Latest news with #LosAngelesPublicLibrary
9 News
17-05-2025
- General
- 9 News
America's most famous celebrity Christian disappears
1 of 14 Attribution: Los Angeles Public Library Evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson was one of the most famous people in the US in the 1920s and 1930s. Known as "Sister Aimee", she pioneered the use of mass broadcast technologies such as radio to send her Pentecostal message to people around the country, and she drew tens of thousands of people to her faith healing events. So when she disappeared on May 18, 1926, it caused a huge commotion. McPherson vanished from Ocean Park Beach in Santa Monica, California, prompting fears she had drowned. However, a search was unable to find any sign of her. On June 23, her church, Angelus Temple, held a memorial service for her - only for her mother Mildred Kennedy to receive a phone call from officials in Arizona to tell her that McPherson was alive and in hospital.
New York Times
17-03-2025
- Lifestyle
- New York Times
$4,750 Rentals in Los Angeles
To provide a resource for those displaced by the Los Angeles fires, this edition of 'What You Get' focuses on rentals rather than properties for sale. Jo David Jo David Jo David Jo David Jo David Jo David Jo David Jo David Jo David Jo David This two-bedroom, two-bathroom house, being rented fully furnished, is a few blocks from the heart of the NoHo Arts District, and within walking distance of an independent movie theater, a diner, and a horror movie-themed coffee shop. Also a few blocks away are the North Hollywood Recreation Center, with sports fields, a pool, and a gym, and a branch of the Los Angeles Public Library. The house is also a 10-minute walk from a Metro station, putting it within a 45-minute train commute to downtown Los Angeles. By car, Burbank Airport is a 15-minute drive. Size: 1,020 square feet Indoors: A red brick path leads from the sidewalk to a front porch trained with flowering vines. Inside is the living room, where there's tiled fireplace with a wooden mantel and a window overlooking the front yard. Through a wide passage is the dining room, which, like the living room and bedrooms, has hardwood floors. Off one side of the dining room is the kitchen, with butcher block countertops and a blue tile backsplash behind a stainless steel gas range. A door on one side of the kitchen opens to a back patio, and around the corner is a laundry room. Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times. Thank you for your patience while we verify access. Already a subscriber? Log in. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Yahoo
27-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Where can L.A. immigrants go for help under Trump? Try the public library
Among the bookshelves at the Central Library in downtown Los Angeles, Ramón Hernández sits in a cubicle a few days a week, holding hour after hour of consultations with immigrants who have questions about their legal status. Demand for the public library's free immigration services has shot up since the return of President Trump, who has attacked immigrants as 'poisoning the blood of our country,' promised the largest mass deportations in U.S. history and suggested selling $5 million "gold cards" granting rich people permanent residency and a path to citizenship. Anyone can meet with an immigration expert by phone, or in person at half a dozen Los Angeles Public Library locations from Wilmington to Pacoima, through a long-running, city-funded program called the New Americans Initiative. 'We've been seeing more folks who are wanting to either get their citizenship finally done or adjust their status to become legal permanent residents — and a lot of them are because of the new administration,' said Hernández, who works for the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights, a nonprofit advocacy organization and one of several service providers the city contracts with under the program. Hernández and his colleagues help people become legal permanent residents, apply for citizenship and renew green cards or Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals permits. They can help people prepare for the citizenship exam or file records requests for their immigration histories, among other services. Read more: A city of immigrants moves to resist Trump. How far can L.A. leaders go? The libraries also offer general consultations to address questions or concerns people have about their immigration status under the Trump administration. 'Everyone right now is looking to have a plan, get their questions answered by talking to a trustworthy immigration services provider, and they need to know their rights,' Madeleine Ildefonso, managing librarian for the L.A. Public Library's Office of Civics and Community Services. Ildefonso, a 20-year veteran of the library system who in 2018 helped launch the New Americans Initiative, said the program has seen an increase in calls since the start of the year. The library also has received a jump in requests for 'know your rights' cards. The size of a credit card, the red cards, available in a variety of languages, advise citizens and noncitizens of their constitutional rights and can be handed to immigration agents to invoke 4th and 5th Amendment protections. She said the library is printing the cards in 18 languages, with plans to expand to 31 languages. The library also is planning more citizenship classes and workshops for families to prepare key documents and decide who will care for