Stream Southern California’s News Leader and Original Shows 24/7
LANCASTER, Calif. — One person is dead after two planes collided mid-air in Southern California Sunday, authorities confirmed.
The planes went down around 12:20 p.m. in the Lancaster, California area, according to the Los Angeles County Fire Department. One landed at 47th Street and Avenue F, the other at Avenue G and 60th Street.
One pilot was pronounced dead at the scene and the other reported no injuries.
It’s unclear what happened before the aircraft collided.
DEVELOPING: We will add more details to this report as they become available.
LANCASTER, Calif. — One person is dead after two planes collided mid-air in Southern California Sunday, authorities confirmed.
The planes went down around 12:20 p.m. in the Lancaster, California area, according to the Los Angeles County Fire Department. One landed at 47th Street and Avenue F, the other at Avenue G and 60th Street.
One pilot was pronounced dead at the scene and the other reported no injuries.
It’s unclear what happened before the aircraft collided.
DEVELOPING: We will add more details to this report as they become available.
Detroit has cars. Chicago has slaughterhouses. New Orleans has jazz. We have orange groves.
Had.
For a hundred years, the Bothwell family’s orange grove in Tarzana stood at about a hundred acres. Now only 14 acres remain, the last surviving commercial citrus grove in the San Fernando Valley, and two-thirds of those — let’s call it 10 acres — could soon be plowed under to build 21 high-end houses. They plan to call it “Oakdale Estates.” Not even “Orange Grove Estates” as a memento mori.
By the early 1970s, only 350 acres of commercial orange groves remained in the Valley. Thirty years ago, it had dwindled to about 40 acres. And now 14. My colleague Julia Wick once did the arithmetic and calculated that these 14 acres represent less than one-thousandth of what the Valley possessed at its peak.
Here’s the thing with California’s oranges: The California gold rush, smack in the middle of the 19th century, was an enormous splash in the placer pan. Hundreds of thousands of men inundated the state, and within a fistful of years, they had changed everything — the landscape, the economy, the politics, the fate of Native Americans and of Californios, and of the United States itself. Few of them got rich, but almost nothing thereafter dimmed that lustrous light coming from the Pacific coast.
Then there came the other gold rush — slower, more modest, but with a steady yield that literally could be plucked from trees: the California orange.
Newsletter
Get the latest from Patt Morrison
Los Angeles is a complex place. Luckily, there’s someone who can provide context, history and culture.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
The gold in the ground was already beginning to peter out when the orange fruit rose on the Pacific horizon — a gleaming, glowing citrus sun, a stand-in for the sun itself on fruit crate labels, tourist guides, postcards. It was more than food — it was the symbol of the California lush life, a divine talisman of an otherworldly place. And in this oversold earthly Eden, the fruit of pleasure and delight was the orange, not the humdrum apple.
Even into the 1950s, kids living in snowbound American climes might find an orange — one solitary, precious orange — sagging in the toe of their Christmas stocking.
The Southern California writer Carey McWilliams declared, rightly so, that the orange was the true California treasure, “the gold nugget of Southern California.”
The citrus tree and its fruit had become “the living symbol of richness, luxury and elegance … the aristocrat of the orchards.” And a citrus grower was no Midwestern sun-to-sun laboring farmer, but a member of “a unique type of rural-urban aristocracy.”
On a few backyard trees, and in scores of acres of groves, the orange filled the vast valleys of Southern California across a citrus belt that ran for miles. People often quote the acidulous writer H.L. Mencken, who was a dab hand at writing with great verve about how much he hated just about everything.
He visited Los Angeles in 1926 and declared that “the whole place stank of orange blossoms.” But he was being metaphorical, commenting on the swoony gossip of Hollywood stars’ supposed romances: “I heard more sweet love stories in three weeks than I had in New York in thirty years … the whole place stank of orange blossoms.”
Back then, orange blossoms were the de rigueur flower of wedding bouquets.
But Mencken was also literally right. This whole place was as fragrant as a million nuptials. Coming over the Cajon Pass in the right season — and maybe even over the Tejon Pass too — the scent rose up and enveloped you; far into the 20th century, locals and visitors still spoke wistfully of it.
There are two types of California oranges, and each has its own story.
The Valencia orange came here with the Spanish padres, the seeds planted in the San Gabriel mission garden around 1804. But these transplants were not always the sweet oranges we know, and sometimes their taste had a tinge of the bitter to them, and their rinds could be as tough as the leather vests on the conquering Spanish soldiers, the soldados de cuera.
It was a Yankee fur trader who crossed 3,000 miles of continent to settle here who perfected those mission oranges and made them make money. William Wolfskill was Kentucky-born, and as the snowballing of history and legend goes, he trekked with Daniel Boone, scouted the frontier with the brothers of Kit Carson, and certainly led pack trains on the Santa Fe Trail.
He was a Catholic and became at some point a Mexican citizen, which stood him in good stead, for in California, he was allowed to hunt furs, to hold land, and in time married a daughter of the illustrious Lugo family of Santa Barbara. As “Don Guillermo,” he presided over his properties from the Old Adobe, his homestead near the river.
1
2
3
1.An advertisement on a vintage postcard from Patt Morrison’s collection.2.What a steal! A vintage postcard from Patt Morrison’s collection depicts a typical scene, apparently, in the “Orange Belt” of Southern California.3.Orange groves used to dominate thousands of acres of land in Southern California.
But back in 1831, he found himself rather hard up in L.A., and took work as a shipbuilder and trapper. Ten years later he was a man of property.
Like his neighbor, the French winemaker Jean-Louis Vignes, Wolfskill planted vineyards along the Los Angeles River. He also grew pears, figs, quinces, lemons and apples — and oranges. His groves lay from Alameda Street to the river, more or less between 4th and 7th streets, near the present-day Arts District.
Wolfskill’s Valencia orange was coaxed into sweeter, sturdier qualities, and he and his son were soon shipping it eastward, and pdq, Americans cultivated a costly taste for the exotic harvests of faraway California.
But still — it had those annoying seeds.
And soon, it had competition.
The navel orange
Eliza Lovell Tibbets was a woman out of her time. She was a few years younger than Queen Victoria, and looked rather like her, in dress and bearing, and took to accentuating the resemblance.
But in virtually everything else, she was ferociously opposite — unorthodox, even radical. She was a revolutionary in a bombazine dress, a committed abolitionist, a social utopian and tireless suffragist who was divorced not once but twice, at a time when a divorced woman was kept as far from proper society as Pluto is from Earth. In a word, Queen Vick would not have received her.
She was also a spiritualist, like many in her circle, and conducted séances. This she did share with Queen Victoria, who held séances, yearning for a little chat with her beloved ectoplasmic late husband, the sainted Prince Albert.
Not long after the Civil War, Eliza and her third husband, Luther Tibbets, moved to a conquered city in Virginia. Luther too was an energetic abolitionist. By one account, he was run out of Tennessee for trying to stop the lynching of a Black man. As far as some Virginians were concerned, he was also an integrationist carpetbagger. The threatening letters he said he got from the KKK, referring to “shed blood” and “assassination,” he handed over to the American military peacekeepers.
It wouldn’t take much for people like the Tibbetses to decide “the hell with that,” and around 1870, they joined like-minded families and came west, to the place we know as Riverside, founded by the abolitionist John Wesley North.
From here on, the origin mythology of the astounding new orange is as serendipitous and chancy as the odds of human evolution happening again.
1
2
3
4
1.Men on tall ladders pick oranges on this vintage postcard from Patt Morrison’s collection.2.A 1924-postmarked postcard exaggerates the size, but not the importance, of California citrus.3.A vintage postcard, bearing a 1920s postmark, shows a “modern orange-packing house.”4.Men pack oranges into crates, depicted on a vintage postcard from Patt Morrison’s collection.
Far off, in the Brazilian Amazon, there grew a seedless orange of fabled sweetness. Travelers marveled at it, and word of it reached the desk of William Saunders, an acquaintance of the Tibbetses and the man in charge of horticultural experiments at the gardens of the newly created U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Saunders had, at President Lincoln’s request, designed the striking layout of Gettysburg national cemetery. Now, in his new post, he thought this orange “might be of value in this country,” he recalled, and wrote back to the correspondent in Brazil (supposedly a “lady missionary,” or perhaps a woman visiting her brother’s rubber plantation), asking for some plants.
