The Brief

A year since California established heat rules for indoor workplaces, labor organizers say employees are still being exposed to dangerously high temperatures on the job.

According to survey data released last month by the California Fast Food Workers Union and Oakland-based labor rights group Worksafe, roughly 60% of fast food chain employees in the state are still dealing with excessive heat during their shifts — and almost half of those surveyed have experienced heat illness symptoms.

Out of the 338 employees surveyed across dozens of cities, only 9% said their employers actually complied with rules meant to protect workers from excessive heat on the job.

“California fast food workers fought for the Indoor Heat Illness Prevention standard, and now we are fighting to make its protections real,” wrote Anneisha Williams, member of the state’s Fast Food Council, which negotiates working conditions with restaurant chains.

In response to the data, labor organizers are asking local officials to organize more “know your rights” training for employees within the fast food industry.

However, these protections against excessive heat on the job actually apply to all indoor workers in the state, including those employed in manufacturing, warehouses, supermarkets and offices. And the state’s workplace safety agency Cal/OSHA is responsible for making sure companies actually follow these rules — and investigates potential violations.

KQED spoke to both Cal/OSHA and labor rights advocates to understand these workplace protections and how workers can advocate for themselves if their employer is enabling a dangerously hot work environment.

And even if you don’t feel comfortable talking about these things with your supervisor, you should know: you still have options.

What are California’s new heat protections for indoor workers?

The state’s rules for indoor workplaces are about a dozen pages long and are split into two sections:

• Your rights as an employee — and responsibilities of your employer — when temperatures in the workplace reach or exceed 82 degrees.
• What your employer must do when temperatures reach or exceed 87 degrees.

Remember, these rules refer to the temperature of the area where you work, not the temperature outside on the street. Once temperatures reach 82 degrees inside your indoor workplace, your employer needs to provide you with four things:

Water for employees

Employers must provide each worker with at least two gallons of water per day, which is about two 16.9 oz water bottles per hour.

This water should be “fresh, pure and suitably cool,” said Eric Berg, chief of health for Cal/OSHA. “Water should be free of charge. Employers can never charge employees for this,” he said.“It has to be as close as practicable where employees are working.”

If a worker needs more water during their shift, they should be able to drink all the water they need without fear of reprisal. If folks are running low on water, it’s the employer’s responsibility to have a plan in place to get more water before it runs out — not the employees’.

Cool-down areas for employees

“This can be an outdoor shaded area or an indoor rest area that’s cool,” Berg said. This space must stay at a temperature that’s less than 82 degrees and be available whenever a worker feels like they need it. These cool-down areas also must be big enough to comfortably fit employees and have fresh water that is easily accessible.

However, Berg adds, cool-down areas must also be spaces that workers aren’t discouraged from using, like a manager’s office. “It’s not going to feel comfortable to rest inside the manager’s office,” he said.

Rest for employees

According to the state’s indoor heat rules, workers in California have the right to take preventative cool-down rests whenever they feel close to overheating. This break can happen in the designated cool-down area anytime during a worker’s shift. While they’re taking that break, their supervisor needs to check in with them to ask if they are experiencing any symptoms of heat illness. A worker can keep resting until they feel ready to go back into the workplace.

If a worker feels or shows symptoms of heat illness (like vomiting, feeling disoriented, walking unsteadily or acting irrationally), their supervisor needs to immediately provide first aid or get the affected employee medical attention. And if someone is, in fact, found to be experiencing heat illness, they can’t be ordered back to work until all their symptoms have gone away and they have fully recovered.

Training for employees and supervisors

Both employees and supervisors need to be trained about these new Cal/OSHA protections, which are required by law. Workers should know the symptoms of heat illness, while employers should ensure supervisors are trained on how to monitor the health of their team and what to do during an emergency.

Your rights when indoor workplace temperatures reach 87 degrees

Once your workplace reaches 87 degrees, your boss still needs to provide you with the four basic protections (water, cool-down areas, rest and training) above. But on top of those, they also need to start doing what Cal/OSHA calls “assessment and control measures.”

