Los Angeles city work crews were out in force Wednesday morning near downtown LA, as part of a new effort to remove trash and filth from more streets.

The effort is part of the city’s attempt to stem an outbreak of typhus, a bacterial disease that has infected at least nine people in the downtown area. Typhus causes high fever, rashes, and stomach pain. 

The action comes in the wake of an NBC4 I-Team investigation that documented how trash, infested with rats and flies, has been piling up since at least May and the city hadn't removed it.

On the orders of LA Mayor Eric Garcetti, who allocated an extra $300,000 for the clean up effort, Sanitation Department crews will now regularly remove trash and feces and then power wash the entire area the city now calls "The Typhus Zone."

The Zone spans from 3rd Street to 7th Street and Spring Street to Alameda Street, an area which includes not just homeless encampments but pricey new residential and commercial buildings.

"Every area around here, that will be in the Typhus Zone, will be cleaned up every four weeks," said Enrique Saldivar, who heads up LA's Bureau of Sanitation.

But people who live and work in the area say the expanded street sanitizing effort doesn't go far enough. There are many trash strewn streets that are just outside the clean up boundary, like Ceres Avenue in the Produce District. 

"This is a city thoroughfare and it's the city's responsibility to clean it up," said Estela Lopez, executive director of the LA Downtown Industrial Business Improvement District.

Because of the I-Team's report, the Bureau of Sanitation now says it will clean out mountains of trash from Ceres Avenue on Friday.

As for the streets that are being regularly sanitized, Sanitation Department crews aren't removing all the filth. On one street, the I-Team noticed a dead rat and a pile of feces left behind after crews supposedly cleaned that block.

"If this is called street cleaning somebody's not doing their job," said Darwin Spears, who told NBC4 he lives in a tent on San Pedro Avenue and witnessed that street being cleaned today. 

"They don't do a good job," he said, pointing to a pile of feces still on the street after crews had power washed it. "That s--- has been there for about three or four days," said Spears.

Former first lady Michelle Obama said Thursday she stands by her “when they go low, we go high” motto despite calls this week by some high-profile Democrats to do the opposite.

"Fear is not a proper motivator,” Obama said. “Hope wins out. If you think about how you want your kids to be raised, how you want them to think about life and their opportunities, do you want them afraid of their neighbors? Do you want them angry? Do you want them vengeful?"

She added that in thinking about which values to promote for children, "you have to think about which motto do you want them to live by."

Obama coined the "we go high" phrase during her 2016 speech at the Democratic National Convention and it became a motto for Democrats on how to respond to Donald Trump’s campaign rhetoric.

But former Attorney General Eric Holder said Sunday at a campaign event in Georgia that Democrats need a new slogan, and suggested: “When they go low, we kick them.” A few days later, Clinton said in an interview with CNN, “You cannot be civil with a political party that wants to destroy what you stand for, what you care about."

"What are the things you’re telling your girls? Which motto do you want them to live by?" Obama, who has two daughters of her own, said. "I have to think about that as a mother, as someone who’s a role model to young girls. We want them to grow up with promise and hope, and we can’t model something different if we want them to be better than that."

Obama has mostly kept a low profile since leaving the White House in January 2017, limiting her public commitments to helping When We All Vote, which says it encourages participation regardless of political affiliation. She announced Thursday on the “Today” show the launch of a new initiative aimed to empower adolescent girls around the world through education.

The Global Girls Alliance, which supports grass roots organizations in local communities around the world and connects its leaders “so they can learn from each other,” was rolled out on Oct. 11 to coincide with the International Day of the Girl.

“We want to play a role in building an alliance of young people that are out there doing the work on the ground and we want to give them an opportunity to network with one another,” Obama told “Today” hosts Savannah Guthrie and Hoda Kotb. ”Leaders need access to resources and technical support. The alliance is going to provide that for them.”

