January 1, 2030 To my three sons: I’m so proud of you. I especially appreciate that, now that you’re 21, 18, and 16 years old, you no longer fight with each other constantly. You’re doing well in school, and have bright futures. But please never forget how lucky you’ve been...
These Immigrants are Making Healthcare More Human
Immigrants, already essential to California healthcare, will become even more important in the future. Today, one in six medical professionals, and nearly one-third of physicians, are foreign-born, and many are bringing not just their labor but their ideas. Immigrants are responsible for one-fifth of all biomedical research and clinical trials. Immigrant Entrepreneurs are Improving Medicine That in turn makes us dependent on immigrant...
Forestiere Underground Gardens Light a Path to Ending Housing Crisis
In our search for inspiring new ideas for solving California’s housing crisis, we must dig deeper. How deep? At least to the depths plumbed by Baldassare Forestiere. If you’ve never heard of Forestiere, you’re not alone. He’s never become the household name he should be in California. He deserves far...
Sacramento Should Look in the Mirror While Fighting Trump
As California builds its capacity to fight the Leviathan that is the Trump administration, does it risk turning our state government into a Leviathan of our own? This unhappy question occurred to me while reading Gary Gerstle’s recent history, Liberty and Coercion: The Paradox of American Government. The book examines...
Should Google or Your Taxes Help Pay for Local News?
Whose job it is to revive local journalism in California? Our state’s elites have a clear, if dubious answer: themselves. Last year, Google announced it was putting $300 million into supporting local news. A few weeks ago, Facebook announced its own $300 million local news initiative. Philanthropists and foundations have...
Immigrants Are Secret to California's Good Health
What makes California the very picture of health? It’s neither sunshine nor silicone. Our health secret is immigration. While President Donald Trump blames immigrants for being sources of disease, Californians have long known that immigrants make us healthier. Those health benefits go beyond the “immigrant health advantage,” the fact that...
Grandma's Home Is Now a Refugee's Slice of Paradise in Anaheim
My maternal grandmother Edith LeFrancois’s former house sits in a cul-de-sac just off the State College Boulevard corridor, which connects Angel Stadium with Cal State Fullerton. 310 N. Olympia Place — a three-bedroom, beige-stucco split-level built in 1957 — was a very hard-earned piece of the California dream when she...
‘My Children Can’t Buy a House in California Anymore’
California is famously a home for abrupt shifts and sudden transformations in culture, lifestyle, and technology. And our homes can change as profoundly as our state does. Few places better represent change than the Long Beach home that my great-grandparents, Raymond and Rebecca Corcoran, paid $8,000 to have built for...
This Tiny Redlands Home Once Hosted Thanksgiving for 50
On Thanksgiving, I wish I were back at the tiny house at 830 Ohio Street, in one of the oldest sections of one of the Inland Empire’s oldest cities, Redlands. It was there that I spent Turkey Day as a kid. Somehow, 50 or more of my relatives would squeeze...
This $2M Tract Home Embodies Crisis and Solutions: Joe Mathews
No home in the world matters more to me than my paternal grandparents’ small blue house at the bottom of a windswept hill in the Bay Area city of San Mateo. But my recent visit was different. While the house still belongs to my family, my grandparents are both dead....