Tagged With "Bay Area"
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Advancing a Plan for Addressing Trauma and Building Resilience within L.A. County Systems (prnewswire.com)
Center for Collective Wisdom Releases Extensive Report Outlining Research and Recommendations First 5 LA, the California Community Foundation, The California Endowment, The Ralph M. Parsons Foundation and the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation along with other local, state and nationally-recognized expert organizations today released a report to advance a comprehensive trauma and resiliency-informed approach in Los Angeles County . "Trauma is a serious health concern affecting many children and...
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Anne Douglas celebrates her birthday at the skid row women's shelter that bears her name (latimes.com)
Anne Douglas could have celebrated her birthday at home in Beverly Hills with her husband, actor Kirk Douglas. Instead, she sat behind a silver-and-pink birthday cake Wednesday as women lined up, weeping, to embrace and thank her for starting the Los Angeles Mission's Anne Douglas Center for Women — one of skid row's first homeless shelters for women. "When I first encountered the women at this homeless shelter it was heartbreaking, and I was determined to make it better," said Douglas, who...
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At "Healing our Communities” conference in LA, youth, parents work with social service providers to impact change!
More than 300 people gathered for the 4th Annual Public Safety/Re-Entry, “Healing our Communities” conference in Los Angeles. The first three conferences were for USC students in the School of Social Work and people who provide social services in the LA area. This year the conference included youth and parents served by those providers. The community safety conference highlighted re-entry initiatives and programs in Los Angeles County organized by agencies such as Homeboy Industries, Project...
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Broadening Your Network and Identifying Partners for More Resilient, Healthier Communities
Who should you partner with to create lasting change through resilience in your community? The Building Community Resilience (BCR) initiative aims to address, prevent, and reduce the effects of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and adverse community environments (ACEs) on children’s health and wellbeing ( The “Pair of ACEs” ). An essential element of the successes of BCR’s five test sites around the country has been strategic collaborations. In your work to build resilience, identifying...
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California issues update on state residents' ACE scores from 2011 & 2013 surveys
The latest adverse childhood experiences survey from the California Department of Public Health shows that 42% of the population has an ACE score of 3 or higher; 16% have an ACE score of 4 or higher. Those with an ACE score of 4 or higher are: 3x more likely to be current smokers 4x more likely to have a depressive disorder 2x more likely to have asthma 2x more likely to be obese 4x more likely to have COPD 3x more likely to have a stroke Here are a few other highlights from the six-page...
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Changing Minds and Creating Trauma-Informed Communities Convenings - South and North
Last week, on two separate days in Los Angeles and in San Francisco, about 150 people (total) convened to listen and brainstorm about creating trauma-informed communities. Futures Without Violence, which is rolling out its Changing Minds campaign later this year, hosted both events. Some very interesting and important themes emerged from the two days: Residents with lived experiences should participate in the decision-making bodies of service providers and vested...
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Community Roundtable Launch - A rousing success!
The Los Angeles Trauma Informed Task Force launched their first Community Roundtable on Tuesday, July 14th, from 6:30 pm to 8:30 pm. A rousing success, their location was at City Council Member Mike Bonin's Westchester Field Office located at...
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Convenience Stores are Known for Chips, Candy and Soda But One Woman in Los Angeles Set Out to Create a Healthy Version of the Well-Loved Bodega. (nationswell.com)
That’s why LaRayia Gaston decided to fuse the low costs of bodegas with the health of Whole Foods. She launched LaRayia’s Bodega, a healthy take on the traditional convenience store. The store is part of Love Without Reason , a nonprofit started by Gaston about four years ago. Outside of the bodega, the nonprofit also provides vegan meals to people experiencing homelessness on Skid Row, a 50-block area with over 4,750 homeless individuals. Gaston and volunteers gather food from grocery...