As the first African American first lady of the United States, Obama said she wanted every girl in the world to have the same kind of opportunities that she had and that her daughters have.

“The stats show that when you educate a girl you educate a family, a community, a country. It makes no sense that the strength of our family — girls and women — are not getting educated, that they are not in school. If we care about climate change, if we care about poverty, if we care about maternal child health, then we have to care about education.”

The United Nations declared Oct. 11 the International Day of the Girl in 2011 in order "to help galvanize worldwide enthusiasm for goals to better girls’ lives, providing an opportunity for them to show leadership and reach their full potential."

This year’s theme, With Her: A Skilled GirlForce, aims to highlight the need for supporting education and training programs for girls in developing countries.

"Of the one billion young people — including 600 million adolescent girls — that will enter the workforce in the next decade, more than 90 percent of those living in developing countries will work in the informal sector, where low or no pay, abuse and exploitation are common," the United Nations campaign says.

Global Girls Alliance has teamed up with GoFundMe to provide a fundraising source for anyone who wants to help.

Obama also talked about life after the White House and revealed the secret to a happy marriage.

“Separate bathrooms,” she quipped.

A 69-year-old career criminal thought to be the "Gypsy Hill Killer" was sentenced to life in prison on Wednesday for raping and killing two teenage girls more than 42 years ago.

The victims were part of the so-called Gypsy Hill Killings from 1976 in San Mateo County that left five young women brutally murdered. 

Rodney Halbower had dozens of outbursts and repeatedly interrupted the judge during his sentencing on Wednesday, which led to an emotional response from the victims' family. Halbower's life sentence also is without parole.

The victims, 17-year-old Paula Baxter and 18-year-old Veronica Cascio, were both in high school. In 1976, both were found stabbed to death in San Mateo County.

"Paula was larger than life," friend Steve Bischoff said.

Bischoff discovered Baxter's body behind a church in Millbrae.

"Justice would be he loses his life and we get Paula and Veronica back, but that's not possible," Bischoff said of the sentencing. "This is what the law allows."

Retired Millbrae Police Sgt. Ron Caine said he was the first to investigate Baxter's death.

"I worked 16 hours a day, seven days a week for four months and got nowhere," Caine said.

The big break in the case came just a few years ago thanks to improvements in DNA science.

Samples collects at two crime scenes back in 1976 led investigators to Halbower, who was serving a 30-year sentence in Oregon for another attempted murder and assault.

"We got notifications from Oregon they had someone in custody who was probably match to Paula and Veronica murders," San Mateo County Deputy District Attorney Sean Gallagher said.

Authorities believe Halblower may be connected to other Gypsy Hill Killings in San Mateo, but prosecutors chose to pursue the cases with the strongest DNA evidence. Families of the other victims said they are relieved to learn Halbower will never be released from prison.

Because the crimes took place in 1976, the judge had to sentence Halbower based on 1976 laws. At that time there was no death penalty in California.

Halbower may also face another trial for murdering a young woman in Reno, also in 1976.

A big piece of actor-producer Tom Hanks’s past is up for sale, right here in the Bay Area.

A houseboat in the Alameda-Oakland Estuary where the Oscar-winning actor once lived for a few years has been listed for $600,000.

Hanks, 62, who was born in Concord, lived on the boat long before he became famous. His father, Amos Hanks, bought the houseboat new back in 1973, and Hanks tweeted that he lived on it from 1973 to 1976.

He was 17 to 20 years old during that span and likely attending Skyline High School in Oakland and Chabot College in Hayward.

Hanks won back-to-back best actor Oscars for "Philadelphia" in 1993 and "Forrest Gump" in 1994. He also received Oscar nominations for "Cast Away" in 2001, "Saving Private Ryan" in 1999 and "Big" in 1989.

A dog was rescued out of a vehicle that submerged in the San Leandro Marina Wednesday morning.

