The Brief

What do stairs have to do with California’s housing crisis? More than you might think, say many local policymakers.

Cities across the state have been considering building code changes to allow new apartment buildings to be constructed with fewer staircases. But where other cities missed a key deadline, Culver City got it done.

In late September, the Culver City Council unanimously voted to pass a guarantee that developers can build up to six stories with just one staircase.

“We're the only city in California to legalize it by ordinance,” said Councilmember Bryan “Bubba” Fish. “I hope that we can be a bit of a bellwether.”

Advocates for the change say it’ll create larger, family-sized apartments on smaller plots of land. But firefighters have come out against these proposals, saying they endanger residents and emergency response crews.

Fish, who pushed for the change in Culver City, lives in a typical kind of new apartment building. It’s large, boxy and has three staircases. The units on each floor are separated by a long hallway. It’s a dimly lit, liminal space — kind of like what you’d see in a hotel.

Fish said he sometimes plays fetch with his dog Walter in this hallway. But otherwise, he sees it as a lot of wasted space.

“No one is using this for anything but just getting where they need to go,” Fish said. “A single-stair building uses this space that we're in right now for more homes, which is what we desperately need right now.”

Single-stair buildings common in other countries

In most of the U.S., local building codes require apartment buildings to have two or more staircases connected by a hallway. With California facing a severe housing shortage, many cities across the state have proposed getting rid of those mandates.

“The requirement makes residential buildings have to look like hotels,” Fish said. “I don't really want to live in a hotel. I want to live in a home.”

In Europe, Asia and other parts of the world, buildings are allowed to wrap around one stairwell. That means they can be built on smaller lots. The lack of hallways and second stairs provides space for additional bedrooms, making apartments larger and more suitable for families.

Fish recently saw this firsthand.

“I went to Berlin not too long ago,” he said. “The units were much larger. There were more of them. There were more bedrooms in every unit, and they were more homey feeling.”

Cities faced deadline to pass single-stair reforms

Single-stair reform is an idea that took hold in many California cities in recent years. But they all needed to pass their proposals by Oct. 1. That’s when state law AB 130 kicked in, freezing local building codes for the next six years.

Culver City is the only city that passed a comprehensive ordinance in time. Larger cities like Los Angeles, San Diego and San Francisco also considered single-stair changes, but they all missed the deadline.

In L.A., records show the City Attorney’s Office privately pushed back on the Council’s efforts to pass a single-stair ordinance ahead of the Oct. 1 deadline.

A motion instructing the office to draft an ordinance passed votes in committee and in the full City Council. But a Sept. 8 confidential report obtained by LAist shows that City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto told councilmembers such a change would be “preempted by, contrary to and illegal under California state law.”

Feldstein Soto went on to say the L.A. Fire Department told her office that the City Council’s proposal would have to be contingent on future changes to state and local fire codes, according to the report.

A spokesperson for Feldstein Soto told LAist her office sent the council a draft ordinance Sept. 11, but the council sent it back to committee. They said the delay in passage “had nothing to do with our office.”

Advocates for single-stair reform said the draft ordinance would not have resulted in viable single-stair projects.

This is not the first time the City Attorney’s office has pushed back on housing-related efforts by the council. She recently refused to sign a tenant aid contract the council was relying on to expand legal assistance to low-income renters facing eviction.

Feldstein Soto argued the sole-source contract violated the city’s charter.

Santa Monica’s City Council voted in September to change local rules, allowing for single-stair buildings up to six stories. But unlike in Culver City, in many cases those developments will not be guaranteed a smooth path forward — they’ll face reviews that could halt projects.

Some say reforms are ‘paradigm changing’

Eduardo Mendoza with the Livable Communities Initiative said other cities will be missing out — not just on new kinds of apartments but potentially new types of condos.

“I've spoken with developers, and they have confidently told me, ‘Listen, if we could put 20 units on a lot and have them for sale, we could sell these things for $550,000 in most markets in L.A.,” Mendoza said. “And I'm like, holy s--t. That is paradigm changing.”

But there is one group opposed to this change: firefighters. They’ve said during a fire, having just one way for residents to get out of a building while crews try to get in would be hazardous.

