The Brief

As counterprotesters tore at barricades, threw fireworks, and beat and pepper sprayed pro-Palestinian protesters at UCLA overnight Tuesday, no law enforcement officers took action to stop the violence or made any arrests. In stark contrast, by Wednesday night, UC Police declared that anyone who remains in the “unlawful” encampment would be arrested.

The reason for such a mixed response from law enforcement: haphazard adherence to UC President Michael Drake’s 2021 UC Campus Safety Plan.

Encampments at a growing number of universities across the state and nation are sparking battles between students’ free speech and campus policies against trespassing and obstructing operations. For the University of California system, the encampments at five campuses are a test of newly implemented campus policing reforms meant to address systemic racism post-2020.

Drake’s safety plan states: “The University will reinforce existing guidelines that minimize police presence at protests, follow de-escalation methods in the event of violence and seek non-urgent mutual aid first from UC campuses before calling outside law enforcement agencies.”

The plan was designed to deter potential violence — and reduce a police role in campus protests. But now, people are questioning why law enforcement did not break up any of the physical assaults or otherwise intervene as violence escalated at the Los Angeles campus. According to a statement Drake released Wednesday, there were at least 15 injuries and one hospitalization.

The UC president has ordered a review of UCLA’s “mutual aid response” and UCLA Chancellor Gene Block said he plans to “dismantle (the encampment) at the appropriate time.”

“My office has requested a detailed accounting from the campus about what transpired in the early morning hours today,” Drake said today. “But some confusion remains. Therefore, we are also ordering an independent external review of both UCLA’s planning and actions, and the effectiveness of the mutual aid response.”

UC lecturers were quick to call for Block’s resignation, citing the mismanagement of police and security response to the overnight violence.

“Chancellor Block has refused to meet with protesters to discuss their interests; instead he has created an environment that has escalated tensions and failed to take meaningful action to prevent the violence that occurred last night,” the UC lecturers’ statement read.

Counterprotesters began setting off fireworks around 10:30 p.m., and later, armed with pepper and bear spray, physically attacked those residing in the pro-Palestinian encampment. During this time, university-hired, unarmed security guards and campus public safety aides watched the scene but did not stop the attacks. By about 1:30 a.m., Los Angeles Police and the California Highway Patrol arrived, after the chancellor called them to assist security guards and UC police. The officers did not break up the violence. Instead, they advanced a line every few minutes to push the counterprotesters out of the area. Some of the counterprotesters who remained, however, continued their assaults.

At about 4 a.m., a small group of student journalists for the Daily Bruin, including Christopher Buchanan, a student fellow for the CalMatters College Journalism Network, were confronted by a group of counterprotesters who began berating them. They targeted the staff’s news editor, calling her names, and blocked the journalists’ route to the Daily Bruin office. One shined a strobe light into Buchanan’s face while others attacked him as he fell to the ground.

“After I was struck and debilitated, I was surrounded by four to seven counterprotesters who proceeded to punch and kick my head and torso for thirty seconds to a minute,” Buchanan said. “I didn’t sustain any internal injuries, but I was badly bruised on the body and face.”

Buchanan said this all happened within earshot of CHP officials, who did nothing to intervene.

Students and government officials are decrying UCLA’s response. UCLA refused to provide interviews or answer questions about their policing response.

California Assemblymember Rick Chavez Zbur, a Democrat whose district includes UCLA, issued a statement condemning the violence against pro-Palestinian protesters.

“The horrific acts of violence against UCLA students and demonstrators that occurred on campus last night are abhorrent and have no place in Los Angeles or in our democracy,” Zbur said. “No matter how strongly one may disagree with or be offended by the anti-Israel demonstrators’ messages, tactics, or goals, violence is never acceptable and those responsible must be held accountable.”

In the past few days, UC Irvine and UCLA have declared their campus encampment protests illegal and in violation of the state education code against non-UC use of university property. Many pro-Palestinian student advocates see this position as an attempt to disrupt their advocacy.

