A look at the Olympics kicking off in Rio, what is “sovereign citizenship”? The college program created to increase the number and impact of women in Hollywood.
Police shooting of Korryn Gaines and the idea of 'Sovereign Citizenship'
On Monday, police in Baltimore shot and killed a young woman, Korryn Gaines, after a long standoff.
Gaines, who was African American, got into the standoff after police arrived at her door to serve an arrest warrant. After the police kicked open the door to gain entry, she allegedly barricaded herself with a shotgun and her young son at the apartment.
She even filmed part of the incident and put it on social media.
Although the investigation into the incident is ongoing, one factor about Gaines is emerging, one that could explain her previous negative interactions with police.
She appeared to believe in something called “Sovereign Citizenship,” something where followers believe they are not subject to certain laws, or not subject to taxes.
We talked about it and the impact her shooting has on the somewhat tense relationship between police and the communities the serve with
Race to Rio: Diary of an Olympic athlete
Today is the day and all eyes are on Rio de Janiero, Brazil. Athletes from countries all over the world will come together tonight for the Olympics opening ceremonies. Among them, will be Desiree Linden.
Linden is a SoCal native and marathon runner who will be running for Team USA at the Olympic women's marathon event on Sunday, August, 14th. But it's not her first time at the Olympics. While chatting with Take Two's A Martinez, she shared her experience from the marathon at the 2012 London games and the injury that ultimately sidelined her.
"When I started the race, the very first right-hand turn on the course is a very hard right-hand turn, I was like 'There's no way I'm going to be able to finish.' The pain was just so intense. So I kinda hobbled through, a mile or two and was just like...this could be detrimental to my career if I am going to try and finish this race. So, I stepped off and that was um...you go from making the Olympic team and then stepping off the course and not even getting to see the finish line."
It's been four years since an injury sidelined her at the Olympics and since then, she's been hard at work at her home in Michigan. She sent us her Olympic audio diary, where she detailed her race to redemption in the weeks leading up to Rio.
To hear the full interview, click the blue play button above.
Lane splitting may soon be formalized in California
It's a common sight on California roadways: Motorcycles speeding between lanes of cars to get ahead of traffic. Advantageous to riders and annoying to drivers, lane splitting has long enjoyed a legal limbo, in part because of a lack of rules around how and when to do it.
But that could soon change. On Thursday, the California State Assembly unanimously approved the lane-splitting bill AB 51, paving the way for California to become the first state in the nation to formalize the practice of lane splitting.
There is currently no law in the state that specifically allows or prevents lane splitting. The practice, however, is widely condoned by motor officers, many of whom do it themselves.
If AB 51 is signed in to law by Governor Jerry Brown, it would add a new lane-splitting section to the California vehicle code. It would also authorize the California Highway Patrol to develop educational guidelines for motorcyclists on how to split lanes in a way that's safe not only for riders but for drivers and passengers of surrounding vehicles.
It also defines lane splitting as “driving a motorcycle … that has two wheels in contact with the ground, between rows of stopped or moving vehicles in the same lane including on both divided and undivided streets, roads, or highways. ”
In 2013, the California Highway Patrol published lane-splitting guidelines on its web site to dispel misinformation, but they were retracted when someone complained that the CHP shouldn't be creating public policy, thus AB 51.
The 2013 guidelines advised motorcyclists to:
- travel no more than 10 mph faster than other traffic;
- refrain from splitting lanes when traffic is flowing 30 mph or faster;
- restrict lane splitting to the space between the first and second lanes;
- and consider the variables that may impact their ability to safely lane split, i.e. the width of traffic lanes, the size of surrounding vehicles, road conditions and the weather.
Whether the new guidelines created under AB 51 would mirror those issued by the CHP in 2013 is unclear. AB 51 requires the CHP develop lane-splitting guidelines with four other agencies — the Department of Motor Vehicles, the Department of Transportation, the Office of Traffic Safety and a motorcycle safety group.
The stated goal of AB 51 is to reduce traffic congestion and improve traffic safety. According to the Office of Traffic Safety, 87% of California motorcyclists split lanes. Common reasons for motorcyclists include getting to their destinations more quickly, keeping their motorcycles cool and keeping themselves cool, since it can be hot to sit in traffic in full safety gear on a hot day. Fatigue is often a contributing factor in motorcycle crashes.
Sue Carpenter is co-host of The Ride, Southern California Public Radio's series on modern mobility.
Firescaping: 5 essentials for protecting your home from fire
The Soberanes Fire near Big Sur has burned more than 53-thousand acres, destroying 57 homes and threatening thousands more. That fire is 35 percent contained.
When homes are threatened by wildfire, there's not much to do besides prepare to evacuate.
But before fires ignite, fire safety experts say there's a way to protect your home and property - it's called firescaping.
Take Two’s Libby Denkmann spoke with the man who literally wrote the book on firescaping and got the essentials on how to protect your building with smarter landscaping choices.
Douglas Kent is Ecological Land Management Specialist at Douglas Kent and Associates and the author of Firescaping: Creating fire-resistant landscapes, gardens, and properties in California's diverse environments.
Defend your property with fire-safe landscaping
Firescaping is essential to property owners, business owners, and even communities. It’s a set of design and maintenance guidelines that help a property defend itself from a conflagration [large, destructive fire].
Protect your home in landscaping "zones"
The zone theory is three concentric zones that radiate out from a structure.
The first zone is the Garden Zone: it extends 30 feet out and this is the area that has to stay fire retardant. It has to defend itself against firebrands- those flying embers that precede a fire.
From that you go into the fuelbreak. The fuelbreak’s main goal is to stop a ground fire. You’re really reducing a lot of the vegetation. There’s no deadwood.
