Communities

Part One of Producer Angela Shelley’s video diary - Big Sadness in the Big Easy. We ride along with Angela as she explores devastated New Orleans neighborhoods, including the Ninth Ward and Lakeview.

Part Two of Producer Angela Shelley’s video diary - Big Hope in the Big Easy. We meet Angela’s family who describe their lives one year after Hurricane Katrina.

Correspondent Craig Miller paid a visit to San Benito County which has mirrored statewide voting results for the past eight years. Do the voters in this county have the inside scoop on the outcome of this November’s election?

Families are moving out of the cities and suburbs into ranch-style homes in the Central Valley. Critics say the trend is consuming our state’s irreplaceable farmlands. Others say it is helping farmers financially. In any case, it is creating a battle ground between the newcomers and the farmers.

California Connected visits the Santa Barbara Zoo.

Commercial fishing took a massive blow this year with the virtual shutdown of salmon fishing along 700 miles of the West Coast. The Governors of California, Oregon and Washington have united in asking the Federal Government for aid for the fishermen.

With its windy coastline and dense fog atmosphere, Half Moon Bay is the perfect environment for pumpkins. That’s why 300,000 people flock to its pumpkin patches along Highway 1 every October.

Youth sports in California are hurting. Umpires and referees are in short supply, resulting in postponed and cancelled games, abbreviated seasons and the loss of some sports altogether. What does the future hold for youth sports if there aren’t enough people to officiate?

We visit U.C. Berkeley’s Sather Tower, also known as The Campanile.

Back in 1993, an enormous wildfire roared through the canyon, destroying hundreds of homes and killing three people. When the smoke cleared, a small, concerned group of Topanga residents decided to organize a disaster response network.

Children’s Beach in La Jolla was donated by California philanthropist Ellen Browning Scripps. This small sandy beach is protected by a sea wall making it a perfect spot for beachgoers. Since the 1990s, harbor seals have turned Children’s Beach into a breeding colony, setting off fierce legal battles over whether people or seals have rights to the beach.

In Mexican communities like Rosarito Beach, American baby boomers are fueling a massive real estate boom but it also comes with a big burden. Can Baja communities keep up with the growing demands these developments place on their infrastructure and municipal services?

During the summer, the Central Valley’s Portuguese community stages regular bullfights in the tradition of their homeland. For the past 30 years, thousands have attended these evening events, where the only concession to American culture and laws is that the bull is spared harm. The animal is covered in Velcro and the matador’s lances simply stick to the material.

Producer Rick Wilkinson, Associate Producer Anne Lilburn and Assistant Researcher Jessica Garcia discuss the making of “Baja Boom”, California Connected’s story on the developing trend of Americans moving across the border into Mexico.

Spanning 1,200 acres in San Diego, Balboa Park was home to the 1915 World’s Fair. In 2005, 12 million visitors enjoyed its 15 major museums, 8 botanical gardens, the world famous San Diego Zoo, the Old Globe Theater, the Cabrillo Bridge, and the Spanish Revival Masterpiece - Casa del Prado.

USC Annenberg School of Journalism students profile 4 Iranian brothers who spent 3 years in detention, suspected but never charged with being terrorists. The story raises the question, in a post-9/11 world, has our government gone too far?

Located on the banks of the Sacramento River, Old Town began as a trading post and flourished during the Gold Rush. After several devastating floods in the mid-1800s, the streets of Old Town were raised above the flood line. Today, Old Town Sacramento is a national landmark and attracts over 5 million visitors a year to its cobblestone streets, waterfront restaurants and Western Heritage museums.

How does Yosemite preserve its natural splendor while maintaining millions of visitors every year?

A giant on-going rockslide has cut off the tiny town of Mariposa from its economic lifeblood - Yosemite National Park. Will it survive or become another ghost town?

California Connected visits a five stamp mill in Mariposa.

Producer Rick Wilkinson and Associate Producer Matthew Chin discuss the making of Views of Yosemite, a story on the park’s mission to preserve its natural splendor while maintaining millions of visitors every year.