A dozen or so arrived at Saunders’ office — at a propitious time, for Luther Tibbets had just written, asking for suggestions for a crop that would grow in Riverside’s climate.
Saunders had ordered the new arrivals grafted onto some trees in the government’s greenhouses, and now he packed off three of the new trees — or was it five, as some accounts say? — to Riverside. Bahia navels, he called them (for the little protrusion at the bottom, which suggests that the orange had an “outie,” not an “innie.”)
And here’s where the legend gets, yes, juicy.
The Tibbetses planted the little trees out in the front of the house — no, others say, it was the backyard. Eliza Tibbets tended them with care, or no, she just nonchalantly watered them with whatever was left sloshing around in her dishpan.
Let’s say there were three trees. One up and died. Another was chewed up, or trampled, or both, by a cow. But whatever Eliza’s husbandry, and however many trees survived, they took several years to bear fruit, and the first crop might have amounted to a massive 16 oranges.
But that was enough.
There’s a navel joke in there somewhere on this 1907-postmarked postcard from Patt Morrison’s collection.
People went crazy for these oranges. Because they’re seedless, you need buds to grow new trees, and soon so many people were trying to steal “just one” from the Tibbetses’ trees that they had to fence off their yard.
The miraculous orange was renamed the Washington navel orange. This was around the time of the nation’s centennial, and the vogue was for everything Washington, though it does sound a little disrespectful to put the godlike name of ”Washington” and a synonym for “belly-button” in the same phrase.
Eliza Tibbets ran a mail-order business for her buds — five cents each. In time they would go for $5 or $10 apiece. (Three of the Tibbetses’ neighbors happened to be horticulturists. They helped to coax the fledgling trees along and took buds themselves, and soon started up prosperous commercial navel orange groves of their own.)
Thus was the massive Southern California industry born. In time, no American breakfast was breakfast without a glass of orange juice. Riverside got rich. Navel orange groves spread for miles. They ornamented their present and gave a glimpse of a grimier future; the smoking smudge pots that burned in the groves on frosty winter nights to keep the trees from freezing created some of L.A.’s earliest smog.
The original tree, seen here on a postcard from Patt Morrison’s collection, is still there, in front of a home in Riverside.
The last surviving Tibbets tree, the “parent tree” of this billion-dollar business, stands in Riverside today, fenced, guarded and commemorated with a plaque noting it as a California historic landmark.
The tree fared better than the Tibbetses themselves. Eliza fled the scorch of Riverside for the Santa Barbara coast, where she died, in 1898. Luther, never the best of businessmen, lost money in typical SoCal fashion — over water rights.
In 1902, as California thought to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the blessing of the navel orange, as 8,000 railroad cars of oranges were sent to market each year, Luther Tibbets was living in a Riverside poorhouse. His house had been foreclosed on, and he was himself, as the New York Times described him, a “white-haired, tattered public charge.” He died a few months later.
Let’s accelerate to today, to the Tarzana grove. A 2022 deal announced by Councilmember Bob Blumenfield would preserve one-third of the Bothwell property under the aegis of the Mountains Preservation and Conservation Authority. A double lane of citrus trees would march along Oakdale Avenue’s west side.
As of a couple of years ago, in Anaheim — itself a regular money machine of citrus prosperity — two acres only remained of the Pressel family orchards, a place of historic import for the history of citrus and of labor. This survivor, too, was meant to serve as an open-air “tree museum.” In their heads, visitors could try to multiply this meager urban plot times more than 30,000, projecting onto the stucco-to-stucco landscape all of the acres of citrus trees that once spread their branches across Orange County.
In June of 1932, California declared the last surviving Tibbets orange tree to be a state historical landmark. The following year, the Depression-era screwball comedy “Bombshell” was released. Its blonde star, Jean Harlow, is playing a blonde star, Lola Burns, and in one scene, her butler hands her a glass of juice and she takes a sip.
Burns: “Hey! This isn’t orange juice.”
Butler: “No, miss, it’s … it’s sauerkraut juice.”
Burns: “Well, take it away. It’s like dipping your tongue in lox.”
Butler: “But, I’m sorry, miss, but there weren’t any oranges.”
Burns: “No oranges? This is California, man!”
Explaining L.A. With Patt Morrison
Los Angeles is a complex place. In this weekly feature, Patt Morrison is explaining how it works, its history and its culture.
A magnitude 3 earthquake occurred just north of Malibu Saturday afternoon, the latest in a cluster of temblors reported over the last week and a half.
The latest earthquake occurred at 2:15 p.m. Saturday, with an epicenter along Kanan Dume Road, about 3.6 miles north of Point Dume.
Saturday’s event was the sixth earthquake of magnitude 3 or higher since a magnitude 4.7 earthquake in the same area was widely felt across Southern California on Sept. 12.
Only “weak” shaking was felt in the area closest to Saturday’s epicenter, which included Zuma Beach and Point Dume State Beach in Malibu, as defined by the Modified Mercalli Intensity Scale, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. That intensity of shaking is so mild that many people don’t recognize it as an earthquake. If they do, the vibrations felt might be similar to the passing of a truck.
This has been an unusually active year for moderate earthquakes in Southern California. The Sept. 12 earthquake north of Malibu was part of the 14th seismic sequence this year in Southern California with at least one magnitude 4 or higher earthquake, seismologist Lucy Jones, a Caltech research associate, said earlier this month.
That broke a record for the last 65 years. Over that time period, Jones said, there were an average of eight to 10 independent sequences of earthquakes annually that included at least one temblor of magnitude 4 or greater.
In some years, there were just one or two of those earthquake sequences; the highest previous tally was 13 in 1988.
The observation is not necessarily an indication that a large, damaging earthquake is around the corner, scientists said.
Some researchers have offered dueling theories — some say earthquake activity increases in a region before a large earthquake, others say seismic activity decreases before a large jolt.
So the recent activity does not offer any hint of when the next large, destructive temblor will occur, said Susan Hough, a U.S. Geological Survey seismologist, earlier this month.
Are you ready for when the Big One hits? Get ready for the next big earthquake by signing up for our Unshaken newsletter, which breaks down emergency preparedness into bite-sized steps over six weeks. Learn more about earthquake kits, which apps you need, Lucy Jones’ most important advice and more at latimes.com/Unshaken.
Amid a record-breaking heat wave, firefighters in Southern California have struggled over the last week to contain three large wildfires that have scorched more than 100,000 acres.
The arson-sparked Line fire has chewed through 38,000 acres in the San Bernardino Mountains between Highland and Big Bear Lake, prompting the evacuation of several mountain communities. The Bridge fire consumed nearly 53,000 acres in the San Gabriel Mountains in Los Angeles and San Bernardino counties, destroying more than a dozen structures. And the Airport fire swept through 23,000 acres in Orange and Riverside counties.
The three blazes are still largely uncontrolled, but an incoming cold front and cloudy weather this weekend are expected to offer some reprieve, officials said Saturday. Much of Southern California saw temperatures ranging from the high 60s to mid-70s throughout the day.
Many parts of the region are expected to see a double-digit drop in temperatures, extensive cloud cover and a chance for light rain over the next few days, according to the National Weather Service. In one of the most drastic swings, downtown Los Angeles is forecast to see high temperatures in the low 70s, a nearly 40-degree drop from its high of 112 degrees Sept. 6. There is even a slight chance for light rain Wednesday and Thursday.
These milder conditions — along with increased humidity — are also expected to extend farther inland near the wildfires.
“As we’ve seen the last few days, there’s been a pretty good cooling trend from the excessive heat wave that we saw persist for almost a week,” National Weather Service meteorologist Bryan Lewis said. “This provides some really nice relief, especially after these fires have been going out of control.”