Rachel Gray and her boyfriend were about to go fishing but couldn’t get their truck started. After hot-wiring it, the truck lurched forward, plunging in the water.

Though the couple was not in the vehicle at the time, their dog Moo was.

"He had to smash the back window, because it's an extended cab, so he had to smash it and his hands all mess up, but he called her and she came to him," said Gray.

The Alameda County Fire Department towed the car out of the water and no injuries were reported.

It's been 20 years since Matthew Shepard, a 21-year-old openly gay college student, was abducted and killed in Wyoming.

On Oct. 26, he will finally be laid to rest. 

Shepard's ashes will be interred at the Washington National Cathedral after a service to celebrate and remember his life. 

Shepard's parents picked the Cathedral as his final resting place because he loved the Episcopal Church and felt welcomed at one he attended in Wyoming. 

"For the past 20 years, we have shared Matt’s story with the world. It’s reassuring to know he now will rest in a sacred spot where folks can come to reflect on creating a safer, kinder world," said Judy Shepard, Shepard's mother, in a statement.

On Oct. 6, 1998, Matthew Shepard was brutally beaten, tied to a fence and left to die outside Laramie, Wyoming. He died in a hospital six days later. The violent attack shocked the nation and highlighted the problem of hate crimes against LGBTQ people, according to NBC News. 

Shepard's parents have advocated for the rights of the LGBTQ community since his death, creating the Matthew Shepard Foundation in his memory.

"In the years since Matthew’s death, the Shepard family has shown extraordinary courage and grace in keeping his spirit and memory alive, and the Cathedral is honored and humbled to serve as his final resting place," said the Very Rev. Randolph Marshall Hollerith, dean of Washington National Cathedral.

Life is a series of choices, we're often told, and choosing to believe that old chestnut is, yes, also a choice.

But choice-making doesn't always have to be so deep nor full of fret; there are happy and delicious decisions to ponder, and such selections grow a bit spookier, and sweeter, in October.

Look to Sprinkles Cupcakes for evidence of this theory.

The famous cupcakery, one of the companies to launch the ever-continuing cupcake craze in 2005 in Beverly Hills, is known for its often fanciful flavors.

But when Halloween grows near, so do the opportunities for eating candy with your cupcake, making those fanciful cupcakes even... fancifuller?

So is candy baked into a cupcake akin to gilding the lily? Or adding too much to what is already a lot?

Well, nope.

Not if you are a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup maven, or a lover of Twix, or you have to have your nubbily little Nerds as often as you can.

Those are the three candies Sprinkles is featuring, during specific weeks, in October 2018. Want Reese's with your chocolate-ganache-y cupcake? Get to a shop by Oct. 14.

Prefer Nerds to fill your small cake, and top it, too? That choice will be available from Oct. 15 through 21 (and, mmm, the cake itself is lemon birthday).

And the Twix cupcake ends it all in quite the delectable fashion, but it won't linger for long: Oct. 22 through 25 are the dates to snatch one up.

The price? Plan on paying somewhere between $4.25 and $5.50 per cupcake, depending upon which bakery you visit.

So are you feeling the frosting-luscious, cakey-cool spin on some of your go-to candy counter favorites?

It is the candiest stretch of the year, after all, but you don't need to wait for a Twix or peanut butter cup in your plastic pumpkin on Halloween night; you can find your snacky favorites, inside and atop cupcakes, at your local Sprinkles.

Perhaps you’re familiar with the rumor that humming “Stayin’ Alive” while doing chest compressions is the best way to perform CPR on someone. Some of you might even remember when Michael Scott memorably sang the Bee Gees’ hit when learning CPR with his co-workers on "The Office."

While chaos ensued in the rest of that episode, this CPR secret can still be beneficial to incorporate in everyday life, and New York-Presbyterian Hospital is here to help you do that.

The top-ranked NYPH created a Spotify playlist and shared it via Twitter to help raise awareness about effective CPR, and help everyday individuals easily remember how to time chest compressions.

