Former President Donald Trump to visit LA next week for fundraiser

• September 6, 2024

Former President Donald Trump will swing by Los Angeles next week for an evening fundraiser, set to take place two days after his first debate with Vice President Kamala Harris ahead of the Nov. 5 election.

The fundraising event, billed as an “evening reception” with Trump, is scheduled for Thursday, Sept. 12, according to an RSVP page posted by the Trump 47 Committee. The time and location of the event were not divulged.

And it won’t be cheap to get in.

Tickets range from $3,300 to $250,000. The deadline to RSVP is Tuesday, Sept. 10 — the same day Trump will be in Philadelphia for the debate.

That debate will be the first time Trump and Harris will square off in person since the vice president moved to the top of the Democratic ticket after President Joe Biden, politically wounded by a lackluster performance in his debate against Trump, dropped out of the race.

Trump this week has sought to discredit that debate, calling ABC News “dishonest” and doubting that tete-a-tete would be fair. Yet, Trump, during a town hall with Fox News host Sean Hannity in Pennsylvania this week, also tried to present himself as unconcerned about his first head-to-head confrontation with Harris.

While the debate will be the first time voters get to compare the two candidates side by side, Thursday’s Los Angeles event will be a chance for Trump to mingle with supporters — and raise campaign cash.

Currently, Harris has the advantage when it comes to campaign contributions.

The Harris campaign had more than $219 million in cash on hand, as of July 31, according to the documents filed with the Federal Elections Commission. Trump had about $151 million, according to campaign finance documents.

The New York Times contributed to this report.

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​ Orange County Register 

Chargers safety Derwin James Jr. has Raiders on his mind going into Week 1

• September 6, 2024

EL SEGUNDO — Derwin James Jr. took one look at the NFL schedule last spring and said to himself: “Let’s (expletive) go, let’s go, let’s go.” The Chargers’ season opener is Sunday afternoon against the AFC West rival Las Vegas Raiders, the team that laid a 63-21 beatdown on the Chargers the last time the teams played.

“Come on, man,” James said when asked if his excitement about facing the Raiders in Week 1 was based on the Dec. 14 game in Las Vegas that prompted the firings of Brandon Staley as coach and Tom Telesco as general manager one day later. “Come on, man, you can’t embarrass me like that.”

In fact, the Raiders didn’t need much help in embarrassing the Chargers on Thursday Night Football, with the known football universe tuned in and expecting to see something resembling a competitive game. It was, instead, a game in which the Chargers seemed unprepared to play.

Quarterback Justin Herbert was sidelined by a season-ending finger injury. Wide receivers Keenan Allen and Mike Williams also were dealing with season-ending injuries. Backup quarterback Easton Stick threw for three second-half touchdowns in his first NFL start, but it was nothing but a consolation prize.

Defensively, it was the most points given up in Chargers history, topping the 57 they gave up in a loss to the then-St. Louis Rams in the 2000 season. The Raiders led 42-0 by halftime, tying the franchise record and falling just three points shy of the NFL record for the most points scored in a first half.

The Chargers fired Staley and Telesco at 9 a.m. the following day.

“I remember it, personally, for myself,” James said when asked Thursday to recall the game at Allegiant Stadium. “But a lot of these guys (in the Chargers’ locker room) weren’t around here then. But I remember it. This is Raiders week. It’s a division opponent. It means that much more.”

The Chargers have a great many reasons to win and deliver some payback to the Raiders, not the least of which is giving new coach Jim Harbaugh a victory in his return to the NFL after nine seasons at the University of Michigan. Harbaugh led the Wolverines to the national championship last season.

Harbaugh and new GM Joe Hortiz gave the Chargers’ roster a makeover in the offseason and well into training camp, but it remains to be seen whether their work pays off. Certainly, no one expects an improved defense to surrender 63 points again.

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“I feel like we’re in a good spot, but we’ve got to go out there Sunday and show it to the world,” said James, a safety who has been selected for the Pro Bowl three times in his six-season career. “It doesn’t matter where we feel like we’re at, we’ve got to go out there Sunday and put it on film for the world to see.”

For James, a new season represents new challenges, new opportunities to prove himself and erase one 60-minute nightmare of a game from his memory.

“It definitely feels different because it’s new, everything is new for us,” James said of playing with a new coach and with new teammates in a new training facility. “But all that don’t mean nothing. We’ve got to go out there and play Sunday. We’ve got a game against the Raiders. It’s a division game and we’ve just got to go out there and play.”

