The Brief

L.A.’s top homeless services official Va Lecia Adams Kellum engaged in major misconduct, including hiring unqualified friends into powerful positions, trying to destroy public records and behaving inappropriately at a conference, according to two whistleblower claim letters obtained by LAist.

The letters were written by an attorney on behalf of two former L.A. Homeless Services Authority employees who alleged they were wrongfully fired for speaking up against wrongdoing by Adams Kellum. Written claims such as these are a required step before filing a lawsuit against a local government in California.

LAHSA arranged for $800,000 to be paid to the whistleblowers — former chief financial and administrative officer Kristina Dixon and former top IT and data official Emily Vaughn Henry — to settle the claims before they became public lawsuits. The settlement amount is equivalent to what it costs to shelter as many as 40 unhoused people for a year, according to a recent audit’s summary of shelter costs.

Legal experts previously told LAist the agency was violating public records laws by withholding the whistleblowers’ written allegations that led to the payouts. But after continued questioning and two articles by LAist about the experts’ analysis, LAHSA attorneys ultimately reversed themselves and released those letters — with extensive redactions that a public records attorney says are unlawful.

Courts have repeatedly ruled that the public is entitled to know the content of misconduct complaints and investigation findings about senior government officials.

A spokesperson for Adams Kellum’s administration said LAHSA denies the allegations, but said no formal investigations were started into the specific allegations against her. Adams Kellum’s administration has not answered whether they reported the allegations to county auditor-controller investigators — something required for all allegations of abuse of LAHSA’s resources, according to an agreement LAHSA disclosed to LAist.

What the whistleblowers alleged

In the newly disclosed letters, the whistleblowers allege that:

• Adams Kellum pushed out experienced staff to hire unqualified friends and former subordinates from her previous job into high-level, high salary LAHSA roles. 
• One of these hires used their personal cell phone for official communications, in violation of agency policy.
• A LAHSA official repeatedly withheld accurate data about Mayor Karen Bass’ signature homelessness program, Inside Safe, “because [Adams] Kellum did not want Mayor Bass to look bad.” (LAist previously reported that officials withheld Inside Safe transparency reports from the L.A. City Council.) Vaughn Henry’s claim letter says Adams Kellum retaliated against her “for not being willing [to] hide the number of clients being served by Inside Safe.”
• Adams Kellum asked LAHSA’s top IT official to violate record retention laws by deleting two official emails that had been sent to Adam’s Kellum’s LAHSA email account. The whistleblower letter claims this was intended to protect the person who had emailed Adams Kellum. The emails were sent “in violation of the City's communication policies regarding using personal email for official business,” according to the claim. The name of the email sender was blacked out by LAHSA’s attorneys — which a public records attorney says is unlawful. 
• Adams Kellum engaged in “inappropriate and unethical behavior” at a conference in Washington, D.C. Vaughn Henry reported the behavior to human resources around August 2023, according to her claim. Adams Kellum subsequently retaliated against Vaughn Henry for reporting the incident, according to the claim letter. The apparent description of Adams Kellum’s alleged misbehavior at the conference was redacted by LAHSA’s attorneys, which a public records attorney says is unlawful.
• Adams Kellum wanted to spend public money on an open bar at LAHSA’s holiday party and responded angrily when told that would be an improper use of taxpayer dollars and create legal liability for LAHSA. Adams Kellum then allegedly suggested a vendor pay for the alcohol. When told that would be a conflict of interest, Adams Kellum allegedly got angry again.

LAHSA leadership failed to commission a neutral investigation into allegations, in violation of the agency’s own policy, according to one of the letters.

[Click here to read Vaughn Henry’s claim letter, and here for Dixon’s.]

Settlements prevented public lawsuit and witness testimony

The claim letters said that if LAHSA didn’t settle the claims, the former executives would file a public lawsuit and gather extensive supporting evidence and testimony for their allegations, which would become public and potentially affect city and county officials.