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Coronavirus: First look at California's hospitalization data [mercurynews.com]
By Emily Deruy, Bay Area News Group, April 2, 2020 Santa Clara County trails San Diego and Los Angeles counties when it comes to the number of confirmed coronavirus patients who have been hospitalized. That’s according to a new searchable dashboard from the state , which offers a first look at how intensely COVID-19 is hitting hospitals in counties across the state. As of Wednesday, hospitals reported a total of 1,855 patients confirmed to have the virus. Los Angeles County, by far the...
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CYW releases "Children Can Thrive: A Vision for California's Response to ACEs"
The Center for Youth Wellness released a new report “Children Can Thrive: A Vision for California’s Response to ACEs”. This report is a follow up to last November’s Children Can Thrive Summit. ...
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Documentary, "Portraits of Professional CAREgivers" Airing on Public Television
CAREgivers film will be airing on most public television stations around the US beginning this month in Philadelphia, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Orlando, Cleveland, Spokane, Boise, Springfield-Holyoke, Youngstown, Idaho Falls, Twin Falls, Fairbanks, ETC. Please check your local public TV stations for future dates and times. Broadcast times will also be posted in advance whenever possible at: http://caregiversfilm.com/screenings/see-the-film/ This documentary addresses secondary trauma (aka...
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Early childhood educators learn new ways to spot trauma triggers, build resilience in preschoolers
A hug may be comforting to many children, but for a child who has experienced trauma it may not feel safe.
That’s an example used by Julie Kurtz, co-director of trauma informed practices in early childhood education at the WestEd Center for Child & Family Studies (CCFS), as she begins a trauma training session. Her audience, preschool teachers and staff of the San Francisco-based Wu Yee Children’s Services at San Francisco’s Women’s Building, listen attentively.
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Gentrification pushes up against Boyle Heights — and vice versa (latimes.com)
For years, Boyle Heights seemed a neighborhood cooped up in the still embryonic stage of gentrification, or "gentefication," a term coined to reflect change driven substantially by Latinos with roots in the Eastside neighborhood. Boyle Heights hasn't seen close to as much gentrification as Silver Lake and Highland Park, or even neighboring Lincoln Heights, with a mostly Mexican American community but more ethnic, racial and socioeconomic diversity and a bigger stock of wood-framed 19th and...
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How One Connection at CYW’s ACEs Conference Sparked Awareness into Action
Origins offers a number of training and consulting services. We developed The Basics as a half-day session to provide the foundation to support trauma-informed and resilience practices across sectors and industries. The session includes an overview of the Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) Study, the neurobiology of toxic stress, the impact of social and historical trauma, and the science of resilience. We have tested The Basics with two cross-sector audiences, in Los Angeles and Phoenix.
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How Social Workers Improve Relationships Between Police and Communities
by MSW@USC Staff In 1955 , the Los Angeles Police Department adopted the motto “To Protect and Serve,” and over the last seven decades, many other American law enforcement departments followed suit. But in the Black Lives Matter era, those words may not resonate with some members of the communities police are tasked with protecting and serving. Community members may feel law enforcement officials exercise more authority than necessary. How can both sides work to create a more positive...
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Immigrants fueled LA economy to tune of $232.9 billion in 2014 (dailynews.com)
A new report finds that immigrants in Los Angeles County contributed $232.9 billion to the region’s economy, nearly 35.7 percent of the area’s economic output. The report, “New Americans in Los Angeles,” breaks down immigrant contributions to the city of L.A. and to the county, providing a “snapshot” on a range of demographic factors, from education and labor participation levels. Backed by the city of Los Angeles, the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce, New American Economy – a bipartisan...
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Inside the California facilities holding children separated from their parents at the border (latimes.com)
In a quiet nook in the small city of La Verne, small cottages topped with Spanish tile are spread across a sprawling green campus. Long ago, it was an orphanage; now it’s a group home for foster kids. Recently, it also became one of several shelters in the Los Angeles area that quietly began to house kids who have been split from their parents at the border. It is now home to some of the children who were forcibly taken from their parents under President Trump’s “zero tolerance” immigration...
