Can Disney CEO Bob Iger lure an NFL team to LA? What to say - and not to say - to vets today, and a in-depth look at the role race plays in officer-involved shootings, in our latest installment of KPCC's 'Officer-Involved' investigation
Impact of Disney CEO joining Los Angeles NFL bid
The company that was formed in the hopes of bringing an NFL team back to Los Angeles added a powerful player to its roster today.
Carson Holdings, created jointly by the Chargers and Raiders to explore the possibility of moving one of the franchises to Los Angeles, announced that it was naming Disney CEO Bob Iger its Non-Executive Chairman, putting the responsibility of hiring the group’s president squarely on his shoulders.
At a whopping salary of $1, there’s no direct financial gain for Iger, though it appears Iger’s contract does allow him the option to buy into either Los Angeles franchise at a later date. The contract doesn’t affect Iger’s job as Disney CEO and gives him an out in situations where there might be a conflict of interest.
City officials from San Diego, St. Louis, and Oakland are meeting with NFL owners’ committees to update them on their efforts to keep each team in its current city.
What kind of firepower does this add to the Los Angeles bid for an NFL team? How exactly will Iger be involved in the process? What are the other stipulations of his contract?
Guest:
, NFL reporter for Bleacher Report
LAUSD Board of Education debates Broad charter expansion plan
LAUSD board member Scott Schmerelson wants the school board to sign a resolution that would put the district on record as opposing a plan currently being floated by the Broad Foundation to expand charters.
That expansion plan would double the number of charter schools over eight years at a cost about $500 million to up to 50% of all schools in the LAUSD. The authors envision as many as half of the LAUSD's students could be enrolled in the charter schools, which they see as an antidote to low-performing public schools.
Currently, about 16-percent of LA's public school students attend charters. Charter proponents hope to raise nearly half a billion dollars to provide charters for half of LAUSD's students. That's got the teacher's union and other charter skeptics like board member Schmerelson very concerned.
Would a dramatic increase in charters improve local students’ learning? What about those left on traditional campuses?
And as the district's enrollment declines, so too does state funding tied to student counts. The school district’s enrollment has already dropped by about 100,000 students in the last six years. Roughly half of that decline is due to students enrolling in charter schools, a panel reported at yesterday’s board meeting.
Read the full story here.
Guests:
Scott Schmerelson, LAUSD board member representing District 3, which covers the western half of the San Fernando Valley; he’s introduced a resolution calling on his colleagues to oppose the charter school expansion plan
Mónica García, LAUSD board member representing District 2, which includes Mid-City, Echo Park, and Downtown LA
‘Please don’t thank me’ — What are the best ways to honor military veterans and active duty?
On this day when we honor veterans of military service, what are the best ways to show our appreciation? Is it in verbally thanking someone in uniform for his or her service?
KPCC's Veterans and Military Reporter John Ismay, a veteran himself, talked to AirTalk about his thoughts on verbal appreciation and what service members he has spoken with have shared with him. Ismay says sometimes showing appreciation is more important for civilians than for actual service members.
"I think the person who is in uniform is pretty OK with being in uniform or else they wouldn't have volunteered, or they'd probably get out," he said. "[Civilians], they have this feeling that they want to share [with service members]."
Some professional sports teams in Major League Baseball have thanked service members by introducing them between innings. A recent Senate review of military recruitment spending shows that nearly $7 million in federal money has been paid to pro sports teams to honor service members. Ismay said that he feels while receiving appreciation is nice, giving money out to show appreciation can change things.
"Whenever someone wants to say thank you or appreciate what we do, it basically always comes from a good place and you can't be upset," he said. "When it's just sort of done as a result of somebody getting paid, that's a different story."
Ismay says some military service members don't feel appreciative of this kind of military spending.
"I think talking to [military] friends of mine [who have gotten out] or seeing what they post [on social media], they feel like it's emotionally manipulative," he said.
So what is the best way to show your gratitude to a service member? Here are some ways that members of the AirTalk audience, including some veterans, said that people could give back:
- "Volunteer at anything for the public good, honor commitments made over the years including funding those obligations."
- "Give back instead through your own civil service."
- "Veterans need services, along with thanks, not necessarily in stadiums."
- "I understand the good will behind 'thank you for your service,' but I struggle with a response. It can be difficult to reconcile my military service to whatever benefit the thanker has experienced. A better way to recognize a veteran’s service is to ask about their military experience: What did they do? What did they learn? For employers in particular, these are questions that could reveal veterans as uniquely qualified candidates for their companies." — Steven Rho
Guest:
John Ismay, KPCC’s Veterans And Military Issues Reporter
Rooting out why blacks are shot more by LA County law enforcement
Criminal justice experts are at odds in explaining why police in L.A. County fatally shoot black people at triple their proportion in the population, as found in a KPCC investigation.
The numbers:
Officer-involved shooting (OIS) fatalities by race in L.A. County 2010-2014:
Arrests by race in L.A. County 2010-2014:
- 50.2 percent Latino | 23.8 percent black; | 20.6 percent white | 5.5 percent other
Professor Terrence Allen, Ph.D., who studies minority policing issues at the University of Texas says “African Americans are stopped at a disproportionate rate, and that’s driven by preconceived notions of African Americans being criminally inclined.” He goes on to say many police officers have an “implicit bias” against black men. “There is a fear – the ‘Mandingo’ concept that black men are uncivilized,” according to Allen.
Some researchers tried to put that to the test in a simulation study led by Lois James, Ph.D., of Washington State University. James tested how officers respond to black, Latino, and white suspects. “What we found, which is a bit more controversial, is [police] are more hesitant to shoot black people, because they fear the consequences,” James explains. Her experiments show officers were less likely to erroneously shoot unarmed black suspects than they were unarmed whites – 25 times less likely in the study.
Recent investigations and analysis by KPCC, The Guardian, The Washington Post, and ProPublica have shone spotlights on officer-involved shootings. Consistently, the investigations show blacks are more likely to be shot. “I’m deeply concerned with what the numbers show,” Congresswoman Karen Bass (D-CA) said in a September press conference. “The disproportionality….is frightening,” she continued.
Harvard economist, Sendhil Mullainathan who hails from Torrance, has studied police killings of blacks across the U.S. Mullainathan’s analysis says if racial bias were at play in shootings, we would have a “larger gap between the arrest rate and the police-killing rate.” He goes on to explore whether police prejudice can explain why African-Americans have so many more encounters with police.
Writing for Reason magazine, columnist Steve Chapman underscores that “the epidemic of unarmed blacks being killed by police comes not when black crime is high, but when it is low.”
AirTalk will hash out what is driving these numbers, and what policies, if any, can affect change. Share your thoughts in the comments.
With files by Aaron Mendelson and Frank Stoltze
Guests:
John Roman, Senior Fellow, Justice Policy Center, Urban Institute - a think tank founded in 1968 to understand problems facing America’s cities
Lois James, Ph.D. in Criminal Justice, Research Assistant Professor, Washington State University; James research includes simulations of officer-involved shootings
Gregory Thomas, President, National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives (NOBLE); Senior Executive for Law Enforcement Operations, Office of Kings County (Brooklyn) District Attorney
Terrence Allen, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, School of Social Work, University of Texas at Austin; Allen studies how communities perceive police officers