halls looking for students who haven't yet turned over their cellphones.

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In interviews with LAist, students and educators reported seeing fewer devices on campus, though compliance with the rules varied.

In Jessica Quindel’s data science class at Venice High, just two of about 18 students slid their phones into the numbered foam locker slots Wednesday.

“ If they're self-regulating and keeping their phone in their backpacks all day, that gets to the same benefit,” Quindel said. “We're not here to be like police officers. We just really want kids to connect and put their phones away so they can learn and connect with each other.”

Parents say ‘we are struggling at home’

The vast majority of teenagers — 95% — carry smartphones.

Board members cited rising concerns about the effect of phones and social media on youth mental health, bullying and distraction from classroom instruction.

Parent Norma Chávez said her “well-behaved” 13-year-old daughter has gotten her phone confiscated in the past.

“We are struggling at home to get the kids to stop using" phones, Chávez said. She hopes that a stricter policy at school will make it easier to limit screen time at home.

Chávez, who volunteers at Richard E. Byrd Middle School in Sun Valley and leads the Parent Teacher Student Association there, is also worried about the academic impact of smartphones in the classroom. The majority of students at the school are not reading or meeting math standards for their grade level.

"During the pandemic, the phone was their friend," Venice High School Principal Yavonka Hairston-Truitt said. "As it became the friend, it became difficult to part from friend. Difficult to go five minutes without looking at friend."

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“We have to try anything we can so that we can help our kids improve their grades and do well in school,” Chávez said.

But some students LAist interviewed say the new policy strips them of a useful tool and doesn’t address underlying challenges in public education, including a lack of resources for extracurricular activities.

Sherman Oaks Center for Enriched Studies freshman Miles, 15, said that prior to the policy, he’d use his phone to take photos of assignments and when he’d finished his work.

“For day-to-day school life, it’s just really, really annoying,” he said.

“I think banning our phones just makes us more focused on our phones and missing our phones. If they want to get us more focused on our education, they have to make the education more interesting to us.”

He said that although the district spent millions of dollars to implement the restrictions, students have to raise funds to pay for band trips that include clinics where he can practice trumpet and ample time to socialize with his peers.

“It makes it a lot less fun when we have to jump through all these hoops to go to the places that we want to go,” Miles said.

Bravo Medical Magnet High School college advisor and parent Victoria Montes said students at the Boyle Heights campus were previously allowed to use their phones, with educator permission. Common tasks included scanning QR codes to sign into the campus college center or download information from prospective schools.

“I just wish that we could teach students how to use a tool rather than just take it away,” Montes said.

Venice High School math teacher and instructional coach Jessica Quindel said she was excited to see a student pull out a book in their homeroom class on the second day of the new policy. "I haven't seen a book in so long because they take out their phones," she said.

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Venice High sophomore Sophia, 15, said instead of limiting access to technology, teachers can capture students’ attention by changing up the school day. For example, her English teacher sometimes takes the class to the school’s garden.

“There's other ways that you can re-ground yourself in a classroom without having your property or like something being stripped away from you like that,” Sophia said.

‘You hear students talking to other students’

At Garfield High School students were already banned from bringing phones on campus and will now have to store them in “Cellphone Airbnb” boxes (once their shipment arrives) at the start of each class.

Elizabeth Ruff, who teaches English at the East L.A. high school, supports the move to keep phones away from students during class. But she's concerned about how much time enforcing the new policy will consume.

An agreement between the district and the teachers union about the new policy pledges to make an effort to “minimize the impact to instructional time.”

"Anytime you implement a big sweeping change like this, there are going to be hiccups that are frustrating,” Ruff said. "If we can try to be patient with one another and reflect on what's going well and work to improve what's not going well, I’m hopeful that the end result will be a better learning environment for our students.”

Among the more manageable struggles students mentioned are figuring out what time it is and where to meet up with friends for lunch or after school.

“I found it to be a little annoying for sure, but it's nothing I can't, like, work out,” said Cyrus, 17, a senior at Los Angeles Center for Enriched Studies in Mid-City.

He said he’s seen fewer phones on campus since the school started using the locking pouches.

“People are definitely communicating more,” he said. “You hear students talking to other students … rather than just people being isolated on their phones.”

The number of people with nowhere to call home decreased both in California and nationwide last year, according to a long-awaited federal report.

The data, showing the first decrease in homelessness in years, provided fuel for activists challenging the Trump administration's narrative that current homelessness policies are failing and need to be overhauled.