INJURY UPDATES

The Chargers added Herbert to their injury report because of the plantar fascia injury in his right foot. He was listed as a full participant in Thursday’s practice. … Wide receiver Joshua Palmer (knee) also was added to the list but was a full participant. … Wide receiver DJ Chark Jr. (hip) did not join his teammates for the second consecutive day. … Cornerback Tarheeb Still (hip) was limited.

​ Orange County Register 

A tree-damaged, half-priced Monrovia house is getting ‘astronomical’ interest

• September 6, 2024

Buying a home seems increasingly out of reach, especially in Southern California, where the housing market is notoriously expensive and competitive.

That’s why when a house in the northeastern L.A. suburb Monrovia went on the market for $499,999 — nearly half the cost of some of the homes on the same street — the listing seemed almost too good to be true.

The catch: only half of the property remains.

This past May, a large tree came down on the one-bedroom home during a storm, trapping the two homeowners inside, and damaging the surrounding property on the driveway.

There were no injuries. What remains of the house are some of its walls, a battered ceiling, and an exposed interior — which is what the new homeowners will inherit.

A Monrovia home, partially crushed by a downed tree, has gone on the market for $499,000 – one bedroom, one bath – on 113 S. Mountain Ave. photographed on Thursday, Sept. 5, 2024.

Because of its current state, the bank will probably not allow for a conventional loan to be taken on the house, said Kevin Wheeler, the real estate agent for the property.

On top of the listing price, the renovation costs pose an additional $350-450/square-foot, estimates Wheeler. Yet the seller is “open to carrying the note,” as the listing reads.

Interested buyers might be those who want to take on home renovation projects or are already in the construction industry.

“Beyond the trend of insurance companies leaving Southern California, mostly due to predatory law firms akin to ambulance chasers soliciting everybody for smoke damage when there wasn’t any…outside of that, there shouldn’t be any problem to insure the property outside of any other home,” Wheeler said.

Wheeler said the electricity is turned off, but the plumbing still works.

Monrovia regulations state that demolitions on properties more than 50 years old, which the house is, require a review. But since it was destroyed by what’s known as an act of God, a review isn’t required, according to Wheeler.

So house-hunters can buy what’s left of the home and fix it up without dealing with some of the red tape typically required during rebuilds.

But despite the alluring price, especially given the difficult reality of buying a home, James Paine thinks the additional cost to renovate just isn’t worth it.

Paine, an Australian national living in San Francisco but whose wife lives in Monrovia, was looking at the property after his friend referred the listing to him.

A Monrovia home, partially crushed by a downed tree, has gone on the market for $499,000 – one bedroom, one bath – on 113 S. Mountain Ave. photographed on Thursday, Sept. 5, 2024.

However, on top of the additional construction the house needs, the high interest rates on taking out a loan for a house is ultimately what turned Paine away. He included that the property would probably be of interest to do-it-yourself home renovators.

“It’s not a turn-key home,” Wheeler said of the site, listed at a size of 645 square feet (measurements taken before the tree fell) on a 2,504-square-foot lot. “It’s gonna need a little TLC.” The listing states that the house is 100 years old and already red-tagged, which means that the government entity or city has deemed the property unsafe to live in, thus implying it was doomed to need renovating anyway.

Since the listing went up nearly a week ago, Wheeler has already received an “astronomical” number of phone calls from interested buyers, including some trying to “lowball” him with offers of $300,000 or less.

“Miracle on mountain…Build your dream. It was always destiny,” the listing reads.

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The Associated Press contributed to this story.

​ Orange County Register 

California lawmakers want to ban anti-union meetings at work

• September 6, 2024

By Levi Sumagaysay | CalMatters

On the final day of their session, California lawmakers sent Gov. Gavin Newsom a bill banning employers from forcing workers to sit through anti-union meetings — the latest attempt by Democratic politicians to support union activity amid a revived labor movement.

If Newsom signs Senate Bill 399, California would join nine other states that have recently passed laws prohibiting an employer from requiring workers to attend so-called captive audience meetings about their political or religious views.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, the Democratic vice presidential candidate, signed one such law last year, and has touted it on the campaign trail.

The California bill can cover discussions of employers’ views on political candidates or legislation, but it’s largely aimed at one specific kind of required workplace meeting — when bosses discuss whether workers should unionize.