children in case a parent or relative is detained. Read more: Despite rumors of a massive immigration sweep in Los Angeles, numbers don't add up About 1.4 million Angelenos, or 36% of the city's population, are foreign-born, and an additional 29% have at least one immigrant parent, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of U.S. Census Bureau data. The L.A. metro area has the second-largest number of immigrants in the nation after New York City. Immigrants make up about 15% of the population nationwide, according to the think tank. This month, L.A. City Council members proposed new measures to ramp up the city's resistance to Trump's immigration policies, including more funding for immigration legal services groups and a comprehensive 'know your rights' campaign. If successful, some of those proposals would mean expanding on the kind of support the L.A. Public Library has been offering for years. The New Americans Initiative was launched under former Mayor Eric Garcetti during the first Trump administration and built on a previous Path to Citizenship program that offered classes to people eligible to naturalize. Some bigger library systems, including New York City, offer similar programs. The program, which is entirely city-funded, has a budget of $1.2 million for the 2024-25 fiscal year and is one of the main ways the city offers assistance to immigrants. Although some of the money supports classes and workshops on naturalization, citizenship and English as a second language, most of it goes toward one-on-one sessions with immigration experts such as Hernández. Assistance is available to anyone at the participating library branches, regardless of their immigration status or where they live. In December, Mayor Karen Bass signed a sanctuary city law that prohibits city employees and resources from being involved in federal immigration enforcement, enshrining a policy first established by executive order several years ago under Garcetti. President Trump has since threatened to punish 'sanctuary cities' by cutting off federal funds, including disaster relief money L.A. needs to recover from the recent wildfires. Read more: Trump's order to cut off funding to sanctuary cities could threaten L.A. fire relief Many appointments are initiated through a phone message line. The multilingual library staffers who return these calls can get hundreds of them each month. Appointments also can be scheduled online. The one-on-ones are offered in English, Spanish, Armenian, Korean, Farsi, Russian and Tagalog. Program administrators hope to add Mandarin Chinese and Thai. All 72 of the Los Angeles public libraries also have 'welcome stations' with materials to help legal permanent residents with the naturalization process. That includes 'citizenship envelopes' with a checklist of all the documents and steps needed to become naturalized citizens, as well as other resources, such as flash cards to help with vocabulary and civics knowledge for the citizenship test. More than 500,000 people in L.A. County were legal permanent residents eligible to naturalize as of May 2024, according to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. One of the biggest barriers to citizenship is the oral civics exam with 100 possible questions. The naturalization application is an obstacle in itself and can take several visits to the library over a few months to complete. Read more: Fewer diners, tense workers at L.A. restaurants amid Trump's immigration crackdown Promoting civic literacy and self-empowerment is in keeping with the long history of public libraries in the U.S. offering education and other resources to immigrants. The tradition goes back to the Gilded Age and steel tycoon Andrew Carnegie, a Scottish immigrant whose philanthropic support for public libraries was designed to educate citizens and immigrants alike. Ildefonso said that anyone with concerns about confidentiality should be reassured by public libraries' long tradition of protecting people's privacy. 'Library staff is trained and knows how to handle questions that come into our library from law enforcement,' she said. 'Community members should feel safe in a library setting. We're just known as safe spaces for a lot of people.' Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Los Angeles Times
27-02-2025
- Politics
- Los Angeles Times
Where can L.A. immigrants go for help under Trump? Try the public library
Among the bookshelves at the Central Library in downtown Los Angeles, Ramón Hernández sits in a cubicle a few days a week, holding hour after hour of consultations with immigrants who have questions about their legal status. Demand for the public library's free immigration services has shot up since the return of President Trump, who has attacked immigrants as 'poisoning the blood of our country,' promised the largest mass deportations in U.S. history and suggested selling $5 million 'gold cards' granting rich people permanent residency and a path to citizenship. Anyone can meet with an immigration expert by phone, or in person at half a dozen Los Angeles Public Library locations from Wilmington to Pacoima, through a long-running, city-funded program called the New Americans Initiative. 