California To Study Reparations For Black Americans, County Reworking Climate Plan, So Long Antiquated Sedition Law, Proposition 16 Break Down And Italian Film Fest Preview

Speaker 1: 00:00 California becomes the first state to study reparations. Speaker 2: 00:04 You weren't officially a slave state as such yet. We allowed slavery to exist here. Speaker 1: 00:10 Maureen Kavanaugh with Mark sour. This is KPBS midday. Speaker 3: 00:25 Sandy Speaker 1: 00:25 Go County starts from scratch on a new climate action plan. Speaker 3: 00:28 I just hope we get it right this time. Way too much. Money's been spent way too much. Time has been wasted. Speaker 1: 00:36 San Diego repeals a hundred year old seditious language law. Speaker 3: 00:41 Add a San Diego film festival opens tonight, Speaker 1: 00:43 Kicking off a month long celebration Speaker 3: 00:45 Battalion cinema. That's a head on mid day edition. Speaker 1: 01:01 California has become the first state in the nation to begin a formal study on reparations to African Americans impacted by slavery. The bill authored by San Diego assembly woman, Shirley Weber was signed into law by governor Newsome on Wednesday. It creates a task force to study. What kind of reparations may be appropriate for the state to offer descendants of enslaved people. And those who've suffered the effects of slavery supporters. Say it is a first step toward addressing the economic and social inequities that have played African American families and communities for generations. Joining me is San Diego state assembly woman, Shirley Weber, and dr. Weber, welcome to the program. Speaker 2: 01:43 Thank you. It's always a pleasure to be here with you. Speaker 1: 01:47 Can you tell us how this task force will be assembled and how it will go about its work? Speaker 2: 01:52 Well, you know, there'll be nine members on the task force and it's a state task force. And so the governor has direct involvement with it. We hope and will be engaged in it. So the governor has a certain number of, uh, persons he'll be appointing. I think he has five and the, um, uh, the speaker of the house has two. And so does the, uh, the president protein we'll have to, uh, there's some specific specifications in terms of what kinds of folks we want in terms of those who had some experience and some research background, those who believe in reparations, those in other words, so it's not a committee to fight amongst itself about it, you know, did slavery exist or not exist? It's really a task force to look at the impact that it has had and what they possibly be. Some of the things we need to do to improve the situation for African Americans in California. Speaker 1: 02:43 There are many people who may be confused about why this reparations taskforce is happening here in California, since it was never a slave state in the 19th century. Can you explain Speaker 2: 02:55 Well, sure. Uh, and it's, and it's interesting those, if you get, if those can get a chance to really read the analysis of the bill, uh, it's a, it's a beautiful analysis done by the staff at, at, uh, at the Capitol because it really Chronicles the engagement and the involvement of Californians in the slave trade. Um, we didn't have, we weren't officially a slave state as such yet. We allowed slavery to exist here. We allow people to bring their slaves here. We allowed them to ensure their slaves. So our insurance companies made a tremendous amount of money on that. Uh, we also, um, uh, if a person came to California as a free state, uh, they had been enslaved. They were sent back to where they came from. And so they were allowed for a slave catchers to come and get people in California, take them back into slavery. Speaker 2: 03:40 So California participated in it. And then as a result of that, once we did become a state and slave slavery ended, we continued to participate in things like red lining. We had laws in California that would not allow a black person to speak in court against a white person. Um, we had, uh, we had some definitely limitations in terms of where people could live. Um, we, so there were a lot of, um, laws against African Americans. In fact, our first governor wanted to create a law that would basically, uh, ban all black people from California, whether they were enslaved or been enslaved or not that he wanted to get rid of all African Americans in California. And so these things are public records. Speaker 1: 04:18 Well, the task force be authorized to study issues such as school segregation and housing discrimination that happened well after slavery. Speaker 2: 04:27 It will, it will be empowered to look at the impact of slavery on that, because even though slavery supposedly ended, we still had all of these things that continued afterwards, and then they impacted other things in people's lives. And so, yes, the fact that we had at school segregated, uh, we had housing segregation in California. Uh, we have a Lord, we at one point at lore funding of schools for kids who are poor and African-American in different areas. So we have to look at the impact because it's not just, okay, now you're free. You can go. But if you continue with the kind