Speaker 1: You're listening to KFI AM six forty on demand.
Speaker 2: KFI AM six forty live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 3: This is Michael Monks Reports.
Speaker 2: I'm Michael Monks from KFI News with un til nine
Speaker 2: o'clock tonight. How about some journalism this evening. Journalism a
Speaker 2: big winner in Southern California today. Journalism the horse, a
Speaker 2: cult sired by the famous horse Curlin, has won the
Speaker 2: Santa Anita Derby and the half million dollar prize. Journalism
Speaker 2: now considered a favorite, maybe the favorite for the Kentucky
Speaker 2: Derby four weeks from now, after running right here in
Speaker 2: Southern California.
Speaker 3: That's exciting.
Speaker 2: Florida has beat Auburn in the first game of the
Speaker 2: Final four clash of Secs Titans, seventy nine to seventy three.
Speaker 2: The Gators will play Monday for the national title against
Speaker 2: the winner of the Houston Duke game that's underway right now.
Speaker 2: We saw another win for the Dodgers, three to one
Speaker 2: over the Phillies in Philly. La is now nine and
Speaker 2: one on the season. That's a hot start for the
Speaker 2: defending world champions and the Angels. My beloved Angels are
Speaker 2: hosting Cleveland in Anaheim, LA is four and three right now.
Speaker 2: We'll see if they stay above five hundred here in
Speaker 2: the early part of the season. They are winning right
Speaker 2: now on the top of the second three to one,
Speaker 2: and that is your KFI sports report. It was a
Speaker 2: heck of a drive into Burbank today from downtown LA.
Speaker 2: Traffic was clogged down there. It's always clogged, but today
Speaker 2: there are protests. Thousands of people are out in the
Speaker 2: streets speaking out against President Trump, elon Musk tariffs, all
Speaker 2: sorts of topics. It's called hands off and these protests
Speaker 2: are happening all across the country, including right here. There's
Speaker 2: a big rally at Pershing Square this afternoon, followed by
Speaker 2: a march to city Hall, and as I understand it,
Speaker 2: these demonstrators carried a twenty foot tall balloon of the
Speaker 2: image of President Trump wearing a diaper and a fifteen
Speaker 2: foot tall helium filled balloon representing tru Trup wearing a
Speaker 2: Russian military uniform. During that march, it was nearly a
Speaker 2: mile long walk across sidewalks and streets downtown all the
Speaker 2: way to city Hall. That could still be underway. There
Speaker 2: are other protests today in Glendale, Hollywood, Riverside, Santa Ana,
Speaker 2: and Palm Springs. Next hour, we're going to talk about
Speaker 2: tariffs because Governor Newsom has declared that California is going
Speaker 2: to work on its own deals with foreign countries after
Speaker 2: this week sweeping tariff policy announced by the White House.
Speaker 2: We saw the stocks tank this week and now there
Speaker 2: are fears about rising prices, potential job losses, a lot
Speaker 2: of worries out there as we watch this very strange
Speaker 2: period in American history and see how this Trump policy
Speaker 2: plays out. But we've got this hour first, and I
Speaker 2: want to tell you about some new neighbors that I
Speaker 2: got in the Fashion District downtown. They're not my building,
Speaker 2: they are outside of it, and they live in some
Speaker 2: new tents. I am seeing more tents on the sidewalk
Speaker 2: outside my building that I have seen in the two
Speaker 2: years and two and a half months that I have
Speaker 2: lived in downtown LA. We've seen one or two pop
Speaker 2: up over that time at different times, but they don't
Speaker 2: last very long. I'm in the Fashion District and that's
Speaker 2: you know, a couple of blocks from skid Row, but
Speaker 2: there seems to be a pretty clear delineation usually like
Speaker 2: it's a hard stop for the row of tents that
Speaker 2: you see in skid Row, it stops and then you're
Speaker 2: in the Flower District, the Fashion District and you just
Speaker 2: see an occasional pop up tent there. But lately they're
Speaker 2: adding up, so they're creeping closer skid Row, creeping closer
Speaker 2: to the Fashion District, and that has me wondering is
Speaker 2: homelessness getting better in Los Angeles, Like the LA Homeless
Speaker 2: Services Authority and the city and the County of Clane
Speaker 2: based on their counts from the past two years.
Speaker 3: I mean, we have some.
Speaker 2: Big news this week on the local homeless front. We
Speaker 2: saw the new sales tax go up that we voted
Speaker 2: for in Los Angeles County to support homeless programs. We
Speaker 2: saw LA County decide to cut off its funding starting
Speaker 2: next year too the LA Homeless Services Authority and create
Speaker 2: its own homeless department. We saw the City Council in
Speaker 2: Los Angeles tell Mayor Karen Bass, no, you can't have
Speaker 2: all the money that you've asked for for your inside
Speaker 2: Safe Homeless program. And just yesterday we saw LA Homeless
Speaker 2: Services Authority CEO Valicia Adams Kellum announce her resignation just
Speaker 2: a few days after La County decided they were no
Speaker 2: longer going to give the agency hundreds of millions of
Speaker 2: dollars starting next year, So we're going to talk about that.
