Today we'll take a look at the new pope and how Latinos are reacting. Then, Cal Tech earthquake early warning system predicts Monday's quake, Rina Palta fills us in on the new chief of jails, soft drink companies worry about the growing popularity of the Soda Stream, a 'Veronica Mars' movie is a go after successful Kickstarter campaign, and more.
Pope Francis I: The history and possible impact of the first Latin American pope
Yesterday the world witnessed the selection of Pope Francis of Buenos Aires, formerly Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio. He is not only the first pope from outside Europe in modern times, but also the first Jesuit, the first from Latin America, and the first named Francis, in recollection of St. Francis of Assisi, who dedicated his life to helping the poor.
We’ll talk about his history as a church leader and what impact he might have.
Then, KPCC's Multi-American blogger Leslie Berestein Rojas joins the show with a report on how the L.A. Latino community is reacting to the news.
Caltech earthquake early warning system predicts Monday's quake
Monday's 4.7 magnitude temblor centered in Riverside County didn't cause major damage. While it may have shaken a few coffee cups in L.A., seismologists at Caltech were ready for it.
California's Earthquake Early Warning System gave them a 30-second heads up, and that, in the future, might be enough to save lives. Thomas Heaton is the Director of the Earthquake Engineering Research Laboratory at Caltech joins the show with more.
Getting to know new LA County jails chief Terri McDonald
Los Angeles County is getting a new Assistant Sheriff for custody. In other words a Jails Chief who'll be responsible for running the largest jail system in the country. Monday is Terri McDonald's first day on the job.
She's the former under-secretary of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. KPCC's Rina Palta joins the show to give us a sense of who she is and what her task ahead looks like.
'Veronica Mars' movie is a go after successful Kickstarter campaign
"Veronica Mars" star Kristen Bell and its creator Rob Thomas launched a Kickstarter campaign to raise 2 million bucks for a movie version of the teen drama which debuted in 2004.
It worked.
In less than 24 hours they raised all the money. For more on Veronica Mars and why it's inspired such a generous fan base, we're joined now by critic Alan Sepinwall who writes about tv for hitfix.com.
Honeybee shortage could harm world supply of almonds (Photos)
A nationwide shortage of honeybees could begin harming the global supply of almonds, which are largely grown in California, bee experts say.
A dieoff of the buzzing pollinators from coast to coast, if it continues, could put a strain on almond orchards across the Golden State, which produces 80 percent of the world’s almond crop.
Beekeepers who have suffered plunging bee populations are reporting huge financial losses. Those that had colonies die, are dealing with remaining bees that are very weak.
“Every beekeeper in the United States is trying to increase their colonies to meet that demand and get that big payday, but most of them are barely able to keep their current numbers,” said Joe Traynor, a Bakersfield bee broker who organizes deals between beekeepers and almond farmers. “They are just treading water.”
Traynor said beekeepers are lucky to survive with 30 to 50 percent losses. He said this year was the worst he’s seen in the decades to bring bees to good colony strength for almond pollination.
Gordon Wardell, a bee biologist for California’s largest almond grower, Paramount Farming Co., said some of the beekeepers it works with this year suffered losses.
“Some of the beekeepers that have worked for us had pretty dramatic crashes as well, some have lost 30, 50 percent, some as much as 60 percent of their bees,” Wardell said.
Wardell said the plunge in honeybee production is being caused by a variety of factors, from the drought in the Midwest, parasitic mites that feed on bee blood, and an unusually cold snap earlier this winter in California.
Every year, 75 percent of the national supply of honeybees is trucked in from places like New York, the Dakotas and Florida to pollinate the 780,000 acres of almond groves in California—an area roughly the size of the state of Rhode Island. Bee experts say about 1.6 million hives are needed to pollinate the crop, but this year, they estimate the bees fell short.
Without bees, there would be no almonds. And the bees are falling behind, even as almond demand is soaring worldwide, from China to India. The desire for the tree nut has boomed as California farmers marketed almonds as a healthy snack.
Almonds are now California’s largest agricultural export, valued at nearly $4 billion in 2011, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
“It looks like we’ve promoted almonds to the point where we need to start promoting bees,” said Mike Mason, a member of the board of directors for the Almond Board of California, a trade group.
Other farming trends are making the future tough for bees. Many farmers have been preferring to grow corn in recent years, inspired by the demand for corn-based ethanol for fuel. But corn doesn’t provide flowers for bees to feed on, cutting out an important food source for bees between seasons.
The dilemma of the beekeepers caused dozens of them to meet on a recent Friday night at a beekeeper’s home in Shafter in the San Joaquin Valley. The home was surrounded by a grove of flowering almond trees.
As the beekeepers met for a dinner of pasta and chicken, there were no easy answers.
David Bradshaw, a second-generation beekeeper from Visalia, drove more than an hour to this meeting to commiserate. He says he lost half a million dollars recently when he saw his bee population plunge by 40 percent.
“Everyone is just full of questions,” Bradshaw said.
Not all almond farms are in trouble. As California’s largest almond grower, Paramount Farming Company’s Lost Hills orchard in Kern County was able to find enough bees. During a tour of its farm, as many as 20,000 to 30,000 bees live in each of the white hive boxes, each containing frames that hold bees and their eggs, pupa and larva.
They buzz toward the bright white blossoms that dot rows upon rows of almond trees.
Some farmers hold out hope that this year’s crop will manage to eke out a decent almond supply. But all bets are off for future seasons if the bee shortage worsens.
Wardell, the bee biologist, said if the almond industry is to thrive, it needs to find ways to keep the bee population alive.
“It’s our responsibility as stewards of the bees to figure out about what’s going on and bring them back into balance,” Wardell said.
