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A UCLA Luskin Student’s Take on the Rollback of Criminal Justice Reforms

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UCLA Luskin Social Welfare student Francisco Villarruel grew up during a tough-on-crime era in California, was incarcerated as a teen, but emerged to find community-based reentry programs that helped him get back on his feet. Now, he is watching with dismay as the state rolls back criminal justice reforms that he believes have led to healthier, safer communities.

In a letter to the editor published by the Washington Post, Villarruel shares his experiences as an Angeleno who spent half his life behind bars, then found rehabilitative services that have helped him to thrive, eventually leading to graduate school at UCLA.

“Community-based reentry programs have an impressive success rate, reducing rearrest and reconviction rates for participants, and doing so more cheaply than simply keeping people in jail,” Villarruel writes. “California’s Proposition 36, which passed last month, will reduce available funding both for these sorts of supportive programs and for victims’ services.”

The result, he says, is that “more kids will be repeatedly caged for huge portions of their lives and released without the support of programs that help people turn their lives around.”

Villarruel was urged to write the letter as an extra-credit assignment in UCLA Luskin’s “Foundations of Social Welfare Policy” class taught by Assistant Professor Sicong (Summer) Sun.

“Francisco draws on his lived experiences and empirical evidence to engage in a timely discussion of criminal justice policy, specifically addressing the recent passage of California’s Proposition 36,” which stiffens penalties for drug and theft crimes, said Sun, who joined the Social Welfare faculty this year.

Mixed Results on Housing Initiatives

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An LAist article on local and state ballot measures addressing housing and homelessness called on UCLA Luskin’s Michael Lens and Shane Phillips for perspective. The latest returns show that more than 56% of L.A. County voters supported Measure A, which increases sales taxes to fund homeless services and new affordable housing development. However, Measure H, the initiative that first established the tax back in 2017, drew 69% support, noted Phillips, a researcher with the UCLA Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies. The dip in support may signal fatigue with funding homelessness efforts through the ballot box. Lens, a professor of urban planning and public policy, weighed in on Proposition 5, the state initiative that would have made it easier to pass affordable housing bonds. Angelenos joined other Californians in voting Prop. 5 down, perhaps because they found the initiative confusing. “A lot of times the default, I think, goes to ‘no’ because you’re suspicious if you don’t fully understand something,” Lens said.

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Peterson on Future of the Affordable Care Act

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Mark A. Peterson, professor of public policy at the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs, commented in a Los Angeles Times article about how the next presidential administration could impact health in California, from food and medicine to medical costs. California lawmakers already have announced steps to block attempts to interfere with the current state agenda. Among areas of concern are former President Trump’s attempt to roll back the Affordable Care Act during his first term, which was ultimately unsuccessful, and his more recent position of replacing the historic legislation only if a better plan is created. “It’s very unlikely that Republicans will want to take on the Affordable Care Act,” Peterson said. “It did not go well for them last time … and now the Affordable Care Act is more popular than ever.” Peterson, a senior fellow at the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research, has a joint appointment at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health.

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Luskin Experts Join UC Consortium Aimed at Meeting Californians’ Basic Needs

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UCLA Luskin’s Paavo Monkkonen and Juan Matute have joined the Abundance Policy Research Consortium at the University of California’s Possibility Lab.

They will join a team of experts from across the state who will spend the next year developing an evidence-based policy agenda focused on expanding Californians’ access to essential resources, goods and services.

While the state is home to great economic abundance, far too many struggle with economic insecurity and a lack of access to basic goods and services. The new consortium is part of the Possibility Lab’s Abundance Accelerator, launched in April to leverage research, innovation and collaboration to work toward a “fundamentals-first” policy agenda.

Monkkonen, a professor of urban planning and public policy, will focus on housing.

“This is an exciting opportunity to work with a diverse and knowledgeable group dedicated to improving Californians’ lives,” Monkkonen said. “The state of California has taken a number of important steps on housing, but a lot of work lies ahead.”

Matute, deputy director of the UCLA Institute of Transportation Studies, will focus on transportation. The consortium’s other areas of focus are food, water, energy, health care, safety, employment, education, child care, elder care and digital connectivity.

The research developed by Monkkonen, Matute and other consortium members will be used for strategic planning by high-level California state government partners.

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Affordable Housing Aspirations and Hurdles

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UCLA Luskin’s Michael Lens spoke to CalMatters about Vice President Kamala Harris’ pledge to build 3 million affordable homes in her first term if she is elected president — and how a similar campaign promise made by California Gov. Gavin Newsom has fared. Harris’ plan includes tax incentives, an “innovation fund” to finance construction, repurposing federal land for housing, streamlining the permitting process — “all of the stuff we talk about at dorky academic conferences,” said Lens, a professor of urban planning and public policy. But as Newsom found, transforming the housing market from the top is difficult, thanks to pricey land, high construction costs, onerous regulations and community resistance. California officials are pushing to clear regulatory hurdles, with modest impact so far but the promise of a faster pace of home construction in the future. “That’s a precursor to making a lot of these things work,” Lens said. “We have to make housing more allowable in more places.”