of negative things that are there, the educational piece, the lack of, of, uh, opportunities to enter certain, uh, businesses, the inability to basically own businesses and the kind of laws that were put in place to prevent African-Americans from buying property in certain sections of Los Angeles and San Francisco. Speaker 2: 05:13 So there were a lot of things that basically hindered the economic development, but also they've handled the academic development and the psychological impact that had on, on individuals in terms of what they thought were their options and opportunities and so forth. And it's really interesting cause most folks don't think of California as a slave state. So when you think, Oh my God, you guys are the farthest away from slavery, but nonetheless slavery had its impact across the nation and in all of our laws. And, and so it will be interesting because if California can, can do this study and realize that there was an impact as this far away from the East coast to the West coast, you can only imagine also the impact that it had in those areas where there are slave, where there was slavery and where their work truly monuments are resurrected, uh, in, in, in, um, in honor of that particular, uh, negative aspect of our history. Speaker 2: 06:01 So we say this is a unique opportunity to help the rest of the nation began to grapple with the issue of racism and slavery and the impact that it still has on the academic and educational achievement of African-American's. And begin to talk about repairing that. What kind of reparations do you think might be appropriate for California to offer? Well, this is one of the things that, that the, the, um, hopefully the commission will grapple with, uh, in terms of, of what would really have an impact. You know, some people say, Oh, does doesn't mean everybody is $20,000? Well, after 4,400 years of, of degradation, enslavement and opportunities lost and so forth and so on, is that the answer, you know, um, I'm an educator. So naturally, you know, of me, top of the list is education. So you know, that everybody kind of knows that about me, but that may not be the only thing that people need to look at. Speaker 2: 06:51 We may need to look at how, uh, people lost homes. So maybe we need a program, but talk about home ownership because clearly home ownership is the first step into wealth in California. Most of folks who have all their wealth is built into their home. Uh, if you don't own property, you can't amass equity. And therefore sometimes the issues of loans or grants, or even financing your kids' education or whatever it may be is not available to you because home ownership is so low in some communities. And we see how oftentimes different standards that applied, whether it was in Chicago or whether it's in LA or wherever it was to African-Americans with regards to trying to get home ownership and the difficulty that's there. Maybe we need something to begin to talk about repairing that, and basically encouraging in some way home ownership among African Americans. Speaker 2: 07:34 So, um, so there are a lot of things that people can think about. I mean, we, we, we have a tremendous opportunity, uh, because California is the fifth largest economy in the world. And, uh, and we have the ability and imagination to basically, uh, talk about it. We have the research institutions who can help us immensely when the task force is ready to make its recommendations. Do those recommendations have to be approved by the legislature. The recommendations will be done in a report, uh, probably accepted by the legislature and governor. Uh, and then the recommendations can be dealt with individually, like any other report that comes out. I have been speaking with San Diego state assembly woman, Shirley Webber. And thank you so much. I appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you for the opportunity. I'm excited about what we will discover Speaker 4: 08:25 The County dumped its plan to address climate change again, and is fashioning a new one. The action comes after court struck down three versions of the county's climate plan, six times in the last decade. Here's how County supervisor, Diane, Jacob put it. Speaker 2: 08:39 I just hope we get it right this time, way too much money spend spent way too much time has been wasted. So let's get it right this time. Speaker 4: 08:49 Joining me to explain the details is KPBS environment reporter Eric Anderson. Hi Eric. I'm Mark. Well, uh, what about the plan? Was the County sued over and what did the court eventually rule? Speaker 5: 09:00 Well, the County was sued because a environmentalist and even the state of California decided that the plan that the County had put forward, the third plan that they had developed in fact, uh, was not adequate. It was not up to task. It did not reduce greenhouse gas emissions. It did not account for a smart growth strategy. And, uh, one of the more controversial items in that plan was this idea of carbon credits. In other words, if there was development in the County that created greenhouse gas emissions, say a housing development in the back country where people have to drive to