In responding to the encampments, the UC, unlike some universities, has avoided an aggressive law enforcement response. Police have not arrested anyone or used tear gas. The UC Campus Safety plan, however, has not been uniformly followed at each campus.

UC Irvine appeared to ignore the campus safety plan. When an encampment was erected on April 29, the university immediately called in the UC police department, the Orange County Sheriff’s Department, and the police forces of Irvine, Costa Mesa and Newport. Officers in riot gear barricaded the encampment entrance.

UC Irvine spokesperson Tom Vasich described the decision to involve five law enforcement departments as “a standard response” for situations where the campus needs support while simultaneously describing the protest as a “very peaceful environment.” He attributed the police response to potential trespassing violations from people not affiliated with the university.

“This isn’t a free speech issue, this is a trespassing issue,” Vasich said.

Sara, a UC Irvine student studying psychological sciences who only gave her first name in fear of retaliation for participating in the protest, said that at around 9 a.m. on Monday, law enforcement prevented students from entering the encampment and giving protesters water.

Despite police pushback, she said students and bystanders later created barricades around their encampment, allowing students to enter the area and receive supplies. “The students here all know the risks,” Sara said. “But regardless, they stood their ground and will continue to stand their ground until our demands are met.”

UC Irvine Chancellor Howard Gillman said in a Monday night statement that police would no longer engage with the protesters, and hours later police cleared out. Gillman promised to work with students to find a different location “that is appropriate and non-disruptive.”

How the UC plan is supposed to ensure safety

The UC Campus Safety Plan is being put to the test amid heightened tensions between pro-Palestinian groups calling for the UC to financially divest from companies with ties to Israel, and pro-Israel groups counterprotesting and calling the actions of those in the encampments anti-semitic.

The UC Office of the President released a statement on April 26 rejecting demands for divestment.

“The University of California has consistently opposed calls for boycotts against and divestment from Israel,” the statement said. “While the University affirms the right of our community members to express diverse viewpoints, a boycott of this sort impinges on the academic freedom of our students and faculty and the unfettered exchange of ideas on our campuses.”

President Drake’s office refused multiple requests from CalMatters to answer questions about UC’s response to campus encampment protests.

The UC’s policing reforms came after the system faced several high-profile instances of excessive force in response to student advocacy on campuses. In 2011, the Occupy Wall Street protests at UC Davis drew international attention when peaceful activists were pepper sprayed by the university’s police department. In the end, students won a $1 million settlement from UC Davis.

In 2020, racial justice organizations and Black student unions at the UC’s nine undergraduate campuses led protests over the police-custody murder of George Floyd, and to cast a light on other Black Americans killed by law enforcement officers.

Their activism elevated negative experiences that some students of color reported with campus police. Students and employees demonstrated against racial profiling and a lack of police transparency. Some pushed for reforms; others called for abolishing police on university campuses.

The 2021 safety plan instituted data dashboards, police advisory boards, mental health responders and professional accreditation for individual police departments. According to the UC’s director of community safety Jody Stiger, all 10 campuses are expected to put the plan into action — with the final, delayed step being professional accreditation for campus law enforcement agencies — by the end of this year.

The UC Cops Off Campus Coalition, composed of UC students and faculty, has criticized the safety plan for not acknowledging the structural biases of police forces, and only increasing the scope of policing power.

UC Riverside Black Studies professor and faculty coalition member Dylan Rodríguez described the Campus Safety Plan as largely reactionary. He said it is the UC’s attempt to quell a push for police abolition in the wake of the UC’s own crises and Floyd’s murder.

“It’s a response to a period of time in which there are deep questions, fundamental and abolitionist questions, about whether campuses should have fully armed, militarized and, sometimes, riot-gear equipped and SWAT team-trained police officers on their campuses,” Rodríguez said.

The stated aim of UC’s tiered response is to use several non-sworn responders in calls for emergencies that don’t require police. Relying on alternatives to police allows campuses to respond to students in crisis who require mental health support or intervention. The plan also establishes public safety officers to patrol residence halls on foot, escort students across campus at night, provide security for events and diffuse unsafe behavior.

