The Thorn West is a state and local news roundup compiled by members of DSA-LA. Our goal is to provide a weekly update on the latest developments in state and local politics, and to track the issues that are most important to our membership.

Issue No. 159 - May 26, 2023

State Politics

• With a legislative deadline approaching, CalMatters rounds up some notable state bills that have advanced out of their chamber of origin this week, including another attempt at legislation that would allow legislative staffers to unionize.

City Politics

• There is growing dissatisfaction with the city’s management of the neighborhood council system, where the general manager was recently pressured to resign.

• A motion to study introducing democracy vouchers into Los Angeles’ campaign finance system, put forward by councilmembers Nithya Raman and Marqueece Harris-Dawson, has passed out of committee. Audio here.

Police Violence and Community Resistance

• The Los Angeles City Council voted to approve the donation to the city of a robotic dog, for use by the Los Angeles Police Department. Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martinez was among the four councilmembers (along with CMs Raman, Hutt, and Price, with CM Hernandez absent but opposed) who voted no, arguing that the robotic dog “represents an expansion of the current boundaries around policing and surveillance.”

• A judge has denied the city’s request that the courts force Knock LA journalist Ben Camacho to return a database of LAPD officer photos that the LAPD had voluntarily given him, stating that “the city had failed to make even the most basic arguments necessary for court intervention.”

Labor

• A city council motion to raise minimum wage for Los Angeles tourism workers has advanced out of committee. More from Councilmember Soto-Martinez here.

Transportation

• Streetsblog LA reviews the Los Angeles Department of Transportiation’s pilot program of “La Sombrita” bus stop structures, designed to provide shade and light to bus riders: an “attempt to address a real issue” that “still feels inadequate.”

Incarceration

• Two juvenile detention centers in Los Angeles County have been ordered to shut down due to ongoing safety and compliance issues, which include the continued use of pepper spray on children in defiance of a county order.

• Health care workers at Men’s Central Jail held a rally outside the facility to protest overcrowding and understaffing.

Environmental Justice

• After months of negotiations, representatives of the states that depend on the Colorado River have reached an agreement, with California, Arizona, and Nevada together committing to reduce water use by 3 million acre-feet between now and the end of 2026.

• The state Air Resources Board voted today to ban the substance known as chromium 6, a highly hazardous substance emitted by chrome-plating businesses. This chiefly affects chrome-plating businesses, which span from vintage automobiles to aerospace components to plumbing fixtures.

• In a recent report, the U.S. Government Accountability Office criticizes the Environmental Protection Agency's response to wildfire smoke, highlighting how it exploits a loophole in the Clean Air Act to avoid calculating the pollution from wildfire into the air quality record.

• Capital & Main covers SB 556, a California state Senate bill that would impose what is likely the strongest law in the nation to hold oil and gas companies accountable when their operations make people sick.