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Pierce on End to Water, Power Shutoffs for Low-Income Angelenos

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A Los Angeles Times story on the decision by local utility officials to halt shutoffs of water and power for low-income customers who can’t pay their bills cited Gregory Pierce, co-director of the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation. The story cited research from the center showing that Los Angeles’ communities of color were disproportionately affected by utility debt and shutoffs during the COVID-19 pandemic. “Protection from utility shutoffs for those enrolled in low-income discount programs will help lessen the debt burden for [L.A. Department of Water and Power’s] most vulnerable customers,” said Pierce, who leads UCLA’s Human Right to Water Solutions Lab. Pierce comments frequently on issues of water access and equity, including in a USA Today fact-checking article on false claims that water scarcity is an illusion. Climate change has created weather extremes, he said, but excess water in one place doesn’t help another place that’s parched by drought.

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Yaroslavsky on What’s Next for Los Angeles

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Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin, weighed in on big issues facing greater Los Angeles in the aftermath of recent elections. A Los Angeles Times op-ed asked civic leaders for ideas on how to improve local governance. Yaroslavsky, who served for decades as an L.A. city councilman and county supervisor, recommended appointing a homelessness czar empowered to “cut through the thicket of bureaucracies that too often slows or prevents progress.” He wrote, “The unhoused don’t have time to wait for a complete overhaul of this broken system. … The creation of a homelessness czar would be a departure from the norm, but a radical departure is what we need.” Yaroslavsky was also cited in an L.A. Times article about county Measure A, which would empower the Board of Supervisors to fire an elected sheriff who commits a serious infraction. “It really needs to be a slam-dunk kind of transgression,” Yaroslavsky said.

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Diaz on Fair Representation and Latino Voting Power

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Sonja Diaz, executive director of the UCLA Latino Policy and Politics Institute, spoke to media outlets following the midterm elections, weighing in on issues including fair representation and the impact of the Latino vote at the local, state and national level. A Los Angeles Times article on the reelection of Sen. Alex Padilla emphasized the significance of a Southern Californian in the powerful position after three decades of Bay Area Democrats holding the state’s Senate seats. Diaz noted that Padilla brings greater urgency to issues facing urban communities of color, including immigration and the environment. She was also cited in an L.A. Times column on Latinos’ party preferences and an editorial calling for an increase in the size of the Los Angeles City Council. On KCRW’s “Press Play,” Diaz described the Latino electorate’s alliance with other diverse voting blocs, harkening back to the broad coalition that propelled Barack Obama into the presidency.

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Yaroslavsky on L.A.’s ‘Confounding Election’

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Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin, spoke to media outlets including Governing and the Financial Times about the contest between Karen Bass and Rick Caruso to become L.A.’s next mayor. While housing, homelessness and public safety have been central issues in the campaign, the leaked audio of City Council members using racist language has become a wild-card factor. The recording contributed to “a sense that the city is broken,” Yaroslavsky said, but he added that it’s not clear whether voters will be motivated to “kick out the bums” or stay home out of cynicism. “You have a city that has changed and a population that is willing to elect people that don’t necessarily look like them — and then this happens, and the danger is that people revert back to their camps,” he said. “It’s really one of the most confounding elections I can remember.” Yaroslavsky also spoke with CBS Los Angeles about the impact rainy weather could have on voter turnout.

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Terriquez on Lessons Learned From L.A. Scandal

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Urban planning professor Veronica Terriquez spoke to media outlets including Newsweek and USA Today about how Los Angeles can move forward after the scandal sparked by a leaked recording of racist comments by city leaders. “Civil society leaders learned a valuable lesson here, that hate speech cannot be tolerated among Latinos or any other elected officials,” said Terriquez, who directs the Chicano Studies Research Center at UCLA. She said she sees hope in the overwhelming condemnation of the bigoted comments, as well as in the rising political generation’s ability to build bridges between groups. “In Los Angeles and Orange County, you see diverse coalitions across ethnicity and race,” Terriquez said. “I think that the younger generation tends to form coalitions that are more inclusive.” She concluded, “The lessons learned from this week may pave the way for the more careful selection of leaders and inclusive representation.”

