The Brief

There’s a frenzy of madness and tangled limbs on the basketball court until someone shoots for a goal. Then it’s all eyes on the ball as everyone holds their breath, watching its graceful airborne arc in anticipation.

But this time, the ball narrowly misses and bounces off the rim, sending a dozen queer ballers scurrying to the opposite end of the court to play offense and defense. The heat is picking up on the courts of Highland Park Recreation Center.

Here, a group of queer basketball players in Northeast L.A., aptly named WNBGAY, meet up twice a week for a pickup basketball game. WNBGAY isn’t the only queer recreational sports group in Los Angeles — there are at least a dozen more scattered throughout the region — ranging from a dozen to a hundred attendees a week. Spaces like WNBGAY have become safe gatherings for gay men, lesbians, trans, non-binary and queer people alike to meet up and play sports, make friends and find community.

Cass Spillman, who runs an event staffing agency, says WNBGAY started two years ago informally as a group chat on Instagram amongst friends who wanted to play ball, until the desire for a queer space for ballers grew into something official. Spillman started helping to organize set locations and times for regular meetups.

Now they have official WNBGAY merch they use to raise money for equipment they need, like basketballs and more.

The most exciting part has been seeing real WNBA players sport their attire while playing.

“[There’s] joy that comes across my face when I just see somebody wearing WNBGAY merch in the wild,” Spillman says. “Because even though I don't know that person, they're repping us [and] they're proud of what we're doing here.”

Dream Team Society

Queer recreational sports groups like WNBGAY and Dyke Soccer LA reflect the large sapphic fanbase that supports many of the women’s professional leagues like the Women’s National Basketball Association and the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team.

But groups are carving out new spaces within other sports that aren’t typically friendly to queer and trans people.

Surfing, a sport often associated with a laidback counter-culture, can often be exclusionary to newcomers with unspoken rules around locals who claim certain beaches. When the World Surf League moved to include transgender people in competitions, famous surfers like Bethany Hamilton spoke up to boycott the WSL.

But Dream Team Society has been pushing to normalize queer bodies in the ocean. Freelance photographer and videographer Shelly Simon organizes monthly meetups for Dream Team Society. Back in March, they hosted an event at the beach for Trans Day of Visibility with over 100 attendees. More recently, Simon collaborated with San Diego Gay Surf to celebrate the end of Pride Month with a bonfire at Ocean Beach.

Members of San Diego Gay Surf and Dream Team society celebrate a bonfire with hamburgers and pets before heading out to the waves.

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Jireh Deng

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For Sergio Morales, who founded San Diego Gay Surf a year and a half ago, the effort started with simply reposting photos to connect with other queer and gay surfers. But Morales quickly wanted to have in-person meetups at the beach.

“There isn't a space for us out there. There's no representation for the queer community in surfing and most of the sports,” says Morales. “So why not start a space where we can bring the local community together and just build that?”

Queer recreational groups aren’t just for those who identify as LGBTQ. Allies of the spaces are similarly drawn to the welcoming atmosphere of inclusivity that allows them to show up fully as themselves. Like Valeria Diaz, who doesn’t identify as queer but comes from a racially mixed background. In other spaces, it feels like her heritages clash, but as a member of San Diego Gay Surf, she’s found acceptance beyond the binaries of identity.

Valeria Diaz (right) and Noah Fox (left), members of San Diego Gay Surf, practice their headstands on the grass.

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Jireh Deng

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“There's a lot of people who work within boxes. Like you have to be Caucasian or you have to be Hispanic,” Diaz says. “This group really just encompasses the idea of love for all, no matter if you're gay, straight … we're all humans, and I think that's why I keep coming back to this group, because our values align.”

Queer Run Club

New queer recreational sports groups like Queer Run Club formed last August out of the need for a connection from the isolation experienced during the pandemic. From Silver Lake to Long Beach to Culver City, Jessi Baron and DJ Ki have made it their mandate to rotate their weekly runs throughout Los Angeles to make their events accessible throughout the county.

Members of the Queer Run Club run at Los Angeles Historic State Park on a Monday evening in June.

