The Brief

The party was winding down. Its young hosts, María Rivas Cruz and her fiancé, Raymond Olivares, had accompanied friends to their car to bid them farewell. As the couple crossed a four-lane main road back to the home they had just bought, Rivas Cruz and Olivares were struck by a car fleeing an illegal street race. The driver was going 70 in a 40-mph zone.

Despite years of pleading for a two-lane road, lower speed limits, safety islands, and more marked crosswalks, residents say the county had done little to address speeding in this unincorporated pocket of southeastern Los Angeles. Since 2012, this half-mile stretch of Avalon Boulevard had logged 396 crashes, injuring 170 and killing three.

Olivares, 27, a civil engineer for the city of Los Angeles, became the fourth fatality when he was hurled across the street, hit by a second car, and instantly killed. Rivas Cruz was transported to a hospital, where she remained in a coma for two weeks. Once awake, the elementary school teacher underwent a series of reconstructive surgeries to repair her arm, jaw, and legs.

María Rivas Cruz survived being struck by a car in southeastern Los Angeles while crossing the street in 2023 with her fiancé, Raymond Olivares, who died at the scene.

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Lauren Justice

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KFF Health News

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A memorial for Raymond Olivares outside his Los Angeles home. Olivares was fatally struck by a car while crossing the street in front of his home last year.

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Lauren Justice

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KFF Health News

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In the aftermath of the February 2023 crash, the county installed protective steel posts midway across the street. But residents, who had sought a platformed center divider and speed cameras, said that wasn’t enough.

“It’s just a band-aid on a cut. This is supposed to solve it, but it doesn’t, and that is what hurts,” said Rivas Cruz, who now at age 28 walks with a cane and lives with chronic pain. “I go to sleep, and I’m like, ‘It’s just a dream, it’s just a dream.’ And it’s not.”

The nation’s road system covers 4 million miles and is governed by a patchwork of federal, state, and local jurisdictions that often operate in silos, making systemic change difficult and expensive. But amid the highest number of pedestrians killed in decades, localities are pushing to control how speed limits are set and for more accountability on road design. This spring, New York and Michigan passed laws allowing local jurisdictions to lower speed limits. In Los Angeles, voters approved a measure that forces the city to act on its own safety improvement plan, mandating that the car-loving metropolis redesign streets, add bike lanes, and protect cyclists, transit riders, and pedestrians.

Still, there’s plenty of political resistance to speed enforcement. In California’s Statehouse, Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) proposed requiring GPS-equipped smart devices in new cars and trucks to prevent excessive speeding. But after pushback, the state lawmaker watered down his bill to require all vehicles sold in the state starting in 2032 to have only warning systems that alert drivers when they exceed the speed limit by more than 10 mph.

Although the Biden administration is championing Vision Zero — its commitment to zero traffic deaths — and injecting more than $20 billion in funding for transportation safety programs through the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, road safety advocates and some lawmakers argue that the country is still far from making streets and vehicles safe, or slowing drivers down.

“We are not showing the political will to use the proven safety tools that exist,” said Leah Shahum, founder of Vision Zero Network, a nonprofit organization advancing Vision Zero in communities across the country.

Still a crisis

The need for safer roads took on urgency during the covid pandemic. Fatalities rose even as lockdown mandates emptied streets. In 2022, more than 42,500 people died on American roads, and at least 7,522 pedestrians were fatally struck — the highest tally of pedestrian deaths in more than four decades.

Experts cite several reasons for the decline in road safety. During the lockdowns, reckless driving increased while traffic enforcement declined. SUVs and trucks have become larger and heavier, thus deadlier when they hit a pedestrian. Other factors persist as streets remain wide to accommodate vehicles, and in some states speed limits have gradually increased.

Residents want more than the yellow protective posts erected since Raymond Olivares, a pedestrian, was fatally struck by a car fleeing an illegal street race. They want reduced lanes, lower speed limits, and safety islands.

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Lauren Justice

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KFF Health News

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Safety barriers added to a crosswalk in Los Angeles have been damaged and hit by passing cars.

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Lauren Justice

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KFF Health News

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Early estimates of motor vehicle fatalities show a slight decrease from 2022 to 2023, but pedestrian fatalities are still notably above pre-pandemic numbers. “It’s an encouraging start, but the numbers still constitute a crisis,” Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg wrote in February of roadway deaths.

