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Supervisor Hahn Honors Local Cambodian Leaders & Commemorates 50th Anniversary of Cambodian Genocide

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Supervisor Hahn Honors Local Cambodian Leaders & Commemorates 50th Anniversary of Cambodian Genocide

LOS ANGELES—On March 25, Supervisor Janice Hahn will honor 22 local Cambodian community organizations in celebration of Cambodian Heritage Month and in recognition of the 50th anniversary of the beginning of the Cambodian genocide committed by the Khmer Rouge in 1975. Last week, the Board of Supervisors approved a motion by Supervisor Hahn declaring April Cambodian Heritage Month for the first time in county history.
Supervisor Hahn will present county scrolls to representatives from the organizations during a ceremony at Tuesday’s Board of Supervisors meeting.

Time: 9:30 a.m. meeting, 10 a.m. presentation, March 25
Cost: Free
Venue: Kenneth Hahn Hall of Administration, 500 W Temple St, Los Angeles

The following local Cambodian organizations will be recognized:
LA County Cambodian Employees Association
Cambodia Town Film Festival
Cambodian American Cultural Center
Cambodia Town
Angkor Arts Collective
Untied Cambodian Community
Asian World Film Festival Cambodia Day
Cambodian Association of America
Cambodian Health Professionals Association of America (CHPAA)
Khmer Parent Association
Long Beach – Phnom Penh Sister Cities Association
Chanchaya Khmer Cultural Heritage
Pacific Asian Counseling Services
Killing Field Memorial
Families in Good Health
United Khmer ChaiYam
Cambodian Veterans Inc
Khmer Culture & Fine Arts of California, USA
Global Refugee Awareness Healing Group
Modern Apsara Dance Company
Khmer Girls in Action
Khmer Krom Association of Southern California

Wage Theft Amidst Ongoing Strike, Long Beach Convention Center Faces Backlash

Terelle Jerricks
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Wage Theft Amidst Ongoing Strike, Long Beach Convention Center Faces Backlash

By Daniel Rivera, Labor Reporter

On March 18, workers from the Long Beach Convention Center rallied at Long Beach City Hall in solidarity amidst to ongoing strike at the convention center and with workers from 1Fifty1 after a report by the Los Angeles Times alleging that the company stole wages and unjustly marked up its services.

“We are here today because of the city-owned Convention Center, after a report of wage theft from labor supplied by ASM Global,” Soledad Garcia, Organizing Director said during the rally in front of city hall.

Reportedly, 1Fifty1 paid its employees in envelopes potentially skirting various income tax laws and not providing paystubs to its employees with a clear statement on what was withheld.

“We want them to ensure that ASM Global hires the affected agency workers, guarantee that all affected workers are made whole for any labor violations they have experienced,” Maria Hernandez, Communications person for UniteHereLocal 11 told Random Lengths News.

ASM moved to terminate the contract with the iFiftyi immediately and members of the union now call for ASM to hire those workers. Those workers are allegedly entitled to preferential hiring under a Long Beach.

They reportedly charged ASM Global more than other contracts for its services, allegedly paying its workers $17-$19 an hour while charging ASM Global about $26 – $30 an hour, a 60% markup paid by the city.

“For seven months, Local 11 members have been negotiating with ASM Global for all a fair contract that ensures that all employees, including subcontracted workers, earn a living wage and are created firmly at the convention center,” Garcia said during the rally amidst the ongoing labor dispute between the union and ASM Global.

The Union that represents these workers, UnitehereLocal 11 has been in contract negotiations with ASM Global since September of last year amid tension on the inclusion of subcontracted workers who have been left out of the deal during a city council decision earlier that year.

“We oppose the city’s efforts to remove protection for sub-contracted workers from the existing living wage ordinance. We know about the work they carry out… the allegations we’ve heard about 151 reportedly paying their workers in cash envelopes without paystubs is damning, we are calling on the city to investigate,” Andrea Romero, a cook for 11 years at the Long Beach convention center said during the rally.

The living wage ordinance is called Measure RW, which was passed last year and was meant to raise the wages of various hospitality workers across Long Beach for hotels with over 100 rooms.

The measure later on expanded to include airport and convention workers however the city council decided to exclude them from that expansion. Measure RW raised the wages to about $17 an hour which was potentially violated by 1Fifty1, and the ordinance also mandated an escalator for wages to about $29 an hour by 2028, the year Los Angeles will host the Olympics.

The city council heard an impact report during that meeting that stated the potential loss of investment and booking that would lead to the center’s inability to meet those rising operating costs.

Subcontracted workers have hourly limits set at 960 annually, about 18 hours a week. ASM Global and the convention center have cited operating costs as the leading reason for these cuts.

The convention center reported income over pre-pandemic levels in December 2024, generating $2 billion in revenue and about $200 million more than in 2018 before the COVID pandemic. However, workers have reported understaffing that has yet to recover to pre-pandemic levels.

Long Beach Convention Center has not immediately responded to requests.

LA #1 In Air Pollution Again

Paul Rosenberg
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LA #1 In Air Pollution Again

Global Report Finds Africa and South Asia Far Worse, But In U.S., LA Stands Alone

Los Angeles is the most polluted major city in the U.S., according to a new report from IQAir, which measures PM2.5 — fine particulate matter — from over 40,000 monitoring stations across 8,954 locations in 138 countries, territories and regions worldwide. And our regional air basin accounts for almost half the 100 most polluted cities in the U.S. The ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach are the largest stationary sources of pollution in the region, and the transportation routes emanating from them are the primary mobile sources, reaching well into the Inland Empire.