Sean DeCrane, the assistant to the general president for health and safety at the International Association of Fire Fighters, said that’s why “building codes and fire codes require, when you go above three stories in the U.S., that you provide two ways out of a building.”

Single-stair buildings are already allowed in Seattle and New York City. A recent study from the Pew Charitable Trusts found that the rate of fire deaths in modern New York single-stair buildings has been no different than in two-stair buildings.

But DeCrane said what works for New York may not work in other cities.

“FDNY can put 56 firefighters on the scene of an apartment fire within 10 minutes,” he said. “It's hard to take that same scenario and then put it into a smaller town.”

Other safety features will be required

Single-stair proponents argue that safety concerns can be addressed by installing features such as sprinklers and pressurized stairwells that keep out smoke.

Architect Erik Mar said he’s happy to see the change in building rules coming to Culver City.

“By insisting on that one kind of typology, we've essentially designed ourselves into a corner,” Mar said. “The quality of life in these urban areas not only gets more expensive, but it gets degraded by longer commutes, more traffic, more urban sprawl.”

Fish said Culver City will require new safety features in single-stair buildings. The change won’t take effect until the state’s Building Standards Commission signs off.

If and when that happens, Fish said he’ll be excited to see different kinds of housing being built.

“To any developers who want to create some really interesting new, modern homes that are not going to be legal anywhere else in the state, come to Culver City,” he said.

The Trump administration virtually has stopped releasing undocumented children in federal custody to their parents and other relatives. That’s according to data obtained by the California Newsroom, immigration attorneys around the country and officials inside the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR), the agency tasked with caring for those children.

The Administration for Children and Families, which oversees ORR, said via email that the office “has not issued a moratorium” on such releases but said earlier this year it put in place “enhanced vetting policies” for adults who will care for the children after their release. The goal, it said, was to better protect children from harm.

However, sources with knowledge of the office’s directives contradict that claim, saying ORR leadership began issuing verbal orders to staff in early November to stop releasing kids to their relatives until further notice.

Here’s what we know right now:

Who are the children stuck in federal custody?

These are kids without legal immigration status — from toddlers to teenagers — who were apprehended crossing the border without a parent or legal guardian or were separated from them during arrests by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The children are then handed over to ORR, which usually places them at shelters it oversees around the country. There are about 2,400 kids in ORR custody right now.

Here in California, there are about 30 shelters with more than 300 kids altogether.

Most of these children came to the U.S. to join their parents or other family members, whom immigration officials call sponsors. ORR must vet those adults before the kids can be released to them.

Attorneys say many of these kids are fleeing violence, persecution or abuse in their home countries, and they plan to apply for an immigration status that protects them from being deported back to those situations.

What’s happening to them now?

According to eight officials at ORR, who asked not to be named because they fear losing their jobs, the government largely stopped releasing children to sponsors in early November, even those who had cleared the vetting process.

Eight immigration attorneys across the country — in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Houston, Miami, Charlotte and Washington, D.C. — said that since early November, they have not been able to get kids with cleared sponsors out of ORR custody in most cases, even after sending letters to ORR demanding they be released and threatening litigation. The attorneys said the government has not explained why it won't let the kids go.

According to recent ORR data obtained by the California Newsroom, the government released about four children per day to sponsors throughout the month of October, before releases were all but stopped. That’s a little over 100 children for the month.

Over the past month and a half, ORR has released just four kids total to sponsors, according to the data.

It’s unclear why the four were released and no other children were.

“ORR continues to discharge children to vetted sponsors when all statutory and safety requirements are fully met and when release is assessed to be appropriate given the child’s individual needs and circumstances,” the Administration for Children and Families told the California Newsroom. “Each case is evaluated individually, and decisions are made based on child welfare best practices.”

But three ORR officials with knowledge of the office’s release process told the California Newsroom that in early November, agency leadership ordered a hold on releasing children to sponsors until further notice, even if the sponsors have been cleared to receive them.

The sources said the order was not put in writing, but issued verbally to field officers across the country who are charged with signing off on releases.

"Many cases are absolutely ready to go, but because releases aren’t being allowed, they are in limbo,” said a field officer who received the order.