“Once litigation is commenced, we intend to take thorough and exhaustive discovery and depose each of the employees, managers, and officers who witnessed, encouraged, condoned, and turned a blind eye to the unlawful acts of the LAHSA, [Adams] Kellum, and elected officials having authority over LAHSA,” the letters state. “There is already a high level of public and media interest in the recent terminations at LAHSA, and a public lawsuit will undoubtedly have far-reaching repercussions for many City and County officials.”

In March, LAHSA’s governing commission authorized $800,000 in settlement payments to resolve the claims and prevent a public lawsuit. The commissioners were not provided copies of the claim letters for their decision on the settlement payments, according to LAHSA.

LAHSA paid $200,000 of the settlements out of city and county general fund money, and the other $600,000 was paid by LAHSA’s insurance provider Chubb, according to the agency.

LAHSA denies the allegations, which weren’t investigated

“The Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority (LAHSA) denied the allegations presented in the letters and resolved these matters with advice of outside counsel and based upon many factors, including business considerations,” the agency said in an emailed statement attributed to Ahmad Chapman, LAHSA’s spokesperson.

“LAHSA does not wish to ‘litigate’ this case in the media and will offer no further comment on this matter,” the statement said.

The allegations were not formally investigated.

“After a diligent search LAHSA has determined that no complaints were filed related to the allegations described, and therefore no formal investigation [was] initiated against Dr. Adams Kellum," said a public records response to LAist from Holly Henderson, risk management director at LAHSA.

Adams Kellum’s administration has not answered a follow up question about why an independent investigation was not conducted into the demand letters' allegations after they were received. They also have not answered whether the allegations against Adams Kellum were previously reported to human resources or risk management director Holly Henderson.

Other local governments have policies to hire an outside law firm or investigator to look into allegations against high-ranking officials — as Orange County did in recent years with high-ranking officials.

Adams Kellum did not respond to multiple requests for comment. She and her administration’s spokespeople declined to answer what LAHSA’s policy is for retaining official emails.

Bass’ office referred LAist’s questions to LAHSA’s attorneys, who have not responded. The questions included whether Bass has used her personal email account to communicate with Adams Kellum about official business.

LAist requested copies of the emails Adams Kellum allegedly wanted deleted. Adams Kellum’s administration did not respond for 11 days, before saying they needed an additional two weeks to answer whether they exist because they need to consult with a separate, unnamed agency interested in the records request.

Dixon and Vaughn Henry declined to comment. Their settlement agreements with LAHSA state that they cannot “volunteer knowingly or maliciously false and disparaging opinions or commentary regarding [LAHSA],” including on social media or responding to news reporters.

The settlement deals also say that LAHSA will “maintain the confidentiality of the terms, conditions, payment amounts, and other aspects of this settlement and Settlement Agreement to the extent permitted by applicable law” — despite settlement agreements being public records under the California Public Records Act.

LAHSA refused to release the records — until LAist kept pushing back

For weeks, LAHSA’s attorneys at the County Counsel’s office refused to release the whistleblower claims that led to the settlement payouts — despite courts repeatedly ruling that those types of records have to be disclosed.

The fact that the claims have been settled — and taxpayer money paid out — makes it even more clear that the public has a right to see them, said David Loy, a leading public records attorney in California and legal director at the First Amendment Coalition.

LAHSA attorneys Dan Kim and Alyssa Skolnick argued that several exemptions allowed the agency to withhold the records, including attorney-client privilege.

But Loy said none of the exemptions apply. For example, attorney-client privilege is about communications between an attorney and their own client — not claims filed by an outside party.

LAHSA’s attorneys then declined to respond to Loy’s point-by-point analysis of why their reasons for withholding the records go against court rulings.

Dan Kim, an attorney with the County Counsel’s office who had declined to release the records, is pictured on a live stream of the LAHSA Commission’s meeting on April 21, 2025.

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LAist has published two articles on LAHSA withholding the records in apparent violation of state law, and is continuing to question top officials about why they were withholding the documents.