get to work, for example, uh, that creates greenhouse gas emissions and what the County wanted to do to kind of balance that, to set that off is to buy carbon credits basically by permission to pollute in the future. So they would be able to, to balance the scales if you will. And what the courts found was that, that that was not an acceptable plan. The county's plan would allow them to buy carbon credits anywhere in the world. And the court said, you just can't check up on whether or not the greenhouse gas emissions are being, uh, balanced in, in that kind of an idea. And, and so the court said, look, you can't do this. This is not an acceptable rule. You have to start over and try again. And I think that's where the County is now Speaker 4: 10:19 Buy some, uh, buy into some project or give some money to something that supposedly helps the climate in say, Brazil. And that's mitigates your problem here. Is that Speaker 5: 10:28 The idea? Yeah, that's the idea that they were working with and what local environmentalist were saying is, look, why don't you, why don't you, uh, if you have a project that creates greenhouse gas emissions, why don't you have a, what they call mitigation here in the County? So if you're creating all these extra miles traveled, that's creating greenhouse gas emissions. Maybe you support a project that bolsters a wetland somewhere in the County that, you know, absorbs and stores that, or maybe you support a project that bolsters a forest that can absorb carbon and, and sort of balance the scales if you will. And that's not what the County did at all. They said, look, we can offset these effects anywhere in the world, as you said, in a rainforest or Brazil or somewhere in the Congo. And the judge in the case said, look, that's this, this just is just as, too hard to check up on. There's no way to tell whether the carbon credits that you're buying somewhere around the world are going to have an impact. And in the meantime, California still has this increase in greenhouse gas emissions. And that runs counter to a couple of laws that are on the books in the state of California that require the state to roll back the amount of greenhouse gas emissions that are put into the atmosphere. Speaker 4: 11:45 Now, you spoke a bit about this, but tell me more about what the county's climate plan control. Speaker 5: 11:50 Sure. It's supposed to do a couple of things. Uh, under state, it's supposed to lay out how they're going to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. It's supposed to lay out how future development will take greenhouse gas emissions as part of the plan to reduce them. And then it's supposed to evaluate and quantify, uh, where the potential climate impacts will be as development occurs. Um, and the County really, uh, in its first three efforts to put together a County plan, you know, you know, over the last decade they've been, uh, all three of those plans have been rejected and the courts have said, uh, no, pretty strongly to this last one as well. And the County really hasn't come up a way to manage the smart growth or the development, the county's general plan accounts for smart growth. It asks for new developments to occur near existing services. But the County board of supervisors has consistently approved these developments that are away from County services in the back country that create many more greenhouse gas emissions than a smart growth plan. Speaker 4: 12:57 And what, and transportation is such a key element in all of this. They say that Speaker 5: 13:01 Transportation is responsible for up to 40 to 50% of the greenhouse gas emissions that the state creates. Uh, you may remember the state decided back in 2006 with AB, uh, 32, that it was going to try and really reduce sharply the amount of greenhouse gas emissions that state municipalities are responsible for. And that's what kind of kick started these, uh, this, uh, demand for climate action plans. And then, you know, the state followed up with legislation, uh, later that said, look, we have to reach these certain levels of greenhouse gas emissions on this tighter timeline. Uh, and that's where these climate action plans are really supposed to address the issue. They want to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, uh, by 2035. They want to reduce that even further by 2050. And if there is no plan in place, or if planning doesn't account for these greenhouse gas emissions, then it's hard for the state, uh, to reach that goal. And I think that's why you saw the state of California filed the Amicus brief, uh, against the San Diego County plan in this latest round of litigation. Yeah, the city of San Diego is a plan of the state Speaker 4: 14:11 It as a plan County plans to come. What's the practical impact of all these various plans on the activities of businesses, governments, all of us individually. Speaker 5: 14:19 Well, I think the impact varies depending on the municipality, but the overall impact is to soften the state's carbon footprint so that we don't put so much carbon into the atmosphere, uh, and that reduces the impact of climate change as we move forward. So, uh, I think that cumulatively, uh, when