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The controversial solution Long Beach has picked to battle shoplifters

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The controversial solution Long Beach has picked to battle shoplifters

Tired of rampant shoplifting scaring away citizens and shoppers, Long Beach is trying to force stores to add staff and reduce dependence on self-checkout.

The beachfront city, with a population of around half a million, last month started requiring major food and pharmacy retailers to do more to stop theft. So far, the measures have led to a heated debate and longer lines.

Employees like the new law. The retail chains warn that the restrictions could backfire. Shoppers are confused.

The city’s “Safe Stores are Staffed Stores” ordinance is the first of its kind in the country. It requires large stores to increase the number of employees relative to self-checkout stands and also puts a limit on the number of items and types of goods that can be rung up at self-checkout.

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It is the latest flash point in a national debate about how to handle what some see as an epidemic of shoplifting. This issue is affecting the quality of life for consumers who are tired of witnessing theft or dealing with measures to stop it, such as locked-up shelves.

The Long Beach ordinance will protect employees and shoppers from dangerous situations, said Matt Bell, the secretary-treasurer of UFCW 324, the union that represents grocery workers.

“The checkers and the cashiers are on the front lines of this,” he said. “It really is necessary to provide them safety and security and better staffing.”

The city said it passed the ordinance to “advance public safety and prevent retail theft,” citing “hostile and unsafe” conditions. Theft is common and underreported at self-checkout, according to the ordinance.

Rampant shoplifting has been a growing issue across the country, forcing stores to beef up security and lock up often-stolen items.

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The National Retail Federation estimates that shoplifting incidents in the U.S. increased by 93% from 2019 to 2023. In 2023, retailers surveyed by the federation reported an average of 177 retail thefts per day.

The Long Beach regulations require that a large store have at least one staff member for every three self-checkout stations it uses. It sets a limit of 15 items per customer for self-checkout. Meanwhile, any items locked inside a case in the store can no longer be bought through self-checkout, according to the ordinance.

As the ordinance will force outlets to either hire more people or cut the number of self-checkout kiosks, the California Grocers Assn. warned that consumers could end up facing longer lines and higher grocery prices.

In response to the requirements, some Albertsons and Vons in Long Beach have closed their self-checkout lanes.

“We are currently unable to operate our self-checkout lanes … due to a new City of Long Beach ordinance,” said a sign for customers at a Vons in downtown Long Beach.

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At a Target in Long Beach, five self-checkout stations were open and staffed by one employee. The store would need to add another employee to monitor self-checkout if it wanted to open more stations, according to the ordinance.

Francilla Isaac, a shopper who lives in the area, said she has seen closed self-checkout lanes and longer lines around the city.

“I use it a lot when I’m just here to get a few items,” Isaac said of self-checkout. “But all the stores are the same now, they have it closed.”

Groups representing grocers and retailers such as Target and Walmart said the ordinance will increase labor costs for employers, leading to higher price tags on the shelf. It will also reduce sales in stores where self-checkout has closed.

“These efforts will ultimately damage self-checkout,” said Nate Rose, a vice president at the California Grocers Assn. “We’re seeing that worst-case scenario play out where a number of grocers have decided it’s not worth it to keep the self-checkout lanes open.”

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The California Retailers Assn. said retailers need freedom to decide on their own what is the most efficient way to deal with theft.

“The problem with the Long Beach ordinance is that it’s so constricting,” said Rachel Michelin, president of the association. “I think we’re going to see unintended consequences.”

Union leader Bell said grocery companies oppose the ordinance because they don’t want to hire more staff or increase their current staff’s hours. While stores may want to avoid hiring more people amid regular increases in minimum wage, they may find that being forced to hire more people actually boosts sales and efficiency.

“This should be better for the customers,” he said. “And it should actually improve profitability for the companies.”

Lisa Adams comes to Long Beach from Utah every month with her husband to sail on their boat. She misses easy access to self-checkout and hopes it will return soon, but they understand the need to tamp down on theft in the city.

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She’s witnessed the theft problem firsthand.

“It was chaotic and loud,” she said. “This guy was pretending to ring his stuff up, and then he booked it for the door.”

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1 Comment

1 Comment

  1. Frank Bovilan

    October 11, 2025 at 3:04 pm

    So, to get this straight, the biggest purveyor of theft, the government, is telling stores how to prevent theft.

    Stupid Californians get exactly what they deserve. More stupidity.