LAist escalated the questioning to the county’s top attorney, County Counsel Dawyn Harrison, who oversees the attorneys refusing to release the documents.

Harrison ultimately disclosed the two documents, with redactions.

The redactions, however, are not lawful, Loy said. And most of the court rulings Harrison pointed to for the redactions require public disclosure, according to the summaries she provided of the rulings.

LAHSA’s redactions are unlawful, expert says

The claims ultimately disclosed to LAist have extensive redactions — including the name of Adams Kellum’s former employer, the names of allegedly unqualified LAHSA executives she hired, and the name of officials who allegedly used their personal email account for official business.

Loy said courts have been clear that exemptions which might be applicable in other contexts, including privacy, do not apply to written litigation claims or demands to public agencies.

If a litigation threat or demand is made and the agency settles — in these cases for $800,000 — "the public has the right to know all of the evidence claimed by the claimants to be able to assess for itself, was this a good deal or a bad deal to settle these claims,” Loy told LAist.

He strongly disputed the reasons Harrison cited for the redactions.

“The agency cannot claim attorney-client privilege over a document sent to it by their adversary’s lawyer,” he said. "I’m baffled as to how they can claim attorney-client privilege is implicated in a communication from opposing counsel.”

Harrison has not responded to a follow-up email from LAist explaining Loy’s analysis of the redactions as unlawful and asking for an explanation backing up the redactions.

Praise for Adams Kellum after $800,000 payouts

Bass and her LAHSA Commission appointee, Wendy Greuel, brought Adams Kellum to LAHSA and have been two of her highest profile supporters after a series of controversies. Those controversies include a court-overseen audit finding a lack of accountability for taxpayer dollars during her time overseeing LAHSA, and signing a $2.1 million taxpayer deal to pay a nonprofit that employs her husband as a senior leader, despite laws against conflicts of interest and Adams Kellum previously claiming she recused herself.

Bass and Greuel have spoken highly of Adams Kellum in recent weeks, including after the $800,000 payouts were approved over the misconduct claims with no public indication of an investigation into them.

In honoring Adams Kellum at a LAHSA Commission meeting last month, Greuel said she had asked Adams Kellum to apply for the LAHSA job.

“I think I [followed] you at events to tackle you to say, ‘Would you apply?’ ” Greuel said of Adams Kellum at the April 21 LAHSA Commission meeting. It was the first meeting after Adams Kellum announced she would be leaving in August, after county supervisors voted to pull county funding from LAHSA.

Bass’ family has known Adams Kellum for years. Bass’ daughter, Yvette Lechuga, started working for Adams Kellum at St. Joseph Center during the coronavirus pandemic, according to the L.A. Times.

Adams Kellum was an advisor for the mayor’s transition in late 2022, and early in her administration Bass directed LAHSA to hire Adams Kellum as a $10,000-per-week consultant to the mayor on the Inside Safe program — which Adams Kellum helped design — ahead of Adams Kellum becoming LAHSA’s CEO.

In a statement last month about Adams Kellum’s plan to leave LAHSA, Bass praised Adams Kellum’s “leadership and bold vision.”

‘Perfect shield for political responsibility’

LAHSA’s relationship with elected officials came up at a recent federal court hearing before Judge David O. Carter.

He said the agency has protected elected officials from responsibility in how billions of taxpayer dollars have been spent on homelessness.

Referring to LAHSA, the judge said: “It's a perfect shield for political responsibility.”

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — President Donald Trump vowed on Thanksgiving to "permanently pause migration" from poorer nations in a blistering late-night, anti-immigrant screed posted to social media.

The extended rant came in the wake of the Wednesday shooting of two National Guard members who were deployed to patrol Washington, D.C. under Trump's orders, one of whom died shortly before the president spoke to U.S. troops by video on Thursday evening.

A 29-year-old Afghan national who worked with the CIA during the Afghanistan War is facing charges for the shooting. The suspect emigrated as part of a program to resettle those who has helped American troops after U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.

