Audio Postcards

Father and Son Bond as Shipmates
The California Report, 10/26/12
Fathers and sons often bond over Little League ballgames or summer camping trips. For reporter Chris Richard and his son Sam, it's volunteering together as deckhands on two tall ships owned by the Los Angeles Maritime Institute. Chris filed an audio postcard from aboard the Irving Johnson during a recent tall ship festival in Orange County.
(4:58)

Health

Sobering Center Offers Homeless a Second Chance
The California Health Report, 4/17/17
A new sobering center in Los Angeles' skid row offers alcoholics a safe place to sober up and guidance on the path to sobriety.

State Refuses to Identify Hospitals It Says Have Harmed Patients
The California Health Report, 10/15/14
The California Department of Health Care Services is withholding information on medical errors that have resulted in nearly $750,000 in Medicaid reimbursements being withheld from hospitals. DHCS officials say they're protecting patient privacy, but health care activists say disclosing the information would make patients safer.

Student Nurses Fight to Curb TB on LA's Skid Row
State of Health, 9/19/13
A scourge in much of the world, tuberculosis has long been seen in this country as a relic of the past. In 2011, the most recent year for which national statistics are available, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported slightly more than three cases per 100,000 people.
But TB persists among the homeless. And on LA’s Skid Row, where crowding and unsanitary conditions help spread the disease, it’s made an alarming advance. A group of UCLA student nurses have joined the fight to root out the contagion.

Health Cures with False Ingredients Turn the Desperate into the Defrauded
The California Report, 6/21/13
Whenever a person seeks treatment for an illness, some amount of trust is involved. You trust that the medicine you buy at the store won’t make you sick; you trust that the medical provider has your best interest at heart.
Sometimes neither of those things is true.
Increasingly, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is seeing purported health cures that include surprise ingredients.
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School Health Centers No Longer Just for Students
The California Report, 4/29/13
Lack of access to health care is a national problem, but especially in poor neighborhoods like South Los Angeles. That has negative effects on the readiness of students to learn at school -- but there simply aren't enough clinics and hospitals to meet the local need. Now, a program on Los Angeles Unified School District campuses provides health care to both students and their families.
(4:06)

Business

Can Your Razor Blade Spy on You?
The Christian Science Monitor, 11/6/03
Civil libertarians are wary of a technology originally designed to track merchandise.

Textile Industry Repossessions
Marketplace, 8/10/01
A rising dollar and growing foreign competition has put a snag in the U.S. apparel business, and equipment repossessions are increasing.
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Celebrity Sports Stories Hide Sales Pitches
Marketplace, 8/14/01
Pharmaceutical companies pay sports celebrities to promote their products in news interviews and public service campaigns.
(4:48)

Trends

ESL Classes Struggle as Budgets Are Cut
The California Report, 1/16/13
In a state with as many immigrants as California has, English class offerings at public schools are perennially popular. But budget cuts have decimated many of those programs.
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Humor

Riverside is Insulted
Marketplace, 10/14/03
Fox Television pokes fun at Southern California's hinterland, much to the annoyance of Riverside politicians and business leaders.
(5:05)

Can an Advertisement be Defamatory?
Marketplace, 4/20/00
A pizza company's ad triggers a legal battle over the line between acceptable exaggeration and defamation.
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