everyone is on board with a working plan, uh, the idea is that we'll allow the state to take steps on the path toward reducing their carbon footprint. Speaker 4: 14:48 I've been speaking with KPBS environment, Eric Anderson. Thanks, Eric Speaker 6: 14:53 Pleasure. Speaker 4: 15:04 I'm Mark Sauer with Maureen Kavanaugh. You're listening to KPBS mid day edition. The idea of being arrested and charged with sedition, which is conduct or speech inciting insurrection toward the established order, seems like a Relic from a century ago. That's because the federal sedition act established after world war one to quell critics of the war and the government was repealed by Congress in 1920, the San Diego city council finally got around to doing something similar this week, joining me to discuss the unanimous decision to abolish the city's seditious language ordinances. Jonathan Markovitz staff attorney with the American civil liberties union in San Diego. Welcome to midday edition. Thanks very much. We'll start with, uh, what the San Diego municipal code said about sedition. Speaker 6: 15:50 So it prohibited, um, words that have a tendency to create a breach of the public peace in the presence of other people that heart of the problem with the code is that it flagrantly violates the first amendment. Um, there is no requirement in the code that the language that's being used will incite violence, um, that it's likely to incite violence, that it is directed to inciting violence, um, or that imminent violence or imminent lawless action is a likely outcome of the speech. Um, so it is a ordinance that criminalizes really just pure speech. Um, but the other thing to say about it is that it's an ordinance that whatever the actual words are doesn't seem to have been enforced in a way that has anything to do with what sedition is traditionally thought of, which is an effort to overthrow the government. Um, sedition as enforced by the San Diego police department seems to have entailed things like officers who were displeased with, um, people who were playing rap music too loud, or people who insulted them. Speaker 6: 17:10 Um, there's really good, solid uncontroverted case law saying that contempt of cop is not a crime. Um, so the, the police for very, very long time have been arresting people or citing people, I'm sorry for really nothing more than pure speech. And that is again, just a flagrant violation of the first amendment. Um, one of the things that indicates just have starkly unconstitutional, this lie is, is that it appears that nobody in city government, um, had any interest in defending it. Um, as soon as the voice of San reported on it, the city pretty much everybody in city government seems to acknowledge that it was unconstitutional, that it was antiquated and that it should be repealed. And so it's great that it finally was the difficulty with that, I think is that that only goes for the, that only affects issues and people going forward. It doesn't affect the harm that the department and the city created by enforcing this blatantly unconstitutional law in what appears to be a racially discriminatory manner for a very long time, Speaker 4: 18:29 Right? There's evidence, the law in San Diego really affected people of color directly. Speaker 6: 18:34 The numbers that I've seen are the 30% of the people who were ticketed were, were black. Um, African Americans make up only about 6.5% of the city's population. Um, there were dozens of different officers according to the reporting, um, who issued citations under this law. It's just since 2013. So this appears to have really been a systematic, um, use of an unconstitutional ordinance. And one of the, the, I think really key questions is how did this happen? Speaker 4: 19:10 I was just going to say, what precipitated this? How did the law come about in San Diego? Speaker 6: 19:15 The law is, is a hundred years old. Um, I think voice of San Diego has done some reporting on it. It's a Relic of an era in which there was kind of unquestioned sense on the part of many government officials that it was permissible to do whatever you could do to quell dissent. Um, and I think that that, that understanding of what government authority was, is fortunately for the most part, a Relic of the past, Speaker 4: 19:47 Right. And why do courts allow it here? If it's a, if it's against the first amendment and unconstitutional, uh, why in the world, uh, didn't a defense attorney say, Hey, uh, raise these issues and stop these cases as they went forward. Speaker 6: 20:02 It's a really good question. And I think the answer probably has to do with the fact that the citations were issued as infractions rather than misdemeanors. So that meant that people weren't directly hauled into court. They weren't directly brought into the criminal justice system and they probably, they may not have had defense attorneys. Um, they, the, the way that I suspect this became a problem, a very serious problem for a lot of people who are resided, um, is if they were unable to pay their initial fines, um, if they were issued later warrant for that failure to, to pay fines or for failure to appear in court. Um, at