The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection credited high moisture levels with slowing the Line fire, which was 25% contained as of Saturday but continued to creep into dry vegetation while making occasional runs along slopes. Favorable wind conditions also helped keep the Bridge fire — the largest active wildfire in California — within its current footprint but it remained only 3% contained Saturday. The Airport fire was only 9% contained.
Patchy fog and drizzling rain could help firefighters in these hot spots as well.
“We’re calling it more of a drizzle to light rain,” Lewis said. “That’ll likely impact these lower elevation areas. It’ll help dampen the fuels and potentially help put out some of the smaller spot fires.”
Meanwhile, communities stretching from the San Gabriel Mountains to Lake Elsinore remain under a smoke advisory from the South Coast Air Quality Management District. The air district has encouraged residents to take precautions to protect themselves from dangerous levels of air pollution, including remaining indoors and keeping windows closed as wildfires have released large plumes of smoke and ash, which continue to hover over nearby communities.
Last week, several air monitors in the Inland Empire detected fine-particulate pollution levels above the federal health limits, including Riverside, Ontario and Fontana. An air monitor in Big Bear City recorded the highest level with a daily average of 372 parts per million, more than 10 times higher than the federal health standard.
The pollution has eased in many areas. However, communities in the San Gabriel and San Bernardino mountains were still experiencing unhealthy air quality, according to the air district.
Three major wildfires in Southern California expanded dramatically — burning homes, cars and horse stables in hillside communities and injuring at least a dozen people, officials said Wednesday.In the tight-knit community of Wrightwood, trees burned behind homes as authorities implored residents to evacuate the exploding Bridge Fire. Erin Arias, a 39-year-old teacher, said she was racing up the mountain when she got the sudden order to leave and did, grabbing her passport and dog while the fire roared. On Wednesday, she and her husband doused water on the roof of their still-standing home. Their cat is missing, she said.“It’s absolutely scary,” Arias said, looking at the burned embers of her neighbor’s home. “We’re really lucky.”The wildfires have been endangering tens of thousands of homes and other structures across the region after they sprung to life during a triple-digit heat wave that finally broke Wednesday. Other major fires were burning across the West, including in Idaho, Oregon and Nevada, where about 20,000 people had to flee a blaze outside Reno.California is only now heading into the teeth of the wildfire season but already has seen nearly three times as much acreage burn than during all of 2023. The White House said President Joe Biden was monitoring the wildfires in the West and urged residents to heed state and local evacuation orders.The extent of the damage was not immediately known as firefighters battled multiple fires simultaneously. The three blazes include:— The Airport Fire in Orange County that burned nearly 35 square miles (91 square kilometers), leaving in its wake charred cars and rubble and pushing into neighboring Riverside County. The fire was 0% contained Wednesday and reportedly sparked by heavy equipment operating in the area. Orange County Fire Capt. Steve Concialdi said eight firefighters were injured, mostly heat-related. One resident suffered smoke inhalation and another burns, he said.— The Line Fire in the San Bernardino National Forest that charred 54 square miles (140 square kilometers) and injured three firefighters. Authorities said it was caused by arson and arrested a man Tuesday.— The Bridge Fire east of Los Angeles that grew tenfold in a day, burning 75 square miles (194 square kilometers) and scorching homes in the community of Wrightwood. The cause of the fire was not immediately known. It was 0% contained Wednesday morning.At least five homes burned in Wrightwood and flames ripped through a popular ski area but the resort’s buildings appeared to remain intact, said Janice Quick, president of the community’s chamber of commerce. The fire was still burning, she said, cautioning “the winds have picked up a little bit and something can flip on a dime.”The fire has affected area ski resorts but it has not yet been safe to assess the damage, the U.S. Forest Service said in a statement.Evacuation orders in Southern California were expanded as the wildfires grew late Tuesday. Cooler temperatures were expected to potentially start tempering fire activity as the week progresses.In Riverside County, the Airport Fire reached El Cariso Village, a community of 250 people along Highway 74, late Tuesday while some residents scrambled to evacuate on the road clogged with fire trucks and firefighters, and the sky turned dark and began raining ash. An Associated Press photographer saw at least 10 homes and several cars engulfed in flames.In San Bernardino County, evacuation orders included parts of the popular ski town Big Bear. Some 65,600 homes and buildings were under threat by the Line Fire, nearly double the number from early Tuesday, and residents along the southern edge of Big Bear Lake, a popular destination for anglers, mountain bikers and hikers, were told to leave.The blaze blanketed the area with a thick cloud of dark smoke, which provided shade for firefighters trying to get ahead of winds expected later on Wednesday, said Fabian Herrera, a spokesperson for the Line Fire, which was 14% contained.The San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department announced Tuesday the arrest of a man from the town of Norco who was suspected of starting the Line Fire on Sept. 5 in Highland. He was charged with arson and was held in lieu of $80,000 bail. Officials did not specify what was used to start the fire.On the Nevada border with California near Reno, the Davis Fire destroyed one home and a dozen structures and charred more than 8 square miles (21 square km) of timber and brush along the Sierra Nevada’s eastern front. Truckee Meadows Fire District Chief Charles Moore said he ordered off-duty firefighters back to work Wednesday as the National Weather Service forecast winds could gust up to 40 mph (64 kph), creating “a particularly dangerous situation.”Jeremy Human, a U.S. Forest Service operations chief, said air tankers were trying to make some retardant drops before gusty winds likely forced the grounding of aircraft. Schools were closed in Washoe County and an evacuation center was moved farther from the flames.“We’re doing our best to be prepared for the anticipated winds, the very dramatic weather day … and potential for either new starts or rapid rates of spread should something escape containment lines,” Human said.See more coverage of top California stories here | Download our app | Subscribe to our morning newsletter
WRIGHTWOOD, Calif. —
Three major wildfires in Southern California expanded dramatically — burning homes, cars and horse stables in hillside communities and injuring at least a dozen people, officials said Wednesday.
In the tight-knit community of Wrightwood, trees burned behind homes as authorities implored residents to evacuate the exploding Bridge Fire. Erin Arias, a 39-year-old teacher, said she was racing up the mountain when she got the sudden order to leave and did, grabbing her passport and dog while the fire roared. On Wednesday, she and her husband doused water on the roof of their still-standing home. Their cat is missing, she said.
“It’s absolutely scary,” Arias said, looking at the burned embers of her neighbor’s home. “We’re really lucky.”
The wildfires have been endangering tens of thousands of homes and other structures across the region after they sprung to life during a triple-digit heat wave that finally broke Wednesday. Other major fires were burning across the West, including in Idaho, Oregon and Nevada, where about 20,000 people had to flee a blaze outside Reno.
California is only now heading into the teeth of the wildfire season but already has seen nearly three times as much acreage burn than during all of 2023. The White House said President Joe Biden was monitoring the wildfires in the West and urged residents to heed state and local evacuation orders.
The extent of the damage was not immediately known as firefighters battled multiple fires simultaneously. The three blazes include:
— The Airport Fire in Orange County that burned nearly 35 square miles (91 square kilometers), leaving in its wake charred cars and rubble and pushing into neighboring Riverside County. The fire was 0% contained Wednesday and reportedly sparked by heavy equipment operating in the area. Orange County Fire Capt. Steve Concialdi said eight firefighters were injured, mostly heat-related. One resident suffered smoke inhalation and another burns, he said.
— The Line Fire in the San Bernardino National Forest that charred 54 square miles (140 square kilometers) and injured three firefighters. Authorities said it was caused by arson and arrested a man Tuesday.
— The Bridge Fire east of Los Angeles that grew tenfold in a day, burning 75 square miles (194 square kilometers) and scorching homes in the community of Wrightwood. The cause of the fire was not immediately known. It was 0% contained Wednesday morning.
At least five homes burned in Wrightwood and flames ripped through a popular ski area but the resort’s buildings appeared to remain intact, said Janice Quick, president of the community’s chamber of commerce. The fire was still burning, she said, cautioning “the winds have picked up a little bit and something can flip on a dime.”
The fire has affected area ski resorts but it has not yet been safe to assess the damage, the U.S. Forest Service said in a statement.
