The Brief

In the heart of L.A.’s Chinatown neighborhood, a 6,000-square-foot space looks to provide mental health care services for Los Angeles Unified School District students, as well as for kids and young adults ages six to 25.

For years, mental health has been a top concern for L.A. youth, many of whom experience high-level stressors, including housing insecurity, gun violence and discrimination in and outside school.

Last year, the L.A. County Youth Commission’s annual report revealed mental health was the top concern for youth, with education and employment falling close behind.

The commission surveyed 856 youth across the five different districts of the county, 524 of whom listed mental health as a top concern. The majority of the youth who selected mental health as their main concern were Latino and system-impacted.

Witnessing rising health care costs and deep cuts to mental health funding in California led Gateways Hospital and Mental Health Centers to expand their critical outpatient services for youth, also known as their Child and Adolescent Outpatient Program (GCAOP).

With a new location for its GCAOP inside the Chinatown Service Center, the Gateways Hospital and Mental Health Centers hope to reach more children and youth who can benefit from therapy, medication management and psychiatric care.

On Tuesday, L.A. Mayor Karen Bass attended the ribbon-cutting ceremony to celebrate the new location for the GCAOP in Chinatown. She began her remarks by thanking Gateways Hospital and Mental Health Centers “for stepping up,” with the new facility expected to serve more than 230 youth annually.

“This place will provide the healing needed to prevent challenges from escalating into crises,” Bass said. “Make no mistake, we have a long way to go, but my administration and leaders like those at Gateways are turning the tide on major challenges like mental health that have been ignored for decades.”

Last year, the U.S. Department of Education, under the Trump administration ,announced it would stop funding roughly $1 billion in grants that were meant to boost the ranks and training of mental health professionals who work in schools. The department claimed that the grants were awarded under the Biden administration, a decision that was said to conflict with the current administration's priorities.

Aside from terminating the 2025 grants, the department also proposed an additional reduction for the 2026 fiscal year. These consecutive cuts would reduce resources for school counselors and psychiatrists, something that for school districts like LAUSD can be detrimental.

As L.A. Public Press reported earlier this year, LAUSD enrollment has dropped due to ICE raids spreading across L.A. County and many LAUSD staff, including counselors, have indicated that in times like these, the hiring of more trained attendance counselors and investing in mental health support are vital.

Despite that, for many LAUSD campuses, especially in low-income neighborhoods, staff shortages, including counselors and therapists, are a reality.

To combat some of the local shortages when it comes to mental health, the Gateways Hospital and Mental Health Centers are partnering with LAUSD to provide outpatient services to students, including individual and family therapy and psychiatric evaluations across more than 15 of the district's campuses.

“Our program is designed to meet young people where they are, whether that’s in school, at home, or here in the new Chinatown Service Center location,” said Charlotte Bautista, director of Gateways Child and Adolescent Outpatient Program. “We know early access to mental health care can change the trajectory of a child’s life, and we are providing a safe space where families can heal, grow and thrive together.”

Charlotte Bautista, director of Gateways Child and Adolescent Outpatient Program, said this expansion also allows for more students and families who deserve consistent, high-quality care to be reached, reducing waitlists and out-of-pocket costs.

“Our program is designed to meet young people where they are, whether that’s in school, at home, or here in the new Chinatown Service Center location,” she said. “We know early access to mental health care can change the trajectory of a child’s life, and we are providing a safe space where families can heal, grow and thrive together.”

This story was produced by CALÓ News, a news organization covering Latino/a/x communities.

U.S. domestic air travel has boomed in recent years, except for one segment. Short flights of a few hundred miles decreased over the past decade, while longer flights became more popular, according to data gathered by the aviation analytics firm OAG for NPR.

Nearly 4 million short flights are scheduled for this year. But as of mid-April, the number of flights spanning less than 250 nautical miles had declined by 11% from 2016 to 2026 — the biggest drop of any route length. The decline comes as no surprise to John Grant, a senior analyst at OAG.

