Monday, February 2, 2026

Altadena Pastor Who Saved His Church While His Home Burned Gets Community Thank-You

Pastor Kenebrew saved his church while his home burned. Last week, a grateful community thanked him for his sacrifice

Pastor G. LaKeith Kenebrew made seven trips into the Eaton Fire zone on the night of January 7, 2025, fighting to save Hillside Tabernacle City of Faith while his own home burned less than a mile away. On Friday, January 30, his community publicly thanked him for putting their needs first.

Kenebrew lost his home in the fire that killed 19 people and destroyed more than 9,400 structures across Altadena. But the 58-year-old church at 2561 N. Fair Oaks Ave. survived—and became a distribution hub for emergency supplies.

Thirteen months after the fire, Kenebrew’s congregation and community acknowledged his sacrifice at a recognition event, and the church has been rebuilt.

“I thought about my church family,” Kenebrew told KNX News reporter Karen Adams. “I thought about the church members, and I thought about what my wife and I lost, but it was,

Monday, February 2, 2026

Local Residents Included in Mandatory No-Burn Order for West San Gabriel Valley on Monday

A mandatory residential No Burn Day is in effect Monday for Pasadena and the wider West San Gabriel Valley, according to a notice issued by the South Coast Air Quality Management District.

The alert prohibits residents from burning wood, pellets or manufactured fire logs in any indoor or outdoor wood-burning device, and bans burning charcoal except in cooking devices. The No Burn Day applies to the South Coast Air Basin, which includes large areas of Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties, with the exception of the High Desert and the Coachella Valley.

Information on AQMD’s “Check Before You Burn” program is available at www.aqmd.gov/cbyb, and residents can sign up to receive e-mail alerts at www.AirAlerts.org..

According to AQMD, No-Burn Day alerts are mandatory in order to protect public health when levels of fine particle pollution or ozone are forecast to be high anywhere in the South Coast Air Basin. Particles in smoke can get deep into the lungs and cause health problems,

Monday, February 2, 2026

CA Groups Seek Local Taxes to Offset Federal Health Care Cuts

By Lynn La, CALMATTERS

Would raising a county sales tax help local residents stave off federal health care cuts? A coalition of health care organizations and workers say yes.

As CalMatters’ Ana B. Ibarra explains, Restore Healthcare for Angelenos is pushing to place a measure on the June ballot that would ask Los Angeles County voters to decide whether the county could impose a half-cent sales tax through 2031. The money would go toward helping residents pay for primary and emergency care, as well as behavioral health needs for people who have lost their Medi-Cal coverage.

The coalition says the proposal would raise about $1 billion a year, and it’s working with Supervisor Holly Mitchell to present the motion to the county.

• Mitchell, in an emailed statement: “This option is on the table because what’s at stake are safety net services unraveling for millions of residents. … This is a last resort option for the times we’re facing.”

The board is expected to vote on the proposal next month.

Monday, February 2, 2026

Alleged Unlicensed Contractors Charged in Eaton Fire Zone Set for Pasadena Hearing Monday

Defendants charged with offering services without licenses in Altadena are among the first prosecuted under felony disaster-zone statute

Three men charged with suspicion of working as unlicensed contractors in the Eaton Fire disaster zone are scheduled to appear Monday in Pasadena Courthouse to have a preliminary hearing date set in their felony cases.

Edgar Geovanni Lopez Revolorio, 42, of Arleta; Guillermo Ramirez, 54, of Pomona; and Melvin Hairon Mejia Ordonez, 41, of Los Angeles are among five defendants charged by the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office in December for allegedly offering contractor services without licenses in Altadena. The cases are among the first felony prosecutions targeting contractors accused of preying on fire survivors as they rebuild from the January 2025 blaze that destroyed more than 9,000 structures.

All three defendants pleaded not guilty at their arraignments in December and were released on their own recognizance.

Monday’s proceeding in Department D, scheduled for the courthouse at 300 E.

Monday, February 2, 2026

Young Eaton Fire Survivors Tell Their Stories in Free Pasadena Theatre Production

In Other People’s Shoes Productions stages verbatim testimonies from anonymous youth, with therapist-led discussion to follow

A year after the Eaton Fire destroyed more than 9,000 structures in Altadena, a Pasadena theatre company is putting young survivors’ voices on stage—using their exact words.

The Fire Stories Project, a free staged reading at Lineage Performing Arts Center on Monday at 7 p.m., features the verbatim testimonies of young people who experienced the January 2025 fire.

Professional actors will perform the script, which was edited from interviews conducted by In Other People’s Shoes Productions in partnership with therapists from Pacific Clinics. The young people remain anonymous.

“We wanted to give young people the opportunity to have their voices heard, and to share their experiences of a very defining event in our community,” said Mireya Hepner, founder of In Other People’s Shoes Productions and co-creator of the project, in a statement.

The performance marks the final of three readings commemorating the fire’s one-year anniversary.

