Posts Tagged: analyze

Here’s how we can improve the way laws are made in California

The California state Capitol in Sacramento. (Photo: Karin Hildebrand Lau, via Shutterstock)

by CHRIS MICHELI posted 10.05.2022

ANALYSIS: Are there ways to improve the lawmaking process in the California Legislature? I believe there are. I believe the fundamental problem is that there are too many bills each year. There just is not enough bandwidth for all persons involved in the legislative process to sufficiently review and analyze the volume of bills.

Lawmakers must view all bills’ impact on poor, people of color

The corner of San Pedro Street in a low-income portion of downtown Los Angeles. (Photo: Hayk Sahlunts, via Shutterstock)

by DEBRA GORE-MANN and KELSEY LYLES posted 05.11.2021

OPINION: Did you know that Los Angeles once had a thriving, affluent Black community called Sugar Hill that was obliterated when Interstate 10 was built right through it in the early 1960s? Or that historically Black West Oakland was economically strangled when Interstate 980 cut it off from the downtown commercial district?

The COVID tunnel: We need to push through

A hospital in Tustin with signs lauding health care workers. (Photo: BrianPham75, via Shutterstock)

by CARMELA COYLE posted 12.03.2020

OPINION: The numbers grow scarier each day. Over the past week, California has topped more than 20,000 new cases of COVID-19 in a single day, with more than 8,000 people hospitalized due to the virus. Those volumes dwarf any seen in the past year, and the impact of get-togethers during Thanksgiving are not yet being felt, nor is the projected effect of the December and New Year’s holidays.

CA election data: People of color at disadvantage

A Californian casts a ballot. (Photo: Vepar5 via Shutterstock)

by John Dobard and Karthick Ramakrishnan posted 08.10.2016

OPINION: All the votes from the June primary elections are finally counted. We now have the second highest number of votes—more than 8.5 million—ever cast in a California statewide primary. While this is good news for our communities and for the state, we have a lot more work to do when it comes to ensuring that more Californians have a say in the political process.

Critical priority: Dental care for low-income children

A youngster on his visit to the dentist. (Photo: Wavebreakmedia, via Shutterstock)

by WENDY LAZARUS posted 03.19.2015

It is not often that dental professionals, health care providers, advocates, and legislators from both sides of the aisle all agree on an issue, but that is precisely what happened at a hearing this week on the state’s dental program for low-income children. Testimony and discussion honed in on the sobering results of a December 2014 state audit, which found that millions of children enrolled in Medi-Cal (California’s Medicaid program) were not getting the dental care they need.

After decades of prison planning work in California and around the country, I’ve seen two prevailing assumptions about crime and punishment begin to finally begin to crack after years of real-world testing.

The first is that prisons are the primary way to reduce crime. The second is that law enforcement will not support changes