Today’s Headlines: Floodwaters and L.A. sewage sludge threaten disaster for Tulare Lake
Hello, it’s Monday, April 3, and here are the stories you shouldn’t miss today:
TOP STORIES
Acres of L.A. County sewage sludge threaten to contaminate Tulare Lake floodwaters
At the western edge of the Tulare Lake Basin dwells a smelly industrial site the size of 150 football fields. Roughly eight times a day, its operations are replenished with a truckload of human waste from the residents of Los Angeles County.
Since 2016, the Tulare Lake Compost facility has been converting Southland sewage sludge into high-grade organic fertilizer. But as epic Sierra Nevada snowpack threatens to overwhelm this phantom lake bed with spring runoff — inundating a region that has already suffered flooding from a series of powerful storms — some fear the facility could be transformed into an environmental disaster.
In a city rocked by corruption, Ridley-Thomas’ conviction brings public tributes, not scorn
The corruption cases that have upended Los Angeles city politics in recent years have been greeted by a familiar set of reactions: public disgust, condemnation from elected officials, urgent calls for reform.
But in the days since a jury found former City Councilmember Mark Ridley-Thomas guilty of bribery, conspiracy and fraud charges, some of the city’s political leaders have given a markedly different type of response, offering tributes instead of scorn — a testament to the huge base of friendship and political support amassed by Ridley-Thomas over his three decades in elected office.
More politics
Sign up for our California Politics newsletter to get the best of The Times’ state politics reporting and the latest action in Sacramento.
Anger, tears and a birthday serenade after a deadly fire in Mexico migrant lockup
Dozens of mourning demonstrators gathered at a migrant detention center in Ciudad Juárez where at least 39 people perished in a fire Monday. All the dead and the dozens injured were natives of Central and South America, and they were among the thousands of migrants marooned here and in other Mexican border towns hoping for a chance to enter the United States.
U.S. leaders have endeavored to offshore to Mexico the task of keeping migrants out. But this latest tragedy again dramatized for many how Mexico is ill-equipped to handle the influx of U.S.-bound migrants transiting the country.
A 9-year-old girl didn’t want her goat slaughtered. California fair officials sent deputies after it
Jessica Long’s young daughter raised a brown and white floppy-eared goat as part of the 4-H program with the Shasta District Fair. But when it was time for Cedar to be sold at the fair’s auction, the 9-year-old couldn’t go through with it and Long tried to negotiate a different fate for the animal.
Fair officials reached out to the Shasta County Sheriff’s Office. Armed with a search warrant, detectives drove more than 500 miles across Northern California in search of the goat before Cedar was taken and slaughtered.
Long has since filed a federal lawsuit against Shasta District Fair officials and the county. Long and her attorneys allege the dispute was a civil matter she was willing to resolve. Documents reviewed by The Times show how the dispute quickly escalated.
A Bay Area city reels from refinery’s hazardous fallout. Did warnings come too late?
It was the morning after Thanksgiving when residents in the Bay Area city of Martinez awoke to find their homes, cars and yards blanketed by a mysterious pale residue.
Today, residents of this tight-knit community 30 miles northeast of San Francisco are still demanding to know what risks they face after 20 tons of spent catalyst were lofted over area homes, and why it’s been so hard to get answers.
County health officials have insisted the most significant health risks were short-term respiratory effects from inhaling the pollution over the two days it was released. While the county has launched an investigation into why the refinery failed to issue an alert, residents have accused county health officials of failing to properly inform residents of potential health hazards long after the incident.
Our daily news podcast
If you’re a fan of this newsletter, you’ll love our daily podcast “The Times,” hosted every weekday by columnist Gustavo Arellano, along with reporters from across our newsroom. Go beyond the headlines. Download and listen on our App, subscribe on Apple Podcasts and follow on Spotify.
OUR MUST-READS FROM THE WEEKEND
California poppies and wildflowers are blooming early this year in Walker Canyon, near Lake Elsinore. Poppies didn’t blanket the hillsides in the past three years because of the drought.
(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)
Here’s where California’s remarkably wet year is bringing welcome recovery. The precipitation that has all but ended the state’s three-year drought has, without doubt, brought devastation to some areas of the state. But in many corners of the state that have avoided calamity, super-wet 2023 has been a boon.