"That is an awful distance to be operating," he says, because short flights are more expensive for airlines than flights with a longer cruise time.

In contrast, every domestic flight category of more than 500 miles saw notable gains over the same 10-year span. The numbers depict the U.S. hub-and-spoke aviation system moving toward longer "spokes" for some routes.

The trend was well established even before rising fuel prices from the Iran war rattled U.S. aviation. It could now accelerate, as airlines raise prices and trim less-profitable flights due to jet fuel supply constraints.

Domestic jet fuel costs have roughly doubled since early February, before the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran. U.S. airlines spent more than $5 billion on jet fuel in March, a 56% increase from February, according to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics. Spirit Airlines blamed the soaring fuel costs when it announced it would shut down last weekend. Prices are even higher for Asia and other markets that rely more heavily on supplies transiting the Strait of Hormuz.

"Any time there is pressure like that, particularly a cost pressure, but also a resource pressure, airlines are going to concentrate flying where they can move the most passengers with the fewest pilots," says Faye Malarkey Black, CEO of the Regional Airline Association.

Short-hop flights are the most frequent, and least efficient

Every day, thousands of U.S. airline passengers step off planes without needing to check the local time and weather, because they've traveled less than 100 miles, on flights lasting less than an hour.

For example, there are dozens of flights between Milwaukee and Chicago each week, even though they're separated by less than 80 miles and have been connected by rail lines for more than a century. But there's a key snag for travelers in the Milwaukee area who might want to take the train to O'Hare International, says Joshua Schank, an urban planning professor at UCLA who's also a partner with the consulting firm Infra Strategies.

"Remember, that rail is going between the [cities'] two downtowns, and it's not between the airports," he says. "And that's the key distinction," he adds, noting that a majority of the route's passengers are likely connecting to other destinations beyond Chicago.

For routes like that to make economic sense, they require enough people willing to pay, says Black, of the airline association.

"It's not the distance, it's the density," she says. "If you have a short flight that has a lot of density because it's between two urban centers and it's a viable option, then people will take that option."

It's one of the shorter spokes in the U.S. hub-and-spoke system that helps airlines concentrate their traffic. That's why the sub-250-mile distance remains the second most popular domestic route, even with its double-digit decline. The most popular flight category over the past 10 years isn't much longer, with the 251 to 500 nautical mile distance scheduled 2.1 million times in 2026, despite a roughly 4% dip.

But all those repeated shorter flights come at a cost.

"A lot of the fuel is used in the takeoff and landing processes," Grant says. And every landing, he notes, adds wear and tear on the planes' equipment.

To hit the sweet spot of revenue versus cost, Grant says, "airlines typically try to be in that two-hour block time" – a category that includes flights over 500 miles, such as Washington, D.C., to Atlanta.

At airports, short flights also add to the workload for understaffed air traffic control systems and congested gates. A small regional jet carrying 50 people, for instance, is just as important to a controller as a wide-body airliner. And it takes up gate space repeatedly, as it shuttles passengers back and forth to a hub airport. As Black notes, the impact of all those short flights adds up.

"Regional airlines have always been the backbone of air service to smaller communities," she says. "In the early 2000s, they were the only source of scheduled air service for roughly three-quarters of U.S. airports. Today, that figure is closer to two-thirds."

Prices for U.S. jet fuel have nearly doubled since before the Iran war began, shaking up the aviation industry. This file photo shows a worker preparing to fuel a United Express jet at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, in Grapevine, Texas.

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Where are we heading? 

Despite their recent decline, short-hop flights are integral to the hub-and-spoke network, taking people from Colorado Springs to Denver, for instance, or from Birmingham to Atlanta.

But airlines have shifted more toward longer flights over the past decade, thanks largely to a new generation of narrow-body aircraft that are more efficient, making them an enticing option for longer-range routes. That's why the trendline favors routes such as the 501 to 750-mile category (e.g. Portland to Las Vegas, or Houston to Tampa), which grew by 11% to nearly 1.7 million scheduled flights in 2026. Flights of more than 750 and 1,000 miles each saw double-digit percentage gains, as well.