What does this mean? Put simply, your employer needs to start keeping a detailed record of the temperature in your workplace throughout the work shift. The records need to include the date, time, and specific location of all measurements.

And something important to clarify: your employer cannot just look at the weather app on their phone and record that temperature. They need to manually measure the temperature of the workspace itself using an actual thermometer.

Having this record in place can also help workers in the future if they need to report an unsafe workplace, said AnaStacia Nicol Wright, policy manager at Worksafe, an Oakland-based labor rights nonprofit that’s advocated for years in favor of indoor heat protections.

“If the employee chooses to take some kind of legal action, there are these records that were supposed to be kept that they can request access to,” she said.

Something else to keep in mind: if your job requires you to wear full body clothing throughout your shift, your employer is required to start keeping track of temperature earlier on, when it’s 82 degrees.

“Full body clothing would be protective equipment or coveralls meant to protect the product or protect the employee from contamination,” Berg from Cal/OSHA said. “It doesn’t include breathable clothing, like a uniform.”

Is my employer required to have A/C installed during a heat wave?

No, the new heat regulations don’t require employers to install air conditioning in the workplace if they don’t already have it.

In its rulebook, Cal/OSHA considers air conditioning to be a type of “control measure” and employers “shall use control measures … to minimize the risk of heat illness.”

If A/C is available on-site, it should be turned on to bring the temperature down to below 87 degrees. The same goes for any cooling fans and swamp coolers available. And if this isn’t enough to bring temperatures below 87 degrees, employers then have to start applying other strategies, including:

• Requiring cool-down breaks with more frequency
• Rotating different workers in high-heat areas
• Distributing personal heat-protective equipment to employees

But if there isn’t A/C already on-site — as is the case in many Bay Area homes and workplaces — an employer isn’t required to install it. That’s because Cal/OSHA has to take into account all the different types of workplaces in California before establishing a new rule, Berg said. This part of the rulebook “doesn’t dictate a specific measure,” he explained. “It just says to look at all the possible controls and implement what’s effective and what’s feasible for that workplace.”

However, that doesn’t prevent workers from coming together to request A/C if they feel they need it — as was the case of Acevedo and her coworkers at the Taco Bell in San José.

Do these protections apply to everyone who works indoors?

Cal/OSHA’s heat rules protect every person working indoors in California — with one exception: people who work in prisons, local detention facilities and juvenile facilities. California’s prisons employ tens of thousands of guards, nurses, janitors and other positions, along with nearly 39,000 incarcerated people who also have jobs in state prisons, most of whom make less than $1 per hour.

Despite the fact that prisons are also exposed to extreme heat — officials are currently investigating the death of a woman imprisoned at the Central California Women’s Facility in Madera County that advocates say was a case of heat exhaustion — Cal/OSHA does not include this population in the new protections. That’s because regulators agreed to exempt state prisons as part of a compromise with Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration, which claimed including prisons would cost these facilities billions of dollars to comply.

Outside of prisons, these regulations apply in every single indoor workplace in the state, including restaurants, schools, offices, shops, warehouses, factories and any other type of facility where employees work indoors.

They also apply when workers lack a permanent legal status in the United States. “All our regulations that protect workers apply regardless of what papers a person may have or not have,” Cal/OSHA’s Berg said. “Immigration status has no importance whatsoever.”

Heat protections also apply in workspaces where employees are working without a formal job contract in place. If there’s an exchange of money for work you’re doing, that establishes an employer-employee relationship, even without a signed contract.

It’s over 82 degrees where I work, but my employer isn’t following the state’s rules. What can I do?

Now that these rules are in place, workers have a role to play in making sure their employers actually follow them, Wright with Worksafe said.

“We can’t just rely on the goodness of humanity,” she said.

First, share the information

If your employer isn’t providing you and your coworkers with enough water, rest or training during a heat wave, you are protected by law to bring this up to your supervisor.

It might be possible that they are indeed unaware of the new regulations — and if that’s the case, you can share with them the complete Cal/OSHA rules and let them know that the agency can even help them create a plan to fulfill all the requirements.

