What’s happening today?
Los Angeles Police Department officials say they want to try out Axon automated license plate reader cameras mounted on light posts. This comes after a contract with Flock ran out earlier this year. The Board of Police Commissioners is set to take up a three-month “no-cost” contract with Axon at its 9:30 a.m. meeting today. According to that contract, the LAPD would own the data that the Axon cameras pick up. Axon already logs license plate reader data for the LAPD through dashboard cameras on 1,500 police vehicles. There has been a trend lately of cities dumping Flock, but switching over to Axon instead.
The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors is set to take up Supervisor Holly Mitchell’s motion calling for creating a way to identify law enforcement gangs in the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department. The motion, which is on the board’s Tuesday 9:30. a.m. agenda, says that “courts, independent oversight bodies, and investigative journalists have documented incidents in which membership in these deputy gangs were associated with unlawful uses of force, falsification of reports, witness intimidation, retaliation against whistleblowers, and targeted harassment of Black and Latino community members.” There are 27 known deputy gangs identified within the Sheriff’s Department, the motion says, but as recently as late 2025, Sheriff’s department officials say they have not identified any group that qualifies as a law enforcement gang. Mitchell’s motion calls for creating criteria for identifying such gangs “based on patterns of conduct, shared identifiers, logos and other evidence and information,” and for reports – both confidential and public – to come back in 120 days (or four months).
What just happened?
Mayor Karen Bass shows off labor support, defends LA Convention Center project against critique from Nithya Raman
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass responded on Saturday to Council member Nithya Raman’s latest volleys, which included a critique of the Los Angeles Convention Center expansion project that Bass worked to push through. Raman launched a website on Thursday that reminds people of other city expenses that the $100 million or so a year that’s set to go into the spendy renovation of the conference facility could have paid for. Bass said during a pre-canvassing rally at the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor headquarters that the convention center project will create jobs, and her message seemed to be that Raman was not just coming from Bass, she was also attacking working people.
“You can’t say you support working people if you’re against the Convention Center,” Bass said. The unions at the rally included unions supporting city workers, and non-faculty workers at Los Angeles Unified School District. It was also an opportunity for Bass to show off her own extensive support from labor, after Raman recently unveiled endorsements from the Western States Regional Council of Carpenters and Unite Here Local 11. State Sen. Maria Elena Durazo, a former president of Unite Here Local 11, kicked off the rally for Bass, though.
Saturday’s pre-canvass rally was also being held for City Attorney candidate Marissa Roy, who is endorsed by the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor.
A few more things…
Much ado over LAHSA: While some fuss was made over Mayor Karen Bass saying she was stepping down from the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority’s oversight commission, the LA Times’s David Zahniser, writing in Saturday’s LA on the Record, notes that the agency’s days “are numbered,” and that Bass is following in the footsteps of Lindsey Horvath and Kathryn Barger, two other elected officials who also appointed themselves to the panel (Bass was the remaining elected official on that board). The difference with Bass stepping down is that she is in the midst of a tough re-election campaign, and every move she makes can bring greater scrutiny. Meanwhile, county officials have pulled funding from the agency, and are now also seeking to take control of case management responsibilities that LAHSA currently holds. LA city officials are also taking steps to pull away.
Guerilla crosswalk painted: Jonathan Hale, who has been conducting guerilla crosswalk painting operations, just completed one in Hollywood, after taking to public comment last week to criticize Mayor Karen Bass for not moving faster. Hale says people can help with more such operations by signing up to volunteer with People’s Vision Zero.
Motions and Reports: The LA City Council motions from Friday can be found here. They include a motion by Council member Tim McOsker that moves several thousand dollars around to help with completing a big renovation of the Warner Grand Theatre. // Council member Eunisses Hernandez put out a resolution calling for the city to take an official stance to support a bill awaiting signing by Gov. Gavin Newsom that would prohibit public dollars from being used on private detention facilities. // Hernandez also has a motion to accept federal dollars to tackle extreme heat through cool pavement and shade projects. // There’s also a resolution from Council member Heather Hutt and John Lee, with a second from Adrin Nazarian, seeking official city support for state legislation that creates a zone around places of worship where protesters would not be allowed to approach congregants or block people from entering or exiting. // The Bureau of Sanitation submitted their report on water quality testing related to the Lineage warehouse fire. They found that while there was increased levels of mercury, the main concern was elevated levels of bacteria. Sanitation officials write that “bacteria were measured at levels that are consistent with levels associated with raw sewage, likely a reflection of the copious amounts of decaying food material that began showing up in the runoff.” They also touched on the matter of the dead fish in the Los Angeles river, but said they did not collect any of the dead fish for analysis nor look at any necropsy reports. They noted that they had earlier said in their report that “as a result of the natural decaying process, the oxygen levels in the runoff could become depleted, making the water uninhabitable for fish. They also wrote that “toxic by-products from decay, including ammonia, can also be acutely toxic to aquatic life; however, LASAN did not measure ammonia in the runoff or in the Los Angeles River. By the time LASAN staff were aware of this potential concern, the diversion of runoff to the sewer system had already been established.”
