Tuition hikes for Cal State. California may cut a week from the school year. Cool cars and hot wheels at the Auto Show. County jails flooded with new prisoners. Is the Supreme Court ready for its closeup? Van Gogh: The Life.
Students protest rate hikes, support Occupy movement
Student groups are rallying and sitting in at universities throughout the state this week. In yesterday’s rally in Berkeley, students occupied a plaza that is well known for being the site of civil rights protests in the 1960’s. The rallies are affiliated with the Occupy movement, but this week California State University students at campuses in Long Beach, Los Angeles and Fullerton are protesting an issue that hits close to home -- yet another rate hike in state tuition.
The CSU trustees are meeting today to vote on a proposal that would raise rates 9% next year if the system doesn’t receive more state funding. Students are livid about the rate hikes – Cal State trustees have voted to raise rates nearly every year since 2004. In just the last 5 years tuition has doubled as students have had to make up for shortfalls from in funding from the state.
And CSUs aren’t the only campuses that are being Occupied – following violence at a rally at UC Berkeley earlier this week, University of California’s Board of Regents canceled a scheduled meeting in San Francisco because they feared further student uprising.
WEIGH IN:
Will student involvement lead to change in California’s university systems?
Guest:
Adolfo Guzman-Lopez, KPCC reporter
James Suazo, Senior at CSU Long Beach
California may cut a week out of the school year
California's projected 13 billion dollar budget shortfall will likely trigger budget cuts that could cut out a week of the school year, according to the state legislative analyst's office.
Guest:
H.D. Palmer, Deputy Director for External Affairs, California Department of Finance
Julie Small, KPCC State Capitol Reporter
Cool cars and hot wheels at the Auto Show
This week kicks off the Los Angeles Auto Show, where automakers show off their latest models and concepts in the city known for its car culture. It is the first major North American auto show of the new model year and sets the tone for the rest of the year for the car industry.
New vehicle debuts will number in the dozens when it opens to the public this Friday. Notable this year will be a significant increase in fuel efficiency across the board in all categories. A whole pack of electric vehicles will be highlighted at the show, including Mitsubishi’s all-electric I, the Ford Focus Electric, BMW’s i3 Concept, CODA’s Sedan, and the updated Honda Insight Hybrid.
The auto show is always the place for big, splashy debuts of high performance vehicles, sports cars, and luxury autos. This year’s show also features high-tech systems that have become one of the most important features of the car itself.
WEIGH IN:
What are the most anticipated new vehicle models? How will this year’s vehicle debuts compare to last year’s show? What new car technologies will be the buzz at this year’s Auto Show?
Guest:
Matt DeBord, senior reporter and business blogger for KPCC. He writes The DeBord Report for KPCC.org.
Ed Hellwig, Editor, Edmund’s Inside Line website
Eddie Alterman, Editor-in-Chief, “Car and Driver”
County jails flooded with new prisoners
California county prisons are receiving more inmates than expected after the controversial prison realignment plan began a few months ago.
Los Angeles County officials expected 600 state prisoners but now they’re booked at 900. Orange County expected its jails to reach capacity by 2013, but at this rate they could reach it by the middle of next year. In Kern County, Bakersfield, the jail system filled up so quickly that the Sheriff’s Department released 50 parole violators because there weren’t enough jail beds.
Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca is considering a similar move if the state can’t provide enough funding to help house the prisoners. Los Angeles County, like others, are under court order averting jail overcrowding, so releasing some inmates is almost inevitable to make room for state prisoners.
Sheriff Baca said he is considering a plan to release some inmates who are awaiting trial and attach electronic monitoring devices to track their movements. Other county officials consider major expansion of house-arrest programs or moving some nonviolent inmates to mental health programs would ameliorate the problem.
WEIGH IN:
What are other solutions to a prisoner influx in county jails? Why is there a prisoner influx in county jails to begin with? Is there a better way to reduce California’s massive inmate population? At this rate, will jail admissions level out? If not, and there isn’t enough money to house all the prisoners, is electronic monitoring a viable option? How many inmates can be released safely wearing such a device? What are other options?
Guest:
Chief Alex Yim, Chief of Correctional Services Division, Los Angeles County Sheriffs Department
Chief Jerry Gutierrez, Chief of Corrections, Riverside County Sheriffs Department
Commander Steve Kea, Commander of Custody and Court Operations Command, Orange County Sheriffs Department
High Court TV
This week, when the Supreme Court decided it will hear arguments over the constitutionality of the new health care law, legal watchers started salivating. Scheduled for next March, it's being characterized as one of the most important cases in the Court's history.
Yesterday, C-SPAN sent a letter to Chief Justice John Roberts asking permission to televise the hearing. C-SPAN Chief Executive Officer, Brian Lamb wrote: "The Court's decision to schedule at least five-and-a-half hours of argument indicates the significance of this case. We ask that the Court further reflect this particular case's significance by supplementing your 'end of week audiocast' policy with live TV coverage. We believe the public interest is best served by live television coverage of this particular oral argument. It is a case which will affect every American's life, our economy, and will certainly be an issue in the upcoming presidential campaign. Additionally, a five-and-a-half hour argument begs for camera coverage -- interested citizens would be understandably challenged to adequately follow audio-only coverage of an event of this length will all the justices and various counsel participating."
The letter continues by asking the justices to set aside any misgivings about cameras in the courtroom. What are those misgivings? Supreme Court scholar Lisa McElroy says the justices are worried for a number of reasons: it could alter the behavior of those in Court; it could violate the privacy and anonymity of the justices; it could risk embarrassment for the justices; it could endanger them; and they aren't comfortable with new technology.
WEIGH IN:
Are these valid concerns? Would you want to watch these arguments?
Guest:
Lisa McElroy, Professor of Law, Earle Mack School of Law, Drexel University; Supreme Court scholar
Van Gogh: The Life
Starry nights, storm-heavy hayfields, sky-wheeling crows and sunflowers -- we’ve come to know the artist Vincent van Gogh through his paintings. The emotional turbulence and despair that powered every brushstroke; the ever more intense palette of colors splashed across each canvas; the unspeakable loneliness that emanates from his self-portraits. In this stunning, expansive new biography, Steven Naifah and Gregory White Smith (who co-authored the Pulitzer Prize-winning “Jackson Pollock: An American Saga”) illuminate more of van Gogh’s inner life than ever before. The authors not only make extensive use of archival material from the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, but also delve deeply into a new edition of the artist’s letters, published in 2009. The result is an affecting, entertaining and highly readable immersion into the life of an artistic genius whose story is even more complex than we imagined. They also reintroduce a long-rumored but mostly forgotten alternate theory of his death at age 37.
WEIGH IN:
Was it suicide, as accepted thought goes? Or an unfortunate accident, resulting from an altercation with local village boys? What role did Vincent’s relationships with teachers, with women, with other artists play in shaping his vision? How did his devoted brother Theo, an art dealer, sustain and support him through his most desperate times? Was Vincent’s life-long search for emotional connection ever realized in his art?
Guest:
Steven Naifeh, co-author with Gregory White Smith of Van Gogh: The Life (Random House)
Naifeh and White will speak at LACMA on November 19th at 2:00 p.m. Event is free, no reservations. For more event information, click here.