that point there would have been probably some kind of judicial oversight, but when it was at the infraction level, I think that a lot could really escape judicial oversight Speaker 4: 21:00 In August. The police chief in San Diego told the officers to stop enforcing the seditious language law and, uh, the city attorney's not got any of these cases anymore. What does that tell you about the department's progress and updating antiquated models of policing that have disproportionately impacted people of color? As it said, Speaker 6: 21:19 I think the fact that there were so many citations issued for so many years suggests that there's very little progress. The fact that the, the chief ordered an end to enforcement and the city ultimately repealed the law is great, but I think it probably has to do with just how openly unconstitutional, blatantly unconstitutional and indefensible the ordinance was once the city was called on it. And once the police department was called on enforcement, I think they really just had no way to continue enforcing it. And, and repeal was the only thing that made sense. The fact that this is one of many kinds of biased policing that have been documented in the city in recent years by the San Diego state university study by, um, the campaign zero study, um, suggests that progress really is probably not the right term when thinking about the police department and racial bias. Speaker 6: 22:22 Um, I think that if we want progress, then this is a step. Um, the city, I think, needs to come to terms with the harm that it's inflicted on the people who were cited here. So I think that it needs at the very least to expunge people's records, it needs to refund any fines that they paid. It needs to look to see if there were secondary charges, failure to appear, failure to pay, um, and expunge those records and make people whole pay those fines back. I never return any funds to people. Um, but it also, I think, needs to take a serious look at decriminalizing other offenses that should have never been criminalized. It needs to look at, at traffic stops that are disproportionately affecting people of color. It needs to really take decriminalization much, much more seriously. Speaker 4: 23:17 Now, council members didn't want to stop with just overturning this. They want to investigate why it remained on the books for so long and why police were trained to cite people for seditious acts. Uh, that's pretty important, right? Speaker 6: 23:29 I think absolutely. I think that, that, again, this appears to have been a racially biased form of policing. It appears to have been a form of policing that really just targets behaviors that cops found, um, or that found to be unappealing. Um, and there should be an investigation to how this was allowed to happen. How were the police allowed to penalize people for nothing but pure speech for so long and were they trained to do it? Um, who trained them? What kinds of policies were in place that made this acceptable? Right? And I'll know both president Trump and his attorney general William Barr have urged federal prosecutors to charge those involved in violence at protests, with sedition that's alarm. Some us attorneys, even as Trump attacks the integrity of the election with lies about voter fraud bar went so far as to suggest CA Seattle's mayor, Jenny Durkan be criminally charged for allowing a police free protest zone for a time. What do you think about that? I think that that we're living in really troubling times and that the federal overreach and seeking to impose criminal penalties on people who are engaged in peaceful protest really strikes at everything that make the democracy possible. I've been speaking with Jonathan Markovitz staff attorney with the American civil liberties union in San Diego. Thanks very much. Thank you. Speaker 7: 25:19 I spoke earlier today about a landmark reparations bill authored by assembly woman, Shirley Webber, and signed into law yesterday. By governor Newsome on this November's ballot, voters will consider another proposal from San Diego assembly woman Weber proposition 16 is asking California voters to bring affirmative action back to public schools and government work. California eliminated the policy in 1996 by passing another proposition, prop two Oh nine KPBS reporter Shalina Chatwani explains that supporters of prop 16, say it would help balance the scales, but some critics say it could hurt in the 1950s when she was a young girl assembly woman, Shirley Weber's family, moved from hope, Arkansas to Los Angeles. They had to her father, a sharecropper had a target on his back. He was going to be lynched that the talk in the town was that he was one of these uppity Negroes. He fought for himself here on the San Diego state university campus Weber recalls how she escaped persecution and eventually helped start SDSU Africana studies department. She was driven by her desire to work hard and fight like her father, but she had help. I went to grad school because I was a black student. So that was an affirmative action program for a poor kid like me versus when California banned affirmative action in 1996, poor underserved minorities