Homeless woman’s case sharpens focus on justice system and mentally ill

By | July 24th, 2015|Health, Police & Community|

The list of Trishawn Cardessa Carey’s prescriptions fills a page in her case file: clonazepam for seizures and panic, methocarbamol for muscle spasms and quetiapine for spells of psychosis. She suffers delusions, paranoia and “dramatic mood swings.”

For years, the homeless woman has lived off Social Security tied to her mental disability — a doctor diagnosed

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San Francisco slaying upends immigration debate in 2016 presidential race

By | July 24th, 2015|Immigration|

The immigration debate in the 2016 presidential campaign unfolded along familiar lines: Republicans called for greater border security and Democrats called for expanded rights for those in the country illegally.

All that changed one blue-sky day at Pier 14 on San Francisco’s world-famous Embarcadero. A 32-year-old woman was killed July 1 while strolling with her father

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Milestone for Disability Studies

By | July 24th, 2015|Disability|

The University of Toledo is starting the nation’s first full undergraduate major in disability studies, an interdisciplinary field that already has considerable scholarly interest and graduate options.

A generation or two ago, students interested in disabilities “had to invent our own programs,” finding faculty members in various disciplines who had an interest in the subject, said

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L.A. County task force suggests ways to divert mentally ill from jails

By | July 23rd, 2015|Police & Community|

Cutting the number of mentally ill inmates in Los Angeles County’s jail system would require spending tens of millions of dollars on new treatment facilities and housing for offenders who would otherwise be released into homelessness, a long-awaited report concludes.

A task force of public officials and mental health advocates convened by Los Angeles County Dist.

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Parents of grown children with developmental disabilities worry about future

By | July 23rd, 2015|Disability|

The doctors told Elizabeth Criss that a child with her daughter’s disorder would only live until she was 8.

She would suffer from seizures, the doctors said. She would likely be unable to communicate and would have problems with her vision.

Almost all of that was true, except Emily Criss is now 29.

“We never expected she would

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Most Undocumented Immigrants Will Stay Under Obama’s New Policies, Report Says

By | July 23rd, 2015|Immigration|

Under new immigration enforcement programs the Obama administration is putting in place across the country, the vast majority of unauthorized immigrants — up to 87 percent — would not be the focus of deportation operations and would have “a degree of protection” to remain in the United States, according to 

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No room at the inn for innocence

By | July 22nd, 2015|Employment & Housing, Police & Community|

The children gather at dusk on the pitted motel parking lot, hard against the sound wall of the freeway. They kick a scuffed soccer ball and play with the stray dogs they have rescued. One holds a cockroach he pretends is a pet turtle.

Eddie Martinez, 14, rides his bike among them, happy they are

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A dose of reality on homelessness

By | July 21st, 2015|Employment & Housing|

Four years ago, after a long and desperate search for housing in San Francisco, I moved my daughter into a studio apartment on a seedy stretch of Market Street, between a tavern and what police described to me as a “parolee hotel.”

For a few years, things went well. My college-student daughter learned to coexist with

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California’s children still struggle in poverty, new report says

By | July 21st, 2015|Intergroup Relations|

California’s children are more likely to have health care coverage, avoid teen pregnancy and live until adulthood, but many remain in poverty or with parents who lack secure jobs, according to a report released today.

That mixed assessment of the well-being of California’s youth means the Golden State ranks poorly when it comes to making programs

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