There were 181,934 homeless Californians counted last year — a 2.8% decrease from 2024, according to the new federal report. Overall, the country saw a 3.3% drop in homelessness, marking the first decrease since 2016. Nationwide, an estimated 745,652 people are homeless.

Those numbers come from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, which released its annual homelessness report to Congress on Friday after an unexplained five-month delay. As the country’s main barometer for how efforts to combat homelessness are working, the report plays an important role in allocating funding and shaping policies — and is a major political tool.

The Trump administration used the report to promote its policies, including its crackdown on immigration and efforts to direct funding away from permanent housing. Meanwhile, the National Homelessness Law Center was quick to point out that the decrease in homelessness happened while former President Joe Biden was still in office.

“Homelessness is down because President Biden funded things that we know work, like housing and support,” law center spokesperson Jesse Rabinowitz said in a news release. “Sadly, the Trump administration is doing everything they can to backtrack on this progress.”

The federal government downplayed the small one-year decrease in homelessness, instead focusing on the fact that homelessness has increased 27% nationwide since 2013. That’s when the country started following a practice called “housing first,” which moves people into housing right away instead of requiring them first to get sober or meet other conditions.

"The data is clear that the status quo of ‘housing first’ has failed to meaningfully reduce homelessness, resulting in crisis levels of people living on the streets," said HUD Secretary Scott Turner. "HUD is restoring its programs to advance recovery and self-sufficiency and to ensure that taxpayer-funded benefits serve American families.”

The Trump administration wants to end housing first and instead prioritize housing that requires people to stay sober. The administration also has tried to divert homelessness funds away from permanent housing and into temporary shelters. California is one of 19 states suing the Trump administration over that change.

The federal administration tied the 2025 drop in homelessness to immigration, saying in a news release that it was “attributable to decreases in sanctuary cities.” The full report never mentions sanctuary cities, but it says some communities in New York and Illinois attributed their decreases in homelessness “in part” to changes in federal immigration policy.

Where homelessness declined

California was among the five states that reported the largest decreases in homelessness last year, though there were more significant drops in Illinois (44%), Hawaii (41%), Florida (11%), and New York (8%).

In California, 17 communities reported decreases in the number of people who were “chronically homeless,” meaning they have a disability and have been homeless for a year or longer. Los Angeles County reported 2,394 fewer such people. Officials from communities that saw those declines attributed the trend to opening new housing, placing people in housing more quickly, using a coordinated system to match people with available units and increasing street outreach, according to the report.

The data comes from the federally mandated homeless point-in-time count, which tallies people sleeping in shelters and outside on a given day in January. Volunteers count people they see sleeping on the street, in cars or in other places not meant for habitation. The effort is generally viewed as an undercount, as it’s easy for volunteers to miss people tucked away in hard-to-reach areas.

The federal government requires each community to count the people sleeping on its streets every two years. Counts are conducted by “continuums of care,” which include a county (or multiple counties), cities and local service providers. In California, 14 of the state’s 44 continuums of care did not count last year. HUD used 2024 data for communities in which no 2025 data was available.

Each community is required to submit its point-in-time count data to HUD, which reviews, verifies and analyzes the data before publishing a report. That report typically comes out in December of the year of the count.

How Trump changed point-in-time report

When the federal report finally came out Friday, the Trump administration put its stamp on it in several ways, including by scrubbing all references to gender. The prior report from 2024 broke out homelessness by gender (39% of people counted were women and 60% were men), and included categories such as transgender, gender questioning and non-binary. The 2025 data includes no such breakdown.

And while the previous report referred to “people experiencing homelessness,” the new report instead referred to “homeless persons.”

While the drop in nationwide homelessness last year is a “relief,” there is trouble on the horizon, according to Ann Oliva, CEO of the National Alliance to End Homelessness.

“So much of the progress reflected in the 2025 (point-in-time) count is due to targeted housing and service resources that were available in 2024 to rehouse people,” she said in a news release, “including the highly successful Emergency Housing Voucher program, and new funds to address rural and unsheltered homelessness. Unfortunately, the Trump Administration has largely deprioritized these tools and worked to dismantle the very systems that drove these reductions.”

This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.

When a candidate invests their personal fortune in running for public office, does it represent a rich person trying to buy a seat or does it grant them independence from powerful special interests? Voters will decide on Tuesday in an election that has seen candidates spend more of their own money than any previous election.