"Only REVERSE MIGRATION can fully cure this situation," Trump posted on his Truth Social platform. "Other than that, HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO ALL, except those that hate, steal, murder, and destroy everything that America stands for — You won't be here for long!"

Trump's threat to stop immigration would be a serious blow to a nation that has long defined itself as welcoming immigrants.

Elected on a promise to crack down on illegal migration, Trump's raids and deportations have disrupted communities across the U.S. as construction sites and schools have been targets. The prospect of more deportations could be economically dangerous as America's foreign-born workers account for nearly 31 million jobs, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The president said on Truth Social that "most" foreign-born U.S. residents "are on welfare, from failed nations, or from prisons, mental institutions, gangs, or drug cartels" as he blamed them for crime across the country that is predominantly committed by U.S. citizens.

The perception that immigration breeds crime "continues to falter under the weight of the evidence," according to a review of academic literature last year in the Annual Review of Criminology.

"With few exceptions, studies conducted at both the aggregate and individual levels demonstrate that high concentrations of immigrants are not associated with increased levels of crime and delinquency across neighborhoods and cities in the United States," it said.

A study by economists initially released in 2023 found immigrants are 60% less likely to be incarcerated than people born in the U.S. Immigrants have been imprisoned at lower rates for 150 years, the study found, adding to past research undermining Trump's claims.

But Trump seemed to have little interest in a policy debate in his unusually lengthy social media post, which the White House, on its own rapid response social media account, called "one of the most important messages ever released by President Trump."

Trump claimed immigrants from Somalia are "completely taking over the once great State of Minnesota" as he used a dated slur for intellectually disabled people to demean that state's governor, Tim Walz, the Democratic vice presidential nominee last year, calling him "seriously retarded."

Trump has ramped up his rhetoric since the shooting. On Wednesday night, Trump called for the reinvestigation of all Afghan refugees who had entered under the Biden administration.

On Thursday, the director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Joseph Edlow, said the agency would take additional steps to screen people from 19 "high-risk" countries "to the maximum degree possible."

Edlow didn't name the countries. But in June, the administration banned travel to the U.S. by citizens of 12 countries and restricted access from seven others, citing national security concerns.
Copyright 2025 NPR

Kris Edwards waited at home with friends for his wife, Erika “Tilly” Edwards, to go out to dinner, but she never made it back to the house they had purchased only four days earlier. Around 9 p.m. on June 29, a hit-and-run driver killed Tilly as she walked to her car after a fundraiser performance in Hollywood.

“I’ve just got to figure out how to keep living. And the hard part with that is not knowing why,” Edwards said of his wife’s death.

Despite local, state, and federal safety campaigns, such as the global Vision Zero initiative to eliminate traffic fatalities, such deaths are up 20% in the U.S. from a decade ago, from 32,744 in 2014 to an estimated 39,345 in 2024, according to data from the Department of Transportation’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Although traffic deaths have declined since peaking at 43,230 in 2021, the number of deaths remains higher than a decade ago.

Since the covid-19 pandemic, the Pew Research Center found, Americans’ driving habits have worsened across multiple measures, from reckless driving to drunken driving, which road safety advocates call a public health failure. They say technology could dramatically reduce traffic deaths, but proposals often run up against industry resistance, and the Trump administration is focusing on driverless cars to both innovate and improve public safety.

“Every day, 20 people go out for a walk, and they don’t return home,” said Adam Snider, a spokesperson for the Governors Highway Safety Association, which represents state road safety offices.

American roads have become more dangerous than violent crimes in some cities: Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Houston are among the major cities that now report more traffic fatalities than homicides. In 2024, the Los Angeles Police Department reported an estimated 268 homicides and 302 traffic deaths, the second consecutive year that the number of people killed in collisions exceeded the number of homicide victims, according to Crosstown LA, a nonprofit community news outlet.

