The House of Representatives passed its plan to combat the spread of the Zika virus, checking in on Ecuador's recovery, LA's Ovarian Psyco Bicycle Bridgade.
As deadline looms, voter registration surges in LA County
California's June 7th primary is a little more than two weeks away.
The really important deadline to know? This Monday, May 23 is the deadline to register.
A surge of new voters have already added their names to the registration rolls in California. According to Political Data Inc., more than 850,000 new California voters have registered in the lead up to the primary.
In Los Angeles County, Registrar-Recorder Dean Logan says that since January of this year, 196,000 new voters have registered and more are expected to sign up in the last few days before the deadline.
"This has been sort of unprecedented for a primary season," Logan says. "Typically this is the kind of activity and volume that we would see leading up to a presidential general election."
The new voters are mostly young— about 61 percent are under the age of 30. And Logan says that's encouraging because "for years people have been trying to bring up that age group's participation in election."
If you haven't yet registered to vote, Logan says it only takes about two minutes to register online at lavote.net.
And if you are registered to vote, it's still a good idea to check to make sure you're registered with the party whose candidates you want to see on your primary election ballot. The deadline to change your party affiliation is also close of business on Monday.
To hear the full interview, click the blue player above.
Congress struggles to come to a deal on Zika virus funds
Congress has been criticized for its slow response to the Zika virus, especially as mosquito season approaches in the U.S.
This week, both houses of Congress approved two very different measures to fund the fight and both fall far short of the almost $2 billion President Obama asked for in February.
On Thursday, the Senate approved its $1.1. billion plan, almost double of the House's $622 million standalone measure.
For more on this, we turned to Molly Reynolds, fellow in Governance Studies at The Brookings Institution.
The police union sues LAPD chief over disciplinary process
The union that represents police officers in Los Angeles has filed a law suit against LA Police Department Chief Charlie Beck.
The union claims he's violated the due process rights of officers by pressuring the department's three-person disciplinary panel to dole out certain punishments, like firing them...
The union says officers who do not deserve it are being dismissed, but the group has yet to present concrete example of this, citing privacy, according to Southern California Public Radio reporter Frank Stoltze.
Stoltze talks with A Martinez about what's at the root of the lawsuit and the history of tensions between the police union and Chief Beck.
To hear the full interview, click the blue play button above.
Live Tom Waits' L.A. on a tour this saturday
No one captures L.A. quite like musician Tom Waits.
The gravelly voiced singer has long crooned about the grittier side of the city of angels, inspired by late nights at dingy diners and seedy motels. And for those who'd like to relive the early creative life of Waits, they'll have an opportunity to do so on Saturday, May 21, alongside author David Smay, who wrote a book on the life of Waits titled "Tom Waits' Swordfishtrombones."
"If you think back on that time, Tom was writing about a Los Angeles that nobody else was writing about," Smay recently told Take Two host Alex Cohen. "And he's very specific about where he places his lyrics in his songs... he's talking about specific street corners, particular bars that he would go to. And that's something that we can include on the tour. You can see exactly where he was. Where he was drinking. Where he was recording. Where he was getting into all kinds of shenanigans."
The tour will visit downtown L.A. to check out Waits' favorite dive bars, old recording studios on the Sunset strip, the former spot of the Tropicana Inn Motel, of which Waits used to call home, and the famous Canter's Deli, said Smay, "We stop at Canter's because there was a huge food fight there between Tom fans and his entourage and a bunch of punk rockers... a very legendary food fight after a Troubadour gig."
To hear the entire interview, which details more information about the tour, click on the link embedded at the top of this post.
Ovarian Psycos Bicycle Brigade rides to combat gentrification, violence against women and more
It's a full moon tomorrow night and if you're out on the streets of LA, you may see the Ovarian Psycos Bicycle Brigade.
The Ovas are an all-women of color bicycle collective that ride out every full moon for what they call a Luna ride. These rides can often draw up to 20 or 30 riders.
The group's founder Xela De La X spoke to Take Two about the group and why they ride.
INTERVIEW HIGHLIGHTS
What is Ovarian Psycos' purpose?
"A bicycling brigade specifically created for the benefit of healing our communities physically, emotionally and spiritually by addressing very important issues that affect us as women of color in our community here in Boyle Heights, East LA, Southeast LA."
