San Diego’s Latest Coronavirus Case, Climate Action Report Card, 50 Years Of Women Studies At SDSU

Speaker 1: 00:00 San Diego County has its first case of covert 19 and the climate action report card is out which cities meet the goal. I'm Jade Hindman and I'm Maureen Kavanaugh. This is KPBS mid day edition. It's Tuesday, March 10th County health officials say a woman who tested positive for Corona virus in San Diego last night is hospitalized and doing well. The identified patient is the first person to test positive in the County while not in quarantine on a military base official, say the woman is in her 50s and recently traveled abroad. Here's Dr. Eric McDonald with San Diego County health and human services. Speaker 2: 00:49 The general public has no change in their very low risk here in San Diego because this is clearly a travel related case. Speaker 1: 00:57 County officials have not revealed where the patient traveled, but Scripps green hospital has announced the patient is at their facility. Joining me is KPBS reporter Matt Hoffman, who's been following the Corona virus story in San Diego and Matt, welcome. Hey Maureen, what else do we know about this Corona virus patient? Speaker 2: 01:15 Right? So obviously we know that she did travel internationally and we do know that she traveled overseas. Now officials aren't telling us where exactly that happened, but we know that it wasn't from one of the high risk areas. So we're talking like Italy or China. It wasn't from one of those countries that seeing a, an incredibly high number of cases. Um, we also know that, uh, after she had her international travel, she had fever and she had some respiratory problems and she ended up going to the hospital by herself and then that hospital ended up contacting the County. They made the decision to test. And then last night, obviously we got the results. The first positive case here in San Diego Speaker 1: 01:48 was the woman in any kind of self quarantine since her trip. Speaker 2: 01:51 She was not in self quarantine. And basically there's explanation we got from County health services. Was that because she didn't go to one of these high risk identified countries, uh, she wasn't mandated to have this, um, you know, self quarantine at our house. Uh, they say they're talking with CDC and they said, just give them some time. So maybe they're going to be updating some of those guidelines in terms of high risk countries. Speaker 1: 02:10 Right. What is, what is the County doing then to isolate and test people? The patient may have been in contact with it. Speaker 2: 02:16 Right. We know from County health officials that uh, she had a contact inside her home. That's someone who's under under investigation and then also a number of healthcare workers at the hospital where she was, cause she was admitted with these problems, but they didn't know that she had the Corona virus, um, until they did some more tests until they requested the test here in San Diego County. Um, yeah, so they are monitoring a handful of individuals who this woman may have exposed. Speaker 1: 02:38 We've heard about a few other people testing positive in San Diego hospitals. Why is this considered the first case in the County? Speaker 2: 02:46 It's the first resident in the County. Uh, yeah. If you remember last month in February we had about 230 people from Mohan China evacuated from the epicenter of where that Corona virus coven 19 outbreak is. Um, and obviously from that batch we had two people test positive. Now those were not San Diego residents. So the County is sort of claiming this one as their own, if you will. I'm saying this is our first case. Obviously we did have a, just I believe last week, um, that 18 T worker who lives in orange County but works down here in the South Bay and San Diego County. Uh, they did test positive, but that's an orange County case. They're calling it. So this is the first San Diego County resident, this woman in her 50s to test positive. Speaker 1: 03:24 Now the results of the testing on this woman in the hospital are being called probable for Corona virus. What has to happen before the testing results are confirmed? Speaker 2: 03:33 Right. So basically the County lab, now that it has the Corona virus testing capability, even though they get a positive test, they have to send it to the CDC sort of for double confirmation. Uh, but I will say though, even though it's called a presumed probable case, County health officials are acting like this is an actual case. Like they're not saying like, Oh, this might not be a case. They're saying, no, this is probably a case. Uh, it's just sort of like a kind of a formality that they have to send it to the CDC for double testing. Uh, we do know that, uh, the County has a little bit less than a thousand testing kits available on hand right now. Um, and they told us yesterday that they're expecting to get within the week, uh, another thousand. So they're asking people to be sort of, do justice here as they, you know, think, Hey, I might be sick. Speaker 2: 04:11 Do I have the coronavirus? Um, they have to have these, you know, travel histories to places where the coronaviruses widespread or have contact with somebody who may have been to one of those areas. Um, and that's a conversation that happens between the County, the person's healthcare provider, and that person, and even the CDC as well too. So they don't want to just give a test out to anybody in the County. Last night, they really