Zach Behrens

"The need for shared responsibility and shared sacrifice isn't just rhetoric, it's reality,'' Villaraigosa said today about his $7.04 billion budget for the next fiscal year. Today's proposed budget, which is 1% less than last year's, should eliminate the $530 million deficit the city could incur. One of Villaraigosa's biggest initiatives is avoiding laying off 2,800 city workers, but that comes with a menu of options such as deferring automatic raises--that would save 1331...

He beat it with a sledgehammer, took a chainsaw to its head and fed it to his dogs. Jack Ziniuk, 64, of Anza in the 909 951 was arrested today for felony animal cruelty. “He told us he was having an argument with his neighbors and some dogs had attacked his horse but when deputies got out there they found the horse already dead,” a Riverside County Sheriff’s said to the LA Times. “He...

Yesterday broke records and today it's expected to get hotter, breaking triple digits again, in some areas such as inland-valleys. Some predicted highs are 94 for LAX, 96 for Burbank, 97 for downtown, 98 in Long Beach, 101 in Anaheim and 97 in Woodland Hills and Pasadena. Cooler temps should come to the coastal areas tomorrow with widespread cooling on Wednesday or Thursday....

Photo by blaisetnutter via Flickr Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa will release his proposed budget later this morning promising to to close the $530 million deficit for the upcoming fiscal year (July '09 through June '10) all while continuing to build the LAPD and preventing layoffs--up to 2,800 by his estimates--by asking employees to share the sacrifice. Of course, now through June 12th when City Council has to adopt it by, things will change. Villaraigosa's proposals...

Photographer A.C.Thamer wants you to guess where in LA this was taken. Comment below with your guesses | Via LAist Feautred Photos on Flickr Due to the statewide drought, the LA City Council today approved new water rates to encourage conservation. If you use a lot of water, watch out, your bill will soon be higher if you don't start using less. A vegan cupcake shop from New York City will be opening a...

Photo by damon.garrett via Flickr She made Tokyo's Park Hyatt into a character in "Lost in Translation" and now Sofia Coppola is set to film a movie based in Hollywood's Chateau Marmont. "Somewhere" is about "a bad-boy actor stumbling through a life of excess at the Chateau Marmont," describes Variety. "With an unexpected visit from his 11-year-old daughter, he is forced to reexamine his life." Coppola said she wanted to make "an intimate story...

Photo by thinkvisualdesign via Flickr A portion of Sunset Boulevard will be closed tonight for street resurfacing, a first in 30 years for this stretch of street. The full closure will be from 8 p.m. tonight to 10 a.m. Saturday morning between Highland and La Brea avenues. “I’m proud that we’re finally re-paving this stretch of Sunset Boulevard, but it may inconvenience some people,” said Councilmember Tom LaBonge at press conference today. “City crews...

The Ladies Professional Golf Association last year began suspending players if they could not speak English proficiently. "The policy was based on the premise that language fluency in speeches and media interviews was critical to the sport's promotion," the LA Times explained. Well, that pissed off one politician who proposed a new law that was passed by the State Senate yesterday and next moves on to the Assembly floor. Opponents said this was a...

And these numbers are expected to continue to rise through the summer. 62,100 jobs were lost last month, pushing the state's unemployment from 10.6% to the current 11.2%, the highest since 1976 when the U.S. Government began keeping records. Over the last year, 637,400 jobs have been lost. The western states represent the worst job loss region with 9.8%, more than a point higher than the national average, which is 8.5%....

Photo by Al Pavangkanan via Flickr An estimated 5,400 deaths a year in Southern California are attributed to environmental factors and air pollution, but little alarm over that fact has been raised. Today, that changes. It was two years ago when the Supreme Court ruled that the Environmental Protection Agency had to determine if greenhouse gases harm the environment and the health of the public. If it didn't, they would have to explain why....

Whether they were gang members or innocent bystanders, that's a high number of deaths over the last ten years for Los Angeles County. But with an estimated 1,000 gangs and over 80,000 gang members, is this any surprise? Yesterday at a panel on gang violence, LAPD Chief Bill Bratton, Sheriff Lee Baca and community advocate Connie Rice called gangs a "public health disaster of epidemic proportions," as the Daily News put it. The panel...

On Monday, a new pedestrian crosswalk with a flashing overhead yellow light will be debuted on Sunset Boulevard at Portia Street. In a recent citywide study to find where higher than average pedestrian accidents occur, this one was identified and pushed for by the city's volunteer citizen Pedestrian Advisory Committee. The crosswalk is currently installed, but the flashing lights will be turned on Monday morning when Councilman Eric Garcetti and others flip the switch....