Taylor on the Addition of New Toll Lanes on the 405

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Brian D. Taylor, director of the Institute of Transportation Studies at UCLA Luskin, spoke to the Orange County Register about the opening of new express lanes on the 405 Freeway. Motorists who use the two express lanes on 16 miles of the freeway in Orange County will have the option of paying a toll or carpooling. The lanes will be free to three-person carpools, but two-person carpools during rush hours will need to pay. Taylor, a professor of urban planning and public policy, said express lanes help keep traffic flowing compared to general lanes. For example, the two express lanes on the 91 Freeway carry about 45% of its total traffic. “Those two lanes are operating so much more efficiently that more people are getting through as a result,” Taylor said.

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Monkkonen on L.A.’s Challenge to Meet Affordable Housing Goals

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Paavo Monkkonen, professor of urban planning and public policy at UCLA Luskin, spoke to LAist about the status of Mayor Karen Bass’ pledge to fast-track affordable housing construction in Los Angeles. Development projects in single-family neighborhoods are now ineligible for the accelerated permitting due to a rules change in June. About three-quarters of L.A.’s residential land is zoned for single-family homes, and proposing large apartment developments in those areas can lead to outcries from homeowners opposed to neighborhood change. Monkkonen said leaving suburban areas untouched brings its own risks. Under state law, the city of Los Angeles must plan for 185,000 new low-income homes by 2029 and reverse long-standing patterns of segregation by putting many new affordable homes in wealthier areas. “Once you take them off the table, it’s really hard to live up to the fair housing mandate,” Monkkonen said.

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Shock Waves of Trauma Following UNLV Shooting

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UCLA Luskin Social Welfare scholars Mark S. Kaplan and Ron Avi Astor spoke to the Las Vegas Review Journal about the lasting trauma experienced by school communities in the aftermath of campus shootings. On Dec. 6, a gunman killed three members of the faculty at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and gravely injured a fourth. “This is going to send shock waves through the campus,” said Kaplan, who teaches a class on firearm violence prevention policy at UCLA. Access to counseling is critical for students, faculty and the entire UNLV community, he stressed. Astor said memorials and vigils can help the community come together to process grief and trauma. He added that school safety literature shows that many people rate their own schools — both K-12 and college — as very safe even as they express anxiety about campus shootings.

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Torres-Gil on Ageism in Electoral Politics

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Fernando Torres-Gil, professor emeritus of social welfare and public policy at UCLA Luskin, spoke to USA Today about ageism in electoral politics. At 81, Joe Biden is the oldest president in U.S. history, and polls indicate that some voters view his age as a liability. Yet these concerns are not routinely aired in conversations about other politicians from Biden’s generation, including Donald Trump, 77, and Bernie Sanders, 82. “I think it has a lot to do just with style and personality, how you are perceived” — and appearances can be superficial, said Torres-Gil, director of the UCLA Center for Policy Research on Aging. “We still have a relatively ageist and ableist society where if you look old and act disabled, it creates a more negative impression.”

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Astor Receives 2023 School Mental Health Research Award

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The National Center for School Mental Health has selected UCLA Luskin Social Welfare Professor Ron Avi Astor as the recipient of the 2023 School Mental Health Research Award. Launched in 2018, the award recognizes scholars who have made a significant contribution to advancing research and practice in school mental health. Astor received the award on Dec. 5 at the 2023 Annual Conference on Advancing School Mental Health, held in New Orleans. At a summit on the eve of the conference, Astor shared his scholarship on campus climate, social-emotional learning and social justice with leading school mental health researchers from across the country. In his decades of research, Astor has studied tens of thousands of schools and millions of students, teachers, parents and administrators, and his work has been published in more than 200 scholarly manuscripts. His latest research examines antisemitism in K-12 settings, and he is spearheading research exchanges focusing on schools that empower students in Arab, Jewish and other diverse communities in the Middle East and Los Angeles. Astor’s far-reaching impact on the field of school mental health was cited in three separate nominations he received for this year’s School Mental Health Research Award. “This interdisciplinary career award coming from such an important organization that does critical work for our schools means the world to me,” said Astor, who has a joint appointment at the UCLA School of Education and Information Studies. “I appreciate the recognition and hope to use it as a platform to spread peace and mental health support to our world’s children.” 