In an interview with CalMatters before this week’s violence, Stiger praised the increase of unarmed security guards and guidance against a police presence at protests. Police were not called to the scene during recent labor strikes, nor for earlier protests on both sides of the Gaza war.

“In almost a majority of those on every campus, you don’t see any police. You might see maybe one or two that are just in the area, but you don’t see a major police presence,” Stiger said.

Late Tuesday, the university delivered a formal letter to UCLA’s Divest Coalition declaring the encampment an unlawful assembly in violation of campus policy. Chancellor Block put out a statement saying the university removed demonstrators’ barricades blocking entrances to specific buildings, and warned that students could face suspension or expulsion.

Campus police chiefs at UC Berkeley, UCLA and UC Irvine refused several requests for comment from CalMatters.

The UC Student Association — systemwide student representatives — published a statement on April 29 in solidarity with students protesting for “Free Palestine” and condemning the law enforcement response.

“We demand that the UC, at a minimum, allow students to exercise their freedom of speech,” the statement read. “We denounce any use of police force to silence us.”

Christopher Buchanan, Li Khan and Hugo Rios contributed to this story.  All authors are fellows with the College Journalism Network, a collaboration between CalMatters and student journalists from across California. CalMatters higher education coverage is supported by a grant from the College Futures Foundation.

This story first appeared on The LA Local.

Housing needs for current and future residents, environmental justice, access to local commercial corridors and preserving Boyle Heights’ cultural legacy will be priorities as the neighborhood grows, according to its newly updated community plan.

In a 14-0 vote, city leaders last week officially approved the update to the Boyle Heights Community Plan, which acts like a blueprint for the future of one of L.A.’s oldest neighborhoods. The multidecade effort to update the document is its first change since 1998.

Councilmember Ysabel Jurado spoke to the greater City Council during a June 24 meeting and pointed to the history of Boyle Heights residents being left out of conversations that impact their neighborhood. For the updated plan, she said neighbors and other stakeholders worked to mold it into a positive asset for the community of roughly 85,000 people.

“This plan reflects years of community advocacy for stronger environmental protections, more thoughtful land-use decisions, greater compatibility between industrial and residential uses, affordable housing antidisplacement measures and investments that allow families to remain in the neighborhoods that they built,” Jurado said during the meeting. 

Jurado spoke as the Lineage warehouse fire was still burning next to homes. She stressed the future of the neighborhood didn’t necessarily have to mirror its past.

“No community plan can undo generations of inequitable land use decisions overnight…” Jurado said, referring to the residential neighborhoods around the industrial zone that endured smoke from the fire for days. “A community cannot thrive if families are asked to bear environmental burdens that [other communities] aren’t forced to accept.”

The plan will allow for 13,000 new homes, attract 12,000 more work opportunities, and accommodate 37,000 additional residents in Boyle Heights through the year 2040, according to a press release from L.A.’s Planning Department.

The latest update incentivizes developers to build in the proposed zones by the L.A. River that will allow more mixed-use structures, such as apartments above small businesses. The plan will also offer opportunities for legacy small businesses to be relocated to the new development area to further preserve the culture and identity of the neighborhood. 

Addressing environmental harms

The plan also includes updated building code guidelines to ensure that:

• Potentially disruptive or hazardous industrial uses along streets that serve as boundaries between industrial areas and residential neighborhoods are discouraged
• Facilities that handle hazardous materials near residents and schools are phased out
• Qualifying development projects conduct soil testing to ensure that lead and arsenic are removed from the soil prior to any ground disturbance

Housing, jobs and neighborhood character

The plan update also features the following tools to “promote affordable housing, economic development, and maintain the community identity” in the neighborhood:

• Prioritizes new production of housing development along commercial corridors and near transit stations to reduce automobile dependency, while safeguarding existing residential neighborhoods
• Incentivizes units for a range of lower-income households, including families of four that make less than $16,000 annually, and family-sized units for intergenerational housing needs 
• Adopts new zoning standards that promote corner shops, or tienditas, that provide groceries and household goods within a walkable distance of the surrounding residential neighborhood
• Strengthens local business and job growth potential along major corridors with new regulations that limit the size of commercial spaces to support mom-and-pop-style businesses and neighborhood grocery stores rather than big-box stores and chains
• New zoning standards that require design features on new development to be compatible with and reflect the existing character of historic and potentially historic buildings, such as those along the historic Brooklyn Avenue corridor

The updated Plan was initially approved in September 2024 and preserves access to incoming affordable housing while safeguarding housing in existing residential neighborhoods.

