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Jan 16, 2025 | 
latimes.com | Gabriel San Román
Florice Hoffman is ready to lead Orange County Democrats as the party’s new local chair. Orange County Democrats on Monday selected a new leadership team to guide the party into the 2026 midterm elections, with labor attorney Florice Hoffman as its new chair. Running unopposed, Hoffman, 66, succeeds Ada Briceño, who served as chair for the past six years before she stepped down during the Democratic Party of Orange County Central Committee meeting held in Garden Grove.
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Jan 15, 2025 | 
latimes.com | Gabriel San Román
San Clemente City Councilman Victor Cabral held up a long, dried-out weed plucked from a hillside during a special meeting on fire preparedness. He snapped off a barren branch as a cautionary tale. “These weeds that are growing out there … they’re ready to burn,” Cabral said.
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Jan 14, 2025 | 
latimes.com | Gabriel San Román
Supervisor Don Wagner speaking at an O.C. Human Relations Commission meeting last year. Wagner voted to shrink the commission. The Orange County Board of Supervisors voted to overhaul a county commission tasked with tackling discrimination and issuing annual hate crime reports.
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Jan 9, 2025 | 
latimes.com | Gabriel San Román
Fullerton Union High School’s longtime nickname may change due to a new state law on racial mascots. For decades, Fullerton Union High School’s “Indians” nickname has prompted protests from activists who claim it is offensive to Native Americans.
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Jan 8, 2025 | 
latimes.com | Gabriel San Román
A comprehensive review of the 2024 general election in Orange County found no evidence of fraud or interference, according to a new Orange County Grand Jury report. Released this month, the 25-page report further concluded that O.C.’s voting system, which services the seventh largest voting district in the nation with a population greater than 21 states, displayed the “highest level of integrity.”Registrar of Voters Bob Page thanked the grand jury for their work.
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Jan 7, 2025 | 
latimes.com | Gabriel San Román
At first glance, Orange County appeared to have reversed a years-long trend of rising hate crimes, according to a new annual report. Despite the early tensions of the Israel-Gaza war and a polarizing election season around the corner, the 2023 Orange County Hate Crime Report found that hate crimes in O.C. against African Americans, Jewish Americans, Latinos, Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders all declined.
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Dec 5, 2024 | 
latimes.com | Gabriel San Román |Gabriel San Roman
More than half a century after first considering an inspection program for rental housing, the La Habra City Council declined to fund and staff the policy once more. During Monday’s council meeting, council members debated the merits and timing of a three-year pilot program that would hire a code enforcement officer to routinely inspect rental units for substandard and unsafe living conditions.
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Dec 5, 2024 | 
latimes.com | Gabriel San Román |Gabriel San Roman
Scare actors will be getting ready with their holiday best for a new creepy Christmas carwash in Anaheim. You better watch out. You better not cry. The “Haunted Holidays” carwash is coming to serve up suds and scares for Christmastime. A spin-off from the Haunted Carwash, a creative drive-through Halloween fright fest that originally began as the “Tunnel of Terror” during the pandemic, Haunted Holidays is the latest event to mingle the seasons in offering one final chill before the year’s end.
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Dec 3, 2024 | 
latimes.com | Gabriel San Román |Gabriel San Roman
Former Supervisor Andrew Do’s conviction has led to a wave of transparency efforts, including contract audits. The Orange County Board of Supervisors voted to green-light an external audit of select county contracts following former Supervisor Andrew Do’s conviction on bribery charges in October. Supervisors resumed discussion on the size and scope of a potential independent investigation during Tuesday’s meeting after an initial debate at the Nov.
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Nov 21, 2024 | 
latimes.com | Gabriel San Román |Gabriel San Roman
Homes in the wealthy Cowan Heights neighborhood of North Tustin in a photo from 2008. North Tustin, a hillside community of luxury homes dotted along narrow, winding roads, may soon get its own ZIP code — and a clear exit from one of the highest sales tax rates in Orange County. Republican Rep.