Speaker 2: Adams Kellum tried to get the Board of Supervisors to
Speaker 2: change their minds, and I'm going to play for you
Speaker 2: part of what she said, because it struck me while
Speaker 2: I was watching this on Tuesday that not only was
Speaker 2: the County's relationship with LASA clearly over, as demonstrated by
Speaker 2: what happened while adams Kellum was talking, but I think
Speaker 2: adams Kellum's career, at least in that position was also
Speaker 2: very clearly coming to an end. I'm going to place
Speaker 2: some sound from that presentation for you. And then over
Speaker 2: at City Hall, council members taking a harder stance against
Speaker 2: Mayor Karen Bass and her inside Safe programs. The mayor
Speaker 2: hat asked for like forty six million dollars for this
Speaker 2: quarter to continue operating her policy that we don't know
Speaker 2: a whole lot about it. Even council members don't get
Speaker 2: all of the data or the information that they want
Speaker 2: about it. So they said, no, you can't have it all.
Speaker 2: You can have twenty nine point one million dollars. Instead,
Speaker 2: because a lot of that money is spoken for. We
Speaker 2: want to make sure the vendors are paid. We're going
Speaker 2: to get into that this hour as well. But I
Speaker 2: want to hear from you. I mean, am I seeing things.
Speaker 2: It feels like it's gotten worse in my neighborhood.
Speaker 4: Now.
Speaker 2: I know I'm unique in our area and that I
Speaker 2: kind of live in the midst of it, but it's
Speaker 2: getting worse in the midst of it from my vantage point.
Speaker 2: Do you think any of the news this week will
Speaker 2: make the homeless situation better in La in La County?
Speaker 2: Do you think it's getting better? Do you think there's
Speaker 2: anything they can do to make it better? The sales
Speaker 2: tax has gone up, the new homeless department is being
Speaker 2: stood up, LAS has basically been defunded. City council is
Speaker 2: starting to get a little stronger, apparently towards Mayor Bass's
Speaker 2: Inside Safe program. Do you think any of this is
Speaker 2: going to make a difference in the presence in the
Speaker 2: volume of homeless homelessness across the city in the county.
Speaker 2: You open up the iHeartRadio app, click on that talkback button,
Speaker 2: and we're gonna play some of your messages during the
Speaker 2: show tonight. Also tonight a marine biologist on the front
Speaker 2: line of trying to save sea lions and dolphins sickened
Speaker 2: and dying by that toxic algae at our beaches. And
Speaker 2: next hour, Democratic US Senator Adam Schiff joins us. He'll
Speaker 2: talk about the tariffs, and then we'll have republic and
Speaker 2: State Senator Tony Strickland. He'll be here to weigh in
Speaker 2: on California's financial state. Spoiler alert. He doesn't think we're
Speaker 2: in a good financial position, and he'll share with us
Speaker 2: what he thinks the state should do based on some
Speaker 2: Republican ideas. That's all I had tonight on Michael Monks Reports,
Speaker 2: We're with you till nine o'clock. Hope you can stay
Speaker 2: with us, Hope you can join our conversation. We'll continue.
Speaker 1: You're listening to KFI AM six forty on demand.
Speaker 2: KFI AM six forty live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 2: This is Michael Monks Reports. I'm Michael Monks from KFI News.
Speaker 2: We're with you till nine o'clock tonight, and I know
Speaker 2: there's a lot of worry all across the country, really
Speaker 2: at this point across the world about price increases, economic
Speaker 2: impacts from the sweeping policies announced by President Trump as
Speaker 2: it relates to tariffs across the globe. But we are
Speaker 2: already facing rising prices in Los Angeles County. And if
Speaker 2: you don't like it, thank your neighbors. Because this was
Speaker 2: voted on LA County voter's last November approved measure A
Speaker 2: increasing the sales tax, putting a full half cent addition
Speaker 2: on it, replacing a quarter cent edition, solely to fund
Speaker 2: homeless programs and to keep people from falling into homelessness.