The Biden administration has directed $15.6 billion to road safety until 2026 and $5 billion in local grants to prevent roadway deaths and injuries. Under the U.S. Department of Transportation’s new “vulnerable road user” rule, states with 15% or more deaths involving pedestrians, bicyclists, or motorcyclists compared with all road deaths must match federal dollars in their safety improvement spending.

Road safety advocates argue the federal government missed an opportunity to eliminate outdated standards for setting speed limits when it revised traffic guidelines last year. The agency could have eliminated guidance recommending setting speed limits at or below how fast 85% of drivers travel on uncongested roads. Critics contend that what’s known as the 85th percentile rule encourages traffic engineers to set speed limits at levels unsafe for pedestrians.

But the Federal Highway Administration wrote in a statement that while the 85th percentile is the typical method, engineers rarely rely solely on this rule. It also noted that states and some local agencies have their own criteria for setting speed limits.

In response, grassroots efforts to curtail speeding have sprouted across communities. In April, Michigan passed legislation granting local governments authority to round down when setting speed limits.

And after four years of lobbying, New York state passed Sammy’s Law, named after 12-year-old Sammy Cohen Eckstein, who was killed by a driver in Brooklyn in 2013. The law, which will take effect in June, allows New York City to lower its speed limits to 20 mph in designated areas.

“With this legislation, I hope we can learn more children’s names because of their accomplishments, their personalities, and their spirit — not their final moments,” said Sammy’s mother, Amy Cohen.

Cindi Enamorado stands beside a memorial for her brother, Raymond Olivares, outside his Los Angeles home. Olivares died after being hit by a speeding car while crossing the street to the home he had just bought.

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Lauren Justice

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KFF Health News

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Push for pedestrian safety

Advocates would also like the federal government to factor in pedestrian safety on the five-star vehicle safety rating scale. However, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has proposed a separate pass/fail test that would be posted only on the agency’s website, not on labels consumers would see at the dealership.

Automakers like BMW questioned the effectiveness of a program testing pedestrian protections in vehicles arguing that in European countries that adopted such a regulation, it’s not been clear whether it led to fewer deaths and injuries. According to the campaign finance site Open Secrets, automakers spent about $49 million lobbying in 2023 compared with $2.2 million spent by advocates for highway and auto safety.

“The federal government has the biggest punch when it comes to requiring improved vehicle safety design,” said Wiener, the California state lawmaker.

Although Wiener modified his proposal to restrict excessive speeding, he has advanced companion legislation that would require Caltrans, the state transportation agency, to make improvements such as adding crosswalks and curb extensions on state-owned surface streets to better serve pedestrians, cyclists, and transit users.

When that bill was heard in a committee, opponents, including engineering firms and contractors, cautioned it would remove flexibility and hamper the state’s ability to deliver a safe and efficient transportation system. Lawmakers have until Aug. 31 to act on his bills.

María Rivas Cruz looks through a scrapbook of memories from her more than a decade-long relationship with Raymond Olivares, who died last year after the two were struck by a speeding car outside their home in southeastern Los Angeles. Rivas Cruz survived but now lives with chronic pain and walks with a cane.

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Lauren Justice

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KFF Health News

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In Los Angeles, hope for change arrived in March when voters passed Measure HLA, which requires the city to invest $3.1 billion in road safety over the next decade. Rivas Cruz’s house, however, sits eight blocks outside the jurisdiction of the city initiative.

It’s been more than a year since the crash, but Rivas Cruz finds reminders everywhere: in the mirror, when she looks at the scars left on her face after several surgeries. When she walks on the street that still lacks the infrastructure that would have protected her and Raymond.

Stories of pedestrians killed in this Latino working-class neighborhood are too common, said Rivas Cruz. In September, she attended a memorial of a 14-year-old who was killed by a reckless driver.

“There’s so much death going on,” the Los Angeles Unified School District teacher said from her mother’s living room on a spring afternoon. “The representatives have failed us. Raymond and I were giving back to the community. He was a civil engineer working for the city, and I’m a LAUSD teacher. Where is our help?”

