Governor Gavin Newsom has signed a package of education bills introduced by State Senator Anthony Portantino, who represents the Pasadena area. The legislation addresses critical issues facing California schools, including the opioid epidemic, language barriers in special education, and truancy policies.

Regional nonprofits that serve Californians with developmental disabilities will now be required to make their records publicly available on request as part of a bill Gov. Gavin Newsom signed into law on Saturday.

hen it rolled out last year in eight counties, CARE Court took aim at one of the state’s most vexing challenges: how to treat people whose illness often makes them believe they are not sick and who, if left untreated, can oscillate between jails, hospitals and homelessness.

The State of California hosted the first-ever community forum on discrimination, hate and crime against adults and children with disabilities on Thursday, September 27, in Oakland with statewide access via livestream. 

Long COVID patients and advocates in the Bay Area have spent years pushing for a concerted effort toward research, prevention and a cure.

They’re now hopeful that the increasingly widespread chronic condition that follows many COVID-19 infections will soon be better understood, thanks to legislation introduced Friday in the House of Representatives that would provide $10 billion in funding for long COVID research and education.

This November, voters will consider Proposition 36, “The Homelessness, Drug Addiction, and Theft Reduction Act,” which increases penalties on retail theft crimes and classifies certain drug offenses as treatment-mandated felonies. What voters may not realize is that Prop. 36 could lead to forced treatment and mass incarceration of people living with disabilities, exacerbating the already compounding health inequities faced by communities of color.

A bill before Gov. Gavin Newsom would force the group of regional nonprofits that serve Californians with developmental disabilities to comply with the same transparency laws as state agencies, allowing nearly 450,000 people with disabilities to access certain records and information related to their care for the first time.

A cluster of long-vacant buildings at a sprawling state hospital in Norwalk could soon be transformed into housing for people living with mental illness.

Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a bill over the weekend allowing L.A. County to lease seven unused structures at Metropolitan State Hospital for new mental health housing and services.

In recent weeks, proponents of Proposition 36 have drastically shifted their messaging. Initially, they claimed crime, including retail theft, was out of control and something they needed to urgently address. But with report after report debunking their claims, they have abandoned their original “tough on crime” message for a more sympathetic message of a “mass treatment” approach.

Rev. Mahsea Evans opened Sacramento’s third annual Solidarity Summit on Homelessness with a welcoming speech and a secular prayer on Sept. 7 at the First United Methodist Church in Midtown. The summit highlighted the ties between affordable health care and rental housing, harm reduction versus punishment and the needs of the Black unhoused community. 

Prop 36 would Increase drug crime and theft penalties and allow a new class of crime to be called “treatment-mandated felonies,” which also require some offenders to participate in drug and mental health treatment.

Nearly 50 residents at Camp Resolution –  a homeless campsite in North Sacramento since 2022 – were forced out of the area by Sacramento police on Monday, Aug. 26. The City of Sacramento had a lease agreement with Safe Ground Sacramento for the property located at 2225 Colfax St., which ended Aug. 10. 

During Zuleima Baquedano’s first year as a teacher, she faced an important choice. One of her students had difficulty controlling her emotions. One day, she had a meltdown and kicked Baquedano down. The principal asked Baquedano if she wanted to call the police, because the incident legally counted as assault. But not long before, the student had moved in with her family after being in and out of foster care, was beginning the diagnostic process for her disability and had been working with Baquedano on coping mechanisms. 

The West Los Angeles College website boasts that the Culver City campus is located on 70 acres overlooking Marina Del Rey and Greater West Los Angeles, with views of the Pacific Ocean on a clear day. But the topography’s visual blessing is a curse for students who have limited mobility.

In Oakland, you might be caught for using someone else’s Costco membership — but not for displaying a disabled parking placard that was not issued to you. Oakland stopped actively enforcing disabled parking placard fraud completely after the pandemic. That means anyone who illegally uses someone else’s placard or displays a counterfeit one will not get fined. Citations for the infraction dropped from 931 in 2019 to 14 in 2023, a 98% decline.

After eight years of litigation, a federal judge has ordered West Los Angeles College to provide on-campus transportation for two students by the start of the fall semester. The ruling may have broader implications.

On July 29, 2024, a federal judge ordered West Los Angeles College (WLAC), part of the Los Angeles Community College District (LACCD), to restore a transportation assistance system to provide access for two disabled student plaintiffs, Charles Guerra and Karlton Bontrager, to WLAC's steep, hilly campus by the start of the Fall 2024 semester. 

For deaf adults like Peterson, finding work isn’t easy. Either they take a position that requires little person-to-person communication, or their employers must hire a sign language interpreter, which can cost a business more than a hundred dollars an hour. Once hired, some deaf adults say they struggle to attain promotions or feel a sense of belonging at work, especially when there are few other deaf people around. 

The Illinois Answers Project found jail staff are restraining people in chairs in ways that often violate policies and last longer than recommended by manufacturers.

 Disability Rights California said this week it condemns the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in the Grants Pass v. Johnson case that allows local governments to ban sleeping outside because the decision inflicts harm on people with disabilities.