Keep a record of what’s going on

Unfortunately, not all workers may have a positive relationship with their supervisor. If you think your employer is simply refusing to provide heat protections, Wright recommends that you start documenting what’s happening at work.

“Document, log and write down whenever your employer fails to provide these protections,” she said. These notes don’t have to be too complex, she adds — they can be as simple as making a quick note on your phone or on a piece of paper that you keep to yourself, which describes things like asking your supervisor for water or a cool-down break and being turned down.

“Just write down the date and time,” Wright said. She gives the following as an example of what an effective note could look like:

July 1: there was no cooldown area provided. At 1:30 p.m., I asked my employer if I could sit down and take a break in his office because it has A/C and he said no. I asked again at 3:30 p.m. because I told him I wasn’t feeling well. He said no again.

Keeping track of everything going on at your workplace will help you later down the line if you choose to file a complaint against your employer with Cal/OSHA. With that in mind, Wright recommends talking with your employer about heat issues through email or text so you have a written record of their response as well.

“Now it gets tricky,” she said, “because once you start documenting things like that — especially if you work somewhere where you’re not normally talking via email correspondence — [your employer] will probably get the idea that you’re trying to lay the groundwork for a legal case.”

If you’re nervous about how your boss may react if you start talking about what’s happening at your job, another option is to first talk to your coworkers and check in if they’re also struggling with the heat. “If you act in pairs — if you were to go and complain with another employee, you’re engaging in what’s considered ‘concerted action’ and that gives you some additional protections,” Wright said.

Stay calm and document anything you’re experiencing that goes against the rights the state legally affords you.

You can file a safety complaint against your employer with Cal/OSHA by contacting the agency’s field office closest to your place of work. A list with the contact information of each field office is available on the Cal/OSHA website. You can even file a complaint anonymously if you fear possible retaliation by your employer.

What if your employer retaliates against you?

Documenting when your employer isn’t keeping you safe — and speaking out about it — is protected in California by law. In fact, it’s illegal for an employer to fire or cut the hours of someone who speaks up about their labor rights.

But while that’s what the law says, the reality can be much more complicated.

“They can’t retaliate against you — but the reality is that they can,” Wright said.

Some employers will step up and start following safety rules once they see workers start to take action, she said. “Sometimes you put them on notice that you know your rights.”

“But you do have to unfortunately consider that this could put you on your employer’s radar and risk losing your job because of it,” Wright said. “It’s not fair. It’s not right. Anytime we have a client, we have to tell them of what may happen once you file against your employer.”

If you lose your job or hours after talking to your employer about heat protections, you have a reason to file a retaliation complaint with the state Labor Commissioner’s Office. You can file a retaliation complaint online by calling (714) 558-4913 or through email.

While it takes several months for a complaint to move through the Labor Commissioner’s Office, this agency does have the power to investigate employers, impose penalties and give affected workers their lost wages or even their job back.

This guide includes reporting from KQED’s Farida Jhabvala Romero and Brian Krans, and was originally published on August 6, 2024.

The immigration detention center closest to Los Angeles has placed dozens of people in solitary confinement each month since June, according to the most recent data from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

In May 2025, the Adelanto ICE Processing Center had 14 people in isolation. When the Trump administration’s mass deportation effort revved up in June 2025, the number of detainees in solitary confinement there more than tripled. By July, it was 73; by August, 105.

The most recent data available shows that number went down slightly in January, to 74 people.

Ranked by percentage of the detainee population in “segregation,” as it is called at immigrant detention centers, Adelanto is among the U.S.’s top 10 facilities as of January, according to an LAist analysis of the most recent ICE data.

The data shows that of 229 ICE facilities that reported holding people since October 2024, between 50 and 60 usually reported putting at least one person in segregation in a given month. Out of the facilities that did place people in solitary confinement, Adelanto tended to do so less often than others until June 2025. (The facility held just a few people from October 2024 into January 2025.) When ICE’s presence increased in L.A. in June, the number of people sent to isolation in the facility also shot up — three to five times as many people have been isolated in Adelanto compared to the average facility that used any solitary confinement.

