Bay Area News Group: Judges Clear Way For Berkeley To Close Two Of Its Largest Homeless Camps
After initially preventing Berkeley from clearing two of its largest homeless camps, judges have allowed the city to move forward with the sweeps, a sign that courts are less willing to halt encampment closures in the Bay Area since a landmark U.S. Supreme Court ruling last year granted cities broad authority to clamp down on homelessness. (Varian, 7/2)

LAist: More Unsheltered Angelenos Are ‘Rough Sleeping’ Without A Tent, Study Says
A study that counts unsheltered populations in three L.A. neighborhoods — Skid Row, Hollywood and Venice — found a 15% decrease in the population last year overall compared to a year earlier. However, the people who remained on the streets in 2024 were more vulnerable and harder for outreach organizations to serve, according to the report released Tuesday. (Schrank, 7/1)

CalMatters: CA Schools Improve Tracking Of Homeless Students
In Kern County, the first rule in counting homeless students is not saying “homeless.” Instead, school staff use phrases like “struggling with stable housing” or “families in transition.” The approach seems to have worked: More families are sharing their housing status with their children’s schools, which means more students are getting services. “There’s a lot of stigma attached to the word ‘homeless,’” said Curt Williams, director of homeless and foster youth services for the Kern County Office of Education. “When you remove that word, it all changes.” (Jones, 7/2)

LAist: LA County Officials Select Leader Of New Homelessness Department
Los Angeles County has picked a leader for its first-ever homelessness department but hasn’t released that person’s name publicly. The L.A. County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously Tuesday after meeting in closed session for roughly five hours. After coming out of closed session, the supervisors voted to officially name the new unit the Department of Homeless Services and Housing. (Sievertson, 7/1)

San Francisco Chronicle: CA Finally Passed CEQA Reform. Will It Stop Housing Roadblocks?
The titanic shift in California housing policy orchestrated by Gov. Gavin Newsom on Monday night, resulting in the rewriting of large parts of the California Environmental Quality Act, will allow him to spend the final 18 months in office trying to correct one of his biggest policy failures unencumbered by what he views as a key roadblock. Newsom and housing advocates have long blamed the CEQA environmental review process for the state’s inability to keep up with growing housing demand. But with the legislation passed Monday those reviews have been severely curtailed. (Dineen, Waxmann and Libby, 7/1)

San Francisco Chronicle: New Toxic Metal Has Been Found In The Air And Homes After L.A. Fires
Krista Copelan’s home didn’t burn in the Eaton Fire. But for months afterward, it was filled with poisonous traces of things that did. Arsenic from treated wood and pesticides in the soil. Copper, likely from the wiring systems of the thousands of homes reduced to ash. Lead, discovered on the floor of her daughter’s bedroom, from old paint and leaded gasoline that leached into the ground only to be vaporized by flames. And on Copelan’s kitchen floor: beryllium. (Munce and Neilson, 7/2)

Los Angeles Times: The Palisades Fire Spewed Toxins Into The Pacific. Summer Surf Camps Are Paying The Price 
For decades, surf camps and schools have been a mainstay of local beaches across Santa Monica Bay, but concerns over pollutants from the Palisades fire are hurting business. (Miller, 7/2)

Los Angeles Times: Eaton Fire's 18th Victim Has Been Identified. He Was An Actor And A Teacher 
Kevin Devine was last seen outside of his Boston Street apartment complex in Altadena on Jan. 7, hours after the deadly Eaton fire ignited. Weeks passed without word of his fate. The county medical examiner’s office has confirmed that Devine, 54, died in that fire. His remains were discovered April 2 in the 900 block of Boston Street, one block east of Lake Avenue. He is the 18th person known to have died in the Eaton fire, and the only victim to perish east of Lake Avenue. Devine was identified in the medical examiner’s website on April 22. (Purtill, 6/30)

Berkeleyside: Lake Anza Is Open For Swimming With Toxic Algae Abated For Now
The Tilden lake’s swim season ended abruptly in mid-June last year. Officials say they've made progress mitigating some of the underlying factors behind harmful algae blooms. (Ekonde, 7/1)