were left because state institutions could not develop programs specifically for, Speaker 8: 26:48 We can't develop a teacher training and a program of recruitment for new teachers based on race. And the improvement of my schools is contingent upon getting teachers who understand the kids. Speaker 7: 26:58 Opposition 16 asked voters to strike the non-discrimination language in the state's constitution. But critics say that won't help with inequality. In the years, following the civil rights movement, affirmative action was seen as a next step to reverse centuries of racism, but California passed proposition two Oh nine, which said public institutions and government work should grant no preferential treatment based on race, sex, ethnicity, or national origin. Speaker 9: 27:24 You know, you can't give preferential treatment to one group without discriminating against another group. Speaker 7: 27:30 Harriet is a professor of law at the university of San Diego. She says, she's one of the lead donors to the no on prop 16 campaign. We met at her home in Kensington, Speaker 9: 27:43 Just go cold Turkey. You're not going to fix things by saying, well, we used to discriminate this way. Now let's discriminate that way. Speaker 7: 27:52 The yes on prop 16 campaign are use recent protests against police brutality reflect how law enforcement treats black and Brown people differently from white people. But Harriet says you can't solve discrimination with discrimination. Speaker 9: 28:07 That just perpetuates it forever. Yeah. Speaker 7: 28:09 And she says, underserved communities have done better. It's true. The UC California system has seen an increase in students of color since 1999. The percentage of Latinos has doubled and the black population has gone up by just under one percentage point. She says, it's not helpful. When students are admitted into schools, they aren't prepared to compete at. Speaker 9: 28:29 It's a good thing. When students attend colleges, uh, where their academic credentials put them in the ballpark with the rest of the students, Speaker 7: 28:36 But there are still disparities while Latinos and blacks make up around 46% of California's population. They're only a third of the undergrad, UC California system. Autumn Arnett says that's because with or without affirmative action, we live in a racist society. We're not really good at acknowledging who we were discriminating against. She's an independent education equity researcher in Austin, Texas. So we know that across industries, whether education or employment that white women have been the greatest beneficiaries of affirmative action, one 1995, California Senate committee study found that after decades of affirmative action, it was white women who ended up gaining most managerial jobs, not the people of color who were supposed to be elevated black and Brown people have still not been able to seeing their levels of representation, increased proportionate to their population. Numbers are not says, it's one thing to create a policy, to give people of color, more opportunities. But once they get to school or get to the job, they have to be given the support to succeed. People are absolutely getting more opportunities, Speaker 10: 29:42 Right? You absolutely can't say whites only college. That attractors though, are that maybe we didn't help the people that we set out to help as much as we needed to Speaker 7: 29:53 That says real progress can only happen when everyone commits to moving toward a more equitable society, backers of prop 16, say passing the proposition doesn't mean the work is done, but it's certainly a start opponents say, affirmative action is a necessary. And the work to level the playing field is already happening. Joining me is KPBS reporter Shalina Chatwani and Shalina welcome to the program. Hey, glad to be here. What would prop 16 actually do? I mean, does it outline how affirmative action programs should work in schools and government? So what Speaker 10: 30:30 Prop 16 would do is to revoke proposition two zero nine and the California constitution. So that is explicitly what it would actually do. Um, so prop two Oh nine was a response, um, in 1996, by the California legislature to affirmative action, um, voters overwhelmingly over 50% of voters decided that it would be better than having preferential treatment based on race, gender, national origin, ethnicity, to instead say, you know what, we're going to be color blind. We're going to be sex blind and no public institutions. And no universities should consider these factors at all in their recruiting or admissions processes or work hiring processes. So what this specifically would do is reverse the prop two Oh nine ban on affirmative action and allow institutions to develop programs based on preferential treatment for race, but more so to target people of color or women specifically in hiring and recruiting processes. Speaker 7: 31:44 Since the expert you interviewed says the old affirmative action programs did not primarily benefit people of color. Why does supporters of prop 16? Think this time it will. Speaker 10: 31:56 Yeah. So the argument is a little bit more nuance than