Evacuation orders in Southern California were expanded as the wildfires grew late Tuesday. Cooler temperatures were expected to potentially start tempering fire activity as the week progresses.
In Riverside County, the Airport Fire reached El Cariso Village, a community of 250 people along Highway 74, late Tuesday while some residents scrambled to evacuate on the road clogged with fire trucks and firefighters, and the sky turned dark and began raining ash. An Associated Press photographer saw at least 10 homes and several cars engulfed in flames.
In San Bernardino County, evacuation orders included parts of the popular ski town Big Bear. Some 65,600 homes and buildings were under threat by the Line Fire, nearly double the number from early Tuesday, and residents along the southern edge of Big Bear Lake, a popular destination for anglers, mountain bikers and hikers, were told to leave.
The blaze blanketed the area with a thick cloud of dark smoke, which provided shade for firefighters trying to get ahead of winds expected later on Wednesday, said Fabian Herrera, a spokesperson for the Line Fire, which was 14% contained.
The San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department announced Tuesday the arrest of a man from the town of Norco who was suspected of starting the Line Fire on Sept. 5 in Highland. He was charged with arson and was held in lieu of $80,000 bail. Officials did not specify what was used to start the fire.
On the Nevada border with California near Reno, the Davis Fire destroyed one home and a dozen structures and charred more than 8 square miles (21 square km) of timber and brush along the Sierra Nevada’s eastern front. Truckee Meadows Fire District Chief Charles Moore said he ordered off-duty firefighters back to work Wednesday as the National Weather Service forecast winds could gust up to 40 mph (64 kph), creating “a particularly dangerous situation.”
Jeremy Human, a U.S. Forest Service operations chief, said air tankers were trying to make some retardant drops before gusty winds likely forced the grounding of aircraft. Schools were closed in Washoe County and an evacuation center was moved farther from the flames.
“We’re doing our best to be prepared for the anticipated winds, the very dramatic weather day … and potential for either new starts or rapid rates of spread should something escape containment lines,” Human said.
A pair of modest earthquakes rattled Southern California on Saturday morning, with epicenters in Ontario.
The earthquakes, of magnitudes 3.5 and 3.9, occurred within about a half hour of each other. Shaking was felt as far away as the city of Los Angeles, Orange County and northern San Diego County, according to crowdsourcing reports sent to the U.S. Geological Survey.
“Light” shaking, as defined by the Modified Mercalli Intensity scale, was felt close to the epicenter, which included Ontario International Airport, the USGS said. Light shaking is enough to disturb windows and dishes and can rock standing cars noticeably.
“Weak” shaking may have been felt as far away as Los Angeles, the San Gabriel Valley, Long Beach, Orange County, Riverside and San Bernardino.
The first earthquake struck near Archibald Avenue and Brookside Street at 10:05 a.m. Saturday, and was followed by the larger earthquake about three-fifths of a mile to the northeast, with an epicenter at the 60 Freeway and South Oak Hill Drive.
The Ontario Police Department said there were no immediate reports of damage.
In Rowland Heights, a resident felt his desk shake hard for a few seconds. The shaking was so jarring he initially thought someone might have crashed into the house.
It’s news but not a big surprise: The Inland Empire claimed the biggest share of top 100 industrial leases nationwide in the first half of the year.
A couple of years have elapsed since the inland market — which covers both Riverside and San Bernardino counties — held the top spot in the regular reports by CBRE. It returned to the top spot in the recent six-month period with 15 of the top 100 industrial leases in the U.S., L.A. Business First reports.
The 15 deals combined for 13.5 million square feet, with nearly half of them new leases.
The Inland Empire got a second nod related to the overall top spot, laying claim to the most industrial lease deals of 1 million square feet or more during the period.
The region’s industrial market turned white hot during the pandemic, when the trend toward digital commerce and home delivery drove inordinate demand. From 2021 to 2023 it was not unusual for spec distribution centers of hundreds of thousands of square feet to find tenants to sign leases for entire developments before construction was completed.
But the Inland Empire and the rest of the country saw demand drop over the past year, as some big tenants, such as Amazon.com, sorted out their needs and trimmed space.
The Dallas-Fort Worth market supplanted the Inland Empire as the hottest industrial market in 2023, based on CBRE’s data, but fell back to second place nationwide for the first six months of this year with nine large leases combining for 8 million square feet. Memphis finished third, also with nine leases that together accounted for 6.1 million square feet.
Ian Britton, CBRE managing director and regional leader for the Inland Empire, told L.A.Business First that the deals in the region over 2024’s first six months reflect a trend of big tenants consolidating distribution operations in bigger facilities.
“Although deals are taking longer to make and there is less urgency among tenants, larger occupiers are taking advantage of the opportunity to right-size their supply chains and become more efficient,” Britton said in a statement. “Many are consolidating multiple facilities under one roof, improving demand in the 1 million-square-foot-plus size range.”
Average lease rates nationwide, which are around 70 cents a square foot, rose by 7.7 percent in the first half compared to a year earlier. The average rate in the Inland Empire was around $1.24 per square foot.
Voters rank the economy and inflation as the most important issues facing the country, and in spite of good news on both fronts, discontent over pocketbook issues remains steady. There’s one stretch of Southern California where, one could say, that all began: Los Angeles’ harbor and coast.
As the center for U.S. Pacific trade and an archetype for exuberant housing markets everywhere, the region’s waterfront clarifies why so many Americans feel frustrated and under pressure — and just how challenging it may be to fix this, no matter who becomes the next president.
Stretching back to the mid-19th century, when the United States annexed Southern California from the Mexican Republic, Americans looked to Pacific trade and westward settlement to stabilize their nation. That’s why our local ports were developed.
In the 1850s, a federal agency, then called the U.S. Coast Survey, identified San Pedro Bay as a focal point for shipping efforts. Since the 1910s, this has been home to the Port of Los Angeles and the Port of Long Beach, collectively the busiest shipping hub in the Western Hemisphere, making the region prominent in global supply chains and transpacific trade.
Officials believed Pacific trade and settlement to be a safety valve for turmoil back East, that over slavery most of all. The results proved them wrong. Commerce and settlers intensified political conflict, both in Washington and in California, by increasing the stakes. Land speculators — in most places pushing out Indigenous people and Mexicans — looked to grab former rancho claims near California’s prospective harbors, in Southern California’s enviable climate. It was a rush for beachfront property like the region had never seen. Their actions set Los Angeles’ property lines and the basis for today’s real estate markets from Malibu to Newport Bay.
This history was invisible to me as I grew up around L.A., but its effects were and are all around, continuing to reshape Southern California during my lifetime. By the early 2000s, container ships, larger than before, accumulated in the outer waters as the ports were sometimes overwhelmed. Semitrucks crowded the 110 and 710 freeways. At the same time, the coastal real estate market boomed yet again. My parents — new arrivals to the region — found it full of opportunity. They purchased their first and only home, in a subdivision on former rancho lands, and they paid it off as valuations exploded around them and their nest egg grew. The region’s economy was a dynamo, a safe harbor in more ways than one.
Shipping and competitive real estate — two legacies of 1850s Southern California — remain with us. Moreover, they are part of an ongoing story of Los Angeles and its place in American life. Today’s voters’ sense of their economic well-being is based on the prices of household necessities, mostly imported goods, and about one-third enter the U.S. through the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach. Historically, the ships and containers that crowd San Pedro Bay have expanded affordability, but the COVID-19 pandemic and international crises disrupted their flow. Suddenly transpacific trade was blamed for soaring costs, not credited with making household items affordable. Even after the disruption abated, high prices and memories of scarcity have lingered. Nationally, politicians and the public have come to doubt the virtues of globalization. The clash between high hopes for Los Angeles’ harbors and the realities of global trade contribute once more to Americans’ sense of an uncertain world, and once again the high stakes linked to Southern California’s economy feed into tensions nationwide.