Liberal billionaire Tom Steyer put up $213 million to fund his campaign for governor. All together, more than 200 candidates have contributed about a quarter billion dollars of their own money this year. That’s an eight-fold increase since the last time Californians voted for governor in 2022 and the most since California started keeping digital campaign finance records in 1999.

The last time a candidate spent anything close to Steyer was in 2010 when Meg Whitman gave over $140 million to her own unsuccessful campaign for governor, setting a record at the time.

Previous statewide races also saw big spenders: Steve Poizner gave $14 million to his campaign in 2006 running for insurance commissioner; Eleni Kounalakis shelled out upwards of $8 million when she ran for lieutenant governor in 2018; Yvonne Yiu dropped nearly $6 million on her campaign for controller four years ago.

Candidates running for state Senate this cycle have given nearly $4 million to their campaigns – the highest amount recorded for the chamber and more than double the $1.7 million candidates put up 20 years ago. Likewise, current congressional candidates have contributed more than $29 million to their campaigns, the most of any cycle in the past two decades.

And this year, some congressional candidates have set records for self-funding their campaigns.

Two of the five congressional candidates who contributed the most money to their campaigns over the last 20 years are running this election. In the competitive contest to succeed Nancy Pelosi in her San Francisco-based congressional district, Democrat Saikat Chakrabati gave nearly $9 million to his campaign, the most of any congressional primary candidate in state history. Eric Jones, who wants to oust fellow Democrat Mike Thompson from his district representing the North Bay, transferred over $5 million of his personal fortune.

Chakrabarti said the money he’s putting up is to counter the millions being spent against him by opponents and that self-funding his campaign is his best choice in a bad system.

“To go up against that kind of money I have two options,” he said. “I could either spend my time calling big donors for money and then I can go to DC and owe a million people a million favors…so I chose to put in my own resources.”

The increase in self-funding may reflect the need for more money to compete after the Supreme Court in a 2010 decision known as Citizens United lifted restrictions on campaign spending by wealthy people and corporations, said Jeremy Mack, executive director of the nonprofit advocacy group The Phoenix Project.

In other words: more money in politics begets more money in politics.

“In California," he said, "it’s often been corporations, real estate and police unions that have often worked together to [fund] similar candidates.”

Maria Colon, a voter in Sacramento who attended a Steyer rally last week said she views corporate donations as implicit corruption, and while self-funding might be a reason to warrant further scrutiny of a candidate, she understands why some like Steyer are pouring money into their own campaigns.

“Frankly, I think there needs to be caps on how much money needs to be raised,” Colon said. “[Corporations] are not giving you their money for free, bro.”

Money is critical for political campaigns and so candidates who can contribute their own cash might have an advantage, said Dr. Wesley Hussey, a professor of political science at Sacramento State University. “A candidate who’s able to put in enough of their own money to start off is a great way to be a viable candidate.”

Andrew Coolidge, a Republican running for Assembly District 3 in the northern part of the state who is the biggest donor to his campaign, said voters should be skeptical of candidates who can fund their own campaign but chose not to.

“I think a candidate who doesn't have some skin in the game is a candidate you have to worry about," he said. "I can feel very comfortable making every decision based on my conscience rather than based upon the opinion of someone else.”

Chris Anderson, a candidate for Lodi City Council who has contributed to his own campaign and attended the Steyer rally, said he likes candidates who can self-fund while raising some questions at the same time.

“There is a part of me that likes the fact that a person is funding their own campaign because they’re less likely to be beholden to a special interest,” he said. “But on the other hand, what special interests got them to where they are?”

Money doesn’t buy everything. Hussey said voters will look at other factors in deciding how to view candidates who spend their own fortunes on their campaigns.

Take Steyer and Whitman. Both had different degrees of involvement in politics before they ran for office. Whitman was involved in both Mitt Romney's and John McCain's 2008 presidential runs, while Steyer has been active in environmental causes for over a decade.

Voters might get more suspicious when a rich candidate shows up without a political track record, Hussey said. “Tom Steyer gave a lot of money to politicians for a long time and tried to kind of enter the political world himself for a while.”

When asked if voters should view his hundreds of millions of dollars as a rich person trying to buy a political office, Steyer said at last week's rally that he believes voters should judge him by the amount of money being spent against him and not as much by the hundreds of millions of dollars he’s put into his campaign.

“In this race there is only one person who isn’t conflicted by taking money from corporations,” he said. “That’s me.”

At a recent public event at Stanford University, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Katie Porter said she doesn’t think being rich means you’re immune to lobbying.