The World Health Organization PM2.5 guideline of 5 micrograms per cubic meter (μg/m3) as an annual average was only met by 17% of global cities, while 126 (91.3%) out of 138 countries and regions exceeded it. It’s a stark reminder that the climate crisis isn’t the only threat to human life from the fossil fuel industry, which falls primarily on the global South.
Yet, this is actually a significant improvement from 9% of cities meeting the guideline in IQAir’s report last year. Regionally, 56.9% of cities in Oceania (Australia, New Zealand, and French Polynesia) met the guideline — setting an example of what is possible. In North America, second best, it was 29.3%. It was 8.0% in Europe, and 7.8% in Latin America and the Caribbean, but was 0-1% in the rest of the world’s regions — all of Africa and Asia.
“IQAir has provided a real contribution by publishing this integrated worldwide perspective on particle burdens – which is a critical marker for environmental and public health,” said Ed Avol, professor emeritus at USC School of Medicine. “One of the most significant accomplishments of the report is to draw attention to continuing and widening exposure disparities in various regions of the world,” he added. “The data reflect not only the disparities that exist between nations and continents but also the potential for real improvement (as seen among those countries that have enforced emissions reduction efforts).”

Although it’s only one component of air pollution, PM2.5 had a dominant health impact. As the report notes, “In 2021 alone, 8.1 million total deaths were attributable to air pollution, with 58% of those deaths caused by ambient PM2.5 air pollution.”

LA averaged 10.1 (more than twice the guideline) compared to 8.8 to 7.7 for the next nine major cities, four of which were in Texas. In addition, all five of the most polluted cities in North America were in the South Coast air basin, topped by Ontario at 14.3, although an expert cautioned Random Lengths the data could be skewed due to monitoring locations. Of the 100 most polluted municipalities in the U.S., 60 were in California, and 45 were in the regional air basin: 33 in LA County, 5 in San Bernardino, 4 in Orange and 3 in Riverside. This contrasts sharply with the fact that 43% of the 863 locales in California met the standard, including cities like San Francisco, Oakland, Alameda and San Jose.

This is consistent with previous findings from the South Coast Air Quality Management District. “Local air regulators tell us that, on average, more than 1,000 people in the Los Angeles region will die prematurely each year between 2025 and 2037 because of exposure to PM2.5 that exceeds federal standards,” former AQMD Boardmember Joe Lyou told Random Lengths. He directed attention to a 2022 chart projecting 1,168 annual deaths from PM2.5 along with 341 due to ozone.

There was no breakdown for LA city neighborhoods, but Compton (11.9), West Rancho Dominguez (11.9), Gardena (11.8), Carson (11.2) and Signal Hill (10.6) were all in the top 100. Long Beach (9.8) was slightly lower, while Manhattan Beach, Rolling Hills and Palos Verdes Peninsula all registered 7.7.

As the report explains, the data from individual monitoring locations is “organized into ‘settlements,’ indicating cities, towns, villages, counties, or municipalities, reflecting local population distributions and administrative divisions,” but the report itself refers to all settlements as cities. IQAir sells low-cost air quality monitors to non-governmental organizations, or NGOs, and has an initiative, Schools4Earth, that seeks to provide over 1 million schools with air quality monitors. Children are especially vulnerable to pollution’s health impacts due to their higher respiratory and metabolic rate, and monitors located in schools generally capture the conditions for entire populations. This could lead to long term health complications like asthma or cancer. But presently, IQAir estimates only 21% of the global population has such monitoring. Consequently, country and regional totals are calculated as population-weighted averages based on city-level data. And here the global picture is striking.

The Global Picture
Chad (91.8) is the world’s most polluted country, “influenced by the Bodélé Depression, one of the largest global sources of atmospheric dust,” in contrast to fossil fuel pollution’s dominant role worldwide. The Indian subcontinent — India (50.6), Pakistan (73.7), and Bangladesh (78.0) is the most polluted geographical sub-region, with three of the five most polluted countries, while nearby Tajikistan (46.3) ranks #6 and adjacent Nepal (42.8) ranks #7.
The other top-five country, D.R. Congo (58.3), is part of another highly-polluted regional cluster, along with Uganda (41.0), Rwanda (40.8) and Burundi (40.3), which ranks 8-10.
On the city level, Karaganda, Kazakhstan (104.8) ranks #3 and N’Djamena, Chad (91.8) ranks #8, and Hotan, China (84.5) ranks #17. Aside from them, all of the 40 most-polluted cities are either in India (27), Pakistan (8) or Bangladesh (2). More broadly, India has 74 of the 100 most-polluted cities.

The wider Central and South Asia region “continues to experience some of the worst air pollution in the world” as “Nearly one-third of cities recorded annual PM2.5 concentrations exceeding ten times the WHO guideline, posing a severe health risk to millions.” The region’s urban centers are relatively well-monitored, however, “many areas in India remain under-monitored, particularly in smaller cities and rural regions.”

In contrast, “Africa’s air quality in 2024 remains a major public health crisis,” exacerbated by “rapid urbanization, population growth, and limited air quality monitoring.” Specifically, “With just 400 monitoring stations — only 0.6% of the global total — significant data gaps persist, most notably in Lagos, Africa’s second most populous city, which was absent from the report due to insufficient data.” Monitoring is expanding, but there’s a long way to go. “The number of reporting cities grew from 79 in 2023 to 106 in 2024, yet only 24 of Africa’s 54 countries had cities that met data inclusion requirements.” And more monitoring reveals even more pollution: Kinshasa, Africa’s most populous city, was the second most polluted at 58.2 μg/m³, “a 40% increase from the previous year, partly due to expanded data availability.”

