Zach Behrens

A football stadium next to Staples Center? | Photo by victoriabernal via LAist Featured Photos on Flickr An idea to bring a football stadium to downtown Los Angeles has resurfaced, according to LA Times, citing multiple sources. The facility would be in direct competition with a stadium already in the works outside the city--developer Ed Roski's people say the news doesn't affect their progress--but at this point it's just a concept. So here's the...

President Barack Obama will arrive in Los Angeles on Monday evening for a quick trip in support of Senator Barbara Boxer at her fundraiser. There will be no public events and only media will be allowed to be present for his arrival and departure. He'll be gone by the Tuesday morning. If a local high school in Lawndale wins a White House contest, the President will be back to give the commencement speech....

The L.A. Board of Water and Power Commissioners approved a one-time rate hike of 0.6 cents per kilowatt hour this afternoon. The move comes after the City Council convened an emergency meeting yesterday afternoon, recommending the rate hike, after learning of today's meeting. Some believe the move to call in meeting on such short notice was a violation of the state's open meeting laws. In fact, a city attorney present at the meeting recommended...

The LAPD this afternoon released a composite sketch of the suspect in Saturday evening's purse snatching that left one woman injured after she was shot in the arm. He's described as a Hispanic male between 20 and 35 years of age, has a thin-build and is around 5'8". At the time of the incident, he was wearing a dark blue hooded sweatshirt. The incident happened on the 2300 block of Glendale Boulevard, near Silverlake...

One of the major talking points in the Oscar-winning documentary "The Cove" was that Japan continues to hunt whales--under the auspices of scientific study--with the meat sold across the country. It's still illegal to sell to the U.S. or South Korea, but DNA tests have confirmed that the meat from The Hump, the shuttered Santa Monica restaurant caught serving the meat, was from a scientific catch some three years ago....

A Los Angeles Police patrol car is shown at the entrance of the Adat Yeshurun Valley Sephardic Orthodox synagogue where a gunman shot and wounded two men Thursday Oct. 29, 2009 in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Al Seib, Pool) A Beverly Hills Police Department SWAT team arrested a suspect today that happened to be the suspect in last October's North Hollywood synagogue shooting. On the 29th of that month, Christopher Littlejohn allegedly walked into the...

LAX officials this morning are reporting that at least two British Airways flights have been canceled today after volcanic ash from Iceland has drifted over Europe. "[Airport Operations is] into the US carriers that fly to Europe too," LAX spokesman Marshall Lowe. More cancellations are expected as further checks are made with airlines. Passengers advised to check with their airlines if they are departing on flights to Europe.” UPDATE: 4 arrival flights and 5...

Photos: gabeshedd/LAist Featured Photos The plan to freeze police hiring, which would deplete the force as officers retired, was rejected by the L.A. City Council yesterday and sent to committee for further study, according to the LA Times. That move, however, comes as job cuts continu across the city, including civilian positions within the police department. "The impacts are very real, as officers are forced to stay at home because of overtime concerns and...

Photo Courtesy of Wicks Walker Well, it didn't take long before someone ruined the Banksy fun. LAist reader Wicks Walker said a portion where the security guard with the Jeff Koons dog was is gone. As in someone took a whole chunk of the wall. Compare the above photo to this photo here. Wicks, however, notes the positive of this: "One good thing about this is that this really great piece being lifted will...

Beyond the Huntington Beach Pier | Photo by morgan.arnold via LAist Featured Photos on Flickr One architect wants to "Save the Peak" by turning the Hollywood Sign into a hotel... literally. While the L.A. Angels of Anaheim were loading onto a bus outside their New York City hotel today, a man committed suicide right in front of them. With people coming and going all night and blacked out windows, El Monte neighbors had suspicions...

A state bill that would prohibit health insurers from raising customers’ rates more than once per year took was approved by the Assembly's Health Committee today. “This measure complements the recent federal health reforms by ensuring that health insurers are prohibited from raising their rates multiple times per year. If insurers raise rates when their subscribers aren’t expecting an increase, cash-strapped families could be forced to give up their coverage,” said Mike Feuer, the...

Photo: sfxeric/LAist Featured Photos The L.A. Department of Water and Power today are applauding Angelenos for record breaking water use. In February, customers used water equivalent to the amount used in 1979. “Our customers’ ability to reach 1970s water use levels at a time when our City’s population has grown by more than a million people is truly remarkable,” said Lee Kanon Alpert, President of the Board of Water and Power Commissioners. For the...