AP: Anne Wojcicki's Nonprofit Gets Court Approval To Buy 23andMe For $305 Million
Anne Wojcicki’s bid to buy 23andMe, the genetic testing company she cofounded nearly 20 years ago, has received the court greenlight. That means Wojcicki’s nonprofit TTAM Research Institute will purchase “substantially all” of San Francisco-based 23andMe’s assets for $305 million. The transaction — which arrives more than three months after 23andMe filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy — is set to officially close in the coming weeks. (Grantham-Philips, 7/2)

Los Angeles Times: O.C. Congresswoman Targeted By Protests Over Trump Megabill
Protesters railed on Tuesday against an Orange County congresswoman who could be a critical vote on President Trump’s proposal to cut more than $1 trillion in federal dollars that helped pay for healthcare for those in need and extend tax cuts for millions of Americans. Trump’s proposed “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” narrowly passed the U.S. Senate hours before hundreds of people gathered in a cul-de-sac outside of the Anaheim field office of Republican Rep. Young Kim to protest those cuts. The legislation still needs to be voted on by the U.S. House of Representatives, which could happen before the end of the week. (Mehta, 7/1)

CNBC: Medicaid Cuts In Trump’s ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ Will Leave Millions Uninsured, Threaten Rural Hospitals
President Donald Trump’s “big beautiful bill” would make sweeping changes to U.S. health care, leaving millions of vulnerable Americans without health insurance and threatening the hospitals and centers that provide care to them. (Constantino, 7/1)

Fierce Healthcare: Senate Bill Cuts Medicaid Funding For Planned Parenthood
The Senate version of President Donald Trump’s "big beautiful bill," which narrowly passed Tuesday, includes a provision that would prohibit federal Medicaid funding for any healthcare services provided by clinics that also provide abortion services for one year. The Senate parliamentarian Monday ruled that the language banning federal funding for Planned Parenthood for one year does not violate the chamber’s Byrd Rule, clearing the way for the provision to be included in the bill. (Landi, 7/1)

The Wall Street Journal: What Medicaid Work Requirements Mean For Enrollees’ Coverage
President Trump’s tax-and-spending megabill seeks to implement a policy long championed by Republicans: work requirements for Medicaid beneficiaries. Policy analysts expect millions of people to lose coverage either because they won’t bother to comply with the new rules or because they aren’t able to keep up with the paperwork and other bureaucratic hurdles states will erect for proving eligibility. (Walker and Mosbergen, 7/1)

The New York Times: Poorest Americans Would Be Hurt By Trump’s Big Bill
Millions of low-income Americans could experience staggering financial losses under the domestic policy package that Republicans advanced through the Senate on Tuesday, which reserves its greatest benefits for the rich while threatening to strip health insurance, food stamps and other aid from the poor. For many of these families, the loss of critical federal support is likely to negate any improvements they might have seen as a result of slightly lower taxes, experts said. (Romm, 7/1)

The Washington Post: GOP Tax Bill Includes A $6,000 ‘Senior Deduction.’ Here’s Who Qualifies.
The tax bill approved by Senate Republicans on Tuesday includes a proposed $6,000 deduction for seniors, the legislative version of President Donald Trump’s 2024 campaign pledge to end taxes on Social Security payments. The new deduction is one of the flashiest provisions in the Trump tax legislation, and the White House has been eager to tout it as a major economic benefit for Americans 65 or older. But the provision would not benefit tens of millions of low-income seniors, and it would hasten the date by which the Social Security trust fund runs out of money, according to nonpartisan estimates. (Stein, 7/2)

Modern Healthcare: Tax Bill Passing Senate Draws Reactions From Healthcare Industry
The Senate brought the One Big Beautiful Bill Act of 2025 and its more than $1 trillion in cuts to Medicaid and other healthcare programs one critical step closer to President Donald Trump’s desk Tuesday. Healthcare organizations have sharply criticized the legislation since Trump and the Republican majority in Congress began working on the measure in January. Following the Senate action, trade associations slammed the bill, saying it would devastate providers and patients. (Hudson, 7/1)

