Augusta Ada King, Countess of Lovelace was a visionary, a maths prodigy to the nth degree who, in the first half of the 19th century, glimpsed the future of computers and coding. She would be an attractive character even if she weren’t the daughter of Lord Byron, the celebrated Romantic poet. It’s no wonder Lauren Gunderson is not the first to write a play about her.
But Ada and the Engine doesn’t do her justice, running out of steam after the first act and making her life less interesting than it really was. Thankfully, good casting in the title role keeps what happens onstage emotionally engaging.
We meet Ada (Jenna Palermo French) on the eve of her formal entry into society. Her mother (Holly Jones) insists she get to work on landing a husband because that’s supposed to be the main occupation of young eligible women in 1830s England. But Ada’s is a life of the mind, so the chief highlight of her debut is meeting Charles Babbage (Brian Pirnat), an inventor/mathematician/theorist hard at work on a calculating machine. Ada is vastly excited by the idea — immediately grokking possibilities that most men with university educations (a path closed to women at the time) couldn’t hope to grasp — and Babbage eagerly accedes to a correspondence, starting a relationship that would be the most important of their lives.
Clunky as it can be, Act I sets all of this in motion satisfactorily enough. French makes for an excellent Ada, effusing the lambent mind and spirit that is evident in real-life Ada’s correspondence (upon which the Gunderson draws heavily and explicitly). And though Gunderson’s characterization of Babbage leaves something to be desired, Pirnat and French create the play’s most poignant moments with simple body language, embodying the connection of true soulmates.
But Act II gets stuck in the mud. Opening with an argument between the two that should seem a bit overwrought even to those who don’t know that it’s Gunderson’s invention (based on a disagreement hinted at in their epistles that lasted fewer than four days), the script never regains traction. Nearly half the act is basically an overlong dénouement followed by an overlong musical number that director Kelsey Weinstein would need to scale up for it to have any chance of working the way Gunderson intends. But with a droll, brief coda Weinstein does enable the audience to leave on a high note.
Although this production partly succeeds on a human level thanks to good acting and rapport, in telling the story of a pair of great minds who together weaved an image of the future, Ada and the Engine best serves as inspiration to delve into the historical facts.
Ada and the Engine at Long Beach Playhouse
Times:Fri–Sat 8:00 p.m., Sun 2:00 p.m. The show runs through July 5. Cost: $20 to $30 (plus $4 fee if ordering online) Details: (562) 494-1014; LBplayhouse.org Venue: Long Beach Playhouse, 5021 E. Anaheim St., Long Beach
On the Summer Solstice, San Pedro will shine brightly. Taking place in three creative quarters in town, three events will happpen between June 20 to 22, showcasing the town’s distinctive artistry — two of them brand new to the scene.
The Solstice celebrations kick off June 20 with Wunderkammer’s opening gala, presenting its World of Wonder Exposition. Then, on June 21, Collage, A Place for Art and Culture, will kick off Make Music Day, 2025, filling the streets with rhythm and energy. Lastly, Angels Gate Cultural Center will host its monthly Family Art workshop, a hands-on opportunity to create and connect.
World of Wonder Exposition
Wunderkammer, Memento Mori LA and Jose Palos Productions present:The World of Wonder Exposition. Witness the 20,000 sf Market nestled inside a historic Navy warehouse built in 1945 at The Port of Los Angeles, featuring over 100 unique vendors. Sideshow and Cirque performers are on stage and roaming the halls all weekend. Strange & unusual curiosities, antiquities, relics, vintage items, original art, jewelry, apparel & so much more.VIP ticket holders will be granted free access to return to the World of Wonder all weekend.
Time: 6 to 11 p.m. opening gala, June 20, and 11 a.m., markets, entertainment, June 21, 22.
Collage will celebrate the worldwide sonic celebration known as International Make Music Day with a full day of concerts, jam sessions, and other events. Collage is doing this as part of a festival that will bring music and song to several venues within a few blocks of its space. More information will be available soon – watch for more details.
CARSON — The City of Carson June 17 announced a new zero-tolerance policy on fireworks — including so-called “safe and sane” varieties — effective immediately under Ordinance 25-027. The policy designates Carson as a ‘Firework-Free Zone,’ reflecting the city’s commitment to preventing needless fires, injuries, and property damage that occur every year as a result of fireworks use.