An LAPD abortion squad chased down women before Roe vs. Wade. In a still unsettled post-Roe world, no one knows for sure what enforcement of abortion laws will look like. But L.A. in the 1950s and 1960s offers a hint into at least one possibility.
CALIFORNIA
Mutual aid clubs are still going strong in L.A. Chinatown. But their future is uncertain. As the neighborhood gentrifies and Chinese residents grow older and fewer, the clubs — called “tong,” “gungso” or “wui” in Cantonese — remain a vital social glue.
Recent drought-busting storms mean misery for allergy sufferers in Southern California. Many people are showing symptoms brought on by the dark side of the recent storms — a profusion of blossoming trees, weeds and grasses dispersing pollen spores in the wind.
A scuffle at a pro-Trump rally in Huntington Beach leaves 2 injured. A 33-year-old San Bernardino man was arrested after a fight broke out during a Saturday protest near the Huntington Beach Pier, where supporters of former President Trump gathered following the announcement he had been indicted.
Support our journalism
Subscribe to the Los Angeles Times.
NATION-WORLD
At least 26 dead after tornadoes and other severe weather in Midwest and South. Storms that brought possibly dozens of tornadoes killed people in small towns and big cities, tearing a path through the Arkansas capital, collapsing the roof of a packed concert venue in Illinois and stunning people throughout a wide region Saturday.
In rare call, Blinken says Russia must release American reporter and Paul Whelan. Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken urged his Russian counterpart to immediately release a Wall Street Journal reporter who was detained last week as well as another imprisoned American, Paul Whelan, the State Department said Sunday.
Fox News defamation case headed to trial after judge rejects motion to dismiss. A Delaware judge denied Fox News’ motion to dismiss Dominion Voting Systems’ $1.6-billion defamation suit against the network on Friday. A jury will be asked to determine whether the network committed actual malice when it presented false voter fraud allegations in the 2020 election.
HOLLYWOOD AND THE ARTS
10 books to add to your reading list in April. Beloved writers including Ocean Vuong and Emily St. John Mandel are returning to push their particular talents in bold new directions. These recommendations include amazing books on some dark and difficult subjects, but there is always joy in great writing.
Review: A dazzlingly danced ‘Like Water for Chocolate’ proves story ballet is bigger than ever. The dancing bedazzles. The choreography is full of spectacle, and the production is effects-rich. The familiar narrative serves up sentiment without embarrassment and the sheer scale of theatrical engineering is astonishing, writes Times critic Mark Swed.
‘Dungeons and Dragons’ dethrones ‘John Wick 4’ at the box office. Hollywood’s most recent attempt to adapt “Dungeons & Dragons” for the screen performed at the high end of early box-office projections, conjuring up an estimated $38.5 million and besting the action film.
BUSINESS
Will celebrities pay for Twitter Blue? Many are ready to lose the check. The company said it planned to take away the coveted verification check marks — and hand them out only to those who pay for a Twitter Blue subscription. But entertainers, pro athletes and content producers appeared to be in no rush to sign up, with some emphatically against it.
A fight over pay for L.A. hospital execs could hinge on what President Biden makes. An L.A. ballot measure, backed by SEIU-United Healthcare Workers West, would set the annual limit for healthcare executives at “the total compensation for the President of the United States.” The California Hospital Assn. has gone to court to stop the measure.
SPORTS
LSU defeats Iowa for its first NCAA women’s basketball championship. Coach Kim Mulkey’s Tigers used a record offensive performance to beat Caitlin Clark and Iowa 102-85 on Sunday and win the first basketball title in school history.
San Diego State guard’s buzzer-beater sinks FAU, puts Aztecs in national title game. SDSU trailed by 14 and didn’t lead Florida Atlantic in the second half until Butler’s 14-footer from the right side, giving the Aztecs a 72-71 win at Houston’s NRG Stadium on Saturday and putting them in the national title game Monday against Connecticut.
Free online games
Get our free daily crossword puzzle, sudoku, word search and arcade games in our new game center at latimes.com/games.