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ITRC 2018 California Conference: Preparing People for Climate Change in California
To See the Conference Agenda, List of All-Star Speakers, and To Register Click Here Why Should Californians Attend This Unique Conference ? From high levels of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs), to job and financial struggles, racism and other forms of inequity and injustice, traumatic stress is epidemic today. Climate change will aggravate all of these existing adversities, and add many new ones as well. Yet, California is leading the U.S. in finding innovative new ways to address...
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L.A. County supervisors vote to expand sheriff's mental health teams (latimes.com)
The Los Angeles County Sheriff ’s Department has long had specially trained teams to de-escalate confrontations with people who have severe mental illness, but after two decades, the agency has struggled to deploy mental health responders at all times of day or night because of funding and staffing shortages. The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors moved to fix that problem on Tuesday, voting unanimously to expand the number of employees assigned to the department’s Mental Evaluation...
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LA county leaders green-light construction of new mental health center in Valley (dailynews.com)
A $14.5 million project that will expand mental health services in the San Fernando Valley was approved unanimously Tuesday by the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors. The proposed new building will include outpatient mental health services, mostly for children, a waiting area, reception area, business offices, counseling/therapy rooms, and group therapy rooms, among other spaces. " The San Fernando Mental Health Center project will enhance the County's ability to provide mental health...
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With dramatic homeless increases, Redondo Beach works to help individuals (tbrnews.com)
Homelessness in Redondo Beach has tripled since 2013, causing the city to look deep into its pockets to see where representatives can help. The most recent survey from the Greater Los Angeles Area Homeless Count in January found 216 individuals in Redondo Beach, up from 165 in 2015 and 70 in 2013. The city accounted for 83 percent of the homeless population across the beach cities and El Segundo. At the most recent Redondo Beach City Council meeting, both police and the Los Angeles County...
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Working at the intersection of violence and land use (preventioninstitute.org)
This past September, the Healthy, Equitable, Active Land Use (HEALU) Network convened a summit in Los Angeles to explore the nexus of land use and community safety, drawing nearly 100 community members, policymakers, and representatives of community-based organizations. Our new report shares key learnings from this summit and invites people working in land use, transportation, food policy, education, housing, and other areas to consider the ways their own work can support safe communities.
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San Francisco Trauma Informed Systems Initiative 2014 Year In Review
The Department made the commitment to train all of its 9,000 staff to become trauma-informed. From the report: The Trauma Informed Systems Initiative Workgroup is led by Dr. Ken Epstein and currently staffed by a full time Coordinator, a team of 4...
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‘Seeing’ My Brother on the Venice Boardwalk (citywatchla.com)
HOMELESSNESS: A PERSONAL PERSPECTIVE--I lost my brother Steve last week. He died of cardiac arrest at 63. Steve was the black sheep of our family of six children. He did not go to college and struggled to make a living building decks and remodeling bathrooms and kitchens. If my parents had not let him live in a converted garage behind their house in Santa Monica, he would very likely have ended up like many of the folks we see living on the street in Venice – and he certainly would have died...
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SPARCC’s Six Regions | Igniting New Approaches to Equity & Opportunity (Robert Wood Johnson Foundation)
The Strong, Prosperous, And Resilient Communities Challenge – or SPARCC – is a three-year, $90 million initiative that will empower communities and bolster local groups to ensure that major new infrastructure investments lead to better opportunities for all. SPARCC is excited to announce its initial cohort of six sites, empowering communities to advance initiatives that lead to more equitable outcomes. SPARCC’s initial six sites are: Atlanta, Chicago, Denver, Los Angeles, Memphis, and the...
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Spirituality in Post-Traumatic Growth
One of the five domains of post-traumatic growth is spirituality. Helping us understand the role of spirituality in recovering from trauma at the Echo Frontiers of Resilience conference is Shaun Tomson . If you think the name and face look familiar then perhaps you know him from his days as a world champion surfer. Shaun needed every single one of the lessons he had learned about facing challenges in the form of towering waves and overcoming wipe-outs when he lost his 15-year-old son to a...