Neha Desai, who leads the National Center for Youth Law’s work on behalf of immigrant children, pushed back on the agency’s explanation for the stalled releases, citing research that shows prolonged detention is detrimental to children’s health.

“There are currently many children in custody who are very predictably experiencing a severe mental health decline,” she said. “The premise that kids are necessarily safer while in government custody than they are in the homes of their families is fundamentally flawed.”

Marion “Mickey” Donovan-Kaloust, legal services director at Immigrant Defenders Law Center in L.A., said that, whatever the reason for the vanishingly few sponsor releases, it’s taking a toll on kids.

“Children are very tearful, expressing difficulty sleeping,” she said. “No one can tell them, ‘Well, just wait a little longer, only this step is missing.’ We have no idea why they’re still detained.“

Has this ever happened before?

Child welfare experts inside and outside ORR who work with migrant children told the California Newsroom they’ve never seen reunifications at a virtual standstill, the way they have since early November.

Starting this spring, the Trump administration began adding new vetting requirements for sponsors — for example, all adult members of a household have to be fingerprinted, and sponsors claiming to be related to the child must take DNA tests.

“Earlier this year ORR enhanced its sponsor vetting policies — since the previous administration’s policies prioritized speed over safety and put children in danger — to address common categories of sponsor fraud and to establish clear protocols for detecting, documenting, and preventing criminals from exploiting children,” the Administration for Children and Families said.

The requirements added earlier this year ground vetting to a crawl.

“Across the board, we are seeing prolonged detention and extreme delays in the reunification process,” said Alexa Sendukas, an attorney at the Galveston-Houston Immigration Representation Project.

Kids who would have spent only a few weeks in ORR custody are now stuck there for months, advocates said. Prior to November, they were at least trickling out of custody on a daily basis, according to the ORR data.

ACF did not specify whether yet another vetting process has been put in place since early November.

What are advocates doing about it?

In addition to sending letters to ORR demanding the government release children in its care, attorneys also are preparing to file habeas corpus petitions — in other words, they’ll be asking federal courts to force the government to release kids based on the claim that it has no legal reason to detain them.

Many of those attorneys now are having to learn the mechanics of a habeas petition, which, until recently, has rarely been necessary for children.

“Habeas is really starting to feel like the only way to help a child get to their family,” Donovan-Kaloust said.

Why isn’t the administration releasing kids now?

Sources within ORR said the office’s leadership is keeping a tight lid on why reunifications have been halted, and when or whether they will return to previous levels.

Attorneys have said that an increasing number of children are deciding that waiting to be released to their sponsors isn’t worth it. Instead, they’re choosing to get out of U.S. custody by leaving the country.

Scott Bassett, managing attorney for the children’s program at Amica Center for Immigrant Rights in Washington, D.C., said the delay in getting kids released has turned ORR shelters into “pressure cookers.” In addition to expanding the vetting requirements for sponsors, Bassett listed off the other ways the Trump administration has twisted the screws on unaccompanied minors: fining them thousands of dollars for entering the U.S. without authorization, arresting family members who come to claim them and offering them money to leave the country.

Now, attorneys have to tell children there’s no way to know how long they could be in federal custody.

“That's definitely contributing to these decisions to take voluntary departure,” Bassett said.

During a recent visit to an ORR shelter, Bassett said he was wrapping up a know-your-rights training when a teenage girl raised her hand and asked a simple question: “Why do they keep doing this to us?”

The California Newsroom is a collaboration of public media outlets throughout the state, with NPR as its national partner. 

Billionaire entrepreneur Jared Isaacman's confirmation as the new head of NASA closes a turbulent chapter that began over a year ago.

The Senate voted 67-30 on Wednesday to confirm Isaacman along bipartisan lines. All 30 senators who voted against him were Democrats.

The 42-year-old e-commerce mogul has flown to space twice on private missions — both in partnership with Elon Musk's SpaceX — and in 2024 became the first civilian to walk in space. Isaacman has no federal government experience.

Isaacman was among President Donald Trump's first picks for his second administration: Trump announced his nomination in December 2024, well before his inauguration, and formalized it after taking office in January.