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Zepeda-Millán on Damage to Labor’s Influence

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A Los Angeles Times column on an L.A. labor leader’s role in the scandal that has upended city politics cited Chris Zepeda-Millán, associate professor of public policy. Ron Herrera resigned his post as leader of the L.A. County Federation of Labor after a leaked recording of a racist conversation that also involved three City Council members. Union members across the country were shaken by the recording, which undermined the labor principle that workers must stick together to ensure dignity for all. The timing of the leak, weeks before the midterm elections, also threatens voters’ trust in organized labor, one of the most powerful political players in California and the country. “With a scandal this bad, with the L.A. Federation of Labor being involved, it could really do some long-term damage,” said Zepeda-Millán, who chairs the labor studies interdepartmental program at UCLA.

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Yaroslavsky on the Scandal Shaking L.A.

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Zev Yaroslavsky, the longtime city councilman and county supervisor who now directs the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin, spoke to several media outlets about the scandal shaking L.A. City Hall. The release of a recording that captured racist and disturbing comments by city officials is a sign that the governance system is profoundly broken, Yaroslavsky said. “I don’t think there’s been anything like this in city government since the ’30s and ’40s, the corruption heyday of Los Angeles,” he told Politico. “As much as it was a racist, racial, ethnic disparagement of everyone in town, it was more about power. It was a raw power grab,” he told the New York Times. The prospect that three members of the City Council would be forced to step down has no precedent, “but this whole crisis is without precedent,” he told the Los Angeles Times. Yaroslavsky also spoke to the Los Angeles Daily News, KCRW’s “Press Play” and KPCC’s “Air Talk.”

 

Message From the Dean: Recent Events in the L.A. City Council All of us — not just prominent people and elected officials but especially them — must do more to make the world a safer, saner place.

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Oct. 11, 2022

Friends, Colleagues, Students:

I am once again called upon to communicate to you in a moment where I find myself almost speechless. The wildly offensive racist, anti-Black, anti-indigenous, antisemitic and homophobic conversation among three members of the City Council and a local labor leader deserves all the condemnation it’s receiving and then some. That one party of the conversation was, until two years ago, a member of this academic community is personally painful and deeply disappointing.

We are called upon in moments like this to remember that the cause of human equality and a commitment to decency, equity, and inclusiveness is an ongoing project, one requiring self-examination and vigilance. Let us use this moment to once again repudiate anti-Blackness, repudiate derision directed toward indigenous communities, repudiate antisemitism, repudiate homophobia and demand that all of us — not just prominent people and elected officials but especially them — do better and do more to make the world a safer, saner place in which we all might flourish.

The School is not permitted to take public political positions. However, I wanted you to hear from me that today, in my personal capacity, I signed onto a letter from community and civic leaders across academic, philanthropic and political organizations. The letter calls for the resignation of all three officials, an important first step toward rectifying this injustice and allowing healing to begin.

Our times remain vexed. Emotions remain high. Let’s work to make our better selves the authors of the future.

In solidarity,

Gary M. Segura

Professor and Dean

Zepeda-Millán on Labor Organizing, Activism and Scholarship

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Chris Zepeda-Millán spoke of his Boyle Heights roots, early activism in labor and anti-war movements, and inspiration to pursue a doctorate to broaden the perspectives heard in academia during an interview marking his selection as chair of the UCLA Labor Studies Interdepartmental Program. An associate professor of public policy and Chicana/o and Central American Studies, Zepeda-Millán grew up hearing about the challenging conditions his grandparents faced as garment workers and migrant farmworkers and learning about the importance of labor organizing. It was not until pursuing higher education that he would discover the connections between his family’s work, economic and social inequality, race and immigration status. In college, “for the first time in my life I was able to read books and stories that literally took place in my neighborhood,” he said. “I saw these courses as intellectual ammunition. I was learning how to defend my beliefs, to be able to call out things that I knew were wrong.”

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