OPINION
There’s a looming crisis in the crushing cost of elder care and the crippling effects of low wages. When policymakers and academics say society is unprepared for all the aging-related challenges speeding toward us, elder care is a chief concern. At its simplest, the problem is two-pronged, writes columnist Steve Lopez.
Why do so many young white men in America find fascism ‘cool’? “Fascism feeds off culture wars, exploits psychological insecurities and uses deeply held resentments to convert the impressionable. At a time of intense polarization and cultural battles over race, gender and democracy, it’s not surprising that fascism has found young adherents.”
ONLY IN L.A.
(Patrick Hruby / Los Angeles Times)
Don’t plant in the mud and other gardening tips for a super-soaked spring in L.A.: A wet winter and early spring means your start to gardening season may look a little different this year. It usually takes a few days after a good rain for the soil to dry out enough that you can start planting. The moisture may also mean a banner year for weeds and mosquitoes. Here’s more tips to help you plan, and a list of events to help you find inspiration.
FROM THE ARCHIVES
The cast of “Barney & Friends” in 2006.
(Donna McWilliam / Associated Press)
More than 30 years ago this week, “Barney & Friends” first aired on PBS and helped kick off the rise of an iconic figure of the ‘90s. The character was originally the star of a direct-to-video series before receiving a television show aimed a preschoolers, according to a brief preview The Times published on April 5, 1992.
Just a year later, in April 1993, a Times story dubbed him “Elvis for toddlers,” citing a bidding war for the rights to air a prime-time Barney special, international distribution plans, a $100-million toy deal with Hasbro and event appearances plagued by enormous crowds.
But with massive popularity also came backlash. By 1998, anti-Barney jokes had become just as ubiquitous as the character they lampooned, constituting an early strain of internet humor (“Anti-Barney humor” even has its own Wikipedia page). With the release of Barney’s first motion picture, “Barney’s Great Adventure,” a Times review of the film referred to the character as “the great purple scourge” who offers “benignly lobotomized entertainment” while another piece offered haters a list of websites where they could digitally punch, slap and otherwise work out their negative feelings toward Barney.
A new version of Barney is set to debut next year with an animated show and product line.
We appreciate that you took the time to read Today’s Headlines! Comments or ideas? Feel free to drop us a note at [email protected].
Hello, it’s Monday, April 3, and here are the stories you shouldn’t miss today:
TOP STORIES
Acres of L.A. County sewage sludge threaten to contaminate Tulare Lake floodwaters
At the western edge of the Tulare Lake Basin dwells a smelly industrial site the size of 150 football fields. Roughly eight times a day, its operations are replenished with a truckload of human waste from the residents of Los Angeles County.
Since 2016, the Tulare Lake Compost facility has been converting Southland sewage sludge into high-grade organic fertilizer. But as epic Sierra Nevada snowpack threatens to overwhelm this phantom lake bed with spring runoff — inundating a region that has already suffered flooding from a series of powerful storms — some fear the facility could be transformed into an environmental disaster.
In a city rocked by corruption, Ridley-Thomas’ conviction brings public tributes, not scorn
The corruption cases that have upended Los Angeles city politics in recent years have been greeted by a familiar set of reactions: public disgust, condemnation from elected officials, urgent calls for reform.
But in the days since a jury found former City Councilmember Mark Ridley-Thomas guilty of bribery, conspiracy and fraud charges, some of the city’s political leaders have given a markedly different type of response, offering tributes instead of scorn — a testament to the huge base of friendship and political support amassed by Ridley-Thomas over his three decades in elected office.
More politics
Sign up for our California Politics newsletter to get the best of The Times’ state politics reporting and the latest action in Sacramento.
Anger, tears and a birthday serenade after a deadly fire in Mexico migrant lockup
Dozens of mourning demonstrators gathered at a migrant detention center in Ciudad Juárez where at least 39 people perished in a fire Monday. All the dead and the dozens injured were natives of Central and South America, and they were among the thousands of migrants marooned here and in other Mexican border towns hoping for a chance to enter the United States.
U.S. leaders have endeavored to offshore to Mexico the task of keeping migrants out. But this latest tragedy again dramatized for many how Mexico is ill-equipped to handle the influx of U.S.-bound migrants transiting the country.