that. So the expert says affirmative action was absolutely helpful in the sense that it did help people of color because people in the country could no longer say, okay, whites only college or male only college, or we want to hire white men specifically in this firm that became illegal to do that was the thing you could not do anymore. And that's in that came after the civil rights movement, because we recognized that we didn't go far enough to just say, Hey, you do, you should be segregate because the human nature at the time to remain segregated. And so formative actions to say, you know what? You absolutely just cannot do that. So it did help people of color. But the experts point is to say we very much do still live in a racist society that does give preferential treatment to a white men in particular and, and white people in general. And so what did end up happening with affirmative action is that, uh, you know, one study said that, you know, it was white women in the end who ended up gaining most of the managerial jobs in California, not the people of color who it was intended for, but they did gave more managerial jobs. So there was a higher net benefit, but more of that net benefit went to white women. And that would also check out in, in college applications as well. Speaker 1: 33:31 What is the main concern of people who oppose prop 16? Speaker 10: 33:35 The main concern is essentially a reverse discrimination argument, which is that if you give preferential treatment to one race, you essentially are discriminating against other races. Or if you give preferential treatment to one gender, you're discriminating against another gender. And so the argument is you can't solve discrimination with discrimination, um, because you can't have an equal society. There's a concern. Speaker 1: 34:03 And among members of the Asian American community, that affirmative action will decrease the number of spots open to them at elite schools. What is that argument? Speaker 10: 34:14 Yeah. So there's a lot of Asian Americans that are part of the, no on prop 16 base who say admissions into college, um, and recruiting into high level jobs. Public sector jobs should not be based on race, but rather on merit. And so particularly Asian Americans who have historically done very well in school, take lots of AP classes, get into very elite schools, say we should not be discriminated against because we work hard. Our chance to be admitted into a school should not be taken away and given to a student of a particular race who might not have as good of scores because maybe they didn't earn them. Um, and so there are a lot of Asian Americans that are in within that base who say, don't take away our opportunities just because we're not black or Latino. Speaker 1: 35:09 Does the polling look like for prop 16? Does it look like it has the support to pass? Speaker 10: 35:13 It's still a little unclear at this point. So the Los Angeles times reported back in September on a public policy Institute of California poll that around 31% of likely California, California voters said they would vote for the proposal. Well, 47% said they oppose it. And the remainder of 22% were undecided. So while it looks like the majority of voters Speaker 11: 35:38 Are opposing it, um, they're still at 22% that could flip it the other way. So I think we'll have to wait until a little bit closer to election day to really know Speaker 3: 35:50 I've been speaking with KPBS reporter Shalina Chatwani and Shalina thank you. Speaker 12: 35:54 Yeah. Thanks. Speaker 3: 36:07 KPBS midday edition. I'm Maureen Kavanaugh tonight, both the GI film festival and the San Diego Italian film festival kickoff, their online programming, the Italian film festival will be running all month KPBS, film critic, Beth hock, Amando previews the festival with its artistic director, Antonio [inaudible] and executive director. Deanna Augustini. The festival has revised their tagline from being an Italian perspective to saying an activist Italian perspective. So what does that mean for this year's films? Speaker 12: 36:42 It means that we really believe that the Italian movies are movies that can be used as a perspective to talk about issues and problems that are important for Italians and also for people for Americans as well. And so we selected the movies having in mind, this general theme activism this year is an election year. We really believe that everybody needs to do their part and, but our movies are not going to be just about politics or immigration, but also about art also about disability, also about gender inequality, also about inclusion, all our movies. And also most of our shorts are going to deal with social justice issues. So that are very relevant in contemporary Italy in Italy today, but also believe us in, in America today. Speaker 11: 37:38 Well, what I was going to add is that oftentimes when it comes to activism, some people might be automatically going to documentaries or something related yes. To strictly to politics or, and, uh, when we, you will see the Italian perspective that we're bringing in definitely has that component for sure, but also through our comedies and through