“Fireworks cause thousands of preventable injuries and millions in property losses nationwide,” said Mayor Lula Davis-Holmes. “Carson is taking a stand and violators will receive a fine of up to $5,000. With the support of our Sheriff’s and Fire departments, we are saying ‘no more’—and we are backing up that commitment with focused enforcement and community rewards.
Key Elements of the Zero-Tolerance Policy include:
All Fireworks Prohibited – Sale, possession, and use of any fireworks, including “safe and sane” in Carson City limits are illegal, without exception.
Enforcement Collaboration – Carson is partnering with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department and Los Angeles County Fire Department to conduct joint patrols and targeted operations leading up to and on July 4th and other peak periods.
Community Reward Program – Residents who provide information that leads to a citation for illegal fireworks are eligible for a $250–$500 reward.
Reporting Hotline – Suspected fireworks activity should be reported to the Carson Sheriff’s Station at 310-830-1123. Calls may be kept confidential.
Why This Matters:
Preventable Fire Hazards – Fireworks are a leading cause of structure and brush fires in Southern California’s dry climate.
Public Safety – Emergency rooms treat thousands of serious burns, eye injuries, and limb traumas every year—many involving children.
Quality of Life – Loud explosions impact veterans suffering from PTSD, frighten pets, and disturb neighborhoods long before and after holiday, including July 4th.
Residents can play a key role in keeping Carson safe by choosing not to use fireworks and instead enjoying professional, permitted displays in neighboring communities. If residents witness illegal fireworks activity, they can report it by calling 310-830-1123 with location details, descriptions, or any available photo or video evidence.
Lastly, help spread the word — share the message on social media that Carson is now a Firework-Free Zone and encourage others to celebrate responsibly.
Details: Public safety, 310-952-1786, carsonca.gov
This is the first of a three-part series of townhall discussions, led by residents, for residents, among residents, on the insufficiently addressed urgent local issues of the day.
All city residents are invited to join Long Beach neighborhood association leaders in a series of discussions. It is time folks started getting back out of their Covid-era pattern of separateness and back involved in real, in-person, lively discussions of the issues that matter to all of us who make Long Beach neighborhoods our home.
This event is sponsored by longtime neighborhood advocacy group CARP (Citizens About Responsible Planning) and will include information tables for many neighborhood organizations. The program focuses on issues of uptown concern, particularly in the neighborhoods to the west and east of the airport:
The series begins this June 19
Issue #1: General Aviation impacts, to be discussed in conversation with SANeR (Small Aircraft Noise Reduction) Group founder Lisa Dunn.
Issue #2: The threat to homeowners posed by land use decisions like the five-story project slated for Wardlow Rd. & Cerritos Ave. , to be discussed in conversation with HOOD (Homeowners Oppose Oversize Development) founder Cindi Milrad.
The issue discussions will be followed by an open audience forum, with audience members afforded the opportunity to ask questions on the featured issues or speak out on whatever issue is of concern to them.
Future Community Conversations events are scheduled for Sept. 18 at McBride High School (Lecture Hall) and Nov. 19 at EXPO Arts Center. Topics for those events will be decided by audience vote at the June 19 event.
Time: 5:15 p.m.doors open, 6 p.m., program June 19
The huge decentralized turnout for No Kings Day has shown that grassroots power can be a major force against the momentum of the Trump regime. The protests were auspicious, with 5 million people participating in 2,100 gatherings nationwide. Activists are doing what the national Democratic Party leadership has failed to do – organize effectively and inspire mass action.
What we don’t need now is for newly activated people to catch a ride on plodding Democratic donkeys. The party’s top leadership and a large majority of its elected officials are just too conformist and traditional to creatively confront the magnitude of the unprecedented Trumpist threat to what remains of democracy in the United States.
Two key realities are contradictions that fully coexist in the real world: The Democratic Party, led by the likes of Sen. Chuck Schumer and Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, is in well-earned disrepute, having scant credibility even with most people who detest Trump. And yet, Democratic Party candidates will be the only way possible to end Republican control of Congress via midterm elections next year.