"Jared's passion for Space, astronaut experience, unlocking the mysteries of the universe, and advancing the new Space economy, make him ideally suited to lead NASA into a bold new Era," Trump wrote on Truth Social at the time.

Isaacman made it as far as a three-hour Senate subcommittee hearing in April, where he downplayed his connections to Musk but declined to answer when asked whether Musk was in the room when Trump offered him the role. Isaacman also expressed support for lunar and Mars missions, saying he believed NASA had the budget to do both.

While NASA is focused on its Artemis mission to return Americans to the moon for the first time since the early 1970s, the second Trump administration has concerned some with its seeming preoccupation with Mars exploration — a riskier and more divisive concept that just so happens to be a longtime dream of Trump's onetime ally, Musk.

But Isaacman didn't get the chance to answer questions about any of that in front of the full Senate, because Trump withdrew his nomination in late May — the same week Musk left his role in the administration.

Trump said the decision followed a "thorough review" of Isaacman's "prior associations," and later explicitly blamed his donations to Democratic causes. Public filings show that Isaacman has contributed to candidates and political action committees of both parties over the years, but since 2016 has supported more Democrats.

Isaacman has described himself as "relatively apolitical" and a "right-leaning moderate," and noted that his campaign donations were public long before Trump nominated him — suggesting that wasn't the only reason for the reversal. In June, Isaacman said being considered to lead NASA was "truly the honor of a lifetime."

"Even knowing the outcome, I would do it all over again," Isaacman wrote in a letter to investors.

And that's what ended up happening — only the second time, it worked.

Isaacman takes the helm at a turbulent time for NASA

In early November, Trump nominated Isaacman again, without acknowledging the turmoil that had unfolded along the way.

At his confirmation hearing in early December, Isaacman once again denied that his connections to Musk posed a conflict of interest. The nominee explained that his spaceflights were operated by SpaceX because the company is the only option for sending Americans to space since NASA retired its space shuttle program in 2011.

"In that respect, my relationship [to Musk] is no different than that of NASA," he said, adding that "there are no pictures of us at dinner, at a bar, on an airplane, or on a yacht because they don't exist."

Isaacman takes the helm of an agency that has been grappling with a lack of permanent leadership, downsizing, competitive pressure (particularly from China) and significant funding cuts — with threats of more to come.

The administration's 2026 budget proposes a historic 24% cut to overall NASA funding, which would slash its workforce by about a third and spell the end of 41 science projects.

In recent months, protesters have descended on Capitol Hill to lobby against the proposed budget cuts. Among them was beloved "Science Guy" Bill Nye, the CEO of the nonprofit Planetary Society, who also attended Isaacman's December hearing in a show of support for the nominee. The House and Senate both reject the deepest proposed cuts, but differ in how much funding they think its science budget should get.

A 62-page draft agenda named "Project Athena," which Isaacman defended after it leaked in May, offers clues as to how Isaacman seeks to run NASA: primarily, more like a business.

Its priorities include reorganization "aimed at reducing layers of bureaucracy," putting more astronauts in space more often, playing a larger role in certifying commercial space missions and partnering with industries like biotech and pharma to "figure out how to extract more value from space than we put in."

Jared Isaacman — pictured before he led the first all-civilian spaceflight in 2021 — has worked closely with Elon Musk's company SpaceX.

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Patrick T. Fallon

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AFP via Getty Images

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Isaacman's background is in e-commerce and private spaceflight

Isaacman traces his interest in space back to his childhood, when he was inspired by a picture book in his school library.

"I told my kindergarten teacher I was going to go to space someday," he recalled in 2021.

But first, he made it as an entrepreneur. He founded the payment processing firm now known as Shift4 Payments as a teenager out of his parents' New Jersey basement in 1991. The company, which went public in 2020, says it processes payments for 1 in 3 restaurants and 40% of hotels across the U.S.

Isaacman dropped out of high school to pursue his business, but later earned his GED and a bachelor's degree in aeronautics from Embry‑Riddle Aeronautical University. He is a licensed pilot with over 7,000 flight hours, according to his Polaris bio.

