The Brief

The tourism industry in Los Angeles, still rebounding from the pandemic, has gotten a rare gift in the form of Shohei Ohtani.

Since the baseball season started in March, Japanese fans have come by the thousands to L.A. despite a historically weak yen, in hopes of seeing the two-way star slug a home run.

The surge is apparent at the Miyako, a mid-sized, unassuming hotel in Little Tokyo that has become a top attraction for Japanese visitors because of its proximity to Dodger Stadium — just 2 miles away — and a 15-story, very ‘grammable mural of Ohtani covering one of its exterior walls.

Inside the Miyako, workers at the Okayama Kobo bakery in the lobby, sell Japanese-style pastries shaped like blue Dodger helmets while reporting that their Japanese is vastly improving from more Japanese guests coming through the door.

A top seller at the Okayama Kobo Bakery inside the Miyako Hotel are Japanese-style pastries shaped like Dodger helmets.

One traveler from Osaka, Megu Adachi, was in the lobby last week checking in with several other friends. They had tickets to watch Ohtani play, or as Adachi fondly called him, yakyu shonen — a kid obsessed with baseball.

“Baseball only!” Adachi emphasized in English.

Tens of thousands of Japanese fans are coming to see Shohei Ohtani play at Dodger Stadium.

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L.A.’s tourism industry eagerly welcomes international travelers for their tendency to stay longer and spend more than domestic visitors, said Adam Burke, president and CEO the Los Angeles Tourism and Convention Board.

With travel down from China, the biggest pre-pandemic source of overseas visitors to L.A., other countries such as Japan are proving to be increasingly important sources of tourism dollars.

Because of Ohtani's appeal — not to mention the Dodgers also signing of Japanese pitcher Yoshinobu Yamamoto — Japan this year may surpass visitor numbers for markets like the U.K. and Australia.

“We could be over 400,000 Japanese visitors," Burke said. "It would absolutely make it one of our top four international markets.”

Leading Japanese tour operator JTB alone plans to bring as many as 25,000 customers to watch Shohei play this season.

Osuke Ishiguro, who manages the agency’s L.A. office, said many customers are paying to see multiple games. Some of them are very casual baseball fans, but were stunned to see Ohtani secure his record-breaking $700 million, 10-year contract with a storied franchise.

“They found out he’s a superstar,” Ishiguro said. “So a lot of people want to just see the game, how he does and how he reacts.”

Shift to South Bay

When the Dodgers are playing at home, half of the Miyako's rooms are occupied by Japanese tourists, said general manager Akira Yuhara. Before Ohtani’s arrival, they had little reason to visit Little Tokyo, Yuhara said, noting some perceive downtown as dangerous.

“Especially this area, they don't want to come,” Yuhara said.

Though it is a cultural hub for Japanese Americans that's rooted in history, Little Tokyo is not widely known in Japan, Yuhara said.

Akira Yuhara, general manager of the Miyako Hotel in Little Tokyo, has seen a big uptick in visitors from Japan since Ohtani started playing on the Dodgers.

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Rather, the most famous L.A.-area attractions are Disneyland, Hollywood, Santa Monica and Universal Studios, home to the new Super Nintendo World co-designed by Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto.

Yuhara said Japanese businesspeople coming to work in L.A. typically end up staying in the South Bay, where SoCal’s Japanese American population center shifted after World War II.

It’s also where scores of Japanese companies like Honda and All Nippon Airways have located their U.S. operations, and where many of their employees live, eat, bank and shop.

Yuhara said a sister hotel he manages in Torrance has traditionally been more popular with Japanese travelers.

If they want a photographic souvenir of Ohtani, they need go no farther than neighboring Hermosa Beach, which has its own mural of the superstar.

But the pull of Ohtani has more travelers traveling up the 110 Freeway and squeezing in a stay downtown.

A mural of Shohei Ohtani on the outside wall of Oceanview Liquor Store in Hermosa Beach.

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“Even when we don't have a game today, they go to Dodger Stadium,” Yuhara said. “They’re interested in Dodgers [merch] shopping.”

Fried octopus and chicken katsu

At the stadium, visitors can pick up Ohtani’s No. 17 jersey. Concession stands sell chicken katsu sandwiches and takoyaki (fried octopus.)

Signs in kanji characters dot the stadium, where tours are now given in Japanese several times a week.

The demand to see Ohtani has created unexpected new lines of business for companies such as Elite Sports Tours, which creates sports travel packages for customers.

Elite went from having "zero" bookings from Japan to, seemingly overnight, working with Japanese tour operators to secure tickets and advising on L.A. traffic, said CEO Tim Macdonell.

JTB manager Ishiguro said the gambling scandal involving Ohtani's ex-interpreter that exploded at the start of the season didn't seem to affect interest among Japanese travelers wanting to see Ohtani.

He expects even more Japanese fans will come during the summer and into the fall should Ohtani stay healthy, the Dodgers make the postseason and the yen recovers.

