The Brief

Last year was supposed to mark a milestone in the psychedelic movement. Lawmakers and advocates were set to make California the next frontier in allowing the use of “magic mushrooms.”

They were hopeful because Gov. Gavin Newsom in 2023 — after vetoing a bill that would have decriminalized the possession of psychedelics — asked legislators for a bill that would prioritize the therapeutic promise of these drugs.

Sen. Scott Wiener, a San Francisco Democrat, responded to Newsom’s request with a proposal that would have allowed for psilocybin and other hallucinogens to be ingested in a controlled setting and under the supervision of licensed and trained facilitators.

But that bill, like three similar ones before it and after it, went nowhere. Skeptical lawmakers expressed concerns about funding, standing up a complex program and safety as they turned down the measures.

Undeterred, advocates now are regrouping to try again.

What exactly a new legislative proposal would look like in California is still uncertain, advocates and lawmakers say. Most agree that getting something through in California will have to be more narrow than what’s been proposed in the past, and likely will be centered on providing access to veterans.

What’s most feasible is “some sort of pilot program, or something on a smaller scale to prove it out,” said Jesse Gould, founder and president of the Heroic Hearts Project, which has sponsored psychedelic proposals in California and other states. His nonprofit connects military veterans struggling with post traumatic stress disorder with psychedelic programs in other countries.

Psychedelics remain illegal at the federal level, but voters in two states have authorized them for certain uses and several California cities have passed measures decriminalizing them. President Joe Biden in late 2023 signed a defense spending bill that included money to study how psychedelic drugs could be used to treat veterans and military service members.

What Gould and other advocates envision as a first step for California might look like a proposal Sen. Josh Becker, a Democrat from Menlo Park and Sen. Brian Jones, a San Diego Republican, submitted last summer. Their bill, dubbed Heal Our Heroes Act, would have allowed the counties of San Diego, Santa Cruz and San Francisco to launch up to five centers each where licensed staff could facilitate psilocybin to veterans and former first responders over 21 who passed a screening test.

Their bill did not move forward, but their concept could return.

Prioritizing and limiting this experimental access to veterans and former first responders is the most responsible route, Jones said. He does not support decriminalizing psychedelics for recreational use.

“I want to serve our veterans who are suffering from these mental ailments and do everything we can so that they get the attention they need when they come home,” Jones said.

As of publication, Jones and Becker said they had not yet decided whether they’d re-introduce the Heal Our Heroes bill this year. Wiener’s office did not respond to requests for an interview.

States legalize psychedelic therapies

Approximately 8 million Americans used psilocybin mushrooms in 2023, according to RAND, a research organization, and a UC Berkeley poll showed that 61% of voters  support regulated therapeutic use of psychedelic substances.

Since 2020, at least 37 states have introduced bills or ballot measures pertaining to psychedelics. These range from funding research to reducing penalties for possession. Not all proposals make it through, but some researchers predict this momentum will lead to change in state laws over the next several years. One 2023 analysis published in the Journal for the American Medical Association Psychiatry forecasted that a majority of states will have legalized psychedelics by 2037.

In the Golden State, drug reform advocacy groups and researchers have tried at least three times since 2022 to place psychedelic-related measures on the ballot, but have failed to meet the signature-gathering deadlines.

Going to voters is expensive and a major undertaking with no guarantee. The ballot box strategy proved successful in Oregon and Colorado, where voters, in 2020 and 2022, approved measures to allow the facilitated use of psychedelics.

Voters in Massachusetts, however, recently rejected a measure that would have allowed the state to legalize and regulate five plant-based psychedelics for people 21 and up.

Part of the issue with the Massachusetts ballot initiative was that it was too broad, said Jared Moffat, deputy policy director of New Approach, a political action committee dedicated to drug reform. Voters were confused about what exactly the measure would do and who it would apply to, he said. He didn’t view the measure’s failure as a sign that people would reject legalizing psychedelics for specific uses.

“I think that there’s still a ton of support for therapeutic access,” he said. “I think that people, broadly speaking, have a deep understanding that there is a mental health crisis, and that the existing tools that we have help some people, but there are a lot of folks that aren’t being helped.”