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Jireh Deng

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Baron and Ki have made it their goal to reach a diverse range of queer runners, not just geographically, but across identities. They say it's important to note that Queer Run Club was started by two queer people of color.

“That was like an intentional move on our part to let people know, like, this isn't just going to be a white-only space,” says Ki. They point out that there are few sapphic bars beyond the newly established Honey’s at Star Love and Ruby Fruit. “This isn't only going to be like a gay man's space. It's for everyone. I feel like the turnout is so diverse as well. Not just ethnic and racial but like age groups.”

WeHo Dodgeball

One neighborhood is home to some of the most active queer sports groups. The West Hollywood Recreation Center is home to multiple queer sports that utilize its facilities. West Hollywood Aquatics brings together local swimmers and water polo players who compete internationally.

But WeHo Dodgeball’s Tuesday and Thursday games at the recreational center bring the friendly competition to another level. At any time during their evening tournaments, four games are happening simultaneously, with referees managing the organized chaos as people hurtle balls to knock the opposing team out of play.

Competing teams rush to grab dodgeballs after the referee’s whistle signals the start of a new match.

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Jireh Deng

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For some, the connections forged in the heat of the sport go beyond friendly competition. It’s helped people find queer friends, partners and even chosen families. MJ Rios works as a high school choir teacher in East L.A. and has been part of WeHo Dodgeball since its inception over a decade ago in 2010 by local organizer Jake Mason. They’ve been grateful for how the space not only destigmatizes queer athletes but also female-identifying athletes who are allies to the LGBTQ community like herself.

“The group of people here, I will tell you that even at my own wedding, most of my invites were dodgeball people,” Rios says. “They've been my family for over a decade.”

Chris Witherspoon only joined WeHo Dodgeball a few months ago, but he’s already been sucked into the sport’s social orbit. He works as an audio engineer and commits to making the sometimes two-hour round trip from the San Fernando Valley, where he lives, to West Hollywood on Tuesdays to play dodgeball. For Witherspoon, it’s difficult trying to make LGBTQ friends in his neighborhood, so as someone who isn’t from Los Angeles, WeHo Dodgeball has helped him find a group of friends where he feels seen and included in his queerness.

“Because the LGBT community is smaller, you see a lot of the same people and the same faces,” Witherspoon says of WeHo Dodgeball. “These leagues tend to be more social. So every time we play a game, afterward, we go out to the bars.”

It’s hard to dismiss the fact that the whole reason why these queer recreational sports teams exist is because of the exclusion of queer athletes from sports. Val Horton, a league manager with WeHo Dodgeball, wants to center joy in queer recreational sports in light of all the contemporary challenges that queer and transgender people face in sports and beyond.

“We're living in a world where queer rights are being challenged every single day. And to have a place where we can come and not really have to think about that [and just be] with our people feels even more important now,” says Horton.

Trans Boxing

At Trans Boxing, over half a dozen attendees practice their fight stances, pivoting in circles while sharing grass space with their feathery neighbors at MacArthur Park on a Saturday morning (and avoiding duck poop).

As people pair up for pad work, they’re learning lifesaving skills for defense in the real world. Cal Xu has been training in martial arts long before they came out as queer. But since coming out as non-binary, Xu is uniquely aware that every time they step out into the world, they face a threat as a visibly queer person; training has helped them feel safer in their body.

“It's hard to exist as a queer person and just not hear what's going on politically,” Xu shares. “Dressing the way that I want to dress, presenting the way I want to present has felt so much more safe. Because I know that if push comes to shove and I really need to, I can defend myself.”

Trans Boxing members practice hand movements and mock sparring at MacArthur Park on a Saturday morning.

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Miles Enriquez-Morales founded Trans Boxing during the pandemic when the New York City-based organization ran classes online.

After recovering from top surgery, Enriquez-Morales started the Los Angeles chapter to offer a sanctuary for transgender and gender non-conforming people who want to participate in sports like martial arts without the toxic machismo and homophobia that can be prevalent in institutional spaces. Learning at the park is only temporary until they can find a place to call home.

