The Brief

California housing officials are now suing Norwalk, following through on warnings that a local ban on homeless shelters would land the city in court.

The lawsuit, filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court on Monday, alleges that Norwalk officials violated a number of state housing laws when they voted in August to pass a temporary ban on shelters and housing projects for unhoused people. After state officials said the policy was illegal, the City Council voted again to extend the ban by more than 10 months.

Rob Bonta, California’s attorney general, said in a news conference that the lawsuit was a last resort. “We would prefer that Norwalk simply follow the law,” he said. “But they have chosen. It is their choice. They've decided to willingly, intentionally and deliberately violate the law.”

Norwalk officials did not immediately respond to LAist’s request for comment.

The backstory

The legal action ratchets up a conflict that has already led to officials in Sacramento revoking certification of Norwalk’s state-mandated plan for accommodating new housing. By taking that action, the state has taken away streams of state homelessness and housing funding and the city’s ability to stop large-scale housing projects proposed through the “Builder’s Remedy.”

Norwalk’s City Council moved to ban permits for new homeless shelters and supportive housing based on the premise that such developments posed a threat to public health and safety. The ban also applies to laundromats, payday loan businesses and liquor stores.

Margarita Rios, the city’s mayor, previously told LAist that local officials know the needs of the community better than those serving in statewide office.

The larger trend

State officials have grown increasingly impatient with what they see as stubborn NIMBYism (an acronym that stands for “Not In My Backyard”) from elected leaders in a number of cities across the state.

California has won court battles against Huntington Beach over the city’s efforts to bypass a state law requiring local governments to plan for more housing. In Northern California, the city of Elk Grove recently settled with the state in a lawsuit over alleged fair housing violations.

“The Norwalk city council’s failure to reverse this ban, despite knowing it is unlawful, is inexcusable,” Gov. Gavin Newsom said in a statement on the latest in this round of housing lawsuits. “No community should turn its back on its residents in need.”

What happens next 

Bonta acknowledged that it could take months before a judge reaches a decision in the Norwalk case. He said the goal is to require the city to overturn its ordinance banning projects for unhoused residents, and to send a message to other cities that they will also face legal challenges if they attempt to enact similar policies.

“My office will continue to use the full force of the law to ensure Californians have a place to call home,” Bonta said.

This story first appeared on The LA Local.

In a subculture long defined by masculinity, chrome and hydraulics, Tina Blankenship-Early carved out her own lane as a lowrider pioneer.

For more than 30 years, Blankenship-Early has been immersed in a scene historically dominated by men. She’s been featured in publications from The Wall Street Journal to Essence Magazine.

There are many firsts attached to her name. She’s known in the culture as “First Lady,” she was the first woman member of her car club, Super Natural Lowriders, and the first to be named Woman of the Year for Lowrider magazine in 2023 — appearing on the magazine’s cover the following year for a special edition honoring women lowriders.

She was even inducted into the National Lowrider Hall of Fame in 2012, according to the Peterson Automotive Museum, and her cars include a 1966 Chevrolet Caprice named “Game Killa” and a 1961 blue Impala featuring a painting of Michelle Obama on its trunk.

“The cars are the main focus, but it’s the people of the community for me,” Blankenship-Early said. “The realness and the people who are all about the cars and the culture made me want to be deeply involved.”

Blankenship-Early’s legacy highlights a shift within lowrider culture where women are no longer viewed as just passengers or eye candy but are celebrated as creators and competitors. Because of her influence, women are joining car clubs that specifically cater to them, like the L.A.-based Girlz in the Hood and Thee Lady Lowriders.

Women began creating their own car clubs in the 1970s, according to the automobile magazine Motor Trend. Over the past decade, there’s been a resurgence of all-women car clubs in California.

Les Riley, longtime lowrider and member of the Super Natural Lowriders, told The LA Local he didn’t see a lot of women in the culture nearly 40 years ago when he first started, and he knows having a lowrider is not an easy or cheap hobby.

“She’s doing everything that the men are doing and probably doing it better,” Riley said of Blankenship-Early. “So I take my hat off to her.”

Blankenship-Early went from watching lowriders to building them

Blankenship-Early, 58, said she was about 8 years old being raised in Watts when she first saw guys lowriding.

Her chance to work on a lowrider came with her best friend’s father.