Why bicycles? What do they represent?
"The bicycle represents a lot for us, as Ovarian Psycos. We are a working class community and a lot of us can't afford anything else but a bicycle. But also, the way that we grew up, we were not allowed as young girls-- we were not allowed to use bicycles. Our bodies have always been about containing them for the access of somebody else, usually a male. We're just trying to reclaim our bodies for ourselves."
Why did you feel it was important to form this collective?
"I just kept thinking about young girls and girls riding and how whatever issues that we're facing already as pedestrians or as--just like women in our community, we're also going to face it cycling. And so I felt compelled to begin a collective, you know for the purpose of my daughter having back-up, for the purpose of other young girls having back-up but also just to build community off of the fact that we're cycling."
On the pushback the bicycling brigade has received:
"You know it's not always been easy, from the gate we had a lot of pushback from folks that didn't understand like 'why did it have to be women only? Why did it only have to be women of color only?'. We're talking about rape, we're talking about domestic violence, we're talking about very personal realities, right? And so I feel like it necessitates an all women's space."
"At the end of the day, we really don't care nor are we looking for anybody's validations. So for us, it's--we do what we do because we understand that it's necessary in these times. It's necessary for my daughter to see a group of women that are coming together and are working towards building a better world."
For more on the Ovarian Psyco Bicycle brigade, you can look into the documentary coming out about them from filmmakers Joanna Sokolowski & Kate Trumbull-LaValle.
The documentary premiered to rave reviews at the SXSW festival in March and is making its West Coast premiere at the Seattle International Film Festival on June 3rd.
For more on the Ovas and their documentary you can click here, here and here.
To hear the full interview, click the blue play button above.
Taking the new Expo extension? We have a few suggestions for nearby places to check out
Do you have your TAP card ready to go for the new Expo Line extension? Why rush to the beach when you could get to know the neighborhoods in between. We have suggestions for places stop and check out at all seven new stops.
>> See an interactive map of the stations and surrounding points of interest
Palms station
The area around the Palms station has the largest residential population along the new Expo Line route, according to Metro. Nearby Motor Avenue includes several schools, restaurants and a weekly farmers market every Sunday at the corner of Motor and National Boulevard.
Parking: None.
Places to check out:
- Scoops Ice Cream (3400 Overland Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90034): Walk a short distance from the station and you're rewarded with some amazing and unique daily ice cream flavors, like brown bread, salty vanilla Oreo and ricotta halva.
- Wildcraft (9725 Culver Blvd, Culver City, CA 90232): A popular pizza spot with a knack for making delicious dough.
Westwood/Rancho Park station
This neighborhood is primarily filled with single-family homes, though there's a thriving commercial corridor north of the station along Pico Boulevard, according to Metro. You'll find the Westside Pavilion shopping center here, with nearby Westwood Boulevard connecting UCLA, Westwood Village, Pico Boulevard and the Palms neighborhood.
Parking: None
Places to check out:
- Apple Pan (10801 W Pico Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90064) "It's a burger place. They've kept it very basic. They only have a handful of menu items, but it's one of our most hallowed institutions in L.A.," says food writer Katherine Spiers (who also co-hosts the podcast How It Got In Your Mouth). "For a lot of people, it's good because it's nostalgic. But they do a good burger."
- Westside Tavern (10850 W Pico Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90064 in Westside Pavilion). "It's really quite good, it's a great place to take your parents," says Spiers.
- Food Cafe (10571 W Pico Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90064): KPCC listener Sarah Hays recommends this neighborhood restaurant — especially something delicious from its daily salad case. She likes that she frequently sees her neighbors here. "I think it's one of the great things about living in this neighborhood: these little opportunities to feel like you're in a small town," she says. "It's one of the things I'm excited about with the Expo Line, because more people can come and visit us."
- Sew Modern (10921 W Pico Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90064): A fabric store for the hip kids, Sew Modern is a great stop to pick up modern fabrics, patterns and DIY sewing kits.
- F & S Fabrics For The Home (10654 W Pico Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90064): If you want to go old-school, this fabric shop has you covered. But also go for the classic mural that lines the outside wall.
