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The work we have done since expanding our staff over the past five years has made a tangible difference in Long Beach, along with winning dozens of statewide and national awards (including an Emmy nomination).
Here’s some of the ways our work has made an impact:
Homelessness
Locked Out: Homelessness in Long Beach is a series launched in 2021 that continues to examine how the city is spending tens of millions of taxpayer dollars to address homelessness. Despite receiving unprecedented funding, homelessness increased by a staggering 62% between 2020 and 2022, and rose another 4.6% in 2023.
The stories in this series looked at the difficulties families face in securing mental health care for their homeless relatives; flaws in the system related to motel vouchers and housing vouchers; the fractured criminal justice system and policing around homelessness; and the toll that homelessness has had on businesses and local libraries. In one case, we even helped a community group reconnect with a disabled homeless woman they’d been caring for after she suddenly disappeared.
Since this series began, the city declared a local emergency, created a dashboard for information about homelessness, explored new safety measures for Downtown, attempted to fix plumbing problems at a local homeless shelter, boosted efforts to get landlords to accept housing vouchers, and more.
Queen Mary
Our investigative series on the Queen Mary revealed how city leaders had let the publicly owned, historic ocean liner deteriorate in the hands of a string of private operators who attempted to pump as much profit and prestige out of the ship while leaving crucial repairs undone. Since our series, the city has elected to manage the ship itself, bringing a new level of public accountability and transparency that never existed when the Queen Mary was leased out to private companies.
Changes in state law
Our stories on the tragic death of a young family at the hands of an underage drunk driver on Halloween night motivated lawmakers to increase penalties on problem liquor store owners. Our reporting showed how lax regulations let a North Long Beach businesswoman repeatedly skirt the rules without facing any lasting consequences, prompting the city prosecutor in Long Beach to lobby for changes to state law.
Police accountability
The Long Beach Post undertook the first-ever analysis of race-related data collected by the Long Beach Police Department that showed definitively how officers disproportionately pulled over Black motorists. Our work in this area informed how Long Beach police would analyze and publicize its own data. A related story about how frequently Long Beach police used force — including a controversial stranglehold — won recognition from the Sacramento Press Club for its statewide policy implications.
The Long Beach Police Department tightened its investigative practices after our reporting showed how a Long Beach police officer was tipped off to the fact that he was a suspect in a case involving the distribution of images showing children being sexually abused.
After the Long Beach Post wrote about the weakness and opacity of the city’s police oversight commission it became a target for change during the racial justice protests of 2020. City leaders acknowledged that their original plans for the commission had failed and brought an initiative to voters to reform the body. The measure passed and is currently being implemented.
Convention and Vistors Bureau
We wrote a series of investigative stories about the lax oversight of the city’s Convention and Visitors Bureau, an agency supported by public funds that is charged with promoting tourism in the city. The stories began when a lawsuit was filed by a former finance director at the Long Beach Convention Center, which alleged that the CEO of the CVB, Steve Goodling, had been spending public money without accountability on extravagant parties, props and more.
The Post reviewed hundreds of pages of public records, interviewed more than a dozen people who’ve worked with Goodling, obtained internal bureau communications and examined a sample of financial statements over the course of 2023. In response to our reporting, the Long Beach City Attorney opined that the CVB was required to abide by public records laws, prompting the city to instruct them to comply with transparency requirements they’d never followed before.
As a result, the CVB went to such lengths to avoid full compliance with public records requests and open meeting requirements that it created an entirely new organization called Meet Long Beach. We reported on the City Council’s decision in November 2023 to sanction this move.