Since June, only two facilities have sent people to solitary confinement more times than Adelanto: one southwest of San Antonio, the other in central Pennsylvania.

Both of those facilities held twice the number of detainees as Adelanto on average from October 2024 through September 2025; but the number of people held in Adelanto since then has tripled, growing larger than either of the other facilities to hold an average of 1,800 people a day since October.

More on solitary confinement  

According to ICE, detainees may be placed in segregation for “disciplinary reasons,” or because of:

• “Serious mental or medical illness.”
• Conducting a hunger strike.
• Suicide watch.

The agency also says it might place detainees “who may be susceptible to harm [if left among the] general population due in part to how others interpret or assume their sexual orientation, or sexual presentation or expression.”

Not only is ICE holding more people in solitary confinement, but the agency's data also shows that detainees across the country are being isolated for longer periods of time. Detainees ICE considers part of the "vulnerable & special population" spent an average of about two weeks in solitary confinement each time they were isolated in 2022, when ICE first made the data available. By the end of 2025, the average stay in isolation had risen to more than seven weeks straight.

The GEO Group Inc., a private company that operates the Adelanto ICE Processing Center, has not responded to requests for comment.

How isolation can affect immigrant detainees  

UN human rights experts consider solitary confinement placements that last 15 days or more to be torture, though the U.S. Supreme Court has held that isolation doesn’t violate the Constitution.

The UN also maintains that solitary confinement should be prohibited for people “with mental or physical disabilities when their conditions would be exacerbated by such measures.”

In January, a coalition of immigrant rights groups filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of current detainees, calling for conditions at Adelanto to be improved. In addition to an unsanitary environment and a lack of healthy food and clean drinking water, detainees say solitary confinement is frequently used to punish those who speak out about conditions at the facility.

People held in immigrant detention centers are technically in “civil detention,” meaning that they are being detained to ensure their presence at hearings and compliance with immigration orders — not to serve criminal sentences.

According to the immigrant rights groups’ complaint, one detainee was placed in solitary confinement after complaining about the showers being broken. Another detainee said that, after asking a guard to “use more respectful language toward him, he was ridiculed, written up and given the middle finger by a guard who shouted, ‘Who the f--- do you think you are?’” Then, the detainee was placed in solitary confinement for 25 days.

Alvaro Huerta, the director of litigation and advocacy at the Immigrant Defenders Law Center who is representing detainees at Adelanto, told LAist that when people are placed in isolation at the facility, they’re typically in the same cell for 23 hours per day, unable to receive visits from their families.

For clients who are experiencing mental health challenges — especially those with suicidal thoughts — being placed in solitary confinement “can really exacerbate their condition,” he added.

In multiple statements to the media, ICE has said that the agency “is committed to ensuring that all those in custody reside in safe, secure and humane environments.” The agency has also said that detainees receive “comprehensive medical care” and that all detainees “receive medical, dental, and mental health intake screenings within 12 hours of arriving at each detention facility.”

Huerta called that “laughable.”

“We have countless examples of people who have said that this is not true, that they're not getting the medication that they're requesting, that they're not being seen for chronic conditions and emergency conditions,” he added. “And we know it's not true because 14 people have died in ICE custody this year alone.”

Lori Rovner of Manhattan Beach is a big sports fan, so there was no question that when tickets for the Olympic Games went on sale, she'd be signing up.

She scored a slot in the first ticket drop, which launched Thursday, and logged on right at 10 a.m., hoping to score tickets to the Opening Ceremonies and some finals too. After battling her computer to get through "access denied" screens and a lost shopping cart due to a 30-minute time limit, she bought 16 tickets.

It was only when she was about to purchase that she noticed the service fees, which were around 24% of each ticket. One $2,100 ticket had a $505 service fee, bringing the total cost to $2,604.63.

"It's insane," she said of the fee. "I don't understand what the service is."