- La Serenata Restaurant (10924 W Pico Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90064): This is the Westside hermana to the famed restaurant located in Boyle Heights' Mariachi Plaza. Diners swear by the salsa and cochinita pibil burritos.
- Children's Book World (10580 W Pico Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90064): This 30-year-old book store for kids — and the young at heart — gets a strong recommendation from journalist David Kipen, who spoke with KPCC's "Take Two." "Everybody I know who has kids who lives within a five-mile radius just cherishes it," Kipen said.
Expo/Sepulveda station
Not far from where the 405 and 10 freeways meet, this station is an active manufacturing and commercial area, according to Metro. Nearby businesses including a cement plant, a lumber retailer, government office buildings, public storage, animal services and more. There are also some homes and apartments in the area. Most of the stores and restaurants nearby are on Pico Boulevard.
Parking: 260 spaces (77 require permits on weekday mornings).
Places to check out:
- Tsujita LA (2057 Sawtelle Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90025): This has some of the best tsukemen in the city. "It's definitely not for dieters (sorry) but is huge on flavor and delicious," says KPCC listener M.J. Lai. "I would describe the broth as liquid bacon!"
- Anawalt Lumber (11060 W Pico Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90064): This is the last family-owned lumberyard in L.A. and it's been around since 1923. KPCC listener Kenneth Fleischer, who grew up nearby, suggests stopping by to get hardware from Anawalt and also learn a little bit of history. "It's one of the businesses that's been in West Los Angeles," he says, "and they'll probably be here forever."
- Alias Books (1650 Sawtelle Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90025): Journalist David Kipen says that this is a "great old bookstore, almost a classical bookstore, though you're not tripping over books just to get around."
- Sideshow Books (11323 Idaho Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90025): Kipen described Sideshow as "eccentrically put together," with sights like a TV playing an old movie loop between books on a shelf in the film section.
Expo/Bundy station
The neighborhood surrounding the Expo/Bundy station is home to a growing patch of creative and media business, according to Metro. Head north and you'll find a largely commercial area that's home to a car dealership, the Westside Media Center, offices and big-box retailers. Farther north and directly south, you'll find more residential areas. Head farther south and you'll hit Pico Boulevard, with plenty of independent mom-and-pop shopping spots.
Parking: 217 spaces (131 require permits on weekday mornings).
Places to check out:
Liquid Kitty (11780 W Pico Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90064): Along with the Arsenal, food writer Katherine Spiers says the Liquid Kitty is one of L.A.'s great noir bars. Come for the cheap drinks, stay for the late-night karaoke.
26th St/Bergamot station
The big attraction nearby is Bergamot Station. It's a former railroad station that now houses art galleries for your perusing pleasure.
Parking: None
Places to check out:
- Bergamot Station (2525 Michigan Ave, Santa Monica, CA 90404): The stop at 26th/Bergamot drops off right at Bergamot Station, which isn't a station itself but the name for the adjoining arts center. Wayne Blank developed the site in 1993 and it also houses his own Shoshana Wayne Gallery, one of 35 on site. "This place is not intimidating to the average person," he says, "You'd be hard pressed to find something you didn't like."
- City Garage (2525 Michigan Ave, Santa Monica, CA 90404): Situated at Bergamot Station is City Garage, which journalist David Kipen says is a great literary theater.
17th St/Santa Monica College station
The draw here is, of course, Santa Monica College. Parking nearby is next to nil, unless you're able to park at the school, just three blocks away.
Parking: 67 spaces (13 require permits on weekday mornings)
Places to check out:
- Bay Cities Italian Deli (1517 Lincoln Blvd, Santa Monica, CA 90401): Beloved for its famous "Godmother" sandwich, Bay Cities is responsible for giant sandwiches, massive lines and even a video from Esquire — food writer Katherine Spiers calls it "another classic."
- Highways Performance Space and Gallery (1651 18th St, Santa Monica, CA 90404): This theatre space features experimental performances, dancers, musicians and more from a diverse range of cultures and backgrounds that reflect SoCal and the world. "We've been here for 27 years and it's going to be great having you hear," says artistic director Leo Garcia.
