The Brief

Palisades Charter High School reopens Tuesday a little more than a year after fire tore through campus and the surrounding community.

The Palisades Fire destroyed 30% of the campus including classrooms and the track and field. Now there is a wide grassy expanse where an academic building once stood. Bulldozers cleared the baseball diamond to make way for three dozen portable classrooms. Many of the campus’ trees are still standing with blackened trunks.

A few of the 2,400 students expected to return in-person toured the campus Monday, including junior Jackson Richmond. He said despite the changes, the campus still feels familiar.

“Nothing just beats, like, the look of Pali,” Richmond said. “Like, it's in movies for a reason.”

But other Palisades families are more cautious about returning. Some parents have raised concerns about whether the remediation efforts went far enough and how the test results were communicated to families.

“ I have mixed feelings,” said Victoria Kotlyar, parent of two sophomores. “I'm happy that they're gonna have a school to go to, but I am concerned about just the environment and if there's any pollution.”

The process to reopen the school included debris removal, cleaning, and multiple rounds of soil, water, air and surface testing in the new and remaining buildings.

LAUSD installed 36 new portable classrooms where the Palisades Charter High School baseball field once was.

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“At the moment, I'm 100% convinced that we are in a very safe environment,” said Principal Pamela Magee on Monday. “We've got folks watching out to make sure that that continues into the future.”

Environmental testing continues

Pali High was once part of the Los Angeles Unified School District. The school converted to an independently run charter school in 1993, but continues to lease its campus from the district.

LAUSD coordinated and paid for the post-fire clean-up.

LAUSD hired outside contractors to test, clean and retest the soil, water, air and surfaces in the remaining and new structures for toxins related to the wildfire.  

“We have full confidence that what was done was appropriate to safeguard not only our students, but our staff, students [and] the community,” said Office of Environmental Health and Safety Director Carlos Torres in a virtual community meeting on January 21.

The district did additional environmental testing in November and December 2025 to ensure the campus was not harmed by the demolition and construction in surrounding neighborhoods.

“We will be doing periodic sampling and analysis at this school and all the schools that were directly impacted by the fire,” said Deputy OEHS Director Jennifer Flores,

For example, the district has installed air sensors at the school that can detect two types of particulate matter (PM10 and PM2.5) and nitrogen dioxide, which are associated with pollution.

What risks remain?

Toxins related to wildfires can linger indoors, including in porous surfaces like carpet, stuffed animals and acoustic ceiling tiles. They release into the air over time in a process called “off-gassing.”

UCLA environmental health sciences professor Yifang Zhu said one way to imagine off-gassing is through the lingering smell of cigarettes at a casino that no longer allows smoking.

A large green field lies where Pali's "J" building once stood. Junior Tiffany Jensen said she imagines eating lunch here in the future.

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Whether those toxins harm people depends on “a combination [of] the chemicals themselves and then the level of exposures and the duration of the exposures over time,” Zhu said.

LAUSD contractors used vacuums with special filters to clean Pali’s remaining ceiling tiles. The air was tested several times and the results showed no buildup of fire-related compounds, “therefore the removal of the ceiling tiles is not necessary, and the interior spaces are safe to occupy,” read the district's report.

The school district asked Zhu and fellow researchers studying the health effects of the fires to review the district’s remediation plan and environmental test results. (Zhu said she and her colleagues were not compensated for their evaluation.)

“There's always chemicals you can detect, but I think we should really think through the lens… what is the additional level of risk?” Zhu said.

Zhu, whose daughter is a recent graduate of Pali, concluded that if given the choice now, she would feel comfortable sending her back to the campus.

“There's no such thing as zero risk,” Zhu said. “Risk is very personal. Every family is… different.”

Students plan to revive Pali traditions

Students say they’re looking forward to reviving Pali traditions from pep rallies to the senior’s blind speed-dating event.

Homecoming returns to the campus gym Saturday. The students pushed the fall dance to the end of January to hold it on their home turf.

The theme is “A Night in Greece,” and junior Tiffany Jensen said she expects to see a lot of blue and white summer dresses.

“A year ago, no one knew what was gonna happen to Pali,” she said. “It feels so amazing to be back on the campus to see all of our teachers, our faculty, staff, everyone is really excited to come back.”