As the locals-only sale kicks off and Southern Californians have their first chance to buy tickets to the Olympic Games, some fans are wide-eyed at the high fees on all tickets and the prices in general, which start at $28 but go up to more than $5,500 a pop. Opening Ceremony tickets start at $328.68

The service fees aren't a surprise add-on. The price fans see when browsing the site is the total cost, including the fee. Still, some who bought in the first phase of sales were surprised when they saw the fees add up.

One user on Reddit of shared their cart of 10 tickets, which added up to $11,264. That included $1,038 in fees alone. Commenters responded in shock and awe.

Service fees are standard in ticket sales, but the percentage they charge can vary widely. High fees have been a source of ire for music and sports fans for years. A 2018 report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office found that the average fees on a primary ticket market were 27%.

LA28 did not respond to LAist's requests for details on the service fee, like what it pays for or why it's a percentage rather than a flat rate.

Not everyone seemed bothered by the prices. Some people LAist spoke with opted for only $28 or similarly priced tickets, even if it meant missing some of the biggest Olympic events. One user on Reddit said they purchased 18 tickets for around $550.

"I went with all $28 tickets," they wrote in the online forum about the Olympics. "I got women’s soccer, gymnastics, beach and regular volleyball, track and field, baseball and a few others."

For some, the ticket process, the prices and the dense web of events to choose from made it too hard to pull the trigger.

Jeff Bartow of Sierra Madre made a spreadsheet with some competitions he was interested in seeing before he logged on to buy tickets Friday.

"So many times, so many schedules, so many events," Bartow said. "I think I initially thought I was going to go to a bunch, but thinking about how crazy it's going to be … I might be a little more limited."

This is just the first ticket drop. There will be more opportunities to buy tickets in the months to come — and on a resale market that launches in 2027.

Some ticket-buyers told LAist they already were contemplating which tickets they'd keep and which ones they'd re-sell, just minutes after buying them.

In the more than two months since the Department of Justice released its latest batch of files on the investigation into Jeffrey Epstein, prosecutors have not brought any new charges based on the documents, despite federal lawmakers on both sides of the aisle continuing to demand accountability.

The more than 3 million pages of documents include accusations by alleged victims of Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell's abuse and thousands of emails and photos showing Epstein associated with prominent figures. The files indicate that many of these people maintained contact with the disgraced financier long after he pleaded guilty in 2008 to sex crimes that involved minors. Appearing in the files is not necessarily an indication of criminal wrongdoing.

The release of the Epstein files came after Congress passed the Epstein Files Transparency Act, which forced the Justice Department to make public all documents it held related to Epstein.

Epstein died in prison about a month after a 2019 arrest on sex-trafficking charges. Maxwell was convicted on sex-trafficking charges in 2021 and is serving a 20-year sentence. Since the release of the files in 2025 and 2026, there have been no related arrests in the U.S. However, the disclosures have led to some resignations and other reputational repercussions for some high-ranking Americans.

The lack of arrests in the U.S. contrasts to the fallout in the U.K., where investigators have pursued charges related to corruption, not sexual abuse, in their dealings with Epstein. Two former government officials — former Prince Andrew and ex-ambassador Peter Mandelson — were arrested on suspicion of misconduct in public office. Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, as he is now known, has denied wrongdoing and has not been formally charged. Mandelson has also not been charged, and lawyers for Mandelson have said that the arrest was prompted by a "baseless suggestion."

In the U.S., top Justice Department officials have said that they found no evidence compelling enough to pursue further charges related to Epstein, and that the public can make their own assessments based on the disclosed documents.

In a statement to NPR, Justice Department spokesperson Katie Kenlein said that "there have not been additional prosecutions beyond Epstein and Maxwell because there has not been credible evidence that their activities extended to Epstein's network. However, if prosecutable evidence comes forward, the Department of Justice will of course act on it as we do every day in sexual trafficking and assault cases across the count[r]y."

On Thursday, President Trump announced that Attorney General Pam Bondi is out of the top job at the Justice Department, following bipartisan criticism over her handling of the Epstein files.

