Today’s Headlines: Kindergarten could soon be mandatory for California children

By Elvia Limón and Jason Sanchez

Hello, it’s Wednesday, Aug. 31, and here are the stories you shouldn’t miss today:

TOP STORIES

Kindergarten could soon be mandatory for California

California is one step closer to mandating that children attend kindergarten, a requirement that would come after droves of the state’s youngest students skipped the grade during the COVID-19 pandemic, heightening learning-gap concerns.

Like most states, California does not require kindergarten as part of its compulsory education laws. But a bill approved by the state Senate is headed to the governor’s desk and, if signed, would require children to complete a year of kindergarten before entering first grade beginning with the 2024-25 school year.

More politics

• California lawmakers passed legislation requiring all employers based or hiring in the state to post salary ranges on all job listings.
• The state’s lawmakers also passed legislation designed to protect the privacy and well-being of minors on social media and shield them from predators and exploitative commercialization on internet platforms.
• Lawmakers also sent Gov. Gavin Newsom a bill to limit solitary confinement and ban its use altogether for vulnerable populations such as pregnant and elderly people.
• President Biden traveled to Pennsylvania to address a stubborn liability for his party: crime.

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L.A.’s pandemic protections against evictions and rent hikes may soon end

Los Angeles may wind down many of its COVID-19 protections against evictions and rent increases by January, ending some of the nation’s strongest and longest-lasting tenant safeguards during the pandemic.

Starting in 2023, landlords will again be allowed to evict tenants for not paying their rent even if they’ve fallen behind for COVID-19-related circumstances, under a new proposal by the city housing department. The plan also calls for tenants living in rent-controlled apartments to face rent increases again starting in January 2024.

If passed by the City Council, the proposal would put L.A. back in line with many other cities that have repealed or let expire renter protections enacted when the pandemic began in spring 2020.

Stay up to date on variant developments, case counts and vaccine news with Coronavirus Today.

Attorneys say driver in the Windsor Hills crash may have been unconscious

The nurse facing six murder charges for allegedly slamming her car into traffic earlier this month was in the throes of a “frightening� mental health crisis in the days, hours and minutes before the crash, new court records filed by her attorneys say.

The motion and attachments, obtained by The Times, detail Nicole Linton’s four-year struggle with bipolar disorder and include a bombshell determination by doctors in the immediate aftermath of the deadly incident that Linton suffered an “apparent lapse of consciousness� at the time of the crash.

The ‘heat dome’ is descending over California

Extreme heat intensifying under a massive “heat dome� over much of California is forcing residents to once again brace for dangerously high temperatures this week, expected to last through Labor Day, if not longer.

The weather phenomenon has become almost like clockwork for many Californians, especially as marine breezes slow toward the end of the summer — but in recent years, climate change has only made the stifling “heat dome� conditions more extreme, experts say.

Plus: Stay safe in the heat. Officials from the National Weather Service and public health offices advise people to stay indoors as much as possible, particularly between 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. when the sun is strongest.

The money for a judge’s beach condo came from a trust for cancer victims

Justice Tricia Bigelow, the presiding judge of an appellate court in downtown Los Angeles, wanted a weekend place at the beach. She did not have to rely solely on her judicial salary to pay the substantial price tag. Tom Girardi, the powerful attorney with whom she was having an affair, wired her $300,000 on the day she closed on an Ocean Avenue property, financial records filed in court show.

The wire came not from Girardi’s personal bank account but from a trust account containing settlement money for clients of his Wilshire Boulevard law firm, Girardi Keese. At the time of the transfer to Bigelow, the account held funds owed to cancer victims and other residents of a polluted Riverside County neighborhood, court records show. Many have still not received their full settlements, according to bankruptcy claims.

PHOTO OF THE DAY

Hitchin’ a lift: Bodybuilder Ike Catcher shows some muscle at Muscle Beach in Venice on Saturday. More hot-weather photos.

(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)

CALIFORNIA

El Segundo Unified School District was ordered to pay $1 million in a bullying case. A Los Angeles County Superior Court jury found that the school district’s negligence was a factor in causing harm to El Segundo Middle School student Eleri Irons, who was 13 when the bullying started, according to court records. One student started a petition called “Let’s kill Eleri Irons,� according to the April 2019 lawsuit, which said that after teachers found out about the petition, they didn’t notify Irons’ parents, resulting in “significant physical and psychological trauma.�

This dive team found Kiely Rodni’s body. It’s searching for more missing California women. Adventures With Purpose, a volunteer search and recovery dive team, has traveled across the U.S. for the last two years helping to look for missing persons and vehicles. Now the team is trying to find 22-year-old Jolissa Fuentes of Selma and 75-year-old Annette Adams of San Luis Obispo.

Sheriff’s officials tried to block the testimony of a key witness at a “deputy gang� hearing, a lawsuit says. The directive that Sgt. Jefferson Chow should not testify came from Sheriff Alex Villanueva and was delivered to Chow by a lieutenant working for Undersheriff Tim Murakami on Aug. 19. That was the day Chow was set to appear before the Sheriff Civilian Oversight Commission, according to sources with knowledge of the order.

NATION-WORLD

Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev has died at age 91. In a breathtaking series of reforms, the former Soviet leader lifted the Iron Curtain that drew a messy line between the East and West, liberated the arts and pulled Red Army troops from foreign conflicts such as the Soviet Union’s 10-year debacle in Afghanistan.

Ukraine claimed bold strikes on Russians in the south in a sign of a possible counteroffensive. The clashes took place in the country’s Kherson region, where Moscow’s forces rolled up major gains early in the war. Ukraine claimed to have destroyed bridges and ammunition depots and pounded command posts in a surge of fighting.