Downtown Santa Monica station
This station drops you right in downtown Santa Monica. You're just two to three blocks from the Santa Monica Pier, Metro's Jose Ubaldo told KPCC, as well as right by the Third Street Promenade.
Parking: None.
Places to check out:
- Tongva Park (1615 Ocean Ave, Santa Monica, CA 90401): This park debuted in 2013, transformed from its past as a parking lot for the Rand Corporation. It's sandwiched between Santa Monica City Hall and the shore, and Mayor Tony Vazquez says it's a great place for children, catching a performance at Tongva After Dark or gazing at the beach from one of its two basket-like observation decks. "This is probably one of the best places to catch the sunset," says Vazquez.
- Fritto Misto (601 Colorado Ave, Santa Monica, CA 90401): Mayor Vazquez also recommends this local Italian restaurant just steps away from the new downtown station. "It's one of my favorite spots," he says. "It's home-cooked, it's reasonably priced and it's tasty." Diners have a chance to create their own pasta with any any combination of noodles and sauces they'd like.
- Harvelle's (1432 4th St, Santa Monica, CA 90401): Established in 1931, the downtown Santa Monica hangout claims to be the Westside's oldest music venue. "It's a legendary jazz club," said food writer Katherine Spiers. "Everyone needs to go there."
- Beyond Baroque (681 Venice Blvd, Venice, CA 90291): This literary arts center was founded in 1968, based out of Venice's original city hall building. Famed science fiction writer Ray Bradbury lived nearby, journalist David Kipen told KPCC, and both the firehouse for "Fahrenheit 451" and the canals for "The Martian Chronicles" drew their inspiration from this area.
- Small World Books (1407 Ocean Front Walk, Venice, CA 90291): This bookstore was described by Kipen as a "beatnik time machine," offering "a little trap door into the heyday of L.A. bookstores in the '60s."
Bonus: Bike the Expo Line bike path
The Expo Line also features a bike path that runs along most of the extension, connecting downtown Culver City to downtown Santa Monica.
"The beauty of the bike lane is you don't have to deal with traffic on Olympic or Colorado," says KPCC listener Joni Yung. "You're protected most of the time."
(Note: there is a gap between the Palms and Westwood/Rancho Park station where you'll be biking through a neighborhood, instead. Here's a map someone compiled to help guide you.)
If you don't have a bike, Yung suggests joining the Santa Monica Breeze Bike Share program.
You'll be able to rent a bike outside the 26th/Bergamot, 17th St/Santa Monica College and Downtown Santa Monica stations.
Once you're signed up, look for the bright green color of the bikes at a designated rack. Punch your code into a bike to unlock it, and you're on your way to traveling up and down the path.
Have a suggestion of your own? Let us know! Tag @KPCC in your tweet, let us know on Facebook, or post your comment below!
Love on the rails: Will the Expo extension motivate daters to cast a wider net?
Metro's latest Expo extensions make their debut today. The additional 6.6 miles of track took about four years and $1.5 billion dollars to lay.
There are seven new stops, allowing riders to — for the first time since over six decades — ride rails from Downtown LA to Downtown Santa Monica. The new track could mean less time on the road for commuters.
It could also bring some relief to the city's daters.
That's right, daters.
As part of a special look at the new Expo extension, and the places to see and do, along the way, we consider how one's love life might be affected.
In a meme, dating when you live on the Eastside might best be summed up by this:
And for good purpose. The last time a light rail ran from Downtown LA to Downtown Santa Monica, this song was headed to the charts:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mrd14PxaUco
LYRICS: “I got a woman way over town, she’s good to me.”
This is somewhat ironic because after the Pacific Electric’s Red Car ceased operation in 1953 if one did have a significant-other "way over town," it probably became a lot harder to see them on a regular basis.
Fast forward about six decades.
“I think when I first signed up for an online dating app, I first set my distance to like, 10 miles? Ten miles from Downtown LA.” -Dora Quach, former LA single lady
When Dora Quach was on the market, distance mattered a lot.
“I judged it based off of whether I was willing to make the commute after work to have dinner with someone.”
But there's a reason why Dora was hesitant to date someone on the other side of town: she tried it once before about five years ago. Dora was working downtown; her then-partner lived on the westside. They kept things going for almost a year, but it wasn’t meant to be.