Few congressional Democrats have been able to articulate and fight for a truly progressive populist agenda – to directly challenge the pseudo-populism of MAGA Republicans. Instead, what implicitly comes across is a chorus of calls for a return to the incremental politics of the Biden era.
Awash in corporate cash and milquetoast rhetoric, most Democratic incumbents sound inauthentic while posturing as champions of the working class. For activists to simply cheer them on is hardly the best way to end GOP rule.
With top-ranking Democrats in Washington exuding mediocrity if not hackery, more and more progressive organizers are taking matters into their own creative hands, mindful that vocal reframing of public discourse can go a long way toward transforming public consciousness and the electoral terrain. The Occupy movement did it early in the 2010s. The Bernie Sanders presidential campaigns did it later in the decade. The Black Lives Matter movement did it several years ago.
In contrast, playing follow-the-leader by deferring to the party hierarchy is a trip on a political train to further disaster. The kind of leadership now exemplified by Schumer and Jeffries amounts to the kind of often-devious partisan maneuvering that dragged this country into its current abyss, after protracted mendacity claiming that President Biden was fit to run for re-election.
Today, realism tells us that the future will get worse before it might get better – and it can only get better if we reject fatalism and get on with organizing. Republicans are sure to maintain control over the federal government’s executive branch for another 43 months and to retain full control over Congress for the next year and a half. While lawsuits and the like are vital tools, people who anticipate that the court system will rescue democracy are mistaken.
The current siege against democracy by Trump forces will be prolonged, and a united front against them will be essential to mitigate the damage as much as possible. The need is to engage in day-to-day pushback against those forces, while doing methodical groundwork to oust Trump’s party from the congressional majority in 2026 and then the White House in 2028.
But the need for a united front against Trump should not blind us to the political character of aspiring politicians. Widely touted as the Democratic Party’s next presidential nominee, Gov. Gavin Newsom is a cautionary case in point. Outside of California, few are aware that he has repeatedly vetoed state legislation that would have helped domestic workers, farm workers, undocumented immigrants and striking workers.
Last weekend, under the breathless headline “Newsom Becomes a Fighter, and Democrats Beyond California Are Cheering,” The Hill senior political correspondent Amie Parnes wrote that he “is meeting the moment, Democrats say” – “he’s punching back, and he’s going on offense.” Newsom provided clarity when he said in a June 10 speech, “If some of us can be snatched off the streets without a warrant – based only on suspicion or skin color – then none of us are safe. Authoritarian regimes begin by targeting people who are least able to defend themselves, but they do not stop there.”
Yet touting Newsom as a working-class hero would be a tough sell. He signaled his elitist proclivities months ago when he sent prepaid phones to 100 heads of major corporations along with notes inviting them to use the speed-dial programming to reach him directly. “If you ever need anything, I’m a phone call away,” Newsom wrote to a tech firm CEO. No such solicitude has gone to advocates for the millions of Californians in desperate economic straits while he pushes to slash the state’s social safety net.
The Democratic Party will need a very different orientation to regain support from the millions of working-class voters whose non-voting or defection to Trump last fall put him back in the White House.
Progressive populist agendas – such as enhanced Medicare for all, increases in Social Security benefits, higher taxes on the wealthy, free public college tuition, and measures against price-gouging – appeal to big majorities of working people and retirees. But the Democratic Party is mostly run by people who want to remain on the neoliberal pathway that led to Trump’s electoral triumphs. The same approach still dominates in mass-media debates over how the party might revive itself.
In effect, the Democratic establishment keeps insisting that the way to get out of the current terrible situation is the same way that we got into it in the first place – with the party catering to corporate America while fueling wars with an ever-bigger military budget and refusing to really fight for people being crushed by modern capitalism.
But people can unite to lead so that leaders will follow, and justice can prevail. The imperative is to work together and make such possibilities come true.
By Jordan Freeman, Guest Columnist, Managing Editor Terelle Jerricks contributed to this story.
Depleted tear gas canisters and flashbang shrapnel littered the intersection of Alondra Boulevard and Hunsaker Avenue as a flaming palm tree dropped embers on the Home Depot landscaping. One of the rounds had landed in the tree’s crown.
