The Brief

The Los Angeles region is at a critical juncture in how it approaches perhaps its thorniest crisis: homelessness.

County elected leaders voted last week to defund the L.A. Homeless Services Authority, or LAHSA, which has been the subject of multiple audits uncovering serious financial and oversight failures.

That agency’s chief executive, Va Lecia Adams Kellum, announced Friday that she would step down after a tumultuous two-year tenure.

Her decision comes at a time when the L.A. City Council is also weighing plans to pull funding from LAHSA. Meanwhile, county leaders are deciding how to spend more than $1 billion per year in expected revenue from a sales tax approved by voters for homeless services and affordable housing production.

How did the region end up losing its top homelessness executive and deciding to forge a different path on efforts to house more than 75,000 people living on the streets and in shelters?

Here are five key events leading up to Adams Kellum’s resignation.

Resignations at LAHSA precede Adams Kellum’s arrival 

When Adams Kellum took the reins at LAHSA in 2023, the agency was not known for stable leadership. Before her term, LAHSA had been overseen by a string of short-lived executives and acting directors.

The last LAHSA chief who lasted more than a couple years was Peter Lynn, who led the agency between 2014 and 2019.

Heidi Marsten took over as executive director in 2020 and stepped down in 2022. In her resignation note, she said she received pushback over her efforts to freeze LAHSA executive compensation in order to give raises to the agency’s lowest-paid workers.

“Leaders at the helm of the homelessness crisis are quick to state they want to end homelessness,” Marston wrote at the time. “But when given the opportunity to create housing security, I have watched those same people refuse to make the sacrifices necessary to effectuate that change.”

Next, LAHSA was led by a pair of acting co-executive directors, Kristina Dixon and Molly Rysman. Following their tenure, Stephen David Simon acted as LAHSA’s interim executive director before Adams Kellum’s arrival.

Late payments to service providers

Multiple audits of LAHSA have identified one recurring problem: frequently delayed payments to the providers who work directly with unhoused people.

Even before the release of the latest round of audits, the issue came to a head last year in a county Board of Supervisors meeting where service providers said LAHSA’s late payments had in some cases forced them to take out private loans in order to make payroll.

John Maceri, CEO of the nonprofit the People Concern, said during the meeting that the late payments had brought his organization and others to “the breaking point.”

Adams Kellum said the long-standing issue predated her time as CEO.

“This issue right here is my primary focus,” she told county supervisors at the time. “I'm losing sleep, as you can imagine. And I should, because this must get addressed.”

County audit finds un-recouped loans and lack of oversight 

In November, the L.A. County auditor-controller’s office released an audit that confirmed LAHSA was indeed routinely paying service providers late. And it found much more than that.

The audit concluded that LAHSA had failed to track whether providers followed the terms of their contracts. It uncovered that the agency had in some cases distributed funds set aside for specific purposes to providers for completely different purposes. The agency also failed to establish repayment agreements with service providers it gave $51 million in advances.

Shortly after the audit came out, Supervisor Lindsey Horvath said she would introduce a motion to redirect county funding away from LAHSA and into a new county department responsible for homelessness response.

“The audit findings make clear the structure we have for service delivery is not working. We need greater accountability and bold action," Horvath said at the time.

Adams Kellum signs $2.1M contract to her husband’s employer

Public officials are generally banned from getting involved in contracts in which they have a financial interest, according to state conflict-of-interest laws. That includes contracts that financially benefit their spouse.

Adams Kellum told LAist late last year that she had disclosed the fact that her husband was employed by a local homeless services provider. She said she had been “completely recused” from contracts involving that provider.

But LAist found through a public records request that Adams Kellum signed a $2.1 million contract to Upward Bound House, the Santa Monica provider where her husband, Edward Kellum, works in a senior role.

A LAHSA spokesperson told us agency employees mistakenly sent the contract to Adams Kellum for her signature. But her failure to designate an alternate signer was criticized by Supervisor Kathryn Barger in a recent Board of Supervisors meeting.

“This is about just plain old sloppy work by [executives at] LAHSA, and quite frankly the executive director who signed it,” Barger said at the time. “If my spouse was working for ABC Corporation and I saw something come across my desk, I would know I shouldn't sign that.”

Adams Kellum tries to save LAHSA’s county funding 

As scrutiny of LAHSA intensified, agency officials made the unusual decision to release early, incomplete data from this year’s homeless count.

In March, Adams Kellum said that preliminary data suggested that when the full results of the 2025 homeless count are released this summer, they would show a 5% to 10% drop in unsheltered homelessness across the county. She said that would build on a 10% drop in the city of L.A.’s unsheltered population the previous year, according to her agency’s count.

But those numbers were not enough to stop elected leaders from moving forward with plans to pull county funds from LAHSA.