California workers, following a nationwide trend, have increasingly sought unionization in recent years. Union elections have spiked in the last three years, with nearly 17,000 workers voting at more than 300 California workplaces in 2023. So far in 2024, more than 14,000 California workers have voted in a union election, according to a CalMatters analysis of National Labor Relations Board data.

The National Labor Relations Board has generally allowed “captive audience” meetings for decades — provided employers don’t threaten workers or withhold benefits for supporting a union. But the board’s general counsel under President Joe Biden has sought to crack down on them, arguing they are often used to intimidate employees.

Business groups say the bill would be much broader, and would infringe on employers’ free speech rights. State bans in Connecticut and Minnesota have been challenged in court. Wisconsin in 2009 was one of the first states to ban such meetings; when employers filed suit the following year, arguing it conflicted with federal law, the state backed down and agreed not to enforce it.

The California Chamber of Commerce made SB 399 one of their most fiercely contested bills this year. In a legislative alert on Tuesday, the chamber said the bill would “effectively chill any discussions related to legislation, regulations, or other ‘political matters.’”

In an August letter to lawmakers opposing the bill, business groups argued they already can’t coerce workers to vote for certain candidates or to vote against unionizing. They also said that because the bill could fine bosses for talking to employees about political views but not other matters, it’s a violation of the First Amendment.

The bill includes exemptions for “political organizations” that employ people whose job duties require them to engage in political activity, but chamber policy advocate Ashley Hoffman said in the letter that it’s too vague.

But supporters say the bill only targets intimidation in the workplace by penalizing employers who punish workers for refusing to attend a “captive audience” meeting.

“If an employer wants to share [their] beliefs at the worksite, that’s fine, but no one should be coerced to listen,” Assemblymember Eloise Gómez Reyes, a San Bernardino Democrat, said on the Assembly floor Friday before voting for the bill.

Fast food workers cheer “¡Si Se Pudo!” or “Yes, We Could!,” before Gov. Gavin Newsom signs legislation supporting the rights of fast food workers and boosting wages to $20 an hour, starting in April of 2024, during a press conference at SEIU Local 721 in Los Angeles on Sept. 28, 2023. Photo by Alisha Jucevic for CalMatters

The bill’s passage last week was a win for unions amid a number of losses this year in the Legislature, especially compared to the 2023 session.

And while the state in the past two years has increased wages for fast food workers and health care workers, and boosted worker benefits such as paid sick days, labor-backed demands to make it easier to unionize or go on strike have been a tougher sell.

“If we just keep doing legislation that makes things better for workers, that’s good, but it’s not the same power that you’re giving workers in the workplace when they’re able to strike, when they’re able to organize without intimidation,” Lorena Gonzalez, leader of the California Labor Federation, told CalMatters.

In 2022, Newsom was reluctant to sign a bill making it easier for farmworkers to form unions by giving them an option to signal their support without employers knowing who was voting. He only gave his approval after the United Farm Workers drummed up political pressure from fellow Democrats, including Biden. That law has now been challenged by growers in court.

Last year, he vetoed a bill to allow striking workers to collect unemployment benefits, a proposal that Hollywood writers and actors said would have helped them through the “hot labor summer” of work stoppages. Unions attempted to revive the bill this year, and it passed the Senate but failed to get enough votes to clear an Assembly committee.

The captive audience meetings bill also passed the Senate last year, and then eked out of the Assembly last week with just over the minimum 41 votes needed to pass (though a handful of Democrats added “yes” votes later). It won final approval in the Senate Saturday on a 31-9 vote.

The chamber is urging Newsom to veto the bill. The governor has not taken a position, and has until the end of September to decide.

Two other bills sent to Newsom last week seek to help laborers cut out of traditional worker protections. He has rejected versions of both before.

Newsom in 2022 vetoed an expansion of unemployment insurance to undocumented immigrants, saying that the bill didn’t identify how to pay for it. The unemployment bill passed this year would require the administration to figure that out, and then report the plan back to the Legislature.

In the past three years, Newsom has twice vetoed an expansion of workplace safety regulations to include domestic workers, such as house cleaners, nannies and caretakers, citing concerns about subjecting thousands of private homes to possible workplace safety inspections. The bill passed this year exempts workers who are privately employed by a homeowner or who are sent to private homes by publicly funded programs — such as county programs that pay caretakers for the elderly and disabled.

Instead, the bill that passed this year puts the onus on house cleaning and home care agencies to ensure their employees are safe.