“As with any effort, there are some technical issues of potential concern worth exploring; these include distribution of instrumentation, deployment and specific criteria for instrument installation, maintenance, proportional weighting, and/or corrections for integration of regulatory monitoring data with the larger set of low-cost citizen-operated units,” Avol said.

“However, the summary visualizations and tabular rankings will hopefully motivate interest and discussion, which sets the stage for future improvements in understanding and emissions reduction … and for that, IQ Air has provided a substantial public service.”

Letters to the Editor: Journalism & Activism, Economic Chains, Tariffs, Education, Dystopia, Treason, a Love Letter and Humanity

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Letters to the Editor: Journalism & Activism, Economic Chains, Tariffs, Education, Dystopia, Treason, a Love Letter and Humanity

“To announce that there must be no criticism of the president, or that we are to stand by the president, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile but is morally treasonable to the American public.” — President Theodore Roosevelt

 

The Journalist-Activist Who Helped Save Terminal Island’s History

I don’t know what comes first, activist/journalist or journalist /activist, but in either case, RLn community news reporter, Emma Rault, is both. I want to credit and thank her for her role in getting the buildings on Terminal Island designated as historical landmarks for the City of Los Angeles.

She sounded the alarm of the possible razing of those historic buildings that were the last remaining remnants of the once-thriving Japanese-American community on the Island (everyone should know that the Japanese community, mostly American citizens were forced off the Island immediately after Japan bombed Perl Harbor in Hawaii).

With the leadership of Terry Hara, Terminal Islanders Association President, project leader Paul Boyea, and VP Donna Contrell, they were able to team up with Los Angeles City Councilman Tim McOsker and get this important designation. It should be also noted that the LAPort leadership has been open and supportive of this effort of historical preservation and will be a valued critical partner in the steps forward.

I can testify to all of this because I was engaged as an advisor to this effort because of being a descendant of Terminal Islanders, my grandmother was a Japanese language school teacher, my grandfather owned and ran the only gas station in “Fish Harbor” ( what the Japanese community was called in East San Pedro) and my father, born in San Pedro Hospital, grew up there. By the way, both my older brother and I were born in that hospital.

As stated in Emma’s March Rln article, titled, “From Tuna Street to Walker’s Cafe,” we cannot let “Demolition by neglect be an existential threat to our legacy and our histories. Once again, thank you, Emma.

Last note, I don’t know what comes first… Random Lengths News is a newspaper/activist or activist/newspaper… conclusion; BOTH!

Warren Furutani

Gardena

Financial Slaves

It’s truly sad and ironic. Just about two months ago America was recognized as an “Economy” that was the “envy” of the world.” Now, our convicted criminal and traitor to our allies of a president, supported by a devious, disloyal billionaire co-president, Elon Musk, and a coterie of trifling Republicans have placed our country (America) and its citizens on track for a financial disaster, based on these facts below:

  1. 1. Illegally and unlawfully cut thousands of government employees’ jobs. Under Article 1 Section 8, Clause 18 (only Congress can have the power to create and remove federal agencies). Yet, these cuts and other unlawful actions are DESIGNED to devastate our economy.
  2. 2. Dangerous Tariffs, cutting vital benefit programs such as Social Security and Health Care. This further pushes us into a recessionary situation.
  3. And 3. A so-called crypto reserve is a speculation currency without a collateral value. This “Inflationary Scheme” will lead to finally add the financial collapse of our country.

To prevent us from becoming Financial Slaves, “Our Voices and the Courts’ Rules of Law” is our last resort for American Democracy!

Robert Lesley

Carson

 

Who Actually Pays for Tariffs?

There seem to be two belief systems on who pays tariffs. One is accurate and one is inaccurate. Under both belief systems, Americans pay the increased tariffs.

Reality:

Tariffs on goods imported from other countries into the U.S. are taxes paid by the U.S.-based importer directly to the U.S. Treasury. Such taxes are usually passed on to U.S. consumers by increased prices. They are not paid by the exporter country.

There is a paper trail of documents and wire transfers showing that the U.S. importer makes the tariff payments to the U.S. Treasury.

If the exporting country paid our tariffs, there would be documents showing payments from other countries directly to the U.S. Treasury. Those types of documents have never been produced to the public because they don’t exist.

Alternate Reality:

Tariffs on goods imported into the U.S. are paid by the exporting country. If that is true, it follows that the opposite is true too. That means that when the U.S. exports its goods to other countries, the U.S. Treasury pays the tariffs that the exporter country levies on our goods. So, either way you believe, the bottom line is Americans pay increased taxes because of increased tariffs.

John Henrichs

San Pedro, CA

 