Speaker 2: So there's a whole lot of different pieces to this,
Speaker 2: but it's mostly homeless stuff. The previous quartercent sales tax
Speaker 2: was supposed to expire in twenty twenty seven. This new
Speaker 2: one does not expire. It would have to go back
Speaker 2: to the ballot again for people to repeal it. So
Speaker 2: now we're stuck with this one. A lot more money
Speaker 2: is going to be coming in to fight homelessness. This
Speaker 2: was a big, big week for homelessness in Los Angeles County,
Speaker 2: a lot of changes. This sales tax went into effect
Speaker 2: on Monday. On Tuesday, LA County voted to leave basically
Speaker 2: the LA Homeless Services Authority, the joint agency governed by
Speaker 2: the County and the City of Los Angeles. They're tired
Speaker 2: of all of the poor audits, all of the misinformation
Speaker 2: or lack of information and data on outcomes on whether
Speaker 2: the programs are even working. So La County's going to
Speaker 2: do its own thing. And that left the city in
Speaker 2: a lurch. City council members came crawling to the Board
Speaker 2: of Supervisors begging them not to break up. But then
Speaker 2: that same day, city council members told Mayor Karen Bash
Speaker 2: she can't have all the money that she's asked for
Speaker 2: for her Inside Safe Homeless program. And then yesterday the
Speaker 2: loss of CEO announced her resignation. This was a consequential
Speaker 2: week for homelessness in La and La County. And I
Speaker 2: want to hear from you. Do you think it will
Speaker 2: make a difference. Do you anticipate things improving with more
Speaker 2: money at different department, maybe a little more resolved to
Speaker 2: see results from our government officials Before we went to
Speaker 2: break I told you I'm seeing in my own neighborhood
Speaker 2: more tents popping up. I lived downtown. I'm not far
Speaker 2: from skid Row, but skid Row's gotten closer in the
Speaker 2: past few weeks, and I'm curious what you think up
Speaker 2: the iHeartRadio app. Click on that talkback button and we
Speaker 2: will place some of your messages during the course of
Speaker 2: this program. At the Board of Supervisors meeting on Tuesday,
Speaker 2: as I noted, they voted to create their own homeless department.
Speaker 2: They're going to handle their own money from here on out,
Speaker 2: and they're basically defunding LASA. But before they voted to
Speaker 2: do so, five members of the Los Angeles City Council
Speaker 2: finished up their own meeting at City Hall and then
Speaker 2: they marched up to the Kenneth Han County Building to
Speaker 2: talk to the supervisors. And I want you to hear
Speaker 2: what City Councilman Bob Blumenfield told the supervisors.
Speaker 5: Measure A is not just county dollars. These are Angelino's
Speaker 5: who not only supported this, but who are the majority
Speaker 5: of the homeless folks. So you know, I think of
Speaker 5: the old store. When you go in a store, if
Speaker 5: you break it, you own it. So you know, we're
Speaker 5: breaking up LASA. Here is the way I see what's happening.
Speaker 5: And there's going to be a lot of ownership on
Speaker 5: the county in terms of the responsibilities for service. And
Speaker 5: I know it's not technically.
Speaker 3: Breaking it up.
Speaker 5: But you pull out all of that money.
Speaker 3: It's just the city.
Speaker 1: Basically at this point what.
Speaker 5: LASSO would just become an outgrowth of the city and
Speaker 5: we'd have to figure out how to manage that situation.
Speaker 2: That's what they're going to have to figure out how
Speaker 2: to manage because all of those measure a dollars, as
Speaker 2: he mentioned the sales tax dollars, those are going to
Speaker 2: the county. Now they're going to share it with the
Speaker 2: cities based on their homeless count So LA will still
Speaker 2: get a disproportionate share, or I should say a proportionate
Speaker 2: share compared to the other cities. City Councilman Nitthia Rahman,
Speaker 2: who chairs the city Council's Homeless Committee, also went and
Speaker 2: kind of refused to stop talking. Let's hear from her.
Speaker 6: We've had a ten percent reduction in street homelessness thanks
Speaker 6: to our work and investments citywide, and a forty percent
Speaker 6: reduction in street homelessness provements in that data, and we've
Speaker 6: already been able to use that data to make significant
Speaker 6: improvements in the number of people moving indoors and off
Speaker 6: the streets. I thought I would have three minutes. That's
Speaker 6: what I staff told me, I'm just going to finish
Speaker 6: reading this, if that's okay.
Speaker 2: I've also so do you hear her there? Basically, these
Speaker 2: council members showed up, they did not have a scheduled presentation.
Speaker 2: They were put in the gallery with people like you
Speaker 2: and me. If you wanted to talk to the supervisors,
Speaker 2: and everybody was given one minute. Counselman Nithia Rahman did
Speaker 2: not agree to that and continued talking.
Speaker 6: Potentially jeopardizing all of the shared progress that we've made.
Speaker 6: Our hundreds of millions of dollars in investments are invested
Speaker 6: in shared programs that are at risk of falling apart
Speaker 6: when you move quickly, and we are also at a
Speaker 6: time of great federal funding risk. What we need right
Speaker 6: now is collaboration and planning, trying to start, not uncertainty,
Speaker 6: and I remain uncertain about why moving from one bureaucracy
Speaker 6: to another will actually help us achieve the outcomes.
Speaker 2: Thank you that we have.
Speaker 6: Already been moving towards and that we desperately want to
Speaker 6: get to.
Speaker 3: Thank you.