“I have options where I could move the gym into a space that's very queer but maybe it's not as boxing [focused] as I would want it to be. And then maybe I could move it to a place that's very boxing-oriented and it's not as LGBTQ-accepting as I would want it to be,” Enriquez-Morales says. “Feeling like those are my only two options is really disheartening because it feels like I have to compromise.”

For now, all the equipment they use is funded by Trans Boxing’s Patreon subscribership and paid out of Enriquez-Morales’s own pocket when there is further gear needed for classes.

LBians

But not all queer groups face the same constraints on physical space. Like the lesbian bike riding group, LBians, which meets monthly to ride throughout Long Beach’s LGBTQ neighborhood. Locals call the Broadway corridor and its rainbow crosswalks “the gayborhood,” with half a dozen gay bars within walking distance.

Every month, LBians meets at Hot Java Coffee on Broadway for some exercise, and a lot of socializing — the end of every ride usually ends with drinks and food at a local brewery or bar.

Vanessa Cisneros juggles organizing these meets alongside their full-time job as a fraud analyst and stacked courseload studying software engineering. It’s not easy, but Cisneros says seeing the joy on the faces of her peers makes it all more worth it.

LBians meet up at the Beach Garden Social House, a local queer bar on Broadway after their monthly bike ride.

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“I love after every single ride someone comes to me, hugs me and thanks me for creating this awesome space. There's people who made lifelong friends here,” Cisneros says.

“Seeing this community is just awesome … [you’re] making new friends with people you won’t meet anywhere else.”

Queer Racquet Society

Part of the inclusivity of queer sports is how organizers have prioritized athletes of all skill levels and sought to make queer recreational sports the genesis for genuine connections outside the bar.

Through Queer Racquet Society, Teline Guerra has shown up amongst her sapphic peers at Griffith Park Tennis Courts while reclaiming the sport she used to play in high school.

“No one's dating-focused. You're focusing on tennis. When you're working out, no one's dressed to impress here,” said Guerra. She also points out that relationships like these, built outside the queer clubs, create change for the LGBTQ community.

On the courts of Griffith Park Tennis, Queer Racquet Society play friendly rounds of doubles.

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“Community is not who you f**k … the community that gets laws passed, the community that protests, the community that stands up for others starts with this kind of thing.”

On water and land, queer people are reclaiming access to the physicality of their bodies in the sports they love and are learning. There are still moments of discomfort when a safe space is burst, like when members of the Queer Run Club notice a man catcalling them from the sidelines. But they're able to shrug off moments like this because they have safety in numbers. And perhaps a safe space in queer sports isn’t necessarily about where you are at, but who you are with.

File this under things that could only happen in L.A.

Paradise Dynasty, the Singapore-based chain known for its signature eight-flavor xiao long bao, has teamed up with Burritos La Palma — the SoCal burrito institution whose birria de res recipe traces back over 45 years — to create a limited-edition birria soup dumpling. The Birria XLB will be available starting Monday (May 11) for a limited time at Paradise Dynasty locations.

I've eaten my weight in both soup dumplings and burritos, so naturally, I'm a fan of both.

Paradise Dynasty has been on a steady ascent as a major player in L.A.'s dumpling scene, with locations at South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa and The Americana at Brand in Glendale.

Meanwhile, Burritos La Palma — known for its simple, savory burritos and finely crafted flour tortillas — has been capturing hearts and stomachs since Alberto Bañuelos opened the first eatery in L.A. in 2012. It’s since grown to several spots across L.A. and Orange County, earning a Michelin Bib Gourmand award in 2024 for its high-quality, Zacatecan-style handmade flour tortilla burritos at an affordable price.

How the collab came together

So what exactly is a birria soup dumpling? A delicate wrapper, lightly packed with tender birria de res — slow-braised beef stewed in chilies and spices — juicy, savory and gone in one bite.

It all began with a call from Paradise Dynasty, when Jason Kuo, district manager for Paradise Dynasty USA, reached out to Bañuelos, calling it, simply, a perfect match between the two dishes.

Kuo said the idea came straight from the community.

"When we started asking guests and people around us what flavor they would want to see in a soup dumpling, birria kept coming up again and again — it was very clear. If we're going to do birria, it has to be done right. Burritos La Palma was the first name that came to mind."

