Home Care In South Pasadena, CA

Voting citizens and families who are strongly outspoken about protecting South Pasadena’s neighborhoods may be barking up the wrong tree. City Council may make the perfect ‘Tree Ordinance’, but it may not matter much if is ignored by Newsom.

The controversial ‘housing bill’ with sweeping implications for local control of development, Senate Bill 79, now sits on Governor Gavin Newsom’s desk. The Governor has until October 12 to either sign or veto the measure.

The Stakes

SB 79, authored in the Legislature earlier this year, has drawn intense scrutiny across the San Gabriel Valley and beyond. Supporters argue it is a critical tool for advancing affordable housing mandates and streamlining compliance with state housing law.

Opponents, including City of Los Angeles, residents in South Pasadena and neighboring cities, see it as a fundamental side-stepping of existing local decision-making, potentially opening the door to larger and denser projects that bypass voter oversight.

If SB 79 becomes law, South Pasadena may lose much, or all, of its authority to protect the City’s trees when developers claim housing law protections. The ordinance would remain on the books, but in practice, state law would override it, especially for larger housing projects.

The debate has escalated in recent weeks as communities raise questions:

A Tense Countdown

The Governor’s office has not indicated how he intends to act on SB 79. For many observers, the timing raises alarm: by law, bills passed late in the legislative session must be acted on within 30 days. That window closes on October 12.

If signed — or allowed to become law without a signature — the measure would take effect on January 1, 2026, reshaping how housing development is approved and contested in cities like South Pasadena.

Why It Matters Locally

South Pasadena has already been at the center of contentious development battles, from the Mission Bell project to height-limit measures and the long-running fight over Caltrans-owned properties. Residents and city officials alike warn that SB 79 could override years of careful local planning and voter-approved safeguards.

Now What?

As the deadline approaches, advocacy groups, city officials, and residents are ramping up calls, letters, and lobbying efforts urging the Governor either to sign or to veto. The risk, many say, is that inaction alone could set in motion one of the most consequential housing shifts the region has seen in decades.

For now, communities are left waiting — watching the calendar tick toward October 12, when silence from Sacramento could speak louder than words.

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When Kyle Wilkerson was gutting the interior of the new Sid the Cat Auditorium in South Pasadena, he found reminders of the woman who first made it beautiful a hundred years ago.

“Lucile Lloyd was a prominent [Works Progress Administration] muralist; she did work all among the schools in this area,” said concert promoter Wilkerson. “There are photos of her in menswear smoking up in the rafters back in the 1930s. She had a tragic life, and ended up committing suicide. We thought all of the panels she did here were gone.”

“But then right before Christmas,” he continued, “one of the ceiling panels had started cracking. I looked up and I was like, ‘They’re still there.’ The light was still shining in.”

A few gorgeous floral stencils, small sculptures and a stained glass window remain from Lloyd’s work in the auditorium of the former South Pasadena elementary school, which closed to students in 1979. But she was a muse for the team at Sid the Cat, an independent concert promoter which has put on shows across L.A. for over a decade. It’ll finally have the rambling, meticulously restored historic venue of its dreams opening this fall.

Less than a year after the Eaton fire destroyed Altadena, a nearby neighborhood beloved by generations of musicians, the 500-capacity venue is a sign of new life returning to the area’s arts scene.

“The first thing we thought of when the fires happened was ‘What can we do to help?’ The second was ‘I wish we were open already, because we could have done food drives and shows to raise funds,’” Wilkerson said. “It’s a very fragile little ecosystem that we’re a part of here.”

Before the pandemic, Sid the Cat — a team of promoters including Wilkerson, Brandon Gonzalez and Sean Newman — thought they’d found their home venue at the Bootleg Theater on the southern edge of Echo Park and Historic Filipinotown. That nightclub was beloved by locals, but closed in 2021 during the apocalypse that COVID-19 wreaked on independent venues. (The space is now 2220 Arts + Archives).

“We loved the Bootleg, but it was DIY from the beginning,” Gonzalez said. “We did the best we could with the tools and the resources we had.”

They kept a packed calendar of one-off shows at venues like the Highland Park Ebell Club, Zebulon and even the Bob Baker Marionette Theater. Acts like Khruangbin, Bright Eyes, Wet Leg, Jackson Browne and Fiona Apple have played their concerts, but it was exhausting managing and rebuilding new concert setups night after night. “Sometimes I felt like an ice cream shop owner,” Wilkerson said. “I’d go to the artist and be like, ‘What flavor do you want? You want a seated venue? You want this side of town?’ We loved having options, but we really wanted a beautiful-sounding room of our own.”

