Monday, August 10, 2026

Altadena’s Permit Counter Closes 90 Minutes Before Its Doors Do

Monday brings the county’s widest slate of rebuilding services to West Woodbury Road, but paperwork has to be in hand by 3:00 p.m.

Anyone bringing rebuilding paperwork to Los Angeles County’s Altadena permit office on Monday afternoon needs to be there by 3:00 p.m., an hour and a half before the doors actually close.

The county’s Altadena One-Stop Permit Center keeps its widest service slate on Mondays, when rebuild consultations, Southern California Edison planner appointments, SoCalGas virtual appointments and the county job center all run out of 464 West Woodbury Road, Suite 210. Walk-in hours run from 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Last call for permits is 3:00 p.m. Nineteen months after the Eaton Fire, the Woodbury Road office is where the county’s permitting departments meet Altadena residents in person.

The Monday schedule is not the same as Tuesday’s. Rebuild consultation appointments run from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Virtual SCE planner appointments run from 8:00 a.m.

Monday, August 10, 2026

Last call: CA Liquor Delivery Law Ending After Lobbying Blitz

By Lynn La, CALMATTERS

The days of small-batch whiskey and gin being delivered to your doorstep are almost over.

An extensive lobbying effort to kill a proposal that would allow craft liquor distillers to keep shipping their products to California customers underscores how wealthy and powerful interests influence policy among lawmakers, writes CalMatters’ Ryan Sabalow.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Gov. Gavin Newsom issued an executive order allowing craft distillers to ship spirits to their customers’ homes. Legislators have kept passing laws to extend the temporary policy, with the latest expiring Dec. 31.

One Sacramento-area Republican is trying to make the policy permanent, but national alcohol distributors, truck drivers represented by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and California’s wine industry are working behind the scenes to spike the plan.

As alcohol consumption falls across the country, opponents insist they aren’t trying to stamp out small competitors. Though it’s unclear how much these groups spent on specific legislation,

Monday, August 10, 2026

Murder Case in Altadena Man’s Killing Returns to Pasadena Courtroom

Enrique Real, held since September 2020, is due back in Department F for another pretrial hearing

Enrique Antonio Real is due in a Pasadena courtroom at 8:30 a.m., where a case that began in a drugstore parking lot nearly six years ago will move one more step without reaching a jury.

Real, of Baldwin Park, faces one count of murder in the death of Christopher Flores, a 30-year-old Altadena resident. The hearing is set for Department F of the Pasadena Courthouse. Real was 19 the night Flores died, and he has been in custody since.

Pasadena police were called to the 100 block of East Orange Grove Boulevard at approximately 8:14 p.m. on Friday, Sept. 11, 2020, after multiple callers reported a stabbing victim in the CVS parking lot. The store sits at 20 East Orange Grove Boulevard, at the intersection with Fair Oaks Avenue.

Officers found Flores on the ground, bleeding heavily. He was taken to a hospital and died there.

Sunday, August 9, 2026

An Altadena Nonprofit’s Annual Back-to-School Giveaway Moves to Pasadena City Hall For the First Time Today

By THERESE EDU

LOV Olive Branches will distribute supplies, barbering vouchers and clothing to nearly 2,000 registered families on Sunday, August 9

When Valerie Toliver talks about handing a child a backpack, she does not talk about zippers or notebooks. She talks about the look on a kid’s face — the shift, she calls it — when a small face softens as yungster realizes, “Hey, there’s people out here that care.”

That moment will play out again on Sunday, August 9, when LOV Olive Branches Community Development Corporation holds what Toliver described as its 17th annual Back to School Community Give Back at Pasadena City Hall, distributing backpacks, school supplies, food, gift cards and clothing to families who have registered for the free event. Toliver is the organization’s President.

Close to 2,000 families have already signed up, Toliver said in early August.

The giveaway, scheduled from 12:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. at 100 North Garfield Avenue,

Saturday, August 8, 2026

PUSD Trustee to Tell Rotary How Her Mother’s Whistleblowing Closed Willowbrook

Jennifer Hall Lee traces a 1972 television exposé to the special education law that followed, and Wednesday’s luncheon is open to the public to attend

Pasadena Unified School District board member Jennifer Hall Lee will tell the Rotary Club of Pasadena on Wednesday how her mother’s whistleblowing inside a New York institution for people with disabilities helped force its closure and reshape special education nationwide.

The noon luncheon at the University Club of Pasadena is open to the public to attend, and it brings a national civil rights story back to the district Hall Lee helps govern. The federal law that guarantees special education services in every PUSD classroom traces to the scandal she will describe.

Her topic, as the club has billed it, is “Willowbrook School, Geraldo Rivera and Why Special Ed was Never the Same Again.” Hall Lee represents District 2 on the seven-member PUSD board and lives in Altadena. She also serves on the boards of the Pasadena chapters of the United Nations Association and the National Women’s Political Caucus.