“I’ve always wanted to lowride, but what actually made me go ahead and do it — my best friend, her dad, me and him built his ’66 Impala in his garage, and he would take me riding with him all the time,” she said.

In 1988, she said she bought a Nissan 200 SX, and after watching her neighbor install an audio system in the car, she taught herself and began installing them for local car clubs.

After installing an audio system for Super Natural Lowriders' then-President Andre Jones, she was asked to join the club as its first woman member in 1998.

Former club Vice President Gerald Hill gave her the nickname “First Lady.” Today, she holds the title of vice president, a role she said she’s using to plan food drives for unhoused people in the community and backpack giveaways for local students.

And the sense of community she’s found within lowriding has extended far beyond South L.A.

“Since I’ve been doing this, I’ve made friends in other countries that I chat with on a regular basis,” Blankenship-Early said. “It’s opened up worlds for me that I probably would’ve never encountered.”

During a Super Natural Lowriders meeting at Point Fermin Park in San Pedro on March 15, member Kenneth Jones told The LA Local that Blankenship-Early has been in a leadership role since he joined the club.

“When I came into the club, Tina was already here influencing the club and doing a lot of things,” Jones said, adding that having a woman in the car club’s leadership is cool and she knows what she’s doing.

Blankenship-Early owns a lowrider named ‘Game Killa‘

Blankenship-Early has owned at least three lowriders in her lifetime.

“The first lowrider I bought was a 1984 [Buick] Regal, and that was a whole different experience for me,” Blankenship-Early said. “I remember being excited to pick it up from the hydraulics shop.”

She bought her award-winning lowrider, a 1966 Chevrolet Caprice named “Game Killa,” for $500 in 2005. It took her three years to transform it from a shell into a car built for cruising and competition.

The car was named by fellow club member Ivan Lopez, who told her she’d be “killing the game” after seeing photos of the car’s transformation.

Game Killa has earned dozens of awards, appeared in music videos and even appeared in ads for the 2015 film “Straight Outta Compton.”

Blankenship-Early was given the nickname “First Lady” after becoming the first woman to join the Super Natural Lowriders in 1998. Her second car, a blue 1961 Impala also named “First Lady,” pays tribute to former first lady Michelle Obama.

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LaMonica Peters

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Blankenship-Early owns another customized lowrider: a 1961 blue Impala fittingly named “First Lady,” that sits in her home garage. The car has painted murals of former First Lady Michelle Obama on the trunk.

When she isn’t driving one of her lowriders, Blankenship-Early operates a street sweeper for the city of Los Angeles, a job she’s had for the past eight years.

She said she likes to spend time with her husband and family, while helping to take care of her aging mother. But Sundays are for cruising.

“They know Sunday is my day,” she said. “You have to have some time for yourself to just breathe.”

This story first appeared on The LA Local.

Koreatown-raised entertainer Dumbfoundead tells it straight: “I don’t think I’m just Korean or Korean American. I’m more Koreatown than both of those labels.”

The Korean American rapper, born Jonathan Park, moved to Koreatown at 3 and has lived there ever since. He’s often called the “mayor of Koreatown,” a title he proudly embraces.

The neighborhood sits at the center of his memoir, SPIT: A Life in Battles, which he promoted at a book launch in early April hosted by the Los Angeles Korean Festival Foundation.

Set to be released Tuesday from Third State Books and co-written with Donnie Kwak, SPIT traces Park’s childhood through his late 20s. He chronicles coming up in the music scene while dealing with racist stereotypes, problems at home and addiction.

“This is the culture I grew up in, in the neighborhood, and that’s what made me who I am. If I didn’t grow up in a neighborhood that proudly had Korean letters on menus and signs and I could be unapologetically Korean, I would not be able to battle rap in confidence and be able to have thick skin to fight opponents verbally,” he said.

Rapper and actor Dumbfoundead (Jonathan Park) at Love Hour in Koreatown on March 26.

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Park, 40, was born in Argentina to Korean parents. He and his younger sister later crossed the U.S.-Mexico border with their mother, eventually landing in Koreatown. The neighborhood didn’t have much of a hip-hop scene but provided the young Park a space to find his voice.