​ Orange County Register 

Surf and tunes mix with Board Builder Hall of Fame awards and Rhythm & Resin festival

• September 6, 2024

They are craftsmen who have shaped the San Clemente surf scene for decades, their boards ridden on waves up and down the coast and around the world.

And now the nine honorees will be inducted into the San Clemente Board Builders Hall of Fame, now in its second year, during a celebration at 10 a.m. on Saturday, Sept. 7, in front of the Catalyst at Bashams surf shop.

This year’s inductees include Matt Biolos, Del Cannon, Garth Day, Terry Martin, Jerry O’Keefe, Timmy Patterson, Rick Rock, Cole Simler and Jean Pierre “Fly” Van Swae.

The San Clemente Board Builders Hall of Fame will honor Terry Martin (left) and Jerry O’Keefe (center), in front of the shop prevjiously owned by Brad Basham (right), who died in 2022. Martin passed away in 2012. (Photo courtesy of Luki O’Keefe)

“I just think it’s so great that these people are being honored, because they get so little accolades and yet they are absolutely the essential players to providing millions of surfers with their equipment,”  said California Surf Museum executive director Jim Kempton, who will emcee the induction.

The Hall of Fame ceremony, which will happen outside of the surf shop along Calle de Los Molinos, will be followed by Rhythm & Resin, a music festival that will shut the street down for the day and bring bands and booths to the town’s industrial and manufacturing area for the second year.

There will be about 100 vendors and bands performing throughout the day, including Tunnel Vision, Slapbak, West Chiller, Trolson County Bros and the Flys.

The Rhythm & Resin music festival and the Hall of Fame were created by surfboard maker Damian Brawner, who owns Brawner Surfboards in Dana Point.

Brawner’s father, Danny, was an early-era boardmaker and a surf music icon as a member of the Sandals, which recorded the soundtrack for “The Endless Summer” movie.

“The second generation is picking up the torch, they are all understanding what came before them, and now they are paying homage to that,” Kempton said.

About the inductees:

• Biolos first started sanding surfboards under Herbie Fletcher and later created Lost Surfboards, one of the biggest and most successful surfboard brands in the world. Several world championships ride his boards.

• Cannon was an original pioneer of modern foam shaping and among the surfers credited with riding Waimea Bay for the first time. He appeared as a performer in early Bruce Brown films. After shaping for Hobie and Ole surfboards, Cannon opened his first shop in San Clemente in 1965 before moving to Hawaii in the ’70s. He died in 2021 at 85.

• Day, who won the 2015 San Clemente Times People’s Choice Awards, is a well-respected shaper and beloved character in the southern Orange County surfing world. Day died in 2015, with nearly 300 people gathering for a paddle-out in his memory.

• Martin worked for Hobie Surfboards, shaping more than 80,000 surfboards over the span of six decades, at an average of 10 boards a day, earning him the nickname “The Machine.” Martin died in 2012.

• O’Keefe shaped more than 25,000 surfboards over 25 years while working for labels such as Hobie Surfboards, Stewart Surfboards, Dewey Weber, Timmy Patterson, Lost Surf Boards and Hurley, as well as his own label Soul Stix.

• Patterson, a well-known California shaper and creator of innovative fin designs, is a second-generation shaper from a legendary surf family.

• Rock was raised in Buena Park and started shaping on his own in 1970 under the Rockit surfboard label. In 1984, he started working at Basham’s shop where laminator guru Mike Muir introduced him to Shaun Stussy, who became his mentor. Rock struck out on his own with Fredrick Surfboards. In 2022, he won the Boardroom Icons of Foam award. He shapes for Lost and Mayhem.

• Simler started at the Hobie factory learning from the legends, then founded the Surf Spot with Roy Gonzolez in San Clemente. Cole Surfboards was started in 1987 in San Luis Obispo, after he moved there to attend Cal Poly. In 1999, Simler relocated back to San Clemente.

• Van Swae was born in Belgium, landing in Southern California as a youngster. He was part of many production teams, most notably for both Dale Velzy and Hobie Alter. He continues to make surfboards, paddles and hand planes.

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​ Orange County Register 

USC WR Ja’Kobi Lane finds stability while trying to be ‘the one’

• September 6, 2024

LOS ANGELES — Ja’Kobi Lane slumped into the parking lot in Tempe, Arizona, at the end of the night, crestfallen after the homecoming that never came.