Kris Edwards and his cat, Rex, in the garden of the home he bought with his wife, Erika “Tilly” Edwards, only four days before her death.

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San Francisco reported more than 40 traffic deaths and 35 homicides in 2024. In Houston, approximately 345 people died in crashes and 322 from homicide.

“Simply put, the United States is in the middle of a road safety emergency,” David Harkey, president of the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, testified during a House Energy and Commerce subcommittee hearing this summer. Out of 29 high-income countries, America ranks at the bottom in road safety, Harkey said. “This spike is not — I repeat, is not — a global trend. The U.S. is an outlier.”

In January 2017, then-Mayor Eric Garcetti joined 13 other L.A. city leaders in pledging to implement the Vision Zero action plan and eliminate traffic deaths in the city by 2025.

Instead, deaths have increased.

An audit released in April that was commissioned by the city’s administrative officer found that the level of enthusiasm for the program at City Hall has diminished and that it suffered because of “the pandemic, conflicts of personality, lack of total buy-in for implementation, disagreements over how the program should be administered, and scaling issues.” The report also cited competing interests among city departments and inconsistent investment in the city’s most dangerous traffic corridors.

Mayor Karen Bass’ office did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

A hit-and-run driver killed Tilly Edwards as she walked to her car after a fundraiser performance in Los Angeles’ Hollywood neighborhood in June.

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Last year, California state Sen. Scott Wiener proposed a bill that would have required new cars sold in the state to include “intelligent speed assistance,” software that could prevent vehicles from exceeding the speed limit by more than 10 mph. But the bill was watered down following pushback from the auto industry and opposition from some legislators who called it government overreach. It was ultimately vetoed by Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, who said a state mandate would disrupt ongoing federal safety assessments.

Meanwhile, the Alliance for Automotive Innovation, an influential automotive lobby, this year sued the federal government over an automatic emergency braking rule adopted during the Biden administration. The lawsuit is pending in federal court while the Department of Transportation completes a review. Even before Donald Trump was sworn in for his second term, the alliance appealed to the president-elect in a letter to support consumer choice.

Under Trump, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy is prioritizing the development of autonomous vehicles by proposing sweeping regulatory changes to test and deploy driverless cars. “Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards were written for vehicles with human drivers and need to be updated for autonomous vehicles,” NHTSA Chief Counsel Peter Simshauser said in September in announcing the modernization effort, which includes repealing some safety rules. “Removing these requirements will reduce costs and enhance safety.”

Some Democratic lawmakers, however, have criticized the administration’s repeal of safety rules as misguided since new rules can be implemented without undoing existing safeguards. NHTSA officials did not respond to requests for comment about Democrats’ concerns.

Advocates worry that without continued adoption of road safety regulations for conventional vehicles, factors such as excessive speed and human error will continue to drive fatalities despite the push for driverless cars.

“We need to continue to have strong collaboration from the federal, state, local sectors, public sector, private sector, the everyday public,” Snider, of the Governors Highway Safety Association, said. “We need everyday drivers to get involved.”

Kris Edwards points to photos of his wife, Tilly. Traffic deaths across the U.S. are higher than they were a decade ago.

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It took nearly a month for police to track down the driver of a Mercedes-Benz G-Wagen allegedly involved in Tilly’s death. Authorities have charged Davontay Robins with vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence, felony hit-and-run driving, and driving with a suspended license due to a previous DUI. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges and is out on bail.

Kris Edwards now tends to the couple’s backyard garden by himself. Since his wife’s death, he has experienced sleep deprivation, fatigue, and trouble eating, and he relies on a cane to walk. His doctors attribute his ailments to the brain’s response to grief.

“I’m not alone,” he said. “But I am lonely, in this big, empty house without my partner.”

Edwards hopes for justice for his wife, though he said he’s unsure if prosecutors will get a conviction. He wants her death to mean something: safer streets, slower driving, and for pedestrians to be cautious when getting in and out of cars parked on busy streets.