Six of the top ten stolen car hotspots are in California. California Connected goes on the spot to investigate what’s behind these high theft rates. We look at the role that the hotrod culture, and also methamphetamine, plays in the crimes.

We talk again with Commander Pennal about what’s changed on the frontlines of the war against California’s meth epidemic in this first person account.

San Bernardino and Maywood find themselves on opposite sides of the heated immigration debate. Earlier this year, Maywood became the first municipality in the state to declare itself a “sanctuary city” for illegal immigrants, while San Bernardino recently considered a tough measure that would ban the undocumented from renting property and punish those who hire them.

Graffiti Summer is Modesto’s month-long classic car and oldies summer festival. Hot rodders and low-riders cruise the city streets and end up at the A&W drive-in where car hops deliver food right to the car window.

Animal poaching – the illegal taking of wildlife – is an estimated $100 million business in California. The most sought-after animals? Abalone and caviar-producing sturgeon. We follow California’s Department of Fish and Game on a statewide take-down of suspected poachers.

Devil’s Slide is the crumbling mountainside along a 250 foot stretch of Highway 1 in San Mateo County.

As organics go mainstream there is a debate raging among organic farmers as to what it really means to be organic.

The surfing community was rocked when virtually the only supplier of polyurethane blanks, used to manufacture surfboards, closed his business. Californians are stepping up to fill the void with new technologies and ideas that may revolutionize the industry — but only if surfers buy in.

We sat down with Dr. John Swartzberg, head of the Wellness Letter Editorial Board, to find whether or not our bodies care if we eat organic.

We sat down with Dr. John Swartzberg, head of the Wellness Letter Editorial Board, to find whether or not our bodies care if we eat organic.

The Marine Mammal Center is a nonprofit hospital dedicated to the rescue, rehabilitation and study of ill and injured marine animals.

Since we left Ward 7-D, there has been progress to report.

A powerful water battle is brewing in the tiny town of McCloud. Nestle wants to open a bottled water plant there but the company’s plan is getting a mixed reception from local residents. At issue - will the plant stimulate the economy or drain the natural resources?

According to a recent study, that water bottle costs about 2000 times more than what comes out of the faucet and, often times, isn’t any better for you. John Ridley comments on Americans’ $9 billion dollars-a-year obsession with plastic encased H2O in this Sideways.

In a community where overnight street parking is illegal, a unique Santa Barbara program helps people living in their cars find places to spend the night. In this extended scene from “Half-Homeless,” we follow the daily lives of Frank and Gary.

In a community where overnight street parking is illegal, a unique Santa Barbara program helps people living in their cars find places to spend the night.

AT&T Park has been home to baseball’s San Francisco’s Giants since 2000. Located on the San Francisco waterfront, this open-air stadium seats 41,000 people. It’s most famous attraction is McCovey Cove, beyond right field, where fans float in boats and kayaks waiting for the next “spash hit” homerun.

Big companies like Google and Earthlink see gold in that plan and are partnering with the city of San Francisco to build a network to connect the city. A poor, rural southeastern Indian reservation in San Diego County is providing wireless Internet access to reservations across a 250 square mile network via transmitters mounted on mountaintops.

We sit down with Sun Microsystems Chief Technology Officer Greg Papadopoulos to find out why open source is the business model of the future.

Built in 1963, the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway ascends 2.5 miles from the floor of the Coachella Valley to the peak of Mt. San Jacinto in less than 10 minutes.

The New River is called North America’s most polluted river. It flows from Mexicali, Mexico all the way up to California’s Salton Sea.

Proposition 82 proposes free pre-school for every 4 year old in California.

Political analyst David Lesher, from the New America Foundation, tells us how the increase of Independent voters is shaping the political landscape.

In the small Northern California community of Isleton, citizens keep a very close eye on their elected officials.

Our producers discuss the story behind the story of “Troubled Waters.”

Executive Producer Bret Marcus joins Associate Producer Anne Lilburn to discuss “Costly Cures.”

We visit San Pasqual Academy, an intergenerational living program for seniors and foster teens.

Producer Angela Shelley shares her behind-the-scenes experience producing “Family Matters.”

Myles, Cherie, and Patricia share their poems in an extended scene from “Family Matters.”