Dismissal from Dodson Gifted Magnet

I am Raymond Moser and have been teaching history at Dodson Gifted/High Achieving Magnet for a quarter century. My class has always been a rite of passage for students at Dodson Magnet that prepared them for their future education, not high school, but college. I always considered Dodson a Prep school for urban youth who cannot afford private school. However, the Los Angeles School Board will be voting on my dismissal in the near future. The reason is very simple: John Vladovic was corruptly installed as the principal at Dodson and proceeded to proudly undo everything that had made Dodson great. I spoke out against his actions and so the persecution began. The UTLA-LAUSD Collective Bargaining Agreement is the contractual equivalent of the North Korean justice system. If you are accused, you are guilty. No matter how badly an administrator violates the contract, LAUSD is both defendant and judge, convenient for covering their abuse of teachers. I now have eleven Conference Memos and six suspensions totaling 76 days, with dismissal on the horizon. In order to accomplish this, Dodson administrators have had to: 1) lie; 2) knowingly abet students lying; 3) pull students out of class and encourage them to bad-mouth teachers; 4) violate the contract; and, 5) violate California State law by including illegally obtained recordings of me in my classroom. Not only was this a violation of the law, but they included the recordings in a record of events that happened seven years after the recording. These are the desperate measures that LAUSD will take against a teacher who speaks the truth. LAUSD has lost its way, for they choose administrators based on loyalty, not competence; and teachers based on compliance not talent, focus on testing not teaching, and ego not education. When I posted the district’s intention on Facebook, 50 of my students sent emails to the School Board protesting this action in six days. These included students from as far back as 2001, including a comedy writer in Hollywood, a former fighter pilot and professor at the Air Force Academy, and a novelist and writer for Entertainment Weekly. Teachers are concerned about students’ education, while administrators are only concerned about the appearance of education. Most teachers do not have either the stomach or the financial means to fight this abuse or their dismissal; I have both.

Raymond R Moser

Harbor City

 

What a sad, dystopian address

If anyone was hanging on by a thread of hope, it’s clear that Donald Trump does not accept the pain and struggle millions are facing across the country. His 3 R’s – retribution, rejection, and a complete detachment from our reality – are exacerbating the lives of Americans and others around the world.

For one, Trump is incapable of speaking without spewing hatred and dehumanizing entire groups of people, particularly the LGBTQ+ community and legal immigrants. All he wants to do is quickly cast blame and sow division rather than protect all our communities as his job demands.

He rejects every analysis that shows tariffs are bad. He rejects the history of tariffs having caused and worsened recessions. And he rejects his own past advice from the market crash he caused:

And much like Elon, he’s lost touch with reality. Just think of his claim, “the days of rule by unelected bureaucrats are over.” He’s the president. Declaring everything that’s good is his doing, and everything bad is somebody else’s fault.

And who has he made the scapegoats? The nurses who care for our veterans. The workers who keep our public parks clean and safe. The monitors who alert us of oncoming storms and natural disasters so we can prepare, potentially saving communities millions of dollars. The investigators who protect us from fraud. The family farms who feed our children.

Donald Trump has claimed he has a mandate to deliver real results that improve lives. None of this is it. None of this is okay, and we need to push back now.

While many elected officials stay on the sidelines, I’m fired up and ready to fight back against Donald Trump’s chaos. I’m on the ground in our communities right now. And as your governor, I will provide a firewall for California against extreme attacks on our state and provide a roadmap that the rest of the country can follow.

Betty Yee,

former CA Secretary of State

 

Musk accused me of treason

It’s a Thursday. The sun rose this morning and will set later today. And Elon Musk accused me of treason. The more I hold him accountable for his flagrant conflicts of interest, the more he lashes out.

It won’t stop me.

Elon took to social media earlier this week to share right-wing lies about my leadership of Trump’s first impeachment, over, that’s right, Trump’s effort to shakedown President Zelenskyy of Ukraine.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

But it’s not my leadership of Trump’s impeachment that has Elon seething. It’s my exposure of his massive conflicts of interest, and his potential violations of the law against self-dealing.

You see, I demanded information from the head of the Office of Government Ethics as to whether Elon was violating 18 U.S.C. Section 208, which makes it a crime to participate in government decisions affecting your own business interests, something Elon seems to be doing every day.

But before I could get an answer, the head of that office was fired. Along with the firing of Inspector Generals, this action was designed to facilitate the grift that is going on in the Trump Administration.

Nevertheless, I couldn’t help but be struck by the irony: accused of treason just days after Donald Trump withdrew all military aid for our ally, Ukraine, to bow down to Vladimir Putin and Russia. I told Elon that if he was looking for someone betraying our country and its national security interests, he needn’t look very far.

Now, these attacks aren’t new. I’ve had a target on my back for years, James Preston.

What is new is the authority that Elon Musk, Donald Trump, and countless right-wing officials have to weaponize the government against me and others.

Trump has given Musk unfettered access to millions of Americans’ data. Kash Patel is in charge of the FBI and can investigate whomever he wants. Pam Bondi can order the Justice Department to seek vengeance against any and all of Trump’s rivals – including me. We have already seen the Justice Department threaten Democratic officials for speaking out.

And we need to fight back.

We cannot let Elon’s lies go unanswered. And we certainly cannot turn our backs on Ukraine and our fellow democracies around the world.

It’s unfortunate that Elon and Trump are spending their time seeking revenge on their rivals instead of making a difference and lowering costs.

While I respond to their attacks, I’m also delivering relief for Californians. Your support helps me do both.

Thank you,

Adam Schiff, US Senator CA

 

Love Letter to LA

In my dream

I woke to tell the story

Still uncertain what it was:

A city, our city

However transient

By heritage or adoption

Lay open as a map before us

Sliced like an orange down the middle

Displaying its sections

Some of these had been destroyed

What to make of the fires of late?

Nobody seems to know.

Black market fashions

Hummocks of remaindered clothes

Shaped beneath the rain

Like massacred corpses

Drawing the empty lot

Partitioned by chain-link fence.

Our city, I say! uncertain how to write

The violence of elsewhere

Upon which we depend.

It first comes home

In vacant words

Then chapter and verse to follow

Postmarked letters stamped and sealed

Into the mud

You cared for me

To the missing one, I failed to engage:

Grant me the wisdom to know

That one is me.