Veterans seeking new PTSD treatments

Gould started his nonprofit, Heroic Hearts Project, after his own journey with PTSD led him to the Peruvian Amazon for nontraditional therapies.

Two years after leaving the military, Gould was diagnosed with PTSD. He was also dealing with the aftermath of a traumatic brain injury. The former Army Ranger sought therapy from the Department of Veterans Affairs, but even before he could see a therapist, he was being offered prescription drugs, he said.

“This didn’t seem like the first, next best step, and I was sort of disillusioned by what was offered,” Gould said. “It was just sort of an acquiescence of, ‘oh yeah, you’re messed up, and you’re going to be messed up,’ as opposed to building tangible steps forward.”

Around the same time, he was hearing about Ayahuasca retreats in Peru. After lots of internet research and a leap of faith, Gould made the trip to Iquitos, a remote town in the northwestern part of the country. He described the experience as one of the most challenging things he’s ever done. Immediately after he felt lighter, more at peace and more connected to everything around him, he said. In the following months, he noticed that the things that would trigger anxiety, hypervigilance or depression, didn’t affect him to the same degree as before, he said.

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Groups including Heroic Hearts and Veterans Exploring Treatment Solutions (VETS) provide “healing grants” to veterans from across the country seeking to try guided psychedelic retreats in other countries. More recently, Heroic Hearts has also started helping vets access psychedelic programs in Oregon.

“There are a lot of veterans from California going to our retreats in Oregon,” Gould said. “I feel like if I was a politician in California, that’d be a little bit embarrassing.”

But demand currently outstrips the availability of these grants, said Khurshid Khoja, director of public policy at Veterans Exploring Treatment Solutions, an organization that focuses on veteran suicide prevention.

“We are saying no to a majority of the folks who are applying because we simply don’t have the funds to be able to send them,” Khoja said. “We try to identify folks who have tried everything at this point, and they need a Hail Mary because they are experiencing a suicidal ideation.”

Suicide is the second leading cause of death for veterans under the age of 45, according to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. In California, 449 veterans died by suicide in 2022, the most recent federal data show. By some estimates 1 in 5 U.S veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan experience PTSD and major depression.

The goal, Khoja said, is get to a point where the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approves a psychedelic product for therapy that can be available and covered by the Department of Veterans Affairs, but in the meantime, Veterans Exploring Treatment Solutions is looking to states to create psychedelic programs.

One of the first things on advocates’ wishlist is a memorandum promising states that the federal government would not pursue charges in states that legalize and regulate psychedelics, said Sam Chapman, a political strategist and former campaign manager for Oregon’s measure that legalized psilocybin use there. The Obama administration issued that kind of guidance to states in 2013 with regard to marijuana.

“The states are going to continue to lead,” Chapman said. “The states passing laws are the reason that the federal government will eventually get off the bench and do something.”

Supported by the California Health Care Foundation (CHCF), which works to ensure that people have access to the care they need, when they need it, at a price they can afford. Visit www.chcf.org to learn more.

A theater project bringing the world of William Shakespeare to local veterans is gearing up for its first public performance on Sunday.

For the past year, a group of about a dozen veterans have met at the West Los Angeles VA campus to study the work of the Bard of Avon.

The project is in partnership with the Shakespeare Center of Los Angeles, Veterans in Art and other organizations. The group is led by trained theater artist — and fellow veteran — Aaron Lyons.

Lyons is a longtime staple of L.A.’s theater community and is a member of the Antaeus Theatre Company. He said seeing this group express themselves through these timeless works has been inspiring.

“Helping them grasp Shakespeare, not only intellectually but emotionally, has been one of the most uplifting experiences of my life,” Lyons said.

Ranging in age from their 30s to their 70s, the group includes veterans of the Vietnam War and most of its members live at the West LA VA Campus, Lyons said.

The actor, who’s performed in more than half of Shakespeare’s plays, said part of his goal with the project was to demystify Shakespeare’s canon for veterans who might not have studied it since grade school.

“Watching this group of men and women understand it and be able to connect with it in ways that they didn’t think possible was really, really inspiring,” Lyons said.