He also co-founded a civilian aerobatic display team called the Black Diamond Jet Team, as well as Draken International, which provides tactical fighter aircraft to customers including the military and defense industries. He sold a majority share of it to the investment firm Blackstone Group in 2019 for a reported nine-figure sum.

Forbes values Isaacman's current net worth at $1.2 billion. That fortune has allowed him to pursue his astronaut ambitions, as well as support STEM-related causes (he and his wife have pledged to donate the majority of their wealth to charity).

Isaacman funded and commanded the first all-civilian orbital flight in 2021 — which raised over $240 million for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital — as well as the 2024 Polaris Dawn mission, in which he and crewmate Sarah Gillis became the first civilians to conduct a spacewalk.

Upon his return, Isaacman told NPR's All Things Considered that while Earth looked beautiful from afar, "looking out into the darkness of space, it was a very unwelcoming feeling that this is a threatening environment for humans."

"We certainly didn't evolve to be here, and if we want to be here, we're going to have to work really hard in order to kind of open up this last frontier," he added. "That was kind of one of the big takeaways I had."
Copyright 2025 NPR

A huge chart record has fallen: Mariah Carey's 1994 holiday staple "All I Want for Christmas Is You" now holds the all-time record for most weeks at No. 1, with 20. Elsewhere on the charts, Ariana Grande lands a slew of albums on the Billboard 200, while She & Him cracks the Hot 100 for the first time ever, thanks to a TikTok trend.

Top story

Last week, Carey's "All I Want for Christmas Is You" pulled into a three-way tie for the longest run at No. 1 of any song in the history of the Hot 100 singles chart. That's a significant milestone — albeit one largely made possible by the streaming era, which has produced ever-larger runs atop the charts — which her song shared with Lil Nas X's "Old Town Road (feat. Billy Ray Cyrus)" and Shaboozey's "A Bar Song (Tipsy)." As of last week, all three songs had posted 19 weeks at No. 1.

This week, "All I Want for Christmas Is You" takes the record outright, as it posts an unprecedented 20th week on top of the Hot 100. And, given the likelihood of it returning to No. 1 — not just next week and the week after, but also in holiday seasons to come — we may be looking at a record that borders on the untouchable.

Incredibly, Carey also recorded the song with the longest-ever run at No. 1 prior to the streaming era — her Boyz II Men collaboration "One Sweet Day" topped the Hot 100 for 16 weeks in 1995 and 1996. She's also spent the most weeks at No. 1 on the Hot 100 of any artist in Billboard history, with 99. (In second place: Rihanna, with 60, followed by The Beatles, with 59.)

"All I Want for Christmas Is You" first came out in 1994, but it didn't hit the top 10 until 2017, as streaming helped transform classic holiday songs into chart perennials. It first hit No. 1 in 2019 and has topped the chart every holiday season since — seven in all.

To overtake the song with the longest run in Hot 100 history (Teddy Swims' "Lose Control," with 112 weeks), it'll likely need another four or five years' worth of holiday seasons. But, with Billboard recently changing its eligibility rules to make it harder for non-holiday songs to post "Lose Control"-style runs on the chart, it would appear that it's only a matter of time until "All I Want for Christmas Is You" holds that record, too.

Top albums

The album-release schedule traditionally slows down in December, as many artists take a break from touring and Christmas albums storm the top 10. This week is no different — no album debuts in the top 40 of the latest chart — and that's good news for Taylor Swift, whose The Life of a Showgirl holds at No. 1 for a ninth nonconsecutive week, followed by two chart standbys: Morgan Wallen's I'm the Problem and the soundtrack to KPop Demon Hunters.

After that, though, the holiday assault on the top 10 begins with the smooth sounds of Michael Bublé, Bing Crosby and Nat King Cole, while the Vince Guaraldi Trio's A Charlie Brown Christmas and the girl-group classic A Christmas Gift for You From Phil Spector also turn up in the top 10.