"Unfortunately for short-haul routes, the economics are not in their favor," says Ahmed Abdelghani, professor of operations management at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Florida. He notes that a smaller jet's higher costs must be borne by fewer passengers than a larger plane, prompting higher fares.

"Those new generation narrowbody aircraft will have much better economics than the smaller 50-seater, 70-seater aircraft," Abdelghani says, citing the newer jets' ability to spread costs over more than 160 seats, depending on how they're configured.

The newer planes align with airlines that prioritize route profitability, Abdelghani says. But he and Black both say that larger narrow-body planes aren't a good fit for every market – and as a result, smaller communities could see fewer flights and connectivity.

"The airports with the sharpest service losses tend to be small hub and non-hub airports," Black says, "and those markets are often built around shorter-distance flying." She notes that other problems, such as pilot shortages, are also affecting small markets. "As pilot availability tightened, airlines had to make decisions about where limited flying could be sustained," Black says.

As Abdelghani puts it, "The airline decides, OK, since now I'm going to fly only efficient aircraft, I'm going to sacrifice the routes that this aircraft doesn't fit."
Copyright 2026 NPR

I try to keep my cool and maintain professionalism as a radio host, but as I prepared questions for William Shatner and Neil deGrasse Tyson while sipping coffee from my Star Trek mug — and gazing at my copy of Astrophysics for People in a Hurry — I realized that would be a challenge.

So, I decided to third-wheel their legendary bromance as my approach to the interview. I have no regrets.

A serendipitous friendship

Shatner and deGrasse Tyson are an unexpected pairing that makes total sense when you see them together.

These two giant personalities have met their match in one another, and they love it.

They had crossed paths before, on a cruise to the Antarctic where they were put on stage as the night’s entertainment. It only deepened their connection

Their love of conversing quickly resulted in an audiobook. Cosmos Confidential: Bill & Neil's Excellent Bromance and the touring live show, “The Universe is Absurd!” coming to L.A. this month.

Despite contrasting careers, and a more than two-decade age difference, commonalities bond them like commiserating on being thrust into sudden fame. But their camaraderie seems to go deeper with a shared sense of curiosity and passion for discourse.

Referring to the lengthy recording time of “Cosmos Confidential,” Shatner spoke highly of his time spent with deGrasse Tyson.

“We were required to spend some 20 hours talking to each other to make this book and in that discovery, I fell in love with Neil deGrasse Tyson,” Shatner said. “He's the most remarkable man and some peccadilloes are worth examining for a more lengthy time.”

Turning to deGrasse Tyson he remarked, “You are unique in many ways.”

Like puzzle pieces, they fit well together — Shatner, an eternal student and deGrasse Tyson, an innate teacher.

“William Shatner has the curiosity of a middle school kid who's just discovering the world,” said deGrasse Tyson. “Except this curiosity, he's retained his entire fricking life. So, as an educator, I bask in the curiosity of others who have questions about the universe.”

They don’t stick just to the cosmos, though. Shatner and deGrasse Tyson like to also get personal entertaining topics from the abstract and spiritual, to the tangible and scientific.

An open debate and a dose of optimism 

The most refreshing thing about Shatner and DeGrasse Tyson’s dynamic may be their ability to joyfully challenge and disagree, gleefully ribbing one another in a free-flowing back and forth..

Another breath of fresh air is their shared hopefulness for the world.

Shatner, who has actually seen our planet from orbit, is inspired by the Earth itself despite threats to the environment.

“How quickly nature heals itself from the defamation of human beings,” he said. “I say, get out of the way, let nature take over and human beings sit back for a moment.”

Meanwhile, deGrasse Tyson described himself as an “optimistic realist” and offered an endorsement for the pay-it-forward philosophy.  

“When you pay it back, it closes off that good deed from the universe,” he said. “Whereas if we pay it forward, they become tributaries of good deeds that move through society and through civilization where everybody will be doing good things for other people. And this is a future that I wanna move towards.”

