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DeVone Boggan could teach a class on the art of making a statement. In 2010, he invited a group of the most dangerous gun offenders in Richmond, a Bay Area city of about 100,000 residents, to a conference room at City Hall. At each seat was a name card starting with “Mr.” and an information folder labeled “Operation Peacemaker.” Wearing a suit and his signature fedora, Boggan began the meeting by apologizing on behalf of the city for not reaching out to the men sooner. Peace in Richmond, he...

The California Department of Social Services, Office of Child Abuse Prevention is hosting a series of meetings around the state to release the updated version of Vehicles for Change. Vehicles for Change has been the primer for family resource center and family support practice since it's creation in 2000. Attend a regional convening to learn more about the updated version 2.0, and share your wisdom about how ACEs can be integrated into the State's family support and child abuse prevention...

A coalition of California tribal governments, including two from the North Coast, say the state has taken a ‘monumental’ step toward addressing systematic failures to protect tribal civil rights in child custody cases. The tribes’ comments Friday came after members of a tribal government task force presented California Attorney General Xavier Becerra with a report two years in the making detailing longstanding compliance issues with the U.S. Indian Child Welfare Act. The report drafted by...

On Wednesday, March 22, I had the opportunity to attend a community gathering in Marin County that was convened by their Health and Human Services Department. The event was a “Learning Lab” where ideas and innovation are explored to see if there might be a better way of caring for and working with vulnerable members of the community. The gathering — Networking Breakfast: Addressing Adverse Childhood Experiences and Building Resiliency — was located at the Marin County Office of Education and...

In recent years, the idea of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) has gained traction in child-serving organizations as a way to understand behavioral issues and poor health outcomes faced by children with traumatic life experiences, such as abuse, neglect or household dysfunction, like having an incarcerated parent. The growth of trauma-informed services is part of a continuing push to help children overcome these experiences. But some advocates say that until communities and individuals...

For years, local politicians, county health officials and health care professionals have been talking about making Sonoma County the healthiest county in the state by 2020, a goal that is at the heart of numerous local health, education and socio-economic initiatives. In 2011, Sonoma County ranked 12th among 56 California counties surveyed in the first County Health Rankings by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. It took three years for the county to break into the top 10, reaching eighth.

State laws that encourage alternatives to school-based policing in California may have done little so far to decrease the number of students funneled into the school-to-prison pipeline, but a bill introduced in January aims to change this through policy enforcement and data collection. Current state law requires California schools to collect data on police and student interactions to be submitted to the Department of Justice upon request. In reality, the law’s enforcement mechanisms are...

A bill in Sacramento would make California the first state in the country where drug users could be provided with a place to inject. The bill's author says the measure is aimed at reducing overdoses and other problems caused by drug abuse. "In the U.S. we have criminalized rather than treated addiction as a medical or social issue," said Assemblywoman Susan Eggman (D-Stockton). "Our prisons are full of people suffering from issues of addiction. Being able to provide a safe place for someone...

Do you want to know how kids in your area are really doing? Then the 2016–2017 California County Scorecard of Children’s Well-Being is the tool for you. The Scorecard evaluates children’s well-being across California’s 58 counties, and organizes the data into categories of health, education, and child welfare and economic well-being. The Scorecard has a number of features that local leaders find particularly useful, including: The County Comparison , which allows for county-to-county...

Sens. Ricardo Lara, D-Long Beach, and Holly J. Mitchell, D-Los Angeles, coauthored eight equity and justice bills, four of which focus on young children in California’s juvenile justice system and another four that target injustices in the adult prison system. Among the bills is Senate Bill 190, which this week was approved by the Senate Public Safety Committee. The measure would eliminate administrative fees faced by families with children in a youth detention or youth probation facility.

Editors Note: In the first of two articles based on a new report by EdSource titled “Early Learning Time: Accessing Full Day Preschool and Kindergarten in California,” we examine the state’s progress in providing full-day preschool and the current financial disincentives to offering a full-day program built into the way California funds these programs. In part two, we will look at full-day kindergarten. Despite continuing efforts to expand learning time for young children, large numbers of...

Vonya Quarles grew up in South Los Angeles and describes herself as a third-generation convicted felon. But by the time she took the microphone at a Highland town hall meeting in January 2016, she was a lawyer and executive director of a Riverside County nonprofit that helps connect the homeless, formerly incarcerated and mentally ill to transitional housing. [For more of this story, written by Jazmine Ulloa, go to ...