Landlords in Los Angeles County will soon be allowed to raise rents by more than 10% from their baseline before the January 2025 fires.

A vote by the county’s Board of Supervisors that could have extended a ban on post-fire price gouging for another month failed on Tuesday. Supervisors Lindsey Horvath and Hilda Solis voted in favor, but Supervisors Kathryn Barger, Janice Hahn and Holly Mitchell abstained.

As a result, the long-standing countywide prohibition on rent gouging will expire May 29. The milestone comes more than 16 months after the L.A. County fires destroyed thousands of homes and plunged families into a hectic rental market.

Arguments for and against keeping post-fire rent limits

In her motion to keep the rules in place through June 27, Horvath argued the ban should be preserved because about two-thirds of fire survivors are still in temporary housing.

Horvath wrote that many families “have run out of financial displacement coverage from their insurance companies, which reinforces the need to continue price gouging restrictions, to protect these homeowners from drastic price increases.”

Landlord groups have been pushing county leaders for months to end the rent gouging ban. During public comment in Tuesday’s meeting, Jesus Rojas with the Apartment Association of Greater Los Angeles said the rules have long outlived the post-fire emergency.

“They are wrongfully being used to harm thousands of rental housing providers throughout the entire county,” Rojas said. “This must stop, and it must stop now.”

How the rules have worked so far 

In March, the county ended post-fire price gouging restrictions on hotels, because survey data found that few displaced families were still staying in temporary motel rooms. Horvath argued the rent-gouging ban should be continued until the Department of Consumer and Business Affairs could deliver further data on resident displacement and the rental market.

The rules have banned landlords from raising rents by more than 10% from advertised pre-fire levels. They also prohibited rents exceeding 200% of fair market value, as established by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, on previously unlisted properties.

Tenant advocates found thousands of likely violations

Following the 2025 Palisades and Eaton Fires, prosecutors filed a handful of misdemeanor charges against landlords and real estate agents accused of violating the price gouging rules.

In the days after the fires, LAist spoke with one agent who encouraged her client to raise the rent on a Bel Air home nearly 86% from a previous 2024 listing.

The agent, Fiora Aston with Compass, said at the time, “I've never seen anything like this. People are desperate. There’s so many families without a house.”

The listing was later taken down. But tenant advocates with a group called The Rent Brigade started compiling data on other listings that appeared to violate price-gouging laws. By January 2026, they reported finding 18,360 listings featuring likely violations.

Homelessness has decreased in Orange County, according to data released this week from the county’s point in time count conducted in January.

The numbers are down 13.5% compared to 2024, when the last point in time count took place, according to Doug Becht, director of Orange County’s Office of Care Coordination. The office leads the county's efforts to address homelessness. In total, 6,321 people were counted as living outdoors, in vehicles or in shelters across the county.

During the last count in 2024, there was a spike of around 28% in the number of unhoused people, with around 7,300 people experiencing homelessness at the time.

The latest data was shared on Monday during a press briefing.

What the results show

 Becht said there was a 37% decrease in veterans experiencing homelessness as well as a 20% decrease in young people aged between 18 and 24 experiencing homelessness.

The latest point in time results also show that family homelessness has decreased.

In contrast, older adults in the county are experiencing higher rates of housing challenges. The number of seniors experiencing homelessness increased 1.5% compared to the last count, Becht said.

Southern cities in the county saw the largest decrease in homelessness while the central region 15.5% reduction. Laguna Hills, Laguna Niguel, Lake Forest and Mission Viejo all saw drops in people experiencing homelessness. In north Orange County, homelessness decreased by about 7.5%.

Becht said the survey also revealed that the number of people experiencing chronic homelessness — defined as an extended period or several episodes of homelessness — is rising within the county’s shelter system but decreasing on the streets.

He attributed that “to the ongoing housing shortage” that is causing people to stay in shelters longer. Around 3,200 of the county’s total unhoused population live in shelters, according to the data.

And when people stay in shelters longer, there’s not enough beds available for those who are on the streets, he said.

Over 50% of the people surveyed said they were experiencing homelessness because of financial reasons like losing a job and the lack of affordable housing options.