'We've been seeing more folks who are wanting to either get their citizenship finally done or adjust their status to become legal permanent residents — and a lot of them are because of the new administration,' said Hernández, who works for the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights, a nonprofit advocacy organization and one of several service providers the city contracts with under the program. Hernández and his colleagues help people become legal permanent residents, apply for citizenship and renew green cards or Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals permits. They can help people prepare for the citizenship exam or file records requests for their immigration histories, among other services. The libraries also offer general consultations to address questions or concerns people have about their immigration status under the Trump administration. 'Everyone right now is looking to have a plan, get their questions answered by talking to a trustworthy immigration services provider, and they need to know their rights,' Madeleine Ildefonso, managing librarian for the L.A. Public Library's Office of Civics and Community Services. Ildefonso, a 20-year veteran of the library system who in 2018 helped launch the New Americans Initiative, said the program has seen an increase in calls since the start of the year. The library also has received a jump in requests for 'know your rights' cards. The size of a credit card, the red cards, available in a variety of languages, advise citizens and noncitizens of their constitutional rights and can be handed to immigration agents to invoke 4th and 5th Amendment protections. She said the library is printing the cards in 18 languages, with plans to expand to 31 languages. The library also is planning more citizenship classes and workshops for families to prepare key documents and decide who will care for children in case a parent or relative is detained. About 1.4 million Angelenos, or 36% of the city's population, are foreign-born, and an additional 29% have at least one immigrant parent, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of U.S. Census Bureau data. The L.A. metro area has the second-largest number of immigrants in the nation after New York City. Immigrants make up about 15% of the population nationwide, according to the think tank. This month, L.A. City Council members proposed new measures to ramp up the city's resistance to Trump's immigration policies, including more funding for immigration legal services groups and a comprehensive 'know your rights' campaign. If successful, some of those proposals would mean expanding on the kind of support the L.A. Public Library has been offering for years. The New Americans Initiative was launched under former Mayor Eric Garcetti during the first Trump administration and built on a previous Path to Citizenship program that offered classes to people eligible to naturalize. Some bigger library systems, including New York City, offer similar programs. The program, which is entirely city-funded, has a budget of $1.2 million for the 2024-25 fiscal year and is one of the main ways the city offers assistance to immigrants. Although some of the money supports classes and workshops on naturalization, citizenship and English as a second language, most of it goes toward one-on-one sessions with immigration experts such as Hernández. Assistance is available to anyone at the participating library branches, regardless of their immigration status or where they live. In December, Mayor Karen Bass signed a sanctuary city law that prohibits city employees and resources from being involved in federal immigration enforcement, enshrining a policy first established by executive order several years ago under Garcetti. President Trump has since threatened to punish 'sanctuary cities' by cutting off federal funds, including disaster relief money L.A. needs to recover from the recent wildfires. Many appointments are initiated through a phone message line. The multilingual library staffers who return these calls can get hundreds of them each month. Appointments also can be scheduled online. The one-on-ones are offered in English, Spanish, Armenian, Korean, Farsi, Russian and Tagalog. Program administrators hope to add Mandarin Chinese and Thai. All 72 of the Los Angeles public libraries also have 'welcome stations' with materials to help legal permanent residents with the naturalization process. That includes 'citizenship envelopes' with a checklist of all the documents and steps needed to become naturalized citizens, as well as other resources, such as flash cards to help with vocabulary and civics knowledge for the citizenship test. More than 500,000 people in L.A. County were legal permanent residents eligible to naturalize as of May 2024, according to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. One of the biggest barriers to citizenship is the oral civics exam with 100 possible questions. The naturalization application is an obstacle in itself and can take several visits to the library over a few months to complete. Promoting civic literacy and self-empowerment is in keeping with the long history of public libraries in the U.S. offering education and other resources to immigrants. The tradition goes back to the Gilded Age and steel tycoon Andrew Carnegie, a Scottish immigrant whose philanthropic support for public libraries was designed to educate citizens and immigrants alike. Ildefonso said that anyone with concerns about confidentiality should be reassured by public libraries' long tradition of protecting people's privacy. 'Library staff is trained and knows how to handle questions that come into our library from law enforcement,' she said. 'Community members should feel safe in a library setting. We're just known as safe spaces for a lot of people.'
