The Brief

For more than a century, the Santa Monica Pier has weathered through storms, private development and a lack of funds.

It was built in 1909 to run sewage into the ocean and then developed into an amusement park concept in 1916 during the heyday of pleasure piers, which populated coastal towns nationwide. Today, it's one of the few that remain.

Weathering through hazards

By the 1960s, the pier was no longer viable for Santa Monica and City Manager Perry Scott was tasked with turning it around. Voters rejected a plan to extend the pier to a man-made island with a resort hotel, a convention center and other amenities.

But Scott didn’t give up, according to Santa Monica Pier Corporation executive director James Harris, who wrote Santa Monica Pier: America’s Last Great Pleasure Pier. A revised edition is out May 21, and looks at the history and lore of the pier.

"He went out and sourced a developer to come in and pay for the project, which then only needed the city council's approval," he said in an interview with LAist's daily news program, AirTalk. "So, the city council saw the problem solved. This makes the pier more viable, and we don't even have to pay for it."

However, activists, bartenders and fishermen fought back against the city and helped create the Pier Restoration Corporation to maintain it.

Soon after, a series of El Niño storms severely battered the pier in 1983, bringing 10-foot waves that swallowed the lower fishing deck.

The city quickly sent a crane to the west end of the pier to clean up the damage. But then another storm came in shortly afterward, knocking the crane into the ocean and a third of the pier.

Reimagining the pier

The storms gave the city of Santa Monica a chance to improve and revive the pier, something that the city had been attempting to do that since the 1960s.

The city had concrete structures added for stability. The new structures supported the incoming restaurants, retail stores and the beginnings of an amusement park, which opened in 1996.

Harris said the city began to host concerts and events to draw people to the pier. Cirque du Soleil had their first touring show at the pier.

"Really, the pier became known as an events venue and then an amusement park," Harris said.

Next year, the city plans to start construction on the pier bridge, what some people call the pier ramp, which will take people from Palisade Park to the pier and the beach. That project is expected to be completed before the 2028 Olympics.

A different world

Harris said the pier's first heyday was in the 1940s just after World War II, when paddle boarding began to take off. By the late 1980s, Harris said the pier brought in 2 million visitors, mostly summer tourists.

Today, Harris estimates the pier draws in between 11 and 14 million people annually.

When asked why people keep coming to the Santa Monica Pier, he said it's an escape.

"You feel like you're in a different world, even though the city is just a block or two behind you," Harris said. "And the further you get out west on that pier, the more freedom you feel, the more of an escape you feel, and I think that's what it is that really keeps drawing people to it."

The Covina City Council is set to vote Tuesday night on whether to allow construction of a battery energy storage facility that’s faced backlash from community members.

The project is a 110-megawatt storage system that would include two structures that take up 3.4 acres in a mixed business and residential area in northeast Covina.

The city’s planning commission voted unanimously against the project in June following resident feedback. Hundreds of community members attended the commission’s meetings in June, resulting in hours of public comment on the issue.

The backstory

RWE Americas, a subsidiary of German energy company RWE, filed an initial study report with the city for the construction of a 110-megawatt battery energy storage system in Covina in January.

These types of systems store electricity generated from other sources, such as wind farms and solar plants, in large batteries. The batteries can then be tapped by local electrical grids during power outages or times of high usage, such as heat waves.

RWE Americas’ website says the project would enhance the reliability of the city’s electrical grid, create 150 jobs during its construction and generate over $17 million in property taxes.

The public response

The proposed project has received significant negative backlash from the community on social media.

Some residents allege a lack of transparency from the city regarding the project’s development while others cite concerns ranging from potential noise pollution to fires and smoke to insurance hikes.

There has been similar backlash from communities against proposed battery energy storage systems in the City of Industry and San Juan Capistrano in recent years.

Recent storage system fires include incidents in San Diego in 2024 and Monterey County in 2025. The San Diego fire had flareups for seven days following the initial incident. The Monterey County fire resulted in the evacuation of 1,200 local residents for 24 hours. The root causes of these fires remain under investigation by the EPA but have been attributed to an overheating process called thermal runaway associated with the lithium-ion batteries used in these facilities.

Covina is one of eight storage projects in the United States proposed by RWE Americas.

How to keep tabs on the Covina City Council

The Covina City Council meets on scheduled Tuesdays. Meetings start at 7:30 p.m.

Here’s how you can follow along:

• Attend in person: The board meets at City Hall, Council Chambers, 125 E. College St., Covina
• Watch the live broadcast
• Here’s how to submit a comment or contact the council

Topline:

The details: Prosecutors from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California allege Michael Angel Alvarez, 41, was an 18th Street gang leader at the same time he worked as a peace ambassador for the nonprofit Healing Urban Barrios. The job focused on reducing tensions and potential violence among gangs in L.A.’s Council District 1.

The backstory: Alvarez was previously convicted of a gang-related murder in 2002 and released from custody in 2024. A spokesperson for Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez, who represents the district, previously told LAist they were never told of any new allegations against Alvarez prior to his arrest in May.

What the lawyers say: Prosecutors claim in court documents that Alvarez already admitted to law enforcement officers that he was in a leadership position within the gang and had body armor despite his previous murder conviction.

Alvarez’s lawyers have argued in court documents that he did have contact with the 18th Street gang after his release from prison but only because of his employment as a gang violence-reduction worker with Healing Urban Barrios.