tried to be transparent. I mean, they called this news conference with like less than an hour's notice to the media. And really they said basically they tested that woman earlier in the day. They got the results in the afternoon and they called that news conference just a couple hours after they got the results. So really the County of health officials who are trying to be transparent, let everyone know what's going on. Speaker 1: 04:46 Now, yesterday we talked to you about the grand princess cruise ship passengers who were disembarking and eventually headed for the Miramar days. Do we know if they've arrived at the base yet? Speaker 2: 04:57 Uh, as of right now, they are not at the base. We know that the earliest they could come would be today, but that would likely be later in the evening, maybe night if they did. Uh, but more than likely it sounds like that this is going to be happening tomorrow and we're talking, we don't know exactly how many people are going to be coming it, I mean, we do know that it's a split of a little less than a thousand Californians, uh, between Travis and Miramar. And we know that Miramar base officials tell us they have the capacity for 300 rooms. And as we talked about yesterday, 300 rooms could mean you know, four people per room, two people per room, spouses, family. So, uh, they can hold quite a bit of people at Miramar. And, uh, we should, I mean, I, I, I've been told that federal health officials are just trying to, uh, split up people based on region. So people who live in Northern California, central California will go to Travis. People who live in Southern California will come to Miramar. Speaker 1: 05:42 Another new development is that UC San Diego has decided to hold spring semester entirely online. Now, any other schools in the County doing something like that, Speaker 2: 05:53 right? UC San Diego, the first large institution in the County to make such a, a big that they're moving their classes online. We also know that, uh, there are some reports that the CSU system is considering closing some schools in California, uh, so that they can kind of take a break and say, Hey, let's look at this Corona virus, this coven 19 outbreak, and see what we need to do. Does that mean going online? Does that mean canceling classes? What does that mean? Speaker 3: 06:15 Now, the San Diego County health and human services officials are giving a presentation about Corona virus to the board of supervisors today. What are they expected to cover in their talk? Speaker 2: 06:24 Well, one, they're going to be extending that, uh, emergency declaration here in San Diego. And basically that emergency declaration, uh, gives them, uh, powers for like reimbursement for supplies, masks and other things. But it also gives them some like administratively way where like, you know, say that this outbreak really starts ramping up in San Diego. Um, instead of going to the board and saying, Hey, we need to hire out of state nurses. Hey, we need to buy this. Um, this emergency declaration gives them power to just say, Hey, we're going to hire these nurses. We're going to buy these supplies. We need them. They can bypass the County board of supervisors. Um, today they're expected to just give them an update on that. Obviously they're going to be voting to extend it another 30 days. Uh, but they're also telling them that they're monitoring, you know, a large number of people here in the County. As of yesterday, we do know that the County is monitoring or has monitored to date about 464 people. About 82 people are still being actively monitored under self quarantine within the County. And they'll also be telling them like how many people they're testing, how many testing kits they have. Like we said about a thousand on hand. Right now they've tested in total about 76 people. Obviously that one positive case, still about 20 cases. Pending results though, so we could have some more positive cases there. Speaker 3: 07:29 I've been speaking with KPBS reporter, Matt Hoffman. Matt, thank you very much. Thanks Maureen. Speaker 3: 07:38 When it comes to fighting climate change, the San Diego region is making progress, but there's still a lot more that could be done. The San Diego based nonprofit climate action campaign is out with its 2020 climate action plan report card. It grades cities and the County with bronze, silver and gold ratings. And so far the grades are mixed. Joining us to talk more about the findings of the report card is Muleeka Marsden. She's a climate justice advocate and organizer with the climate action campaign. Muleeka welcome. Thank you so much for having me. So let's start with the big picture. This is the fourth edition of the report card. No cities in the region received a gold medal for climate action, but generally speaking, how much progress is the region making toward carbon neutrality and other climate action goals? Speaker 4: 08:26 Right. Um, so I do want to start by saying that there are some really great wins that we want to celebrate, especially around clean energy. We now have eight cities in the region that are committed to 100% clean energy and eight cities that are moving forward with community choice energy programs, which will provide residents with cleaner energy and lower rates. So that is really, really wonderful. Um, we also have seen some cities move forward to make sure that equity is centered in climate solutions, which is great. So overall, um, while we are winning some battles, we are