When Horvath’s motion came up for a final vote last week, Adams Kellum showed up at the Board of Supervisors meeting to argue against the move. Instead of being welcomed by the board to share her perspective at length, Adams Kellum spoke from the public comment podium like any other county resident lining up to voice their opinion on board votes.

“I made promises — one would be a reduction in unsheltered homelessness, which we’ve seen now two years in a row,” Adams Kellum said. “To enhance transparency, I promised that we would improve our operations, and we have. We’ve implemented 20 new data dashboards that provide unprecedented insight into how our system functions.”

Adams Kellum said she had also made progress on fixing LAHSA’s late payments to providers.

“We’ve made a lot of the changes that you proposed,” Adams Kellum told the board, shortly before her public comment time ran out and her microphone was cut off.

The board ended up voting, 4-0 (with one abstention), to pull nearly $350 million in county funding from LAHSA.

Three days later, Adams Kellum announced her resignation.

President Donald Trump said Wednesday he is seeking immediate negotiations for the ownership of Greenland but he would not "use force."

"We probably won't get anything unless I decide to use excessive strength and force where we would be, frankly, unstoppable. But I won't do that," he said during his speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
"That's probably the biggest statement I made because people thought I would use force, but I don't have to use force. I don't want to use force. I won't use force," he said.

Trump said U.S. ownership of Greenland is necessary for national security and that "who the hell wants to defend a license agreement or release, which is a large piece of ice in the middle of the ocean."

"So we want a piece of ice for world protection, and they won't give it. We've never asked for anything else, and we could have kept that piece of land, and we didn't. So they have a choice. You can say yes and we will be very appreciative, or you can say no and we will remember," Trump said.

Trump's push to acquire Greenland

Just two weeks ago, Trump posted on social media that he'd address affordability when he spoke at the World Economic Forum in Davos.

But his belligerent foreign policy is once again overshadowing his attempts at a cohesive economic message. Trump's aggressive push to acquire Greenland has turned to open antagonism toward allies in recent days, becoming a central focus of this year's forum.

Just days before the forum began, Trump on social media threatened to tariff goods from eight European nations and NATO members until they support a U.S. deal to purchase Greenland.

Those countries responded with a statement saying that they stand in solidarity with Denmark and Greenland, which is an autonomous territory of the Kingdom of Denmark.

Over the weekend, Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr also revealed a text conversation in which Trump said that not receiving the Nobel Peace Prize — which the Norwegian government does not confer — is influencing his decision to pursue Greenland.

It also became clear in recent days that other world leaders were seeking to dissuade Trump from attempting to take over Greenland, when Trump on Monday night posted screenshots of text messages from NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte and French President Emmanuel Macron.

Rutte began his message with flattery, praising Trump's recent strikes in Syria. Rutte added, "I am committed to finding a way forward on Greenland."

Macron, for his part, was harsher: "I do not understand what you are doing on Greenland," he wrote, but added that he wanted to have dinner after Davos.

And Trump on Tuesday reposted a social media message that cast the U.N. and NATO as the "real threat" to the U.S., as opposed to China and Russia.

All of this buildup has brought American foreign policy to center stage at Davos. When Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent took the stage with Fox Business's Maria Bartiromo yesterday, her first question was about Greenland: "How do you justify taking over a country when in fact Denmark and Greenland have said they're not interested?"

"Greenland's becoming more and more attractive for foreign conquest, and he very strongly believes that it must be part of the U.S. to prevent a conflict," Bessent said as part of his answer.

Meanwhile, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney on Tuesday delivered a forceful speech that, without mentioning Trump explicitly, argued that his policies are leading to the breakdown of the international order.

"Let me be direct: We are in the midst of a rupture, not a transition," Carney said. "Great powers have begun using economic integration as weapons, tariffs as leverage, financial infrastructure as coercion, supply chains as vulnerabilities to be exploited."

"We stand firmly with Greenland and Denmark and fully support their unique right to determine Greenland's future. Our commitment to NATO's Article 5 is unwavering," he later added. "Canada strongly opposes tariffs over Greenland."

But Trump, speaking at length with reporters Tuesday, seemed to step off the gas slightly when it came to his harsh rhetoric. Asked about how his push for Greenland could result in breaking up NATO, Trump seemed to demur.

"Something's going to happen that's going to be very good for everybody," he said.

The foreign policy Trump is bringing to Davos goes beyond Greenland. On Thursday, he will participate in what the White House is calling a Board of Peace Charter Announcement.

The "Board of Peace" is being created as part of Trump's 20-point plan to end the conflict between Israel and Hamas and has come under sharp criticism. A copy of the charter obtained by NPR said that countries that want permanent membership will have to pay $1 billion, and that Trump is the permanent chair, even after his term as U.S. president ends. The charter also says that the world needs a more effective international peace-building body — which may signal the board is hoping to act as a rival to the U.N.