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Nike to Cut 1,400 Jobs as Part of Its Turnaround Plan

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Nike to Cut 1,400 Jobs as Part of Its Turnaround Plan

Nike is cutting about 1,400 jobs in its operations division, mostly from its technology department, the company said Thursday.

In a note to employees, Venkatesh Alagirisamy, the chief operating officer of Nike, said that management was nearly done reorganizing the business for its turnaround plan, and that the goal was to operate with “more speed, simplicity and precision.”

“This is not a new direction,” Mr. Alagirisamy told employees. “It is the next phase of the work already underway.”

Nike, the world’s largest sportswear company, is trying to recover after missteps led to a prolonged sales slump, in which the brand leaned into lifestyle products and away from performance shoes and apparel. Elliott Hill, the chief executive, has worked to realign the company around sports and speed up product development to create more breakthrough innovations.

In March, Nike told investors that it expected sales to fall this year, with growth in North America offset by poor performance in Asia, where the brand is struggling to rejuvenate sales in China. Executives said at the time that more volatility brought on by the war in the Middle East and rising oil prices might continue to affect its business.

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The reorganization has involved cuts across many parts of the organization, including at its headquarters in Beaverton, Ore. Nike slashed some corporate staff last year and eliminated nearly 800 jobs at distribution centers in January.

“You never want to have to go through any sort of layoffs, but to re-center the company, we’re doing some of that,” Mr. Hill said in an interview earlier this year.

Mr. Alagirisamy told employees that Nike was reshaping its technology team and centering employees at its headquarters and a tech center in Bengaluru, India. The layoffs will affect workers across North America, Europe and Asia.

The cuts will also affect staffing in Nike’s factories for Air, the company’s proprietary cushioning system. Employees who work on the supply chain for raw materials will also experience changes as staff is integrated into footwear and apparel teams.

Nike’s Converse brand, which has struggled for years to revive sales, will move some of its engineering resources closer to the factories they support, the company said.

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Mr. Alagirisamy said the moves were necessary to optimize Nike’s supply chain, deploy technology faster and bolster relationships with suppliers.

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Senate committee kills bill mandating insurance coverage for wildfire safe homes

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Senate committee kills bill mandating insurance coverage for wildfire safe homes

A bill that would have required insurers to offer coverage to homeowners who take steps to reduce wildfire risk on their property died in the Legislature.

The Senate Insurance Committee on Monday voted down the measure, SB 1076, one of the most ambitious bills spurred by the devastating January 2025 wildfires.

The vote came despite fire victims and others rallying at the state Capitol in support of the measure, authored by state Sen. Sasha Renée Pérez (D-Pasadena), whose district includes the Eaton fire zone.

The Insurance Coverage for Fire-Safe Homes Act originally would have required insurers to offer and renew coverage for any home that meets wildfire-safety standards adopted by the insurance commissioner starting Jan. 1, 2028.

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It also threatened insurers with a five-year ban from the sale of home or auto insurance if they did not comply, though it allowed for exceptions.

However, faced with strong opposition from the insurance industry, Pérez had agreed to amend the bill so it would have established community-wide pilot projects across the state to better understand the most effective way to limit property and insurance losses from wildfires.

Insurers would have had to offer four years of coverage to homeowners in successful pilot projects.

Denni Ritter, a vice president of the American Property Casualty Insurance Assn., told the committee that her trade group opposed the bill.

“While we appreciate the intent behind those conversations, those concepts do not remove our opposition, because they retain the same core flaw — substituting underwriting judgment and solvency safeguards with a statutory mandate to accept risk,” she said.

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In voting against the bill Sen. Laura Richardson, (D-San Pedro), said: “Last I heard, in the United States, we don’t require any company to do anything. That’s the difference between capitalism and communism, frankly.”

The remarks against the measure prompted committee Chair Sen. Steve Padilla, (D-Chula Vista), to chastise committee members in opposition.

“I’m a little perturbed, and I’m a little disappointed, because you have someone who is trying to work with industry, who is trying to get facts and data,” he said.

Monday’s vote was the fourth time a bill that would have required insurers to offer coverage to so-called “fire hardened” homes failed in the Legislature since 2020, according to an analysis by insurance committee staff.

Fire hardening includes measures such as cutting back brush, installing fire resistant roofs and closing eaves to resist fire embers.