In the coastal community of Santa Barbara, the median home cost - more than $1.2 million - has forced local police, fire fighters and nurses further and further inland for affordable middle class housing. What happens when first-responders live outside the community they are protecting?

We sit down with Kai Ryssdal, host of public radio’s “Marketplace,” to find out his down-to-earth reasons why not to overinvest in your home.

The inventiveness and persistence from one group of Oakland skaters to transform a freeway underpass into a skate park has inspired neighborhood activists across San Francisco Bay. What can embracing skateboarders do for your town?

Executive Producer Bret Marcus joins Producer Joseph Angier, Story Editor Randa Cardwell, and Reseacher Jessica Garcia to discuss Undocumented Life.

What is it actually like to live in America as an undocumented immigrant? Meet three immigrants who share their experiences “getting by” on the fringes of California society.

More than 100 murals grace the Boyle Heights neighborhood. The most famous are the murals of the Estrada Courts, between 3200 and 3300 Olympic Blvd.

Katherine Perez is the Executive Director of the Transportation & Land Use Collaborative of Southern California. She discusses the connection between land use and transportation, as well as the state’s alternative growth choices.

Anthony Pico, chairman of the Viejas Band of the Kumeyaay Indians in San Diego county, discusses the significance, past and future, of Indian Gaming.

Prof. Amir Hussain discusses the most religiously diverse place in the history of the world: Southern California circa the present day.

Dr. Dana Goldman looks ahead to a time when a pill can add 15 years to your life and billions annually to the state’s health care expenditures.

Herrmann Spetzler, whose work focuses on alleviating the lack of health care services in rural communities, discusses both the depth of the problem and some surprising solutions.

California’s Central Valley is the country’s heartland but it also has a poverty rate nearly double that of the rest of the state. In this final installment in our Kids For Real series, 10 year-old Ramiro gives us a first-hand look at how his family copes with hunger.

Filmmaker Cathee Weiss has a mother’s desire to share with her children the best of her own childhood experiences, like summer camp. But as the mother of two autistic children, realizing that dream is an exceptional challenge.

Nearly one million children in California are without health insurance. Each has a family and a story. This one is Alex’s.

What happens to a community when its streets and schools become crime scenes and what, if anything, can be done to reverse a violent tide?

“My name is Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Junior. One reality. The other? I am an African-American male living in Los Angeles.”

In hospitals and doctors’ offices across the state, children are often asked to translate complex and sometimes embarrassing medical information to their parents or family members. Two siblings, ages 10 and 12, describe their experience interpreting for their mother.

California Connected visits Sonora and San Francisco to get a firsthand look at the challenges facing today’s Army recruiters.

No more s%*t! That’s what some residents of Kern County are saying to Southern California’s sanitation districts. The Central Valley region generates 2% of the state’s “biosolids” or sludge — but receives 30% of California’s human and industrial waste each year. Now the rural community wants to ban the transfer of their urban neighbors’ waste.

For over a century, rural Californians have struggled to make themselves heard in the state legislature. The two year-old rural California State Legislative Rural Caucus might buck that trend.

The City of West Hollywood was on the cutting edge a few years ago when it deemed all pet owners to be pet guardians. But a measure to ban the declawing of cats is raising hackles among some pet guardians and veterinarians alike.

Did you know you’re not supposed to put tarantulas on little girls? If not, you probably didn’t read the manual.

Valley Fever, a potentially fatal respiratory disease spread by the airborne spores of a fungus, afflicts an estimated 100,000 Americans each year. A community group in Bakersfield wants to find a vaccine for this confounding ailment.

What do sheep, libertarians, spam and global warming have in common? The tragedy of the commons.

Over the last two decades California’s vineyards have become world class. Now they could also become cutting-edge: by relying entirely on solar electricity.

It is estimated that as many as nine out of every ten minors in California’s detention system have a mental disorder. In the past, few have received the care they need. But an innovative program in Eureka could change all that by combining the efforts of the probation department, county mental health, and local schools.

Two decades after losing much of its timber industry, Humboldt County is reckoning with the results of a burgeoning drug trade.

