A Closer Inspection of Trump’s Comments on Immigration

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A Los Angeles Times article about Donald Trump’s statements about actions he would take if reelected asked UCLA Luskin’s Chris Zepeda-Millán to weigh in on the former president’s comments on immigration. Trump has said he will “seal the border” with a physical wall, “carry out the largest deportation operation in American history,” order the military to attack foreign drug cartels and do away with birthright citizenship. While there is debate about whether to take the candidate at his word or chalk up his comments to populist rhetoric, Trump’s recent comments are his way of “doubling down on getting the most racist white Americans out to vote,” said Zepeda-Millán, associate professor of public policy and co-author of “Walls, Cages, and Family Separation: Race and Immigration Policy in the Trump Era.” Zepeda-Millán’s research shows that most Americans did not support Trump’s first-term immigration policies, and those who did held the “most racist views,” including general discomfort with growing Latino populations.

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Climate Resilience Through Local Investments, Trust-Building

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Streetsblog California put a spotlight on new UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation reports assessing the impact of California’s Transformative Climate Communities (TCC) program, which helps local communities lead and plan projects that reduce emissions and bring economic, environmental and health benefits. In addition to describing individual projects funded by the program, the reports contain personal stories and testimony from participants. One case study demonstrated the trust that the program has built among initially skeptical residents. Phillip Martinez, a resident of Pacoima in the San Fernando Valley, was seeing his energy bills rise with the heat — but he did not initially believe an offer to install solar panels on his home at no charge, a benefit of the TCC program. Once Martinez was reassured, the panels were installed and his power bills immediately went down. In addition to the Pacoima program, the Center for Innovation is evaluating TCC investments in Fresno, Ontario, Stockton, South Los Angeles and Watts.

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Yaroslavsky on Olympics’ Legacy in L.A.

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An L.A. Daily News article on Los Angeles’ long history with the Olympic Games quoted Zev Yaroslavsky, longtime public servant and director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin. The Summer Games first came to Los Angeles in 1932 then returned in 1984, when Yaroslavsky was a member of the L.A. City Council. “It was a huge success financially,” Yaroslavsky said of the first privately financed games, which produced a surplus of hundreds of millions of dollars used to launch a foundation to promote youth sports. Yaroslavsky also credits the Los Angeles Olympic Arts Festival, a 10-week event that preceded the games and drew 1.25 million visitors, for elevating the region’s reputation as a cultural hub. “L.A., which was already a cultural mecca, really went to a new level,” he said. “I think the arts was a bigger legacy of the Olympic Games than the games were.” The Olympics will return to Los Angeles in 2028.

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L.A. Transportation Goals for the 2028 Olympics and Beyond

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Juan Matute, deputy director of the Institute of Transportation Studies (ITS) at UCLA Luskin, spoke to Dwell about Los Angeles’ pledge to expand transit options in time for the 2028 Summer Olympics, which will add an estimated 10 million ticketholders to an already crowded metropolis. Organizers who once promoted a “car-free games” now prefer the phrase “transit-first,” as a number of hoped-for projects will not be completed in time. “Moving ‘car-free games’ from marketing slogan to reality would have required the government sending clear, unambiguous signals that the city and county would de-prioritize automobile transportation relative to other modes, in order to bring modes like walking, biking and public transit to greater parity with driving,” Matute said. He said officials can still act to make streets safer and more multimodal ahead of the games. This fall, ITS will present the UCLA Lake Arrowhead Symposium exploring how Los Angeles can advance long-term transportation goals through mega-events such as the Olympics.

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Spill-Over Effect of Strong Native American Economies

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Strong Native American economies can provide benefits to non-Native neighbors, according to new research that could give tribal communities seats at the economic development table that weren’t available before, according to UCLA Luskin’s Randall Akee. The research by the Center for Indian Country Development at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis showed that Native economic well-being can spill over into surrounding areas, providing them with more business and wider access to federal contracts. These findings could impact policy discussions both on tribal and intergovernmental levels, Akee said during a webinar about the research covered by Tribal Business News. “We can see ourselves and our communities and our economies in the national picture, and start to assert ourselves in these discussions,” said Akee, a professor of public policy and chair of UCLA’s American Indian Studies Interdepartmental Program.