In 2022, after they scouted an estimated 150 rooms from the deep Westside to the San Gabriel Valley, they found the South Pasadena Elementary School, which was planned for adaptive reuse into a dining and nightlife destination in downtown South Pasadena. (Sid’s neighbors in the space will include Villa’s Tacos, District Brewing Co. and coffeeshop the Boy and the Bear).

Just steps from the A Line, and boasting a breezeway entrance with a detached bar, ample bathrooms and a gigantic outdoor patio and parking lot, the space was unique for its amenities and history, right in the center of a San Gabriel Valley neighborhood already adored by working artists (Phoebe Bridgers, who played many of her early shows for Sid the Cat, grew up nearby).

The physical structure of a former school turned out to be distinctly useful for a venue — artists and road crew will thrill to a washer and dryer in the green room and a truck-loading dock that connects directly to the rear of the stage.

“It has such great bones that we can kind of step away and let it do its thing,” Wilkerson said. “It brings out a different level of artistry to put acts in a unique setting that has character and history. If you do this for as long as us, you hear the horror stories on the road, and a space like this stands out on your tour. It has everything you need in a truly walkable neighborhood.”

The team said they did not take on any investors or partner promoters to fund the venue, and paid for the lease and the construction themselves from a mix of ticketing contracts, savings from show profits and a GoFundMe.

“There’s no financial backers. We’re not trust fund kids and we don’t have a bunch of real estate properties making money that way,” Wilkerson said. “It’s literally every dime we’ve ever worked for, and that’s scary.”

The nerve to risk it all on restoring a historic — and all-ages — venue impressed Shannon Lay, an L.A. singer-songwriter whose projects have frequented Sid the Cat venues over the years.

“Promoters have a really unique role in the music scene. They’re the curators, the trusted source,” Lay said. “I learned the other night that the venue is entirely self-funded and it kind of blew my mind. I figured there had to be an investor of some kind, but it’s these incredible people and the community coming together to make it happen.”

“It’s important for people to consider that shows are sacred, especially in the U.S. where financial support is scarce,” she added. “It’s a labor of love. We become our own safety net, and we make it work because we need it.”

For musicians and everyone in northeast L.A., the need for a community safety net became terrifyingly clear during the Eaton fire in January. That disaster, along with the Palisades fire, displaced two distinct communities with deep roots in the music industry.

While high-profile fundraisers like FireAid and groups like MusiCares have steered millions to affected communities, all the larger economic forces that are crushing local artists are still compounding. And as violent ICE raids and a battering ram of tense political news wear down many Angelenos, the musicians and audiences that keep a local cultural scene vibrant are wondering if there’s a future for them in L.A.

“It’s hard to convince people to come out of their house and buy a ticket,” Wilkerson said. “Concert tickets have gone up in price, like everything else. We’ve built a community that people trust, but there are nights that bomb, and we wonder why but most of the time it has nothing do with the art. There are other things happening in the world, or the economy’s tanking. It’s a tough question to answer.”

Having a new, beautifully restored venue to perform and congregate in might sway fans’ and artists’ decisions just a bit.

“With the current administration, the fires and then the ICE raids, sometimes I just want to coil up in a ball and just be away,” Gonzalez said. “But we’ve realized a lot of our community want to be together. We posted about the ICE raids and people were like, ‘How can you still do shows?’ Well, we really believe that people can be inspired to make change through the artists that come through the rooms. There’s a lot of power in that and it gives us the will to move forward even though it’s a tough time.”

While Sid the Cat Auditorium hasn’t set its exact opening date, nor booked its lineup of shows, the team estimates construction is about 85% finished. With the blessing of South Pasadena city government and local neighbors, they’re hopeful they’ll avoid last-minute permit snags or delays, even as costs for construction and labor for a historic building have skyrocketed post-fires and post-tariffs. South Pasadena Mayor Janet Braun said she’s “very excited” about the new venue, calling it “a beautifully renovated historic space with a 21st century sound system and amenities.”

Finding those lost panels from Lloyd was proof enough to believe that, even after tragedy and years of rebuilding, there’s still beauty worth sifting through the ashes for.

“People came out after the fires to our shows and told us, ‘I’m so happy to be out and forget a little bit about what just happened to our city,’” Wilkerson said. “We’re that escape for a lot of people, and they have those four hours where they can get away from all that, enjoy the music and cut loose. It’s such a privilege and we don’t take it for granted.”