"The Universe Is Absurd" live show

Shatner and deGrasse Tyson promise entirely different shows when they take the stage in Beverly Hills for two nights of discussions.

Event details: 
The Universe Is Absurd!
May 19 and 20 at 7:30 pm
Saban Theater, Beverly Hills
Tickets here

In China, President Donald Trump is negotiating with Chinese President Xi Jinping this week, in a remarkably friendly visit despite friction between the two nations on trade, sanctions, and China's role in the Iran war.

Back at home, court documents unsealed this week show that a Los Angeles-area mayor reached a deal with federal prosecutors after admitting that she acted as an illegal foreign agent of China — a case experts say is emblematic of Beijing's broadening tradecraft strategy in the U.S. and around the globe.

Eileen Wang, now the former mayor of Arcadia, agreed to plead guilty to the felony charge accusing her of promoting the interests of the People's Republic of China (PRC) under the direction of Chinese officials, according to court filings. The 58-year-old abruptly resigned from her position on Monday, hours after the plea agreement was made public by the Department of Justice. She faces a sentence of up to 10 years in prison.

Federal prosecutors say that from late 2020 to 2022, Wang and a man named Yaoning "Mike" Sun ran a website called U.S. News Center targeting the area's large Chinese diaspora. (The city of roughly 55,000 residents has an Asian-majority population of about 59% as of 2024, with over 46% of residents saying they are foreign-born.) According to the Justice Department, the two used the platform to disseminate pro-China propaganda at the behest of PRC government officials while concealing their ties to the Chinese government from the public.

"Individuals in our country who covertly do the bidding of foreign governments undermine our democracy," First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said in a statement. "This plea agreement is the latest success in our determination to defend the homeland against China's efforts to corrupt our institutions."

In a joint statement, Wang's attorneys, Brian Sun and Jason Liang, said "she apologizes and is sorry for the mistakes she has made in her personal life."

Sun suggested that Wang, who emigrated from China to the U.S. and has been involved in Arcadia community service for at least 15 years, was persuaded by "someone who she believed to be her fiance" to act on behalf of the PRC, saying, "her trust and love for apparently the wrong person who ultimately led her astray – require her to step away from public service." (It's worth noting that Wang has previously described Yaoning "Mike" Sun as her fiance).

Sun, the lawyer, also noted that Wang's wrongdoings outlined in the plea agreement pre-dated her swearing-in in December 2022.

A 'whole of society' approach

As China consolidates its global might, experts say Beijing is ramping up efforts to leverage the Chinese diaspora to both soften U.S. views of the authoritarian government and promote pro-Beijing politicians, particularly at the state or local levels.

Nicholas Eftimiades, a former senior U.S. intelligence officer who specializes in Chinese espionage, told NPR he's seen an uptick in this approach in recent years.

"We've certainly seen a number of cases of China attempting to recruit lower level officials on long term approaches so that they can conduct covert influence on the United States," he said.

President Donald Trump arrives for a state banquet hosted by Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Great Hall of the People on Thursday.

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For example, in 2024, federal prosecutors charged a former New York state government employee with acting "as an undisclosed agent of the Chinese government while her husband, Christopher Hu, facilitated the transfer of millions of dollars in kickbacks for personal gain." (A trial in late 2025 ended with a hung jury, and the case is scheduled to be retried in early 2027).

Even a senator's office appears to have been infiltrated. In 2018, Politico first reported that a San Francisco-based staffer for former Sen. Dianne Feinstein was allegedly recruited by Chinese intelligence to report back about local politics. At the time, Feinstein acknowledged that the FBI had informed her that it had concerns that China was "seeking to recruit" a staffer.

Eftimiades said China is carrying out a "whole of society approach." Unlike Western intelligence agencies, which focus espionage efforts on other intelligence organizations or militaries, China also focuses on spying at a societal level, he explained. "That means that they're recruiting mayors and congressmen with the hope that they'll rise into greater positions."

