SoCal Edison agrees to pay Eaton Fire victims through a compensation program. Is it enough?

Southern California Edison announced it will offer direct compensation to victims of the Eaton Fire through the Wildfire Recovery Compensation Program. This helps the company avoid entering into a lengthy litigation. While SoCal Edison isn’t admitting fault, they are positioning themselves to help people who lost homes, loved ones, or were injured by the devastating fire. There are concerns that the compensation will not be enough for victims. More details of the program are expected to be announced in the coming weeks. Joining us this morning on AirTalk to discuss is Kathleen Dunleavy, spokesperson for Southern California Edison, and Erin Stone, LAist climate and environment reporter.

Read the LAist story here.

CA Attorney General Rob Bonta on lawsuits against the Trump Administration, and more

Pop quiz, loyal LAist listener! How many lawsuits has California filed against the Trump Administration? If you answered, “a lot? I think?” then you’d be
right — to date, the state has filed 34 lawsuits over a number of issues ranging from the loss of health and medical grants to the blocking of benefits for undocumented immigrants. If this pace keeps up, the Golden State will outpace its legal output during the first Trump administration, during which it sued the federal government 123 times. But the vast majority of those cases did not resolve by the time the Biden administration took over. So what’s the status of California’s current lawsuits, and which are likely to resolve in a meaningful timeframe? Joining AirTalk this morning to discuss the legal landscape California finds itself in is California Attorney General Rob Bonta.

We hear from listeners on their best (and worst) substitute teachers

A good teacher can stick with you for life. The lessons they impart on you, the way they go about running their classroom, and the day-to-day interactions where you see their personality creep through their professional facade all accumulate and leave a lasting impression. In short, a good teacher is impressive. But a good substitute teacher is even more impressive. They’ll come into a classroom knowing full well their time is short, and manage to leave a class in better shape when they found it. On the other hand, the stakes for a substitute teacher are a bit lower than those for full-time teachers. They have less to lose when a teaching gig goes south. So today on AirTalk, we want to hear from you: what’s a substitute teacher memory you’ll never forget? Maybe they were a captivating speaker… or maybe you felt like a captive waiting out the clock to get out of their class. Good or bad, we want to hear about it. Give us a call at 866-893-5722, or you can email us at atcomments@laist.com.

AI bots are enrolling in colleges to get financial aid. How are California colleges detecting them?

AI has been infiltrating the classroom since its inception, from students using ChatGPT to write papers to professors using AI to grade papers. But now scammers are using AI to create fake student profiles to enroll in California’s college system and apply for financial aid. So, how are California colleges combating these ‘ghost students’? Well, with AI, of course. The California Community College system launched an AI initiative in July to detect fake enrollments. So far, the initiative has found over 79,000 fraudulent applications. Today on AirTalk, we talk about California’s ‘ghost students’ and the AI software being used to fight them. We’re joined by West Coast editor for Fortune, Amanda Gerut.

With their budgets now in question, a look at how smaller public radio stations are faring

As you’ve read and heard on LAist, federal funding for public media has been decimated. We’ve covered what this loss of funding means for our station in depth on AirTalk. Today, we’re turning our attention to the many other public media outlets across the nation and how these cuts will impact them. Joining us to talk about the moment we find ourselves in is Bill Davis, principal at Station Resource Group and Cheryl Devall, general manager at KRVS, a public radio station located in Lafayette, Louisiana.

TV Talk: ‘The Sandman,’ ‘Acapulco,’ ‘South Park,’ and more!

Have you felt completely overwhelmed when deciding what new show to watch these days? Us too. There’s just so much content out there between network TV and numerous streaming platforms. Each week, we will try to break through the noise with TV watchers who can point us to the must-sees and steer us clear of the shows that maybe don’t live up to the hype. This week, listeners will get the latest scoop on what’s worth watching with Dominic Patten, executive editor at Deadline Hollywood and Steve Greene, freelance TV critic.

TV shows:

• The Sandman [season 2] (Netflix)
• Washington Black (Hulu)
• Hip Hop was Born Here (Paramount+)
• Acapulco [season 4] (Apple TV+)
• South Park [season 27] (Paramount+)
• Superstar (Netflix)