California lawmakers are advancing a controversial proposal that could mark the beginning of the end for most traditional landline phone service in the state.

Assembly Bill 470, backed by AT&T, cleared the Assembly in June and is now under review by the state Senate Appropriations Committee. The legislation seeks to eliminate the company’s “carrier of last resort” obligation, which currently requires it to provide copper-wire landline service to anyone who requests it.

AT&T argues that landlines are no longer widely used, with only about 5% of Californians — primarily older residents — relying on them. The company says its obligations cost $1 billion annually, despite reporting $12.3 billion in profit last year. “No customer will be left without access to voice or 911 service,” said Susan Santana, AT&T’s California president, promising a phased, multi-year transition to newer technologies.

Supporters of the bill, including Assembly Member Tina McKinnor (D-Inglewood), the bill’s author, contend that the measure will accelerate the replacement of outdated copper wiring with modern fiber-optic networks. Half of AT&T’s required investment would be directed toward underserved areas, aiming to expand broadband access.

The proposal would allow AT&T to phase out landline service only in areas deemed “well served,” defined as regions with at least three alternative providers — typically two cellular carriers and one cable company — including one offering discounted Lifeline plans for low-income households.

Critics, however, warn that the bill could leave hundreds of thousands without a reliable communication lifeline, especially during emergencies when internet and cellular networks may fail. Consumer advocates argue the measure sidesteps the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC), which unanimously rejected AT&T’s previous attempt to abandon landline obligations in 2024.

“There is no way the commission has the resources to verify throughout the entire state where there are verified alternative services,” said Regina Costa of The Utility Reform Network, a San Francisco-based advocacy group.

Business groups and some local officials, such as San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan, support the bill, which received votes from a dozen Bay Area Assembly members. Still, opponents caution that federal broadband maps used to determine “well served” areas often overstate coverage, potentially leaving households with no viable options.

If passed, the CPUC would be tasked with finalizing maps of well-served areas by December 15, 2026. The Senate Appropriations Committee is expected to take up AB 470 in the coming weeks.

The South Pasadena City Council has unanimously voted to amend its housing plan to increase height limits in four areas to meet state housing mandates.

The Aug. 20 vote may raise the general height limit by 10 feet — from 45 feet to 55 feet — with height averaging in consideration, or the average of the property’s height from the ground to the roof at various points.

“We’re talking about doing what we need to do to meet the state’s standards. Because we really have a limited amount of open space,” Councilmember Sheila Rossi said.

The City Council vote directly responds to a measure on the 2024 General Election ballot to address the city’s long-standing height limit in four areas of the city: Downtown (portions of Mission Street and Fair Oaks Avenue), portions of Huntington Drive and The Ostrich Farm (Pasadena Avenue).

For more than four decades, city housing heights were governed by an ordinance passed in 1983, which limits a building’s height to 45 feet, or about four stories.

The 1983 ordinance was initially designed to prevent increased density from encroaching on South Pasadena’s single-family residential areas and to preserve the city’s historic, small-town character.

But the longstanding height restriction was often at odds with California housing policies, including the state’s Regional Housing Needs Assessment.

State goals want to see increased density in construction, translation to taller buildings, and increased housing to promote walkability in commercial and transit-oriented areas — around South Pasadena Metro station, for example.

South Pasadena struggled for nearly two years with updating its housing plan for the 2021-2029 housing cycle, wherein cities and counties must update their housing needs and policies. Its housing plan was approved by the state in May 2023 — 19 months after it’s original due date in October 2021.

The delays in adopting the housing plan even resulted in two lawsuits: Notably, one filed by Californians for Homeownership in April 2022 for non-compliance, and another by the California Association of Realtors in the same month for failing to adopt the updated element by the October 2021 deadline.

To comply with state housing law, the city needs to plan for nearly 3,000 new housing units by 2029. This is a steep hike from the last housing cycle, where South Pasadena only needed to plan for 63 housing units.

South Pasadena has a total population of 25,458 with 10,007 total housing units.

The new height limit is intended to accommodate “757 very low income units, 398 low income units, and 334 moderate income units and 578 moderate units,” according to the city.

The Council’s next move is to submit amended housing plan components to the California Department of Housing and Community Development for review.

Victoria Le is an intern with the Southern California News Group, through a partnership with the L.A. chapter of the Asian American Journalists Association.