How Two California Lakeside Communities Are Ending Chronic Homelessness—at Jet-Ski Speed

In the Pandemic, South Lake Tahoe and Lake Elsinore Are Showing Other Cities Ways to Support All Their Unhoused Neighbors

Have you given up hope that California will ever get its 150,000-person homeless population off the streets? Are you dubious that your hometown could ever reduce its homelessness to zero?

If so, then you should go jump in a lake.

Either Tahoe or Elsinore will do.

South Lake Tahoe and Lake Elsinore—separated by 460 miles, 5,000 feet in elevation, and 25 degrees in average temperature—have built such supportive housing infrastructures that within two years both could achieve “functional zero.” That’s the term for communities that have solved homelessness for a …

by Joe Mathews | March 9, 2021

Why Today’s Social Revolutions Include Kale, Medical Care, and Help With Rent

In the Pandemic, Community Organizations Have Returned to Their Roots in Mutual Aid and Self-Determination

by Rinku Sen | July 1, 2020

When I needed to donate a box of vegetables recently, I called a nonprofit in my neighborhood in Queens, New York, that organizes low-wage immigrant workers. As we arranged the …

Crowdsourcing in the Name of Science

Citizen Scientists Are Great for Data Collection and So Much More

By Jason Lloyd | August 24, 2016

The earthquake near Washington, D.C., five years ago in August 2011—the one that damaged the Washington Monument and the National Cathedral but had little other noticeable impact—caught me by surprise. …

The Secret to South L.A.’s Success Is That It Loves Itself

Local Leaders Discuss Protecting the Community’s Rich Past and Promoting Its Bright Future

By Sara Catania | July 14, 2016

It’s one thing to put in the hard work to improve a community, but when do you declare success?

In long-maligned South Los Angeles, that time is now, said a panel …

Prop. 47 Has the Power to Transform South L.A., If More People Used It

By Reclassifying or Expunging Prior Convictions, Many Californians Could Gain Opportunities

By Gilbert Johnson | July 7, 2016

One way to help transform South L.A.—and communities across California—would be for people to use the new power they have under Proposition 47 to expunge or reduce the felony convictions …

Why Starting a Preschool Is Harder Than You Think

How A Reluctant Community Activist Took Matters Into Her Own Hands

By Ruth Rhodes | September 23, 2015

I was a reluctant community activist. I didn’t plan on creating a movement for a new preschool in our community. I just wanted to find better care for my son. …

community activism