Paramount residents, some on skateboards, came out with signs to protest the federal raid on day laborers gathering for work during the days leading up to June 7. They were intent on making their voices heard.
Police officers in riot gear gathered their numbers at the surrounding intersections, wielding live-fire weapons and weapons that fire less-than-lethal rounds.
A young woman asked a Home Depot security guard for a fire extinguisher. A teenager took a selfie in front of the line of riot cops. With my camera almost out of battery and the sun going down, I heard a familiar announcement from the police loudspeaker. “This has been declared an unlawful assembly.”
For me, it was time to go.
LAPD in riot gear after ordering the crowd (here, mostly credentials press and photographers) to disperse from the 101 Freeway in June 10. Photos by Jordan Freeman
I didn’t know it at the time, but I was witnessing the beginning of a sustained invasion of my city by the federal government. The National Guard would be called in the next day, over the objections of the California governor. Marines were next, equipped for battle with automatic rifles. They were ostensibly there to protect a wave of ICE raids on sewing shops, flea markets, taco stands and car washes. Instead, they are largely confined to closed federal buildings. The arrival of the Guards and Marines prompted a wave of protest, hundreds of arrests, and sparked a nationwide movement.
I arrived downtown just after 3 p.m. on Tuesday, June 10. Mass arrests were already underway, with a small crowd confined to the block in front of the federal detention center. Police in riot gear held a small crowd of peaceful protestors and journalists at the corner. After 15 minutes or so, I checked the KTLA live stream and saw that another group had walked onto the southbound 101 Freeway.
The Highway Patrol soon cleared the freeway, and the crowd marched out towards downtown. The crowd on the adjacent street had thinned to journalists taking a break, and onlookers who chose not to follow the march. The scene was as calm as it could be, with hundreds of armed police in riot gear. I had a snack and took a few clips of the officers who would soon have me in handcuffs. A line of riot police converged from each corner, pinning in everyone left in the area. It happened in a moment, with no loudspeaker announcement or opportunity to leave.
Accredited media were told to approach the line of cops on the north side and were let through. A few unaccredited journalists approached the line and were immediately and violently tackled to the ground.
The plastic cuffs cut into my wrists as I was loaded onto a bus, one of over a hundred people arrested that day. Two hours later, we were made to sit in folding chairs in the parking garage of a South Los Angeles police station. We were fingerprinted and photographed multiple times by multiple agencies. Seven hours after arriving, I was processed out and let out at the gate with a ticket for failure to disperse and a court date, under a banner which read, “The Tradition Continues.”
Each time a group was let go, in threes and fours, those remaining detainees cheered on. The group on my bus was as diverse as the city I’m proud to call home ― all united by our love for all of our fellow Angelenos. The atmosphere of resilience was tempered by the knowledge that the swelling wrists and discomfort we were experiencing were temporary for us, but were just the beginning of brutal confinement for so many others. In the last week, hundreds have been taken from their workplaces and sent to unknown confinement centers, ripped from their community, families, and homes.
A federal court has ruled that the National Guard’s deployment, over the objections of a state’s governor, is illegal, yet they remain in place while the decision is appealed. By the statute, my charge (409PC),failure to disperse, requires that a dispersal order be given, and people be allowed to leave, yet no order was given. People were simply surrounded and arrested, with no consideration for the law.
As we watch centuries of norms and well-established laws be trampled by our president, I have been inspired by Angelenos’ willingness to stand up in a largely nonviolent community resistance. The people of the city have set an example, rooted in American traditions of nonviolent resistance and civil rights. The city, however, seems to be taking cues from the lawlessness at the federal level, rounding up crowds without dispersal orders and arbitrarily firing tear gas and rubber bullets at protesters. When local police fail to respect the laws regarding Angelenos’ right to free speech and freedom of assembly, in protesting federal action, they risk becoming the ground troops of federal overreach.
In documenting the events of June 10, I did not break the law. I intend to plead not guilty. If anyone knows a good lawyer, please reach out.
The Zoom Out-As Things Fall Apart
But the experience has left many of us rethinking the role of law enforcement.
In April, Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent Alberto Carvalho called out the federal government for using schools as a stage for its undocumented immigrant raids, calling it tragic for Los Angeles schools and the broader community.