The agency is booking guests in and around Little Tokyo, shuttling them to and from the stadium and their hotels, Ishiguro said.

He said not since another Japanese superstar, Hideo Nomo, played for the Dodgers two decades ago have this many Japanese tourists regularly flocked to this part of town.

Yutaka Umezawa has noticed more people speaking Japanese on the street and at Daikokuya, the ramen shop where he works.

"I can hear that they're Japanese and usually they're talking about Ohtani," said Umezawa, who moved to L.A. eight years ago from Chiba.

Yutaka Umezawa works at the Daikokuya, which is selling Dodgers-themed shirts celebrating the ramen shop's anniversary. He says that Japanese tourists prefer official MLB jerseys.

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Outside the Miyako hotel, Tadashi Onaka was visiting the Ohtani mural with his son Yusuke, who lives in Arizona. He had traveled from Japan with the intent of seeing his son, but made sure to take a detour to L.A. so he could watch Ohtani play at home.

“He hit a run in the first inning,” Onaka recalled. ”Just getting to see it was good.”

Now he found himself in Little Tokyo, a place he was surprised to learn has existed for 140 years.

Very small, he said, and very different from Japan, he said. Rather, it's its own thing that legions of Ohtani fans are now getting to discover.

California showed it was serious about regulating Big Tech in 2025 — and Big Tech showed it was serious about coming to the statehouse and fighting back.

The upshot was a barrage of laws designed to curb tech harms but often in watered down form.

Take San Francisco Democratic Sen. Scott Weiner’s legislation to keep artificial intelligence systems from enabling catastrophes like biological weapons attacks. The original version would have mandated safeguards over AI systems and imposed possible liability on their developers.Gov. Gavin Newsom vetoed it amid concerns that it would stifle innovation in the state’s booming AI industry. This year’s version, signed into law, merely requires big AI companies to publish safety frameworks and creates a pathway for reporting safety incidents.

Similar dilutions occurred over other tech proposals. Of various bills to regulate data centers, those mandating disclosure of water and power use failed while one merely letting regulators look into those uses passed. On AI chatbots talking to kids, a bill outright banning any harmful chats failed while one just requiring protocols for suicidal users became law. A similar process winnowed six bills to regulate algorithmic pricing down to one signed by the governor, forbidding tech platforms from requiring their business customers to use their pricing recommendations.

That came after another year of aggressive lobbying by tech companies, sometimes behind the scenes.

Still, advocates for more regulation won some outright victories, including a new browser setting to forbid websites from transferring personal data. Experts say this “opt out” will end up helping consumers across the U.S.

Meanwhile, California’s executive branch struggled with the process of guarding against online hackers, losing its top cybersecurity official amid discord in the office that position oversees. Law enforcement agencies across the state also struggled to correctly handle the digital data they collected, with many local police departments illegally sharing information on vehicle movements, gleaned from automated license plate readers, with federal agencies like Border Patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

2026 outlook

Next year will see no end to the tension between protecting Californians from artificial intelligence and the impulse to protect the flow of money into the industry. An ambitious bill requiring disclosure of AI use in consequential decisions, such as in housing and education, will return. Data centers will stir controversy as AI spikes their power use, potentially opening the door to nuclear power. Lastly, the Trump administration and Republicans in Congress have drawn up proposals — thus far not acted upon — to preempt state laws regulating AI. If enacted, such plans would hit California hardest.

This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.

Shortly after the Eaton Fire destroyed thousands of homes in and around Altadena, signs sprung up across the community announcing “Altadena is not for sale.”

Now, nearly one year later, hundreds of Altadena families have concluded that rebuilding isn’t in their budget. In nearly half of recent deals for empty lots, homeowners are selling to investors.

That’s the conclusion researchers with the online real estate listings platform Redfin reached in a new report published Tuesday.

Analyzing transactions in L.A. County burn zones during July, August and September, they found that about 40% of Pacific Palisades vacant lots went to corporate buyers. In both Altadena and Malibu, about 44% of such vacant lot sales went to investors.

“It's not uncommon to see that when disasters hit a place, investors come in,” said Sheharyar Bokhari, Redfin’s principal economist. “It's hard to value a vacant lot, so you could perhaps buy lower than what it should sell for and then flip it.”

More vacant lots are getting scooped up

To conduct the analysis, Redfin researchers looked at sales in the zip codes 90272 for the Pacific Palisades, 91001 for Altadena and 90265 for Malibu. They categorized buyers as investors if their names contained words or abbreviations such as LLC, Inc, Corp or Homes.

There was a marked increase of vacant lots sales in all communities, according to the report. In the Pacific Palisades, 119 lots sold in July, August and September. Altadena saw 61 lot sales. In 2024, before the fires, neither Pacific Palisades nor Altadena had any lots selling in those months.

Malibu saw some vacant lots sell in that time frame in 2024. But before the fires, only about 21% of those sales were to investors.

