Wednesday, April 1, 2026

Registrar: Fire-Displaced Voters in Altadena and Pasadena Could Risk Missing June Primary Ballots

County registrar urges thousands still in temporary housing to update registration before May 18

More than 15 months after the Eaton Fire destroyed over 9,400 structures and displaced thousands of residents in Altadena and Pasadena, the Los Angeles County Registrar’s office is warning that fire survivors who have not updated their voter registration may not receive ballots for the June 2 primary election.

Vote-by-mail ballots begin mailing May 4. The last day to register and receive one is May 18. The county does not forward ballots — they go only to the address on file. For displaced residents whose registered address is a lot that burned to the ground, the result is a ballot with nowhere to land.

The stakes on the June ballot are substantial. California’s open governor’s race — with Gov. Gavin Newsom term-limited — headlines a primary that also includes the Los Angeles mayoral contest, in which incumbent Karen Bass faces roughly 40 challengers, eight LA City Council seats,

Wednesday, April 1, 2026

Five Pasadena Teachers to Be Honored by Rotary — And Receive a Bigger Check Than Ever Before

The club’s Teachers of Excellence program raises its individual award for the first time in 36 years, from $1,500 to $2,300

For 36 years, the Rotary Club of Pasadena has been putting money into the hands of exemplary local teachers. This April 29, for the first time, it will be more money.

The club announced it is raising the individual award in its Teachers of Excellence program from $1,500 — the grant amount since the program’s founding in 1990 — to $2,300, according to the Rotary Club’s announcement. The increase, the club said, is meant to prevent inflation from diminishing what the recognition is worth. Five Pasadena Unified School District teachers will receive that award at the club’s 36th Annual Teachers of Excellence Ceremony, set for noon Wednesday, April 29, at the University Club of Pasadena.

The honorees, selected through a process that includes classroom observations and essay reviews by a committee of Rotarians and members of the Pasadena Educational Foundation,

Wednesday, April 1, 2026

Poppy Festival Aims to Draw Visitors Back Into Altadena’s Recovering Businesses

The Pasadena Jaycees are organizing a free April 18 event with a passport booklet, a scenic route and local shops still rebuilding after the Eaton Fire

A free festival on April 18 will hand visitors a passport booklet and send them on a route through Altadena, stamping their way through local businesses that have struggled to draw customers since the Eaton Fire destroyed more than 9,400 structures 15 months ago.

The Great Altadena Poppy Festival, organized by the Pasadena Jaycees, pairs the passport-booklet stops at participating Altadena businesses with a scenic drive through poppy fields that have replaced the fire’s burn scars — the product of 250 million California poppy seeds sowed by one Altadena resident across more than 750 damaged properties. Organizers say the goal is to get customers back in the door at businesses that have lost foot traffic since the January 2025 fire. Admission is free.

The festival kicks off at Grocery Outlet, 2270 Lake Ave. in Altadena, where participants pick up their passport booklet.

Wednesday, April 1, 2026

No Decisions About Closing Schools Yet Made, Superintendent Tells Tuesday Town Hall

By Altadena Now Staff

Pasadena Unified School District officials told a virtual town hall audience Tuesday that no schools have yet been recommended for closure — but the advisory committee studying possible campus consolidations is only roughly halfway through its work. The earliest closures to take effect would be in the 2027-28 school year.

The March 31 town hall — live-streamed in English and Spanish — offered the district’s most detailed public accounting yet of the consolidation timeline, the legal framework governing the process, and the financial realities driving it.

With multiple campuses still under active review, a projected district budget shortfall in the tens of millions of dollars, and an enrollment decline of roughly 23% over the past decade, district leaders and outside consultants sought to reassure a wary community that the process remains open-ended and inconclusive — even as the demographic trends that triggered it show no sign of reversing.

“I want to be very clear that no decisions have been made about consolidation to close schools at this time,”

Wednesday, April 1, 2026

‘Save Our Schools’ Rally Protests Possible PUSD Closures

By EDDIE RIVERA

Nearly 100 demonstrators line Del Mar Avenue as district budget crisis keeps several schools under consolidation review

Nearly 100 parents, students and community members gathered Tuesday afternoon outside Pasadena Unified School District headquarters, lining Del Mar Avenue under gray skies and the threat of rain, to protest the possible closure of several campuses amid the district’s ongoing budget crisis.

Organizers held up signs and chanted at the busy traffic, as motorists honked in approval. They described the “Save Our Schools” demonstration as a show of unity across multiple campuses still under consideration, as part of a PUSD consolidation process.

“I’m the president of the Marshall PTSA, and we’re organizing (this) rally to save schools in PUSD, all the schools in PUSD,” said Warren Bleeker, who helped coordinate the event.

The district has been grappling with a structural budget deficit that has forced officials to consider a range of cost-cutting measures, including school consolidation.

Wednesday, April 1, 2026

California Governor’s Race: See the Candidates’ Incomes and Tax Payments

We already knew that Democrat Tom Steyer, a billionaire running for California governor, is rich. But how rich?