During that news conference and subsequent news conferences after, Carvalho did two things: He recounted his own story as an undocumented immigrant, in which he said, “I would be the biggest hypocrite in the world, regardless of my position today, if today, I did not fight for those who find themselves in the same predicament I faced over 40 years ago when I arrived in this country at the age of 17 as an undocumented immigrant.” Carvalho went on to say that education made him and saved him. He became a teacher, a principal and a superintendent, leading the nation’s largest district.
“Do not underestimate the power of the immigrant child, who may very well become an adult who does well and good by America,” he said.
The second thing he did was deploy school police to protect students and families from warrantless seizures, especially during high-profile events like graduations. This includes securing school grounds, facilitating safe entry/exit, and maintaining a strong stance against any ICE enforcement attempts, ensuring a threat-free environment for ceremonies.
Other local institutions have not had the wherewithal to put forth such a full-throated defense.
Earlier this month, a Torrance 9-year-old boy and his 50-year-old father were detained by ICE agents during a routine immigration check. They were taken to a detention center in Texas, causing major concern among local elementary school teachers and parents about the impact of the son’s sudden disappearance
Last month, following leaked guidance targeting the sponsors of unaccompanied minors, ICE expanded courthouse and office arrests in Southern California, leading to instances where minors lost custodial adult supervision during routine check-ins.
Frequently, citizens, residents actively engaged in their community’s civic life ask why their community’s law enforcement can’t protect them from federal agents conducting raids without proper judicial warrants. And what’s to stop federal authorities from seizing, detaining and imprisoning locally elected officials doing their jobs in their official capacity?
New York City Comptroller and mayoral candidate Brad Lander was escorting a family out of Immigration Court in lower Manhattan when he was arrested by ICE agents. For context,
Homeland Security has implemented a change in which the legal status of immigrants is stripped through a process called “dismissing their cases.” This sounds good, except that as soon as it happens, immigrants are expedited for removal. ICE agents meet them at the moment of dismissal for arrest and deportation.
Lander recounted watching a Yoruba-French speaking immigrant’s case, in which the judge, after ensuring the defendant understood through a French language translator, dismissed the immigration case. The freed defendant walked out of the courtroom and down the hallway before masked ICE agents waiting in the lobby grabbed him and renditioned him out of the United States. Landers had the protection of an NYPD detail. But protection is dubious in a city led by a mayor who agreed to cooperate with President Trump’s immigration priorities after meeting with Trump’s appointed “border czar,” following the dismissal of a corruption case filed against him by the Joe Biden-era Justice Department.
Just five days before, Sen. Alex Padilla was forcefully removed and handcuffed during a Los Angeles press conference featuring DHS Secretary Kristi Noem. He was attempting to question Noem about immigration raids, introduced himself, and was detained by Secret Service agents.
Patrisse Cullors, one of the founders of Black Lives Matter, and one of the primary intellectual architects of the modern abolitionist movement, in a recent Instagram post, noted that we were warned:
“When black folks were saying, ‘Defund the police… abolish ICE,’ this wasn’t hyperbole. We understood that when we kept law enforcement in power, when we kept ICE in power, when we kept sheriffs in power, it would lead to this … to this moment where we are witnessing the rise of fascism and authoritarianism. This is not a game. This is not hyperbole. If any moment there is to call for abolition, now is the moment,” she said.
If you haven’t been paying attention, the attacks are not just on undocumented immigrants or day laborers at Home Depot. The attacks are on all of us — journalists, students, elected officials, parents, workers. No one is safe from a system that operates without checks, transparency, or regard for the law.
Local police, sheriff’s deputies and National Guard units are instruments of the state designed to protect property, power, and order. Institutionally, they are not intended to protect citizens from government abuses, and too often, they enable it.
What we have — what we’ve always had — is each other. Our neighborhoods, our classrooms, our labor halls, our sidewalks and our streets are where the resistance lives.
This is not just about immigration. It’s about who we are as a people. And whether we’re willing to fight for each other while there’s still time to choose what kind of country this will be.
That was the question a sheriff in full uniform—badge, gun, and all—shouted at a sleeping couple in the early hours of 1958. At 2 A.M.? To quote the 1987 R&B group The System: “Don’t Disturb This Groove.” But disturb it, he did.