A 9-year-old girl didn’t want her goat slaughtered. California fair officials sent deputies after it
Jessica Long’s young daughter raised a brown and white floppy-eared goat as part of the 4-H program with the Shasta District Fair. But when it was time for Cedar to be sold at the fair’s auction, the 9-year-old couldn’t go through with it and Long tried to negotiate a different fate for the animal.
Fair officials reached out to the Shasta County Sheriff’s Office. Armed with a search warrant, detectives drove more than 500 miles across Northern California in search of the goat before Cedar was taken and slaughtered.
Long has since filed a federal lawsuit against Shasta District Fair officials and the county. Long and her attorneys allege the dispute was a civil matter she was willing to resolve. Documents reviewed by The Times show how the dispute quickly escalated.
A Bay Area city reels from refinery’s hazardous fallout. Did warnings come too late?
It was the morning after Thanksgiving when residents in the Bay Area city of Martinez awoke to find their homes, cars and yards blanketed by a mysterious pale residue.
Today, residents of this tight-knit community 30 miles northeast of San Francisco are still demanding to know what risks they face after 20 tons of spent catalyst were lofted over area homes, and why it’s been so hard to get answers.
County health officials have insisted the most significant health risks were short-term respiratory effects from inhaling the pollution over the two days it was released. While the county has launched an investigation into why the refinery failed to issue an alert, residents have accused county health officials of failing to properly inform residents of potential health hazards long after the incident.
Our daily news podcast
If you’re a fan of this newsletter, you’ll love our daily podcast “The Times,” hosted every weekday by columnist Gustavo Arellano, along with reporters from across our newsroom. Go beyond the headlines. Download and listen on our App, subscribe on Apple Podcasts and follow on Spotify.
OUR MUST-READS FROM THE WEEKEND
California poppies and wildflowers are blooming early this year in Walker Canyon, near Lake Elsinore. Poppies didn’t blanket the hillsides in the past three years because of the drought.
(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)
Here’s where California’s remarkably wet year is bringing welcome recovery. The precipitation that has all but ended the state’s three-year drought has, without doubt, brought devastation to some areas of the state. But in many corners of the state that have avoided calamity, super-wet 2023 has been a boon.
An LAPD abortion squad chased down women before Roe vs. Wade. In a still unsettled post-Roe world, no one knows for sure what enforcement of abortion laws will look like. But L.A. in the 1950s and 1960s offers a hint into at least one possibility.
CALIFORNIA
Mutual aid clubs are still going strong in L.A. Chinatown. But their future is uncertain. As the neighborhood gentrifies and Chinese residents grow older and fewer, the clubs — called “tong,” “gungso” or “wui” in Cantonese — remain a vital social glue.
Recent drought-busting storms mean misery for allergy sufferers in Southern California. Many people are showing symptoms brought on by the dark side of the recent storms — a profusion of blossoming trees, weeds and grasses dispersing pollen spores in the wind.
A scuffle at a pro-Trump rally in Huntington Beach leaves 2 injured. A 33-year-old San Bernardino man was arrested after a fight broke out during a Saturday protest near the Huntington Beach Pier, where supporters of former President Trump gathered following the announcement he had been indicted.
Support our journalism
Subscribe to the Los Angeles Times.
NATION-WORLD
At least 26 dead after tornadoes and other severe weather in Midwest and South. Storms that brought possibly dozens of tornadoes killed people in small towns and big cities, tearing a path through the Arkansas capital, collapsing the roof of a packed concert venue in Illinois and stunning people throughout a wide region Saturday.
In rare call, Blinken says Russia must release American reporter and Paul Whelan. Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken urged his Russian counterpart to immediately release a Wall Street Journal reporter who was detained last week as well as another imprisoned American, Paul Whelan, the State Department said Sunday.
Fox News defamation case headed to trial after judge rejects motion to dismiss. A Delaware judge denied Fox News’ motion to dismiss Dominion Voting Systems’ $1.6-billion defamation suit against the network on Friday. A jury will be asked to determine whether the network committed actual malice when it presented false voter fraud allegations in the 2020 election.
HOLLYWOOD AND THE ARTS
10 books to add to your reading list in April. Beloved writers including Ocean Vuong and Emily St. John Mandel are returning to push their particular talents in bold new directions. These recommendations include amazing books on some dark and difficult subjects, but there is always joy in great writing.