The New York Times: Social Security Backs Off Listing Living Migrants As Dead
The Trump administration has backed away from a maneuver in which it sought to classify thousands of living immigrants as dead in a critical Social Security database, part of a strategy to pressure them to self-deport. In April, the Social Security Administration placed roughly 6,300 migrants whose legal status had been revoked on its “death master file,” a vital data set that gets distributed to banks, lenders and other financial institutions. (Berzon, Siegel Bernard and Nehamas, 7/1)

Los Angeles Times: Bill In Congress Would Bar Federal Immigration Agents From Hiding Their Faces 
Following a surge in arrests by armed, masked federal immigration agents in unmarked cars, some California Democrats are backing a new bill in Congress that would bar officials from covering their faces while conducting raids. The No Masks for ICE Act, introduced by Rep. Nydia Velázquez (D-New York) and co-sponsored by more than a dozen Democrats, would make it illegal for federal agents to cover their faces while conducting immigration enforcement unless the masks were required for their safety or health. (Nelson, 7/1)

The New Yorker: What Therapists Treating Immigrants Hear 
Erica Lubliner is a psychiatrist at the University of California, Los Angeles, who directs a clinic that offers mental-health services to Latinos. She provides care to a wide range of patients: first- to fourth-generation immigrants, including undocumented immigrants, and undergraduate and graduate students at U.C.L.A., many of whom are the first in their families to go to college. She usually meets patients in her bright office on campus in Westwood, where paintings by Mexican artists hang on the walls and children’s books are within easy reach. But, after the ICE raids began around the city last month, she moved her appointments online. Lubliner’s patients are safe in her clinic, she told me, “but even getting here can be scary.” She had heard that ICE agents had started parking outside some local hospitals. Many of her patients take the bus or walk to their appointments, and they worry that they might get apprehended on the way. (Cadava, 7/1)

The Hill: 16 States Sue Trump Over School Mental Health Cuts
Sixteen Democratic-led states filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration Monday challenging the Department of Education’s cuts to mental health funding for schools. In April, the Education Department announced the $1 billion cut to mental health funding, citing concerns with diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives embedded in the contracts. The states allege the contracts were unlawfully terminated under the Administrative Procedure Act and that the cancellation goes against congressional mandates. The lawsuit says the cuts would cause “immediate and devastating harm” to schools. (Cochran, 7/1)

AP: Democrat Mayors Sue Over Trump Effort To Restrict Obamacare Enrollment
New Trump administration rules that give millions of people a shorter timeframe to sign up for the Affordable Care Act’s health care coverage are facing a legal challenge from Democratic mayors around the country. The rules, rolled out last month, reverse a Biden-era effort to expand access to the Affordable Care Act’s health insurance, commonly called “Obamacare” or the ACA. The previous Democratic administration expanded the enrollment window for the coverage, which led to record enrollment. (Seitz, 7/1)

The New York Times: Federal Judge Halts RFK Jr.’s Mass Firing Efforts At H.H.S. For Now
A federal judge on Tuesday temporarily blocked the Trump administration from moving forward with a dramatic reorganization of the Department of Health and Human Services, finding that the mass firings and organizational changes were probably unlawful. In an opinion accompanying the order, Judge Melissa R. DuBose of the U.S. District Court for the District of Rhode Island said that Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s efforts to wipe out entire programs and reorient the agency’s priorities and work far exceeded his authority. (Jewett and Montague, 7/1)

San Francisco Chronicle: S.F. Medical Examiner Seeks Help Identifying Woman Who Died In Cathedral Hill
San Francisco’s medical examiner is asking for the public’s help in identifying a woman who died on a sidewalk in the city’s Cathedral Hill neighborhood. The office of the chief medical examiner on Monday released a sketch of the woman, describing her as white, approximately 50 years old, and having red hair and green eyes. She was 5 feet, 4 inches tall and weighed 107 pounds, officials said. (Parker, 7/1)