Once in place, he said the idea is that these leaders could carry out a range of operations on behalf of the Chinese Communist Party, including spying on members of the Chinese diaspora who are perceived as dissidents or monitoring the activities of visiting Taiwanese leadership.

For example, federal prosecutors say Yaoning "Mike" Sun, who worked with Wang on the website and as her campaign advisor, closely surveilled the then-president of Taiwan when she visited the area in 2023.

Sun is currently serving 48 months in federal prison in a separate case for acting as an illegal agent of China, "including while serving as a campaign advisor for a political candidate who was elected to the city council of a Southern California city," according to federal prosecutors. The candidate was unnamed in that case but the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Central District of California now confirms to NPR that the candidate was Wang.

The Chinese Embassy did not respond to NPR's request for comment on Wang's case and on broader allegations of espionage.

'This is what the Ministry of Foreign Affairs wants to send'

Chinese officials asked Wang to repost stories favoring the government's position on controversial issues, according to the plea agreement signed by the former mayor and federal prosecutors.

In June 2021, a PRC official sent Wang and several others in the same group chat a link to an essay in the Los Angeles Times "explaining China's stance on the Xinjiang issue," prosecutors said. According to court documents, the message read: "There is no genocide in Xinjiang; there is no such thing as 'forced labor' in any production activity, including cotton production. Spreading such rumor to do defame China, destroy Xinjiang's safety and stability, weaken local economy, suppress China's development."

Wang posted the article to U.S. News Center within minutes. She then responded to the PRC official with a link to the article on her website. The PRC official responded: "So fast, thank you everyone."

A few months later, in August 2021, Wang and the other members of the group chat shared links to another article on their respective websites, according to the plea agreement. When a PRC official then asked Wang to omit the name of a company mentioned in the story, she complied. Later, Wang sent a screenshot of the story, showing it had more than 15,000 views. The official praised her work, sending a couple of thumbs up emojis. She replied: "Thank you leader."

In November 2021, Wang communicated with John Chen, who prosecutors say is a high-level member of the PRC intelligence apparatus who has met with President Xi Jinping. He's now serving 20 months in federal prison. She urged him to post an article from her website. He hesitated, but according to the plea agreement, she was insistent. "This is what the Ministry of Foreign Affairs wants to send."

A hearing has not yet been scheduled for Wang to enter a guilty plea.

'Definitely the kind of stuff you see in the movies'

Arcadia's deputy city manager, Justine Bruno, said the city council only learned the full extent of the criminal charges levied against Wang on Monday, when the plea agreement was unsealed.

"These are serious charges for our community, and we understand that this is unsettling news for a lot of our local Arcadia residents, as well as the idea of foreign interference in local public office," Bruno told NPR.

She explained that city officials conducted an internal review of Wang's actions while on the council in December of 2024, when Wang's former campaign advisor and fiance was initially arrested. "At that time we conducted our own internal review just to ensure that there was no interference, there was no involvement with city staff or city finances or city decision making. … We were able to clear that at that time," Bruno said.

China's President Xi Jinping and President Donald Trump visit the Temple of Heaven on Thursday.

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But some in Arcadia are skeptical that Wang was no longer working on behalf of the PRC while in the position.

"This is happening everywhere. As long as there's Chinese investment in places, they will install spies, agents, politicians, puppets, Manchurian candidates, you name it," resident Robert Dell told NPR as he walked his dog on a recent afternoon.

More than a dozen Arcadia residents of Chinese descent, who declined to give their full names for this story for fear of retribution from China's government, told NPR they believe she acted to influence attitudes toward Beijing.

And others are just simply reeling. Nishiki Liu told NPR he was stunned when he learned of the charges against Wang. "It's definitely the kind of stuff you see in the movies, so that's wild that it's happening right here," he said.

Copyright 2026 NPR

Seven years ago, California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a law to bring safe and affordable drinking water to the state’s most disadvantaged communities.

Last week, Newsom celebrated the program’s accomplishments.