Why the count matters

The point in time count — a census mandated by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to take place during the last 10 days of January — secures federal funding toward addressing homelessness. State and county officials use those funds to assess what programs and services are needed on the ground.

Point in time counts are widely viewed as undercounts by experts and don’t capture the full scope of homelessness — volunteers helping with the count can easily miss people, for example.

Becht said the count helps county staff engage with people experiencing homelessness. Once they have a person on the radar, it allows outreach teams to go back out and try to get them off the streets and into temporary housing.

This story was originally published by CalMatters. Sign up for their newsletters.

Californians would have to take a four-hour course with live-fire training to buy a gun if a bill advancing through the Legislature gets signed into law.

Senate Bill 948, by Berkeley Democratic Sen. Jesse Arreguín, also would require gun owners moving to California to obtain a firearm safety certificate and register their firearms within 180 days of their arrival. Beginning in 2028, obtaining that certificate would require completing the training.

It’s the latest effort by California Democrats to add more restrictions on firearm ownership in a state that already has some of the toughest gun laws in the country. However, it’s hardly certain the bill will become law. A similar measure died in the Legislature last year.

This year’s proposal advanced from the Senate Appropriations Committee Thursday on a party-line vote with Republicans opposed. Committee members offered no comment on the measure and did not take any public testimony, which is typical for that committee.

But in March, when an earlier version of the bill would have required eight hours of training, Arreguín told the Senate Public Safety Committee the proposed training requirements would reduce gun violence and prevent accidental shootings.

“Firearm safety is essential in preventing firearm-related incidents, especially those involving children,” he said. “By strengthening training requirements and closing gaps in current law, SB 948 will ensure responsible gun ownership to keep Californians and communities safe.”

Rebecca Marcus, a lobbyist for the Brady Campaign, told the committee there were more than 69,000 shootings resulting in death or requiring urgent medical care in California from 2016 to 2021. Around one in three of those shootings were accidental, she said. Many involved children.

Gun rights advocates said the bill would be challenged in court if it becomes law.

Adam Wilson of Gun Owners of California called the proposed requirements “an insurmountable barrier to exercising a constitutional right.”

Clay Kimberling, a lobbyist for the National Rifle Association’s Institute for Legislative Action, said that’s especially true for the estimated 115,000 gun owners who move to California each year.

“Whether they move into the state on a new job, a new military assignment, or family obligations such as helping a sick or elderly family member, lawful firearm owners would now have to search out an instructor, pay for the class … and take eight hours out of their day … for simply wanting to continue to practice their constitutional right to keep and bear arms in a new state,” Kimberling said.

That original version of the bill also would have required new California arrivals to register firearms and take the course within 60 days.

Will the bill make it to Newsom?

Under current law, Californians are required to pass a written test and pay $25 to obtain a five-year firearm safety certificate to purchase a gun, but no formal training course is required.

Licensed hunters are required to take a mandatory hunting-safety course and aren’t required to get a certificate when buying rifles or shotguns. Also exempt are those who’ve obtained a concealed weapons permit, which is issued after 16 hours of mandatory training that includes live-fire at a gun range.

Those exemptions would still apply.

For everyone else, the proposed four hours of training would include coursework on state and federal gun laws, secure firearm storage, safe handling, the dangers of guns, use-of-force laws, how to sell firearms legally and conflict resolution. The live-fire portion of the course would need to last at least an hour.

Second Amendment groups say paying a Department of Justice-certified firearms instructor would add at least $400 to the cost of buying a firearm. Applicants also would have to pay for ammunition, gun rentals and range fees. Fees and firearms taxes already can add more than $100 to the cost of a firearm in California.

The training requirements would take effect July 1, 2028.

Until then, beginning on Jan. 1, gun owners moving to the state would be required to pass the current written test and register their firearms with the Department of Justice within 180 days.

Violating the proposed law would be a misdemeanor.

The bill now moves to the full Senate. It will then have to advance through the Assembly by this summer if Gov. Gavin Newsom is to sign it. He hasn’t taken a position on the legislation.

Last year, a bill with eight-hour training requirements died in the Assembly Appropriations Committee.

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

This story first appeared on The LA Local.

As her family prepared to evacuate their West Altadena home, Claire McLaughlin picked up her favorite snow globe, a music box featuring a mother hummingbird and two babies. She considered packing it, then put it back.