Monday, February 2, 2026

Pretrial Hearing Set Monday for Man Charged in 2021 Altadena Double Stabbing, Partially Witnessed on Zoom

Robert Cotton faces two murder counts in deaths of mother and uncle; case nears five-year mark

A pretrial hearing is scheduled for Monday in the case against Robert Cotton, the Altadena man charged with fatally stabbing his mother and uncle at their shared home nearly five years ago.

Cotton, 37, is scheduled to appear at 8:30 a.m. in Department B of the Pasadena Courthouse, 300 East Walnut Street. He faces two counts of murder with an allegation of using a knife as a deadly and dangerous weapon in the March 22, 2021, deaths of Carol Brown, 67, and Kenneth Preston, 69. Cotton has pleaded not guilty and is presumed innocent until proven guilty.

The case gained attention after one of Brown’s colleagues partially witnessed the attack during a Zoom call with Pasadena City College staff and called 911. The colleague reported seeing a man dragging another man into the living room of the Altadena residence in the 3100 block of North Marengo Avenue.

Sunday, February 1, 2026

Another Altadena Water Company Calls Shareholder Meeting to Address Eaton Fire Financial Woes

Rubio Cañon Land and Water Association faces a $1.95 million gap

Late last month the tiny Los Flores Water Company in Altadena told its customers it was operating with 75% less revenue because of the Eaton Fire and needed to make up for the shortfall. Now, Rubio Cañon Land and Water Association has announced it faces a $1.95 million budget shortfall, and on Tuesday, its shareholders will be asked to decide how to close the gap.

The special board meeting, scheduled for February 3 from 5 to 7 p.m. at the Altadena Community Center, comes as all three of Altadena’s private water companies confront post-fire financial crises. Rubio Cañon is the largest, serving about 9,600 people in the unincorporated area, and unlike its smaller neighbors, its board has explicitly rejected consolidation with other utilities as a recovery strategy.

The meeting will present shareholders with options that may include a proposed 11% rate hike and a monthly fire recovery charge of $10 to $30,

Saturday, January 31, 2026

‘Ashes And Echoes’ Exhibit Spotlights Eaton Fire Survivor Voices

By EDDIE RIVERA

Interactive installation focuses on home, resilience and the long arc of recovery

A new weekend multimedia exhibit at the Pasadena Convention Center invites visitors to step inside the lived experiences of people whose lives were upended by last year’s Eaton Fire, using recorded survivor testimonies as its core.

The interactive installation, “Ashes and Echoes,” is presented by the law firm LA Fire Justice and centers on video-based oral histories paired with immersive visual and audio elements. The Eaton Fire killed 19 people and destroyed more than 9,000 homes across Altadena and Pasadena last January.

Project director Hrag Yedalian said the exhibit is intentionally framed around more than destruction.

“So, this is an exhibit about home,” Yedalian said. “It’s about resilience and it’s about restoration. And the idea behind this exhibit is to take survivor testimonies and to elevate them. So we educate the public about what people are going through, but it’s also future looking.”

Rather than presenting testimonies as static displays,

Saturday, January 31, 2026

Pasadena Area State Senator Rebukes LAPD Chief’s Comments on Anti-Masking Law

Pasadena-area State Sen. Sasha Renée Pérez on Friday criticized Los Angeles Police Chief Jim McDonnell’s remarks implying the LAPD will not enforce California’s anti-masking law, SB 627. Pérez, who represents Pasadena and Altadena in the 25th Senate District, released the statement from Sacramento.

“LAPD Chief McDonnell’s apparent decision to not enforce California’s, SB 627, the No Secret Police Act, by stating it ‘does not make sense’ is alarming and signals a disregard for his legal obligation to uphold our state laws,” Pérez said in the statement. “A Police Chief does not get to pick and choose which laws will be enforced and which will go ignored.”

She said the stance “squarely contradicts the Chief’s own claim at the same press conference that public safety is the government’s foremost responsibility and, without it, everything else fails.” Pérez added that “public safety does not exist when immigration raids with masked agents directly destabilize communities and erode trust.”

“Statements like this create a broader ripple effect that undermine consistent enforcement of our laws and feed into the current federal administration’s arbitrary behaviors,” she said.

Saturday, January 31, 2026

Altadena Library to Help Lead $1.2 Million Countywide Effort to Preserve Wildfire Memories

BASED ON A REPORT BY CITY NEWS SERVICE

A new $1.2 million Mellon Foundation grant will help Los Angeles County preserve the memories and artworks of communities impacted by the January 2025 wildfires, with Altadena included among the communities the project aims to serve, officials announced Friday.

The funding supports a multi-agency initiative titled “LA County Cultural Climate Commons: Community Memory Lab and Living Archive,” involving L.A. County Library, the Department of Arts and Culture, the Los Angeles Public Library, the Altadena Library District and their respective foundations. Grant recipients began the project in January, and it is expected to span through June 2028.

The project aims to preserve the lived experiences, cultural heritage and collective memories of the Altadena and Pacific Palisades communities, which were burned down in January 2025. Funding was intended to coincide with the one-year anniversary of the devastating wildfires.

Key components include a Mobile Memory Lab organized by L.A. County Library, an artist/archivist-in-residence program,