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Pérez’s legislation was thought to have a better chance of passage because it followed the most catastrophic wildfires in U.S. history, which damaged or destroyed more than 18,000 structures and killed 31 people.

The bill was co-sponsored by the Los Angeles advocacy group Consumer Watchdog and Every Fire Survivor’s Network, a community group founded in Altadena after the fires formerly called the Eaton Fire Survivors Network.

But it also had broad support from groups such as the California Apartment Association, the California Nurses Association and California Environmental Voters.

Leading up to the fires, many insurers, citing heightened fire risk, had dropped policyholders in fire-prone neighorhoods. That forced them onto the California FAIR Plan, the state’s insurer of last resort, which offers limited but costly policies.

A Times analysis found that that in the Palisades and Eaton fire zones, the FAIR Plan’s rolls from 2020 to 2024 nearly doubled from 14,272 to 28,440. Mandating coverage has been seen as a way of reducing FAIR Plan enrollment.

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“I’m disappointed this bill died in committee. Fire survivors deserved better,” Pérez said in a statement .

Also failing Monday in the committee was SB 982, a bill authored by Sen. Scott Wiener, (D-San Francisco). It would have authorized California’s attorney general to sue fossil fuel companies to recover losses from climate-induced disasters. It was opposed by the oil and gas industry.

Passing the committee were two other Pérez bills. SB 877 requires insurers to provide more transparency in the claims process. SB 878 imposes a penalty on insurers who don’t make claims payments on time.

Another bill, SB 1301, authored by insurance commissioner candidate Sen. Ben Allen, (D-Pacific Palisades), also passed. It protects policyholders from unexplained and abrupt policy non-renewals.

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How We Cover the White House Correspondents’ Dinner

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How We Cover the White House Correspondents’ Dinner

Times Insider explains who we are and what we do, and delivers behind-the-scenes insights into how our journalism comes together.

Politicians in Washington and the reporters who cover them have an often adversarial relationship.

But on the last Saturday in April, they gather for an irreverent celebration of press freedom and the First Amendment at the Washington Hilton Hotel: The White House Correspondents’ Association dinner.

Hosted by the association, an organization that helps ensure access for media outlets covering the presidency, the dinner attracts Hollywood stars; politicians from both parties; and representatives of more than 100 networks, newspapers, magazines and wire services.

While The Times will have two reporters in the ballroom covering the event, the company no longer buys seats at the party, said Richard W. Stevenson, the Washington bureau chief. The decision goes back almost two decades; the last dinner The Times attended as an organization was in 2007.

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“We made a judgment back then that the event had become too celebrity-focused and was undercutting our need to demonstrate to readers that we always seek to maintain a proper distance from the people we cover, many of whom attend as guests,” he said.

It’s a decision, he added, that “we have stuck by through both Republican and Democratic administrations, although we support the work of the White House Correspondents’ Association.”

Susan Wessling, The Times’s Standards editor, said the policy is a product of the organization’s desire to maintain editorial independence.

“We don’t want to leave readers with any questions about our independence and credibility by seeming to be overly friendly with people whose words and actions we need to report on,” she said.

The celebrity mentalist Oz Pearlman is headlining the evening, in lieu of the usual comedy set by the likes of Stephen Colbert and Hasan Minhaj, but all eyes will be on President Trump, who will make his first appearance at the dinner as president.

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Mr. Trump has boycotted the event since 2011, when he was the butt of punchlines delivered by President Barack Obama and the talk show host Seth Meyers mocking his hair, his reality TV show and his preoccupation with the “birther” movement.

Last month, though, Mr. Trump, who has a contentious relationship with the media, announced his intention to attend this year’s dinner, where he will speak to a room full of the same reporters he often derides as “enemies of the people.”

Times reporters will be there to document the highs, the lows and the reactions in the room. A reporter for the Styles desk has also been assigned to cover the robust roster of after-parties around Washington.

Some off-duty reporters from The Times will also be present at this late-night circuit, though everyone remains cognizant of their roles, said Patrick Healy, The Times’s assistant managing editor for Standards and Trust.

“If they’re reporting, there’s a notebook or recorder out as usual,” he said. “If they’re not, they’re pros who know they’re always identifiable as Times journalists.”

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For most of The Times’s reporters and editors, though, the evening will be experienced from home.

“The rest of us will be able to follow the coverage,” Mr. Stevenson said, “without having to don our tuxes or gowns.”

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