"Only about 46 percent of cardiac arrest victims receive bystander intervention before EMS arrives and women are even less likely to receive intervention," Lauren Browdy, a spokesperson from NYPH, says. "But for every minute without CPR, the survival rate decreases by 10 percent."

Although released last March as part of a #HandsOnlyCPR campaign, the playlist has recently gained traction and has been increasingly shared throughout Twitter within the last few days. The NYPH staff, and specifically Dr. Holly Andersen, a cardiologist, have worked hard to raise more awareness on bystander CPR, and believe this playlist helps make situations like that less scary so that bystanders are more likely, and able to jump in and help.

"Dr. Holly Anderson has been advocating for everyone to learn Hands Only CPR with three easy steps: Check, Call, Compress," Browdy says. "Her goal is to teach everyone to not be afraid to jump in.'

Comprised of 40 songs at 100 BPM, each track consists of the optimum beat to time CPR compressions, so that 100 chest compressions are done per minute.

With songs like “Dancing Queen” by ABBA and “Spirit In The Sky” by Norman Greenbaum, to current hits like “Sorry” by Justin Bieber and “Closer” by The Chainsmokers, there’s a song for everyone to learn how to effectively and simply save a life in a time of need.

Check out the rest of the tracks here, and check out more about the Hands Only CPR campaign here, which has instructional videos so you can learn at home.

Do you generally expect frightful events to creep up around the tenth month of the year?

You're not alone, if you do, and yet an increasing number of more macabre happenings are starting to mix into the merriest season.

There is precedent, of course, for Halloween pairing up with Christmas, from the vintage Bobby Pickett pop hit "Monster's Holiday" to 1993's ever-beloved "Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas," the Skellington-est stop-motion classic around.

And, of course, the hauntingest holiday and the yuletide are practically neighbors, all told, on the calendar.

Which means that the debut of Seasons Screamings, a new one-day shopping pop-up from the terror-minded team behind Midsummer Scream, should fit quite nicely into with the Noël. 

If you know the large-scale Halloween convention, an eeky event that haunts the Long Beach Convention Center each summer, then you know that Season's Screamings will be full of colorful local purveyors of the creepy, and, yes, the Christmassy, too.

As befits the first of December date for the 2018 event, a mash-up of haunts 'n holly.

Seasons Screamings will unfurl at Sweet Hollywood from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Dec. 1, 2018, and a bevy of crafty-cool artisans and makers of monstrous gifties will show to chat with scare fans about matters both festive and frightful.

Skelly Paper Company, Rags to Witches, and Little Haus of Horrors are just three of the cool outfits on the wicked (and lengthy) roster.

The "mini horror con" is all about browsing for "scary stocking stuffers," but there shall be more afoot. Make that ahoof, for Krampus, the joyful holiday's eeriest character, will be in the house and ready to pose for photographs.

If you dare, that is.

Look, too, for the Terrifying Treats Candy Bar Art Show, an Elvira pop-up shop, and more at Sweet Hollywood at this brand-new Hallomas happening.

Los Angeles city work crews were out in force Wednesday morning near downtown LA, as part of a new effort to remove trash and filth from more streets.

The effort is part of the city’s attempt to stem an outbreak of typhus, a bacterial disease that has infected at least nine people in the downtown area. Typhus causes high fever, rashes, and stomach pain. 

The action comes in the wake of an NBC4 I-Team investigation that documented how trash, infested with rats and flies, has been piling up since at least May and the city hadn't removed it.

On the orders of LA Mayor Eric Garcetti, who allocated an extra $300,000 for the clean up effort, Sanitation Department crews will now regularly remove trash and feces and then power wash the entire area the city now calls "The Typhus Zone."

The Zone spans from 3rd Street to 7th Street and Spring Street to Alameda Street, an area which includes not just homeless encampments but pricey new residential and commercial buildings.