“Over 1 million people that didn't have access to clean, safe drinking water today have access to clean, safe drinking water,” Newsom told a conference room filled with California’s water leaders, to a round of applause.

“I'm not saying that to impress you, but to impress upon you real progress. A lot more work to be done.”

But that work could lose critical funding as the Newsom administration overhauls its source: California’s carbon market. The changes to the program’s funding priorities and revenue threaten efforts to bring clean drinking water to schools, homes and communities across California.

“If that funding goes away,” said Sherry Hunter, who has long battled the arsenic leaching into the water supply in the historic Tulare County town of Allensworth, “Oh my god, I can’t even imagine.”

Climate money for clean water

A critical piece of California’s clean water funding is linked to the state’s carbon market, which sets a declining cap on greenhouse gas emissions that oil refineries, power plants and manufacturers can meet by buying and trading carbon credits.

Lawmakers tap this fund for environmental efforts, like combatting unsafe drinking water in rural communities.

In 2019, Newsom signed a law that gave rise to the Safe and Affordable Funding for Equity and Resilience, or SAFER, drinking water program at the State Water Resources Control Board. The law called for funding it with $130 million a year from carbon market revenues through 2030.

It can be a risky source of funding, subject to the rise and fall of credit auctions. But the law came with a promise: When the proceeds fell flat, the state’s general fund would make up the rest.

This isn’t the only pot of money that California draws on for its safe drinking water efforts, but it’s the most versatile, paying for emergency and other types of assistance that bonds and more restrictive funding can’t.

When Newsom and California lawmakers don’t budget enough to provide bottled water for households and schools with dry or dangerous taps, this fund covers the costs.

When low-income communities can’t pay for the technical expertise to manage their water systems or compete for grants needed to drill new wells and connect to safer water, the safe and affordable drinking water fund can help bridge that gap.

Cases of water Sherry Hunter collects in her home in Allensworth on Sept.4, 2024. The community of Allensworth has been dealing with an ongoing issue of arsenic leaking into its wells, one of which consistently exceeds state health limits.

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Thousands of households and dozens of schools rely on this money for emergency supplies — like Hope Elementary School in Porterville, where the taps flow with elevated levels of nitrate. The contaminant is linked to cancers, pregnancy complications and a life-threatening condition in infants known as “blue baby syndrome” when consumed in high enough quantities.

More than $83,000 has been awarded from the fund since 2021 to supply the school with bottled water and roughly $110,000 for technical assistance as the school district works to connect to safer supplies, according to the water board.

The funding lets school officials put their budget to work in the classroom.

“Thank goodness,” said Melanie Matta, the school district’s superintendent and principal. About three-quarters of the students are socioeconomically disadvantaged, Matta said. “That water can get expensive, right? We're already running on a pretty tight budget.”

Matta has a message for Newsom: She’d like him to tour her school, and witness why this money is so important.

“When you meet our kids and walk our small school community, you’ll see exactly why this fight matters and why this funding must be protected,” Matta said in an email. “Safe water is not a gift. It’s a promise. And we need your help to keep that promise.”

‘There’s nothing left’ 

The cuts began in September, when Newsom and lawmakers struck a deal to reauthorize the state’s carbon market after weeks of tense and chaotic negotiations — renaming it “cap and invest.”

The new laws deprioritized funding lawmakers had promised to safe drinking water, clean air, fire resilience, affordable housing and other programs — shifting their priority behind $1 billion for high-speed rail and $1 billion for lawmakers to direct through the budget.

The laws removed the 2030 expiration for the safe and affordable drinking water program. But they also dropped the original promise to make up any funding shortfalls from the carbon market — putting $100 million at risk through 2030, according to a Department of Finance forecast in January.

Assemblymember James Gallagher, a Republican from Chico, called the new priority system “unfortunate” and “misplaced” at a budget subcommittee hearing in March.

“If you ask these Central Valley communities, these rural communities, ‘What would you prefer? Would you want safe drinking water coming out of your faucet, or do you want a high-speed rail in your community?’” he said. “I'm pretty sure I know the answer.”