Speaker 2: So she went on for about three minutes, in spite
Speaker 2: of Supervisor Katherine Barger saying thank you repeatedly and asking
Speaker 2: her to stop But what was really interesting was that
Speaker 2: the CEO of LASS, of the very agency that this
Speaker 2: vote was about, at the County building to enhance transparency.
Speaker 7: I promised that we would improve our operations, and we have.
Speaker 7: We've implemented twenty new data dashboards that provide unprecedented insight
Speaker 7: into how our system functions, the questions you had about
Speaker 7: functions and system improvements. We can actually provide that data
Speaker 7: to you today and it is on our public website
Speaker 7: and it's public facing. To improve our contracting, we're at
Speaker 7: eighty percent.
Speaker 6: Thank you.
Speaker 3: Becover Michaels.
Speaker 8: Please can we give her, given the fact that she
Speaker 8: is over lost, I'd like to give her an initial
Speaker 8: thirty seconds.
Speaker 7: To finish another thirty seconds to improve provider payments, we
Speaker 7: worked with all of you to ensure that we would
Speaker 7: have advanced systems where we would reconcile and providers no
Speaker 7: longer waiting months and months. We've made a lot of
Speaker 7: the changes that you.
Speaker 4: She's basically trying to make the case that we have
Speaker 4: helped make for her agency to be saved way possible,
Speaker 4: but they did not even bring her to a table
Speaker 4: to make any sort of presentation at all.
Speaker 3: As I said before, they turn her mic off again.
Speaker 7: Me and my daughter's experienced homelessness.
Speaker 2: Right, she's about to share her personal story about how
Speaker 2: she and her daughter experienced homelessness together, and they knocked
Speaker 2: the mic off. The county's done with LASA, and now
Speaker 2: she Alicia adams Kellum is also done with LOSSA because
Speaker 2: three days after that meeting where the supervisors voted to
Speaker 2: leave the organization and create their own homeless department, adam's
Speaker 2: Kellum resigned. She does expect to remain on board for
Speaker 2: a transition period of about one hundred and twenty days
Speaker 2: longer if needed, she says. She says she's incredibly proud
Speaker 2: of Loss's talented and dedicated staff and deeply grateful for
Speaker 2: their tireless work. She says, I thank them and the
Speaker 2: Commission for the opportunity to serve as CEO for our
Speaker 2: partnership in reducing homelessness in our region.
Speaker 3: But has she.
Speaker 2: Is it getting better? Will it get better? I want
Speaker 2: to know what you think about all of these moving
Speaker 2: parts that we've seen happen this week, and whether you
Speaker 2: feel any sense of optimism now that all of these
Speaker 2: sweeping changes have taken place. Again, a very consequential week
Speaker 2: as it relates to homelessness and the City of Los
Speaker 2: Angeles and the County of Los Angeles. Open up the
Speaker 2: iHeartRadio app, click on that talkback button and we will
Speaker 2: play some of your messages coming up. And after we
Speaker 2: get back from a little break, I'm going to take
Speaker 2: you to LA City Hall. We're these same council members
Speaker 2: who were begging to keep LASA together. We're also saying, hey,
Speaker 2: we're not so sure about the way we're spending our
Speaker 2: homeless money, so we need to get a better handle
Speaker 2: on it. And they shot down mare Bass's request for
Speaker 2: a lot of money.
Speaker 3: That's next.
Speaker 1: You're listening to KFI AM six forty on demand.
Speaker 2: KFI AM six forty live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 2: I'm Michael Monks. This is Michael Monks Reports. We're with
Speaker 2: you till nine o'clock tonight, keeping tabs on the news
Speaker 2: from the week and the week ahead. And it was
Speaker 2: a busy week on the homeless front across Los Angeles County.
Speaker 2: Lots of big things happening. What does it mean for
Speaker 2: our future? Do you feel better about the government and
Speaker 2: its response to homelessness moving forward?
Speaker 3: Are you more optimistic now?
Speaker 2: That La County is leaving the LA Homeless Services Authority
Speaker 2: founding its own homeless department, Now that the city Council
Speaker 2: is looking a little tougher against the inside Safe program
Speaker 2: by the mayor, And now that the CEO of the
Speaker 2: La Homeless Services Authority has announced her resignation, And now
Speaker 2: that you are paying more on just about everything you
Speaker 2: buy because of the sales tax voters approved last November
Speaker 2: to support homeless programs. You can join our conversation right
Speaker 2: here tonight. Open up that iHeartRadio app, click on the
Speaker 2: talkback button. Let's hear from Larie.
Speaker 8: When are the taxpayers going to realize the money that's
Speaker 8: supposed to go to the homeless people don't go to
Speaker 8: the homeless people. I became homeless under the Biden administration.
Speaker 8: I've been begging for help. They refuse to give it
Speaker 8: to me. Why because I have a part time job.
Speaker 8: I am sixty years old, I'm living on the streets.
