Koslov on the Thorny Debate Over ‘Managed Retreat’

/0 Comments/in /by

Liz Koslov, assistant professor of urban planning, spoke with the New York Times about a new study on “managed retreat” as an option for communities threatened by climate change. The study, published in the journal Science, found that choosing to relocate rather than rebuild can create new opportunities for communities damaged or threatened by climate disaster. Strategic, orderly and equitable relocation plans should be one of several options available to these communities, the researchers said. They added that regularly updated climate hazard maps should be provided to citizens so that they can make informed choices. “I’m so glad that these kinds of pieces are getting written,” said Koslov, noting that the debate over managed retreat is “inevitably thorny and conflictual.” She added that decisions about whether retreat is the best option should factor in social, economic and cultural considerations, not just physical geography.

Read the article

Segura on Biden’s Strategy to Win Over California

/0 Comments/in /by

UCLA Luskin Dean Gary Segura spoke to USA Today about presidential candidate Joe Biden’s strategy to persuade California Democrats that he deserves their support. As the front-runner in several polls, the former vice president has presented himself as the most electable candidate, but his rivals counter that middle-ground politics will not inspire the passion needed to beat President Trump. Segura, who co-founded the polling and political analysis firm Latino Decisions, said Biden would be wise to emphasize his core beliefs. “His argument should start with, ‘There’s a reason I’m the most popular candidate and it’s that the preponderance of the Democratic electorate agrees with me on most issues — and, in fact, the preponderance of other Democratic candidates agree with me on most issues,’ ” Segura said. “He can better frame the argument by drawing attention to the fact that there is a huge portion of the American public that sees him as the logical, rational alternative to what we’ve been experiencing under Trump.”

Read the article

 

Yaroslavsky on Tug-of-War Over Rehired Deputy

/0 Comments/in /by

Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin, spoke to KCAL9 News after a judge overturned L.A. County Sheriff Alex Villanueva’s decision to reinstate a fired deputy. The county Board of Supervisors had sued the sheriff’s department, contending that the deputy, who was let go over accusations of stalking and domestic violence, should not have been rehired. “This is not about some policy decision. This is not about whether you should put more police on the streets in Valinda or more in Willowbrook,” said Yaroslavsky, a former county supervisor. “This is about whether the sheriff’s department is going to hire or reinstate deputies who violated their oath of office.” He added, “If you’re a taxpayer or a voter in Los Angeles County, what the sheriff is doing is exposing your pocketbook to huge lawsuits, huge liabilities that the taxpayers are going to have to pay for.”

Read the article

 

Cohen Offers Perspective on Mental Health Facilities

/0 Comments/in /by

Social Welfare Professor David Cohen provided context and history in a CNN report assessing the veracity of President Trump’s comments linking gun violence to the closure of mental health facilities. “They closed so many — like 92% — of the mental institutions around this country over the years, for budgetary reasons,” Trump said. Cohen clarified that, since the mid-1950s, about half of the nation’s psychiatric facilities have closed and the number of residents in state mental hospitals has fallen from about 550,000 to about 100,000 today. The facilities closed in an effort to “deinstitutionalize” the mentally ill by placing them in less restrictive environments — not because of budget cutbacks, he added. But many patients were left with nowhere to go. “Society after World War II discovered a new passion to solve social problems and include the excluded, and all sorts of institutions — including orphanages, institutions for mentally retarded persons, homes for unwed mothers, youth detention centers, etc. — were phased out, with their residents often in effect kicked out from where they had lived for years,” Cohen said.

Read the article

Taylor on ‘America’s Worst Freeway’

/0 Comments/in /by

Brian Taylor, director of the Institute of Transportation Studies at UCLA Luskin, spoke to Mashable about the prospects for relief on “America’s worst freeway” — Los Angeles’ congested 405. Mayor Eric Garcetti has called for a transportation revolution that encourages ridesharing and emission-free cars and expands the system of rail, subways and electrified buses — all by the time the 2028 Olympics come to town. The plan includes a new public transit system through the 405 corridor. However, Taylor cautioned, “if that freeway becomes free flowing, it is an invitation to use it.” Los Angeles has built an enormous commuter rail system, yet public transit use is plummeting and auto ownership is rising, he said. Though it has been met with suspicion and hostility, his solution to fixing the 405 — charging motorists to use it — is the surest way to change ingrained driving habits, said Taylor, a professor of urban planning. He concluded, “There must be consequences to driving.”

