california
Over the past two years, St. Mary’s Episcopal Church, which sits on a hill four blocks away from the Pacific Ocean in Laguna Beach, Calif., has overhauled its property, adding drought-resistant native plants to its gardens and installing a drip irrigation system to avoid water runoff.
The marchers, organized by the United Farm Workers, were joined by hundreds of allies, including faith leaders, throughout their march. Farmworkers marched through triple-digit temperature days on their peregrinacion (pilgrimage). They carried American and Mexican flags, flags with union logos, and a banner featuring a large image of Our Lady of Guadalupe, a title for the Virgin Mary that carries special significance for Mexican and Mexican-Americans. Marchers proclaimed, “We feed you!” and chanted the UFW slogan “Sí, se puede (Yes, it can be done!)”
State Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco)’s bill would classify affordable housing built on religious or private college land as “use by right,” a term for developments that are exempt from local zoning requirements. The bill would make it simpler for religious institutions and private universities to build affordable housing on their property.
Quick and efficient though they may be, these emergency shelters are a short-term fix. With affordable housing scarce and real estate continuing to rise in one of California’s priciest markets, some critics are concerned Orange County is content to shunt the unhoused out of view without promoting permanent housing.
Romarilyn Ralston spoke with Sojourners’ Jenna Barnett about her previous work for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection as a clerk and a trainer for other incarcerated wildfire fighters. In September, California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a bill clearing the path for inmate firefighters to be eligible for firefighting jobs upon release.
“SINCE WORLD WAR II there have been labor camps in California training incarcerated people to help support Cal Fire on the outside. California has one of the highest fire seasons every year, and it’s getting hotter and hotter because of climate change. So having a workforce of hundreds of well-trained firefighters to cut lines and remove fuel on the sides of mountains for a dollar an hour—it’s a steal. And California saves $100 million a year doing it. On one hand, California is really progressive with our criminal justice reforms, and on the other hand, we’re still so committed to punishment and enslaving, extorting, and treating people inhumanely.
By the end of Super Tuesday, nearly half of immigrants eligible to vote in the U.S. will have made their voices heard in the Democratic presidential primary.
“A teacher once told me it would be better if I didn’t tell people I’m gay,” said Jed McDonald, a Pasadena City College student and former youth in foster care.
“I think she meant it as helpful advice because she wasn’t a mean teacher, but it didn’t feel that way,” McDonald said.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom will impose a moratorium on the state's death penalty on Wednesday, granting reprieves to all 737 inmates on death row and closing the state's execution chamber, an administration source said.
Studies show that foster youth are the most likely to drop out of school and least likely to graduate high school, much less attend and graduate from college. In California, about 50 percent of foster students graduated from high school in the 2016-17 school year, compared to about 83 percent for all other students, according to the state Department of Education.
A dystopian scene is unfolding across California. Charred car skeletons sit idle on the side of roads in the working-class town of Paradise, Calif. In one video, a camera pans to reveal what looks like an apocalyptic movie set — passing the remains of an abandoned school bus, begging us to ask what happened to those who were inside.
Opponents fear the decision could result in a severe undercount that can lead to increased marginalization of immigrants by potentially reducing their representation in Congress and federal funding for local jurisdictions, which is determined by population.
“It is an atrocity that an unarmed young man was shot at twenty times in his own backyard and shows the urgent need in these times for intervention against police misconduct. We will call for a complete and thorough investigation into this young man’s death," Rev. Al Sharpton said in a statement.
President Trump, I personally invite you to also come down to the borderlands with me in Tijuana and San Diego and meet the people directly impacted by the stroke of your pen. I am a co-founding director of Global Immersion, and one of our primary organizational initiatives involves having cross-sector leaders from around the country come to the border to see the human face of immigration and build a set of tools for how to better care of the “stranger among us,” as my sacred text (the Bible) mandates.
The U.S. Justice Department will file a lawsuit against the state of California alleging it is interfering with the enforcement of federal immigration laws, escalating a long-simmering battle over "sanctuary" policies that try to protect undocumented immigrants against deportation, senior department officials said Tuesday.
According to court documents, California Highway Patrol (CHP) worked with and expressed sympathy with the neo-Nazi Traditionalist Workers Party (TWP), treating them as victims and attempted to protect their identity.
The sweep comes in the wake of nationwide ICE raids of nearly 100 7-Eleven stores that resulted in dozens of arrests less than a month ago.
While not yet final, the regulation appears intended to let employers avoid providing birth control coverage if they object for any reason — an expansion of the original effort to exempt those with religious objections. As a result, abortion rights groups warn that up to 55 million women could lose free birth control coverage — something that saves them $1.4 billion annually.
Based near the town of Merced in the Central Valley, which produces over half of the fruit, vegetables, and nuts grown in the United States, the Sisters of the Valley grow and harvest their own cannabis plants.
For what the singer/songwriter/music producer Pharrell said two years ago about Kendrick Lamar is absolutely true. Kendrick Lamar is the Bob Dylan of his generation, an American storyteller on the same plane as Toni Morrison, Eugene O’Neill, Pearl S. Buck, and other U.S. Nobel Prize in Literature laureates. Why this statement may seem overblown is because of highbrow bias against hip-hop, which is to say bias against black language, black storytellers, black people. But, to quote Chuck D, the leader of the rap group Public Enemy, hip-hop is “CNN for black people.” And Lamar is the best reporter in the business.
When I asked Father Guy Wilson what the children of immigrant parents are telling him, amid the current inundation with media chatter, political rhetoric, and executive action on the topic of immigration, tears welled up in his eyes and one fell on his clerical shirt.
“It’s hard,” he said. “They are so scared.”
“Some of the teenagers have told me: ‘My parents are good people. They have never even had a traffic ticket. Why would anyone want to take them away from me?’”