The Brief

Planning to fly somewhere this week? You are not alone. The Transportation Security Administration expects to screen 30 million people over the Thanksgiving holiday. That's a lot of suitcases for airlines to keep track of, and unfortunately, some are bound to get lost. So where does all that lost luggage end up? In a store called Unclaimed Baggage, in Scottsboro, Ala.

Every suitcase lost by an airline in the United States (and some lost on trains and buses) eventually ends up in this little city about 150 miles northwest of Atlanta, in a 50,000-square-foot building. And it's all for sale. At a big discount.

Unclaimed Baggage is laid out like a regular department store, and not just a bunch of bins in a big warehouse. There is even a formal wear and jewelry department

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Melanie Peeples

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It's laid out like a department store, clothes here, shoes there, shelves of books – because who hasn't accidentally left a book on a plane? But that's not the most exciting part.

"The most popular area of the store is the mezzanine," said Sonni Hood, who first started working for Unclaimed Baggage as a teenager, but is now the public relations manager.

"This is home to our electronics department," she said. "Anything from cell phones and laptops, tablets, headphones, you name it!"

All electronics are wiped clean to remove any personal data, and checked out to make sure they work. The laptops, iPads and Nintendo Switches all sell for around half the price of a new one.

But there are even more interesting things up here. Skis, snowboards, an entire bin of skateboards. (Who knew so many people travel with skateboards? They can't all be Tony Hawk's!) There's a sled, a women's pole vaulting pole and even a Bates Kimberly stock saddle. And brand new riding boots.

The electronics department is always a huge hit. The latest cell phones, ipads, and laptops are priced at about half the cost of new ones. The store's tech department employees wipe all personal data from the items and make sure everything works.

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Melanie Peeples

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None of it surprises Hood.

"Anything that you can think of, someone has likely packed it in their suitcase."

And, unfortunately, lost it. But don't feel too bad about that. When an airline loses a suitcase for good, they end up compensating the owner for the contents.

Here's how it works: When a suitcase gets lost (or a pole vaulting shipping container) the airline spends up to three months trying to get it back to its owner. But after three months, the airline gives up and reimburses the owner, up to $3,800.

In fact, 99.5% of suitcases checked on airlines do NOT get lost. It's just that the 0.5% that does, adds up to a LOT of stuff. That's where Unclaimed Baggage CEO Bryan Owens comes in. His father started this business in 1970. Owen's father enjoyed listening to ham radios and one day heard a friend in Washington, D.C., say he worked with Trailways and didn't know what to do with all the unclaimed bags they had.

"A little light bulb went off in my dad's head and he's like, 'I think I can help you,'" said Owens.

So he borrowed $300 and a pickup truck and drove up to Washington, D.C., to buy the unclaimed luggage. Then he drove it back home and tried to sell it.

"People were just standing outside the door and in lines and we were open two days a week to begin with, and as the story continues his [dad's] boss told him, 'You gotta figure out which one of us you love the most, your insurance job or your entrepreneurial venture,' and my dad didn't think twice about it."

Owens' mom wasn't so sure about it, but 53 years later, Unclaimed Baggage is one of the top tourist destinations in Alabama. A million people visit every year. They've had someone from every state. Many make an annual pilgrimage here.

Unclaimed Baggage in Scottsboro, Ala., is the only store in the U.S. that sells items travelers left behind.

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Melanie Peeples

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It is a rare exception for something lost to make it back to its owner, but Unclaimed Baggage CEO, Bryan Owens, said it has happened.

A man from Atlanta showed up for the annual ski sale (an event so exciting people camp out in the parking lot in order to be first ones inside the door) and he purchased a pair of ski boots for his fiancée. And when he got them home to her, she looked inside and there was her name. She had previously lost them on a ski trip.

Sometimes the shipping containers hold the biggest surprises. Owens remembers peeling back the packing paper of one such container.