Now, climate regulators on the California Air Resources Board — chaired by Newsom appointee Lauren Sanchez — are proposing to overhaul the carbon market in ways that could cut revenues in half.

If adopted, the changes could leave no funding at all for safe drinking water and other third-tier programs as soon as the 2027–28 fiscal year, according to legislative analyst Helen Kerstein — though, Kerstein added, the forecasts are uncertain.

Sanchez, who was Newsom’s top climate advisor before leading the air board, defended the staff proposal at a Senate oversight hearing last week.

“Do you believe the Legislature intended to eliminate funding for affordable housing, transit, drinking water, wildfire prevention and clean air programs with the reauthorization?” Sen. Eloise Gómez Reyes, a Democrat from San Bernardino and chair of a Senate budget subcommittee, asked Sanchez.

Sanchez said the staff proposal didn’t specifically call for defunding those programs.

“Let me stop you for a moment. That will be the effect,” Reyes said. “There's nothing left … and those are the most important programs that have served the community.”

Newsom deflected, pointing to the Legislature.

“Any suggestion that California is ‘trading away’ clean drinking water ignores both the current budget proposal, and the Legislature’s ongoing role in funding these priorities,” spokesperson Anthony Martinez said in an emailed statement. Martinez hinted at, but did not specify, what’s coming in Newsom’s May budget revision Thursday.

‘Many of them were left behind’ 

Roughly 613,000 people still rely on water systems that fail to meet state requirements for safe and reliable drinking water. Regulators at the state water board deem another 661 water systems serving nearly 2 million people “at risk” of failure.

Still, almost one million more people have safe drinking water than in 2019 — which state water officials attribute to the safe drinking water program and its unique, flexible pot of money.

“When we were relying on the community to spend its own time and money to get ready, many of them got left behind,” said Darrin Polhemus, who leads the state water board’s Division of Drinking Water. “The safe drinking water fund has allowed us to prepare communities to do long-term projects, faster.”

The program, which draws from other state and federal funding sources, has awarded more than $1.8 billion in grants for disadvantaged communities. It’s helped around 320 water systems serving 3.3 million people come off the state’s failing list, even as other, at-risk suppliers stumble onto it.

The safe and affordable drinking water fund also has helped pay for emergency repairs, technical assistance, bottled water supplies and even some construction costs in communities from San Bernardino to Tulare, Monterey and Sutter counties — all contending with aging and contaminated water systems.

“We could not have done it without them,” said Sherry Hunter in Allensworth, which started work on a new well and storage tank in January to bring clean water to a town struggling with arsenic and other water problems for over a century.

“There's a lot of other smaller disadvantaged communities that depend on them as well,” Hunter said.

The costs for fixing these water systems and household wells could hit billions of dollars in the coming years, according to a 2024 water board analysis. And Polhemus said the challenge will grow — even as funding shrinks — as water suppliers face new limits on contaminants like hexavalent chromium.

“If we’ve started and committed to a project, we’ve got the funding reserve to see it through,” Polhemus said. “It’s just, we won’t be starting new projects.”

Federal money is also running out. A Biden-era funding boost ends this year, slashing another, more restrictive fund for drinking water infrastructure projects from hundreds of millions of dollars to tens of millions, according to federal and water board data. Congressional earmarks could eat into what remains.

Tami McVay, emergency services director for the nonprofit Self-Help Enterprises, which connects rural communities to affordable housing and safe drinking water, is worried.

Her program provides bottled water to more than 3,000 households in the San Joaquin Valley, and trucks water to refill storage tanks at roughly 700 more. Her team helps replace domestic wells and test their water. And it relies on state funding.

Seeing the potential cuts, she said, “it definitely made our mouths drop a little.”

Polhemus said he understands communities are nervous.

“We're going to work with the funds we're given to continue the program as best we can, because we know the need still exists,” he said. “The question of how much of it exists, of course, comes out of our hands and into the political arena.”

This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.