In 2024, Steyer and his wife, Kat Taylor, reported a total income of $39 million, thanks to the duo’s massive investments in the global stock market. That’s more than all nine of his major opponents in the governor’s race and their partners made that year combined, according to their federal tax returns released this week.

A 2019 state law, designed to better inform California voters, requires candidates for governor to release their federal tax returns to qualify for the June primary ballot. Among major candidates, only Chad Bianco, Matt Mahan, Katie Porter and Tony Thurmond have already filed their 2025 tax returns.

Here are some highlights:

Income: $39 million in 2024, primarily from massive investments in the global stock market. They also made $6 million in passive income in Luxembourg, Netherlands, Bermuda and the Cayman Islands in 2024. They collected $38,000 in royalties from other properties and earned $23,000 from TomKat Ranch,

Tuesday, March 31, 2026

Parents to Rally Outside Pasadena Unified Headquarters as Consolidation Committee Considers Second Vote

Campuses remain under review as advisory panel meets tonight with community opposition intensifying

Parents and community members opposed to public school closures will rally outside Pasadena Unified School District headquarters Tuesday afternoon, 30 minutes before the advisory committee reviewing more than a dozen campuses for possible closure or consolidation convenes for what could be its most consequential session yet.

The “Save Our Schools” rally, scheduled from 4:30 to 5:15 p.m. on the sidewalk near the north parking lot at 351 S. Hudson Ave., precedes the fourth meeting of the Superintendent’s School Consolidation Advisory Committee, which runs from 5 to 7 p.m. in Room 151 of the same building.

The committee’s agenda concludes with a second vote — listed as an “after meeting” item — on whether to remove additional schools from the review list, the committee’s most significant procedural step since its March 9 session, when members voted to take nine campuses off the list and left 14 under consideration.

The rally flyer,

Tuesday, March 31, 2026

Supervisor Barger: More Than 1,025 Homes Are Under Construction Across the Eaton Fire Burn Area

Supervisor Barger’s latest recovery data shows construction accelerating — but insurance delays are keeping thousands of displaced residents on the sidelines

More than 1,025 homes are under construction across the Eaton Fire burn area, according to data released Tuesday by Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger’s office. Another roughly 3,000 applications to rebuild have been filed, and approximately 2,000 building permits have been issued.

None of that, Barger said, tells the full story. More than 6,000 households lost homes when the fire tore through Altadena and surrounding communities in January 2025. Fifteen months later, only about half of those households have submitted applications to rebuild — a gap that Barger attributes not to permitting delays, but to insurance checks that have not arrived.

“The fact that only half of wildfire survivors have submitted applications makes clear that significant barriers remain, especially financial ones,” Barger said in the statement from her office. “Many impacted residents have taken no action to rebuild because they lack the capital to move forward — an issue exacerbated by delayed insurance payouts.”

Tuesday, March 31, 2026

Pasadena Education Network to Honor Parent Volunteers at 20th Anniversary Event

The Pasadena Education Network will mark its 20th anniversary with a Wine & Spirits Tasting in Pasadena on April 19, an event that will recognize parent volunteers who support students across the Pasadena Unified School District.

The celebration is scheduled for Sunday from 5 to 8 p.m. at the Shakespeare Villa, 171 South Grand Ave., Pasadena. According to a statement from the Pasadena Education Network, three parent volunteers — Nate Bradley, Emily Mencken and Isis Moulden — will be honored for being role models for the kind of involvement that PEN advocates.

PEN will also present its Founders Award to Amelia Chapman for her commitment to PEN’s mission to promote family participation in public schools to benefit all students.

Guests will enjoy a variety of wines donated by Altadena Wine & Spirits, a Negroni Bar sponsored by Cocktail Cadre, food provided by Stems and desserts compliments of Nothing Bundt Cake. There will also be a silent auction.

Founded in 2006, PEN is a network of more than 2,000 parents who support and send their children to Pasadena Unified School District schools.

Tuesday, March 31, 2026

Big Tech Joins Big Oil As Big CA Politics Spenders

By Lynn La, CALMATTERS

Big Tech spent $39 million to influence state politics last year, making 2025 a blockbuster year of spending for Meta, Google and other technology companies that want to push their agenda to California officials.

As CalMatters’ Jeremia Kimelman explains, the upcoming election, disputes over artificial intelligence regulation and the growth of the cryptocurrency industry have prompted Big Tech to spend big bucks on political campaigns, donate to nonprofit organizations and hire lobbyists.

The $39 million makes the tech industry the top political spender in California, alongside the oil and gas industry, giving tech companies an outsized influence in Sacramento, critics say.

• Catherine Bracy, founder of the nonprofit TechEquity, which is in favor of AI regulation: “There’s a question of why (tech companies) have to spend so much money. And that’s because they’re on the wrong side of history, and people don’t like them very much.”

Since the current two-year legislative session began in December 2024,