"And there was an item on a device inside of there that was, like, suspended by these rubber grommets. So it couldn't touch anything. And it had a placard on it and — I promise you — it said, 'Handle with extreme caution. I'm worth my weight in gold.'"

It turns out it was a guidance system for a fighter plane. The F-14 Tomcat.

"And it was the story that was going around, the military was the Iranians stole it. It actually was not the Iranians – it was sitting in our warehouse in Scottsboro, Alabama."

Owens said they gave that one back to the Navy. And when a camera from a space shuttle showed up, they knew where to find NASA.

Unclaimed Baggage has had so many odd things show up — a centuries-old violin that may have been made by a student of Antonio Stradivari, ancient Egyptian artifacts, and a suit of armor — they've created a museum. There's even a giant puppet named Hoggle, from the movie Labyrinth, that Jim Henson told them they could keep.

Ben Foster of Chattanooga, Tenn., (left) decides what he thinks about the tweed coat his friend Josh Elliott of Atlanta shows him. Elliott had heard about the Unclaimed Baggage store from a friend and was amazed by how organized it is.

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Melanie Peeples

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Most people, though, are drawn here by the easy lure of discount high-end goods: a Louis Vuitton purse, Prada shoes or the hundreds of North Face jackets. Josh Elliott, who lives in Atlanta, made the drive over with a friend. "We found several coats, like bigger coats. He's about to go to Germany. So we're looking for something particularly warm and fluffy."

They aren't disappointed. There are several coats that look like they're fit for an Arctic exploration. It's Elliott's first time here, and he is impressed by how organized it all is.

"This is a lot better than Goodwill," he said.

That's because people donate things they no longer want to Goodwill. Items at Unclaimed Baggage are things people liked so much, they took them on a trip with them.

In fact, a lot of the clothes here still have new tags on them since many people like to go shopping for a new wardrobe before they travel. Or, they shop on vacation. Brands like Rolex and Chanel regularly pass through Unclaimed Baggage. There's a little bit of Hollywood here, too. Aside from the Jim Henson puppet, there's a dress here believed to have once belonged to Marie Osmond. Not to mention, one of this year's Best Director Academy Award winners, Daniel Scheinert, gave his acceptance speech in a tuxedo bought right here.

But it's not just about consumption, reminds owner Bryan Owens.

"It's really like an archaeological dig. You open a bag and you can know what kind of fashions people are wearing, even things like cosmetics or technology, things that they're carrying with them. It really is a cross-section of what's going on in America, and really across the world because the airlines are global."

There is also the plain and simple joy of just imagining the stories behind these items. Was the owner of that pole vaulting pole an Olympian? Did she travel with a spare? I hope the owner of that wedding dress in the formal wear department got lost on the way home from the wedding.

These things will remain a mystery but some are downright mystical. How is it that so many walking aids get left on a plane? Was the traveler cured mid-flight? There's a sizable amount of canes and crutches in a section some employees have taken to calling the "Miraculous Recovery Department."

And let's talk about the jewelry. Judging from the back counter, a lot more MEN'S than WOMEN'S wedding rings seem to go missing. But that's a whole different kind of story.

NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen were ensconced in the Orion space capsule when they dropped into the Pacific Ocean off the coast of San Diego at 8:07 p.m. Friday. The USS John P. Murtha is stationed near the splashdown zone to help recover the crew.

The USS John P. Murtha is stationed near the splashdown zone and will help recover the crew. A team will head out to the floating capsule and install an inflatable raft just below Orion's side hatch. The crew will be examined by a flight surgeon, then helped out of the capsule. From the transport ship, they will hitch a ride back to Johnson Space Center in Houston.

Risk of reentry

There's always risk when returning from space. Glover said that he has been thinking about this portion of the mission since he was selected for it back in 2023, and he's been looking forward to it ever since.

"We have to get back," he said from the Orion capsule Wednesday. "There's so much data that you've seen already, but all the good stuff is coming back with us. There's so many more pictures, so many more stories, and, gosh, I haven't even begun to process what we've been through."