Saturday, August 8, 2026

A Festival Before The Festival

By EDDIE RIVERA

Students tour Brookside ahead of Head in the Clouds

Head in the Clouds is two days away. The grass at Brookside is still green. The stage is still steel bones. The loudest sound on the field belongs to a portable speaker, slung from one hand.

That hand belongs to Tim Le, festival director for Goldenvoice, who spent Thursday morning walking the production lot with a microphone raised, narrating the guts of a music festival for about 25 high schoolers who had never seen one from this close. Behind him trailed forklifts, box trucks, a loader parked near the Arroyo Grill, and a line of students in matching lanyards trying to keep pace.

The event was Career Exploration Day, part of AEG Futures, a program run through the company’s Community Affairs and social impact teams in partnership with Goldenvoice and 88rising, the creative force behind Head in the Clouds. Students came from Crowell Family YMCA,

Friday, August 7, 2026

Unopposed PUSD School Board Races Would Be Removed From November Ballot

By ANDRÈ COLEMAN, Managing Editor

Instant winners will be appointed to school board

Two uncontested races for two school board seats won’t appear on the November ballot if additional qualified candidates do not emerge before tonight’s 5 p.m. filing period cutoff.

Incumbent Patrice Marshall McKenzie and candidate Dennis McNamara have qualified for seats in districts 5 and 7, respectively, and so far are running unopposed.

In accordance with Education Code Section 5328, the pair would be seated as if elected if no one else qualifies for the election.

Earlier this year, the Pasadena Unified School District (PUSD) passed a resolution adopting an Education Code that allows the Los Angeles County Registrar’s Office to cancel uncontested races as a cost-saving measure.

The canceled races would save the school district approximately $60,000 to $75,000 for each race canceled.

Several other school districts including the Arcadia Unified School District have canceled uncontested races.

Friday, August 7, 2026

Grant From Supervisor Barger Keeps Altadena Swimming Pool Open Through September 30

Loma Alta Park’s pool runs lap sessions, water exercise and lessons from August 24 under one-time Fifth District funding

For the second year running, Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger is paying to keep Altadena’s public pool open past the end of the county’s summer season.

A one-time grant from Barger will carry aquatic programming at Loma Alta Park through September 30, her Fifth District office announced August 6. The extended season runs Monday, August 24 through Wednesday, September 30, 2026, at the pool at 3330 North Lincoln Avenue in unincorporated Altadena. Los Angeles County Parks sets the pool’s regular summer season as June 8 through August 15.

The pool will be open Monday through Friday from 8:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. and from 2:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m., and Saturdays from 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. General swimming is free. Along with lap swim, water exercise and swim lessons, the extended schedule includes other aquatic programming, Barger’s office said.

Lap swim runs Monday through Friday from 8:00 a.m.

Friday, August 7, 2026

State Ties $11.8 Million Grant to Hearing on Pasadena Unified Enrollment Decline, Closures

The Pasadena Unified School District will receive about $11.8 million in one-time state money that requires the district to hold a public hearing on how it will address declining enrollment, including school closures and consolidations, the district’s chief business officer told the Board of Education on Thursday.

The disclosure came in the district’s 45-day budget revision, an update to the adopted budget that districts must make available for public review within 45 days of the governor signing the annual Budget Act.

Two conditions attach to the money.

The first requires districts in declining enrollment, or projected to be within five years, to hold a public hearing on plans to address the impact, including school closures or consolidation. Pasadena Unified falls within that category, Arik Avanesyans said. The law does not specify when the hearing must occur.

The second condition bars districts from charging employees fees for professional services, including induction and professional development costs. The district is awaiting a frequently asked questions document from the state to determine whether that applies only to programs a district operates or also to outside programs employees enroll in,

Friday, August 7, 2026

Band-Aid, Not A Cure: Federal Colorado River Plan Leaves States Guessing Every Two Years

By Rachel Becker, CALMATTERS

Dire water conditions, missed deadlines and uncertainty on the Colorado River are complicating critical water decisions in California.

No single state, water agency or federal official has shown the power, or the will, to break the deadlock among Colorado River basin states over how to share the dwindling supplies.

Years of fraught negotiations have failed to yield consensus even as major reservoir storage plummets to record lows — ratcheting up the tensions, and the stakes, for the states’ negotiators.

Now, key agreements for managing the river are expiring at the end of this year. These include agreements reached in 2007 that lasted nearly two decades, which took fewer than three years to craft.

This round of talks has already taken longer — and, so far, produced nothing so durable.

The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, the federal steward for the river under the Department of the Interior, last week released a 10-year framework that establishes rough parameters for managing the river,