losing the fight against the climate crisis and no cities were received the gold standard because, um, cities are primarily failing to address our largest source of greenhouse gas emissions, which is transportation. Um, and that's for a few reasons. That's because we are continuing to build sprawl, uh, rather than density. Speaker 4: 09:23 So we need to start building affordable housing near jobs and transit. And it's also because, uh, cities are really feeling to, to provide residents with real transportation choices, uh, that help residents move around the region without a car. And as you were saying, the implementation of community choice energy in the city of San Diego and a number of other municipalities seems to be the biggest a success story to come out of the report. Why is that important? Yeah, so community choice is really great for a lot of reasons. Um, it allows us to dramatically slash emissions in the regions in the region by providing more clean energy at lower rates. Um, and, uh, putting in the community in charge. Um, this is a public nonprofit, uh, power agency. So we really have control as residents, uh, to how we, how we reinvest the revenue that we make from these agencies, how and where we get clean energy. Speaker 4: 10:26 Uh, so it's really, really exciting for the region and the report points out that housing needs to be built near public transit and closer to where jobs are. What do you take from the results of the recent election where as things stand now, voters turned down both housing related measures a and B? Yeah, so I think the results from that show that, um, there is a strong response that, uh, residents do not want sprawl and residents are ready to see us build, um, affordable housing near jobs and transits to start building smart growth. What other areas do cities need to make improvements on? Uh, so cities are also falling behind on their goals to implement their urban tree canopy targets. So I'm essentially planting shade trees to help remove carbon of the air as well as achieve their zero waste goals. And although we've seen a Imperial beach and city of San Diego elevate equity and climate solutions, most of the region is also failing to center equity in their climate solutions as well. Speaker 4: 11:33 You know, the climate action campaigns, primary focus is working with local governments throughout the County. The report card points out some cities though like Poway aren't making a commitment to fight climate change. Why do you think that is and how do you overcome that barrier? I think that there is, um, a lot climate denial going on and delay and um, we are about building the, the people power and the political will, um, and helping people realize how climate solutions actually lead to quality in life, quality of life improvements for people. The example is CCE, which will not only provide cleaner energy but lower rates for residents. The County was also called out in the report for having a fatally flawed climate action plan. Why is that? So the County is going against, uh, what we know are the necessary strategies to fight the climate crisis. Speaker 4: 12:31 And they are, uh, continuing to build sprawl, which increases transportation emissions and, um, threatens all regional progress. A consistent argument for not taking certain actions to mitigate climate change is the cost. How do you make the case to cities dealing with tight budgets that they need to make these investments now? So what is the cost of not taking action? There are a lot of reports out there showing that the cost will actually be a lot higher to our infrastructure. Um, and other things. Um, but also we want to point out that, um, we are calling for a regional climate authority. This would be a place where cities could come together, break down silos, uh, collaborate, strategize, and also, um, come together to apply for regional funding to implement their climate strategies. You know, how do you craft your message so that people don't end up feeling overwhelmed and just tune out when we look at all of the climate issues before us, right? Speaker 4: 13:33 So, um, we tell people that while the climate crisis is our greatest threat, it's also our great greatest opportunity. Uh, we know now from climate science that we need to be on the path to achieve zero carbon. So get off fossil fuels entirely. And to do that, we are going to have to change everything about the way our economy works, the way we live. And so this is an opportunity of tunity to change who it works for. Um, this is an opportunity to make our, our communities more just more equitable and more prosperous. I've been speaking with Muleeka Marsden with the climate action campaign. Moliga thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for having me. This is KPBS mid day edition. I'm wearing Kavanaugh Speaker 3: 14:18 and I'm Jade Hindman rain is in the forecast in San Diego through tomorrow evening and that has some South Bay officials keeping a close eye on cross border sewage flows. San Diego's border region is being pummeled every day by massive flows of sewage tainted water that often get worse during a storm KPBS environment. Reporter. Eric Anderson says, there is some irony that this daily public health disaster is happening at the same time, a possible solution is near Speaker 4: 14:47 Uriel beach. Mayor Serge Dudina looks at the river flowing this U S Valley. Speaker 5: 14:52 This should be dry. That was the dry weather. There shouldn't be