The plan update also incorporates the New Zoning Code, a more flexible zoning system designed to promote sustainable development and equity across L.A. neighborhoods. Boyle Heights is the second L.A. neighborhood to utilize the new code after downtown. 

Councilmember Ysabel Jurado and members of Eastside LEADS speak at a town hall at the Boyle Heights City Hall on June, 10, 2026.

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Laura Anaya-Morga

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Boyle Heights Beat

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Residents’ hopes for implementation

At a June 10 town hall at Boyle Heights City Hall, various community groups and organizations met with Jurado and the Eastside Leadership for Equitable and Accountable Development Strategies (LEADS) coalition to discuss the plan.

At the end of the meeting, attendees broke into groups to talk about issues they wanted addressed and what neighborhood identity and culture would be important to preserve as the community plan is implemented.

Daniel Jimenez said that his table discussed “how important it is for us to be able to have affordable housing in our neighborhoods.”

In addition to affordable housing, others shared that the plan should ensure adequate parking for new developments, create more green spaces and programming for youth.

Fanny Ortiz, a longtime Boyle Heights resident, said, “In order for us to live and thrive in our community, we should be able to have housing with dignity.”

According to a representative from Jurado’s office, the plan will take effect later this summer. 

This story first appeared on The LA Local.

Every Wednesday morning, at a coffee shop near the corner of Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and Western Avenue, a line begins to form. 

People aren’t just coming to South LA Cafe for coffee, they come for the groceries that will ensure their respective households have enough food for the week.

The food giveaway at the cafe, co-founded by Joe Ward-Wallace, has become a weekly stop for hundreds of residents. What started as a coffee shop has grown into a community hub addressing food insecurity through consistent grocery distributions and local support.

Each week, South LA Cafe distributes 200 bags of groceries, many filled with fresh produce, meat and a mix of pantry goods. 

Most of the people in line are the elderly and families because the distribution happens mid-morning during the week.

“Usually a bag of groceries can feed a family of four for about a week,” Ward-Wallace said. “It gives them the essentials so they can survive … We hope for a lot of people.”

Volunteer Kiki Miller distributing strawberries into each bag of groceries.

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Hawaii Utterbach

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The LA Local

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As of 2026, South LA Cafe has five locations across LA. It opened its fifth location on Vermont Avenue in October 2025. 

“It’s become more than a coffee shop. It’s become a movement in every community.” Ward-Wallace said.

That growth is supported by a system that depends heavily on volunteers. From packing bags to organizing supplies, the weekly food drive requires constant coordination.

 “Every bag has fresh produce in it… so it requires a huge volunteer network,” said Kiki Miller, a volunteer.  “People are constantly coming in to prep and pack bags.”

The need for that support continues to grow as many families struggle to keep up with the rising cost of living. Rent, transportation and supporting a family can quickly add up, making food one of the hardest expenses to afford consistently. According to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, food prices have risen by 3.1% overall during the last 12 months. Grocery prices increased by 2.4%, while dining out saw a 4.1% increase.

There is also a stigma attached to seeking food assistance. Some people feel like spaces like this are not meant for them, or they feel embarrassed to show up at all.

Ward-Wallace understands that feeling personally.

 “I used to be in those lines … and I was embarrassed,” he said. “If we’re going to have a community space, people are going to feel welcome. No one should feel bad for needing food.”

Co-founder of South LA Cafe, Joe Ward-Wallace, stands outside the cafe.