Juniors Tiffany Jensen and Jackson Richmond got a preview of the Palisades Charter High School Campus on Monday.

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A few key features of the campus remain closed. The “stadium by the sea,” pool and related buildings, are still under construction and anticipated to reopen by the end of this February, according to Director of Operations Rafael Negroe.

Constructing a new building to replace the destroyed classrooms will take longer. LAUSD has budgeted $266 million from the bond passed in 2024 to rebuild Pali’s campus by the end of 2028. The district will also seek reimbursement from its insurers and FEMA.

Will all the families who left come back?

It’s still unclear how many families who lost homes in the fires will return or opt to transfer to schools closer to where they now live. Many of the schools damaged by January’s fires have fewer students this year. Pali’s enrollment has dropped 14% compared to before the fire, from 2,900 to 2,500 students. About 100 students are enrolled in the school's virtual learning program.

Parent Victoria Kotlyar said her family sold the property where their Palisades home once stood for “dirt cheap.”

“ We cannot wait so many years to rebuild because our kids are growing and they have nowhere to go,” Kotlyar said.

But her high school aged children, including sophomore Max Paik-Schoenberg, are committed to Pali.

“Whatever we buy, we're trying to buy something in the area so our kids can continue their education journey at these schools,” Kotlyar said. “We love the schools.”

Tuesday is the first time Paik-Schoenberg will see the Palisades since the fires. He transferred to Santa Monica High School instead of switching to virtual learning, but re-enrolled ahead of the campus reopening.

“ I'm pretty excited,” he said, “but I'm not really sure if it's gonna be the same as it was.”

A divided Los Angeles Unified School District Board voted 4-3 Tuesday to issue preliminary layoff notices to more than 3,000 employees, as part of a reduction-in-force plan to reduce the budget after several years of spending more money than it brings in.

Even as California is poised to fund schools at record-high levels, Los Angeles Unified and other districts have grappled with increased costs. For example, LAUSD hired more staff to support students during the pandemic, and now the federal relief dollars that initially funded those positions are gone.

For the past two years, the district has relied on reserves to backfill a multi-billion-dollar deficit. The district projects a deficit of $877 million next school year, about 14% of the 2026-2027 budget.

Who’s being cut?

LAUSD staff estimate the proposed cuts impact less than 1% of the district’s more than 83,000 member workforce.

Notices would go out to:

• 2,600 certificated and classified contract management employees and certificated administrators. 
• 657 central office and centrally funded classified positions. More than a third of these are IT technicians, by far the largest group.
• The plan also calls for reduced hours and pay for several dozen positions.

District leaders have emphasized that an employee who receives a RIF notice will not necessarily be cut.

What's next?

The reduction in force vote is the first step in a monthslong process that could result in layoffs for a still-to-be-determined number of positions because impacted employees may be moved to other positions. Staff said the board would vote to finalize any un-rescinded layoff notices in May or June.

This is a developing story and will be updated.

About 15% of California households lack access to high-speed internet, according to the latest report from UC Riverside. Researchers pointed to affordability as one of the biggest barriers to closing the persistent digital divide.

Edward Helderop, associate director at UCR’s Center for Geospatial Sciences and report author, told LAist that the findings weren't surprising.

“A lot of American households and California households don't have high-speed internet available at home,” Helderop said. “It's sort of just an unfortunate reality that that's the case for the state of California.”

What does the report say? 

Nearly one in seven households in California doesn’t have reliable internet access, according to the report. The biggest barrier continues to be affordability. Even in urban areas, like Los Angeles, where broadband internet is more widely available, the average monthly cost can range from $70 to $80 per month.

But in rural areas, broadband internet is still widely unavailable because of a lack of infrastructure investments from private companies. Only two-thirds of rural households have broadband access at home.

“This digital divide represents not just a technological failure, but a profound barrier to economic opportunity, educational advancement, and civic participation that undermines California’s potential for shared prosperity,” the report states.

Experts also call for mandatory broadband data transparency — internet providers should be required to publicly disclose their service speeds, pricing, reliability metrics and coverage areas.

“Private telecom companies administering the service, they're under no obligation to maintain publicly available data sets in the same way that you might get with other utilities,” Helderop said. “There are issues with the fact that the advertised speeds don't really match up with the actual speeds that people experience at home.”