The group will perform an original work called “Shakespeare Night Live” at 3 p.m. Sunday, March 15, at McCadden Place Theatre. The performance weaves through several Shakespearian monologues and scenes.

Tickets are $10 and available at the Shakespeare Center of Los Angeles website.

The war in Iran is rattling the aviation industry, from flight cancellations to rising costs for jet fuel. So if you're planning to travel this spring or summer, should you grab a ticket now, or wait?

"You should go ahead and book," says Sean Cudahy, an aviation reporter at The Points Guy travel and personal finance website.

It's generally recommended to buy international flights further in advance than domestic trips. But in the current circumstances, Cudahy says he would go ahead and book even domestic flights.

His advice is a sign of how the Middle East conflict is rippling outward, affecting prices and itineraries around the world, beyond the thousands of travelers who were stuck after the war forced a barrage of flight cancellations.

Airlines warn that ticket prices will rise with fuel costs

The war's effect on travel was sudden and striking, resulting in the cancellation of more than 46,000 flights in and out of the Middle East from Feb. 28 — when the U.S. and Israel began bombing Iran — to March 11, according to Cirium, the aviation analytics company.

That includes Dubai International, the busiest airport in the world for international travel, according to Airports Council International, along with popular hubs in Doha and Abu Dhabi.

But even airlines far from the Mideast are facing a sudden surge in a core expense: jet fuel. At the beginning of the year, a gallon of jet fuel cost $2.11; by March 10, the price rose to $3.40, according to the Argus U.S. Jet Fuel Index, a gain of more than 60%.

The spike came after tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz came to a virtual halt, as Iran announced it would close the waterway that normally handles about 20% of the world's oil and liquified natural gas.

Mideast refineries had been sending some 470,000 barrels of jet fuel each day through the strait to airports in Europe and elsewhere, says Rick Joswick, who heads the near-term oil analytics team at S&P Global.

The price for a gallon of jet fuel soared close to $4 in the first week of the war, prompting United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby to say on Friday that airfare price hikes from higher fuel costs would "probably start quick."

As they absorb higher fuel costs, airlines could adjust prices higher across the board, or they might tuck an increase into premium fares, where they'll be less noticeable, Cudahy of The Points Guy says.

Several airlines have publicly confirmed that they'll be raising prices to compensate, as Reuters reports. Other carriers, such as Japan Airlines, publish a schedule of fuel surcharges triggered by cost increases.

"I do think that this is ultimately going to lead to higher fares for everyone," Cudahy says. "The only question now is how significant and how long does it last?"

Air travelers stranded by the Iran conflict are greeted in Athens, Greece, after arriving on a charter flight from Dubai on Saturday.

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Giannis Antwnoglou

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SOOC/AFP via Getty Images

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Crisis parallels earlier global disruptions

The higher fuel prices reflect a genuine struggle to ensure the aviation industry has ample supplies, says Joswick.

"It's not irrational. It's not some trader bidding up prices," he says. Comparing the situation to the COVID-19 pandemic, he adds, "The consumption of toilet paper didn't change. But you notice that all of the supermarkets ran out of toilet paper, right? Everyone wants to be sure that they have coverage of a critical need."

Both Cudahy and Joswick compare the Iran conflict's ripple effects to Russia launching its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, which set off flight disruptions and higher fuel prices. As long as the Strait of Hormuz is closed, Joswick says, prices will keep rising.

"If that were to persist, this would be like a 1979 kind of [oil] crisis," he says. "Anything over a month, and you're seeing a substantial long-term price increase until the flows are restored."

The U.S. and other large economies can mitigate those effects by tapping strategic oil reserves — which they opted to do on Wednesday. But Joswick predicts that while such a move can help ensure adequate oil supplies, it might not bring a sharp drop in jet fuel prices. For one thing, he says, the U.S. reserve focuses on holding crude oil, not jet fuel. And he cites logistical challenges, such as California's reliance on jet fuel that it either produces or imports.

Tips for buying a plane ticket right now

If you're ready to take your chances and book a flight, Cudahy has some guidance.