He had stood out during USC’s 2023 training camp, a 6-foot-4 matchup nightmare, and the freshman receiver from Mesa was hoping for a blowout in last September’s game at Arizona State so he could get some playing time. But ASU hung tough in a 42-28 USC win and Lane didn’t get a snap. It didn’t go the way they wanted, Trojans receivers coach Dennis Simmons lamented to Lane’s youth football coach, Leo Aviles, after the game.

Lane had invited 40 people to Mountain America Stadium that night, suite tickets for all the Mesa faces who had appeared in his young story. They waited for him, postgame, in that parking lot. He could offer nothing except frustration.

The next week, Aviles got a text from Chris Carter, then USC’s director of player development.

Hey, Carter wrote, to Aviles’ memory, what do I need to do to keep this kid motivated? 

And so it was that Aviles and a man named Terry Brennan flew to Los Angeles midseason, meeting with Simmons and then-inside receivers coach Luke Huard to figure out what USC could do with Ja’Kobi Lane. They all had their part to play in this safety net for Lane, a young man climbing to remarkable heights but often caught on thorns along the way.

Aviles was a longtime mentor and quasi-guardian, a youth coach who had stuck around as others had come and gone. Brennan was a Mesa native who helped take in Lane his senior year at Red Mountain High. Huard was the coach who recruited Lane at USC, who made it a mission to help a truly special personality mature through the academic struggles and occasional antics.

Together, they devised a path forward. Normally, a kid with such lack of opportunity would redshirt his freshman year. But, as Aviles expressed concern, if Lane didn’t feel in the mix – feel valued – he could stop trying.

So Simmons and Huard decided to blow his redshirt, and Lane stuck with the program for the rest of the year.

“I think it just answered his question that he’s always had,” Aviles reflected. “‘Do these guys really want me? Do these guys really think I am what they’ve been telling me?’”

There has long been a plan for Lane, USC trying to give a receiver with enormous potential the infrastructure to achieve it. It paid off in December’s Holiday Bowl, a long-blooming connection with quarterback Miller Moss resulting in two touchdowns. It paid off again Sunday against LSU, the 6-foot-4 Lane burning a defender on a fourth-quarter go route for a crucial score and throwing up a west side to the crowd in Vegas.

In less than 150 snaps of college football, Lane has won the hearts of USC’s faithful. He skipped into the Trojans’ first practice this fall, bellowing “LET’S GO!” at the top of his lungs at 6:57 a.m. When USC’s Spirit of Troy student band went marching into one practice in late August, Lane marched right out with them, his helmet resting backward on top of his head as he banged a pair of cymbals in perfect rhythm.

Lane having fun, Red Mountain receivers coach Diego Hernandez said, is the best version of him. To those who know him, it means he’s found true comfort at USC. Because if you show you care about him – show you love him – Ja’Kobi Lane will do anything for you.

“Always fighting for a place that he could call home,” Aviles said. “And once Ja’Kobi finds that, he’s pretty locked in.”

Staying home

At Red Mountain High, the largest school in the largest district in Arizona, everyone knew Ja’Kobi Lane.

He manned the microphone at the pep rallies. He pulled off a backflip, and a frontflip, in a choreographed dance for Red Mountain’s “Beaus and Bros” cheerleader-plus-player homecoming special. He once threw the ball to himself off the backboard in a student-versus-staff basketball game, Red Mountain head coach Kyle Enders remembered, and dunked on a school counselor.

“He just lives life, I don’t know – in the moment, good, bad and different,” Red Mountain teacher Laurel Moore said, pausing. “Yeah. What a character.”

A character, though, that Red Mountain’s staff often tried to reel back. Lane didn’t drink. Didn’t smoke. But Red Mountain operated like a blue-collar program, and coaches occasionally felt Lane would talk back too often or disagree with criticism, and he spent much of his sophomore year relegated to junior varsity.

Constant insecurities expressed themselves in different ways, Red Mountain assistant coach and former Pro Bowl tight end Todd Heap reflected, coming from Lane’s upbringing. He grew up in a single-parent house in Mesa, and was his mother Megan’s world. But he struggled with structure and the lack of it, Hernandez said. At one point, growing up, Lane ran away from home and was refusing to come back.

As the kid’s frame and talent became obvious, Aviles said, youth coaches would try to position themselves as father figures. Grown men would promise him a new pair of cleats, or fly him out to 7-on-7 tournaments, a process that only continued into high school.