Speaker 8: The cachet they want to provide me. I have the
Speaker 8: jump to hoops and go through this Leigo Shavigo stuff
Speaker 8: and it's alone.
Speaker 9: I have to pay it back.
Speaker 3: And now let's hear from Lauri.
Speaker 10: Okay, Monks, no, I don't think anything's going to get
Speaker 10: better now. I don't live in La County, but I
Speaker 10: drive down there quite often with my daughter and we
Speaker 10: see it everywhere. It's not going away. And then those
Speaker 10: clowns are going to make some department and they're going
Speaker 10: to employ all the losers that lost the two billion. Wow,
Speaker 10: that's smart.
Speaker 2: I think Laurie is talking about the two point three
Speaker 2: billion dollars that was identified by a third party audit
Speaker 2: group ordered by a federal judge by the way to
Speaker 2: take a look at the way LASA and the city
Speaker 2: were spending their money on homeless funds. And they didn't
Speaker 2: necessarily say that the money was lost or unaccounted for.
Speaker 2: They were just saying it wasn't properly accounted for. And
Speaker 2: that's pretty damning when you're talking about government spending two
Speaker 2: point three billion dollars worth. And one of the key
Speaker 2: findings of that audit was something that was repeated from
Speaker 2: an audit from last year, that this money is going
Speaker 2: out the door to third party homeless service providers without
Speaker 2: any set expectations, without any metrics to measure on whether
Speaker 2: that money was used successfully. So, for example, let's say
Speaker 2: that you spend money with through your sales tax, the
Speaker 2: county collects it, they put it into the fund that
Speaker 2: they send over to LASA, and then LASA has its
Speaker 2: money to pay these third party providers. And let's say
Speaker 2: there is a homeless shelter that says, I take in
Speaker 2: ten people with the money you give me, and because
Speaker 2: they stay with me, after ninety one hundred and twenty days,
Speaker 2: they'll be sober, they'll be cleaned up, and they'll be
Speaker 2: ready to work. And that's something you can measure. They're
Speaker 2: taking ten people in and the result I expect is
Speaker 2: that these folks will be employed at the end of
Speaker 2: their stay. Instead, third party providers were just being paid
Speaker 2: money and there were no expectations, at least not documented.
Speaker 2: And that most recent audit is what seem to really
Speaker 2: speed up the process of the county leaving lossap. The
Speaker 2: poor accounting, the lack of demonstrable metrics, and the lack
Speaker 2: of demonstrable success. Join our conversation the iHeartRadio app. Click
Speaker 2: on that talkback button and we'll get your comments in
Speaker 2: here as well. It was interesting to watch on Tuesday
Speaker 2: as La City Council members crawled over to the LA
Speaker 2: Board of Supervisors meeting the County Board of Supervisors meeting,
Speaker 2: begging the county to keep LASA intact again. This is
Speaker 2: a joint operation by the county and the city to
Speaker 2: address homelessness, and without the county it's just the city
Speaker 2: with a lot less money and a lot fewer people
Speaker 2: working on the issue. So five council members walked over
Speaker 2: to beg but before they did that, the same day
Speaker 2: there was also a city council meeting taking place, and
Speaker 2: Mayor Karen Bass was already ordered last year by the
Speaker 2: city Council in the new budget process to come and
Speaker 2: ask for her Inside Safe homeless program money every quarter
Speaker 2: rather than just getting a big lump sum at the
Speaker 2: beginning of the year and doing whatever they want with it.
Speaker 2: But the city now faces a billion dollar budget shortfall.
Speaker 2: Suddenly everybody is very budget conscience. City administrative Officer Matt
Speaker 2: and Sabo recommend and did the transfer of about forty
Speaker 2: six point one million dollars to cover cost forty six
Speaker 2: point one million dollars to cover cost related to Inside
Speaker 2: Safe and other initiatives to address homelessness. But instead, on Tuesday,
Speaker 2: the City Council voted fourteen to zero to transfer twenty
Speaker 2: nine point one million dollars instead. That's a difference of
Speaker 2: seventeen million from the original request. And they also said, yes,
Speaker 2: you can have twenty nine point one, but we want
Speaker 2: several reports. We want questions answered because we are not
Speaker 2: getting the information that we want or need about Inside Safe.