“That is the same argument that Donald Trump made,” she said. “'You can trust me not to take special interest money because I'm so rich'–I find that unsettling in a democracy.”

This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.

Starting July 1, a new state law will push cities to increase housing development in neighborhoods located near major transit stops.

When the law was signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom last year, Southern California cities began taking their best guess at where exactly those sites would be.

Now, the list is out. On Monday, the Southern California Association of Governments, known as SCAG, published its official map showing where new housing density will be allowed under Senate Bill 79.

Elizabeth Carbajal, SCAG’s deputy director of land use, said local officials sought many clarifications from state leaders in order to be sure that the map would accurately reflect the Legislature’s intent.

“There were a lot of questions after the statute was signed,” Carbajal said. “The clarifications helped further define bus service, as well as pedestrian access points.”

SB 79 has become a political lightning rod

The law’s impact on neighborhoods near transit lines — including those zoned only for single-family homes — has been heavily debated, especially in the race for Los Angeles mayor.

Mayor Karen Bass asked Newsom to veto SB 79, and she continues to oppose adding apartments within the nearly three-quarters of city land reserved for single-family homes.

City councilmember Nithya Raman, who is challenging Bass in the upcoming election, declined to oppose SB 79 and has said some single-family neighborhoods will need to accept more density.

Spencer Pratt, the former reality TV star running for mayor, made waves on social media when he falsely claimed last year that SB 79 would bring high-rises to the Pacific Palisades, where his home burned down. The official SCAG map confirms that SB 79 will have no impact on the neighborhood.

In response to SB 79, housing opponents in some areas have started focusing their efforts on killing plans for expanded public transit. Responding to public pressure, Burbank officials have stalled construction plans for local portions of a rapid bus line from North Hollywood to Pasadena. L.A. Metro is now suing Burbank over that move.

Where will new housing go? And how much will be allowed?

The rules of SB 79 are complex.

The tallest buildings allowed under SB 79 will be nine stories, as long as they are located within 200 feet of a Metro B or D-line stop. These stations qualify as “Tier 1” stops under SB 79, which puts the tallest buildings near heavy rail lines, which in L.A. only applies to the B and D-line subways.

More common will be the “Tier 2” zones around light rail and dedicated bus lane stops, which will allow buildings up to eight stories tall within 200 feet of those stops.

Height limits step down in areas further out from the station. In “Tier 2” zones, buildings up to six stories tall will be allowed within a quarter-mile of the stop, and buildings up to five stories will be allowed within a half-mile.

Neighborhoods near two Metrolink commuter rail stations, in Burbank and Glendale, will also qualify as “Tier 2” zones.

Change won’t necessarily come overnight

New housing won’t necessarily be coming to those zones immediately. Under SB 79, cities have the ability to put off full implementation until 2030 by making their own choices about where to allow more housing.

“Cities can develop alternative plans and delay implementation,” said Philip Law, a SCAG deputy planning director. “The map is not intended to reflect those situations.”

The city of L.A. has taken the delay approach, with the City Council recently voting to allow buildings up to four stories tall around 55 targeted transit stops. This would let the city put off full implementation of SB 79.

The new SCAG map shows no impact in Orange County. The region does not yet qualify as an “urban transit county” under the state law. However, the impending completion of the OC Streetcar through Santa Ana and Garden Grove, expected later this year, will make Orange County eligible for SB 79.

Once the OC Streetcar opens, SCAG plans to update their map to include Orange County, Carbajal said.

Tuesday is Election Day, so get ready to drop off your ballot or head to your polling place — but not before consulting the LAist Voter Game Plan if you still have some research to do about the most competitive races in your area, whether that’s city council, mayor or even the state-wide governor’s primary.

And happy Pride! We’ll be featuring tons of LGBTQ+ events this month, so stay tuned.

Licorice Pizza’s Lyndsey Parker has your music picks for the week, including: Monday, Las Vegas rockers the Cab will be at the Fonda Theatre, and Scottish indie-pop darlings Camera Obscura will play their first of two shows at Pacific Electric.

Tuesday, new-wave legend Joe Jackson will be looking sharp at the Orpheum Theatre, British-Sudanese R&B artist Elmiene will play the Wiltern and Australian buzz band Vacations will begin their three-night run at the Troubadour.

On Wednesday, alt-country harpist Mikaela Davis is at Sid The Cat Auditorium, and the Grammy Museum hosts a “Reelin’ in the Early Years of Steely Dan” panel featuring Licorice Pizza’s Jeff “Skunk” Baxter.