dry. There should be a pump station on the water in the Tijuana river Valley comes from Mexico and it's on its way to the ocean. On this day, 27 million gallons of sewage tainted water, which also carries a slurry of toxic chemicals, runs untreated into the United States. The smells for residents of South San Diego have been off the charts as well as IB. Some days the flows hit 50 million gallons and this has been happening daily since November to Dina says some weeks, that means 350 million gallons of dirty and dangerous water crossed the border. We've been literally freaking out about the astronomical increase in sewage and then the absolute absence of a communication from authorities in Mexico and then the international boundary and water commissioner. Even EPA KPBS reached out several times to the international boundary and water commission seeking information, but the agency has not answered questions to Dina says it's clear that Mexico's overtax sewage system is collapsing. Pump stations and collectors are offline for repairs and Medina says there is concern the cross border flows may persist Speaker 6: 16:02 per month. The Speaker 5: 16:05 going environmental disaster got a slice of attention from County supervisor Greg Cox during his state of the County address a couple of weeks ago Speaker 7: 16:13 because of topography and a failure to maintain infrastructure in Mexico. Imperial beach has been subjected to Torrance of sewage since the 1930s the O on a river and tributary canyons are the major source of untreated sewage trash sediment and hazardous toxins Speaker 5: 16:33 sounded an optimistic tone and he's confident this is the time to fix the problem. Speaker 7: 16:39 We're closer than ever to solving this problem and I will fight tooth and nail over the coming year to make that happen. Speaker 6: 16:48 Toxin. Other local leaders are putting their helps for a long time long Speaker 5: 16:50 term solution on a $425 million diversion and treatment facility of the U S side of the border. A berm would capture the polluted cross border flows and an expanded treatment plant would clean it up. We think that there is an ample opportunity for us to make substantial investments on the U S side of the border that get results. David Gibson is in charge of the state agency that monitors water pollution in San Diego. He says both the federal government and the state are making money available to fix the problem, but that money can only be spent on projects in the U S which Gibson backs those solutions work. Investments in Tijuana are often inadequate in the first place, poorly maintained, and there's no capital improvement budget to expand or improve upon them as they age out. So we're looking at this from the perspective of putting good money after good money in the U S the EPA controls the $300 million in the United States, Mexico and Canada trade agreement, but they have publicly expressed willingness to back the capture and treat option. Gibson says the forces have aligned much like they did in the 1990s when the international wastewater treatment plant was built. Speaker 8: 18:00 Many of us forget that we used to have about 15 million gallons per day of raw sewage every single day of the year and the Tijuana river. The construction of that treatment plant and the Canyon collectors changed that. We still have a pollution problem, but we don't have the same pollution problem. We're at the same moment now in 20 20th Speaker 5: 18:16 the legal fight to compel the U S government to clean up the pollution has been on hold since late last year. The groups agreed to stand down while efforts to find money for a us solution moved ahead. That makes the situation even more frustrating for Imperial beach. Mayor, Serge Medina, he's concerned about the health of the people living in his small beach town, and we still don't have an accounting of like really what happened to the sewer system of Tijuana, how much water was dumped in the river, but it was astronomical levels and we are just left whole, right. And literally being bombarded by sewage public health is a major concern for the Dina. But what happens to the ocean in Imperial beach is also important to that community's economy. Eric Anderson, KPBS news Speaker 9: 19:09 [inaudible] Speaker 1: 19:11 in Mexico, women refuse to go to work yesterday as a way to protest and alarming rise in violence against women across the country. KPBS reporter max Rivlin Nadler tells us more about the protest called a day without women and what it looked like in Tijuana. Speaker 10: 19:27 The number of women murdered in Mexico is double what it was five years ago. And protesters want to hold the Mexican government accountable for failing to take action. Demonstrators have gathered for weeks now and in Tijuana. Monday, women engaged in a one day strike. They called Buendia seam, who HEDIS protestors have said it's as if the Mexican government wants women to disappear. So for a day, many women did. Some businesses closed and others went short-staffed. One coffee shop hung up cards with the names of missing and murdered women. Many women who did go out wore purple in solidarity. 