That couple, Richard and Mildred Loving—he white, she Black and Native American—were legally married. Yet their relationship was deemed criminal in their home state of Virginia. Theirs was a love story thrust into the national spotlight by the deeply unjust laws of the Jim Crow South.
Their story began with that late-night raid and grew into a historic legal battle that would change America. The Lovings had married in Washington, D.C., where interracial marriage was legal. But when they returned to Caroline County, Virginia, they were arrested for violating the state’s Racial Integrity Act of 1924.
Their sentence: one year in prison. The judge offered them a deal—leave Virginia and stay out for 25 years. They accepted, moving to D.C., forced into exile from their home.
But the Lovings didn’t give up. Mildred wrote to Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, who referred their case to the ACLU. Two young attorneys, Bernard S. Cohen and Philip J. Hirschkop, took up their cause.
On June 12, 1967, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled in Loving v. Virginia that laws banning interracial marriage were unconstitutional. Chief Justice Earl Warren declared that marriage is a fundamental right protected by the Fourteenth Amendment. The ruling invalidated bans in 16 states. It was not just a legal victory—it was a cultural milestone.
Now, every year on June 12, we observe Loving Day, honoring the courage of the Lovings and celebrating the progress their case inspired.
But here’s the thing: I didn’t even know about Loving Day until last year. That ongoing debate about whether Black history is being taught in schools? This is part of it. I never learned this story in elementary school, high school—or even college.
And I should have.
Now, in 2025, we’re still learning. Still unlearning. Still fighting.
Fast forward to today. In Southern California, the spirit of Loving Day lives on—not just on June 12, but throughout the entire month. The Multiracial Americans of Southern California (MASC), based in Los Angeles and Orange County, leads the charge.
“This is a movement,” says Thomas Lopez, MASC Treasurer and LA chapter board member.
“When I first joined MASC, I immediately felt a sense of home,” says Vice President Sonia Kang, who is of Black and Mexican descent. In college, she joined both the Black Student Union and a Latina organization—but neither space fully reflected her whole identity.
“It felt like I had to split myself,” she said. “MASC was what was missing.”
Kang describes her first MASC event as a transformative moment—finally, a space where she didn’t have to choose. “In the end, it’s about belonging and feeling included.”
Lopez, whose father was Mexican American, and mother was German/Polish American, has been involved in multiracial organizing for over 30 years.
“I was just looking for community,” he said. “I didn’t think I could fit in—until I found this.”
Nancy Brown, one of MASC’s co-founders, echoes that sentiment. A white woman with African American children, she recalls her daughter auditioning for commercials but being forced to check only one box under “ethnicity.”
“That always bothered me,” Brown said. “We raised our children to be both.”
This is why MASC’s mission is personal for so many—and why its work is critical in the years ahead, especially as we approach the 2030 U.S. Census.
All three MASC leaders pointed independently to the same issue: the way multiracial Americans are counted.
The upcoming 2030 census may include reforms that more accurately reflect the diversity of modern America. According to the Brennan Center for Justice, “Changes to questions about race and ethnicity will make the count more accurate, equitable, and legitimate.”
MASC is actively advocating with the Office of Management and Budget to ensure multiracial individuals are fully and fairly represented.
But before we look too far ahead, we must pause to reflect on what brought us here.
Richard and Mildred Loving are no longer with us. Richard died tragically in a car accident caused by a drunk driver. Mildred passed away in 2008, having helped reshape American history. In a rare interview, she told the Associated Press: “I never wanted to be a hero—I just wanted to be a bride.”
And she was.
A bride who changed the world.
So, this June, whether you attend a Loving Day event, join a MASC gathering, or simply share the Lovings’ story, remember what they stood for: love over hate, unity over division, and the courage of everyday people to stand up to injustice.
Because in the end, belonging shouldn’t be a battle.
LOS ANGELES — LA County Library is once again partnering with LA County Department of Parks and Recreation or LA County Parks to offer its Lunch at the Library program, providing free, healthy meals to youth ages 18 and under this summer. From June 16 to Aug. 8, participating library locations will offer lunches Monday through Friday from noon to 1 pm, depending on the site schedule.
No registration is required, and there are no income restrictions. Meals are available on a first come, first served basis and must be eaten at the library.