“I left it because I thought, ‘My house isn’t going to burn. I’ll come home later,’” Claire told The LA Local.

Claire never saw her favorite snow globe again.

West Altadena did not receive its evacuation order until after 3 a.m., hours after other parts of Altadena and Pasadena were told to leave. Despite that, Claire urged her family to evacuate after a friend in Pasadena called to warn her to do the same.

“I felt like I was being dramatic,” Claire said, “because we got no notification.”

Eventually, Claire, her mother, father and two older siblings saw flames surrounding their neighborhood from their driveway. Without any official word, they knew it was time to go. Their house burned down a few hours later.

Of the 19 people who died in the Eaton Fire, 18 were in West Altadena, and two of them were Claire’s neighbors: Anthony Mitchell and his son, who needed help evacuating. “I wish people knew that,” Claire said. “No one came to help the west side of Altadena.”

The students who lost their homes

Claire McLaughlin and her siblings outside their old house. Claire is the youngest, on the bottom left.

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Courtesy Claire McLaughlin

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More than 1,000 students in the Pasadena Unified School District lost their homes, and more than 10,000 were ordered to evacuate during the Eaton Fire. Claire was one of those students. At Pasadena High School, however, she said she didn’t know any friends who lost homes. 

“Even though it happened to thousands of people, I felt alone because I was the only kid I knew,” she said.

The fire coincided with major milestones for Claire: prom, graduation and the start of college. “Before the fire, it felt like I was still a kid, growing up,” Claire said. “But then it just sped it up, and it was like, ‘Oh, I’m an adult. I need to do this.’”

At graduation, Claire was so happy that, for a moment, she forgot about the fire. “I realized I wasn’t thinking about it,” Claire said. “It felt strange. I felt like I should be thinking about it.” Looking back, she wishes her school had focused more on the fire during the ceremony.

Now, Claire is in her first year at Pasadena City College.  She is living with her family at her mother’s former boss’s home in Pasadena while their house is rebuilt. Claire found a job at a bowling alley after the restaurant where she worked, Fox’s, burned down. She is excited for the end of the year, when she hopes her family can move back.

Rebuilding what was lost

One of the signs in an empty lot in West Altadena near Claire McLaughlin’s home.

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Rachel Metzger

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The LA Local

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It has been more than a year since the Eaton Fire, but the emotions still linger for Claire. The news coverage has, in Claire’s words, “slowed down.”

“No one really talks about it anymore. Everyone’s moved on. But it just felt like I was stuck. I just keep thinking about it. I should be moving on, but I still feel sad.”

Claire still thinks about her neighbors, her street, her home and her musical snow globe, which she has tried and failed to find on eBay.

She misses her kitchen, her room and the sycamore tree in her front yard, which survived the fire but was later cut down for construction. Claire loved that tree. It’s where she would sit while her boyfriend washed her parents’ car. Her mother and brother would lie under the tree, usually after mountain biking in the San Gabriel Mountains behind their home, with their bikes strewn across the lawn. Claire would join them in the shade.

The tree is gone, but Claire’s house is starting to look as it once did. The last time Claire visited the site, the layout felt familiar. She could see the outline of her room in the same place and size as before.

Feeling lucky

The McLaughlins after buying their home in West Altadena several years before the fire.

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Courtesy Claire McLaughlin

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Nearly all her neighbors are hoping to return. But Claire is worried about investment firms buying lots from families who have lived there for generations and cannot afford to come back. She has attended protests with her mother to raise awareness about West Altadena.

“When I think of the situation with West Altadena, I feel really disappointed and angry,” Claire said. “But when I think of my house, I feel hopeful. Because now I’m going home soon.”

Above all else, Claire is grateful to be able to return. As she said, “You don’t find this sense of community everywhere.”

Right before the fire, on New Year’s Day, while the Rose Bowl was on, Claire’s neighbor was outside with his kid.

“I was messing with him,” Claire said. “The little kid was trying to chase me down the street, and I was running with him, and I thought to myself, ‘I’m so lucky to grow up here.’”

For Claire, nothing can change that feeling.

“I love that place with all my heart,” she said. “I still do.”