Thursday’s a big night for new-wave fans with the triple-bill of the Human League, Soft Cell and Alison Moyet at the Hollywood Bowl, while Vince Staples is at the El Rey. Plus, at 4 p.m. Licorice Pizza is hosting a Q&A with legendary rock photographer Henry Diltz at the record store.

Elsewhere on LAist, you can read up on artists working on post-fire projects in Altadena, and grab tickets to Tuesday’s The Moth at Los Globos and our annual LAist Night at Dodger Stadium on July 11.

Events

Angels Pride Night

Wednesday, June 3, 6:30 p.m. 
Angel Stadium
2000 E. Gene Autry Way, Anaheim 
COST: FROM $35; MORE INFO

Catch the Angels as they take on the Rockies for Pride Night.

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Kick off Pride Month with Pride Night at Angel Stadium, as the Angels take on the Colorado Rockies. You’ll score an Angels Pride jersey and can enjoy the pregame Pride Village.

Marilyn Monroe: Hollywood Icon

Ongoing
Academy Museum 
6067 Wilshire Blvd., Miracle Mile
COST: INCLUDED WITH GENERAL ADMISSION, $25; MORE INFO

Marilyn Monroe: Hollywood Icon is at the Academy Museum.

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Emily Shur

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Academy Museum Foundation

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She may have sung happy birthday to Mr. President, but it’s Marilyn’s turn now. Celebrate the biggest Hollywood star of all time, Marilyn Monroe, on what would be her 100th birthday: June 1. The special exhibit Marilyn Monroe: Hollywood Icon just opened at the Academy Museum, and it includes memorabilia, film clips and costumes that explore Monroe’s impact on the studio system, her iconic style and much more. From her costumes in Some Like It Hot to the pink dress by William Travilla in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes to letters and personal materials, the exhibit takes a complete look at Norma Jeane’s legacy.

Stop Making Sense

Monday June 1, 7:30 p.m. 
Vidiots
4884 N. Eagle Rock Blvd., Eagle Rock 
COST: WALK-UP TICKETS AVAILABLE; MORE INFO

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What, you think I’d let you miss an opportunity to see Stop Making Sense on the big screen? And lose all my indie cool cred? Never. Talking Heads’ classic 1984 music film (directed by the late, great Jonathan Demme) will be shown at Vidiots in 4K digital to celebrate 40 years of everyone’s favorite film nerd superstore.

The Drop: Dogstar

Tuesday, June 2, 7:30 p.m.
Grammy Museum
800 W Olympic Blvd., Downtown L.A.
COST: SOLD OUT BUT WAITLIST AVAILABLE; MORE INFO

Keanu Reeves will perform with his band, Dogstar, this week.

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Keanu Reeves’s other career — as the rockstar lead singer of Dogstar — has taken shape and developed a loyal fanbase over the years. Join the band for an evening of stories, music and conversation on the Grammy Museum rooftop as they release their latest album, All in Now.

Edi Patterson: Playgirl 

Wednesday, June 3, 8 p.m.
Largo at the Coronet
366 N. La Cienega Blvd., Melrose
COST: $50; MORE INFO

Edi Patterson will be improvising an entire play.

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The Righteous Gemstones actress Edi Patterson brings her bold improv to the Largo for her new show, Playgirl. No, she’s not improvising a pinup; rather, she’s doing something so much bolder — performing a full-length play completely improvised right on the spot. Yes, she’s playing all the characters.

Wet Hot Amusical Summer

Thursday, June 4, and various dates through June, 7:30 p.m.
Three Clubs 
1123 Vine Street, Hollywood 
COST: $33; MORE INFO

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A cult film if there ever was one, the 2001 David Wain film Wet Hot American Summer (starring Paul Rudd, Amy Poehler and many, many more) is ripe for a send-up stage treatment — and the folks at Cherry Poppins have delivered with Wet Hot Amusical Summer. The spoof of a spoof is sure to be an over-the-top send-up of what’s already a comedy legend; the show continues through the Hollywood Fringe Festival.

The Big Run 

Wednesday, June 3, 6:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. 
Johnny Carson Park 
400 S. Bob Hope Drive, Burbank
COST: $22.50; MORE INFO

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Celebrate Global Running Day with friends in Burbank as The Big Run takes over Johnny Carson Park. Hosted by Fleet Feet Burbank in partnership with the Burbank Parks and Recreation Department, run the .4 mile loop as many times as you can in 30 minutes to compete!