“I’ve seen countless people,” Hernandez said, “try to get a piece of the pie.”

Eventually, as Megan grew to trust Aviles, Lane stayed on and off with him and the Brenner family for the better part of a decade. When Lane got himself in trouble in middle school, his principals would call Aviles to come pick him up.

Eventually, before Lane got to high school, Aviles sat him down and told him: I’m not quittin’ on you.

“I think Ja’Kobi, just, I think he was testing a lot of people because he had had people jump in and out of his life,” Aviles said.

The summer before his senior year of high school, Lane and Aviles went on a few recruiting trips outside of Red Mountain’s football office, and he missed a few practices. Shortly after, Red Mountain played in a 7-on-7 tournament and Lane showed up, trotting out with the offense on the first series.

“Ja’Kobi,” Enders told him, as Hernandez remembered, “absolutely not. You’re not doing this.”

Lane stormed home. He was being recruited hard by Florida prep school IMG Academy at the time, another voice whispering in his ear, and he began texting back and forth with Enders. Lane was frustrated. Enders made clear he wouldn’t chase him.

“At that point,” Hernandez said, “I really didn’t think he was going to be coming back.”

He did. Red Mountain and Mesa were, after all, home.

The academic journey

It got quiet, sometimes, inside Dalia Garcia Starks and Laurel Moore’s senior English classroom at Red Mountain. Never for long. Often, sitting in his seat, Lane would simply blurt out a random noise to break the silence.

That’s Ja’Kobi, his teachers simply thought. They didn’t care. He was respectful and kind, and he could lay on the floor, for all they cared, as long as he remained engaged. He always was.

“We make kids like Ja’Kobi Lane, make it happen – with his big personality and stuff – to make sure he walks across that stage,” Garcia Starks said.

And Lane needed to make it happen his senior year. Academically, as Aviles reflected, he was “in a hole.” Even as USC showed interest, Aviles remembered, Red Mountain communicated to them that the likelihood of Lane becoming a Division I athlete was slim.

But after Huard came out to Red Mountain, and watched Lane play in person, he refused to let go.

“This guy,” Aviles remembered Huard telling him, “could be the one.”

Head coach Lincoln Riley told Huard to pull Lane’s transcripts, seeing if there was any possible academic path to USC. There was, and the decision was a “game-changer,” Aviles said. In the meantime, Huard set out about learning every single detail possible to Lane’s long backstory, trying to find how USC could make the fit work.

“I kid you not,” Enders said – positively – of Huard’s thoroughness, “I’ve never seen some (expletive) like that.”

And Lane’s coaches and teachers saw a jump, in turn, in his maturity that senior year. He became a leader at Red Mountain. He retook – as Aviles pinpointed – about six to eight classes from his sophomore and junior years, as Moore helped him through one geometry class. He re-enacted the final scene of Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” with aplomb, in that English class, for a final project.

“Seeing that growth as a senior, as a student-athlete,” Enders said, “was huge.”

In late May of Lane’s senior year, Red Mountain teammate Jeremiah Aviles was shot and killed. The community, shortly after, held a vigil at Red Mountain Park, adjacent to the school’s campus. And Lane spoke up, when the ceremony was opened to friends.

He spoke with sheer passion, as the larger group was flooded with tears, Garcia Starks remembered. He spoke with sentiments, Hernandez said, his teammates might have been too shell-shocked to express. It was the best of Lane, in a nutshell.

“Out of everything, taking the football stuff into account, his ability to just connect with people is unlike anything I’ve ever seen,” Hernandez said.

When Lane left Red Mountain for USC, his academic gauntlet successful, he signed his last pair of cleats and gave them to Moore and Garcia Starks. One for each.

Maturation at USC

During one Monday night run at USC last season, fellow receiver Duce Robinson remembered, Lane snagged a touchdown one-handed and then pushed himself up into a headstand.

Not a handstand, Robinson emphasized. A full headstand, inverted upon his helmet for maybe three seconds.

“That’s just Ja’Kobi for you,” Robinson smiled last week.

The worst thing he could do as a coach, Riley emphasized last week, would be to extinguish Lane’s passion. It was “a gift,” Riley called it. But there was a time and place, and the maturation has continued at USC.

At Red Mountain, longtime friend and former quarterback Carter Crispin said, Lane wanted the ball every play. Moss, now USC’s starting quarterback, echoed a similar sentiment in Lane’s development: understanding it wasn’t the end of the world if a play wasn’t designed for him.