Sure investments, meanwhile, no longer offset troubled times. Americans’ primary investment — triumphant in the post-World War II era — is the single-family home. However, the nation’s high-priced real estate has unsettled this convention. Rather than absorbing newcomers and providing a path to financial security, it has multiplied voters’ sense of distress by locking many out of homeownership. The exhilarating prices and low interest rates of recent decades — profit and security to prior home purchasers — now put inflationary pressure on renters and prospective buyers, and on middle-income, low-income or young voters especially. This is most true around coastal Los Angeles, west and south of the 405 Freeway. It is true as well in markets farther afield, such as Phoenix and Las Vegas, long shaped by Southern California migrants and money.
The Southland’s residents and visitors were drawn to the promise of Pacific waters, just as generations before have been. And while many in all eras have benefited from the region’s industries and real estate appreciation, many others have always been left behind. Remembering such connections with history can clarify uncertain times. Recent polarization in U.S. politics has been compared to the Civil War era, but there is perhaps a more apt parallel between today and the 1860s: the economic ideas of trade and land investment, intended to calm political passions and to distribute prosperity, fell short in both moments.
The consequences will play out in the months ahead as pocketbook issues quite likely decide the presidential election. But regardless of the election’s outcome, we should understand that Southern California is never a place apart from U.S. politics and its dilemmas. Instead, these have deep roots in the region. And today, the region continues to invest in imports and real estate as vehicles for prosperity — even as the adverse costs accumulate in national politics.
That makes Southern California the opportune place to resolve these dilemmas of history and to lead the U.S. forward, whether by policy experimentation or new principles for how wealth might be built, sustained and shared. Shaping the nation’s better future will involve tough choices. It certainly will take visionaries and daring. Yet that, too, is a legacy of Southern California’s past, one ready to be reclaimed.
James Tejani, an associate professor of history at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, is the author of “A Machine to Move Ocean and Earth: The Making of the Port of Los Angeles and America.”
Editor’s Note: (7/19/24) Since this story was published in January 2022, Rios, Contreras, and Cisneros pleaded guilty to one count each of conspiracy to violate the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. Rios and Cisneros were both sentenced to 50 years in federal prison and Contreras was sentenced to 35 years in federal prison, according to the US Attorney’s Office. Grisham pleaded guilty to violent crime in aid of racketeering and is expected to be sentenced in September.
CNN
—
Federal prosecutors charged three alleged gang members and one alleged gang associate Thursday in the fatal shooting of off-duty Los Angeles Police Department officer Fernando Arroyos during an attempted robbery.
Luis Alfredo De La Rosa Rios, 29, Ernesto Cisneros, 22, and Jesse Contreras, 34, are allegedly members of the F-13 gang, according to a US Justice Department release. Rio’s alleged girlfriend Haylee Marie Grisham, 18, was also charged.
According to the complaint, Arroyos was house-hunting on Monday with his girlfriend when a black pickup truck drove up. Rios and Cisneros pointed guns at Arroyos and his girlfriend and removed items from both, including chains from Arroyos’ neck.
There was an exchange of gunfire between Arroyos and the two suspects, after which Arroyos collapsed and the two suspects fled, the release said. Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies responded to the scene and took Arroyos to a hospital where he died.
The four defendants were in the vehicle and allegedly were at the scene of the robbery and the shooting, the complaint said. They are charged with violent crime in aid of racketeering, which carries a potential death penalty and a minimum sentence of life in federal prison without the possibility of parole.
CNN has reached out to the Los Angeles County Public Defender’s office in an attempt to contact legal representation for the defendants and is awaiting a response.
Arroyos, 27, “was starting a very promising career,” LAPD Chief Michel Moore said Tuesday. He was with the department for three years and assigned to the Wilshire Division.
“He found himself, after working a series of days in patrol, to have a day off, enjoying it with his girlfriend on a hunt for a house, a place to live, a place to buy and invest in this city and the future of this region,” Moore said.
Arroyos is survived by his mother and stepfather.
“He was the only child, he had a promising future, a bright future that was taken away, viciously, over a street robbery,” the chief said.
F-13 is a “large, multi-generational street gang that previously has been the subject of federal prosecutions, including two large racketeering cases,” the US Attorney’s office said in a news release.
The news release did not mention any connection between Arroyos and the suspects.
Cooler temperatures and potential rain is coming to southern California this weekend, but with increased fire risk in a region where the state’s largest blaze this year is already burning.
The National Weather Service is predicting scattered showers and thunderstorms in the southern half of the state on Saturday, along with some cooler temperatures over the weekend that could finally bring some temporary relief to a prolonged heat wave scorching the region.
National Weather Service meteorologist John Dumas said despite potential wet weather and lower temperatures, fire risk may only increase.
In a pattern referred to as virga, the moisture in the middle layers of the atmosphere will fall as rain, but evaporate before hitting the ground, Dumas said.
“Unfortunately, the lightning can still make it,” Dumas said, which might spark new wildfires.
That could worsen conditions for fire personnel working around the clock to extinguish the Lake fire in Santa Barbara County, California’s largest so far this year. That blaze has grown to 37,742 acres, but firefighters have worked to contain the blaze around the Santa Ynez and Los Olivos region where structures were threatened.
Crew members have made a “visible difference” on the south side of the fire in recent days, where flames could previously be seen from Santa Ynez and the Lake Cachuma area, said Capt. Scott Safechuck, spokesperson for the Santa Barbara County Fire Department
Firefighters have worked through nights to make some progress on the blaze with controlled burns of dry vegetation and a water-dropping helicopter. Those coordinated efforts have “really been successful for us eliminating a lot of the threat on the south side,” Safechuck said.
Risk of fire-igniting dry lightning have led to weather officials issuing a red flag warning until 9 pm Saturday for the mountain and foothill regions of Los Angeles County, according to the weather service, along with the Antelope Valley and valleys of San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara Counties, Ojai and Casitas Valley.
Dumas said weather service officials have tools that can both track in real time and model likely lightning strikes, which helps firefighters on the ground.
Dumas also said the heat will decrease by one or two degrees over the next few days, leading to “almost normal temperatures” by Monday or Tuesday before a new heat wave is expected to roll through Southern California.
After a year-long battle, Marilyn Monroe’s Brentwood home has been saved from destruction.
On Wednesday, the L.A. City Council unanimously voted to designate the Spanish Colonial-style residence as a historic cultural monument, protecting it from being razed by its current owners.
“We have an opportunity to do something today that should’ve been done 60 years ago. There’s no other person or place in the city of Los Angeles as iconic as Marilyn Monroe and her Brentwood home,” Councilmember Traci Park said in a speech before the vote.
Park, who represents the council’s 11th district, where the property is located, added that she’s planning to introduce a motion to evaluate tour bus restrictions in Brentwood after neighbors complained about unwanted traffic around the estate. She also floated the idea of moving the home to a place where the public could more easily access it.
“To lose this piece of history, the only home that Monroe ever owned, would be a devastating blow for historic preservation and for a city where less than 3% of historic designations are associated with women’s heritage,” Park said.
The battle over the home on 5th Helena Drive has been brewing since last summer, evolving into a greater discussion of what exactly is worth protecting in Southern California — a region chock-full of architectural marvels and Old Hollywood haunts swirling with celebrity legend and gossip.
Monroe fans claimed the residence is an indelible piece of Hollywood history; the actress bought the house for $75,000 in 1962 and died there of an apparent overdose six months later, making it the last home she ever occupied.
The homeowners claimed the house has been remodeled so many times over the years that it bears no resemblance to its former self. They also said it has become a neighborhood nuisance as tourists and fans flock to take pictures outside the property.
The saga started when heiress Brinah Milstein and her husband, reality TV producer Roy Bank, bought the property for $8.35 million and immediately laid out plans to demolish it. They owned the property next door and wanted to expand their estate.
An aerial view shows the Brentwood house where actress Marilyn Monroe died.
(Mel Bouzad / Getty Images)
The couple obtained a permit but soon ran into opposition, as historians, Angelenos and Monroe fans jumped in to protest the planned demolition. Councilmember Park said she received hundreds of calls and emails urging her to take action.
The next day, she held a news conference, while sporting red lipstick and short blond hair in a nod to Monroe, giving an impassioned speech urging the City Council to designate the home as a landmark.