The findings are similar to those in a separate report published in October by the nonprofit Strategic Actions for a Just Economy. That report found that 49% of sales in the Eaton Fire burn zone went to corporate entities.

Zaire Calvin lost his family’s home in Altadena and had a sister who died in the fire. He said the trend shows “disaster capitalism” poised to change the diverse foothill community.

“If rebuilding becomes a race for capital instead of a return home for families, then disaster has been basically repackaged as opportunity for those with the most resources,” Calvin said. “It's like they're preying on us while we're still praying for hope and help.”

Some lawmakers and organizations have been working to counteract speculative development..

Assembly Bill 851, signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom in October, outlawed unsolicited offers on properties in burn zones until 2027.

The nonprofit Greenline Housing Foundation has been buying lots from distressed sellers in Altadena, giving them an alternative to more bottom-line driven investors. The organization has said it intends to rebuild homes and sell them at below market prices to first-time buyers.

Corporate buyers: disaster capitalists or helpful rebuilders?

Bokhari, the Redfin economist, said investor activity is not entirely detrimental to communities recovering from disaster.

“Investors who have a lot more capital can come in and build that community,” he said. They can afford to clean up lingering environmental damage and build homes that comply with the latest fire safety codes, he said.

“Investors play that role in bringing back those homes,” Bokhari said.

Still, uncertainty around investors’ plans have left many Altadenans anxious. Will homes be for sale or for rent? How will those homes look? Will investor-built properties give Black families a way to continue building generational wealth in a historically Black corner of L.A. County?

Lori Gay, president and CEO of Neighborhood Housing Services of L.A. County, said in the grand scheme of L.A. real estate, not many lots in Altadena are trading hands so far. Only 61 lots in the community sold in July, August and September according to the Redfin report.

“More will go up for sale over time,” Gay said. But in her organization’s work advising families on how to rebuild, she said, “Most families we’ve seen want to go back home. They’re not trying to leave. They’re trying to figure out how to stay.”

For more on disparities in disaster recovery

Starting in January, many health insurance plans in California must start covering fertility treatments, including in-vitro fertilization.

SB 729, which passed in 2024, requires large group health plans with 100 or more employees to cover the diagnosis and treatment of infertility, like IVF. A single cycle of IVF can cost upwards of $20,000 in California, which has made it inaccessible for many families.

The law also expands the definition of infertility to include same-sex couples and single parents.

“This action reinforces California's leadership in protecting reproductive rights and ensuring that all individuals, regardless of their background or circumstances, have the opportunity to build the family they dream of,” California Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara said at the time of the bill’s signing.

At least 14 other states have similar IVF coverage mandates, according to Resolve, an organization that advocates for patients with infertility.

California’s policy originally was supposed to take effect in July 2025, but lawmakers delayed the implementation after a request from Gov. Gavin Newsom. A spokesperson told KFF News the state needed more time to provide guidance to insurers.

How does the new law work?

Under the new California mandate, health insurers have to cover up to three egg retrievals and an unlimited number of embryo transfers.

The new law is expected to cover about 9 million Californians; it doesn’t apply to religious employers or to Medi-Cal. For state employees who get their insurance through California Public Employees' Retirement System, or CalPERS, it’ll go into effect in July 2027.

How do I know if I’m covered? 

The law takes effect when employers' plans with insurers are renewed after Jan. 1, 2026 — so it might not be right away. Some insurers, though, have already implemented the coverage changes.

Advocates suggest asking your employer’s human resources department about what sort of health plan they have. Resolve has a decision tree to find out if your health plan has to cover IVF under the new law.

Bandfest is an opportunity to see marching bands from around the country — and Mexico and Japan — before their 2026 Rose Parade performance.

“This is the granddaddy of them all,” Tournament of Roses Honor Band Director Peter Huerta said of playing in the parade. “It is viewed all around the world. Everybody is watching you. Every little detail has to be perfect.”

Adriana Del Toro lined up outside Pasadena City College’s Robinson Stadium on Monday to watch her niece play the trumpet in the Los Angeles Unified School District All-District High School Honor Band.

“I'm living my childhood dream through her,” Del Toro said. ”When I was in high school, I always wanted to try out for a band, but I never did it because I was too shy. So I told her, as long as I can, I'm going to be here and support her.”

Some performances incorporated the 2026 Rose Parade theme, “The Magic in Teamwork.”

For example, the Tournament of Roses Honor Band’s performance includes the Beatles’ “With a Little Help From My Friends” and High School Musical’s “We’re All in This Together.”

The Pasadena City College marching band and musicians from 62 local high schools make up the ensemble.

The 250-member Tournament of Roses Honor Band includes the Pasadena City College marching band and musicians from 62 local high schools.

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Drum Major Orlando Garcia said the teamwork theme makes him remember the smoky skies and power outages that followed January’s wildfires.

“We can come together and make great music,” Garcia said of his bandmates, students from Pasadena City College and local high schools. “Just as we always come together and get through everything.”