21 year old Alexandra works at a bookstore off of Avenida wherever. Lucien. She wasn't able to take the day off because the store is staffed by all women, but she says the majority of her friends were staying in on Monday. Speaker 8: 20:17 [inaudible] Speaker 10: 20:20 he says they're not going outside, they're not going to eat anything and they're not going to do social media so they can be a part of this movement. The gas station chain, Randy Chicos uses female gas station attendance in an effort to make women drivers more comfortable as they pull into full service stations on wound DSE Mohandas the woman driven company embraced the strike and it was the men of the company who were pumping gas. Jorge Sanchez Garcia said he was to support his female coworkers on strike. Over 10 of them were taking the day off in protest at that and okay. He's motivated to support the strike because of how serious the kidnappings and the violations of the rights of women have become and he's more than willing to pick up the extra work Speaker 1: 21:07 that was KPBS is max Rivlin neither reporting the goals behind the protest in Tijuana and other international women's day events were similar to those 50 years ago when San Diego state university founded the first women's studies department in the country this spring semester, SDSU educators are celebrating the 50th anniversary of that department and while there's much to celebrate, they're still a long way to go in the workplace, in the home and in politics for women to take their rightful place in present day culture. Journey me are Doreen Mattingly, a professor and the chair of the department of women's studies. Doreen, welcome. Thank you Marie. Nice to be here and who am I? I met gauche, a professor in the department and who used to be the chair of the department and welcome. Thank you very much. My pleasure to be here Doreen. I think sometimes people are surprised to learn. The San Diego state university had the first women's studies department in the country. What prompted the school to take such a big leap back in 1970 Speaker 11: 22:09 so at San Diego state, like in universities across the country, there was a great deal of student and faculty activism pressuring the university to offer courses for credit and offering courses for non-credit. Kind of outside the formal structure. You know, being first really means that it was the first to be approved and the, the experience of Mexican American studies, which is today Chicano Chicana studies a year before really paved a way for women's studies to be quickly approved. And so I think that that was a key factor in the Senate and the college, you know, allowing it to be offered for credit so quickly. Speaker 12: 22:48 Yeah, I think I agree with Doreen. And then it coincided also with young women coming out of the women's movement who were attending university at SDSU, forming a reading groups, teaching groups and women faculty in different departments willing to offer courses, which again coincided with a Dean, Dean marinee, who was married to a feminist Elsa, who also worked on campus to just, you know, move forward and create a program which later became a department. How much, can you tell us a little bit about how the program has changed over the years? The, like Dory and I have to have been here 25 years and had a foot in anthropology, Asian studies and the center for Islamic and Arabic studies. So it's been interesting for me to see how the women's studies program, the department has developed and I think one of its strengths has that it has kept up with the times and the demands for social justice. Speaker 12: 23:51 So it's not just about women and women's rights, but also LGBTQ and transgender. And we've done that through the Arcos offerings through more recent hires. And I think we pretty often are more of an activist, uh, department. So students are attracted to our major and minor because of that. And that has helped us do not just survive but to thrive. Hello. What are the big topics in women's studies now? Transnational feminism is a talking about ethnicity and race in bigger ways. A inclusion of LGBTQ issues also. And I think where our department, uh, for our college took a step in the right direction was internationalized the program too and helping students to travel abroad and get a new perspective or a different perspective on women and gender issues during bringing the conversation to the present day. It's been distressing for some women to see weak support shown for too strong female candidates for president. How do you account for that? Speaker 11: 25:00 So women in politics was my field and I can give you a full lecture about this, the masculinity of leadership, particularly the executive branch. Um, and the way that we understand the duties of the president to be like, what we understand masculinity to be like. And the difficulty that women have both establishing themselves as a strong leader and as a good woman. And there's a kind of a balancing act, which is almost impossible because there are never going to be more male than the man. Sorry. I think that's part of it. I think that this is a context where misogyny is acceptable, is an acceptable form of political discourse and not that many people have the tools to unpack it and to think, you know, that's just flat out misogyny that that is your argument and uh, I'm start people get persuaded by it because the, you know, online is so saturated with it that I think the needle has moved on. You know, how much is acceptable and in public discourse. How long do you, do you Speaker 12: 26:05 think it'll take to have a female president? Let me ask you both. Let me start with OMA. Uh, I hope sooner than later and I hope in my lifetime, uh, we are getting closer to the idea and the concept and I will