Michael Stoll Joins Board of Directors of American Institutes for Research

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Michael Stoll, professor of public policy and urban planning at UCLA Luskin, is one of two new appointees to the American Institutes for Research Board of Directors. Stoll, an expert in labor markets and the impacts of poverty, joins Mayra E. Alvarez, a national leader in public health policy and systems, on the board of the nonprofit organization, which is based in Washington, D.C. “We are excited to have Mayra E. Alvarez and Michael A. Stoll on the board and welcome the deep expertise they bring to key areas of AIR’s work,” said Patricia B. Gurin, chair of the AIR board. “Their experience, knowledge and insights will help the board guide the institution’s strategic direction today, and in the years ahead.” David Myers, chief executive officer of AIR, said that Stoll will join a group of experts who will provide guidance and understanding to AIR’s leadership team and ensure that the organization’s research and technical assistance work is “relevant, meaningful and mission-focused.” Stoll has previously served as a fellow for the institute, which is focused on behavioral and social science research and providing technical assistance to solve national and global challenges. He has also been a fellow at the Brookings Institution, the Institute for Research on Poverty at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and the National Poverty Center at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. He has served as a past visiting scholar at the Russell Sage Foundation. In congratulating Stoll, Professor Robert Fairlie, chair of UCLA Luskin Public Policy, said, “AIR is an amazing place doing extremely important and impactful work.”

 

Bringing Shade to Bus Stops Across L.A.

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Madeline Brozen, deputy director of the Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies at UCLA Luskin, spoke to LAist about new funding to build more bus shelters in the city of Los Angeles. The Sidewalk and Transit Amenities Program will add 3,000 bus shelters and 450 shade structures to the city over the next 10 years, part of an initiative to help Angelenos withstand the impact of climate change, Mayor Karen Bass said. Brozen welcomed the announcement. “Extreme heat kills more people than any other natural disaster,” she said, adding that building bus shelters is one effective way of offering relief through shade and protecting public health. Brozen’s research has found that only about a quarter of Los Angeles Metro bus stops have shelters that provide shade, creating health risks for many of L.A. County’s most vulnerable people.

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A ‘Hesitantly Bullish’ Take on U.S. Unemployment Trends

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A WalletHub article on U.S. states where unemployment is ticking up cited Robert Fairlie, chair of Public Policy at UCLA Luskin and a member of the National Bureau of Economic Research. “I’m hesitantly bullish on the job market for 2024,” said Fairlie, explaining that national jobless rates are still relatively low and are not likely to increase rapidly in the coming year. But he added, “The major problem many people have is that their wages are not increasing as fast as inflation. That is making it hard for people to afford to live, especially in high-cost housing markets.” Moving savings out of non-interest-earning accounts and into money market funds that pay a higher interest rate is one way that people can protect their finances, Fairlie said. 

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Should Public Transit Be Free? It Depends.

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In an updated episode of the Freakonomics Radio podcast, Brian Taylor, director of the UCLA Institute of Transportation Studies, weighed in on a question being taken up in cities across the country: If public transit is good for the environment, for social mobility and for economic opportunity, should it be free for all riders? “Public transit is very context-specific,” stressed Taylor, a professor of urban planning and public policy at UCLA Luskin. Eliminating transit fares might make more sense in a place like Lubbock, Texas, where most riders are low-income, than in San Francisco, where many peak-hour BART riders have higher incomes than the average driver, he said. “Just saying generally, ‘Make it fare-free for everything, for all types of trips,’ I would not agree with that,” Taylor said. “The question is, do we need to give something valuable away to rich people for free on the argument that we want to help low-income people?”

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An Equity-Focused Transition to Clean Energy in L.A.

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Media coverage of UCLA’s LA100 Equity Strategies report, which will help the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power meet its goal of prioritizing equity as it transitions to renewable energy sources, featured several members of the UCLA Luskin community. Gregory Pierce, co-executive director of the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation, which produced the report’s chapter on energy affordability, addressed the DWP’s goal of transitioning to 100% carbon-neutral power by 2035 on KCRW’s Greater L.A. “I’m fairly optimistic that the city will get there, but it needs to move really quickly,” Pierce said. The report, which featured research from across the UCLA campus, was also highlighted in the Los Angeles Times and New York Times. Their stories cited Stephanie Pincetl UP PhD ’85, a professor at the UCLA Institute of the Environment and Sustainability, and Cynthia McClain-Hill, president of the Los Angeles Board of Water and Power Commissioners and a member of the UCLA Luskin Board of Advisors.

Listen to the KCRW report
Read the L.A. Times story
Read the New York Times story