Enter the hip-hop scene of nearby Leimert Park. Old, grainy YouTube videos show him performing at Project Blowed, where rappers gathered for open mic sessions that could run late into the night. He would skateboard there as a teenager, then head back home late. With his immigrant parents working long hours to support the family, the lax supervision allowed him to roam the city freely and build his street cred.

Seth Eklund, executive director of the Koreatown community and resource center Bresee Foundation, remembers the teenage Park from those early years.

“I do consider him like a son, one of my many sons from over the years,” Eklund said. “I started at Bresee in 1996, he started coming in 1998 when we were still up on the third floor of the church.”

In his memoir, Park describes the Bresee Foundation as transformative for his childhood. He started going there when the center served mostly Black and Latino youth. Park, his sister Natalie and their Korean friends Andy and Mimi “stuck out like sore thumbs,” Eklund said, but they quickly became regulars, spending most afternoons at the center.

Eklund remembers Park getting into music and media production. He even went to Leimert Park to watch Park freestyle.

“You had guys out there that were gangsters from all over L.A.,” Eklund said. “It was a really cool cultural scene. And there were really angry battle rappers, gangster rappers, all sorts of people, and he was always the funniest of everyone that would pick you apart with laughter as opposed to angst.”

Sociology professor Oliver Wang from Cal State Long Beach has researched Asian Americans in hip-hop and said the kinds of community spaces Park was part of were critical to him being able to “take off.”

Wang also points to how closely Park has tied himself to Koreatown. He said hip-hop, from its earliest days, has always been rooted in a sense of place, but especially with someone like Park, grounding himself in Koreatown helps listeners understand he is coming from a particular place and, therefore, a particular perspective.

“I think for Asian American listeners, the fact that he comes out of Koreatown, an Asian American ethnic enclave, that completely matters,” Wang said, “because it’s tied into a larger sense of Asian American-hood when you’re naming your Asian American hood, no pun intended.”

Even after growing up and leaving the Bresee Center, Park stayed connected to them, something Eklund says he really appreciates. Park returned to the center for a few summers to run workshops for younger kids, teaching writing and music production. He would also bring his artist friends to teach DJing and graffiti art.

“For a couple summers, our center was just flooded with not just kids from this neighborhood but kids from all over L.A. to learn from him and participate,” Eklund said.

“SPIT: A Life in Battles”

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“He’s a multicultural artist. He’s an L.A. artist. This is what L.A. is, it’s a melting pot of people of different traditions coming together, and that’s why I think people resonate with him,” he added.

Paul Kim, Park’s longtime friend and founder of Kollaboration, a nonprofit that helps grow Asian American talent, remembers seeing Park performing as a teenager.

“You could tell he was just different,” Kim said. “So witty, so funny.”

Kim notes that Park always stayed true to his roots.

“He’s performed at almost every Koreatown nonprofit gala, he’s supported so many different organizations, he’s performed at all the student associations, the cultural performances,” he said. “He was always rapping about real-life situations. He’s just very raw and authentic.”

That authenticity is what drew 23-year-old Johnny Nguyen, originally from the Bay Area, to become a fan of Dumbfoundead.

“I was 13 and I was looking for Asian American rappers because I wanted to support the community and stories that weren’t represented,” he said.

“He is a regular guy living in Koreatown trying to live life like everyone else in the neighborhood,” Nguyen added. “He’s not living in a mansion far away.”

Park agrees that’s all part of his approach to making art.

“I think hip-hop is just authenticity,” Park said. “When I was growing up, I had a lot of songs that were super nerdy. … The other Asian rappers were pretty gangster, and then they saw this dude named Dumbfoundead. He looks scraggly, he skateboards, and he’s rapping about not getting girls while everyone else is rapping about getting girls. Hip-hop is about being unique and standing out.”

Park says his book is about “capturing Koreatown’s legacy, Asian American history and entertainment, all just told through my lens.”

Touring made him more aware of how specific his experience was — and how lucky he was for it. In other parts of the country, he said, he would meet Korean American fans who did not grow up around a large Korean community.

After one show in Wisconsin, he said a young Korean fan came up to him and begged him: take me with you.

“To us it doesn’t mean anything because we can get great Korean food and we just gotta choose between 10 options,” he said about growing up in Los Angeles. “I think we take it for granted a little bit that this is a place where you can have confidence and be unapologetically Korean.”