Bañuelos was "beyond thrilled" to have been approached.

"We come from a small town in Mexico, and to be able to elevate to the level of Paradise Dynasty and that culinary perfection, I can't even really put it into words," he said.

It took months of R&D to get the right consistency. Bañuelos said the process required dialing down the moisture and upping the spice potency and landed on serving a fresh red salsa with thin slivers of serrano peppers alongside — a riff on the black vinegar and pickled ginger traditionally served with soup dumplings.

The Birria XLB's juicy interior is part of what makes it work — the dish is served with a fresh, tomato-based salsa and slivers of serrano pepper in place of the traditional black vinegar and pickled ginger.

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Katrina Frederick

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Courtesy Paradise Dynasty

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How it tastes

I got a chance to try the dumplings ahead of the public launch and was struck by how well the combination worked. The juicy nature of birria is almost turbocharged in dumpling form, its savory, herbaceous flavors fully encapsulated in the thin skin, creating an exceptional texture in every bite. The dish hits even harder when dipped in the light tomato-based salsa — a rush of freshness that cuts through the richness, with a spike of heat from fresh serrano. (Feel free to skip the peppers if spice isn't your thing.)

But what's most impressive is how organic it all feels. This isn't fusion for fusion's sake — it's a natural meeting of two dishes that are deeply embedded in the Southern California diet, each playing to the other's strengths.

It feels like a logical meeting of the minds — birria and soup dumplings have both been part of L.A.'s culinary zeitgeist for the better part of a decade, and it makes sense that these worlds should collide.

When asked whether a collaboration like this could happen anywhere else, Bañuelos was quick: "It has to start in L.A. You just can't compete."

Where to try it

Nine Democratic House members from California are demanding information about how the Trump administration is treating unaccompanied migrant children who are pregnant and in federal custody. They’ve signed a letter, along with 39 other House Democrats, to Trump officials expressing their concern that the girls are not receiving adequate medical care or access to abortion.

The letter comes in the wake of an investigation by the California and Texas Newsrooms, public media collaboratives in those states. LAist is part of The California Newsroom.

The joint investigation found that the federal government is detaining pregnant migrant girls in a single group home in South Texas. Doctors and reproductive-health experts interviewed for the investigation said prenatal care is severely limited in that region.

The letter says the detention violates federal regulations because the children are “entitled to the full range of medical care, including reproductive health care.”

Rep. Gil Cisneros, who represents the central San Gabriel Valley, says he worries that pregnant migrants who are apprehended in California will be put at risk if they’re sent to a part of Texas that is short on obstetric care. Of particularly concern: High-risk pregnancies are common among minors.

“If they were in California," he said, "they would be able to have more choices of the type of health care that they would get when it comes to reproductive health care.”

Rep. Judy Chu, who represents the West San Gabriel Valley, wrote in a statement that “this administration is so intent on restricting abortion that it is using immigration detention as a tool to control these girls’ bodies.”

Mark Betancourt is a regular contributor to The California Newsroom. 

The U.S. Department of Education is investigating how the Los Angeles Unified School District responds to educators accused of sexual misconduct with students.

The department accuses the district of maintaining a policy that “automatically” reassigns teachers to other schools when they are accused of sexual misconduct with students and cites a 2024 agreement with the teachers union.

A Los Angeles Unified spokesperson wrote in a statement that it’s “not true” that staff being investigated for sexual misconduct are reassigned to other school sites.

“‘Reassignment’ typically means an employee is directed to remain at home and away from students and schools during an investigation,” the spokesperson wrote.

United Teachers Los Angeles called the DOE's accusations a “fundamental misunderstanding” of the district’s reassignment policy.

“[Employees] are not reassigned to another classroom or to any other setting where they would interact with students,” read a statement provided by the union. “This policy protects both students and staff and creates conditions for a thorough and appropriate investigation of allegations.”

What to expect from the federal investigation

The federal investigation, overseen by the department’s Office for Civil Rights, will assess whether the district’s policy violates Title IX, a law that prohibits sex-based discrimination in federally funded education programs.