Eric Kongshau

San Pedro

 

Humanity, Kindness and Honesty

In just over two months on December 8, 1980, John Lennon was murdered at age 40. No more Zeppelin, no more Beatles.

Then I thought, what a thing man – at the beginning of Sept ’80 Zeppelin were to tour and all four Beatles were still walking this earth, still a chance they may do something together. BAM! They’re gone and ronald raygun tramples all over our lives and half the country fell for it.

Just a little more than 10 years earlier, down goes Hendrix, down goes Morrison, down goes Joplin, then fucking Nixon tramples into our lives and half the people dug it.

Now we have half the country believing firing working people is a better idea than taxing the rich.

How did humanity, kindness and honesty become such a horrible threat to these people?

Garrick Rawlings

Marvista, CA

Blue Water Clay Cone 10 High Fire Glaze Workshop with John Britt

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Blue Water Clay Cone 10 High Fire Glaze Workshop with John Britt

 

Join a fun and informative workshop with glaze master John Britt. The workshop will be a general overview of ceramic glazes, focusing on cone 10 high-fire glazes. It is designed for beginner to intermediate potters but all levels of experience could surely benefit from the wide-ranging discussions.

Britt Wkshp 2025 1
Blue Water Clay Cone 10 High Fire Glaze Workshop with John Britt

The workshop will discuss cones, kilns, firing dynamics and principles as well as apply those principles to various firing cycles. This will lead to some basic classifications of glazes, like ash, celadon, temmoku, shino, etc. Attendees will learn how and why each type of glaze works and how you can achieve various effects in your studio. John will discuss how to maintain and how to adjust your glazes, how to find new ones, and introduce students to the many tools available on Glazy.org.

There will also be a discussion about glazes from John’s book: The Complete Guide to High-Fire Glazes: Glazing and Firing at Cone 10, which will delve into more detail than the book allows.

Students will mix and test glazes with raw materials from John’s recipes and apply them to three different clay bodies and analyze and compare results. Tiles will be fired to cone 10 in a reduction atmosphere in a Geil downdraft gas kiln. We recommend that you purchase John’s book: The Complete Guide to High-Fire- Glazes: Glazing and Firing at Cone 10, but it is not required.

Link to buy the book: https://tinyurl.com/Britt-pottery

See more about John Britt: https://johnbrittpottery.com

 

Payment and schedule information

Payment can be made using Zelle (preferred) or by credit card on the phone. Zelle

payments should be sent to bluewaterclay@gmail.com (receipts will show the recipient

as Jomon LLC). Registration requires payment in full and is non-refundable afterward.

Time: 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., April 4, 5 and 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., April 6 (Friday through Sunday)

Cost: $600, including firing and lab fee.

Details: To register, contact Blue Water Clay at 424-264-5364

Venue: Blue Water Clay, 801 S. Pacific Ave., San Pedro

From Espresso Shots to Paper Cups

Terelle Jerricks
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From Espresso Shots to Paper Cups

The Transformation of Parisian Coffee
By Lynn Nishimura

Coffee has made quite an impact over the past three decades: in coffee shops, cafes, and between colleagues at work. It is becoming more and more like a social hub, where people can sit and just order coffee, maybe with a pastry or dessert. In parallel to this coffee culture, there is also a current trend: a high demand for coffee to-go for Parisians who just want their morning coffee fix.

In the late 1990s, coffee culture in Paris was a far cry from what it is today. Starbucks had yet to leave its mark on the City of Lights, and the concept of street coffee was virtually nonexistent. If you wanted a cup, you had to order it at a brasserie or sit at a terrace cafe. The coffee itself was a strong, no-nonsense espresso, served in a tiny ceramic cup, with little room for dilution— unless requested.

Unlike the American diner-style experience, where large mugs are endlessly refilled, Parisian cafés adhered to a more deliberate approach: one cup, one serving, no refills. For those who found the standard espresso too intense, options existed—such as a “café allongé” or “café américain,” an espresso diluted with hot water at a 1:5 ratio. This offered a more familiar taste to those accustomed to American-style coffee.

When French tourists travel to the States, they even playfully call American Coffee ‘jus de chaussettes’ or ‘sock juice’ with a myth that Westerners (typically American) used their socks as a filter for their coffee.

At first glance, Paris seemed devoid of the fast-paced coffee culture already common elsewhere. Street coffee and to-go brews were simply not part of daily life. Coffee was meant to be savored slowly, preferably on a café terrace, watching the world pass by — a stark contrast to the convenience-driven coffee culture that would soon sweep across the globe.

It wasn’t until the early 2000s that Paris’ coffee scene began to evolve. Specialty coffee shops, independent roasters, and, eventually, international chains began making their way into the city. But back then, coffee wasn’t just a drink; it was a ritual, deeply embedded in the Parisian way of life.

In 2013, during one of my explorations around the city, I stumbled upon a small, unassuming coffee roaster that would spark a conversation about the evolving coffee culture. L’Arbre à Café stood as a testament to the city’s growing appreciation for quality coffee to-go. As I chatted with the roaster, one thing became clear: Paris still hadn’t fully embraced the concept of street coffee.

This was a time when grabbing a quick cup of coffee on the go hadn’t taken hold the way it had in cities like San Francisco. There, small coffee kiosks and stands were a common sight, with people lining up each morning for their artisanal brews and/or drip coffee before heading to work. In contrast, Paris remained anchored in its traditional café culture, where one either sat to enjoy their coffee or stood at the counter for a quick shot—at a lower price. You may find the most interesting coffee at the most unassuming establishments. Another coffee bar I can share with you is Les cafés San José, where you can find some of the best coffee in the city at the counter or to-go for 1€.

