Los Angeles
Scrap Yards, Scrapped Enforcement?
The City of Los Angeles’s regulatory tools exist to protect communities from metal recycling hazards—but they’re rarely invoked.
This post was co-written by UCLA Law student Kate Inman (J.D., 2026). Throughout California’s Senate District 20, roughly thirty scrap metal recycling facilities sit in the industrial corridors running alongside residential housing. For the working-class, majority-Latino communities living blocks away, the legal system has been slow to respond. Drive through Sun Valley or Pacoima on …
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CONTINUE READINGThe Future of the Colorado
There’s not enough water to go around, but there’s no agreement about what to do.
The Colorado River provides water to 40 million people and about 5.5 million acres of irrigated farmland. There’s only so much water to go around, so how to divide up the water has been hotly disputed for over a century. The previous agreement has come unstuck, but finding a replacement has proved devilishly difficult. I suspect that the Feds would rather avoid this political hot-potato through a state agreement. So far, however, state negotiations haven’t been successful. Maybe the impending threat of a federal mandate will light a fire under the negotiations. Otherwise, we are probably guaranteed years of litigation while the river runs dry.
CONTINUE READING‘Smog and Sunshine’: Achieving Clean Air in California
UCLA’s Ann Carlson discusses her new book and how the state can address federal efforts to undo its emissions standards.
Los Angeles is famous for both sunshine and smog. Turns out the two are related. Ozone pollution is caused by the interaction of sunlight and the chemicals that come out of vehicle tailpipes and factory smokestacks. But when Ann Carlson’s family first moved to Southern California, nobody knew what caused smog and there were no laws …
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CONTINUE READINGA Chance to Rebuild Better
AB 2385 by Assemblymember Cottie Petrie-Norris would help local governments spring into action after disasters.
Fourteen months after the Palisades and Eaton fires, many Angelenos remain uncertain if they will ever return to the neighborhoods they call home and policymakers are still grappling with how to help rebuild. Back in September, I wrote about a drafting wrinkle in state law that’s standing in the way of local governments’ ability to …
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CONTINUE READINGAnother White House Assault on Federalism
Trump’s Executive Order about rebuilding in LA is a huge federal power grab.
esterday, Trump issued an executive order that attempts to eliminate the need for building permits in the LA burn area. The argument is that the permitting process this slows down the rebuilding that FEMA grants are supposed to assist. he idea seems to be that whenever Congress choses to subsidize an activity, it authorizes agencies to eliminate all state regulations that might be barriers. Supreme Court opinions are full of admonitions against just this kind of assault on state authority, especially in fields like building permits that are a traditional domain of state and local government. And no, this isn’t an area where the President can rely on the Supreme Court’s conservatives. As much as they seem to like presidential authority, the conservative Justices have also shown a strong attachment to federalism.
“OFF WITH THEIR HEADS!”
Trump’s new wildfire Executive Order purporting to pre-empt state and local permitting is the latest insanity emanating from the White House.
The Mad King strikes again, or at least is claiming to: President Trump has announced an executive order to allow victims of the Los Angeles wildfires to rebuild without dealing with “unnecessary, duplicative, or obstructive” permitting requirements…. The order calls on the Secretary of Homeland Security and the Federal Emergency Management Agency to “preempt” state …
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CONTINUE READINGAlejandro Camacho Joins UCLA Law Faculty
Camacho will be a core faculty member of the UCLA Emmett Institute and a contributor to Legal Planet.
At this critical moment in environmental law, the Emmett Institute at UCLA School of Law keeps growing stronger. We are pleased to welcome Alejandro Camacho, a renowned regulatory scholar, as a professor of law. Camacho will be a core faculty member of the Emmett Institute on Climate Change and the Environment and a faculty affiliate of …
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CONTINUE READINGA Year After the LA Fires, Who’s Accountable for a Resilient Recovery?
Altadena and the Palisades are moving forward but outcomes depend on survivors’ access to resources. It doesn’t have to be this way.
Last week, on a warm December evening in Los Angeles, my husband and I were tidying our backyard after hosting a holiday lunch when our street’s palm trees began listing in a strong wind. I felt a chill run down my spine then, the same chill I felt the next day when I smelled smoke …
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CONTINUE READINGOne Big Energy Idea for the Next Governor
The Drain is a weekly roundup of environmental and climate news from Legal Planet.
If the candidates running to be California’s next governor want a prepackaged idea for how to reduce pollution while making energy more affordable in 2026, here’s one that has been hiding in plain sight. Make a modernization plan to direct money for electrification that is currently being diverted unnecessarily into aging gas infrastructure. But don’t …
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CONTINUE READINGReplumbing Los Angeles – Painfully Slowly
The City has captured 5.5 billion gallons of stormwater since October 1st — and that is literally just a drop in the bucket.
This caught my attention last week: The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power says it has captured nearly 5.5 billion gallons of water since Oct. 1 following the recent storms. Mayor Karen Bass’ office announced the estimate on Tuesday, saying it’s enough to serve almost 68,000 homes for an entire year. According to …
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