confess that I am very, very disappointed. I thought to name one, Elizabeth Warren would definitely have been up there. Uh, it, uh, surprises me, especially as an anthropologist because I think we live in a bubble. Sometimes we think things are changing faster than they really are. And maybe these are the moments when we have to self reflect, especially in an educational institution to see why things are not moving in the we expected them to. And I think these questions are brought about by the lack of popularity of women candidates, uh, even though they are, you know, competing equally or better and more efficiently, but, uh, they're not able to sway the masses for some reason in a developed country like the U S because when I look at Asian countries, we have had women leaders. Speaker 11: 27:04 How long Doreen? Well, that's a question that presumes I kind of continual progress, right? So that's one way of looking at it. And another way of looking at it is that we have reached the peak and that we're, we are now moving backwards. And I think it's a very open historical question as to whether, you know, what we're experiencing now in terms of the aggressive misogyny that's being tolerated is just the blip or the beginning of a shift in women's power and public roles. Speaker 3: 27:36 Well, I was thinking that this last question of mine was rather silly, but based on what you just said, what do you think the program, the women's studies program might be like in another 50 years? Will we still need women's studies? Speaker 11: 27:48 Well, yes, we always tell them you don't want them studies. There's a revolution and the rest of the university, um, even though many people across the campus talk about gender, talk about women in different contexts, we pick the experiences of people who identify as female at the center of what we do, right. There's the, and then rethink our categories, our disciplines, our topics from there. And uh, there's no other place in the university that does that. It's a really a revolution in scholarship because then you begin to realize how much the categories that we take for granted are not based on the lives of people who identify as female. If you think about the concept of work, work versus family, well anybody who, who does the primary tasks of caring for a family will tell you work and family are the same thing. Why would there be different disciplines for them? Why would economics not talk about the family? And so even the very definition of the disciplines comes from, uh, some stability that is unlike the lives of many women. And so I think that that women's studies is and continues to be and hopefully will continue to be a revolutionary form of knowledge. Speaker 3: 29:02 Thank you. Professor Doreen Mattingly, who is the chair of the San Diego state department of women's studies and Houma. Akhmed gauche, a professor in the department. Thank you both so much. Thanks so much Maureen. Thanks so much. Bye. Bye. This is KPBS mid day edition. I'm Maureen cabinet and I'm Jade Hindman. If you've ever wondered what life is like in the military or what it's like to transition to civilian life and coming is the public radio program you will want to hear. True stories are told straight from the mouths of America's veterans. The new season is out now and it features stories of those who have gone from serving to becoming authors. Comedians satirists joining me, our host, Justin Hudnell Speaker 13: 29:42 and editor Jennifer Corley, welcome to you both. Thanks so much for having a song. Thank you. Yes. Justin, how do you go about choosing the stories and the people you feature on incoming Speaker 14: 29:53 mostly, but what we're really hoping to showcase to our audiences that the military is a lot more than the three stereotypes that are portrayed in the media, which is like the hero, the villain, and the victim. Right. And none of those are real people. Speaker 13: 30:07 And so this is a, the show is produced by San Diego Bay storytelling arts nonprofits. So say we all, what can listeners expect this this season? Speaker 15: 30:16 They can expect a wide variety of stories and it was really fun to edit this season. We have people who kind of run the gamut. We have people who are authors, we have people who are comedians, we have people who are just adjusting to everyday life. And we have stories that are hilarious. We have stories that are poignant and it's just like I said, been a lot of fun to edit. And I think it's going to be really engaging and insightful to listen to Speaker 13: 30:49 Justin and, and particularly this season, you have some controversial characters you introduce listeners to, um, why did you want to feature that, this, uh, or feature this controversial cast of characters now. Like why now the five episodes Speaker 14: 31:02 for releasing his lighting right up at the end of the primary and heading into the general election. And I do not think now is the time for middle of the road storytelling. It just doesn't fit in the chaos of our times between the Corona virus and whatnot. So we thought we'd match it a blow for blow with some of the more loud mouthed veterans that are out there who, uh, really are not suffering from a lack of candor. Speaker 13: 31:28 And in the first episode of the new season, you introduce us to Alison Gill. Tell us about her. Speaker 14: 31:32 That's right. Uh, we're releasing tonight with Alison Gill. She's a San Diego based comedian, Navy veteran and Navy nuke actually