Saturday, March 28, 2026

Supervisor Barger Honors Teen-Founded Altadena Girls With Commemorative Scroll

The Old Town Pasadena nonprofit has distributed more than one million items to fire-affected families since the January 2025 Eaton Fire

Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger presented a commemorative scroll Thursday to Altadena Girls at the nonprofit’s Old Pasadena community center, recognizing the youth-founded organization’s disaster response work as Women’s History Month draws to a close.

The scroll honors Lauren Sandidge, the organization’s president, and her daughter Avery Colvert, who co-founded Altadena Girls at age 14 just three days after the January 2025 Eaton Fire, according to a press release from Barger’s office. The recognition comes more than 14 months after the fire destroyed thousands of structures in Altadena, an unincorporated community within Barger’s Fifth Supervisorial District, where many families remain displaced.

Colvert, now 15, launched the effort with an Instagram post on January 10, 2025, asking for clothing, beauty products and personal care items to help her friends “feel confident and like themselves again,” according to the 19th News. The post drew more than 28,000 likes and celebrity support,

Saturday, March 28, 2026

A Priest’s Balancing Act: Love, Grace, and Growing Crowds at the No Kings March

Featured speaker at today’s march Rev. Tim Rich of All Saints Church says the No Kings march must stay ‘grounded in grace’ — even as concerns widen from immigration to international warfare

[Updated]  The Reverend Tim Rich will stand on the steps of Pasadena City Hall on Saturday and ask several thousand people to do something he freely admits he cannot always do himself: love the people whose actions and beliefs they find repugnant.

“Let me be fully candid, that’s not a balancing act that I always walk very successfully,” Rich, the priest in charge at All Saints Church in Pasadena, said in an interview on Friday.

That candor — a faith leader heading into a charged political moment while openly wrestling with his own capacity for grace — captures some of the tension running through the No Kings 3.0 march, the third and expectedly largest anti-Trump demonstration that will move down Colorado Boulevard since the movement began in June 2025.

The first No Kings march,

Saturday, March 28, 2026

Pasadena Rep. Chu Votes Against House ICE Funding Bill as Shutdown Continues

The 42-day partial shutdown shows no sign of ending as Congress departs for recess with competing bills

Rep. Judy Chu voted against a House Republican bill late Friday that would fund the Department of Homeland Security, including Immigration and Customs Enforcement, for 60 days, calling ICE “an uncontrolled rogue agency” in a statement released by her office.

The bill passed 213-203, with three Democrats — Reps. Henry Cuellar of Texas, Marie Gluesenkamp Perez of Washington and Don Davis of North Carolina — crossing party lines to vote with Republicans, according to CBS News. Chu, who represents California’s 28th Congressional District including Pasadena and the west San Gabriel Valley, was among the Democrats who opposed the measure.

The vote came hours after the Senate unanimously approved a separate bill by voice vote that would fund most of DHS — including the Transportation Security Administration, the Coast Guard and the Federal Emergency Management Agency — but exclude ICE and most of Customs and Border Protection,

Friday, March 27, 2026

Altadena Library Mobile Van to Visit Kidspace Weekly Starting April 3

The collaboration will bring books, resources, and family activities to the museum every Friday afternoon

Families visiting Kidspace Children’s Museum will soon have access to books, library cards, and community resources right outside the museum. Beginning April 3, the Altadena Library District’s Curiosity Connection Vol. 2 mobile library — described as “where family resources meet the road” — will park at Kidspace every Friday from 2:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. as part of a yearlong collaboration between the two institutions.

Visitors can sign up for a library card, check out or return books, browse flyers for upcoming events, and enjoy an outdoor reading space near the van. Families who register for a card will also receive $3 off Kidspace admission for up to four guests.

Kidspace offers free admission on the first Friday of each month, with advance reservations recommended. Tickets are released about two weeks prior to each Free First Friday. The museum is located at 480 North  Arroyo Boulevard in Brookside Park .

Friday, March 27, 2026

School-Closure Fears Dominate PUSD Board Meeting

With 56 public-comment cards submitted, parents, students and teachers warned that consolidating campuses after the Eaton Fire and pandemic could deepen trauma and accelerate the enrollment decline

More than 50 speakers lined up at the Pasadena Unified School District board meeting Thursday to plead against school closures, filling a lengthy public-comment period with accounts of children displaced by the Eaton Fire, disrupted by the pandemic, and now facing the prospect of losing yet another anchor in their lives.

The March 26 session drew 56 public-comment cards — so many that President Tina Frederick proposed reducing each speaker to one minute, which the board accepted without objection, to accommodate the crowd. The central message, repeated by students, parents, teachers and classified staff alike, was that a cost-cutting consolidation plan could worsen the enrollment decline it is designed to address.

“If Marshall closes, I don’t know where I would go or if I would even stay,” said Violet, a student who said she commutes an hour each way to Thurgood Marshall Secondary School after being displaced by the fire.