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Hawaii Utterbach

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The LA Local

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That perspective shapes how South LA Cafe operates. The grocery program meets immediate needs, but it also prioritizes removing stigma around asking for help. 

“Why do they have to go somewhere else?” Ward-Wallace said. “We can do it right here in our own community.”

For volunteers, the impact is easy to see but meaningful.

“I might not be able to fix everything, but today I can come feed someone,” Miller said.

For more information on South LA Cafe’s Wednesday grocery giveaway, including how to receive groceries or volunteer, visit the cafe’s website. 

This story was produced under The LA Local’s Youth Journalism Program. To learn more or to get involved, click here.

Should surgeons be allowed to perform euthanasia by removing patients' hearts and other organs while they're still alive?

The idea, dubbed "Death by Organ Donation," would enable euthanasia patients to donate organs for transplantation in a way that would make their organs more likely to be usable. It would also kill them.

"It would be an ethical thing to do because this is something the patients have chosen for themselves," says Dr. Robert Truog, a physician and bioethicist at Harvard Medical School who co-authored a paper outlining Death by Organ Donation in the New England Journal of Medicine. "They have very generously thought: 'How might my death help other people?' It's a very altruistic, generous thing to do.'"

But the idea is controversial for a variety of reasons, including because it goes against fundamental principles that have guided organ donation for decades. The Dead Donor Rule requires that patients must be dead before any organs are removed. Doctors also can't kill patients in the process of removing organs.

The rule has long generated intense debate, including disputes over how to precisely determine when a person is dead, as well as the development of new ways to extend the lives of dying patients and recover usable organs for transplants.

At the same time, many countries, including Canada, the Netherlands and Spain, have made it legal for doctors to help patients die through euthanasia.

"What if they chose to be organ donors? The problem is that under current standards doctors must not cause death in the process of procuring organs for transplant," Truog says.

So hearts, lungs, livers and kidneys can only be removed from euthanasia patients after they have received a lethal dose of drugs, which makes their organs, especially their hearts, much less useful for transplantation.

"Why would it not be OK for patients to say, 'I've chosen to die by a lethal injection. Isn't there some way I can help others?' They should be able to donate organs as a lasting gift to others. And denying them that option doesn't seem to make any sense," Truog says. "I would say a more appropriate framework is that for patients who are choosing to die from euthanasia they could also choose to have euthanasia linked with organ donation."

A "creepy idea" that might have merit

Euthanasia involves doctors administering lethal drugs to cause the death of a patient. The practice is illegal in the U.S., but a growing number of states have legalized assisted-suicide, in which doctors give patients lethal drugs to take at home.

Instead of a doctor administering lethal medication to a patient, Death by Organ Donation patients would end the patient's life by anesthetizing them and then removing their organs while they are still functioning.

"So the organs would still be in ideal condition," says Truog says.

Some other bioethicists say the argument could have merit.

"The concept of death by donation is an extremely troubling notion at first glance. It's a creepy idea," says Ruth Faden, a bioethicist at Johns Hopkins University. "But in fact if you look at it critically in terms of the foundational ethical considerations, it's not as disturbing as it first appears."

That's because, she says, of the spread and acceptance of euthanasia and the desires of some of those patients to be organ donors.

"If we're committed to respecting the autonomy of individuals at the end of their life. And if they prefer to maximize the good their bodies can do at the end of their life, that's the ethical justification for death by donation," Faden says. She adds it would be important for strong safeguards to be implemented to ensure full informed consent and to protect patients from abuse.

A shift could undermine patient trust

But some other bioethicists are horrified by the mere notion.

"This is asking surgeons to take a living person into the operating room and to come out with a dead person, which I think is murder," says Lainie Friedman Ross, a bioethicist at the University of Rochester. "There are limits to consent. And one of the things we're not allowed to do is consent to saying that somebody else can just murder you."

Others worry this approach would undermine trust in both organ donation and end-of-life care at a time when some potential donors are already wary because of controversies about organ procurement efforts.