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Wray-Lake on California Motor-Voter Bill

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UCLA Luskin Professor of Social Welfare Laura Wray-Lake spoke to KPBS for a story about a proposed California bill designed to increase the state’s voter rolls by automatically registering eligible voters who obtain a state identification or driver’s license, or make a change of address through the DMV. The so-called motor-voter bill — SB 299 — recently passed in the state Legislature and, if signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom, could potentially increase civic engagement among young people and predominantly Black, Latino, and Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) communities, according to proponents. Opponents of the bill believe it could have unintended consequences. Wray-Lake said that a number of states have successfully implemented similar legislation, citing a 2% to 3% increase in registration. She noted that California currently ranks 25th in the nation for registration of young voters. While amendments to California’s motor-voter law in 2015 implemented registration through the DMV, customers could still choose to opt out.

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Leap Comments on California Governor’s Intervention in Policing

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UCLA Luskin Social Welfare’s Jorja Leap commented in a CalMatters article on efforts by California Gov. Gavin Newsom to influence local police agencies to change a number of law enforcement policies. Recent state intervention includes urging Oakland city leaders to change policy on police chases and the deployment of California Highway Patrol officers to Oakland and other California cities. National Guard prosecutors also have been sent to assist the district attorneys of Alameda County, San Francisco, Bakersfield and Riverside with drug cases. These efforts have drawn both support and criticism. Leap, an adjunct professor of social welfare who studies gang violence and community policing, described the state’s actions as a temporary fix for a deeply rooted problem. “We have a bunch of police chiefs who all stood up and said, ‘We can’t arrest our way out of the problem,’” Leap said. “And now we’ve got a governor going, ‘Yes, we can.’”

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Tilly on Raising California’s Minimum Wage

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UCLA Luskin Urban Planning Professor Chris Tilly spoke to CalMatters for a story about California’s Proposition 32, a measure on the November ballot that would raise the state’s minimum wage to $18 in the coming year. The proposed increase follows minimum hikes enacted in 2016 to boost the minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2022. Experts, advocates and workers have questioned whether the most recent hike will be enough to make a significant difference in Californians’ lives. A number of California cities already have enacted higher minimum wages, motivated by the higher cost of living, while unions have successfully pushed for higher wages for specific industries including fast food and health care, and are pushing for more. “In some ways, at the point where this measure is heading to the ballot, it’s kind of underwhelming,” said Tilly, who studies labor markets.

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UCLA Public Interest Research Awards Recognize Tenant Advocacy Project

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When millions of Americans lost wages at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, mass evictions loomed. California, and particularly Los Angeles County, with an estimated 365,000 renter households at risk, were no exception. In response, UCLA scholars Hannah Appel, Gary Blasi and Ananya Roy and their colleagues launched an online eviction-defense application called the Tenant Power Toolkit. Working with housing justice lawyers, technologists and community partners, the UCLA team coded the regulatory landscape of California’s 580 jurisdictions into a program tenants can easily use on any internet-connected device, in Spanish or English, to prepare their defenses. For this work, the three scholars have received UCLA Public Impact Research Awards, which celebrate the efforts of faculty who translate research into positive public action that benefits local, national and global communities. The UCLA Office of Research and Creative Activities, which bestows the annual awards, will host a ceremony honoring the recipients later this year. Since the Tenant Power Toolkit launched in July 2022, the program has prepared more than 8,000 eviction defenses, allowing approximately 21,000 tenants — over a third of them children — to avoid default eviction. “Eviction is a systemic problem,” said Appel, who noted that tenants face civil court eviction proceedings alone. “Our toolkit seeks to provide people the tools to fight their eviction while building the collective tenant power necessary to meet that of landlords and a financialized housing market.” Roy is founding director of the UCLA Luskin Institute on Inequality and Democracy, where Appel is associate faculty director. Blasi is a professor emeritus at UCLA Law. — Madeline Adamo

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Pierce on California’s Water Quality

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Greg Pierce, director of UCLA’s Human Right to Water Solutions Lab, commented in a CalMatters article about nearly 1 million California residents whose water does not meet state standards, according to an annual assessment released by California’s State Water Resources Control Board. The report, which updates earlier research by Pierce and colleagues at the Luskin Center for Innovation, notes that while more than a decade has passed since the state recognized clean, safe, affordable and accessible drinking water as a human right, nearly 400 water systems statewide don’t meet state requirements, particularly in disadvantaged and lower income communities of color. Despite nearly a billion dollars spent on grants in disadvantaged communities, estimated costs of fixing water systems would require billions of dollars over the next several years. “The subtext of this report is pretty clear,” said Pierce, who commended the water board’s transparency and extensive analysis. “The state just needs to put its money where its mouth is.”

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