Friday, March 27, 2026

South Pasadena Masonic Lodge to Host Chili Cook-Off Fundraiser for Eaton Fire Victims

The fundraiser will feature a chili competition, live music, and special guests to benefit victims of the Eaton Fires

The South Pasadena Masonic Lodge will host a community chili cook-off fundraiser on Saturday, March 28 to benefit victims of the Eaton Fires. The free, all-ages event begins at 5:00 p.m. at 1126 Fair Oaks Avenue with live music scheduled to start at 7:00 p.m.

The evening will feature a chili competition judged by members of the South Pasadena Fire Department, live performances by Sunday Best and Jackrabbit — the latter featuring actor Dermot Mulroney — and special guest appearances. Actor Phil Donlon, known for “Chicago Fire” and “High and Outside,” will serve as host.

The event flyer states: “To raise funds and support for communities impacted by the Eaton Fires, while bringing the South Pasadena community together for an evening of food, music, and philanthropy.”

Jackrabbit’s past performances have drawn notable attendees including John Stamos, Lori Loughlin,

Friday, March 27, 2026

Throngs Expected to March Through Pasadena Saturday for Third ‘No Kings’ Protest

Thousands of Pasadena and Altadena residents are expected to march from Pasadena City College to Pasadena City Hall on Saturday morning as part of a nationwide day of political action.

The demonstration, dubbed “No Kings 3.0,” is one of more than 3,000 protests planned across the United States this weekend.

Organized locally by the ACLU and San Gabriel Foothills Indivisible (SGFI), the event aims to voice opposition to the Trump administration’s ongoing immigration enforcement operations and the U.S. military’s month-long war in Iran.

National organizers project the combined demonstrations could draw millions of participants, possibly marking the largest single day of protests in U.S. history.

The Pasadena event will begin at 11 a.m. with a gathering at the Pasadena City College Reflecting Pool. At 11:15 a.m., participants are scheduled to march west along Colorado Boulevard, led by musicians from the National Day Laborers network. The march will conclude at Pasadena City Hall, where a rally featuring local band the NextDoors, DJ Richie C,

Friday, March 27, 2026

Tech Giants are Spending More Than Ever to Shape California Politics. See How Much

By Jeremia Kimelman, CALMATTERS

As California gears up for high-stakes elections this year, including an open governor’s race, major companies focused on artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency invested more than $39 million to influence state politics in 2025, according to a CalMatters analysis.

The companies contributed that money to political campaigns, hired lobbyists to influence policy and donated to nonprofit organizations at the request of lawmakers. In all cases, critics say, the companies used their money to build relationships that give them outsized influence over the legislative process. The companies themselves say that they’re supporting candidates and policies who align with their corporate priorities.

Last July, Meta, which made $201 billion in revenue last year, transferred $20 million to a new political committee it created with the goal of supporting candidates in favor of fewer AI regulations. A month later, the company gave the California Democratic Party $150,000 and a bipartisan group of 20 incumbents in the California Legislature up to $5,900 each.

Friday, March 27, 2026

California Blew a Hole in Environmental Planning Law. Now, Lawmakers are Trying to Fix It

By Alejandra Reyes-Velarde, CALMATTERS

Just south of downtown Los Angeles, the Exide battery recycling facility ??spent decades leaking lead and arsenic into the soil — sickening children, causing cancer, and creating a nearly billion-dollar liability for the state of California.

A flurry of last-minute reforms to the California Environmental Quality Act at the end of last year’s legislative session exempted a broad, poorly defined category of industrial facilities from environmental review – so broad that if Exide were proposed now, it might get a pass, critics say.

Now lawmakers are trying to figure out what they actually meant when they approved those exemptions.

State Sen. Catherine Blakespear, a Democrat who represents coastal San Diego and Orange counties, introduced a bill this week seeking to more narrowly define what kinds of facilities are exempt from environmental review and to add protections for communities near developments.

But the bill deliberately leaves the hardest question unanswered: It doesn’t specify which facilities qualify.

Friday, March 27, 2026

César Chávez Day is No More. California Lawmakers Officially Scrap the Holiday Name

By Nadia Lathan, CALMATTERS

Just one week after damaging sex abuse allegations surfaced against the iconic labor leader César Chávez, California lawmakers unanimously passed a bill Thursday to rename the holiday named for him to Farmworkers Day, capping off a series of rapid-fire moves to expunge his legacy from public places.

The governor quickly signed Assembly Bill 2156. It takes effect immediately, in time for the March 31 holiday.

“Our farmworkers remind us that everyone should be treated with dignity and respect,” Senate President Pro Tem Monique Limón said on the Senate floor. “Their days and their lives inspire us to push for a better California.”

The Senate voted 37-0, following an Assembly vote earlier this week.

It is the latest development in a nationwide backlash against Chávez, who Democrats and Republicans quickly renounced last week after a New York Times investigation found he sexually abused young girls while president of the United Farm Workers union in the 1960s and 70s.