Monarch butterly populations at lowest point in 20 years
Monarch butterfly populations are at their lowest in 20 years, with a 59 percent drop from just over a year ago. Each year these majestic insects migrate thousands of miles between the upper-U.S. and Canada to northern Mexico and Southern California.
But for a look at what's decimating them along the way is Chip Taylor, founder and director of Monarch Watch, which tracks and researches these butterflies.
City Hall Pass: Mayor's race update, city budget status and more
It's time for City Hall Pass, your ticket to all the latest political news coming out of downtown Los Angeles with KPCC's political team of Frank Stoltze and Alice Walton. On tap this week, tomorrow's primary election.
FAQ: Does the LA Better Business Bureau still matter?
The Council of Better Business Bureaus expelled its Southern California chapter this week. It was the culmination of a two-year process by the national council to determine whether the Better Business Bureau of the Southland was living up to the organization's standards. So why did L.A. get kicked out, and what does it mean for the future of the 101-year-old organization?
Q: What did the L.A. Better Business Bureau do that got it expelled?
A: It allegedly engaged in "pay to play" schemes, demanding that businesses join the organization and play dues in order to become accredited. In a statement, Carrie A. Hurt, the President and CEO of the Council of Better Business Bureaus, said that "[o]ver a period of more than two years, BBB of the Southern California failed to resolve concerns about compliance with several standards required of BBBs, including standards relating to accreditation, reporting on businesses, and handling complaints.”
ABC News also conducted a sting operation in which a blogger applied for BBB membership using the name of the accused terrorist organization Hamas. This was briefly successful, and Hamas got the L.A. BBB's "A-" rating.
And other L.A. companies, including chef Wolfgang Puck of Spago fame, maintained that businesses that didn't pay received low ratings from the BBB.
Q: So how did the L.A. Better Business Bureau respond?
A: It said that it was having the alleged bad practices imposed on it by the national council and was leaving on its own. Then it changed its name to the Business Consumer Alliance and characterized the Council's decision as the end result of an ongoing dispute over how ratings are handed out. It is the largest chapter among Better Business Bureaus in the U.S., so it may be able to persevere, but for now, the Council of Better Business Bureaus has retained all the businesses that were formerly accredited by the L.A. chapter and will have to go through a process of re-accrediting them.
Q: So the Better Business Bureau is more than a century old? Does it even matter anymore in the age of Angie's List and Yelp and many other online consumer review sites?
A: The BBB is something of a throwback to a time when American business was a lot more local. But the arrival of big national chains in every town, big and small, has reduced the organization's clout. It still accredits and rates numerous businesses, but the BBB seal of approval is just one factor among many that now goes into a consumer's decision to employ or patronize a business.
Peer-to-peer networks that enable people to easily compare businesses have also undercut the BBB model. During its heyday, local BBBs would aggregate information about businesses and formalize it in a way that helped consumers make decisions. But now technology does that, with consumers simply posting the information. The BBB's middleman role is being cut out.
That said, it's still a large organization, with over 100 local Better Business Bureaus nationwide and a still decent amount of mindshare with the public for being a steward of local business standards. It's also been 25 years since a local chapter — Miami — was kicked out.
VIDEO: Samsung debuts new Galaxy S4, aims to unseat iPhone's dominance
Today, tech giant Samsung unveiled its newest version of the Galaxy cell phone, the S4. The previous model proved to be a serious iPhone competitor when it became the highest selling smartphone in the world in the third quarter of 2012.
Samsung held its launch event in New York. Watch the video here (it starts around 40 minutes in):
"I think Samsung happened to be at the right place at the right time," said Dan Ackerman, senior writer at CNET, on Take Two. "They had a really big device with a big screen that looks nice and did a lot of things so they can be the anti-Apple. That one alternative people could hone in on if they didn't want to be iPhone people."
Since then, the iPhone has topped smart phone sales once again, but could this new iteration of the Galaxy permanently unseat Apple from the top?
"I do think it's unlikely, there are so many people who are really loyal to their iPhones and frankly once Apple has you and you own a lot of other apps and content from Apple you can't take that stuff to another operating system," said Ackerman. "It's hard to get people to move away from that, but I think if Apple has another couple of generations of lackluster products that don't excite people and people find that they want a larger screen that Apple does not offer, that's how you really get people to sign up."
Product Specs:
The Dinner Party: Water is #1, anti-Bloomberg bill and more
Every week we get your weekend conversation starters with Rico Gagliano and Brendan Francis Newnam, the hosts of the Dinner Party radio show.
This week, Brendan tells us about how water claimed the top spot as America's favorite drink ending soda's two-decade reign as the number-one beverage choice in the U.S. Then, this week Mississippi passes the Anti-Bloomberg bill which bans municipalities from limiting portion sizes on sodas and food and from requiring restaurants to post calorie counts. Finally, the history of the NY stock exchange bell.
Should soft drink companies worry about the Soda Stream?
Since the '80s, Coke and Pepsi have waged TV ad and marketing campaigns against each other competing for your dollar at the supermarket or vending machine. Lately, a new player has jumped in the mix aggressively going after the soda superpowers.
Soda Stream, the cola DIY is pulling out all the stops to try to make a dent in the American pop market. With more we're joined by Joshua Rothman who wrote about Soda Stream in the The New Yorker.
New poll shows more working moms prefer to work full-time
A new national poll from the Pew Research Center out today finds a big spike in the number of working moms who say they'd prefer to work full time. Pew's survey of women with kids under the age of 18 found that nearly a third said they'd like to work full time. That's up from 20 percent in 2007.
Researchers believe tough economic times is a big part of the reason why, but there may be some other factors at play.
Here with more on the delicate balance between work and family, especially here in Southern California, we're joined by Darby Saxbe, a mother of two who works as assistant professor of psychology at USC.