California Schools Open with Fewer Students

California’s public schools have shed nearly 500,000 students since 2015-16, and the losses keep coming as a new school year gets underway.

The latest count puts statewide enrollment at about 5.73 million, down 1.3% in a year. The decline is being driven by falling birth rates and high housing costs that are pushing families out of the state’s most expensive regions.

Los Angeles Unified shows the trend at its sharpest, with enrollment projected to fall to 375,661 by 2027-28, nearly half below its 2002-03 peak of 724,113. Declines have hit coastal regions hardest, while much of the Central Valley has grown over the past decade, though most regions are projected to lose students in the decade ahead.

Because funding follows enrollment and attendance, fewer students mean thinner budgets, raising the prospect of layoffs, program cuts, and school closures.

Meta Youth Addiction Trial Begins in Oakland

Jury selection began Wednesday in an Oakland federal court for a trial accusing Meta of designing Facebook and Instagram to addict children.

California is one of the first four states to go to trial, alongside Colorado, Kentucky, and New Jersey, as part of federal multidistrict litigation involving 29 states. The trial is scheduled to begin next week and could run six to eight weeks.

The states argue Meta knowingly built addictive features, misled the public about the risks, and collected data on children under 13 without parental consent.

Meta disputes the allegations and points to the safety features it has introduced for young people.

Meta comes to Oakland court after a recent legal setback. Last week a New Mexico court ordered it to pay $567 million to address harms to young people from its platforms, following $375 million in civil penalties imposed in March.

Leno Pushes Classic Car Smog Bill

Comedian and car collector Jay Leno is again lobbying Sacramento to spare classic cars from California’s biennial smog checks.

The bill is nicknamed “Leno’s Law.” It would exempt collector vehicles built before the 1981 model year starting next January, then add one model year annually until vehicles built before 1986 qualify.

California now exempts vehicles manufactured before 1976. Leno says smog-check facilities equipped to test older cars are so scarce that some LA owners drive to San Diego just to get their cars tested.

“It runs fine, but suddenly you can’t drive it anywhere because there’s no emissions equipment to test it,” Leno said. Sens. Dave Cortese, D-San Jose, and Shannon Grove, R-Bakersfield, are backing the bipartisan measure.

The American Lung Association has raised concerns about the bill, arguing that widening the exemptions would worsen California’s air quality. An earlier version of the bill stalled in the Assembly last year.

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➤ Placer County: The Talbot Fire has burned about 75 acres of the Tahoe National Forest near French Meadows Road, west of Lake Tahoe, with evacuation warnings for the Cedars community and no containment yet. (See Details)

➤ Redwood City: A San Mateo County jury awarded $33 million to twin 11-year-old girls whose parents were killed in a 2022 street-racing crash on El Camino Real, finding the two drivers and one driver’s parents liable. (See Details)

➤ San Francisco: Federal aviation officials rolled out staggered parallel landings at SFO on Wednesday, aiming to lift the clear-weather arrival rate toward 42 planes an hour after runway construction and changes to parallel landings cut it to 36 this spring. (More)

➤ South Lake Tahoe: A 15-year-old boy was arrested on suspicion of attempted murder after an unprovoked stabbing at a Whole Foods, where bystanders helped the wounded 42-year-old victim until officers arrived. (More)

➤ San Mateo County: Don Horsley County Park, a new 58-acre park south of Half Moon Bay, opens Monday with nearly a mile of Tunitas Creek Beach on land privately owned for more than a century before its 2017 purchase. (More)

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➤ Monterey County: The Timber Fire grew to 4,445 acres and remained 7% contained Thursday afternoon, with Highway 1 still closed through part of Big Sur and evacuation orders in effect as crews worked to protect 503 threatened structures. (See Details)

➤ Fresno: The city’s transportation sales-tax measure will stay on the November ballot after a special council meeting called to pull it collapsed for lack of a quorum, potentially leaving Fresno voters to weigh two transportation tax measures at once. (More)

➤ Bakersfield: City staff halted work on a proposed “sanctuary city” policy after residents packed the Aug. 5 council meeting to oppose it. A councilman’s referral to stop work on the policy, which would have limited city cooperation with federal immigration enforcement, took effect without a vote. (See Details)

➤ San Luis Obispo County: County agriculture officials closed an investigation after glassy-winged sharpshooters were found in grape plants shipped from a Fresno County nursery elsewhere in California, concluding no grape plants or invasive pests from the shipments reached the area. (More)

➤ Shaver Springs: Residents are dealing with yellow tap water and soaring utility bills, while Fresno County attributes the discoloration to naturally occurring minerals and works to subsidize bills and find a long-term fix. (More)

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➤ Fullerton: A fire tore through a commercial building beside the airport on Wednesday, sending up thick black smoke that briefly closed the airfield to flights. Firefighters contained the blaze, and no injuries were reported. (More)

➤ Huntington Beach: A marine heat wave is drawing stingrays closer to shore, and the stings are surging. Bolsa Chica and Huntington state beaches have logged more than 3,100 this year, double all of 2025. Lifeguards urge beachgoers to shuffle their feet when entering the water to avoid stepping on rays. (See Details)