they call him. She was a nuclear engineer. Um, and she's built her standup comedian career as a musician on this foundation of trauma from the military and took that and metabolized it into her art as a way of healing and also, um, attacking the message, taking re ownership over it. And I think it's very interesting, honest take on how satire and humor and making other people uncomfortable as a way of staring at truth is a makes for powerful art. Speaker 13: 32:09 Oh, here she is talking about how she felt after she was sexually assaulted. Take a listen. I was terrified. They'd convinced me it was my fault. I was ashamed and I definitely didn't file a report. I fully believed it was a series of bad decisions on my part. That self-blame was so deep in me that years later I would repeat the bullshit. They fed me to my best friend after she had been raped. You shouldn't have flirted with him. You're smarter than that. You shouldn't have put yourself in that situation. Their words coming out of my mouth and it is the biggest regret of my life. Well, and she, you know, she talked a lot about even using comedy to overcome her trauma, but at the same time, comedy is also evolving in today's PC culture. Um, what was her take on that? Speaker 14: 33:05 Well, I wouldn't want to speak for Alison, but I think that it's a very interesting situation she finds herself in as an entertainer where I don't think Alison would ever regret that our culture's becoming kinder. I don't know if I like to think of it as political correctness so much as that our culture is just becoming less inclined to throw around, you know, thoughtlessly hurtful language and thoughts. But it does make it interesting when your career is based on, you know, speaking truth to power and, uh, eviscerating cultural norms for an effect. And a lot of the times to do that, you can't, um, you cannot walk, uh, a middle of the road path. Speaker 13: 33:47 Yeah. Jennifer would have been some of the most memorable moments of the new season. Speaker 15: 33:50 There have been a lot of memorable moments. I think working on Allison's episode has been very memorable because hers is a particular episode where it's both hilarious and really touching. It's from my perspective, it's always a really tough to edit these episodes where I have to engage the bleeps a lot. So hers is one of those where I had to employ that. But um, but it can be really fun too. So who else do we hear from this season? We hear from aside from Alison, we hear from another uh, comedic person who is a writer's name is Paul Solyndra and he is the creator of duffel blog and he's a military. Uh, it's a military satirical website and uh, and he's really popular. And so I think that's going to be a great episode to listen to. We have Kayla Williams who is an author. She was the most forward deployed female service member during the invasion of Iraq. Speaker 15: 34:57 We also hear from Delia Knight who is from San Diego right now she's living in Las Vegas and she is a playwright and she writes about her brother who uh, was a service member and it's really great to get that perspective from someone who is a family member. It's really interesting to have that viewpoint of people who a lot of times people view as being on the sidelines but they're not really on the sidelines because they're constantly engaged. They're constantly thinking about their family member who's out there. And like when we listened to Delia night's episode, it's particularly interesting to hear her talk about her constant anxiety and the pressure that she's under because of her brother who's deployed. So that perspective is really interesting to listen to and we have the perspective of the service member who's deployed and the different things that they go through. Uh, sometimes it's a service member who is in combat. Sometimes it's a service member who's not in combat, the different things that they go through. And sometimes it's a service member who is back home and trying to readjust to civilian life. So we have all these different perspectives that we're listening to. And it's interesting because it's, it's perspectives that civilians don't always think about. Speaker 3: 36:16 And this kind of piggybacks off what you're saying there, you know, I'm curious from the both of you all after producing five seasons of this show, um, what have you learned about the people who have served this country and about America's military? Speaker 14: 36:28 Well, I grew up in San Diego as a Navy brat. My grandfather was chief back when there was Naval training center, which is now a Liberty station. And, um, even I fell into believing a lot of the stereotypes that I think are prevalent around the country, which is that, you know, all Marines for instance, are like Biff from back to the future. They're all, you're the high school bully who, you know, picked on you. Um, and what I think the truth is that I've really had driven home by producing this show is that the military is a lot like our country. It is actually a lot more representative of America as a whole, as most people think that you know, less than 1% of our military ever actually sees combat. Uh, there it's a job for a lot of people. It's a way to go to college. It's a way of taking care of your family and your kids, um, of getting out of a bad marriage. All of the reasons that we make other choices in our careers. The military makes the same choices. And so you're getting that diversity of voices and