The board's membership is still unsettled, but Trump said he has asked Russia's president, Vladimir Putin, to take part. Meanwhile, France's Macron has said he will not join.

Trump told reporters this week that his main message in Davos will be "how well the United States is doing." Economic advisor Kevin Hassett has said the president will also be revealing a new housing policy.

Copyright 2026 NPR

Overcrowded cells, moldy food and lack of medical care are some of the issues plaguing a California detention center amid the recent onslaught of immigration raids by the Trump administration, according to Sens. Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff, who on Tuesday toured the facility in Kern County.

About 1,450 people are currently being held at the California City Immigration Processing Center, according to officials. Schiff and Padilla expect more to be brought to the facility as the Trump administration ramps up immigration enforcement across the country.

The Kern County facility has the capacity to hold 2,500 people, but it already appears short-staffed and lacking proper medical supplies, like insulin for people with diabetes, the Democratic senators said after their congressional oversight tour.

The majority of the detainees they met at the facility do not have a prior criminal records and were detained at their immigration appointments.

The senators toured the facility and met with staff for roughly six hours Tuesday. They left the tour concerned about the conditions at the facility.

“A lot of the concerns we heard were about very valid healthcare issues not being addressed. The staff here acknowledged there’s been gaps,” Schiff said.

Some of the detainees said they became ill after eating moldy food and drinking water while in custody.

“I’m leaving here even more concerned than I was when I arrived,” Padilla said. “If the administration is true to their word, the population here is only going to grow. So the need to address nutrition, medical attention, mental healthcare is only going to grow.

Detainees from across Southern California are being held at California City Immigration Processing Center in Kern County.

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Marina Peña

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Some of the men and women being held at the facility were detained in Los Angeles County, but others were taken from other parts of the country.

“That is absolutely a concern, not just for people from within the state of California to travel long distances, unable to see a family member, but I met a number of detainees here from elsewhere in the country,” Padilla said. “So access to their counsel prior and certainly to their family members is only exacerbated, to that effect.” 

Padilla asked, “Why are people from other states being sent here? We also hear people from California being sent to other states.”

Last year, 32 people died while in the custody of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, according to reporting from The Guardian. Some died in detention facilities, field offices and others died after they were transferred to hospitals for medical treatment.

At least six people have died while in ICE custody this year, according to Padilla and Schiff.

“In terms of getting the standards enforced to make sure they’re being upheld, that requires oversight, and it should be more than the two of us coming out to the detention facility without the power of the subpoena,” Schiff said. “Congress should hold hearings about the conditions in these detention facilities.”

The California City Immigration Processing Center in Kern County is roughly 100 miles north of Los Angeles and operated by private-prison contractor CoreCivic. 

CoreCivic and the Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to requests for comment about Tuesday’s tour. The California City facility has not been inspected by the federal government since it started to receive detainees in August.

Padilla, ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Immigration Subcommittee, and Schiff toured the facility as masked agents continue to carry out an unrelenting wave of immigration sweeps across the country. The senators spoke to reporters outside the remote detention center, one year after President Donald Trump was sworn into office for his second term.

“Today marks the first anniversary of the second Trump administration, and if there’s two takeaways from his first year,” Padilla said, “one is the economic chaos and uncertainty that so many working families are feeling, and the second clearly is the cruelty of a mass deportation agenda, which has included a lot of indiscriminate detentions, arrests, deportations, many without due process.

”The facility is the largest detention center in California. Up until March 2024, the facility served as both a state and federal prison, but was taken over by ICE last year.

A CoreCivic officer stood guard near the facility parking lot throughout the morning. A gaggle of news reporters waited outside the facility’s barbed wire fence for the tour to be complete. The oversight visit comes as some Democrats in Congress consider various restrictions on funding for ICE operations and two weeks after federal agents shot and killed Renee Good in  Minneapolis during an immigration operation. The latest estimates show that more than 73,000 people are being held in ICE custody .

If you’re a typical American, you get home from work and start flipping switches and turning knobs — doing laundry, cooking dinner, watching TV. With so many other folks doing the same, the strain on the electrical grid in residential areas is highest at this time.

That demand will only grow as the world moves away from fossil fuels, with more people buying induction stoves, heat pumps and electric vehicles.

That’s a challenge for utilities, which are already managing creaky grids across the United States, all while trying to meet a growing demand for power. So they’re now trying to turn EVs from a burden into a boon.

More and more models, for instance, feature “vehicle-to-grid,” or V2G, capabilities, meaning they can send power to the grid as needed.