NPR asked four former prosecutors and one former law enforcement officer why there may not have been enough evidence to levy additional charges. Here's what they said.

Prosecutors must prove guilt "beyond a reasonable doubt"

Prosecutors must prove to a jury that a person committed a crime "beyond a reasonable doubt," according to Barbara McQuade, a professor at the University of Michigan Law School.

"One of the biggest misconceptions people have is how difficult it is to charge and convict somebody for a criminal case," said McQuade, who served as the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan.

A prosecutor's ethical responsibility is to charge cases only if they believe there is enough evidence for a conviction, McQuade said. Documents, including emails, jokes, and even plane itineraries, can be a place to start, but, alone, they are not enough to prove guilt, McQuade said.

"What you would need [is] rock solid evidence," McQuade said. "You can't charge someone for a crime without sufficient evidence, and I have yet to see evidence of a crime involving an Epstein associate that has gone uncharged."

Based on his understanding of the case, Paul Butler, a professor at Georgetown Law, said he agreed that prosecutors who investigated Epstein's alleged associates "may have believed that they couldn't persuade a jury beyond a reasonable doubt." He said problems with witness credibility or certain forensic evidence can prevent a case from moving forward.

The U.K. cases are focused on corruption 

In the U.K., the two people arrested are being investigated on suspicion of "misconduct in public office." McQuade said the U.S. does not have a single equivalent federal law. Instead, the U.S. prosecutes public corruption through statutes that focus specifically on crimes such as bribery and extortion.

After the release of the latest files, British police began investigating Andrew's correspondence with Epstein when Andrew was a U.K. trade envoy. At that time, Andrew allegedly shared government itineraries, investment plans and notes from official foreign trips with Epstein. The information may have been covered by the United Kingdom's Official Secrets Act.

Similarly, Mandelson has been accused of passing confidential government information to the late sex offender when Mandelson was a U.K. Cabinet minister.

Meeting the burden of proof is especially challenging for sex crime cases

Victim statements are essential for establishing basic elements, such as the timeframe of events, required to build sexual assault cases, said Diane Goldstein, a retired police lieutenant from California and the executive director of the Law Enforcement Action Partnership. But a victim may be reluctant to come forward because of a fear of retaliation, not believing the police can help, believing it is a personal matter, or not wanting to get the perpetrator in trouble.

McQuade noted that in some sex trafficking cases, especially those in which a perpetrator is in a position of power, victims may experience intimidation or threats that prevent them from speaking out.

Victims also may be hesitant to move forward with allegations because they fear having to testify at trials where defense attorneys may attempt to poke holes in their allegations, McQuade said.

Goldstein said that for sex crime cases to advance, investigators need to follow certain policies and procedures. "If you don't have a legitimate police investigation to start, you're not going to get any type of criminal filing," Goldstein said.

Other potential charges are also a difficult path

Prosecutors may have considered pursuing charges of criminal conspiracy related to sex trafficking against people associated with Epstein, said Jessica Roth, a professor at Cardozo School of Law. FBI documents in the files relating to its investigation into Epstein's crimes identify certain people as "co-conspirators."

But Ankush Khardori, a senior writer and columnist at Politico magazine who worked as a federal prosecutor on financial fraud cases, told NPR those identifiers are not "formal accusation[s]" and are simply part of "interim documents."

"The FBI does not determine who is a co-conspirator," Khardori said. "That is a legal judgment that prosecutors make."

But for those conspiracy cases, "criminal intent," in particular, is difficult to establish, said Roth, who worked as a federal prosecutor in the U.S. attorney's office for the Southern District of New York for seven years. Criminal conspiracy charges "would require knowledge and intent on the part of each individual who was charged," Roth said. If a person who communicated with Epstein had some suspicion that he was engaged in illegal activity, that alone would not be sufficient evidence to press charges, she said.

Investigators may have considered charges related to criminal tax violations, McQuade said. But the statute of limitations has likely ended on those cases, she said, meaning that prosecutors can no longer bring charges.

The current evidence lacks context

Legal experts say the haphazard way the documents were released and redacted makes it difficult for the public to understand why no additional charges have been filed.

