Leap on Indictments of MS-13 Street Gang

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Social Welfare Adjunct Professor Jorja Leap spoke with BBC World Service’s Spanish-language news outlet about the Fulton clique of the MS-13 street gang. A federal indictment of 22 of the gang’s members detailed brutal acts across Los Angeles, according to BBC Mundo. Federal officials said 19 of those indicted are undocumented immigrants from Central America who arrived in the past three or four years. The Fulton clique actively recruits young people, who often behave impulsively and unpredictably, Leap said. Youths who have experienced poverty, poor education, trauma and mental illness are particularly susceptible to gang overtures, she said. The indictments came as MS-13’s influence in the region has waned. Leap said 1,200 homicides were recorded during MS-13’s boom, but last year the number had dropped to 300.

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Akee on Protests Over Giant Telescope on Mauna Kea

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Randall Akee, associate professor of public policy, weighed in on protests sparked by the construction of a giant telescope on Mauna Kea, Hawaii’s highest mountain. Native Hawaiians are attempting to stop construction of the $1.4-billion Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) on the site, which is considered sacred ground. “The sight of some of the most revered and esteemed Native Hawaiian elders being hauled off the mountain in plastic tie bands was appalling to Native Hawaiians everywhere,” Akee wrote in a piece for Real Clear Markets. These images threaten Hawaii’s $16-billion tourism industry, and the cultural and environmental costs of building the telescope would be great, he wrote. Akee was also cited in a Vox report on the protests. “The opposition to the TMT construction is like the straw that broke the camel’s back,” he said. “It represents decades of poor management of Hawaii’s natural resources and prioritizing of economic interests ahead of community interests.”

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Holloway on Protections for LGBTQ Travelers

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Ian Holloway, associate professor of social welfare, spoke with NBC News about Tinder’s new personal security feature aimed at protecting users in countries that are hostile to LGBTQ communities. In these countries, the dating app will keep gender identity and sexual orientation private and will prompt travelers to take other precautions. Noting that the LGBTQ community uses dating apps at a relatively high rate, Holloway welcomed the new protections but said apps that specifically cater to gay users face additional challenges.  “Tinder’s Traveler Alert is a great idea, but I wonder how it would translate to LGBTQ-specific platforms, where people know others’ sexuality by virtue of being on those apps,” he said.

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Koslov on ‘Managed Retreat’ From Rising Waters

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Assistant Professor of Urban Planning Liz Koslov spoke to Vice about “managed retreat” as a strategy for coping with climate change — and perhaps creating a better quality of life. Faced with rising sea levels, some communities lobby for protection from walls and levees. Staying in place is seen as a sign of resilience, moving away a sign of surrender. Koslov noted that walling off cities could create “provinces of the wealthy” that bring about environmental and social havoc. “You could end up with these walled city-states and then everyone else is just left to fend for themselves,” she said. Managed retreat — moving populations away from an environmental threat in a carefully planned strategy — can be empowering and restorative if the people involved have a voice in the move, she said. Koslov, who has a joint appointment with UCLA’s Institute of the Environment and Sustainability, is currently working on a book based on her fieldwork on Staten Island after Hurricane Sandy.

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Matute on L.A. Transit Challenges

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Juan Matute, deputy director of the Institute of Transportation Studies at UCLA Luskin, weighed in on several recent news developments regarding Southland transit. In a Los Angeles Times report on building a Metro line through the Sepulveda Pass, Matute assessed different options for funding the route and securing future revenues. He cautioned that, amid financial uncertainty, “we might just end up with a project that’s on the books, but the can is kicked down the road.” Matute also spoke to the Daily News about a proposed bus line that would eventually connect the San Fernando and San Gabriel valleys. Opponents fear the dedicated lanes for electric buses would worsen traffic and attract unwanted development. “The approach that Metro has is a more collectivist forward-thinking approach,” Matute said, while opponents are more focused on individual concerns. A Curbed report cited Matute’s study of the region’s sluggish bus speeds and his conclusion that the most effective remedies are bus-only lanes or a regionwide congestion pricing strategy.