To get back, the capsule must hit the atmosphere at a precise angle.

"Let's not beat around the bush," said Jeff Radigan, Artemis II's lead flight director. "We have to hit that angle correctly. Otherwise, we're not going to have a successful reentry."

All eyes will be on the heat shield — this is the piece of hardware beneath the capsule that protects the crew from the extreme temperatures during reentry. NASA tested it out on Artemis I, the previous, uncrewed mission, and found that the heat shield wasn't performing as designed.

NASA mission planners and the Artemis II team worked on a way to mitigate that risk. Instead of "skipping" through the atmosphere like Artemis I, this mission would hit the atmosphere steeper and faster, limiting the time the spacecraft spends in those fiery, energetic moments of reentry.

"It's 13 minutes of things that have to go right," said Radigan. "I have a whole checklist in my head that we're going through of all the things that have to happen."

Mission success

The Artemis II mission is a key flight test for Orion, and thus far, mission managers have been pleased with the results. The spacecraft has taken humans farther from Earth than they've ever been, breaking a record set by Apollo 13 astronauts in 1970.

The crew tested the manual control of the spacecraft, which will be needed for future missions that will dock with a lunar landing system. The mission tested the spacecraft's life support systems and ability to keep four astronauts comfortable within the confined space.

Artemis II returned humans to the moon for the first time since the Apollo program over 50 years ago. And while some astronauts back then did see the far side of the moon, the Artemis II crew was able to observe it from a vantage point never before seen by humans. Their images and geological notes will help better determine what the moon is made of and where it came from.

While some of the astronauts' observations may help scientists understand the distant past, others will help mission managers better plan for the future. Case in point: The crew tested out the very first toilet to go to the moon, and it quickly ran into issues during flight. Multiple times during the trip, the crew had to use manual urinals instead. The issue, NASA said, was not with the toilet itself, but the system that dumps the urine overboard when it gets full.

The Orion capsule will return to NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida after the mission, where engineers will examine the spacecraft after its flight, including a closer look at the spacecraft's plumbing. The team will be picking apart the spacecraft to see how it performed — and make any necessary changes ahead of the next mission, Artemis III, set to launch next year.

An L.A. city official sounded the alarm Friday that homeless service providers may go bankrupt or have to lay off staff over major reimbursement delays that still haven’t been fixed by the region’s homeless services agency — despite promises two years ago to fix it.

The L.A. Homeless Services Authority (LAHSA) is late in reimbursing more than $50 million to shelter, housing and other service providers — much of which is more than 90 days overdue — according to a report it issued last month. One service provider said LAHSA is more than 90 days late in reimbursing more than $12 million in invoices to their organization.

”Everybody involved with contracting is frustrated, is angry, is exhausted," said John Wickham, the lead city staff member who presented about the issue to the city council’s Housing and Homelessness Committee on Friday. Wickham said the frustrations are shared by all of the city departments that deal with LAHSA, as well as LAHSA staff and service providers.

Wickham said he’s heard that some service providers may be considering layoffs or even considering filing for bankruptcy because of the delayed payments.

“ When payment delays occur, [service providers] are forced to make difficult decisions that everyone is experiencing right now,” said David Carpio, the chief operating officer for Veteran Social Services, Inc.

Those decisions, he said, include reducing available beds, limiting intake of new people for services, increasing wait times, ending projects — which he said leads to increased homelessness and burden on the city for emergency services calls.

Sharon Sandow, a spokesperson for the city housing department, said the department has paid LAHSA upfront — known as “advances” — so it has cash on hand to pay service providers. Sandow said the city has, at times, borrowed money from the General Fund to make advance payments to LAHSA.

Wickham said advanced payments from the city to LAHSA were being passed “ back and forth and around and around in circles.”

“ I actually haven't been able to get to the bottom of that myself,” Wickham said when asked why that’s happening. “Nobody [can] understand that.”