“This program continues to be a vital service for families in our communities,” said Skye Patrick, County Librarian at LA County Library. “We’re proud to once again provide a safe, welcoming space where children and teens can access nutritious meals, discover books, and stay engaged during the summer months.”
Local area lunch schedule locations:
Tuesday – Friday, 12 to 1 p.m.
Carson Library
Lomita Library
Important Notes: No lunch will be served on June 19 (Juneteenth) and July 4 (Independence Day), which are county holidays.
Long Beach Point in Time Count Shows Uptick in Homelessness
The City of Long Beach hosted a roundtable discussion to share the findings of the 2025 Homeless Point-in-Time or PIT count and discuss the city’s multi-departmental response to homelessness. During the discussion, the city announced that the 2025 PIT count, conducted in the early hours of Jan. 23, identified 3,595 people experiencing homelessness in Long Beach, a net increase of 219 compared to 2024. Over 76% of the increase is a result of the January 2025 Southern California wildfire displacements – among those surveyed, 167 people reported being displaced by the January 2025 Southern California wildfires, which were still active at the time. Homelessness increased by 6.5%, with 5% attributed to the fires and 1.5% due to other causes.
The city has released a comprehensive report detailing this year’s count, including key findings, demographics, a comprehensive look at the causes and underlying conditions of homelessness, and case studies of the youth and riverbed populations.
Long Beach to Celebrate Grand Reopening of MLK Jr. Park Pool
The City of Long Beach invites community members to the grand reopening celebration of the newly renovated Martin Luther King Jr. Park Pool, taking place June 23, 2025, at the park’s swimming facility. The event will feature remarks from Mayor Rex Richardson, Sixth District Councilwoman Dr. Suely Saro and other city leaders followed by a ceremonial ribbon cutting. Recreational swimming will be available after the event from 1 to 3 p.m. following scheduled swim lessons.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Rep. Nanette Barragán (CA-44), a member of the energy & commerce subcommittee on health, June 13 led 16 members of the California Congressional delegation in a letter urging Gov. Newsom and State Legislators to protect Medicaid, known in California as Medi-Cal, and in-home care in the 2025-26 state budget.
Gov. Newsom’s May budget revision proposes to cut access to Medi-Cal and in-home care through Medi-Cal’s In-Home Supportive Services or IHSS program. IHSS is a type of state and federally-funded home and community-based services that provides in-home assistance to eligible seniors and people with disabilities as an alternative to out-of-home care. This program allows Californians to remain safely and independently in their own homes and in the community.
“Medi-Cal and In-Home Supportive Services are essential to helping our most vulnerable community members, including seniors, adults and children with disabilities, and low-wage home care workers,” said Rep. Barragán. “Now, more than ever, it is critical that we preserve access to Medi-Cal. Investing in essential primary health care and social support services like Medi-Cal provides, helps lower costs by keeping Californians out of emergency rooms, preventing chronic diseases, and reducing institutionalization or homelessness. Our healthcare system should support Californians, not require them to stay in poverty.”
“Disability Rights California thanks Congresswoman Barragán for her longstanding commitment to ensuring access to Medi-Cal home and community-based services for disabled Californians,” said Andy Imparato, CEO, Disability Rights California. “It is critical to the health, safety, and wellbeing of thousands of Californians with disabilities that the proposals to cap IHSS provider hours and reinstate the Medi-Cal asset limit do not move forward.”
The letter also acknowledges that the State Legislature took meaningful steps to protect access to Medi-Cal and IHSS in the Legislature’s Version of the Budget.
In addition to Barragán, the letter is signed by Reps. Judy Chu (CA-28), Mark DeSaulnier (CA-10), Jared Huffman (CA-02), Ro Khanna (CA-17), Ted Lieu (CA-36), Zoe Lofgren (CA-18), Linda Sánchez (CA-38), Doris Matsui (CA-07), Dave Min (CA-47), Raul Ruiz (CA-25), Lateefah Simon (CA-12), Mark Takano (CA-39), Mike Thompson (CA-04), Norma Torres (CA-38), Juan Vargas (CA-35), and Maxine Waters (CA-44).
The letter is endorsed by Disability Rights California and Justice in Aging.
