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Khush Cooper Named to L.A. County Commission for Children and Families

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Khush Cooper, adjunct assistant professor of social welfare at UCLA Luskin, has been appointed to the Los Angeles County Commission for Children and Families. The 15-member commission advises the county Board of Supervisors on how to improve the delivery of services to create a safer and more secure future for the region’s most vulnerable families. During her two-year term, Cooper will meet regularly with fellow commissioners to review all county-administered programs providing services to at-risk children, and to seek input from individuals and community groups. In addition to providing guidance on program improvements, they will review legislation dealing with child welfare and make recommendations to the Board of Supervisors. The commission also produces an annual report on the status of children’s services in Los Angeles County, to be distributed and discussed throughout the community. “In addition to supporting the existing strategic focus areas of the commission, such as racial justice and support for transition-aged youth, I intend to lift up community-based strategies for parents of LGBTQ+ youth so that they can fully accept and adequately care for their children and prevent them from becoming embroiled in systems,” Cooper said. “Currently, LGBTQ+ youth are overrepresented in child welfare and probation systems across the county, state and nation.” Supervisor Lindsey Horvath nominated Cooper to the commission, which is made up of individuals who have deep experience in child welfare. Cooper earned her master and doctorate of social welfare at UCLA Luskin.

Cooper has also been named to a state task force tasked with reforming California’s child welfare policies.

 

Yin on L.A. County Proposal to Erase Medical Debt

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UCLA Luskin Public Policy Professor Wesley Yin spoke to the Los Angeles Times about a proposal by the L.A. County Board of Supervisors to purchase and forgive more than $2 billion in medical debt owed by constituents. A growing number of local and state governments have launched similar efforts to purchase such debt at a steep discount, relieving patients and their families of a heavy burden. Yin, who has researched the impact of these programs, said they are particularly beneficial if they erase debt early on, when patients are still working to pay it off. If L.A. County focuses on purchasing the cheapest debt, the kind of years-old medical bills that most people have long forgotten about, “it might not impact people’s financial situations that much anymore,” he said. In addition to debt forgiveness programs, solutions such as hospital financial assistance programs and health insurance expansions would help ensure that bills are paid more quickly, Yin said.

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Younger Angelenos Hit Particularly Hard by Inflation, Pandemic Stresses

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Spectrum News 1’s “Inside the Issues” spoke with Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin, about this year’s Quality of Life Index, a countywide survey that captures Angelenos’ feelings about inflation, housing affordability, health care, race relations, education and more. “For the last three years, dissatisfaction has definitely been on the rise,” said Yaroslavsky, who has directed the survey since its launch in 2016. “Where it hits the hardest is among younger people,” particularly those in their 30s whose families may have been turned upside down by pandemic stresses followed by spiking inflation. The index also polls residents on the favorability of public officials, and Yaroslavsky spoke about the broad popularity of Mayor Karen Bass in the city she leads as well as countywide. “She’s off to a strong start, and she’s using her political capital to try to do big things,” he said. The interview begins at minute 30.

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Pandemic Worsened L.A. Income Divide, Survey Finds

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Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin, spoke to news outlets about this year’s UCLA Quality of Life Index, a countywide survey that revealed that the deep income divide among Angelenos has been made worse by the COVID-19 pandemic. “The lower-income folks are the same people whose income hasn’t come back to pre-pandemic levels, and they’re the ones getting clobbered by inflation,” Yaroslavsky told ABC7 News. This has occurred while many more affluent residents of L.A. County saw their incomes rise over the last three years, the survey found. On NBC Los Angeles’ “News Conference,” Yaroslavsky explained the index’s many findings, including a point of consensus about one way to expand housing options in the region: Three-quarters of respondents supported using vacant commercial and retail buildings for residential use. Coverage of the Quality of Life Index also appeared on news outlets including KCAL News, KTLA, Telemundo and the Los Angeles Daily News.

Watch the KABC7 report

Watch the NBC-LA report

Watch the KCAL report

Yaroslavsky on Standing Up Against Hate

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Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin, spoke with KPCC’s “AirTalk” about a new report on hate crimes in Los Angeles County. In 2021, the number of reported hate crimes rose from 641 to 786, the highest since 2002, according to the county’s Commission on Human Relations. The most targeted groups were the Black, LGBTQ, Latino and Jewish communities. Yaroslavsky said public officials must use their positions of authority to stand up against hate. “You speak up. You make it socially unacceptable to behave in bigoted ways, not just antisemitism but racism, sexism, homophobia,” said Yaroslavsky, who served as a Los Angeles councilman and supervisor for 40 years. “One of the most important roles an elected official can perform is to set the bar high when it comes to human relations, and to give no quarter to anyone who advocates persecution, who traffics in bigotry and antisemitic or racist tropes.”