And then further out from there, you go into the transition zone. There, you try and reduce the severity of the fire.
Use “fire retardant” and “fire resistant” plants
Fire retardant plants are in the garden zone. These plants will not ignite when exposed to high temperatures. So those are like; Calla Lilies, Impatiens, and Wands. These plants tend to be a little more water dependent.
When you go further out in the transition zones and the fuel breaks, then you start using fire resistant plants. These are more California natives and Mediterranean plants and they may sizzle or spark or even ignite in a fire, but they quickly let the fire pass through their structure. The benefit with those plants is that once the fire does pass, they quickly resprout and help control the inevitable erosion that happens after a fire.
Be fire-safe AND drought conscious
When you look at the fire retardant plant list and the fire resistant plant list, the bulk of them are drought adaptive or drought resilient and can handle long periods without water. They are definitely compatible to the state’s goals for water conservation.
Firescape according to location
If you’re on a slope, you’re going to have to extend the length of all the zones.
Here’s a good example, the Tunnel fire in 1992 that ravaged Oakland and Berkeley, those homes were stacked up on top of each other nearly 30 feet away, and they need a whole different type of firescaping. They have to communicate with their neighbors. They need more escape paths between properties and they have to share vegetation instead of stacking vegetation.
When you see video footage of the Oakland Fire, firebrands are preceeding it. So, houses are burning 200 yards ahead of the main fireline. - Because somebody didn’t clean out their gutter, or didn’t take care of their roof, or didn’t paint the eaves of their house, or left dead vegetation or recycled papers along the side of their house where they ignited. Once one home ignites, they’re burning at 3,000 - 2,000 degrees -The radiant heat of that will ignite anything within 20 feet of it which in some cases is another house.
That’s why it's so important in urban areas to remove the dead stuff out of your roof gutters, and clean your roof, and keep your house painted, and remove the dead vegetation and dying branches. And frankly, water once a month or water every two weeks but keep a decent level of moisture on the plants in your landscape plan.
That’s really where the threat lies in those dense urban area. The state’s biggest fires happen in urban areas.
Press the blue play button above to hear the full interview
Learn how to apply firescaping to your property. For more resources check out:
- Firewise Communities
- California Fire Safe Council
- Los Angeles County Arboretum and Botanical Garden
- “Firescaping: Creating fire-resistant landscapes, gardens, and properties in California's diverse environments” by Douglas Kent
*Quotes edited for clarity.
How one college is tackling gender inequity in Hollywood
We hear all too often about gender inequity in Hollywood and how men far outpace women in the writer's room. But a college in Columbia, Missouri is trying to change that.
Stephens College has launched the first M.F.A program specifically designed to increase the number and impact of women working in TV and film.
They hosted an event this weekend at the Writer's Guild in LA.
For a preview, Take Two spoke to Ken LaZebnik, director of Stephens and fellow participating panelist Lizzy Weiss, whose credits include Switched at Birth and Blue Crush.
Press the blue play button above to hear the full interview.
Life in prison for 'Shrimp Boy'
San Francisco-based gangster Raymond Chow, also known as "Shrimp Boy" was convicted of murder and racketeering charges as part of a major federal organized crime investigation.
Chow was sentenced to life in prison Thursday.
For more, Take Two spoke to San Francisco Chronicle reporter Bob Egelko, who has been covering the trial since it started.
Press the blue play button above to hear the interview.
The Dish: Rad Coffee in Upland serves up joe with punk rock, monsters
For some, coffee is an absolute necessity in the morning. Maybe you like yours with some cream and sugar. Or maybe classic black is your thing.
But for the people at Rad Coffee in downtown Upland, they like their cup of joe with a side of skateboarding, punk rock, and a dash of monsters.
Rad Coffee bills itself as the first specialty coffee shop to debut in downtown Upland. They offer drinks like vegan cold brews, and blended matcha green tea inspired by Frankenstein.
One of their most popular blended offerings, dubbed Cereal Chillers, come with or without coffee, and are topped with colorful whipped cream and the cereal of your choice.
For the second installment of our summer food series, The Dish, Take Two caught up with Jade and Rusty Valore, the two young owners of Rad Coffee.
Check out our first episode of The Dish: Looking for Puerto Rican food in LA? Mofongos is the spot
Filmmaker Barbara Kopple on the 'force of nature' that is Sharon Jones
In 2013, life was going pretty well for singer Sharon Jones.
She was enjoying a successful career with her band Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings, a loyal following on the road, and was getting ready to release a new album.
But then she was diagnosed with a life-threatening illness.
Her battle with pancreatic cancer is the subject of a new documentary titled "Miss Sharon Jones!" from Oscar-winning director Barbara Kopple.
Interview highlights:
On meeting Sharon for the first time
"I knew of her music, but I did not know her. The first moment I met her she was having her dreds cut off and her head shaved and she was really sad. And then we went to a place that gives wigs to cancer patients and she was amazingly funny and so great trying them on and not liking any of them and making hilarious comments about them. And I just felt-- this is a person who really loves life and is just so tremendous. This is not a film about a cancer patient. This is a film about a tremendous woman who has so much talent and is so positive and has a zest for life. She's like a force of nature."
On how cancer has changed Sharon
"I think that the cancer has made her stronger, and value life in a way that she knows that it's always going to be in her body. She is out on the road, and she's touring, and she's not going to let a little thing like cancer get her down. She's just going to kick cancer in the butt whenever she can, and somebody with that kind of positive energy is somebody to be reckoned with."
"Miss Sharon Jones!" opens August 5th at the Nuart Theater in Los Angeles.