"You could be doing real damage to both the physician-assisted suicide system and the organ donation system," says Lori Andrews, a bioethicist and professor emerita at the Chicago-Kent College of Law. "It might give people the image that these are vultures that no longer wait until you die to attack. It does give up visions of body snatchers from prior centuries."

Critics also fear that allowing Death by Donation for euthanasia patients could open the door to someday saying it would be acceptable practice for physician-assisted suicide patients and even potentially hospice patients.

But others argue that for now this approach could be considered for at least some euthanasia patients.

"If there are people who want to donate organs, this would be the way to maximize their wishes and their altruistic goal to help others," says Dr. Carter Winberg, a Canadian critical care physician working on his master's degree in bioethics at Harvard who co-authored the New England Journal of Medicine paper. "These are people who are already consenting to voluntary euthanasia and already consent to organ donation. That warrants a new conversation about whether this is possibly ethical."
Copyright 2026 NPR

With the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art opening in Exposition Park this fall, residents who share the South L.A. ZIP code will be able to visit for free with a new pass, officials announced Thursday.

Some members of the community will also be invited into the museum for a preview day a little more than a week before the Sept. 22 grand opening.

Other tickets are going up for grabs starting next week, with members of the museum getting priority access before general admission opens to the public the following week.

CEO Tracey Bates told LAist the 300,000-square-foot building feels comforting, intimate and familiar once you walk inside. Its collection represents more than 40,000 works, and Bates said it platforms artists you may have never seen in a museum before.

“I think as an Angeleno, the sheer love of what this city is built on — storytelling, filmmaking, illustration — is something to really come and take in,” Bates said. “And hopefully inspire you to become a creative when you leave us.”

Here’s what you need to know to get in.

Neighborhood pass

Angelenos who live in the museum’s 90037 ZIP code will have exclusive access to the “LM37” pass, which allows free tickets to be reserved for themselves and one guest.

A portion of tickets will be set aside for passholders for the opening and beyond, according to officials.

The LM37 program launches in August. Those interested in registering for the pass should sign up here.

There will also be a special community preview day on Sept. 13 for partners, local business owners and civic leaders. Officials said tickets to the preview day will be handed out through local government officials, community partners and directly to registered passholders.

“We really wanted to make sure our neighbors were some of the first people through the door to thank them,” Bates said.

Priority access

Founding members will get the first shot at snagging tickets, starting with the highest tiers.

People who got the Insider membership for $375 and Alliance membership for $600 will have access to tickets starting at 10 a.m. July 14.

Priority tickets will be open to all members by 10 a.m. July 15, including the $140 Access tier and $270 Social tier.

Members will also get a preview from Sept. 5 through Sept. 11 before the museum officially opens to the public later that month.

You can find more membership information here.

General admission

General tickets will go on sale at 10 a.m. July 21. Visitors will be able to reserve a spot from the opening date through the end of next February.

Adults will cost $25 and people aged 65 and older will be $21.

All tickets are timed entry, and you can share them with your party if you buy more than one. You’ll have to create an account to accept and access the shared ticket. Whoever purchases the tickets will be required to keep at least one in their account, according to museum officials.

Tickets for children, founding members, active-duty military, personal aides or attendants and EBT cardholders will be free.

Bates said one of the key missions of the museum is inspiring the next generation of storytellers, and the free options help get as many people through the doors as possible.

“We just want to make sure that nobody is limited to come to the museum and enjoy what we hope the museum will inspire in everybody,” she said.

You can find more ticket information here.

More to come

More tickets will be released once museum officials get a sense of how the first several months sell, and next year’s programming will also be announced at a later date.

Bates noted that the 2028 Olympics will bring in visitors from around the world. She said that if people’s first trip to South L.A. is for the Lucas Museum, she hopes they will come back and spend time in the rest of Exposition Park, including the Natural History Museum and California Science Center.

“With the wealth of cultural events that are going to be happening over the next two years, the Super Bowl and LA28, there's just so much going on,” she said. “We're just very proud to be a part of this rich history of Los Angeles.”