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Yaroslavsky on Concern Over Angelenos’ Mental Health

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A Los Angeles Times article on rising concern about Angelenos’ mental health cited the work of Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin. In the last few years, residents have endured skyrocketing inflation, extreme heat and drought, an alarming rise in hate crimes and the lingering effects of a devastating global pandemic. This year’s UCLA Quality of Life Index, which measures Los Angeles County residents’ satisfaction with their lives, found the lowest score since the survey was launched in 2016. “What it said to us is that county residents aren’t happy. There is an anxiety level here that is unprecedented in my lifetime,” said Yaroslavsky, director of the survey and a longtime public servant in Los Angeles. He noted that one-quarter of respondents said they go to bed each night worrying they will end up living on the street — all part of a “perfect storm” of mental health stressors afflicting Angelenos today.

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Alumnus Stephen Cheung to Lead L.A. County Economic Development Corporation

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UCLA Luskin Board of Advisors member Stephen Cheung has been named as the new president and CEO of the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corporation (LAEDC), succeeding longtime president Bill Allen when he retires in January. Cheung, a double Bruin who earned his master’s in social welfare at UCLA in 2007, is currently the chief operating officer at the nonprofit organization, which focuses on equitable economic growth in the region. He also leads the LAEDC-affiliated World Trade Center Los Angeles and previously managed policies and programs related to the Port of Los Angeles. “Our staff, board and I all agree that LAEDC will be in excellent hands under the leadership of our COO Stephen Cheung,” Allen said in a news release. “Stephen has been a tremendous partner to me in leading the LAEDC and WTCLA for the past seven years, and I’m genuinely excited to see where he will take the organization over the next decade.” Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors chair Holly J. Mitchell said, “Stephen has been a steadfast champion to crush the digital divide and to ensure an economy that works for all county residents. We are indeed grateful for Bill Allen’s 17 years of service and look forward to working with Stephen Cheung in the years ahead.”  An active alumnus who has been a member of the Board of Advisors at the Luskin School since 2018, Cheung helped conceive the School’s annual Luskin Summit event and continues to serve on its organizing committee.

 

Informing Equitable Stormwater Investments in L.A. County

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In a drought-prone area like Los Angeles, rainwater provides tremendous potential to boost local water supply, as well as provide multiple other ecosystem and community benefits. That’s why in 2018, L.A. County voters approved Measure W, a tax that raises about $280 million annually to capture, clean and reuse water runoff. Measure W and the program it created, the Safe Clean Water Program, funds projects to clean and strengthen the local water supply and build community resilience. Research by the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation and Stantec is helping to ensure that these investments benefit all Angelenos, especially residents of disadvantaged communities, as the program already calls for. A new report provides advice to the county to strengthen the impacts of the program over time. The study analyzed 116 projects funded by the program — projects like converting open spaces into wetlands and adding rain gardens along transit lines. Researchers explored the program’s selection process and how projects are geographically distributed in disadvantaged communities. The team also conducted workshops with nonprofit, community-based, and public and private sector stakeholders to understand neighborhood needs and anticipated benefits from each project. “It’s crucial that members of disadvantaged communities have the opportunity to identify those benefits for their own communities. It can’t just be a top-down process,” said Jon Christensen, co-author of the report and an affiliated scholar at the Center for Innovation. This project builds upon the center’s research on local water resilience, environmental equity and urban greening, as well as L.A.’s voter-approved infrastructure measures. 

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Yaroslavsky on County Supervisors’ Authority Over Sheriff

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UCLA Luskin faculty member Zev Yaroslavsky spoke to CBS2 News and KPCC’s “AirTalk” about a motion from the Los Angeles Board of Supervisors to seek authority to remove an elected sheriff from office. The proposed change to the county charter, which would require voter approval, comes amid continuing strife between board members and Sheriff Alex Villanueva over funding, hiring, COVID-19 vaccination policies and claims of “deputy gangs” within the agency. “I think the board is right to be frustrated with this sheriff. … But they need to be careful that the remedy does not undermine their high-ground position,” said Yaroslavsky, a longtime public servant who now directs the Luskin School’s Los Angeles Initiative. The timing of the motion may be a “tactical mistake,” he said, as it could divert attention and resources to the supervisors’ action rather than Villanueva’s record as he faces a runoff election in November against former Long Beach Police Chief Robert Luna.

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Listen to the "AirTalk" report

 

Yaroslavsky on Inflation’s Fallout on Local Elections

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Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin, spoke to KPCC’s “AirTalk” about the impact of Southern California’s widening economic gap on upcoming elections. Yaroslavsky cited results of the 2022 UCLA Quality of Life Index, which found a steep drop in residents’ satisfaction with life in L.A. County, largely due to concerns over inflation and public safety. “What stands out is that people are unhappy, they’re anxious, they’re angry, they’re concerned,” Yaroslavsky said. Lower-income households, hard hit by lost wages and rising inflation, have been slower to rebound from the financial shock of the COVID-19 era, the survey showed. “We are the ground zero in this country of the economic divide,” Yaroslavsky said. The Quality of Life Index also showed a decline in approval ratings of many local government officials. “Inflation, I think, is the most pernicious thing economically that we have in our society,” Yaroslavsky said. “That will have a political bite like nothing else.”

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