“Not being complacent,” Lane said, asked last week about his growth. “Trying to get better in every area. Being a good teammate. Learning the playbook inside and out, things like that helped me over time just mold into the person that I am today.”

He had realized that selflessness, Moss said, and Riley praised Lane’s commitment to his development. He’s been supported, along the way, by a USC program that has come to support inside and out: counseling sessions, one-on-one academic help, diligent coaching. Simmons, Aviles said, will text him if Lane misses a math assignment.

“He’s the kind of kid that, as long as you can keep him engaged and invested into what’s going on, you’re going to be able to get – the sky’s the limit with him,” Hernandez said.

After one practice later in his high school career, Heap went over to Lane and caught his attention, the receiver sitting in a group of his buddies. He had all the talent in the world, Heap emphasized, critiquing Lane on a play he should have made in practice.

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“I can either sit here and tell you you’re doing great,” Heap told a young Lane, “or I can tell you the truth and tell you what you need to improve on.”

Lane looked up at Heap.

“I think,” Lane replied, tongue fully in cheek, “I want you to keep lying to me a little bit longer.”

They all collapsed, Heap recognizing amid the laughter that something deep down had clicked in his pupil.

“All of us that have seen him go through all these things,” Heap said, “you wonder if a kid, if a young guy will ever figure these things out and reach his potential.”

“And I think he’s in the process of doing that.”

​ Orange County Register 

Rams WR Puka Nacua staying grounded on heels of record-breaking season

• September 6, 2024

LOS ANGELES — It wasn’t long ago – a little over a year, to be exact – that, as Puka Nacua walked off the Rams’ practice field at training camp, fans yelled his jersey number out when seeking an autograph, unsure of the rookie’s name.

This summer, however, fans screeched his first name, desperate for a moment of his time during practices at Loyola Marymount.

“Definitely not like training camp last year,” he said at the time, “in the best way.”

A lot has changed for Nacua. He’s no longer the relatively anonymous fifth-round pick out of BYU, fighting for the third or fourth receiver job. Instead, he’s a household name, the record breaker who caught more passes and gained more yards than any rookie receiver in NFL history.

That success has led to many life-changing opportunities, from sponsorships with Jordan Brand, Gatorade and Toyota to an appearance at the NBA All-Star Game to a meet-and-greet with Brazilian soccer star Neymar. As all the rewards of his labor have arisen, Nacua has leaned on his family to keep him grounded.

“My mom is my No. 1 help for that. She’s my No. 1 fan but also one of the people that knows me the best,” Nacua said. “All the media stuff that I get to do, she’ll tell if I’m slipping on something. She’ll call me and say, ‘What are you thinking about on this stuff?’ But my family is the people I rely on the most, the people I get to talk to the most, that know me in and out and they can call me some mean names and it won’t digest the way it would from somebody else. … I’ve wanted them to be a part of the success that I’ve had.”

The only other person who can call Nacua those names is Rams receiver Cooper Kupp, even if the mean name is Nacua’s actual first name, Makea. Navigating his new success was one of many things that Nacua picked Kupp’s mind about this offseason.

“He’s a special dude,” Kupp said. “I know there’s a lot of things that he’s navigating and going from a fifth-round pick to having the success he had so quickly. But he’s done a great job of that.”

Nacua worked out with Kupp at the latter’s home during the offseason, trying to glean more from the role model who helped him transition to the NFL as a rookie. He’d arrive as early as 6 a.m. as the pair would go through weight training, conditioning and route running.

An improved diet, including decreased McDonald’s consumption, helped Nacua drop from 218 pounds as a rookie to 210 entering training camp. When Nacua started running tighter routes at practice, receivers coach Eric Yarber joked it was because he no longer had baby fat pulling him in the wrong direction.

Nacua also focused on eliminating dropped catches, a statistic in which he led the NFL a year ago. Tennis balls were a useful tool, but mostly Nacua wanted to work on watching the ball all the way into his hands, and trust that quarterback Matthew Stafford’s passes are leading him in the right direction.

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That work allowed Nacua to feel confident when he returned to practice last week after a knee injury kept him out for a month.

“It’s been feeling good,” Nacua said of his knee. “It’s been nice to get back and get my feet under me. It was a lot of anxious feelings of being out there and watching everything, knowing that we’re trying to find that rhythm and flow of what we ended the season with.”