“I want my wife’s death to be a warning to others who get too comfortable and let their guard down even for a moment,” he said. “That moment is all it takes.”

KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF—an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.Subscribe to KFF Health News' free Morning Briefing.

This article first appeared on KFF Health News and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Cooler weather has returned to Southern California for the weekend. Coastal communities will experience mostly to partly cloudy skies on Friday.

Along the L.A. and Orange County coast daytime highs will drop to as low as 65 degrees with the warmest areas topping out at 71 degrees.

The eastern San Fernando Valley will have highs from 69 to 74 degrees, meanwhile the western side will see highs from 71 to 76 degrees.

Over in the Inland Empire, temperatures will range from 70 to 75 degrees. In Coachella Valley, communities there will see temperatures from 75 to 80 degrees.

No burn alert in effect

The South Coast Air Quality Management District has issued a no burn alert for most of SoCal until 11:59 p.m. because of high air pollution. That means you should avoid any burning of wood, including fireplaces or manufactured logs made from wax or paper.

The alert applies to O.C. and L.A. County's non-desert areas and Riverside and San Bernardino counties.

Excluded from the ban area are residents without natural gas, as well as communities in the High Desert and mountains.

On a small, formerly vacant, county-owned lot on Lincoln Avenue in Altadena, fire survivors can get a glimpse into one of the fastest and most affordable ways to rebuild — prefabricated and modular housing.

The Altadena Prefab Showcase has staged six models of factory-built homes and ADUs on the lot this month. Time is running out to visit — the showcase closes up shop after Sunday.

The factory-built “village” is an “educational tool to help Altadenans understand what might be a really stable, predictable, economical pathway home,” said Ryan Conroy, director of architecture at UCLA’s cityLAB, a housing and urban design research center.

The homes range between about $50,000 to more than $200,000. Prefabricated housing is built at a factory offsite, and designs already are approved at the local and state levels, so the process is often cheaper and faster.

“So you can get a home in months, not years, essentially,” Conroy said. “Things can move concurrently, where your home is being built in the factory while you're working on permits with the county, while you're getting your site ready for foundations.”

The homes also are built up to fire codes, and survivors can use them as a permanent dwelling, a temporary home while they rebuild their main house, or as an ADU.

The showcase is a partnership between the UCLA’s cityLAB, L.A. County, prefab housing manufacturers (largely local) and a variety of community-based organizations. Several of the companies, such as AMEG and Liv-Connected, helped rebuild or provide temporary housing after other disasters and recent fires such as in Lahaina, Maui.

A 3D-printed ADU by Gardena-based modular homebuilder Azure.

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A prefab housing showcase has been installed on Lincoln Avenue in Altadena over the past month.

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Option to stay on property

Tameka Alexander and her daughter still are staying in a hotel — their home was spared by the Eaton Fire, but severe smoke damage has made it unsafe to move back in. She says they’re currently waiting for their home’s insulation to be replaced. That’s why she was at the showcase on a recent Saturday — to see if a prefabricated home may help them return to their property sooner, while their house gets remediated.

“It's been nine months, and I just don't know how much longer it'll be, but I would prefer to actually be in something that would allow me to be on the property,” she said.

Various prefab housing designs at the Altadena Prefab Showcase.

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Casty Fortich also was at the showcase one recent Saturday with his wife. They and their two teenaged daughters, plus their dog and cat, have been living in a small apartment in Monrovia since losing their Altadena home of more than 20 years in the Eaton Fire. The rent was affordable for them for up to three years — the time Fortich estimated it could take to rebuild.

But the apartment is cramped — and with their rebuild still years in the making (Fortich hopes it can be complete by summer 2027), the family is considering purchasing a prefab unit to live in while they rebuild, and then they can rent it out as an ADU. Even with insurance, they estimate they have about a $300,000 to $500,000 gap to rebuild.

“A lot of us are unable to pay for a replacement, and so I think this is an option for many to stay on their property,” he said.