In the months after, the landmark application slowly advanced, first receiving approval from the Cultural Heritage Commission and then from the Planning and Land Use Management Committee.
In the meantime, Milstein and Bank were barred from demolishing the home. Milstein addressed the Cultural Heritage Commission directly in January in an effort to sway its decision.
“We have watched it go unmaintained and unkept. We purchased the property because it is within feet of ours. And it is not a historic cultural monument,” she said at the time.
In an attempt to halt the landmark designation process, they sued the city in May, claiming that officials acted unconstitutionally in their efforts to designate the home as a landmark and accusing them of “backdoor machinations” in trying to preserve a house that doesn’t meet the criteria for status as a historic cultural monument.
“There is not a single piece of the house that includes any physical evidence that Ms. Monroe ever spent a day at the house, not a piece of furniture, not a paint chip, not a carpet, nothing,” the lawsuit says.
A judge denied the claim in June, calling the suit an “ill-disguised motion to win so that they can demolish the home and eliminate the historic cultural monument issue,” according to ABC 7.
The City Council vote was originally set for June 12, but Park requested a postponement, citing the recent court decision and pending litigation, as well as ongoing discussions between the city attorney’s office and the property owners.
A wind-driven wildfire along Interstate 5 near the Grapevine exploded to more than 12,000 acres by early Sunday and had charted a path south toward the town of Castaic, prompting evacuations throughout the area, officials said. The Post fire, which originated Saturday in Gorman in northwestern Los Angeles County, was only 2% contained Sunday afternoon as high winds, low humidity and steep terrain hampered firefighting efforts.
Meanwhile, firefighters were battling another brush fire in the San Bernardino County community of Hesperia that broke out after 6 p.m. Saturday in the 18000 block of North Highway 173. That fire has burned more than 1,300 acres and was 20% contained.
The Post Fire
(Jason Armond/Los Angeles Times)
Fire crews battle a hot spot on Orwin road.
(Jason Armond/Los Angeles Times)
Fire crews battle a hot spot.
(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)
Crews conduct a burn-out operation Sunday near Hungry Valley Road.
(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)
Firefighters at work in Gorman.
(Eric Thayer / Associated Press)
Members of the Little Tujunga Hot Shots at work.
(Eric Thayer / Associated Press)
The Post fire advances on structures in Gorman.
As the fire spreads, experts are gauging the severity of this year’s fire season. A wet winter has nurtured a potentially heavy fuel load of thick grasses, which are drying as temperatures rise.
(Marcio Jose Sanchez / Associated Press)
As the fire spreads, experts are gauging the severity of this year’s fire season. A wet winter has nurtured a potentially heavy fuel load of thick grasses, which are drying as temperatures rise.
(Marcio Jose Sanchez / Associated Press)
A smoldering hillside is left behind by the Post fire.
The Lisa Fire
(Gina Ferazzi/Los Angeles Times)
CalFire drops water from a helicopter to battle the wind driven Lisa fire from the air in a canyon east of Moreno Valley on Sunday in Beaumont. As of 6:45pm the fire had burned 867 acres.
[ad_2]
Robert Gauthier, Jason Armond, Gina Ferazzi, Times Photography Wire Services
In the three years that Adel Hagekhalil has led California’s largest urban water supplier, the general manager has sought to focus on adaptation to climate change — in part by reducing reliance on water supplies from distant sources and investing in local water supplies.
His efforts to help shift priorities at the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, which has traditionally focused largely on delivering imported water to the region, have won praise among environmental advocates who hope to reduce dependence on supplies from the Colorado River and Northern California.
However, now that Hagekhalil is under investigation for harassment allegations and has been placed on leave by the MWD board, some of his supporters say they’re concerned that his sidelining might interfere with the policies he has helped advance.
“I would hope this doesn’t mean that we undo the progress that’s been made since Adel came in,” said Conner Everts, executive director of the Southern California Watershed Alliance, who has supported Hagekhalil’s policies.
Aggressive and impactful reporting on climate change, the environment, health and science.
The accusations against Hagekhalil surfaced Thursday while he was traveling in Singapore for a water conference.
Chief Financial Officer Katano Kasaine made the allegations in a confidential letter to the board, which was leaked to the media. She said Hagekhalil has harassed, demeaned and sidelined her and created a hostile work environment.
Hagekhalil denied the accusations, saying he has always treated the staff with respect and professionalism, and that the claims amount to “disagreements on management decisions.”
The MWD board voted to place Hagekhalil on administrative leave for 90 days while Kasaine’s complaint and other allegations are investigated. In his place, the board temporarily appointed assistant general manager Deven Upadhyay, who has been at the agency for 29 years, as interim general manager.
Everts has for more than three decades been advocating for Southern California to reduce reliance on imported water supplies by boosting local supplies. He said he has been pleased to see Hagekhalil and MWD moving forward with plans for the country’s largest wastewater recycling facility in Carson, and working to develop a plan for adapting to climate change.
Everts said he hopes that whatever results emerge from the investigations, the agency doesn’t revert to an outmoded focus on imported water that he believes some “old guard” leaders of MWD still favor.
Everts, like many others who spoke at Thursday’s board meeting, said the accusations demand a fair and impartial investigation.
“Hopefully, Adel comes back and continues to lead in this direction. And if not, whoever would step in would do that,” Everts said. “Does the culture change of the agency continue to progress? That’s my question.”
MWD is the nation’s largest wholesale supplier of drinking water, serving cities and agencies that supply 19 million people across Southern California.
MWD Board Chair Adán Ortega Jr. said that while the board made “difficult decisions” regarding the allegations against Hagekhalil, “we maintain our commitment to the policies and direction of this organization.”
Ortega said he doesn’t expect any change in the district’s “current policy course.”
“Our task at hand is tackling climate change,” Ortega said in an interview with The Times. “Anybody that would challenge that is up against a pretty embedded policy framework for tackling climate change.”
Ortega was involved in selecting Hagekhalil, who previously worked for the city of Los Angeles and who was hired after a bitter struggle among board members in 2021. Ortega said his priorities as board chair have been the same priorities that Hagkhalil has been pursuing.
As for the accusations against Hagekhalil, Ortega said he was upset that someone leaked the confidential letter.
“I believe that whoever leaked it was trying to box in the board. But we’re not going to let them, and I don’t think it worked,” Ortega said.
He said all the initiatives that Hagekhalil was working on will continue under Upadhyay while the matters are investigated.
“The board drives the agenda,” he said. “I think the board has been united on things that Adel and I have both shared.”
Hagekhalil has led the agency at a time of major initiatives, including negotiations aimed at addressing water shortages on the Colorado River, plans for building the water recycling plant in Carson, and the MWD board’s consideration of Gov. Gavin Newsom’s plan to build a $20-billion water tunnel in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta.
Some of Hagekhalil’s supporters questioned why the matter was brought to the board while he was traveling, and suggested the public airing of grievances appeared to be aimed at pushing aside a leading advocate for transforming the district’s focus.
But Ortega said any speculation that placing Hagekhalil on leave might derail the MWD’s current policy agenda is unfounded.
“The board is fully organized in support of that agenda,” Ortega said. “So I don’t feel any nervousness or doubt about our continued policy direction.”
“It’s a mistake to think that the fate of our policy agenda rests on one person,” he added. “Nothing is changing in terms of the board’s organization or the items that we’re considering in future months, or the composition of the committees. All of that is intact. And so nothing changes.”
Still, some environmental advocates have said they’re concerned about a potential link between the surfacing of allegations against Hagekhalil and efforts by some within the agency to push for the proposed Delta Conveyance Project, a 45-mile tunnel that would create a second route to draw water from the Sacramento River into the aqueducts of the State Water Project. They pointed out that Kasaine currently serves as treasurer of the Delta Conveyance Design and Construction Authority, the entity that was created to finance the tunnel project.
“I think it is a calculated ambush that is designed to get the tunnel approved, over the objections of other members of the Metropolitan board,” said Patricia Schifferle, director of Pacific Advocates, an environmental consulting firm.
During an MWD committee meeting on Monday, supporters and opponents of the proposed tunnel debated the costs and benefits of the project.