"Every area around here, that will be in the Typhus Zone, will be cleaned up every four weeks," said Enrique Saldivar, who heads up LA's Bureau of Sanitation.

But people who live and work in the area say the expanded street sanitizing effort doesn't go far enough. There are many trash strewn streets that are just outside the clean up boundary, like Ceres Avenue in the Produce District. 

"This is a city thoroughfare and it's the city's responsibility to clean it up," said Estela Lopez, executive director of the LA Downtown Industrial Business Improvement District.

Because of the I-Team's report, the Bureau of Sanitation now says it will clean out mountains of trash from Ceres Avenue on Friday.

As for the streets that are being regularly sanitized, Sanitation Department crews aren't removing all the filth. On one street, the I-Team noticed a dead rat and a pile of feces left behind after crews supposedly cleaned that block.

"If this is called street cleaning somebody's not doing their job," said Darwin Spears, who told NBC4 he lives in a tent on San Pedro Avenue and witnessed that street being cleaned today. 

"They don't do a good job," he said, pointing to a pile of feces still on the street after crews had power washed it. "That s--- has been there for about three or four days," said Spears.

Universal Studios is the movie studio that invented the monster movie genre with classics like "Frankenstein," "Dracula," and "The Mummy." So it's only fitting that they have one of the most popular Halloween events in Southern California - Halloween Horror Nights.

There are 8 themed mazes where fans can get their fright on. Some of the most popular this year have been "The Stranger Things" maze, named after the popular Netflix show. And "Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers."

But beyond the mazes, there are nearly a thousand "scare actors" that get dressed up in eerily accurate prosthetics, makeup, hair and costumes to scare guests as they make their way through the park. The team at Magee FX is responsible for overseeing this process each night during Halloween Horror Night and compare it to putting on a large scale stage performance every night.

Professionals who also work in the entertainment industry are behind the scenes putting each blood spatter, torn denim, and gross gown into place in a short amount of time. I wanted to see what it's like to be a "scare actor" during this event and volunteered to transform into a She Wolf - complete with pointy ears and a bloody mouth. Watch the video above or go to the NBCLA Instagram feed to see what happened when I left my reporter pants behind and donned a dress for Halloween Horror Nights.

The event runs on select nights through November 3rd. For more information visit www.HalloweenHorrorNights.com.

Kanye West spoke for nearly 10 minutes straight while visiting with President Donald Trump in the Oval Office Thursday. Here were some notable moments from the meeting.

A 45-year-old man was hospitalized in critical condition Thursday after an explosion that blew out a wall and part of the roof at a Boyle Heights home.

Firefighters responded to the 1100 block of Lorena Street at about 12:30 p.m. Details about the explosion were not immediately available, but aerial video showed part of the house's roof missing.

One side of the single-story house also appeared to have been damaged in the blast. 

A person at a nearby business told NBC4 there was a loud explosion at a house in the area. The witness said firefighters pulled one person from the house. 

The cause of the explosion was not immediately available.

Refresh this page for updates.

Ghost Train opens: What's a bit spooky, so quaint, and widely loved by families, couples, and just about every Halloween maven 'round SoCal? It's this sweet Griffith Park treat, which debuts for the season on Saturday, Oct. 13. Something even sweeter for 2018? Ghost Train, which is helmed by the LA Live Steamers Railroad Museum, has a natty new neighbor in Boney Island, the longtime Sherman Oaks yard haunt that needed more elbow room (that's opening on Oct. 11). Tickets for each? They're separate, so visit the sites for the Ghost Train and Boney Island now.

Pumpkins All Around: Love jack o'lanterns, cool gourds, and trains that take you to patches? So much stem-topped terrific-ness is flourishing around the region as October enters its middle part. Nights of the Jack heads into its first weekend in Calabasas, while the glowful Pumpkin Nights debuts at the Fairplex in Pomona. And up in Fillmore? The PumpkinLiner begins its annual choo-choo-chugga-chugga run, whisking families to a squashy spread of pumpkin goodness.