Wickham said he and colleagues have held over 100 meetings with officials to try to understand how the city contracts for homeless services, but some aspects were still unclear.

Officials promised to get payments back on track two years ago by streamlining their processes. Councilmember Nithya Raman, who has chaired the council’s homelessness committee for the past few years, said on Friday the city is “stuck” and has not fixed the issue.

“We don't have the ability at the city to manage this process any better than we did last year or the year before. We have just not moved forward at all,” she added. “It is extraordinarily frustrating, and those same issues persist at LAHSA that we've been discussing. So we're literally in the same place that we've been for two years.”

What LAHSA leaders say

The agency’s CEO, Gita O’Neill, told the committee the delays are “unacceptable” and that LAHSA is working with a consultant to improve its processes. LAHSA’s chief financial officer, Janine Trejo, said LAHSA “is accepting responsibility,” while she also pointed at the city for what she described as delays in the city finalizing its agreements to fund LAHSA and payments to LAHSA.

Mayor Karen Bass oversees the city agencies that pay LAHSA and is the only elected official on LAHSA’s governing commission, which she has served on for more than two years. She did not respond to a request for comment through a spokesperson on Friday’s discussion of the payment delays. Raman is running against Bass in the June primary election for mayor.

What’s next

Following up on City Council requests from years ago, the council committee plans to decide next Wednesday whether to recommend pulling all of the city’s funding out of LAHSA and having a different agency manage it. It will then go to the full City Council for a decision.

The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday is expected to consider, a motion aimed at assessing the impact of the growing number of data centers in the region.

The centers have drawn criticism for their potential health and environmental effects on surrounding communities, and for the amount of energy they use.

Around the country, the growth in the number of data centers — which house servers, storage systems and other technology — has been driven in part by the proliferation of artificial intelligence, which has drastically increased the need for critical internet technology infrastructure.

There are already more than 70 established data centers in the county, with that number likely to grow as developers approach cities and the county to create additional facilities, according to the motion authored by Supervisor Hilda Solis.

“Establishing local regulatory oversight of data center placement and operation is needed to ensure community and environmental health and safety is protected,” the motion states. “As newer centers expand in scale and complexity, their energy use and environmental footprint is also increasing, with little community engagement on the potential impacts on residents’ health and wellbeing.”

A representative of the data storage industry raised concerns about the motion, which calls for a moratorium on data center development in unincorporated L.A. County that would be initiated “as applicable.”

“What concerns me most with the motion is the inclusion of a moratorium,” said Khara Boender, director of state policy for the Data Center Coalition. “That sends a strong signal as to whether they are welcome in those areas.”

Data centers ‘underregulated’

Solis’ motion calls on various departments including public health, public works and fire to provide findings regarding the health, environmental and safety impacts of data centers on neighboring communities, the impact on electrical and water resources and a review of how other jurisdictions around the county are regulating data centers within urban areas.

It also calls for a community education and outreach campaign to inform residents on potential impacts of advancing technologies.

The Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental group, has said the data center industry is under-regulated and accelerating at a speed, scale and concentration that is impacting energy systems, water supplies, air quality, community health, land use and public finances.

A recent report by the group said state and local policymakers are at the forefront of this expansion, “uniquely positioned to guide it in ways that reflect local priorities and community needs, especially in the absence of federal guidelines.”

A fact sheet from the council said unrestricted buildout of data centers could come with big consequences including:

• Higher household water and energy bills
• Water scarcity 
• Increased water, air and noise pollution

The motion by Solis quotes a 2026 report by Community & Environmental Defense Services that showed pollutants emitted from data centers may adversely impact the health of individuals living as far as 0.6 miles from the site.

Boender, of the Data Center Coalition, said concerns about data centers have been overstated. In addition, she said data centers have “a lot of positive economic impacts associated with them.” She cited a Pricewaterhouse report that found one job in a data center creates six jobs in the broader economy.