Karla Nemeth, director of the State Department of Water Resources, told board members that the project is essential to improving the reliability of water supplies in the face of climate change, sea-level rise and a major earthquake.
Other supporters made similar arguments, while opponents argued that building the tunnel would harm the delta’s deteriorating ecosystem and would be more expensive than other water-supply alternatives.
The costs would be paid for by urban and agricultural water districts that decide to participate. The state recently released a cost-benefit analysis that is intended to provide information for local water agencies to consider.
The MWD would receive a large share of the water, and the board’s eventual decision on whether to participate is expected to be pivotal in determining whether the state’s plan goes forward.
The MWD board in 2020 agreed to contribute $160.8 million toward planning and pre-construction costs. District officials say the board could consider whether to provide additional funding for planning and pre-construction costs at the end of this year, and it will likely be several years before there is a decision on long-term financial participation.
When the state’s cost-benefit analysis was released last month, Hagekhalil said: “The questions are, how can this project be implemented, what kind of assurances can we have in the resilience it provides to the Delta and our water supply future, and at what price?”
Leaders of several environmental groups said they were disappointed to see Hagekhalil placed on administrative leave before the accusations against him have been investigated.
“It is critically important and appropriate for MWD to take these allegations seriously and we applaud the agency’s decision to investigate the claims made, so that the board can have an accurate understanding of what has been happening among the organization’s senior leadership,” said Bruce Reznik, executive director of the group LA Waterkeeper. “That said, the public needs more information to ensure the complete independence of this review.”
He said any action against Hagekhalil should have come after an independent investigation.
Reznik called Hagekhalil a “visionary, inclusive and transparent leader” who is helping the agency reform its approach to adapt to the effects of climate change.
“He has been vocal about his vision and plans to transform the agency,” Reznik said. “That focus must continue at MWD.”
Laurene Powell Jobs, widow of Apple visionary Steve Jobs, just paid $94 million for an oceanfront estate in Malibu’s Paradise Cove, The Times has confirmed.
The billionaire businesswoman has been on a Malibu spending spree over the last decade, amassing a compound spanning multiple parcels in one of the most affluent enclaves in the country.
Real estate records show that Jobs has spent around $80 million on three adjacent properties since 2015. Her latest acquisition is the biggest home sale in Southern California so far this year and the priciest since last May, when Jay-Z and Beyoncé dropped $200 million on a minimalist mansion just up the street.
The blockbuster deal was a quiet one, completed off-market. As a result, there aren’t many photos of the property, but records show the parcel spans roughly four acres and holds an L-shaped home built in the 1950s.
Spanning four acres, the long, slender property overlooks the ocean and beach from Malibu’s Paradise Cove.
(Google Earth)
The house has four bedrooms and four bathrooms across 3,399 square feet, opening out to a lawn overlooking the cliffs and beach below. It will probably be razed as Jobs continues building her compound.
The billionaire philanthropist broke into the Malibu market in 2015, spending $44 million on a double-parcel property and demolishing the 13,000-square-foot home it held. She bought the house next door two years later for $16.5 million, and in 2021 she added an adjacent five-bedroom cottage for $17.5 million.
In 2018, the Real Deal reported that the mansion she was building was among the many homes damaged in the Woolsey fire.
Over the last decade, Paradise Cove has emerged as the most valuable stretch of coast in California and one of the priciest pockets in the country. WhatsApp co-founder Jan Koum paid $87 million for a three-acre spread there in 2021. Later that year, venture capitalist Marc Andreessen broke the state price record when he dropped $177 million on a sprawling estate between Paradise Cove and Escondido Beach — before the record was broken again by Jay-Z and Beyoncé.
A native of New Jersey, Jobs manages the Steve Jobs Trust and founded the Emerson Collective, which doles out grants and investments in education, immigration reform and environmental causes. Forbes puts her net worth at $14.3 billion.
When Jay-Z and Beyoncé broke a California record by dropping $200 million on a Malibu mansion last year, a familiar name was front and center on the deal: Kurt Rappaport.
The 53-year-old real estate power broker represented both the buyers and the sellers in the historic sale — an accomplishment in itself that likely pocketed him several million dollars in commissions. But at this point, it would be stranger if Rappaport hadn’t been involvedin the transaction. He’s handled seven of the 10 most expensive home sales in California history, and the $200-million deal eclipsed the previous high of $177 million, which he had set two years prior.
Discover the change-makers who are shaping every cultural corner of Los Angeles. This week we bring you The Connectors, who understand that power doesn’t travel in a straight line and know how to connect the dots. Come back each Sunday for another installment.
Southern California’s real estate scene is one of the most lucrative in the world, and it’s definitely the most public. Millions of people track who’s buying what, where, how much they paid, how many bedrooms, and how big the pool is. In the age of social media, “house porn” is its own industry.
Rappaport, a Los Angeles native, sits atop it all. In his role as Southern California’s premier real estate agent, he serves as a matchmaker of sorts, taking some of the wealthiest and most famous people on the planet and guiding them to specific properties or neighborhoods.
He also moves markets. Take Malibu, which Rappaport and his most prolific client, Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, have transformed into one of the most expensive markets on Earth over the last two decades by buying dozens of properties and developing one-of-a-kind trophy homes that sell for record sums.
As Southern California’s premier real estate agent, he serves as a matchmaker of sorts.
Rappaport’s other clients have included David Geffen, Brad Pitt, Ellen DeGeneres, Ryan Seacrest and Tom Brady, among many, many others. Last year at his French-style manor in Brentwood Park, he hosted President Biden for a roundtable meeting with California mega-donors to discuss wars, divisiveness and ways to improve the country.
Through a constant flow of emails and texts, he has the ear of almost every noteworthy person looking to buy or sell a home around L.A., and he holds plenty of influence over what and where they shop. Billions in sales translates to millions in taxes for local governments, so whether a neighborhood is hot or cold can have a monumental impact.
Like fine art, a home is only worth what someone will pay for it, and Rappaport helps dictate what that number is. When the next record is set — when a billionaire pays $250 million, $300 million or $500 million for one of Southern California’s finest estates — Rappaport will likely be the one behind the deal.
A magnitude 2.6 earthquake struck Newport Beach on Wednesday afternoon, resulting in weak shaking in Orange County.
The epicenter of the quake, just southeast of Costa Mesa, was underneath Mariners Park. Weak shaking was felt in Irvine, Santa Ana, Huntington Beach, Garden Grove, Tustin, and Fountain Valley, according to people who reported the shaking to the U.S. Geological Survey’s Did You Feel It? website.
The earthquake struck at 1:46 p.m. and occurred near mapped traces of the Newport-Inglewood/Rose Canyon fault zone. In Santa Ana, one person felt the earthquake as starting with the slowest of rumbles, then a quick jolt.
The Newport-Inglewood fault has long been considered one of Southern California’s top seismic danger zones because it runs under some of the region’s most densely populated areas, from the Westside of Los Angeles to the Orange County coast.
The last major quake on that fault occurred in 1933 — the magnitude 6.4 Long Beach earthquake. That temblor — the deadliest in modern Southern California history — resulted in “very strong” shaking, or level 7 on the Modified Mercalli Intensity Scale, in Long Beach, Huntington Beach and Compton.
The 1933 quake left nearly 120 dead and caused $40 million in property damage.
Scientists have said that recent observations suggest earthquakes as large as magnitudes 6.8 to 7.5 have struck the Newport-Inglewood/Rose Canyon fault system, which stretches from the border of Beverly Hills and Los Angeles through Long Beach and the Orange County coast to downtown San Diego.
Research published in 2017 suggested the Newport-Inglewood fault is more active than previously thought. If a magnitude 7.5 earthquake did rupture along that fault system, such a temblor would bring massive damage throughout Southern California. An earthquake of magnitude 7 would hit areas of Los Angeles west of downtown particularly hard.
The 2017 study uncovered evidence that major earthquakes on the fault centuries ago were so violent they caused a section of Seal Beach near the Orange County coast to fall 1 1/2 to 3 feet in a matter of seconds.