Lawyers for Alvarez and the federal government told LAist they would not give further comment on the case Tuesday.

What’s next: A trial date has been set for Aug. 18. Alvarez currently is in federal custody after the court found “by clear and convincing evidence that [he] presents a serious danger to the community,” court records show. Prosecutors wrote in court documents that Alvarez also “knows that he is under investigation for crimes that carry great sentencing exposure,” indicating other charges could be coming.

L.A. resident Jeff van Hoy is setting aside his jerseys and hanging up his scarves after Team USA's brutal 4-1 loss to Belgium last night.

"It feels like Halloween is over," said the diehard American soccer fan, who's been rooting for the national team since it last played on home soil in 1994. "That holiday that you so look forward to celebrating, it's all come and gone. … You have to say goodbye to that aspect of joy for a while."

Van Hoy's team — that eternal underdog, American men's soccer — had a good run. It beat Paraguay in the opening match at SoFi Stadium, making it all look so easy to a local audience more groomed for American football or baseball at Dodger Stadium. The U.S. men came out of the group stage on top, even after a last-minute loss to Turkey, also here in Los Angeles.

Then, they beat Bosnia and Herzegovina. But all that momentum came to naught. The team looked ragged in the Round of 16, bamboozled by a more experienced European team. The moment was further soured after FIFA allowed U.S. striker Folarin Balogun to play despite a red card in the previous match, following an intervention by President Donald Trump.

Watching from Los Angeles, van Hoy was saddened by the loss. But surprised? No way.

"I'm so used to dealing with disappointment," he said in a phone call Tuesday morning. "I try to make sure that I allow myself the joy of hope and excitement when the team is doing well, but I'm always ready for the wheels to come off."

Such is the life of an American soccer fan. With low hopes of seeing the U.S. reach the final, for van Hoy, the World Cup is about his bottomless love of the game — and the buffet of experiences and celebrations that come with the tournament.

Not his first World Cup

A soccer player himself, van Hoy first attended the World Cup when the U.S. hosted the tournament in 1994. He joined his dad at the opening U.S. match against Switzerland in Detroit, which ended in a 1-1 tie. The U.S. went on to defeat top contender Colombia at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, before getting beat in the knockout stage of the tournament.

Van Hoy was enamored. Since then, he's attended four more World Cups, from Germany to South Africa to Brazil and now back in the U.S. again. Along the way, he couch surfed in Kaiserslautern, Germany, where he watched the U.S. tie Italy 1-1 in 2006. He saw a sports journalist wrestle to get his backpack back from a baboon in South Africa in 2010 on his way to the Cape of Good Hope. He was in the crush of fans at a massive fan party on Copacabana Beach in Brazil in 2014.

This World Cup, his first in more than a decade, he went to four matches. Two he attended in Inglewood, just a short trip from his home in Mid City. But seeking that storybook feeling that marked his last few tournaments, van Hoy and his son also took to the road to support their other favorite team, the Netherlands. They drove 22 hours each way to Houston to dance with a sea of Dutch fans clad in orange and watch the Netherlands play Sweden. Then they drove to Tijuana and caught a flight to Monterrey, where they saw the team take on Morocco and lose.

Why he has hope for a future championship

At home, he also enjoyed seeing Los Angeles outside of the stadium, where Angelenos got to experience some soccer madness at city watch parties and fan events, whether they were fans of the sport or not.

Now that the U.S. is out, van Hoy is already looking forward to the next World Cup in 2030. Will the U.S. stand a chance then?

"I thought this was a little too early for us to win the World Cup," he said. "But in five or 10 years, I think we should have a team that's good enough to compete."

In the meantime, he'll be cheering for LAFC here in Los Angeles. There's always the next soccer match.

Boyle Heights families of school age children impacted by the warehouse fire have until Wednesday afternoon to apply for $250 cash assistance payments.

The money comes from the LAUSD Education Foundation’s “compassion fund,” a mixture of donations from individuals and the California Community Foundation.

“ There's tremendous stress and anxiety about how to pay for rent, food [and] childcare,” said Sadie Jefferson, the executive director of the independent nonprofit that frequently supports LAUSD students and programs.

Jefferson said families are reporting asthma flare-ups, missed work and a lack of access to their homes.

An estimated 13,000 Los Angeles Unified families live within two miles of the Boyle Heights warehouse fire. The fire started on June 17 at a refrigerated warehouse owned by a company called Lineage and burned for eight days. The blaze filled the air with acrid smoke and there’s been reports of foul smells, pests and concerns about water-quality as the clean-up continues.

How it works

Families can apply in-person on Wednesday July 8 from 8 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at:

• Sunrise Elementary School— 2821 E. 7th St. 
• Humphreys Avenue Elementary School— 500 S. Humphreys Ave.
• Belvedere Middle School— 312 N. Record Ave.

The application requires families to provide a student’s ID.

Families can also connect with district counselors and other resources at those same schools.

Jefferson said the foundation will support more families if more donations to the compassion fund come in.

The foundation started the compassion fund in 2025 to support families in the wake of widespread immigration enforcement actions throughout Southern California.

Jefferson said the Foundation has distributed nearly $900,000 in cash gift-cards from the fund and that most families make less than $20,000 a year.

 ”We wanted to make sure that people had the dignity of choice on how to use the funding in a way that made sense for their families,” Jefferson said.