U.N. experts warned of the impact of abortion bans on U.S. minorities. The Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination said it was concerned about higher rates of maternal mortality and morbidity among minorities following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision that stripped away constitutional protections for abortion in the U.S. The committee also called on the Biden administration and state governments to do more to buttress those rights.

HOLLYWOOD AND THE ARTS

What’s in store this fall? The Los Angeles Times’ arts and entertainment staff have you covered this fall with comprehensive coverage of the season’s new releases, events and key people to watch across film, television, music, books, art, theater and much more.

L.A. novelist Laura Warrell talks women, men and jazz. “Sweet, Soft, Plenty Rhythm,� out in late September, tells the story of jazz musician Circus Palmer and the many women he charms and devastates. The plot unfolds through the voices of these wronged women. Author Laura Warrell said she wanted them “to each have a moment in the spotlight, but I think it also mirrors music, particularly jazz, where you’ve got an ongoing rhythm, which you could call the narrative thread in a novel, that’s consistent throughout, and you’ve got each player taking a solo.�

The cause of death of “Elvis� actor Shonka Dukureh was revealed. The actor and singer died of “hypertensive and atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease,� according to a medical examiner. Dukureh was found dead at age 44 on July 21 in the bedroom of her Nashville apartment. She made her movie debut as Big Mama Thornton in Baz Luhrmann’s 2022 biopic alongside Austin Butler and Tom Hanks.

Netflix is facing a defamation lawsuit over the true-crime drama “Inventing Anna.� Rachel Williams — a victim of con artist Anna Sorokin, whose story became the Netflix true-crime series “Inventing Anna� — is suing the streamer for defamation and false light invasion of privacy. She alleges the show’s portrayal of her was almost entirely negative and fictional.

BUSINESS

Triller was hit with another licensing lawsuit. Music video app Triller owes millions of dollars, Sony said in its lawsuit filed in New York federal court. Sony has had a licensing deal with Triller since 2016, but since renewing a contract in December 2020, Triller hasn’t paid up in recent months, Sony said in its complaint.

There will be lots of deals this holiday shopping season, Best Buy’s CEO says. Discounting at Best Buy was deeper than expected during the second quarter as the company was forced to mark down items to match other retailers. Promotions are poised to last through November and December.

OPINION

How can we help non-English speakers vote? Making voting accessible is a central duty of government. Hundreds of counties across the country already provide bilingual ballots and other voting materials in multiple languages and recruit bilingual poll workers who make it possible for citizens to vote in their language of choice. Yet many states and counties are failing to comply with an important provision in the Voting Rights Act that guarantees individuals who need assistance in casting a ballot the right to bring the helper of their choice into the voting booth.

A jaguar comeback, Ukraine grain and propaganda-proofing. The good news in this edition of “3 Good Things� comes from places including Argentina’s Iberá National Park, wetlands where jaguars were hunted to extinction 70 years ago. Conservationists have introduced eight adults, and their efforts have been working. Two wild cubs were born there this year.

SPORTS

L.A.’s football teams trim the roster. Quarterback Bryce Perkins and three rookie undrafted free agents — receiver Lance McCutcheon, inside linebacker Jake Hummel and outside linebacker Keir Thomas — were among players who survived cuts and made the Rams’ initial 53-man roster. Meanwhile, after the Chargers’ cuts, there’s not much depth behind star edge rushers Joey Bosa, Khalil Mack.

The race to be the Trojans’ left tackle. USC offensive coordinator and offensive line coach Josh Henson has made it clear that Bobby Haskins and Courtland Ford will be competing through the end of the week: “We’re in a heck of a battle.�

ONLY IN CALIFORNIA

Play tennis! Drive on the sand! Set sail! A vintage postcard from Patt Morrison’s collection advertises the Long Beach Sanitarium.

Southern California’s curious history as the sanitarium capital of America. Tuberculosis was called “the captain of the men of death� and “the white plague,� for how it left its victims pale and listless. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, consumption, as it was also called, killed more Americans than any other contagious disease.

Invalidism was the back-seat passenger to California’s second gold rush: tourism. The sufferers were welcomed by the new TB tourism industry. A “sanitarium belt� extended across Southern California, from Los Angeles to the Inland Empire to San Diego.

FROM THE ARCHIVES

April 9, 1966: A crowd of 40,735 was on hand for the first game at Anaheim Stadium.

(Los Angeles Times)

Fifty-eight years ago today, on Aug. 31, 1964, ground was broken for Anaheim Stadium. A little less than two years later, on April 9, 1966, the Angels played their first game in the Orange County ballpark. The Times reported the next day that the team lost 9-3 to the Giants, but the stadium was a winner: “This is just about the biggest thrill I’ve ever had,� said Angel manager Bill Rigney. “And I’m going to like it even better when we start to find home plate again.� Said shortstop Jim Fregosi: “[I]t beats the brick pile at Dodger Stadium by a mile.�

The stadium is the fourth-oldest park in the MLB (after Dodger Stadium in 1962, Chicago’s Wrigley Field in 1914 and Fenway Park in Boston in 1912).

It’s been a tumultuous time recently for the stadium and the Angels. Owner Arte Moreno is “exploring� selling the team. Moreno had a $320-million deal with the city to renovate the stadium and build a ballpark village around it, but the deal was killed in May amid an investigation of then-Anaheim Mayor Harry Sidhu for public corruption. Read our Q&A: “What’s next for the Angels.�

Times staff writer Amy Hubbard contributed to this report.

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