some other documentaries, it brings a different type of, um, lens. So that of being an activist in your everyday life, which is what we hope also, our audience can take out of this. Speaker 3: 38:17 First of all, we'll be kicking off this Thursday with a film called it will be chaos. So I have to say that is kind of a fun, daring and exciting way to launch the festival this particular year. So what can you tell me about Speaker 12: 38:31 It will be chaos in particular is an extraordinary about migration crisis migration crisis in Europe, but of course also in Africa, and of course also in the middle East, in particular, in this movie, we're going to follow a family fleeing from Syria and trying to reach, you know, easily. And then, and then Europe, uh, the two directors Filippo Piscopo Lorena channel are two Italian independent filmmakers that have been living in New York city for, I don't know, 20 or so. And yes, so we start Thursday night. Our audience will be able to watch the movie for three nights, Thursday night, Friday night, Saturday night, uh, and then Sunday morning at 11:00 AM. We will host the Q and a conversation with the Filippo Lorina, joining us from new Yorker on zoom and, uh, be able to have our usual Sunday morning conversation with the two with the two directors. So I'm very excited about that. And, uh, we thought that this was the perfect movie with the perfect title to start the, you know, this particular, uh, festival. Speaker 13: 39:51 I had the pleasure of seeing a, I think it would be called the docu film or docu drama on Caravaggios that you guys showcased. And this year you are looking to another famous artist Michelangelo. Yes, Speaker 12: 40:03 Absolutely. So I'm, I'm glad that you mentioned Caravaggio because, uh, this movie as well, Michelangelo, Michelangelo and Dulles is made by the same team, the same team in terms of, uh, production and idea behind the it's another extraordinary movie about an extraordinary artist for us. Our activism is of course about social justice, but also about art because art has the power to transform our lives and as also the power to transform an artist's life. And we are going to see an experience that, uh, for Michelangelo, what we're going to see with Michelangelo is a, is a sort of documentary bio Pico reinvented because we're going to have two actors, one plane in all the Michelangelo, remembering his life and work. And on the other side, we're going to have a scholar, a historian that wrote a book about the Michelangelo and all the other artists in Renaissance, Italy that is going to tell us also, you know, insightful information. And what is really extraordinary about the movie is the ability of seeing his work of art in a way that we never experienced before. We're going to see the Sistine chapel before it was, uh, you know, uh, reinvented by Michelangelo. And then we're going to see me can Angelo at work, uh, with that, we're going to see Michelangelo's work with the, with the, with the David. So it's quite the quite extraordinary, but also very informative, Speaker 3: 42:04 Kind of emphasizing and even more international flavor to the Italian film festival is Bangladesh, which gives us a kind of an Asian perspective through Italy. Speaker 11: 42:14 So of course we also looked for comedies that would still fit the bill of the activism piece. And so Bangla was just perfect. It's, uh, it deals with, um, identity identity in terms of, uh, where your traditions from your family, where you're born, where do you feel you belong? And the struggle between that? So a very young director Fiheem who is also the main character of the, um, in the movie is of a Bangladeshi heritage. And, but he was born and raised in Rome. He has a thick Roman accent. He's 22. He lives in, uh, one of the most, um, diverse neighborhood, uh, in Rome. And he's, you know, he's a musician, he plays in a band. He, um, hangs out with his friends, does all the things that Italian youth would do. Uh, at the same time, his family is very traditional Bangladeshi family, and so very rooted in, uh, their own, um, identity. Speaker 3: 43:23 I had the privilege of being a judge for the restreto program. So talk a little bit about the shorts program you're running. Speaker 12: 43:28 Yes. We've been, uh, wanted to do that for many years. And finally, last year we started with this, um, a ward. So we, we ask everybody, everybody here in the States, you need Ellie in the ward to participate to the competition, um, with the criteria that, uh, either you need to have, you need to be, you know, an Italian director or deal with any Italian, Italian or Italian American theme this year as well. We put in the, uh, call for submissions, a precise emphasis on social justice themes. In other news this year is the audience award. So whenever you watch a movie on our digital platform, you can score the shorter. And that's very important for us because we really want to engage our audience as much as possible. Speaker 3: 44:25 That was Beth Armando speaking with Antonio Ionata and Deanna Augustini of the San Diego Italian film festival. The festival will offer a film and discussion each week in October.