Read the article

 

Park on Hot Classrooms and the Achievement Gap

/0 Comments/in /by

R. Jisung Park, assistant professor of public policy, spoke with KPCC’s “Take Two” about his research linking extreme heat with the racial education achievement gap. Students who experience more hot days during the school year perform worse on standardized exams, Park and his colleagues found. In addition, black and Hispanic students are 9 percent less likely than white students to attend schools with functioning air conditioning, they found. “We know that that can have effects on the economic opportunities that these students can have access to,” Park told “Take Two” in a segment beginning at minute 23:40. Park, associate director of economic research for the Luskin Center for Innovation, advocates for air conditioning powered by clean energy. “In the meantime,” he said, “we need to protect the most disadvantaged communities from the effects of climate change that are already coming down the pike.” Park’s research was also highlighted in USA Today and the Washington Post.

Listen to the KPCC podcast

 

Yaroslavsky on County Election Chief’s Grand Plan

/0 Comments/in /by

Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin, spoke to the L.A. Times about the county’s election chief, who is spearheading an overhaul of the voting system. Since Dean Logan became the registrar-recorder and clerk for Los Angeles County in 2008, he has advocated for replacing an antiquated balloting system. The new $300-million system known as Voting Solutions for All People will face its first test in March, when it is introduced countywide for the presidential primary election. Voters will use the new machines at a smaller number of multipurpose “vote centers” that will replace the roughly 5,000 traditional polling places. Yaroslavsky, who served on the county Board of Supervisors from 1994 to 2014, expressed confidence in Logan. “He’s got an engineer’s mind with an artist’s vision,” Yaroslavsky said. “If you’re in an airplane that has a problem in midair, he’s the kind of guy you would want as the pilot.”

Read the article

 

Villasenor on Strategies to Guard Against ‘Deepfakes’

/0 Comments/in /by

Public Policy Professor John Villasenor spoke to the Brookings Cafeteria podcast about strategies that voters and other consumers of digital media can adopt to guard against “deepfakes” — videos manipulated with artificial intelligence technology to deceive, parody or, sometimes, educate. “Anybody who has a computer and access to the Internet is in a position to produce deepfakes,” Villasenor said, but he added that the technology to detect the doctored videos is also quickly evolving. He urged consumers of digital media to “unlearn what we’ve learned since we were all small, which is usually seeing is believing. … Deepfakes scramble that understanding.” Even if a video is clearly fake, he said, “the visual imagery is very powerful and so I think it’s a big concern.” Villasenor is a professor of management, law and electrical engineering, in addition to public policy. He is a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.

Listen to the podcast

 

Mukhija on Meeting Affordable Housing Needs

/0 Comments/in , /by

Urban Planning Chair Vinit Mukhija held a wide-ranging dialogue about affordable housing with state Sen. Bob Wieckowski (D-Fremont) on the podcast Then There’s California. Mukhija’s research focuses on informal, makeshift housing in the United States and abroad. He has studied slums, border areas and farmworker dwellings but noted that unregulated and unpermitted shelter is becoming more commonplace in cities and suburbs. Wieckowski has sponsored legislation to remove barriers to the creation of granny flats, garage conversions and other so-called accessory dwelling units. “This can be a very reasonable way of adding housing supply from our existing physical resources,” Mukhija said. In addition to addressing the growing demand for affordable housing, regulated accessory dwelling units can bring in significant property tax revenues, he added.

Listen to the podcast

 

The Traffic Bogeyman Is Us, Manville Says

/0 Comments/in /by

Michael Manville, associate professor of urban planning, spoke to LAist about a study examining the impact that Uber and Lyft have on road congestion. The study, which was commissioned by the rideshare services, found that they accounted for 2 to 3 percent of all vehicle miles traveled in Los Angeles County in September 2018. “If [Lyft and Uber] have confessed to slowing you down while you are in traffic, then they have confessed to sharing in the crime that you are also committing,” said Manville, a faculty fellow with UCLA Luskin’s Institute of Transportation Studies. Manville said his colleagues like to joke that a more interesting study would be to look at how much Ford and Toyota contribute to traffic congestion. “It’s fun to blame tech companies for things — they’re really easy to dislike — but congestion is something that we all cause,” he said.

Read the article