Does it take a family or a village to raise a (troubled) child?

In January 2005, Jesus Saldana took up his new position as a state legislator in the Mexican state of Michoacan. What is unusual about this job is that he was elected to represent constituents who no longer live in Mexico.

In the latest installment of an ongoing saga, the lumber giant claims it may go bankrupt as a result of state regulations. The state disagrees while environmentalists charge PALCO is responsible for increased flooding.

How the Wiyot Tribe has successfully reclaimed “Indian Island” near Eureka, using both financial and political resources.

Ships docked in the LA-Long Beach port complex churn out more pollution each day than one million cars. Environmental activists say a “green” terminal is only a good start to mitigating a growing problem.

Outside of the classroom, individual teachers are seldom seen or heard. We interview three award-winning California educators to get their take on the state of their profession.

What percentage of California’s K-12 students are learning English in the classroom?

Van Tran wins the contest for the 68th District of the State Assembly, making him the highest ranking Vietnamese-American politician in the country. He’s a Republican.

Saudi-born Ferial Masry is the Democratic candidate for the 37th District of the California Assembly in Ventura County–as a write in candidate.

Have you ever wondered why horse racing and the lottery are legal, but casinos are only legal on Indian land?

A liberal and a conservative compete in “enemy territory” in a contest to see who can register the most voters.

A look at two innovative ballot initiatives on California county slates in 2004: Instant Runoff Voting and Early Voting Booths.

A visit to San Bernardino, where voter participation is particularly low, to investigate voter apathy.

A trip to the remote community of Markleeville, in search of Alpine County’s lone unregistered voter.

An online discussion of growing tensions between agriculture and real estate interests in the Central Valley with Alan Deutschman, Deborah Gonzalez and Carol Whiteside.

A tale of art imitating life imitating art: reformed urban bad boys play to type for suburban audiences.

Growth in the Central Valley is increasingly pitting farmers against residents as in the case of pesticide drift.

How did nail salons get so cheap? Why are they often staffed by Vietnamese women? The answer spans one war, two continents and a major movie star.

A Youth Radio report on Oakland’s illegal, late-night street parties known as “Sideshows.”

A provocative and emotional documentary explores the lives of teen-agers sentenced as adults to life in prison.

Can a mythical creature resurrect a dying logging community? Did a talking mouse help Orlando, Florida?

An online discussion on the future of prisons in California with Richard Steffen, Margot Bach, Prof. Craig Haney and Lenore Anderson.

An interview with SF Mayor Gavin Newsom on his plans for the future and the controversial topic of gay marriage.

An online discussion on the origins and goals of the nascent Native American legal movement.

Do voters really mistrust the state government or is their unease just a big misunderstanding?

Comedian Cris Franco explores the usage of the term “Hispanic” from as the Bard of the Barrio.

How American Indians are fusing U.S. and native values to create their own legal mechanisms and protections.

The unlikely story of one of America’s most presitigious colleges: an all-male school/ranch east of the Sierra Nevada.

A tour of Cheech Marin’s extensive collection of Californian artists, primarily Chicano painters.

This northern California town has learned how to govern by consensus.

A new state prison program tries to foster cohesive families by allowing inmate mothers to remain with their children in an alternative facility.

Two anti-immigration advocates square off against two anti-anti-immigration advocates.

Actor John Amos explains how he uses sailing to mentor kids.

Two filmmakers team up with high school students to make a “real” drug prevention movie about crystal meth.

See how capital, services, goods and people circulate in and out of the Golden State.

An online discussion regarding the myths and realities of immigration in California with Prof. Michael P. Smith and Belinda Reyes.

A shortage of nurses in the First World has prompted many doctors from the Third to immigrate for a pay raise and a professional downgrade.

Most of us have heard about the challenges farm workers face, but what about the people who recruit these workers? Meet a licensed farm labor contractor who can’t find enough legal workers to fill his crews each day.

A pilot program launched by the Mexican government matches remittances sent home by workers abroad to foster economic development.

Donna Tisdale, who owns a ranch 1.5 miles from border, has experienced firsthand the effects of Operation GateKeeper.