That’s not to say variety was lacking. Parisian brasseries offered an array of options: espresso (what you get when you order a cafe), café macchiato (double shot espresso with a dollop of steamed milk), and cappuccino (sometimes adorned with a heart). Yet, the culture of sipping coffee while walking through the streets remained a bit rare and is not typically Parisian.

Fast forward to 2025, and the coffee landscape has undergone a dramatic transformation, particularly in the wake of the pandemic. Once open, there were even lines outside Nespresso stores — Parisians were eager for their coffee, but now with a newfound appreciation for speed and portability.

What was once a niche culture of coffee-to-go has now become mainstream, even international, reshaping daily rituals across the city. Social distancing and stay-at-home orders accelerated the need for convenience, pushing even the most traditional Parisian coffee drinkers to embrace paper cups and biodegradable straws as a new normal.

It’s not uncommon to see Parisians today, briskly walking with tiny paper cups in hand, outside their office, sharing a quick caffeine fix with coworkers or friends — a stark departure from the slow-sipped espressos of the past. The rise of “ambis”— a term that blends ambitious coffee brands with hybrid spaces mixing coffee culture, co-working hubs, and creative venues — has also played a role in this shift. These spaces offer more than just coffee; they provide an experience, catering to the modern, on-the-go lifestyle. It’s where you can grab a cup, work for a while, or meet a friend, all in a thoughtfully designed setting.

While other cities had already embraced this transformation pre-pandemic, Paris initially resisted. However, post-pandemic, the city has found a balance between its cherished coffee traditions and the increasing demand for convenience. Coffee stands, kiosks, and artisanal roasters have flourished, providing high-quality brews to those who no longer have the luxury of time.

In 2025, coffee-to-go is no longer a novelty — though still not a staple as in other countries. Yet, in a city renowned for its reverence for tradition, a distinct rhythm persists. True Parisians still prefer to leave their coffee where it belongs: on a café table, facing the street, as they take a breath and savor the scene. Paris is still the pinnacle of new trends and experiences, and the coffee scene is still growing. Small brunch spots with hand-crafted coffee are what is on the up and up, often run by young, innovative individuals who want to share their passion with you!

Captain America: Brave New World Brings the Marvel Universe Back to San Pedro.

Reporters Desk
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Captain America: Brave New World Brings the Marvel Universe Back to San Pedro.

By Rosie Knight, Columnist

There’s a reason that I’m lucky enough to write a column here at Random Lengths centering on all the incredible movies and TV shows made in San Pedro and that’s because our lovely town has been at the heart of many Hollywood productions over the years.

While productions in Los Angeles are still getting back to their pre-COVID / pre-strike levels, San Pedro has been the home to a number of recent shoots including hit series like Abbot Elementary, NCIS Origins, and a new unnamed Nic Cage period piece. It was while taking a walk around Fort MacArthur to see if I could spot South Bay legend Cage for this very column, that I really got familiar with the barracks, which ended up inspiring this column after I watched the newest entry in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and immediately spotted the famed location.

It’s not the first time that San Pedro has hosted the world’s mightiest heroes, most recently and prominently in the third Ant-Man movie, Quantumania, where our very own 6th street in San Pedro was used to shoot the opening and closing sequences set in San Francisco. While those were comedic scenes starring Paul Rudd, quipping his way through the streets, Brave New World is more of a political thriller than a superhero film, centering on the failed assassination of the fictional president, which makes the use of Fort MacArthur even more fitting.

Standing in for Washington, VA, Fort MacArthur plays a vital role in the film acting as a secret military base that holds the dangerous and intelligent villain known as The Leader. Returning to his role in one of the first MCU movies The Incredible Hulk, character actor Tim Blake Nelson brings to life the numbers-obsessed supervillain who is trapped beneath our beloved Angel’s Gate Park. It’s Anthony Mackie’s hero Sam Wilson who is the beating heart of the story, aiming to save his good friend Isaiah Bradley (Carl Lumbly), the first Black man to take on the mantle of Captain America during the wartime efforts of America’s attempts to recreate the Super Soldier serum that brought Steve Rogers the original Captain America to life.

That secret Black history of Captain America was first revealed in the brilliant and heartbreaking comic, Truth: Red, White & Black by writer Robert Morales and artist Kyle Baker. Inspired by the brutal reality of the Tuskegee experiments, Truth asked us to think about the cost of scientific discovery and the harsh truths that are often behind American “success stories”.

In that way Captain America: Brave New World coming to San Pedro feels fitting, especially with Isaiah Bradley as a core part of the story, just like Captain America, San Pedro has a hidden history of brilliant Black people who are often written out of the story of our city. Something that our Managing Editor Terelle Jerricks has been uncovering with his fantastic series of stories on the Hidden History of Black San Pedro. So when you watch Disney’s latest blockbuster hit and spot San Pedro, let it inspire you to uncover our true history and all the often-forgotten people who played a part in building the city that we all love and live to this day.

Remy and the Chocolate Bean

Reporters Desk
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Remy and the Chocolate Bean

 

Not everyone loves chocolate, but those who do feel it deeply. My son Remy is one of those people. A skilled cook with the ability to think himself inside the dish he’s preparing, traveling between the food molecules and comprehending the forces at work. All cooking is an expression of love, but chocolate, more than most foods, confers the feeling of being loved. And for the last several years Remy has been researching the process by which chocolate is created from raw cacao beans. So when we arrived in Hawaii a few weeks ago, Remy was ready.