Wednesday’s earthquake was the fifth of magnitude 2.0 and above that has struck the Southern California metro area in the last five days.
Earlier Wednesday, a magnitude 2.2 earthquake struck underneath the San Gabriel Mountains, less than two miles from the northern edge of Rancho Cucamonga in San Bernardino County. That earthquake, which was down from an earlier estimate of 2.5, struck at 5:01 a.m.
A pair of earthquakes hit the eastern Los Angeles neighborhood of El Sereno on Sunday and Tuesday. The first was a magnitude 3.4, striking at 9:56 a.m. Sunday, a couple blocks south of Huntington Drive and Eastern Avenue. The second was a magnitude 2.8, down from an earlier estimate of magnitude 3, and hit at 3:05 p.m. Tuesday. Its initial estimated epicenter was revised from beneath the Elephant Hill Open Space to farther south, about 700 feet northwest of Sunday’s quake.
On Friday, at 10:26 a.m., a magnitude 3.6 earthquake — down from an original estimate of 3.8 — occurred with an epicenter just north of the Ojai Valley, causing weak shaking to be felt from Santa Barbara to Los Angeles.
It’s not uncommon for Southern California to see small earthquakes. Most do not lead to larger, catastrophic quakes. And while some larger earthquakes are preceded by smaller quakes, that is not always the case.
It’s simply impossible to know whether small earthquakes are “foreshocks” to a larger quake before the more powerful event strikes.
Times staff writer Gustavo Arellano contributed to this report.
For much of the past year, the Southern California housing market has been defined by an extreme shortage of homes for sale.
The abnormal scarcity — compounded by the region’s long-running underproduction of housing — emerged when homeowners chose not to sell and give up pandemic-era mortgage rates. The so-called seller strike helped pushed home values to new records, despite rising borrowing costs.
Now the inventory picture might be changing.
“It’s getting a little bit better,” said Eneida Contreras, a Compass real estate agent who specializes in the San Fernando, Santa Clarita and Antelope valleys.
In April, the number of homes listed for sale in most Southern California counties rose from the same month a year earlier, according to data from Zillow.
Los Angeles, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura counties turned positive for the first time since the first half of 2023, each recording an increase of at least 5%.
Orange was the only county to see a decline, while in San Diego, inventory has risen for two consecutive months and is 18% above what it was a year ago.
To be sure, the availability of homes remains at historically low levels. But as it rises, it opens the possibility that prospective buyers will have an easier time making the largest purchase of their lives.
Jordan Levine, chief economist with the California Assn. of Realtors, said more homes are coming onto the market because owners are increasingly accepting that the new normal is interest rates in the 6%-7% range.
As people get married, divorced and have children, the “benefit of the low rate starts to be outweighed by having a house that doesn’t work,” Levine said. “Ultimately, these are people’s homes, too, and they are not just straight-up investments.”
Levine said he expects inventory levels to increase and home prices to be lower than they would have been if inventory continued to shrink. However, he and other experts said home prices are unlikely to decline. That’s because though more owners are coming to terms with high rates, many will likely choose to keep their sub-4% mortgages — a phenomenon known as the lock-in effect.
Other factors are at play. The economy is growing, and while most Southern California households can’t afford to buy, there’s a sizable population of techies, Hollywood types and other white-collar workers who can funnel excess cash into large down payments that offset high mortgage rates.
“The current level of inventory rise — which is a little bit, but not a lot — is likely to slow price appreciation but not turn it negative,” said Mike Simonsen, founder of Altos Research, a real estate data firm.
The rise in inventory is providing opportunities for buyers with means, but the market is still tough.
Interest rates are above 7%, and even if home prices rise at a slower pace, they will set records.
In Los Angeles County, the average home price in April was $890,516, an increase of 1.4% from March and surpassing the previous record, set in June 2022.
The six-county Southern California region climbed above its 2022 average home price record in March. It set another all-time high last month, reaching $875,388.
If mortgage rates noticeably decline, the lock-in effect could lessen and bring more homes onto the market. Falling mortgage rates would also immediately make housing more affordable.
Whether falling rates provide much relief is another question. Lower borrowing costs may bring a flood of additional buyers who quickly gobble up new listings and supercharge price growth.
“Building more housing is really what is going to break that cycle,” said Nicole Bachaud, a senior economist with Zillow.
According to the latest forecast from the Mortgage Bankers Assn., rates will remain high but will drop to 6.4% by the end of 2024.
Carol Otero of Rodeo Realty is among the Los Angeles agents seeing an increase in inventory. She estimated that the number of homes for sale in some San Fernando Valley neighborhoods has at least doubled in the past few weeks.
Buyers are eager.
Last Friday, Otero listed a four-bedroom home in Northridge. She said she has received six offers, all above the $869,000 asking price.
Here’s a look at the 1992 riots in Los Angeles. The riots stemmed from the acquittal of four white Los Angeles Police Department officers in the beating of black motorist Rodney King in 1991.
The rioting destroyed or damaged over 1,000 buildings in the Los Angeles area. The estimated cost of the damages was over $1 billion.
More than 9,800 California National Guard troops were dispatched to restore order.
Nearly 12,000 people were arrested, though not all the arrests were directly related to the rioting.
March 3, 1991 – Rodney King is beaten by LAPD officers after King leads police on a high-speed chase through Los Angeles County. George Holliday videotapes the beating from his apartment balcony. The video shows King being struck by police batons more than 50 times. Over 20 officers were present at the scene, most from the LAPD. King suffered 11 fractures and other injuries due to the beating.
March 4, 1991 – Holliday delivers the tape to local television station KTLA.
March 7, 1991 – King is released without being charged.
March 15, 1991 –Sergeant Stacey Koon and officers Laurence Michael Powell, Timothy Wind, and Theodore Briseno are indicted by a Los Angeles grand jury in connection with the beating.
May 10, 1991 – A grand jury refuses to indict 17 officers who stood by at the King beating and did nothing.
November 26, 1991 – Superior Court Judge Stanley Weisberg orders the trial of the four officers charged in the King beating moved to Simi Valley.
April 29, 1992 – The four white LAPD officers are acquitted of beating King. Riots start at the intersection of Florence and Normandie in South Central Los Angeles. Reginald Denny, a white truck driver, is pulled from his truck and beaten. A news helicopter captures the beating on videotape. Mayor Tom Bradley declares a state of emergency, and Governor Pete Wilson calls in National Guard troops.
April 30-May 4, 1992 – Dusk to dawn curfews are enforced in the city and county of Los Angeles.
May 1, 1992 – King makes an emotional plea for calm, stating, “People, I just want to say, can we all get along? Can we get along? Can we stop making it horrible for the older people and the kids?”
May 3, 1992 – Over 1,100 Marines, 600 Army soldiers, and 6,500 National Guard troops patrol the streets of Los Angeles.
August 4, 1992 – A federal grand jury returns indictments against Koon, Powell, Wind and Briseno on the charge of violating the civil rights of King.
October 21, 1992 – A commission headed by former FBI and CIA Director William Webster concludes that the LAPD and City Hall leaders did not plan appropriately for the possibility of riots prior to the verdicts in the King case.
February 25, 1993 – The trial begins.
April 17, 1993 – The federal jury convicts Koon and Powell of violating King’s civil rights. Wind and Briseno are found not guilty. No disturbances follow the verdict.
August 4, 1993 – US District Court Judge John Davies sentences both Sergeant Koon and Officer Powell to 30 months in prison for violating King’s civil rights. Powell is found guilty of violating King’s constitutional right to be free from an arrest made with “unreasonable force.” Ranking officer Koon is convicted of permitting the civil rights violation to occur.
April 19, 1994 – The US District Court in Los Angeles awards King $3.8 million in compensatory damages in a civil lawsuit against the City of Los Angeles. King had demanded $56 million, or $1 million for every blow struck by the officers.
June 1, 1994 – King is awarded $0 in punitive damages in a civil trial against the police officers. He had asked for $15 million.
April 2012 – King’s autobiography, “The Riot Within: My Journey from Rebellion to Redemption. Learning How We Can All Get Along,” written with Lawrence J. Spagnola, is published.
