New consumer spending patterns fuel investment in entertainment venues.
Future in Context
Future in Context
For populations that rely on social services, getting help has become difficult as the omicron variant spreads rapidly. But Pennsylvania’s York County officials are adjusting their services to distribute aid amid the risk.
The standoff between Chicago’s mayor and teachers’ union is raising issues ranging from the effective use of federal funding to how much we really care about our front-line workers.
From paid sick leave to corporate discrimination, lawmakers are enacting policies to balance businesses’ economic revitalization with ensuring worker safety as the coronavirus continues to spread across the state.
To address the persistent worker shortage, some lawmakers have suggested job training programs, increased affordable housing and child-care access and cutting taxes, but it is unknown which, if any, will be the final solution.
More than 300 employees are quarantining due to COVID exposure, stretching the city’s public transit and emergency response staff as they work to keep service schedules normal. The city’s 7-day new case average is 829.
More than 1 in 5 of those tested for COVID-19 last week in Los Angeles County were positive and each infected person is spreading the virus, on average, to two other people. The county had 21,200 new cases on Sunday.
In the two weeks following a cyber attack against the state’s Department of Health servers, more than 28,500 residents have tested positive. The system was taken offline as a precaution but not all data was restored immediately.
Preliminary CDC data shows that more than 1 in 4 COVID-related deaths in the state occurred since the start of July, when vaccines were easily available. The grand majority of those deaths were of unvaccinated residents.
The Valencia lab, a public-private venture between the state and PerkinElmer, processed only 1 to 8 percent of all Californians’ COVID tests in the first 10 months of the contract. And the lab was riddled with dozens of problems, according to an inspection report.
The city’s Department of Public Health will use more than $1 million to develop its own sequencing lab to more quickly determine the infecting variant of COVID, but it won’t open until June.
A new study found that population loss due to domestic migration out of California has more than doubled since the beginning of COVID-19. Entrances to the state have dropped 38 percent since March 2020.
Local criminal justice officials have called Gov. Kate Brown’s commutations of those at high risk for COVID-19 an overreach of executive authority. But many of those that were released quickly returned to prison for new crimes.
Gov. Ned Lamont announced that the state will soon release a voluntary digital vaccination verification system that local governments and businesses can enact as they see fit. The state will not reinstate a mask mandate.
The Los Angeles School District has struggled to increase school enrollment with a shortage of teachers and staff. That has left many students with disabilities without the assistance they need.
Vaccinations are rising in response to the new variant. While much is unknown, health officials hope the public — and politicians — will be inspired to get back to the basics of protection.
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