Helicopter border patrol agent Elizabeth Ebisuzaki takes us on a tour of her daily work.

Banafsheh Akhlaghi gave up her career as a law professor to provide legal aid to Muslim immigrants inadvertantly caught in a post-9/11 dragnet.

Meet May Ying Ly, helping to create a bridge between Hmong refugees and mainstream American society.

From brownfields to infill, new approaches to urban development may help California ease into the next century.

Meet a few of California’s non-english language media stars.

Actor Robert David Hall discusses work and disabilities.

How some Central Valley communites are actually planning for “smart” growth.

What happens to kids in foster care when they turn 18? Many become homeless.

An online discussion of talk radio with Al Peterson and Michael Harrison.

A brief discussion of conservative talk radio in California, widely credited with launching the 2003 recall election.

Marriage counseling for returning soldiers provided en masse in auditoriums.

Meet the couple behind MoveOn.Org, an online grassroots political organization.

Californians of Chinese descent delve into their genealogy by traveling across time and space.

The Enemy of the State vs. Minerva and the Bears.

How did a town without street lights, sidewalks or even police officers manage to revitalize their Central Valley community?

Teen counseling gets a radical make-over for the year 2003 at SF’s Balboa High School.

Find out how Youth Radio has been successful at educating hundreds of teens and entertaining millions of adult listeners.

Chuck Gardner and son Chas

Meet three fathers who have risen to the challenges of autism and the lasting legacy of their efforts.

Ann Randolph on volunteerism and self-obsession.

What happens to the neighborhood when an Indian casino moves next door? A visit to the River Rock Casino in Sonoma County and the conflicting reactions it has inspired among local residents.

How did a Yosemite Park ranger bring back to life a 200 hundred-year-old African American cavalryman and why? The inside story on one of California’s best-kept secrets.

Cris Franco spoofs affirmative action.

Can playing baseball help reform and rehabilitate prisoners? Meet the volunteer coaches and community-based fundraisers who think the answer is most definitely “Y-e-s-s-s-s.”

The Humboldt County DA has filed a complaint against Pacific Lumber and now his constituents are torn between praising the lawsuit and recalling him from office.

Cris Franco on the middle-class ritual of the Quinceañera.

California muslim Ahmed Ahmed and Rabbi Bob Alper take their irreverent and ecumenical comedy routine on the road while taking stereotypes to task.

Rob Nelson makes light of San Francisco’s anti-war protests.

Scavenging for Republicans in San Francisco.

Watch the Senior Fraud Patrol Bust Scammers in Southern California.

A truck stop ministry hopes to inspire truckers to cap off a shower and coffee with a visit to the chapel.

Environmentalists want to reduce the amount of land available for off-road-vehicle use in this Southern California public park. Off-road-vehicle enthusiasts say “Tough luck” and the Bureau of Land Management is stuck in between.

Off-road-vehicle enthusiasts vs. environmental conservationists. If neither side is happy, does that mean the Bureau of Land Management is getting it right?

As residents, workers and tourists wait to cross the U.S./Mexico border, high and low tech innovators are coming up with ways for speeding up the process.

When a good doctor is really, really hard to find. California Connected follows a growing crisis in rural health care as the state legislature struggles to stop the exodus of medical professionals from remote areas.

Indian gaming is bigger than ever in the state of California. How did it get to be such a booming business and, amidst growing criticism from its competitors and detractors alike, what does the future hold for Indian Casinos?

The unprecedented growth of Indian casinos is attracting customers and controversy. California Connected explores the issues in California.

Ward Connerly, famous foe of affirmative action, is now championing a ballot initiative that would strip all references to race and ethnicity from government forms with a few exceptions.

Will racial privacy end racism or lead to private discrimination? An ongoing debate in the streets could hit the ballot box.

A fledgling Afghan journalist, publisher, commentator — and a college freshman — hopes to bridge the gap between Afghan and U.S. cultures.

What began as an effort to get proper representation for a small town, has given birth to the “State” of Jefferson. Sixty years later, residents of Jefferson are striving to create a separate identity in spirit and attitude from their California and Oregon neighbors.