Park has never left much doubt about how he feels about Koreatown.

“I really do thank the neighborhood in that way,” he said. “I think that that played a big part.”

Park is scheduled to appear in conversation with chef Roy Choi at Barnes & Noble at The Grove on April 16 and at the LA Times Festival of Books on April 19.

A new and returning slate of TV shows and straight-to-streaming movies are heading your way this spring, with a good number of them set here in Los Angeles (and one in Orange County).

From (yet another!) comedy about the entertainment industry — this one starring Keanu Reeves, Cameron Diaz and Jonah Hill — to one set (and filmed in) Fullerton — starring Elle Fanning and Michelle Pfeiffer, and based on the popular novel of the same name.

Outcome (April 10, Apple TV)

Keanu Reeves and Martin Scorsese in "Outcome," premiering April 10, 2026 on Apple TV.

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Apple TV

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This dark comedy was co-written and directed by Jonah Hill, who also plays Hollywood mega star Reef Hawk’s (Keanu Reeves) crisis lawyer in the film. After Hawk finds himself blackmailed with the release of a video that could destroy his career, he sets off on an apology tour in the hopes of stopping the extortion plot.

Matt Bomer and Cameron Diaz play Hawk’s friends, alongside a star-studded cast including Susan Lucci, Martin Scorsese, Drew Barrymore, Laverne Cox and comedians Roy Wood Jr., Atsuko Okatsuka and David Spade.

Margo’s Got Money Troubles (April 15, Apple TV)

Nicole Kidman in "Margo's Got Money Troubles."

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Apple TV

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Based on the hit 2024 novel of the same name, Margo’s Got Money Troubles is about a 19-year-old aspiring writer and single mom (Elle Fanning) who lives in Fullerton and turns to OnlyFans to make ends meet.

Margo’s mom, an ex-Hooters waitress, is played by Michelle Pfeiffer, and her dad, a former pro wrestler, is played by Nick Offerman (with Nicole Kidman playing an old wrestling buddy of his).

The show was filmed in Los Angeles, downtown Fullerton and on the Fullerton College campus, with over $50,000 of the proceeds reportedly going to a scholarship fund.

Funny AF (April 20, Netflix)

Kevin Hart in Funny AF.

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The reality competition show Funny AF is only partially filmed/set in Los Angeles (with auditions also in New York and Chicago), but we’re including it on this list because the finale is set to take place in Los Angeles at the Netflix is a Joke Festival.

Comedian Kevin Hart hosts this search for “the next stand-up superstar,” with help from guest judges including Kumail Nanjiani, Chelsea Handler and Keegan-Michael Key.

The winner, ultimately chosen from a list of finalists by audience votes, will get their own Netflix stand-up special.

Jerry West: The Logo (April 16, Prime Video)

Head coach Jerry West of the Los Angeles Lakers looks on from the bench during an NBA basketball game circa 1977 at The Forum in Inglewood, California. West coached the Lakers from 1976-79.

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Another slight outlier, we’re calling this documentary L.A.-based because of the Lakers connection. Jerry West: The Logo is about the All-Star Los Angeles Lakers player and executive whose silhouette was the basis for the NBA logo.

Directed by Kenya Barris (black-ish, BlackAF), the film features the final interviews West participated in before his passing in 2024. Other interviewees include Magic Johnson, Michael Jordan, Kareem Abdul-Jabaar, Shaquille O’Neill, Steph Curry and Kevin Durant.

Returning shows, also with SoCal locations

Hacks (April 9, HBO Max)

The fifth and final season of Hacks (HBO Max) premieres this week. The season was partially filmed in L.A., along with Las Vegas, New York and Paris. A side note on the show’s L.A. filming locations: the Altadena home that was featured as the “side mansion” of lead character Deborah Vance (Jean Smart) burned down in the 2025 Eaton Fire.

Euphoria (April 12, HBO Max)

The show, returning for a third season (which may be its last) is set in the fictional city of East Highland but is largely shot in and around Los Angeles. Zendaya returns to her Emmy-winning role of Rue, along with supporting cast members Sydney Sweeney and Jacob Elordi.