Injury report

Rams right tackle Rob Havenstein (ankle) and cornerback Decobie Durant (hamstring) were limited in practice Thursday for the second consecutive day.

​ Orange County Register 

Tritium detected in water at San Onofre, but Edison says it poses ‘no risk’

• September 6, 2024

The San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station in 2019.  (Photo by Leonard Ortiz, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Elevated levels of tritium — a radioactive form of hydrogen — have been found at the shuttered San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, but pose no risk to public health or safety, officials from Southern California Edison said on Thursday, Sept. 5.

The Environmental Protection Agency has set a “maximum contaminant level” of 20,000 picocuries per liter for tritium in drinking water. Routine monitoring at San Onofre found a low concentration of 3,430 picocuries per liter in one well, and a higher concentration of 19,100 picocuries per liter in an adjacent well.

Neither, however, is a drinking water well, officials said.

The plant is just yards from the ocean, so groundwater beneath and around it is salty. It typically flows east to west — that is, inland toward the ocean — and wouldn’t enter the drinking water supply, said Ron Pontes, Edison’s decommissioning manager.

Excavators demolish the control building at San Onofre Nuclear Power Plant on Aug. 1. (Nelvin C. Cepeda / The San Diego Union-Tribune)

“We’re bringing this up now so you know we’ve got an issue here, we’re aware of it, monitoring it, taking action,” Pontes told the Community Engagement Panel at its quarterly meeting. “We’ve engaged a hydrogeologist so we can understand the spread of this tritium, where it is exactly, and how to mediate it,” he said.

It’s not the first time tritium has been found at the site. In 2006, it prompted the temporary closure of one drinking water well in southern Orange County (tests revealed no detectable radioactivity and the well was returned to service); in 2009, it was found in the ocean off the coast and in groundwater protection wells (attributable to sampling shortly after a planned discharge of filtered wastewater from the plant); and in 2012, pumps extracted tritium water from near Unit 2 (pumps were shut off in 2015 and there was no rebound of tritium in that area, Pontes said).

Dry storage of spent fuel at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station in 2021. (Photo by Jeff Gritchen, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Small tritium leaks were common at aging nuclear plants, but the health and safety threats of such leaks were characterized as “next to zero,” an investigation by the Associated Press reported more than a decade ago. A person could drink 130 gallons of the most radioactive water found beneath San Onofre in 2006 and still have no cause for health concern, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission said at the time.

The new findings are so low that reporting isn’t required, but Edison made courtesy notifications to federal, state and local authorities nonetheless, spokesman Jeff Monford said. It will also be monitoring wells more frequently as it decides how to proceed.

Tritium is a byproduct of nuclear reactions, but it’s also produced naturally when cosmic rays collide with nitrogen molecules in the upper atmosphere, the EPA says. It’s used to make luminous dials, as a source of light for exit and similar safety signs, and as a tracer for biochemical research, animal metabolism studies and groundwater transport measurements.

A radiological monitoring program mandated by the NRC requires Edison to test the environment surrounding the plant, including ocean water, sediment and beach sand. The NRC’s threshold for tritium in an ocean water sample that prompts reporting is 30,000 picocuries per liter, and San Onofre’s findings remain well below this level, Monford said.

Pontes also provided more detail on two self-reported, low-level violations revealed in a recent NRC inspection report of San Onofre. The first involved a “failure to ensure a package for shipment was leakproof and properly closed and sealed to prevent release of radioactive content as required by U.S. Department of Transportation regulations,” and the second involved a “failure to ensure, by examination or appropriate tests, that the packaging for the Unit 2 pressurizer (main function: to keep reactor’s coolant below boiling) was proper for the contents being shipped as required by DOT regulations.”

“Weep holes” in a pressurizer were blocked, Pontes said, so about 190 gallons of radioactive water remained inside when it should have been dry. New protocols will ensure that doesn’t happen again, he said.

The panel got an update on demolition progress — still on track for finishing up in 2028, more or less — and, as always, there was spirited discussion about the ocean releases of wastewater from the plant. Those releases have been happening regularly for decades, and are smaller now than they were when the plant was actively splitting atoms. Nearly 1 million gallons have been released so far this year, and another 850,000 gallons are slated to be released by the end of the year, Edison said.

Dan Stetson, volunteer chair of the Community Engagement Panel, thanked Edison for “a robust discussion.” The next meeting is slated for December.

​ Orange County Register