The glut of holiday titles helps drive the Wicked: For Good soundtrack out of the top 10, but that's the closest thing to bad news for costar Ariana Grande, who's otherwise having a remarkable week on the charts. Not only does "Santa Tell Me" return to No. 5 — its peak position to date — on the Hot 100, but Grande also swarms the Billboard 200 albums chart. In addition to the two Wicked soundtracks, Eternal Sunshine; Sweetener; Thank U, Next; Positions; Dangerous Woman; and My Everything all chart this week. Eight albums in the top 200 is bordering on Taylor Swift territory for the versatile pop star.

Top songs

This week's top 10 looks a lot like last week's, though it's perhaps worth noting that Brenda Lee's "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" reclaims the No. 2 spot from Wham!'s surging 1984 staple "Last Christmas." Those two look poised to swap silver and bronze medals in the Decembers to come, while the estate of poor Bobby Helms (of "Jingle Bell Rock" fame) stands, sulking, just off the podium.

At the other end of the Hot 100, there's a chart entry worth noting, all the way down at No. 99.

She & Him — that's the duo of Zooey Deschanel and M. Ward — has graced the Billboard 200 several times in its career, including with 2011's A Very She & Him Christmas. But this week, the arrival of "I Thought I Saw Your Face Today" marks the pair's first-ever Hot 100 entry — and it's not a holiday song.

"I Thought I Saw Your Face Today" dates back to She & Him's debut album, Volume One, back in 2008. So why is it charting now? In a word: TikTok.

The same phenomenon that's recently sent old songs from Imogen Heap, Radiohead and Rihanna onto the Hot 100 for the first time has now reached She & Him, whose bittersweet ballad has been deployed as the soundtrack to a huge assortment of TikTok clips.

The song's arrival in the Hot 100 is especially impressive considering that 41 holiday songs crowd the Hot 100 this week, which is making it harder than usual for marginal hits to land on the chart. It'll be intriguing to see how "I Thought I Saw Your Face Today" performs once January rolls around and nearly half the competition gets mothballed.
Copyright 2025 NPR

Renting in California is not cheap. The average rent for a one-bedroom in the Golden State — $2,100 — is 40% higher than the national average. But renters will soon be getting a little more for their money: a working refrigerator and stove.

On Jan. 1, California will begin requiring landlords to provide their tenants with a fridge and stove — and repair or replace them if they stop working.

While this new law may surprise some tenants who have always lived in apartments that already came with these appliances, it’s more common in Southern California cities for landlords to rent out homes with no stove or refrigerator, placing this responsibility on the tenant.

AB 628 — authored by state Assemblymember Tina McKinnor, D-Inglewood — adds these appliances to the state’s definition of a livable home, helping secure access to these appliances for the state’s millions of tenants.

“Having a working, safe fridge and stove will be a minimum requirement for keeping the unit in a habitable state,” said Ethan Silverstein, staff attorney for the housing rights nonprofit, The California Center for Movement Legal Services.

Whether you are a renter or landlord, keep reading to learn how AB 628 applies in different situations and what legal experts recommend to make sure your home is up-to-date with the state’s habitability standards.

What does the law actually say?

All new leases signed on or after Jan. 1 will need to include a working fridge and stove.

When an existing lease is renewed or extended at any moment starting on Jan. 1, those homes will also need to have these appliances.

“The way this law is written, it will eventually apply to all new and current renters in California,” Silverstein said.

This law also applies to homes where tenants are renting without a formal written agreement (e.g., renting “informally” with a month-to-month lease).

What tenants should know

If you’re thinking about moving and hoping to land a new spot sometime in 2026, any potential landlord must be ready to provide a stove and refrigerator, along with any maintenance these devices need in the future — at no cost to you. And if you plan to stay in your current rental home, this law will impact you, depending on who provided the appliances.

If you bought your own refrigerator when you moved in, you can talk with your landlord before it’s time to renew your lease and decide together if it makes more sense to keep it or replace it with one provided by your landlord.

“The parties can agree for the tenant to bring their own refrigerator,” said Whitney Prout, executive vice president of legal affairs for the California Apartment Association, which advises landlords and developers. “But you can’t require the tenant to bring their own refrigerator. … It has to be the tenant’s voluntary choice and the landlord has to agree.”

