LA Podcast - Just Say Noma

Alissa, Rachel, and Mike discuss LA city’s six-year journey to end the racist and ineffective practice of pretextual stops by police. For the first time in a decade, the number of homeless people who died in LA County went down, not up; from a high of seven deaths per day to six deaths per day. Then: the Noma pop-up in Silver Lake is protested after allegations of abuse by Danish chef René Redzepi resurface, fueling a reckoning over how restaurants treat workers.

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LAist: “Black and Latino Angelenos are overrepresented in traffic stops used to investigate serious crimes”

The city’s Chief Legislative Analyst office report noted Black people made up one third of all pretextual stops, despite being only 8% of the city’s population. LAPD released its own report, and Catalyst California released a report showing the ineffectiveness of such stops

Meanwhile, traffic enforcement of actually dangerous driving has decreased since 2020

Listen to Mike’s interview with Chauncee Smith of Catalyst California and Leslie Cooper Johnson of the Community Coalition

NACTO’s 2020 statement: “The harassment and injustice that people of color, particularly Black people, experience at the hands of law enforcement on transit and in streets and public spaces is unacceptable and wrong”

During a joint hearing of the transportation and unarmed response committees, Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson testifiedthat he had been stopped four times in a city vehicle, including the previous Wednesday

A new poll shows LA Mayor Karen Bass is polling very poorly for an incumbent, with just 20% support

Read the LA County Department of Public Health report: “Lives Lost : Mortality Trends and Prevention Opportunities For People Experiencing Homelessness in LA County, 2015-2024”

The Guardian: ​​”LA county reports first drop in deaths of unhoused people in a decade”

But as the LA Times reports, “health officials warn that steep cuts to federal and state homeless services threaten to reverse the progress achieved over the last two years”

LA City Council had to overrule City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto to fund $107 million in tenant aid after her office tried to end the Legal Aid Foundation contract

Watch Feldstein Soto’s very disingenuous campaign video claiming she supports renters

The famous Copenhagen restaurant Noma was just about to start an LA pop-up for $1500 a person when new allegations surfaced about chef René Redzepi

Former Noma employee Jason Ignacio White has been collecting allegations of abuse from workers on his Instagram

Protests at Noma LA have been organized with One Fair Wage, which has been fair wages for restaurant workers

Eater LA: “Noma LA Sponsors Exit Amid Abuse Allegations”

Redzepi stepped away from Noma — posting a statement and video — but the protests have continued

LA Times food critic Jenn Harris wrote that she would not reviewNoma LA. “Normally, an event of this scale would warrant coverage. Instead, I found myself making no plans to attend, and even rethinking how I approach my job”

As Meghan McCarron and Julia Moskin write at the New York Times, local chefs were promised spillover economic impact by Noma coming to town that never really happened. And some of them have joined the protests

This episode was produced by Sophie Bridges

The reporting and analysis you hear in the show is put together by our rotating cast of producers and co-hosts every week. All opinions expressed on the show are solely those of co-hosts and may not represent the views of LA Forward