Roth, the Cardozo law professor, said the information is in "isolation," without the appropriate context. "We'll see an individual photograph that looks perhaps incriminating. We'll see an email that looks incriminating, but we don't necessarily have everything that was said before and after that email and that exchange," Roth said.

One document that could explain why no charges were pursued, according to Butler, is a heavily redacted DOJ memo naming "potential co-conspirators" of Epstein. "The parts that should indicate why the department declined prosecution on any alleged co-conspirators other than Ghislaine Maxwell [are] redacted," said Butler, the Georgetown law professor and a former federal prosecutor.

Butler said those redactions are "unusual" because they do not appear to follow the permissible reasons for redactions in the Epstein documents. Those reasons include confidentiality for Epstein's alleged victims, or anything that would compromise an ongoing investigation, Butler said.

"When the Justice Department grudgingly releases information when pressed by politics or forced by Congress, it also creates the impression that they have something to hide," Butler said. "That there is some cover-up going on."
Copyright 2026 NPR

Nearly 30% more students in Los Angeles County experienced homelessness from 2022-23 to 2023-24, making it the county’s highest rate in the past five years and far outpacing the rate of homelessness across the state in the same timeframe, as the resources to identify and support this student population have decreased.

The UCLA Center for the Transformation of Schools published two reports on Wednesday on the state of student homelessness in the county: “Rising Numbers, Fading Resources: Students Experiencing Homelessness in Los Angeles County” and “Hidden in Plain Sight: Fear, Underidentification, and Funding Gaps for Housing-Insecure Students in Los Angeles County.”

Researchers found that Norwalk-La Mirada Elementary Unified School District had the highest rate of student homelessness in the county — 1 in 3 students, meaning that over 4,700 students were identified as experiencing homelessness during the 2023-24 school year out of a total cumulative enrollment of about 15,600.

The city of Norwalk, where the district is located in the eastern region of the county, was sued by the state in 2024 for banning emergency shelters and other support services for people experiencing homelessness. Last year, the state reached a settlement with the city, which was forced to overturn the ban and put $250,000 toward building affordable housing.

Student homelessness is defined differently under the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act, a federal law that requires every public school to count the number of students who are living on the street, in shelters, in motels, in cars, doubled up with other families, or moving between friends’ and relatives’ homes.

As a result of this expanded definition, McKinney-Vento includes doubled-up students in the count of homelessness. Doubled-up is a term used to describe children and youth ages 21 and under living in shared housing, such as with another family or friends, due to various crises.

There were a few other patterns seen in the L.A. County data analyzed by the UCLA researchers:

• Latino students were disproportionately more likely to experience homelessness: they represent 65% of the county’s student population, but 75.5% of student homelessness
• A third of homeless students were in high school
• Many districts with the highest rates of homelessness had higher school instability but lower dropout rates

While McKinney-Vento has an expanded definition that includes more types of homelessness than several other definitions, identifying students remains difficult.

The second report from the UCLA Center for the Transformation of Schools focuses on the lack of dedicated funding for school staff to identify and support homeless students. Students and families facing homelessness do not always self-identify, whether due to fear, shame or being unaware that their housing situation is considered homelessness under McKinney-Vento.

“A lot of these young people are dealing with a lot of trauma, so they don’t want to be identified. They don’t want to be pointed out; sometimes it’s scary for them, because they think we’re going to report them to the Department of Children and Family Services,” said L.A. County Office of Education staff interviewed for this report.

School staff, known as homeless liaisons, who work with homeless students received a historic influx of federal funds during the Covid-19 pandemic — $98.76 million for California, out of $800 million nationwide, from the American Rescue Plan-Homeless Children and Youth.

That funding has since ended, and there is no other dedicated, ongoing state funding set aside solely for the rising number of homeless students. This has led districts in California to “heavily depend on highly competitive and unstable federal streams,” the UCLA researchers wrote. Those federal streams have become increasingly precarious as the federal administration last year sought policy changes that would shift how they are structured.