Within minutes of arriving at my friend Ken’s lushly planted property, Remy had an oblong yellow cacao pod gripped firmly in hand, freshly twisted from one of Ken’s trees. He carried that pod around as he took stock of the location of Ken’s other cacao trees, counting the ripe pods. Harvesting the rest of them was complicated by the fact that Remy was now working one-handed, as it never occurred to him to put down his original pod.

Long before he’d unpacked his suitcase, Remy had harvested roughly 20 more golden pods. Moving with the calm steadiness of an expert, despite never having touched cacao in his entire life, Remy opened the pods with a small machete and extracted the seeds, which are covered in a sweet white fruity pulp. He then asked Ken for a container in which to ferment the beans.

They decided on a sun tea maker, into which they placed the pulpy beans and left it in the sun. For the next few days we enjoyed the kombucha-like liquor that built up as the pulpy beans fermented in the sun. It was fruity, alcoholic and decidedly non-chocolatey, despite being pure cacao parts.

Although Ken has a grove of cacao trees, he doesn’t bother with the laborious chocolate making process with his small harvest. Instead, he has a hack to easily turn the beans into a tasty snack. He simply places the individual cacao seeds on dehydrator trays, pulp and all. He dries the beans to a crisp, and done. The pulp shrinks down and hardens into a sweet leather that encapsulates the seeds, adding just the right amount of sweetness to balance the bitterness of the cocoa bean, to my taste anyway. If I had cacao trees, I would probably opt for doing the same with my beans too.

But Remy was laser focused on the smooth, refined chocolate you find wrapped in bars, with zero interest in shortcuts or hacks. After several days of fermenting his beans, he then dried and roasted them on cookie sheets in the oven, carefully stewarding them into a rich, Oreo shade of brown. The transformation was impressive, as the beans developed a rich and deeply fulfilling chocolatey flavor that Ken’s dehydrated beans lacked. Taking not of this, I began my own research project.

As Remy had cleaned out Ken’s ripe cacao pods, I visited a nearby self-serve farm stand and grabbed a few, with which I made a batch of Ken-style seeds, but with a twist. Before dehydrating them I tossed the white pulpy seeds with sugar and vanilla, because nothing brings out the flavor of chocolate like those two. After dehydrating these seasoned cacao seeds I roasted them to add that rich, dark chocolatey flavor. At this point they were perfect. No further processing necessary. A sweet and vaguely fruity deeply chocolatey snack, as crunchy as a corn flake. I am munching on some of these as we speak, as I sip my coffee. A more pleasurable and potent combination of beans does not exist.

Meanwhile, Remy was ready to grind his beans, but there was no cacao grinder in the house. So he used Ken’s coffee grinder on his roasted fermented beans, shaking it like a maraca as it spun so as to prevent a paste from building up and sticking to the bottom, out of reach of the blades. It was a generous move by Ken to allow him to use the coffee grinder, which was never the same, to put it mildly. Before that heroic little machine overheated and died, Remy managed to incorporate cocoa butter, sugar and some powdered milk to his mixture, and grind it to a state of smoothness that was probably as silky as we were gonna get without a stone roller to slowly grind away at the beans for about 48 hours.

Our chocotourist proceeded to spoon his mixture from the broken down coffee grinder into a rubber mini ice cube tray, and put it in the fridge to harden. A few hours later we enjoyed some damn good chocolate.

If you want to try any of these diy chocolate methods, finding cacao pods online is significantly cheaper than a trip to Hawaii. But you don’t have to go anywhere near those lengths in order to get creative with chocolate. Allow me to introduce my own hack that was created out of necessity one evening when I found myself needing chocolate, but had only cocoa powder. I came up with a little recipe that is so simple and easy that I fear I might have to go into hiding after telling you this, so the Hershey hitmen don’t hunt me down and give me the kiss of death.

For the recipe, follow this link: https://arilevaux.com/remy-and-the-chocolate-bean/

The Dirt is Moving

Terelle Jerricks
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The Dirt is Moving

Carson Mayor Davis-Holmes’ State of the City Address to UnderscoreProgress Made In Developing 157 Acres

Days before Carson Mayor Lula Davis Holmes delivered the State of the City address, the mayor celebrated the groundbreaking for Envision Carson with the principals of the Faring/ Lennar partnership who are set to build a 1,115-unit development at the site of the Imperial Avalon mobile home park.

This is but only one of several developments set to come online. The city had been in talks with a few big box retailers to develop a store on the vacant lot across from the Porsche Experience. Costco had pulled out months ago after reaching an impasse with the developer of that property.

At the Feb. 15 community meeting on the Trump administration’s executive orders, planning commission president Diane Thomas noted that the city isn’t allowing litigation, referencing developer Cam-Carson, a joint venture between Macerich and Simon Property Group, to stop progress at the 157-acre project.

To get around this issue, the 157-acre project was broken into six parcels, two of those parcels were taken over by Faring and Lennar, separate from the Envision Carson project. Also, work has started on the construction of Leonardo Drive, a necessary step to begin building anything else on the 157-acre site.

But on Monday, the mayor didn’t duck the elephant in the room. Instead, she gave Faring a proverbial pat on the back for staying the course when the Imperial Avalon mobile home residents fought for their homes through demonstrations and protests at council meetings.

“In 2019, you and I were on a hit piece and saying we were trying to displace our mobile home park residents. They tried to take us out Jason,” the mayor said from the podium to Faring founder and CEO, Jason Illoulian.

She didn’t explain who “They,” were.

