Yesterday afternoon Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was convicted of murdering George Floyd, an outcome Melina Abdullah says would not have arrived without the massive uprisings of the last year. The Black Lives Matter-LA co-founder explains her reasoning behind reimagining public safety, reallocating police funds to public services, and why she’s protesting Mayor Garcetti’s budget proposal.
President Biden will convene a summit of 40 world leaders tomorrow (Earth Day) to discuss the threat of climate change and what they can do to address it. This represents an opportunity to do what Mark Hertsgaard, executive director of Covering Climate Now, tells KCRW is necessary to tackle climate change –– cooperate. He says we can take a lesson from what was called on in addressing the pandemic, broad national and international cooperation, and apply that to the climate crisis.
In his State of the City address on Monday, Mayor Garcetti outlined a fiscal budget that would include nearly $1 billion to address homelessness. KCRW housing reporter Anna Scott says that the city has come a long way in understanding the urgency of homelessness, and allocating funding towards it. But she points out that initiatives like Prop HHH, aiming to create more affordable housing, have been “very slow going.”
Like most other facets of society, the college admissions process was thrown completely out of whack over the last year. Lisa Prezekop is the director of admissions at UC Santa Barbara and says in her 36 years there, this was “definitely the craziest.” All of her staff has been working remotely, they have not had standardized testing scores to look to, and they saw a 16% increase in total applications. The process was thus “more nuanced” and slower going.
This Sunday, join KCRW on Twitter as we live-tweet the Oscars! Yes, it’s been a weird awards season with most people not seeing any of the nominated movies in theaters, making it hard to gauge the buzz around certain films. But, we have each other and KCRW has hosted a few choice screenings + conversations, so gather up what you know, grab a beverage and your phone, get comfy, and let’s make it a thing from 5-8 pm. Yeah? Great!