LA County enacts emergency powers to save failing Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall

The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors has enacted emergency powers, typically reserved for disasters, to speed up the hiring and firing of probation officers and allow for the deployment of potentially hundreds of county employees from other departments to bolster staffing at Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall, which remains open in defiance of state law.

The emergency proclamation, passed by a 4-1 vote Tuesday, Dec. 17, will activate “disaster service workers” from around the county to temporarily...