Speaker 2: This twenty nine point one million includes twelve point one
Speaker 2: for booking agreements. Keep in mind, Inside Safe is basically
Speaker 2: a hotel program. These homeless folks are gathered out of
Speaker 2: their camps and placed in motels. Twelve point one for
Speaker 2: the fiscal year, second in th third quarters, two point
Speaker 2: seven million for occupancy costs. What does that mean? Ten
Speaker 2: point seven million dollars for the Inside Safe Motel Interim
Speaker 2: Housing Portfolio Service provider first quarter remaining. Did you see
Speaker 2: the language that's used? How can you even understand what
Speaker 2: these millions of dollars are being used. What was explained
Speaker 2: by members of council is that those costs had already
Speaker 2: been incurred. Basically, either third party homeless service of providers
Speaker 2: or the motels hotels that are working with the mayor
Speaker 2: on this program had already done the work, so they
Speaker 2: should be paid for it. So that's the money that
Speaker 2: they gave out, but they weren't too excited about the
Speaker 2: rest of the funds. We talked last week with city
Speaker 2: councilmen Monica Rodriguez about her frustrations related to homeless spending
Speaker 2: and the city's budget and all that, and that was
Speaker 2: on Saturday last week. But on Tuesday at this meeting,
Speaker 2: she was also pretty ticked off. Let's hear what she
Speaker 2: had to say.
Speaker 11: My frustration about how this program has operated is obviously
Speaker 11: no secret. The fact that we are accepting after the
Speaker 11: Budget Committee gave a very clear instruction about the data
Speaker 11: that was supposed to be provided to this council with
Speaker 11: respect to the inside safe operations, and that these reports
Speaker 11: still have a litany going back for over a year
Speaker 11: of blank spaces with pending information only underscores the failure
Speaker 11: for LASA to give us real time data and the
Speaker 11: Mayor's office I don't understand given this fiscal crisis. By
Speaker 11: the way, happy National Financial.
Speaker 3: Literacy Month, she's getting sassy.
Speaker 11: Okay, we are in a fiscal crisis, and yet we
Speaker 11: have not cut off the spigot for funding that continues
Speaker 11: to allow the Mayor's office to expend these resources and
Speaker 11: put a gun to her head to say, well, if
Speaker 11: we don't pay the bill, all these service providers in
Speaker 11: all these rooms are going to go under. That wasn't
Speaker 11: the way this was intended.
Speaker 2: I love it when La Signora gets a little feisty
Speaker 2: down there and she is really ticked off lately, especially
Speaker 2: about homeless spending. She's been on at the longest. She
Speaker 2: was criticizing inside Safe last year, she was criticizing LASA
Speaker 2: last year. She called for a city homeless department to
Speaker 2: be created last year. So she's not gotten any happier
Speaker 2: about the situation. But in our previous segment, you heard
Speaker 2: city Councilman Bob Blouomenfield go to the County Board of
Speaker 2: Supervisors and say, please, don't break up with us, Let's
Speaker 2: keep LASA intact. However, he notes that there are problems
Speaker 2: even with the spending at the city and its inside
Speaker 2: Safe program spearheaded by the mayor, let's hear from him.
Speaker 5: And first and foremost, we want to make sure that
Speaker 5: that service providers are not carrying any debt, any millions
Speaker 5: of dollars or any debt. So we're going to make
Speaker 5: sure that the money that they are owed gets out
Speaker 5: the door. But we also want to make sure service
Speaker 5: providers are documenting their expenses and their services are getting
Speaker 5: advances for are rendered in a way that's producing results.
Speaker 5: That's why I supported all the amendments today that we're
Speaker 5: introduced for more details for greater council involvement and how
Speaker 5: we move forward.
Speaker 2: But it's also why with.
Speaker 5: Council Women Ramen, we introduced an amendment to hold quarter
Speaker 5: three advances, not the money that's oh to ensure that
Speaker 5: there's greater council involvement in oversight over the limited general
Speaker 5: fund dollars that we're spending. We need to make sure
Speaker 5: that service providers are focused on throughput and the city
Speaker 5: verifies services that are being rendered. There's a real possibility
Speaker 5: that if people are not moving onto permanent housing, they
Speaker 5: may move to another interim site in the city because
Speaker 5: it's not sustainable to continue funding motels with booking agreements
Speaker 5: that are not Alliance compliant.
Speaker 2: So now they're asking questions that maybe would have been
Speaker 2: better asked a year ago, but they're asking them now.
Speaker 2: That's why I'm asking you, do you feel a change
Speaker 2: in the air. Do you sense something different? Are you
Speaker 2: more optimistic about the city and the county and the
Speaker 2: response to homelessness. Join the conversation, open the iHeart media,
Speaker 2: excuse me, the iHeartRadio app, and click on that talkback
Speaker 2: button and let us know. I want to be clear.
Speaker 2: City Councilman Nthia Rahman, who basically violated the public speaking
Speaker 2: rules at the county meeting, said during this city council
Speaker 2: meeting before she went down and disrespected the supervisors that
Speaker 2: this vote not to give the mayor all the money
Speaker 2: she wants for inside Safe should not be seen as
Speaker 2: a slight. They just want to make sure that they
Speaker 2: are quote better at doing the work that we have
Speaker 2: all committed to over and over again, over and over again.
Speaker 2: Is correct? Will it work this time? Remains to be seen.
Speaker 2: Up next, a conversation with a marine biologist on the
Speaker 2: front lines of helping those six sea lions and dolphins
Speaker 2: who are dying across southern California beaches.