Researchers also recommend that broadband providers be regulated as utilities, like water and power, monitoring rates, quality and service obligations.

“When we regulate something like a utility, it comes with a few regulations that we take for granted,” Helderop said. “Something like a universal service obligation, in which the utility … their primary motive is to provide universal service, so to provide the service to every household in California.”

As a public utility, officials could ensure that providers are offering the same type of service to every household in the state, as well as regulate rates.

Why it matters 

Norma Fernandez, CEO at Everyone On, said access to affordable, high-speed internet is a basic necessity.

"Still, too many families, particularly those in under-resourced communities, predominantly of color, are still left out,” Fernandez said. “Expanding reliable connectivity means addressing affordability, investing in community-centered solutions, and ensuring that digital access is part of every policy conversation."

Digital equity advocates say they see the need from local families every day, but available data doesn’t reflect that.

“On the maps, families appear to live in ‘connected’ neighborhoods, but in reality, they still can’t afford to get online because the monopoly provider’s plans are unaffordable,” Natalie Gonzalez, director at Digital Equity Los Angeles. “The provider-reported broadband maps don’t match what residents experience on the ground, and that gap has real consequences.”

In L.A., for example, hundreds of thousands of households lack reliable internet, but only a fraction qualify for public funding because available data says they’re already served, Gonzalez added.

“Public investment alone doesn’t guarantee equity if the underlying data is flawed,” Gonzalez said. “When the only data regulators have come from the providers themselves, the providers end up defining reality. Communities are then forced to prove they’re disconnected, without access to the same information the companies use to claim coverage.”

Cristal Mojica, digital equity expert at the Michelson Center for Public Policy, said pricing data is intentionally obscured.

“It makes it harder for people to shop around between internet plans,” Mojica told LAist. “It makes it really challenging for our state legislators to be effective and make effective decisions around affordability when they have to try to dig around for that information themselves.”

What’s next? 

California has already invested $6 billion for broadband –called the “Middle-Mile” project –through Senate Bill 156. The 2021 law is the largest state investment in broadband in U.S. history to get more people online.

Helderop explained that broadband investments are typically made possible through grants or loans to private telecom companies, making the state’s investment critical.

“It's the first time that any state, or any government in the United States, is taking it upon themselves to build and then own the infrastructure at the end of it,” Helderop said. “I would say that's probably the primary reason that we don't have universal broadband available to households in the United States right now.”

When completed, the “Middle-Mile” project will open markets to new providers and reduce monopolies, Helderop added.

Playboy founder Hugh Hefner’s widow, Crystal Hefner, is raising the alarm over her late husband’s foundation collecting about 3,000 of his personal scrapbooks and his diary, which she says contain thousands of nude images of women, some of whom might have been minors at the time the photos were taken.

In a press conference Tuesday, Hefner and her attorney, Gloria Allred, announced they’ve filed regulatory complaints with California and Illinois attorneys general, asking them to investigate the foundation’s handling of the scrapbooks. The complaints were filed to both attorneys general because the foundation is registered to do business in California but incorporated in Illinois.

“I believe they include women and possibly girls who never agreed to lifelong possession of their naked images and who have no transparency into where their photos are, how they’re being stored or what will happen to them next,” Hefner said.

She added the diary includes names of women he slept with, notes of sexual acts and other explicit details.

Hefner said she was asked to resign from her position as CEO and president of the Hugh M. Hefner Foundation on Monday after raising concerns about the materials. She said after she declined to resign, she was removed from her role.

She said she was told the scrapbooks may be in a storage facility in California. Allred says they were informed that the foundation plans to digitize them, but it’s unclear what it plans to do with them.

“This is not archival preservation. This is not history. This is control. I am deeply worried about these images getting out,” Hefner said. “Artificial intelligence, deepfakes, digital scanning, online marketplaces and data breaches means that once images leave secure custody, the harm is irreversible. A single security failure could devastate thousands of lives.”

In addition to asking for an investigation into the foundation’s handling of the materials, it also asks the attorneys general to take appropriate actions to secure those images.

LAist has reached out to the Hugh M. Hefner Foundation for comment.