The mayor called up city council members to speak after her, starting with Councilman Jim Dear, who after reminding all in attendance of his longevity in Carson’s civic life and praising Faring for partnering with the city, said he wanted to bring, “a little touch of reality,” to the occasion, by noting that only three of the dozens of residents who chose the option that would allow them to return, will be doing so.

Random Lengths News attempted to follow up on the councilman’s comment with Illoulian after the photos of shoveling dirt were taken. He said he couldn’t recall the exact number. RLn also asked him about the status of the SLAPP motion Faring filed against Imperial Avalon’s Homeowners Association, which supported the residents in their fight to stay in their homes. He never responded.

SLAPP stands for strategic lawsuit against public participation. They’re intended to intimidate, censor, or silence critics by burdening them with costly and time-consuming litigation.

HOA president Jeff Steinman said by phone later that ultimately the SLAPP suit was dropped after all the residents had moved and the HOA agreed to not publicly disparage the company.

Dear said of Envision Carson, “It’ll be safe… it’ll be convenient … it’ll be somewhere where people can realize their individual family dreams,” he said.

Then he reminded attendees, saying, “As you know, I fought very hard for the residents of the mobile home park who were displaced,” referencing the three options the residents had to choose from.

“I think, Jason, only about three of them took Plan C,” Dear said. Then he followed with a backhanded compliment, “So that saved you a lot of money but it did show that you fulfilled your agreement.”

Dear concluded his remarks, noting that “if you have a dream that you’re willing to work for, you can’t just say, it’s the jewel of the South Bay, you have to make it happen.” Then he unintentionally deadpanned, “I think under the mayor’s leadership it will happen” to the giggles of some in attendance.

Hidden History of Black San Pedro

Reporters Desk
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Hidden History of Black San Pedro

 

Sam Flood: A Church Leader, Labor Advocate and Champion for Justice

This past January, Warren Chapel CME Church celebrated its 80th anniversary. Regardless of denomination, a church is formed when two or more believers come together in worship, teaching, and fellowship. While the church’s mission is to spread the gospel and make disciples, the church has had to speak on the material realities of its believers, which included confronting racism and racial discrimination in employment and housing. Mount Sinai Baptist Church was the first Black church in San Pedro to engage in this work, starting in 1924. The work was just getting started by the 1940s. And where Mt. Sinai had Rev. D. Robert Cofield, Warren Chapel had one of its founding trustees, Deacon Sam Flood.

Flood was a man of deep Christian convictions and a lifelong advocate for workers’ rights, racial equality, and community development. Born on June 6, 1897, in Kansas City, Missouri, Flood was the son of a preacher. Despite his religious upbringing, he chose to serve in the U.S. Navy during World War I, enlisting in Colorado. In the early 1930s, he moved to Shreveport, Louisiana, where he joined the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) and worked at a meat processing plant. By 1943, he relocated to San Pedro, California, finding employment as an electrician at Todd Shipyards and beginning a decades-long career in labor and community activism.

Flood played a crucial role in advocating for African American workers’ rights in an era when unions were largely unwelcoming to Black workers. He became vice president of Local 9 of the United Marine Shipbuilding Workers of America, serving in this capacity for 17 years. Beyond his work in labor unions, he was deeply involved in civic and service organizations, including the San Pedro Chamber of Commerce, the American Legion, the Veterans of Foreign Wars, The San Pedro Coordinating Committee, and the Mayor’s Advisory Council. He also served as chaplain of the World War I Barracks.

His faith guided his deep commitment to equality and justice. In a 1972 interview with the Daily Breeze, Flood stated:

“My Christian experience makes me have feelings for my brother, and I know no boundaries of mankind. Every man is a man with me, and I’m thankful for the knowledge to know that I can be like that. I feel that with all the critical times now, every man ought to learn to practice that type of attitude. I’ve always tried to do the things that I thought were right, and I try to put oil on troubled waters.”

Flood’s activism extended beyond labor rights. He was an advocate for affordable housing and fair housing policies in San Pedro. As a founding trustee of Warren Chapel CME Church, he understood the importance of addressing the material conditions of his community alongside spiritual guidance. He was instrumental in organizing residents of Banning Homes, a temporary workforce housing project, to secure permanent low-income housing when Banning Homes was slated for demolition. He opposed plans to transfer the site to the National Guard as a training ground, instead pushing for it to remain a resource for displaced families.

In the late 1960s, as the Beacon Street Redevelopment Project threatened to displace working-class residents, Flood partnered with Pastor Ulysses L. Butts of Warren Chapel CME Church, the Greater Peninsula Council of Churches, and the League of Latin American Citizens to form the nonprofit Verdes del Oriente. Their efforts led to the development of Verdes del Oriente Apartments (just above Rancho San Pedro public housing slated to be replaced in phases by the mixed-use development project, One San Pedro), colloquially known as the “White Bricks” and the Harbor Towers for seniors to provide affordable housing for those impacted by redevelopment.

Flood was known for his relentless dedication to people and his community. Even after retiring from the shipbuilding industry, he remained deeply involved in civic affairs. When asked why he continued working so tirelessly, he responded:

“To keep from becoming stagnant. You have to keep active. Besides, I’m just interested in people and like to do good wherever I can.”

Sam Flood and his wife, Regina, were Los Angeles Harbor Area residents for more than 30 years. Until his passing in 1973, he remained a steadfast advocate for justice, equity, and community welfare. His life’s work left an enduring impact on labor rights, civil rights, and affordable housing in San Pedro, cementing his legacy as a champion for the people ― a legacy seemingly forgotten in the 50 years since Flood’s death, evidence by this town and this city’s deficit in affordable housing.

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