Speaker 1: You're listening to KFI AM six forty on demand.
Speaker 2: I Am six forty live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 2: This is Michael Monks Reports. I'm Michael Monks from KFI
Speaker 2: News with you till nine o'clock tonight. Tragedy has unfolded
Speaker 2: on beaches across southern California, sea lions, dolphins, birds falling
Speaker 2: sick and dying because of a toxic algae bloom in
Speaker 2: the water. Some of the animals can be saved, some can't.
Speaker 2: And one of the people working to help these sea
Speaker 2: mammals is Dave Batter, a marine biologist at the Marine
Speaker 2: Mammal Care Center in San Pedro, and he joins us now,
Speaker 2: Dave Bater, I'm so grateful for the time you're giving us.
Speaker 3: Thanks for being with us.
Speaker 9: Yeah, thanks for having me.
Speaker 2: I know this is a very challenging time for your organization.
Speaker 2: We're seeing a lot of headlines, a lot of news
Speaker 2: updates coming out of the beach areas. What is the
Speaker 2: situation in your fascetability right now? What can you tell
Speaker 2: us about what's going on with your patients.
Speaker 9: Yeah, right now, we have a massive harmful alva bloom
Speaker 9: off the coast of Los Angeles and actually throughout southern California.
Speaker 9: There's an algae planktonic algae out there that's creating neurotoxins
Speaker 9: called demoic acid builds up in the food chain, eventually
Speaker 9: concentrating into animals like California sea lions, dolphins, and seabirds,
Speaker 9: causing symptoms like seizures, lethargy, abnormal behavior, sometimes aggressive behavior,
Speaker 9: and sometimes death for the animals as well.
Speaker 2: What does it mean though, to be infected by this
Speaker 2: or to be affected by this when we hear that
Speaker 2: they are sick. What's going on?
Speaker 9: So the toxin is a neurotoxin. It affects obviously, they're
Speaker 9: nerves and some organ function as well. The toxin causes
Speaker 9: the nerves to to fire uncontrollably, which leads to the
Speaker 9: symptoms like seizures, and really the animals are having a
Speaker 9: hard time, you know, with all of their nervous functions
Speaker 9: and can cause them to act abnormally and wind up
Speaker 9: in places that they shouldn't be. And unfortunately for a
Speaker 9: lot of them, the toxicity this time around seems to
Speaker 9: be higher than it has in the past and causing
Speaker 9: a lot of fatalities as well.
Speaker 2: That's what I wanted to ask, because you're an organization
Speaker 2: that deals with sick sea mammals, But have you ever
Speaker 2: seen it on this scale before?
Speaker 9: So this is the fourth year of a harmful algabom
Speaker 9: of this type, which is really unprecedented. In twenty twenty three,
Speaker 9: we had at that time the most massive, harmful alglabloom
Speaker 9: of this type in southern California. This year, it seems worse,
Speaker 9: but it's important to remember we had a similar bloom
Speaker 9: of this type of algae in twenty two, twenty three,
Speaker 9: twenty four, and now again in twenty five, and it
Speaker 9: seems to be that twenty five is the worst of
Speaker 9: all of those years.
Speaker 2: You mentioned that sometimes these animals are ending up in
Speaker 2: places they're not supposed to be.
Speaker 3: Where are those places?
Speaker 9: Yeah, I guess we should rephrase that, because when we
Speaker 9: go to the beach, we're going to a place that
Speaker 9: is the wild. You know, going to the beach is
Speaker 9: the same as going to the Santa Monica Mountains or
Speaker 9: up here in the Saint Gabriels. You're going to a
Speaker 9: wild place, and you should expect to see wildlife. When
Speaker 9: I say that they're in places that they shouldn't be,
Speaker 9: it's more like the places that we shouldn't we don't
Speaker 9: normally expect that see them. And you know, on our
Speaker 9: popular beaches alone, to sea lions in particular like to
Speaker 9: hang out in groups. So it's really that this neurotoxin
Speaker 9: is affecting their ability to you know, make decisions and
Speaker 9: really do normal activities of the California sea lions. But
Speaker 9: we need to remember that when we go to the beach,
Speaker 9: we're going to the wild, and we need to give
Speaker 9: wild animals the space they deserve, especially at this time
Speaker 9: when the animals are so sick. You want to make
Speaker 9: sure we give animals fifty feet of space at least,
Speaker 9: and if you're worried, give us a college.
Speaker 2: We're talking with Dave Bator or marine biologists with the
Speaker 2: Marine Mammal Care Center in San Pedro. We're not talking
Speaker 2: just sea lions in this case, Is that right? I mean,
Speaker 2: sea lions have seemed to grab a lot of headlines,
Speaker 2: but other animals are being impacted by this.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 9: Unfortunately, we're seeing quite a few dolphins also show up
Speaker 9: on our local beaches as well as seabirds, and it's
Speaker 9: particularly tragic for dolphins. Most of them, actually all of
Speaker 9: them are. When we find them, they're either no longer
Speaker 9: alive or really close to death, and the only treatment
Speaker 9: really is humane euthanasia. It's important to remember whens get sick,
Speaker 9: they're sick at sea. They don't come to shore ever,
Speaker 9: and if they're so sick that they end up washing ashore.