“Not to be mean, but I don't think I liked him well enough to deal with the traffic.”
Dora says other factors contributed to the decision to break it off too, but the distance was an important factor. Sometimes it took up to an hour to drive to see her partner after work. They even tried to use public transit, but:
“It was a heavier burden on me and at the end of it, it just wasn't worth it.”
LA-based dating coach Damona Hoffman says she hears that a lot from her clients.
“When you're facing a 45-minute coffee date, and it will take more than an hour to drive there, suddenly that person and that date doesn't seem as attractive anymore.” -Damona Hoffman, dating coach
She says that's because LA daters think about travel as time instead of distance. And that can make people pickier — maybe even a little shallow.
“Different daters have different criteria that they use to determine if someone is worth the distance and sometimes it's just as simple as the physical attractiveness of the date. Especially when we’re talking about dating apps and really all you have to go on in that initial phase is how attracted you are to their picture and the couple of things they said about themselves.”
So will Expo be a boon or bust for LA daters? Well, it depends.
Just three of the seven new stations have parking spots, so if you're not walking distance from a stop, you might wind up shelling out to park in a nearby lot.
In addition, what previously took Dora more than an hour in the car will still take riders between 46 and 50 minutes.
It's hard to say.
Incidentally, Dora does believe in life after love. She just moved in with her boyfriend, who she met through a dating app. He was in her 10-mile radius. And Dora's not jaded about her attempt at distance dating in LA.
“With public transit expanding, I hope it gets easier [...] Ultimately you have to keep an open mind because you never know who you're gonna meet and who's willing to make the drive for you.” - Dora Quach
A reader's guide to the new Expo Line extension
You can ride the expo line under a full moon on Saturday night and it just so happens there's a little bit of literary history along the route and some really great bookstores.
Take Two contributor and founder of Libros Schmibros, David Kipen, joined the show to break down the reader's guide to the expo line extension, stop by stop, from east to west.
Palms
"Ray Bradbury, arguably the father of modern science fiction and almost a lifelong Angeleno, lived a 10-speed ride away from here, and he was from the monorail to any number editorials about the people mover--he was a great champion of local public transportation so he would've been thrilled today."
David Kipen will be at the event 'When We Reach the City: Ray Bradbury and the Future of Los Angeles' which will be hosted by the city Cultural Affairs Department on Sunday, May 22 at Clifton's cafeteria at 4:51 p.m. Kipen will speak with Ray Bradbury's biographer, Sam Weller, and others about transit and Bradbury's future for LA. For more information, click here.
Westwood Rancho Park
"Children's book world, just walk a little bit north from the station and it's on Pico sort of between Rancho park and Overland. A great children's bookstore, I think it's 30 years old this year...everybody I know who has kids who lives within a five-mile radius just cherishes it."
Sepulveda
"Just a few blocks from Pico and Sepulveda are two bookstores very close to each other up by Santa Monica Blvd and Sawtelle. There's Alias Books which is a great old bookstore, almost a classical bookstore, though you're not tripping over books just to get around. And Sideshow books like half a block away which is wonderful and which has like a television with an old movie loop playing between books on a shelf in the film section--I mean it's just so eccentrically put together, you have to see Sideshow."
Bundy
Bundy is near the site of the late lamented Buzz magazine, which saw the transit future of LA better than anybody else, and survives online not at all.
"You can see from the elevated Bundy station, Buzz Magazine, where I used to work...they ran so many prophetic pieces about LA transit. Somebody's got to resurrect that online!"
Bergamot
Kipen could not detail what there was to see at Bergamont station because host A Martinez is impatient and just wanted to get to the beach. However, off-air, Kipen did suggest City Garage, the best literary theater walking distance -- or as he put it 'limping' distance -- from the station.
The Beach- bringing it full circle!
"Small World Books is like this wonderful beatnik time machine on Ocean Front Walk, and I just adore it. It's a little trap door into the heyday of LA bookstores in the sixties."
What else is there to see at the end of the line? Beyond Baroque, where Ray Bradbury used to live, and where he filched both the firehouse for "Fahrenheit 451" and the canals for "The Martian Chronicles."
To hear all of David Kipen's suggestions, click the blue play button above.