Others are experimenting with what’s called active managed charging, in which algorithms stagger when EVs charge, instead of them all drawing energy as soon as their owners plug in. The idea is for some people to charge later, but still have a full battery when they leave for work in the morning.

A new report from the Brattle Group, an economic and energy consultancy, done for EnergyHub, which develops such technology, has used real-world data from EV owners in Washington state to demonstrate the potential of this approach, both for utilities and drivers.

They found that an active managed charging program saves up to $400 per EV each year, and the vehicles were still always fully charged in the morning.

Utilities, too, seem to benefit, as the redistributed demand results in less of a spike in the early evening. That, in turn, would mean that a utility can delay costly upgrades — which they need in order to accommodate increased electrification — saving ratepayers money.

How it works

Active managed charging works in conjunction with something called “time of use,” in which a utility charges different rates depending on the time of day. Between 4 p.m. and 9 p.m., when demand is high, rates are also high. But after 9 p.m., they fall. EV owners who wait until later in the evening to charge pay less for the same electricity.

Time-of-use pricing discourages energy use when demand is highest, lightening the load and reducing how much electricity utilities need to generate. But there’s nothing stopping everyone from plugging in as soon as cheaper rates kick in at 9 p.m. As EV adoption grows, that coordination problem can create a new spike in demand.

“An EV can be, on its own, twice the peak load of a typical home,” said Akhilesh Ramakrishnan, managing energy associate at the Brattle Group. “You get to the point where they start needing to be managed differently.”

That’s where active managed charging comes in. Using an app, an EV owner indicates when they need their car to be charged, and how much charge their battery needs for the day. (The app also learns over time to predict when a vehicle will unplug.) When the owner gets home at 6 p.m., the owner can plug in, but the car won’t begin to charge. Instead, the system waits until some point in the night to turn on the juice, leaving enough time to fully charge the vehicle by the indicated hour.

“If customers don’t believe that we’re going to get them there, then they’re not going to allow us to control their vehicle effectively,” said Freddie Hall, a data scientist at EnergyHub.

The typical driver goes only 30 miles in a day, Hall added, requiring about two hours of charging each night. By actively managing many cars across neighborhoods, the system can more evenly distribute demand throughout the night: Folks will leave for work earlier or later than their neighbors, vehicles with bigger batteries will need more time to charge, and some will be almost empty while others may need to top up.

They’re all still getting the lower prices with time of use rates, but they’re not taxing the grid by all charging at 9 p.m.

“The results are actually very, very promising in terms of reducing the peak loads,” said Jan Kleissl, the director of the Center for Energy Research at UC San Diego who wasn’t involved in the report. “It shows big potential for reducing costs of EV charging in general.”

Active managed charging would allow the grid to accommodate twice the number of EVs before a utility has to start upgrading the system to handle the added load, according to the report. (And consider all the additional demand for energy from things like data centers.) Those costs inevitably get passed down to all ratepayers. But, the report notes, active managed charging could delay those upgrades by up to a decade.

“As EVs grow, if you don’t implement these solutions, there’s going to be a lot more upgrades, and that’s going to lead to rate impacts for everyone,” Ramakrishnan said.

Vehicle-to-grid technology

At the same time, EVs could help reduce those rates in the long term, thanks to V2G, a separate emerging technology.

It allows a utility to call on EVs sitting in garages as a vast network of backup power. So when demand surges, those vehicles can send power to the grid for others to use, or just power the house they’re sitting in, essentially removing the structure from the grid and lowering demand. (And think of all the fleets of electric vehicles, like school buses, with huge batteries to use as additional power.)

With all that backup energy, utilities might not need to build as many costly battery facilities of their own, projects that ratepayers wouldn’t need to foot the bill for.

Active managed charging and V2G could work in concert, with some batteries draining at 6 p.m. as they provide energy, then recharging later at night. But that ballet will require more large-scale experimentation.

“How are we going to fit in discharging a battery, as well as charging it overnight?” Hall said. “Because you do want it available the next day.”

To cut greenhouse gas emissions as quickly as possible, the world needs more EVs. Now it’s just a matter of making them benefit the grid instead of taxing it.

The mostly cloudy skies today are courtesy of a low-pressure system that brings a 30 to 50% chance of showers to the region. It will be dry today, but we can't rule out a slight chance of showers tonight.

Today's temperatures will be cooler, with highs mostly in the mid- to upper 60s for the beaches and coastal communities. The valleys will see temperatures between 68 to 73 degrees and up to 74 degrees over in the Inland Empire.

High temperatures in the Coachella Valley will reach 70 to 75 degrees. Meanwhile, in the Antelope Valley, temperatures there will remain between 58 to 66 degrees.

The National Weather Service says any showers will be light to moderate come Thursday into Friday morning.