experience just like you would anywhere else. Even more. So, Speaker 3: 37:26 I had been speaking with host Justin Hudnell and editor Jennifer Corley. Thank you both for joining us. Thank you so much. Thanks for having us. You can hear incoming on podcast wherever you get your podcast or by going to kpbs.org/incoming Speaker 9: 37:46 [inaudible]. Speaker 3: 37:48 So Russia is used to spice up everything from chips and chocolate bars to burgers. But the story of Saracho is rise to mainstream condiment began with a Vietnamese refugee who found a home and just the right peppers in Southern California. KCRW is Avitia artsy delves into the history of the sauce for the California report's series, golden state plate. Speaker 16: 38:13 So how did this sauce go from niche condiment to a mainstream staple to find out, I went to the man responsible for Saracho high profile rise, David Tran, he's the CEO of Hawaii Fong, the company that makes hot chili Saracho sauce, you know the one green top with a rooster on the bottle? The rooster, because Tran was born in 1945 the year of the rooster Tran is wearing a red t-shirt that reads the boss of the sauce and he didn't really want to talk. I don't want to repeat and repeat this story, sorry. The story he's told so many times is how his brother gave him a chili field in Vietnam. So he started making and selling hot sauce in the late seventies the chili sauce actually originates in Thailand in a coastal town called Saracha. Donna Lam, his sister in law, and the company's executive operations officer jumps in and he used to sell them Ashley on bikes. Speaker 16: 39:09 And actually my husband was one of the guys that the boys that you know, I helped him sell it to the markets over there because in Vietnam they, everybody makes their own hot sauce. Tran is ethnically Chinese. That made him a target of the communist regime in Vietnam. Following the Vietnam war, he fled the country on a freighter called the Hawaii fog, which means gathering prosperity. He named his company after the boat. He sailed to the U S arriving first in Boston, but the winters were too cold for him and he couldn't find a local source of fresh peppers. So in 1979 he moved to Los Angeles to establish his business. College Speaker 17: 39:45 fornia is the farmer stay. They have a lot of pro deals. So I started [inaudible] in California. She seems like the right choice. Speaker 16: 39:57 Tran uses red jalapenos. Those are the same as the green ones, but they're left on the vine to mature. So they become spicier and sweeter. Speaker 17: 40:05 In Asian. In China, Chile must be the red, no green from beginning, we using red. No, we don't. Not using green pepper, Speaker 18: 40:15 like all this California food revolution stuff. That's happening, and I did seventies where chefs resourcing locally and seasonally or trying to source locally and seasonally he was doing it. Speaker 16: 40:24 10 when writes about food and immigration, she says, David Tran is quintessentially Californian in his use of local produce. Speaker 18: 40:32 He sourced these really fresh peppers. He processed them and they were on your table and that's, that has become the definition of California cuisine. I really think that he has helped developed this idea of what it means to cook and eat locally and seasonally. Speaker 16: 40:47 [inaudible] says, as Vietnamese and Thai food became more popular, chefs and foodies sought out Serratia as well, and eventually supermarkets started stocking it for 28 years. Hoy Fon got peppers exclusively from Underwood ranches in Ventura County, but the partnership fell apart in 2016 over allegations of an overpayment and breach of contract. Dueling lawsuits ended the summer when a jury in Ventura County awarded the grower over $23 million, but that was not [inaudible] first legal battle. It's factory is an Irwindale about 20 miles Northeast of downtown LA. In 2013 the city filed suit because some neighbors complained about headaches and itchy eyes caused by odors from the plant, the company countersued. But by then David Tran sauce was a pop culture phenomenon with Saracha flavored everything along with cookbooks at documentary and hip hop shout-outs co piso with a ASA ratchet tonight. Speaker 4: 41:49 Get some Roger Manian. No one's South. I put that on every time I put that on every time. Or you got a buddy likes. So rats shot every time I bring you round the homeys 100 Watts Speaker 16: 42:06 lawsuits over the odors were dropped. Tran like a modern day. Willie Wonka opened his factory to public tour. Speaker 4: 42:13 Alrighty, so good morning. Welcome to Hawaii Fung foods and my name's Andrea and I'm going to be your tour guide for today. Speaker 16: 42:18 Andrea Castillo leads us up a flight of stairs to look down on a conveyor Speaker 19: 42:22 belt. Bright blue, 55 gallon barrels slide past while workers in white uniforms look on the barrels are filled with a mixture of ground chilies, garlic, salt and vinegar. That bright red paste will be poured into bottles and shipped around the world. Speaker 16: 42:42 So does David Tran have a vision for the future? He says he has no plans to sell the company or take on investors. The company makes about $80 million a year without spending a dime on advertising. There are no new products in the works to date. I'm 73 I don't have any and the teeth to make the ad product. All he wants to do, he says, is make what his customers want. And that's the Saracha. I'm Amish. I artsy in Los Angeles.