Kimberly Richey, the assistant secretary for civil rights, wrote in a statement that Title IX requires schools to address claims of sexual misconduct in a “timely manner.”

“It is unconscionable that the district would simply ignore Title IX’s procedural requirements to protect teachers who cause life-changing harm to their kids,” Richey wrote. “The Trump administration will always fight to uphold the law, protect the safety of all students and restore common sense to our schools.”

The Trump administration also has recently targeted LAUSD's desegregation policy and transgender student protections.

Last year, the office failed to resolve any cases related to sexual harassment, sexual violence or racial harassment, according to a report released by Sen. Bernie Sanders in late April. Sanders is the top-ranking Democrat on the Senate Education Committee.

In March 2025, the Trump administration pushed to cut over half of OCR’s nearly 600 staff members, which contributed to a growing backlog of cases. Those employees were placed on administrative leave pending the result of legal challenges, and many were later brought back.

The Education Department has also withheld records related to civil rights investigations, prompting a lawsuit from investigative nonprofit newsroom ProPublica.

What does LAUSD’s policy say? 

LAUSD protocol related to employee misconduct says administrators must remove accused employees from their classroom or worksite whenever there is a risk to the safety of students or staff.

The 110-page protocol document also lists several other requirements for allegations related to sexual misconduct, including contacting law enforcement and the agencies that license teachers.

“Los Angeles Unified takes all allegations of sexual misconduct and harassment with the utmost seriousness,” a spokesperson wrote in a statement. “Our primary responsibility is to ensure the safety, dignity and well-being of every student and staff member in our care.” The statement also said the district follows Title IX procedures and continuously reviews its policies, training and reporting systems.

The UTLA settlement outlines several circumstances where an employee can be reassigned, including a law enforcement investigation of misconduct, sexual harassment of a student, behavior toward a student perceived to be motivated by a sexual interest and communicating with a student for non-school-related purposes.

School employees are “mandated reporters” who must, by law, notify local law enforcement or child welfare agencies of suspected child abuse or neglect. California Attorney General Rob Bonta reminded K-12 school district leaders in late April of their legal obligation to prevent sexual misconduct and protect students.

How prevalent is sexual misconduct in California schools?

There have been few comprehensive studies of sexual misconduct in schools. A 2004 report to the Department of Education estimated 1-in-10 students experiences sexual misconduct, ranging from inappropriate comments to physical abuse.

A new California law requires schools to train students and staff to recognize and report misconduct and write new policies on “appropriate behavior.” It also will create a new database of educators credibly accused of abuse.

More than 1,000 lawsuits related to sexual abuse that date to the 1940s have been filed against California school districts since the enactment of a 2019 law that gave victims a three-year window to sue.

LAUSD has authorized $750 million in bonds to pay for sexual misconduct settlements related to suits stemming from the law.

The LA County Library has begun its Summer of Soccer program to bring the excitement of the North American tournament to all Angelenos.

“Soccer has a unique way of bringing people together across cultures and communities,” Skye Patrick, director of the LA County Library, said on the library website.

The program kicked off May 1 with the library system offering limited-edition Summer of Soccer library cards, emblazoned with the library logo, the outline of a soccer pitch and a ball hitting the back of a net.

The new limited-edition Summer of Soccer library cards

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Courtesy LA County Public Library

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The cards are available for free for anyone signing up for the first time and for $1 for people who already have an LA County Library card.

From soccer story time to making circuit boards

There’s a whole range of Summer of Soccer events at branch libraries, from May 20 to July 9.

Highlights include a soccer-themed story time for 2- to 5-year-olds at Graham Library, north of Watts at 3:30 p.m. June 4, while at 3 p.m. the same day, the A C Bilbrew Library west of Compton hosts “Makey Makey for Teens,” which will lead youth through the steps to make their own game controllers and test them on a virtual soccer field. This and other programs repeat at other branches.

All Summer of Soccer events are free and are designed to support youth and families during the summer months when school is not in session.

The LA County Library serves more than three million residents through its 86 libraries and four Cultural Resource Centers, as well as Bookmobiles and other outreach vehicles.