LA Decompression 2018: Haven't gotten over Burning Man just yet? Or didn't get the chance to attend? Make for LA State Historic Park on Saturday, Oct. 13 for the "decompression" gathering, which is full of art and music and a lot of the elements seen around Black Rock Desert at Labor Day. A ticket is twenty five bucks. And while there's no camp-over scene, the hours are pretty long: One in the afternoon right through to an hour before midnight. Find your esoteric and art-tastic expression, in DTLA, at the annual wind-down.

Strange 80s II: Have you never quite gotten over the decade that came before the decade that came before the last one? It was a pretty magical time, music-wise, and in all the -wise ways. Make for The Fonda in Hollywood on Friday, Oct. 12 to dance to live tunes from a host of favorites from the era, including members of "The Offspring, No Doubt, Fall Out Boy, Sum 41, Slipknot, and so many other major acts. Don't forget your neon, your acid-washed jeans, or whatever else you want to rock. Tickets start at $43.

Games, Art, More Art, and Space: Enjoy playing the games of tomorrow as independent makers gather in Santa Monica at IndieCade, through Oct. 13. Two free art-focused walk-arounds are coming up: ArtNight in Pasadena on Oct. 12 and the Brewery ArtWalk on Oct. 13 and 14. And at the Carnegie Observatories in Pasadena? Be there, lovers of all things cosmic, for the science-minded destination's annual open house. The date: Oct. 14 from 2 to 5 o'clock.

Meet Charlie, the pet of the week for Thursday, Oct. 11, 2018.

Charlie is a 2-month-old neutered tuxedo male. He's super sweet and loves to play. If you hold and love on him, he'll purr very loudly. He has lots of energy and would make a great addition to any family.

ID: A1817293

West Valley Center
20655 Plummer Street
Chatsworth, CA 91311
(818) 756-9325 (center)

Customers at a Los Feliz Starbucks may have recognized a familiar face behind the counter on Thursday.

Secretary of State Alex Padilla played barista for an hour, serving up "coffee and democracy" as part of the company's voter registration push across California.

Padilla worked the morning shift at the Starbucks Reserve, located on 2138 Hillhurst Ave. He worked with Starbucks baristas to prepare coffee and serve customers.

Starbucks is partnering with the Secretary of State's "Democracy at Work" program to promote voter registration to customers and employees.

All corporate Starbucks locations in California will install a "Coffee and Democracy" poster, featuring California's voter registration deadline and a link to the Secretary of State's online voter registration website. 

The deadline to register to vote in California is Oct. 22.

To check your registration status and information such as voter preferences, what address you currently are registered under and voter history, visit voterstatus.sos.ca.gov.

NBC4's Mekahlo Medina contributed to this report. 

President Donald Trump's lawyers are preparing answers to questions submitted by special counsel Robert Mueller, a source familiar with the matter told NBC News on Thursday.

The questions are focused on the issue of whether the Trump campaign colluded with Russia during the 2016 presidential race, the source said. However, the source stressed that these questions are a refined version of questions that have gone back and forth between the two sides for months.

CNN was first to report that the president's legal team was preparing answers to the written questions submitted by Mueller.

After the discovery of remains in the Southeast Antelope Valley Thursday near a burned-out shell of a home, the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department was digging up earth around several spots.

Investigators responded to the 30900 block of 106th Street in Littlerock, a small community roughly 60 miles northeast of Los Angeles, just after 4 p.m. 

It wasn't immediately clear whether they were human or animal, but a crew from the Los Angeles County Sheriffs Department was investigating. 

While information was limited, a half dozen investigators could be seen digging and combing in one area next to the burned out home, and a scorched sedan. 

Several other blue tents were set up around the burned down home, which was next to another home, located down a dirt road.