Speaker 9: They're really close to death and they're suffering. It's important
Speaker 9: that we remember that because we don't want to increase
Speaker 9: their suffering at all. I know a lot of people
Speaker 9: want to do something to help, and they want to
Speaker 9: push the animals back out to sea, but really those
Speaker 9: animals are if they go back into the ocean, likely
Speaker 9: to drown, and if we're to interact with them, likely
Speaker 9: to cause them additional stress in their last moments. We
Speaker 9: have to remember that and you see these animals. Give
Speaker 9: these animals the dignity to deserve in those last moments
Speaker 9: and call eight hundred three to nine whale, let us
Speaker 9: come down and let us manage the situation. It's the
Speaker 9: best thing we can do.
Speaker 3: That is what I wanted to ask you.
Speaker 2: It does sound like in your response there that there's
Speaker 2: really there's not much that we can do as humans
Speaker 2: other than calling more skilled humans like you. As heartbreaking
Speaker 2: as it is to see a dolphin washed.
Speaker 9: Ashore, yeah, it's been causing quite a toll on our
Speaker 9: staff as well. You can imagine. Well, it's so many
Speaker 9: animals being so impacted. It's hard on all of us,
Speaker 9: and it's important to remember that we were doing our
Speaker 9: best to manage the situation as best we can, and
Speaker 9: sometimes the outcomes aren't positive. But it's also good to
Speaker 9: remember that for those animals we can get to in time,
Speaker 9: we can provide treatment, we can help them with their symptoms,
Speaker 9: we can sedate them, we can give them anti seizure medicines,
Speaker 9: and for a lot of these animals, we're able to
Speaker 9: rehabilitate them, get them back to help and get them
Speaker 9: back out into the oceans.
Speaker 2: What type of difficult decisions are your staff having to make,
Speaker 2: because if you come across some of these animals and
Speaker 2: you have so many in your care already, are you
Speaker 2: having to make determinations on wish ones you can take
Speaker 2: in and wish ones just have to be left behind.
Speaker 9: Unfortunately, that's the case. We have so many animals that
Speaker 9: are stranding on our local beaches that we have only
Speaker 9: so many rescue trucks that we can go out to
Speaker 9: pick up those animals and bring them back. But fortunately
Speaker 9: we have a wonderfully dedicated group of volunteers that are
Speaker 9: out on our local beaches. We call them the Piniped Patrol.
Speaker 9: When we have an animal that strands, we're able to
Speaker 9: call in those volunteers who can stay with the animal,
Speaker 9: help engage the public, inform them of what's happening, keep
Speaker 9: the animals safe, keep the public safe.
Speaker 3: How does this end?
Speaker 9: So these blooms tend to last in the past four
Speaker 9: to eight weeks. Unfortunately, we're I think we're in a
Speaker 9: new normal now. You know, it's not normal for us
Speaker 9: to have blooms of this type four years in a row.
Speaker 9: They usually were somewhere between three and seven years apart,
Speaker 9: and the duration of these sort of unknown. Right now,
Speaker 9: it's not abating, it's as concentrated as it has been,
Speaker 9: and we're least five weeks in right now, so we're
Speaker 9: hopeful that it follows the same path and we're able
Speaker 9: to see an end to this in the next few weeks.
Speaker 2: It's such a terrible situation to think of our beautiful
Speaker 2: beaches being the scene of such tragedy. We're talking about
Speaker 2: pregnant sea lions giving birth to stillborn pops and all
Speaker 2: of these affected animals, whether they be sea lions, seabirds,
Speaker 2: or dolphins. So I'm sure the community would express its
Speaker 2: gratitude to you for the work that your organization is doing, Dave,
Speaker 2: and we do thank you for taking some time out
Speaker 2: of all of the work that you're doing to talk
Speaker 2: to us about it.
Speaker 9: Thank you, yeah, thank you. We deeply appreciate the community
Speaker 9: that stepped up. We've seen so much wonderful support for us,
Speaker 9: and I just want to say thank you to everybody
Speaker 9: who's listening for the contributions that you've made.
Speaker 2: In our next hour, the president's tariff policy has California
Speaker 2: looking to chart its own path with the world, and
Speaker 2: we're joined by US Senator Adam Schiff to talk about
Speaker 2: the new tariffs and Republican state Senator Tony Strickland on
Speaker 2: GOP prior parities for the state budget. This is Michael
Speaker 2: Monks's reports on kf I AM six forty KFI.
Speaker 1: AM six forty on demand.
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