If both you and your landlord decide to keep the fridge you provided, the law requires that the lease acknowledge this arrangement by adding the following disclosure:

“Under state law, the landlord is required to provide a refrigerator in good working order in your unit. By checking this box, you acknowledge that you have asked to bring your own refrigerator and that you are responsible for keeping that refrigerator in working order.”

But under no circumstances can the landlord ask a tenant to buy their home’s stove. “The landlord needs to provide the stove,” Prout said. “You can’t have an agreement for the tenant to provide their own stove.”

What landlords need to know

Landlords should start preparing now to comply with AB 628, Prout said. “Look at when your lease renewals are coming up, because that does give you some flexibility in terms of phasing in compliance with this law — especially if you have a lot of appliances you need to acquire,” she said.

What kind of stove or fridge are landlords required to provide? The actual text of the law is pretty broad and only specifies that these appliances need to be in “good working order.” A stove must be “capable of safely generating heat for cooking purposes,” while a refrigerator should be “capable of safely storing food.” According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, a refrigerator that can keep temperatures at 40°F or below can protect most food products.

On Jan. 1, California will begin requiring landlords to provide their tenants with a fridge and stove — and repair or replace them if they stop working. (Alicia Windzio/Picture Alliance via Getty Images)As for what appliance brand or model, that’s the landlord’s decision. But Prout added that it could be a good idea to share with tenants some information on the appliances you’ll provide them with, especially if you’re planning to replace what’s in their home.

“The tenant may have feelings about aesthetics,” she said. “They may have invested in a stainless steel refrigerator that they’re really happy with, that has certain functionalities.”

And if you will replace existing appliances, make a plan to safely remove them. “Communicate with residents what the appropriate processes are for removal and disposal of tenant-provided appliances,” Prout said, adding that “Illegal dumping is a huge problem around rental property.”

What if these appliances break down?

If the tenant provided the fridge— and both the tenant and landlord agreed to this arrangement — then it’s actually the tenant’s responsibility to make repairs.

But if the landlord provided both the refrigerator and stove, then it’s up to the landlord to make sure they keep functioning. “You provide the appliances; if they break down, you fix them or replace them — as long as you’re doing that, you’re in compliance with the law,” Prout said.

The law explicitly states that property owners have 30 days to either replace or repair these appliances if there is a recall from the manufacturer.

Landlords: Keep in mind that while it’s legal to provide your tenants with second-hand appliances, it may be more difficult to keep up with recall announcements, as the manufacturer may not have a record that you bought their product.

But if these devices simply break down with time or use, “It’s like any other repair issue where the landlord needs to act in a reasonable amount of time to get it replaced,” Silverstein said.

Silverstein recommends that tenants notify their landlords about any repair needs through written communication, like a text message or email.

“The worst thing you can do is make the request verbally through the phone,” he said, adding that keeping this “paper” trail could be helpful if your landlord fails to make necessary repairs. You can also ask your landlord for a clear date for when repairs will be made and what you can do in the interim to safely store or cook your food.

If a landlord is not complying with AB 628, tenants can contact their city’s rent board or building code enforcement agency. After a tenant files a complaint, code enforcement staff will contact the landlord to enforce the state’s habitability standards.

Below is the contact information for the code enforcement departments of several California cities. You can also quickly look up the contact information for your city’s agency with an online search.

• Los Angeles: If you live in a property that only contains one house, you can call (888) 524-2845 or file a complaint online. If you live in a property that contains multiple homes — like a duplex or an apartment complex — you can call (866) 557-7368 or file a complaint online. And if you live in unincorporated Los Angeles County, you can call 211 or file a complaint online.
• San Diego: If you live in the city of San Diego, call (619) 236-5500 or file a complaint online. And if you live in unincorporated San Diego County, you can call (858) 694-2705.
• Long Beach: Call (562) 570-2633 or file a complaint about a Long Beach rental online.
• San Francisco: Call 311 or file a complaint about a San Francisco rental online.
• Oakland: Call (510) 238-3444 or file a complaint about an Oakland rental online.
• San José: Call (408) 535-7770 or file a complaint about a San José rental online.
• Santa Ana: Call (714) 667- 2780 or file a complaint about a Santa Ana rental online.