Beef (April 16, Netflix)

Much of the first season of the Netflix series, starring Ali Wong and Steven Yeun as strangers who meet through a road rage incident, filmed on location in the San Fernando Valley and Koreatown. Season 2 involves an entirely new story and cast, including Carey Mulligan and Oscar Isaac, and was filmed at least partially in downtown Ojai.

Running Point (April 23, Netflix)

The series where Kate Hudson plays a woman who’s unexpectedly put in charge of her family’s professional basketball team (inspired in part by the real-life Los Angeles Lakers owner Jeanie Buss) films in L.A. and is also set here.

The Comeback (March 22, HBO Max)

The Comeback has already come back (in this latest iteration — its third and final season — last month), but new episodes of the Hollywood satire starring Lisa Kudrow are still coming out on Sundays.

Los Angeles leaders could soon make changes to the city’s embattled “mansion tax.” But some housing advocates, who blame the tax for a slowdown in apartment development, say the new attempts at reform don’t go far enough.

The city’s Housing Department released a report last week recommending the City Council make four changes to voter-approved Measure ULA, a tax on real estate sales of $5.3 million or more.

The changes, described by the Housing Department as “narrowly focused,” mainly deal with the financing and regulation of affordable housing projects funded by Measure ULA. The department recommended the City Council approve those changes by early fall so loans for new affordable housing projects can close later this year.

Mott Smith, an adjunct professor of real estate at USC and a critic of the tax, said the reforms proposed in the report could fix overly restrictive spending rules. But he said they don’t address the tax’s broader impact on housing development across the city.

“This is really a form of admission that ULA is not working as designed,” Smith said. “It's frankly about time that the city admits this because we're never going to fix it if they can't admit there's a problem.”

The report’s conclusions were reviewed and endorsed by the citizen oversight committee tasked with monitoring Measure ULA’s outcomes. Joe Donlin, director of the United to House L.A. coalition, said supporters are in favor of the proposed changes.

“ULA was written with flexibility to make these exact kinds of amendments,” Donlin said. “We always knew that there would need to be adjustments along the way, and we continue to support efforts to optimize Measure ULA in any way possible.”

How the tax has worked so far

Since taking effect, Measure ULA has raised more than $1 billion for tenant aid programs and affordable housing construction. Before voters approved the tax in 2022, proponents said it could produce 26,000 homes in its first decade. So far, the tax has funded the construction of about 800 homes, according to supporters.

Tax proponents say thousands of new homes are entering the development pipeline. Last year, the city began taking applications for $387 million in funds for housing development and preservation. But according to the Housing Department report, affordable housing lenders have told the city that Measure ULA requirements can discourage them from funding projects.

Based on those concerns, the report recommends changes that would:

• Exempt projects built by affordable housing developers from paying the tax
• Ensure terms for other sources of public funding don’t conflict with terms for Measure ULA funding 
• Allow foreclosed projects to be sold to other developers
• Let building owners increase rents if they lose rental subsidies

Azeen Khanmalek, executive director of Abundant Housing L.A., said those changes would help unlock Measure ULA funding but wouldn’t do much to convince market-rate developers to return to L.A.

“The biggest thing that we don't see in this report is around addressing the impact measure ULA is having on multi-family housing production across the income spectrum,” Khanmalek said.

Several economic studies have concluded that because the so-called “mansion tax” applies to new apartment buildings — not just mansions — development has slowed in L.A. more than in nearby cities.

Tax supporters dispute those findings, blaming high interest rates and other macroeconomic factors for slower building in L.A.

‘Mansion tax’ fight headed for the ballot

The proposed changes come at a time when Measure ULA has come under fire, with multiple efforts to reform the tax — or invalidate it — likely to appear on the November ballot.

The Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association has turned in signatures for a ballot measure to overturn such taxes statewide.

Meanwhile, the L.A. City Council has set up a committee to develop potential reforms for the November ballot that would alter but not eliminate the tax. The new report from the housing department has been referred to that committee, but it has not yet been scheduled for a vote.

Miguel Santana, president of the California Community Foundation, said he and other business leaders, academics and affordable housing developers recently formed a new coalition — called Mend It, Don’t End It — to support proposals such as a 15-year tax exemption for new apartment buildings.

“ULA has created circumstances where investors are deciding not to invest in Los Angeles and are investing in surrounding communities,” Santana said. “We know that at the crux of the affordable housing crisis is supply and to be able to respond to that issue.”