Support for state legislation

In addition to asking county staff to assess the impact of data centers, the Solis motion calls on the county to support state legislation that directs the Public Utilities Commission to create a special rate structure for large-scale energy users and requires these users to pay for upfront transmission or distribution upgrades.

The county Board of Supervisors is expected to consider the motion during its regular meeting Tuesday. For more information, click here.

Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell, one of the leading candidates for California governor, came under increasing pressure Friday to drop out of the race following a report by the San Francisco Chronicle that he sexually assaulted a former female staffer. Swalwell denied the allegations.

Several other Democratic candidates called for him to immediately drop out, including Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond, San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan and former Controller Betty Yee, who called the allegations “sickening.”

Swalwell had racked up endorsements across the Democratic establishment, and at least one labor union and one politician who was backing him suspended their support swiftly Friday afternoon.

The Chronicle reported that a woman who worked in Swalwell’s Castro Valley office claimed to have had sexual encounters with him while she worked for him and alleged he sexually assaulted her when she was intoxicated. The report comes after weeks of rumors that Swalwell had inappropriate interactions with staff for years. On one instance in 2019, the woman said she became intoxicated after Swalwell asked her for drinks and woke up in his bed in a hotel room, feeling the effects of intercourse.

"These allegations are false and come on the eve of an election against the frontrunner for governor. For nearly 20 years, I have served the public — as a prosecutor and a congressman and have always protected women. I will defend myself with the facts and where necessary bring legal action,” Swalwell said in a statement Friday.

In recent weeks, two social media influencers began posting online what many people had considered rumors about Swalwell’s behavior with women. The influencers said they had spoken with several young women with whom Swalwell had behaved inappropriately. CalMatters has not independently verified the claims.

Swalwell pushed back hard against the allegations this week, telling reporters at a town hall in Sacramento on Tuesday that they are “false,” that he had “never” had a sexual relationship with anyone who worked for him. He suggested the allegations were politically motivated.

“I don’t want there to be any question in the minds of Californians,” he said. “I’m offering myself also as somebody who is fearlessly going to stand up for Californians on the toughest issues and not flinch.”

An attorney for Swalwell sent cease-and-desist letters to some of the women, one of the influencers, Arielle Fodor, wrote online. The attorney, Elias Dabaie, did not respond to a request for comment on the Chronicle story but confirmed to other news outlets the letter’s authenticity.

On Thursday night, Swalwell canceled a planned town hall in Southern California. Swalwell began calling groups that have endorsed him Friday morning to tell them of an upcoming story in the Chronicle, and denying the story, according to a person familiar with the matter who spoke to CalMatters.

At least four of his senior campaign staffers, including a top consultant who helped him court labor support, abruptly resigned before the news report.

Swalwell’s top two Democratic competitors in governor’s race, Tom Steyer and Katie Porter, on Friday avoided calling for him to drop out, though both issued statements commending the woman in the Chronicle story for coming forward.

Some groups that have endorsed Swalwell declined to comment on the allegations when reached by CalMatters, saying their board members needed time to digest the news.

For others, the exodus was swift. U.S. Rep. Jimmy Gomez, a Los Angeles Democrat who chaired Swalwell’s campaign, resigned from the role Friday and called on Swalwell to drop out. He called the allegations “the ugliest and most serious accusations imaginable.”

“My involvement in any campaign begins and ends with trust,” he said in a statement. “The congressman should leave the race now so there can be full accountability without doubt, distraction, or delay.”

The powerhouse union California Teachers Association immediately suspended its support of Swalwell, calling the allegations against him “incredibly disturbing and unacceptable” in a statement by President David Goldberg. “Our elected board will be meeting as soon as possible to follow our union’s democratic process to determine next steps.”

Another heavyweight union that endorsed him, Service Employees International Union California, suspended at least one ad buy in support of Swalwell following the accusations.

The California Medical Association, another backer, was convening an emergency meeting of the board, and “takes these allegations extremely seriously,” said spokesperson Erin Mellon.

CalMatters' Yue Stella Yu contributed to this report.

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