Review: A dazzlingly danced ‘Like Water for Chocolate’ proves story ballet is bigger than ever. The dancing bedazzles. The choreography is full of spectacle, and the production is effects-rich. The familiar narrative serves up sentiment without embarrassment and the sheer scale of theatrical engineering is astonishing, writes Times critic Mark Swed.
‘Dungeons and Dragons’ dethrones ‘John Wick 4’ at the box office. Hollywood’s most recent attempt to adapt “Dungeons & Dragons” for the screen performed at the high end of early box-office projections, conjuring up an estimated $38.5 million and besting the action film.
BUSINESS
Will celebrities pay for Twitter Blue? Many are ready to lose the check. The company said it planned to take away the coveted verification check marks — and hand them out only to those who pay for a Twitter Blue subscription. But entertainers, pro athletes and content producers appeared to be in no rush to sign up, with some emphatically against it.
A fight over pay for L.A. hospital execs could hinge on what President Biden makes. An L.A. ballot measure, backed by SEIU-United Healthcare Workers West, would set the annual limit for healthcare executives at “the total compensation for the President of the United States.” The California Hospital Assn. has gone to court to stop the measure.
SPORTS
LSU defeats Iowa for its first NCAA women’s basketball championship. Coach Kim Mulkey’s Tigers used a record offensive performance to beat Caitlin Clark and Iowa 102-85 on Sunday and win the first basketball title in school history.
San Diego State guard’s buzzer-beater sinks FAU, puts Aztecs in national title game. SDSU trailed by 14 and didn’t lead Florida Atlantic in the second half until Butler’s 14-footer from the right side, giving the Aztecs a 72-71 win at Houston’s NRG Stadium on Saturday and putting them in the national title game Monday against Connecticut.
Free online games
Get our free daily crossword puzzle, sudoku, word search and arcade games in our new game center at latimes.com/games.
OPINION
There’s a looming crisis in the crushing cost of elder care and the crippling effects of low wages. When policymakers and academics say society is unprepared for all the aging-related challenges speeding toward us, elder care is a chief concern. At its simplest, the problem is two-pronged, writes columnist Steve Lopez.
Why do so many young white men in America find fascism ‘cool’? “Fascism feeds off culture wars, exploits psychological insecurities and uses deeply held resentments to convert the impressionable. At a time of intense polarization and cultural battles over race, gender and democracy, it’s not surprising that fascism has found young adherents.”
ONLY IN L.A.
(Patrick Hruby / Los Angeles Times)
Don’t plant in the mud and other gardening tips for a super-soaked spring in L.A.: A wet winter and early spring means your start to gardening season may look a little different this year. It usually takes a few days after a good rain for the soil to dry out enough that you can start planting. The moisture may also mean a banner year for weeds and mosquitoes. Here’s more tips to help you plan, and a list of events to help you find inspiration.
FROM THE ARCHIVES
The cast of “Barney & Friends” in 2006.
(Donna McWilliam / Associated Press)
More than 30 years ago this week, “Barney & Friends” first aired on PBS and helped kick off the rise of an iconic figure of the ‘90s. The character was originally the star of a direct-to-video series before receiving a television show aimed a preschoolers, according to a brief preview The Times published on April 5, 1992.
Just a year later, in April 1993, a Times story dubbed him “Elvis for toddlers,” citing a bidding war for the rights to air a prime-time Barney special, international distribution plans, a $100-million toy deal with Hasbro and event appearances plagued by enormous crowds.
But with massive popularity also came backlash. By 1998, anti-Barney jokes had become just as ubiquitous as the character they lampooned, constituting an early strain of internet humor (“Anti-Barney humor” even has its own Wikipedia page). With the release of Barney’s first motion picture, “Barney’s Great Adventure,” a Times review of the film referred to the character as “the great purple scourge” who offers “benignly lobotomized entertainment” while another piece offered haters a list of websites where they could digitally punch, slap and otherwise work out their negative feelings toward Barney.
A new version of Barney is set to debut next year with an animated show and product line.
We appreciate that you took the time to read Today’s Headlines! Comments or ideas? Feel free to drop us a note at [email protected].
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