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Going Car-Free, by Choice or by Necessity

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Urban Planning Professor Evelyn Blumenberg spoke to USA Today about Americans who are going car-free, by choice or by necessity. Of the roughly 8% of U.S. households that don’t own a vehicle, some are drawn to options such as e-bikes and public transit, taking advantage of a multitude of incentives for reducing car use. However, most of those households fall below the poverty line. “A very small percentage of those without cars truly make that choice,” said Blumenberg, director of the Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies at UCLA Luskin. Car ownership is associated with a greater likelihood of finding and retaining employment, a study co-authored by Blumenberg found. And some places in the country are ill-designed for moving from place to place without a car. “We have created an urban environment around the automobile, with a few exceptions, in the U.S.,” she said. “It makes it very difficult for most households to be car-free.”

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‘Look What These Students Have Gone Through’

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Social Welfare Professor Ron Avi Astor spoke to The 74 about new federal data showing that troubling student behavior — from a lack of attentiveness to threats made to classmates in person or online — has continued years after the COVID-19 pandemic triggered disruptions to learning. The Department of Education research indicated that students’ well-being has been impacted by high rates of trauma, a fraught political climate, and the feeling that they are unsafe or unseen in school. “Look what these students have gone through … not only the pandemic, through wars. Through a tumultuous, divisive political environment in the last six or seven years that’s only intensifying between right and left, between Black and white, between immigrant and non-immigrant,” said Astor, an expert on school violence and campus culture. Students are also witnessing state legislatures and local school boards limit what classrooms can and cannot teach, leading them to question whether they belong in their school, he said.

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Segregating Effect of Freeway Construction in Pasadena

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Pasadena Now covered a study by the Center for Neighborhood Knowledge at UCLA Luskin that documented how the construction of the 710 and 210 freeways from 1950 to 1980 polarized neighborhoods and heightened racial segregation in Pasadena. Paul Ong, the center’s director, presented the findings to a city advisory group considering redevelopment options for the “710 Stub,” land cleared of homes decades ago for a freeway project that was never completed. The study found that the minority population in areas affected by construction of the two freeways declined from 52% in 1950 to 23% by 1980. As a whole, Pasadena became less segregated over time thanks in part to the passage of anti-discrimination laws. However, the areas impacted by freeway construction bucked this trend, becoming more segregated, according to the study. “We have this contradiction in terms of what these massive infrastructures are doing in terms of residential patterns along race lines,” Ong told the advisory group.

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Mobility Wallet Provides Transportation Options for Those in Need

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LAist spoke with Madeline Brozen about her analysis of Mobility Wallet, a program in which low-income Los Angeles County residents receive prepaid debit cards to help cover transportation costs. Brozen, deputy director of the UCLA Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies, said she and fellow researchers found significantly reduced stress among participants. When buses run late or don’t show up, participants now have transportation alternatives, including rideshare services that were formerly too expensive. “Giving people access to a range of options seems to be really beneficial,” Brozen said. Lack of transportation access can significantly limit people’s opportunities to participate in outings with friends and family. Brozen cited a Mobility Wallet participant who used his card to take his child to Disneyland after his car broke down. “That’s gonna be a lifelong memory for this kid that was only possible because this person had financial support for transportation.”

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Vestal on the Meaning of Fences in Los Angeles

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Marques Vestal, assistant professor of urban planning at UCLA Luskin, is quoted in a Los Angeles Times column about the use, meaning and politics of a ubiquitous L.A. fixture — the fence. Wrought iron, chain link and the omnipresent horizontal, wood-planked — or so-called “gentrification” fences complete with cameras — serve as L.A.’s literal and actual gatekeepers of its various enclaves. The simple structures can have several functions and meanings, including a perceived need for security or changing ideas about neighbors, neighborhoods and whole communities. “People are moving into neighborhoods without the expectation that they will get along with the people there. They buy a piece of land and fortify,” Vestal said, describing a shift toward “inward home ownership.” Vestal also commented on the historical role that fences have played throughout the city, citing the heightened focus on crime and gangs amid the “war on drugs” of the 1970s and 1980s, when fences proliferated throughout Southern California.

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