First, don't buy a restricted, basic economy ticket that you can't change later, he says.

Instead, he recommends buying a regular, full-fare economy ticket: "If the price does eventually drop, you can then go back and change it and capture the lower price."

Another tactic, Cudahy says, is to use airline miles.

"You can generally cancel it and get all your miles back later, if the price goes down," he says.

Use services such as Google Flights to comparison shop and set up alerts for price changes. And if you book flights through a third-party site such as Expedia, be sure you understand its cancellation and change policies, in case they differ from the airlines.

Because of the chance for renewed hostilities in and around Iran, Cudahy says he would try to avoid nearby airline hubs for the next couple of months.

But he wouldn't wait to book a ticket.

"In the same way that we're seeing relatively long lines at gas stations with folks trying to get their tanks filled up before the price goes up even more than it already has, I would be thinking the same way when it comes to airfare right now," he says.

While you might drive an extra mile or two to find cheaper gas, airlines and airports don't have that luxury when they buy jet fuel.

"Prices are always set on the margin," Joswick says. "That last airport that needs to buy jet fuel, they will pay whatever it takes to get that. And that price then becomes the standard for the whole industry."
Copyright 2026 NPR

The story first appeared on The LA Local.

Los Angeles residents were walking dark streets and passing broken lamps even as the LAPD quietly disbanded a specialized unit in July that tracked thieves stealing copper wire from streetlights. 

Known as the Heavy Metal Task Force, the unit launched in early 2024 to combat persistent copper wire theft from lamps lighting the Sixth Street Bridge connecting Boyle Heights to Downtown L.A.

Lt. Andrew Mathes confirmed to The LA Local this week that the unit was eliminated in July 2025 as the department and city tightened budgets. The L.A. Bureau of Street Lighting, the department responsible for maintaining the lights, also had its budget cut by about 5% in the current fiscal year as its backlog of reports continues to grow. 

The team led investigations that exposed organized wire theft, resulting in more than 300 arrests. And it conducted inspections of local scrapyards to make it harder for people to cash in on high copper resale prices.

“When you get an eye for it, copper is everywhere,” Mathes said. 

Public concerns about lights persist

Calls for repair of streetlights surged from about 35,000 in 2022, the year the Sixth Street Bridge was opened to the public, to 46,000 in 2024. There was only a slight dip in such calls in 2025.

The calls made to the city’s 311 line for non-emergency services include lamps that were hit by cars or could be malfunctioning due to age. But the jump in calls starting in 2022 also include a surge in thefts.

Reports of copper wire theft doubled from about 7,200 in fiscal year 2022-23 to nearly 16,000 in 2024-25, according to data from the L.A. City Controller. But starting last year, the monthly calls began trending down, from 1,500 in October 2024 to about 200 in May 2025. 

After previously leading a similar team on catalytic converter thefts, Mathes was tapped for leading the unit on heavy metal thefts in early 2024. The team was based in the LAPD’s Central Division near where such thefts had been focused.

“LA is the copper theft capital,” Mathes said. “It’s the worst of the worst here.”

At their most active, Mathes said, the unit was conducting two or three operations a week.

They inspected scrapyards for stolen metal and warned the owners of the penalties they could face for purchasing it. They found people impersonating construction workers removing reams of wire for resale. He’d find makeshift processing operations in decrepit RVs, with huge spools of wire spun by hand and toxic fire pits where people would melt away plastic shielding because the unwrapped copper fetches a higher price.

Mathes said they tracked a 70% reduction in such thefts in the Newton Division, south and east of downtown.

So what happens if there is no specialized unit? 

Mathes said it was fitting that the first and last arrests made by the heavy metal unit occurred near the iconic bridge on Sixth Street. 

The officers who served on the unit developed valuable experience, Mathes said. And soon before it disbanded, he said they redoubled efforts to prepare the members to continue the work in their new assignments. Central, Hollenbeck and Newton police divisions have a specialist for these kinds of investigations.

When asked about wire thefts growing in other parts of the city in 2025, he presumed it was because of the intensive work the unit was doing near downtown.

“They had to find new places to target,” Mathes said.