 

Panofsky on White Pride, DNA and Denial

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Aaron Panofsky, associate professor of public policy, society and genetics, and sociology, spoke to the New York Times about his research on white nationalists who learn from DNA ancestry tests that they may not be as white or European as they previously thought. By analyzing the “white pride” online discussion forum Stormfront, Panofsky and researcher Joan Donovan of Harvard University found that commenters shared test results even when they indicated mixed heritage, and that their fellow white nationalists offered potential reasons those results should not be trusted. Among them: skepticism about the tests’ interpretations of the science and conspiracy theories about Jewish-owned genetic testing companies’ multicultural agendas. Since he launched the study, Panofsky said, genetic tests have increasingly been used to encourage the “mainstreamification” of white nationalism. “Science cannot save us,” he said. “The political problem of white nationalism needs to be confronted on the level of values and law enforcement.”

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Villasenor on Easy Access to Powerful Technology

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Public Policy Professor John Villasenor spoke to Business Insider about “deepfakes,” phony videos and digital images manipulated using artificial intelligence. Easy access to both the technology to alter videos and the platforms to distribute them widely has heightened concern about deepfakes, Villsasenor said. “Everyone’s a global broadcaster now. So I think it’s those two things together that create a fundamentally different landscape than we had when Photoshop came out,” he said. Altered videos can be used in satire and entertainment, creating complications for legal efforts to crack down on malicious users. Time constraints are also an issue, Villasenor said, citing deepfakes used in political attacks. “Election cycles are influenced over the course of sometimes days or even hours with social media, so if someone wants to take legal action that could take weeks or even months,” he said. “And in many cases, the damage may have already been done.”

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Holloway on Dating Apps as a Tool for Crime

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Ian Holloway, associate professor of social welfare, spoke to NBC News about a string of attacks against gay men who were targeted through the dating app Grindr. Anti-LGBTQ hate crimes rose 3 percent nationally in 2017, the story reported. In some cases, apps such as Grindr are used to identify victims who may be kidnapped, robbed, carjacked, assaulted or slain. Holloway noted that the risk is international in scope. “There are people impersonating romantic partners and friends in countries where being gay is illegal, then threatening to out the user,” he said. Experts advise app users to guard their personal information and create a safety plan. Holloway noted that LGBTQ dating platforms can have a positive impact. “Parts of the U.S. can be incredibly isolating for LGBTQ people, which is where the apps come in,” he said. “For people living in these areas or in countries where homosexuality is criminalized, apps can be a way to build community.”

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Park on Rising Temperatures and Sinking Productivity

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Jisung Park, assistant professor of public policy and environmental health sciences, spoke with Marketplace about the impact of climate change on economic productivity. The International Labor Organization predicts that heat stress linked to global warming could drain more than $2 trillion from the world’s gross domestic product. In hot weather, people work more slowly, need more breaks and make errors, studies have found. “If you work outdoors, it’s much harder to protect yourself from either the productivity or the health impacts from extreme heat,” said Park, who has conducted research showing that student test scores decline in hot weather. The effect of rising global temperatures on cognitive development is particularly acute in low-income areas where air conditioning is not available, Park has found.

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Yaroslavsky on Feud Between Mayor and Union

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Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin, spoke to the L.A. Times about the political feud between Mayor Eric Garcetti and the union that represents workers at the Department of Water and Power. The union has run a series of television and radio commercials attacking Garcetti’s plan to address climate change, saying it would eliminate thousands of jobs amid a serious housing crisis. Much of the opposition is driven by Garcetti’s plan to close three DWP natural gas plants but that is not mentioned in the ad, the story notes. “Unless you’re on the inside, you don’t really know what this is all about,” Yaroslavsky said. “You don’t know that it’s about shutting down fossil-fuel-powered plants in the basin.” Noting that the ads may be aimed at City Council members, Yaroslavsky said the union’s message may be: “This is what we’re doing to the mayor. Imagine what we can do to you.”

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