➤ Valencia: Six Flags Magic Mountain’s X2 has been closed more than a month after a July incident in which a rider was reported unconscious. California workplace safety officials are investigating, and a wrongful-death suit over a 2022 X2 ride goes to trial in September. (See Details)

➤ Camp Pendleton: The Marine recruit who died after a medical emergency during a fitness test at Camp Pendleton has been identified as 18-year-old Pvt. Aiden Craig, who was stricken on his 47th day of recruit training and died four days later. His death remains under investigation. (More)

➤ Los Angeles: A grand jury indicted Nick Reiner, 32, on two counts of murder in the December stabbing deaths of his parents, director Rob Reiner and producer Michele Singer Reiner, at their Brentwood home, adding a lying-in-wait allegation that could make him eligible for the death penalty. He pleaded not guilty. (More)

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➤ Former UCLA basketball player Russell Westbrook announced his retirement from the NBA, finishing as the league’s all-time triple-double leader. He had stints with both the Los Angeles Lakers and Sacramento Kings over the course of his 18-year career. (More)

➤ Dodgers first baseman Freddie Freeman appeared to avoid serious injury after falling down the stairs into the visitors’ dugout while chasing a foul popup Wednesday night. Freeman said he didn’t hit his head but was left sore after the fall. (More)

➤ Cal football will bring back its Joe Roth throwback uniforms for their season opener against UCLA. Roth’s No. 12 is the only retired number in program history, honoring the quarterback who died of melanoma in 1977. (More)

➤ A California court ruled the Rams’ arbitration agreement unenforceable this week, finding that letting the NFL commissioner or his designee resolve employee disputes was unconscionable. It’s the third recent court decision to invalidate an NFL arbitration provision. (More)

➤ Yesterday’s Results: NFL | MLB | Golf | Tennis | WNBA | Soccer

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➤ California’s high-speed rail project could run out of cash as soon as December 2027 without new financing, the project’s inspector general warned, citing a $9.5 billion five-year funding gap and faulting the rail authority for obscuring key facts about the project’s finances and schedule. (More)

➤ Pink’s Hot Dogs, the Los Angeles landmark that started as a $50 pushcart near La Brea and Melrose in 1939, plans to open its first Japan location, a Tokyo flagship, by year’s end through a partnership with restaurant operator Sunpark. (More)

➤ FedEx, Staples, and LAZ Parking are cutting 500 jobs across Southern California. FedEx is eliminating 116 positions as it closes facilities in Victorville and Palm Springs, LAZ Parking is cutting nearly 250 jobs near LAX and Ontario International Airport, and Staples is laying off workers in La Mirada. (More)

➤ Heritage Oak Winery, whose owners have farmed their Lodi-area land for five generations, plans to close in December as owner Tom Hoffman retires amid a broader wine industry downturn. The family launched its own wine brand and tasting room in 2007 after years of growing grapes for other labels. (More)

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Palantir grew 1,540% This company did 32,481%

Palantir just rocketed to $420 billion by helping companies turn vast amounts of data into value.

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Like Uber turned cars into taxis and Airbnb turned homes into hotels, Mode is transforming smartphones into EarnPhones.

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➤ D23, Disney’s ultimate fan event, takes over the Anaheim Convention Center and Honda Center through Sunday, with the largest show floor in event history, more than 120 stars, panels, performances, and Sunday’s Disney Legends ceremony hosted by Ryan Seacrest. (More)

➤ High Hill Ranch in Placerville, one of California’s apple-iest destinations, kicks off its fall season Saturday, more than a month before autumn officially arrives, with apple doughnuts, fritters, pies, caramel apples, and hard cider drawing fall lovers to the 155-acre Gold Country spread while summer still lingers. (More)

➤ Butano State Park near Pescadero is the only California destination on a new roundup of America’s 13 best-kept secret state parks, a 4,000-acre pocket of old redwood canyon in the Santa Cruz Mountains with 40 miles of fern-lined trails and a $10 day-use fee. (More)

➤ Solvang’s iconic horse-drawn trolley will keep rolling after the city council unanimously approved a five-year license renewal for the family-run operator, which has run nearly 20 years without an accident. Locals called the carriage an integral part of the Danish-themed town’s identity. (More)

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The following stories are featured exclusively on The Flyover Podcast—a daily show that gives you the most important headlines in under 15 minutes. Clicking the links will take you directly to these stories:

➤ Hawaii’s Big Island is under a hurricane watch as a strengthening Pacific storm threatens heavy rain and flooding. (Hear Details)

➤ Luigi Mangione is reportedly weighing a courtroom move that could upend his murder trial in New York. (Hear Episode)

➤ Tech executives are cloning themselves with artificial intelligence, and some of the digital doubles are already going rogue. (Listen Now)

Fall flavors are arriving early at High Hill Ranch. Be honest, what’s your favorite season?

1. Fall
2. Summer
3. Spring
4. Winter

Yesterday’s Results:

Police departments around California are rethinking their use of automated license-plate reading cameras. How do you feel about them in your community?

1. Keep or expand them: 24%
2. Allow them, with strict limits: 24%
3. Not worth the privacy risk: 22%
4. Not sure: 16%
5. Other: 14%

The Central Coast tourist town of Solvang was founded by Danish immigrants in 1911. What does the town’s name mean in Danish?

Show me the answer