Posts Tagged: communities

News

‘Pesticide drift’ affecting California health and safety

A helicopter sprays a field in the Salinas Valley. (Photo: Dwight Smith, via Shutterstock)

Angela Mancuso had just dropped off her kids at Glenwood Elementary School when she started to smell something “funky.” She was driving back to her home just a mile away in Stockton and decided to roll down her window for some fresh air. She noticed too late that a helicopter applying pesticide to a nearby walnut grove that Tuesday morning in September 2016 kept flying back and forth across the road, spraying continuously.

News

Pandemic: CA pauses multimillion-dollar testing expansion

A coronavirus anti-body testing station in Palo Alto run by Stanford University. (Photo: Sundry Photography, via Shutterstock)

In April, Gov. Gavin Newsom launched a multimillion-dollar state initiative to bring COVID-19 testing to the people and places with the least access: rural towns and disadvantaged inner-city neighborhoods. California is now halting its expansion, citing costs, even as the state is getting walloped by record-setting spikes in new infections and double-digit increases in hospitalizations.

Opinion

COVID-19: Yet more pain for human trafficking victims

Photo illustration of a child victim of human trafficking. (Photo: 271 EAK MOTO)

As many Californians struggle with the effects of COVID-19, what this pandemic means for human trafficking victims is their abusers have yet another way to coerce and exploit. Before COVID-19, victims already faced extreme barriers to safety, health services, and employment; now, they are vulnerable to even greater unrelenting abuse.

News

Note to industry: Electric trucks save lives

An electric big-rig tractor-trailer truck. (Photo: Union of Concerned Scientists)

OPINION: Polluters never miss an opportunity to exploit a crisis for financial gain — and the coronavirus crisis is no exception. As millions of Americans hunker down in their homes, sacrificing their incomes to save lives, truck manufacturers are endangering people in my community by lobbying for delays to the nation’s first electric truck standard, which would slash toxic air pollution from trucks.

News

Delayed census could greatly affect CA redistricting

A Census worker canvassing a neighborhood. (Photo: Wayne Via, Shutterstock)

Pushing back the census deadlines could have a profound political impact on California, ultimately forcing the state to draw scores of political districts for the 2022 elections within a tiny, two-week window. The Trump administration’s plan, announced earlier by Census Bureau Director Steven Dillingham, calls for a 120-day  delay in developing and reporting the finished data.

Opinion

Childcare in a locked-down world

Youngsters at play in a kindergarten.. Photo: Robert Kneschke, via Shutterstock)

OPINION: A recent television news headline asked, “Can day cares stay open amid coronavirus outbreak?” The answer has been confusing to many – school are closed, shouldn’t childcare centers be, too? Why are these groups of people okay but not others? What about the safety of the kids and staff?

News

November ballot plan seeks new school money, would alter Prop. 13 of 1978

A California school classroom. (Photo: Monkey Business Imagesd, via Shutterstock)

An initiative to reclaim up to $12 billion for California public schools and local communities could make its way onto the ballot in November 2020. Proponents of the measure say it will force large corporations to pay their fair share in property taxes. The Schools & Communities First initiative would amend the current property tax law established under Proposition 13 in 1978.

Opinion

Suicide prevention and Newsom’s focus on housing, homelessness

Homeless people in tents underneath a Los Angeles bridge. (Photo: mikeledray, via Shuytterstock)

OPINION: Gov. Newsom pledged up to $1.4 billion to attack the homeless situation. To help people on the verge of homelessness keep their apartments, Newsom is proposing a sum of $750 million, some of which will go towards subsidizing rent to keep people from falling into homelessness. He also said he would sign an executive order to provide trailers and tents as temporary housing.

News

Following the money — in cash

Counting the cash. (Photo: NATNN, via Shutterstock)

When Steve Swanson decided to stop accepting cash at his longtime chain of Sacramento area dry cleaning stores, it seemed to make all the sense in the world.  “Cash was such a small portion of our operation,” he says. “Some days we might have only a few dollars for a whole day.” But soon he might not have a choice.

Opinion

Eliminating natural gas for electricity carries risks

A pipeline carrying natural gas near San Jose. (Photo: Sundry Photography, via Shutterstock)

OPINION: Climate change is one of the most important challenges of our time.  And in California, we have felt the brunt of both the economic impacts of climate-driven disasters, as well as aggressive technology innovation that is trying to address it.

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