New York Times
31-01-2025
- Lifestyle
- New York Times
$3,500 Rentals in and Near Los Angeles
To provide a resource for those displaced by the Los Angeles fires, this edition of 'What You Get' focuses on rentals rather than for-sale properties. Long Beach | $3,500 This one-bedroom, one-bathroom is in the Newberry Lofts, once a local department store that was converted into residences with ground-floor retail in the mid-2000s. The area is bustling, with a sake shop, a sushi bar and, across the street, a bakery specializing in pies. Within a 10-minute walk are a brewery, a rooftop French restaurant and a tapas restaurant. Lincoln Park, home to the main branch of the Los Angeles Public Library, is less than half a mile away. ShoreLine Aquatic Park and Shoreline Village, both with harbor views, are five minutes away by car. Driving to downtown Los Angeles takes around 40 minutes. Size: 1,230 square feet Cost per square foot: $2.85 Indoors: The front door opens to a foyer with dark engineered hardwood floors that continue into an open-plan living area. The unit is available furnished or unfurnished. The sitting area is bright, with high ceilings and exposed ductwork, space for a large sofa and a nook that could hold a desk. Between this space and the entryway is the kitchen, where a center island has quartz countertops, a brushed nickel backsplash and stainless steel appliances, including a gas range and a dishwasher. On the other side of the sitting area, behind a glass-paned wall, is the bedroom, with a floor-to-ceiling street-facing window, motorized shades and a wall with butterfly-print wallpaper. A walk-in closet is attached. The bathroom is off the foyer, with the wall behind the double vanity covered with wallpaper in a dark floral pattern. The combined tub and shower is lined with white tile, and across the hall is a laundry closet with a stacked washer and dryer. Outdoor space and amenities: The building has a shared roof deck with views of the city, plus an attached parking garage, with one spot for this unit. Utilities: Water and trash are included but electricity, gas and cable/internet are not. Contact: Cyrus Mohseni, The Keystone Team, 562-501-4450 La Quinta | $3,250 This three-bedroom, two-and-a-half bathroom house is in Mira Flores, a gated community near Rancho La Quinta Country Club and within a 10-minute drive of a several other golf courses. Old Town La Quinta, a hub for shopping and dining, is also a 10-minute drive, and a shopping center with a Target, a Trader Joe's and a movie theater takes five minutes. The Coachella Valley National Wildlife Refuge is 20 minutes away by car and downtown Palm Springs is 35 minutes away. Riverside is an hour and 15 minutes away, and driving into Los Angeles takes a little more than two hours. Size: 2,100 square feet Price per square foot: $1.55 Indoors: A paved path leads from the sidewalk to this home's covered porch, where a wood door opens into the living room. This space has a ceiling fan and windows that face the front and side yards. Tiled floors continue back to the bedroom wing and left to the open dining nook and family room. In the dining nook, there's a wrought-iron ceiling light fixture. In the family room there's a gas fireplace set into one wall. Behind the family room is a second dining area, this one with sliders that open to the back patio. The house is available furnished or unfurnished. The kitchen, also off the family room, has a window above the sink and a wall-mounted oven. A gas cooktop is built into a countertop, with ample cabinet space above and below. A powder room and a laundry room are off this part of the house. All three bedrooms are at the back of the house, and at the end of a hall is the larger primary suite. Here, more sliders open to the patio and there is a shower and a separate tub. The remaining bedrooms are carpeted, with space for queen-size beds. The guest bathroom has a double vanity and a combined tub and shower. Outdoor space and amenities: The paved patio behind the house includes a terra cotta fountain, room for a dining and a grill. Community amenities include a park and an in-ground swimming pool, both within walking distance. The attached garage holds two cars. Utilities: Landscaping and use of the community's amenities are included; but electricity, gas, water and cable/internet are not. Contact: Ed Borquez, Desert Sotheby's International Realty — La Quinta, 760-262-4175 Los Angeles | $3,300 This two-bedroom, one-bathroom unit is in Village Green, a midcentury modern Baldwin Hills condominium complex designed by the architect Reginald D. Johnson. Village Green is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is a Los Angeles Historic Cultural Monument. A Ralphs supermarket is less than five minutes away by car, as is Kenneth Hahn State Recreation Area, which has hiking trails, a disc golf course and a hummingbird garden. Culver City is less than 10 minutes away by car, and the campus of U.S.C. is a 15-minute drive. Venice Beach and LAX are each a 20-minute drive. Size: 826 square feet Price per square foot: $4 Indoors: This ground-floor unit's front door opens to a living room with parquet wood floors and a large window overlooking lawns and mature trees. The space is big enough for separate living and dining areas. Behind the living room is the galley-style kitchen, with colorful tiles depicting fruit, flowers and marine life above a range with an electric cooktop. There's a built-in microwave, and on the other side of the kitchen, a sunny breakfast nook with a door to a private patio. Both bedrooms are off a hallway from the living room. The primary bedroom is big enough for a king-size bed and has mirrored closet doors. The second bedroom, across the hall, has a closet with a built-in storage system. Both bedrooms have use of a full bathroom with a window and a combined tub and shower lined with blue and white tile. Outdoor space: Off the kitchen, a paved and fenced patio has space for a small table and chairs. This unit has a one-car garage, and the community offers walking paths and green space available to residents. Utilities: Water and trash collection are included but electricity, gas, and cable/internet are not. Contact: Emilia Arau, Compass, 310-963-0683