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States Produce a Bumper Crop of ACEs bills in 2017—nearly 40 bills in 18 states
A scan done in March by the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) through StateNet of bills introduced in 2017 that specifically include adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) in the text produced a surprising volume of bills (close of 40) in a large number of states (18). A scan done a year ago produced less than a handful. NCSL is a bipartisan organization that serves both state legislators and their staffs. The shear volume of bills in so many states represents a promising...
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Stretched thin, LA County’s mental health teams struggle to get patients out of jails and into hospitals (dailynews.com)
The 13-year-old held a knife against her throat one spring morning, looked her mom in the eyes and said she’d do it. In desperation, her mom called 911. It was the second time her daughter’s behavior forced her to dial the trio of digits, to reach out to strangers for help. But unlike the last time, the two Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies who responded weren’t alone. They came with social workers who are part of the Mental Evaluation Teams, a growing program that the public and many in...
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The Effects of Educational Disengagement
Introduction The need for a caring school culture that promotes a sense of connectedness and belonging is essential and must begin the day a child begins their educational experience. Yet, for those of us who work in alternative education environment, we often hear the all too common story of a school experience that didn't meet the students needs. Meeting the needs of a student is a broad connotation that can vary considerably depending on the school setting and the student describing the...
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This Zillow-like platform helps people find apartments for homeless people (fastcompany.com)
In Los Angeles, it’s now far simpler for nonprofits to find apartments to help people get off the street. For someone living on the street or in a homeless shelter in Los Angeles, the wait to get housing through the county’s Coordinated Entry program–a system that tries to connect people who are homeless with an apartment or house as quickly as possible–usually takes months, leaving a person waiting without a home. A new platform may help make the wait a little faster, by making it easier...
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Thousands participate in LA Homewalk to help end homelessness (dailynews.com)
Almost 12,000 people participated in Saturday’s 10th annual HomeWalk, setting a record, raising more than $1 million to help end homelessness, organizers said. Elise Buik, president and CEO of the United Way of Greater Los Angeles, and Pro Football Hall of Fame member Eric Dickerson spoke before the 5- kilometer walk/run held at Grand Park for the first time. It was previously held in Exposition Park. The Conrad N. Hilton Foundation matched every $5,000 a person or team raised with another...
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Venus and Serena Williams just opened a center for gun violence victims in Compton. (upworthy.com)
The two sisters just opened a safe haven for Compton residents affected by gun violence, which they're calling the The Yetunde Price Resource Center. The center’s mission hits close to home for the tennis stars: They were raised in Compton, California, and their sister, Yetunde Price, fell victim to gun violence in Compton in 2003. Serena Williams opened up about the trauma from the tragedy in 2009 and how therapy was vital in her recovery. The purpose of the center is simple: Community...
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Virtual Screening of Broken Places on March 21st & Registration for ACEs Connection Members!
Please join us on Thursday, March 21st for a special virtual screening of Broken Places , the latest U.S. documentary on early childhood trauma and resilience. The film will be offered via a private Vimeo link with passcode to all registered members of ACEs Connection, for free, accessible in the United States and internationally. REGISTER TODAY: To register, please visit : https://goo.gl/forms/apdoINwgtQmydEXK2 The viewing portal for the film will open on Vimeo at 6am EST and close at 11pm...
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Why mentoring matters, and what you can do for Los Angeles-area youth: Guest commentary (svgtribune.com)
The failure to engage the needs of inner-city boys is an ongoing American tragedy. Inner-city violence is causing death and injury that resonates with all it touches while burdening entire communities with the dread of daily insecurity. One third of those murdered in Los Angeles County are African American, who comprise only 8 percent of the population. This violence kills and scars the bodies and psyche of the men and women who are subjected to it. It is a tragedy that drains billions of...
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Wisconsin 5th graders make music video to a mindfulness hip hop song by SF Bay Area artist, Just Me
Wisconsin elementary-school teachers are incorporating simple mental exercises in the classroom to promote well-being, thanks to a partnership between the Madison Metropolitan School District and the Center for Healthy Minds at the Waisman Center, University of Wisconsin-Madison. The school's 5th graders recently made a music video for the song, "Don't flip yo' lid," by SF Bay Area hip hop artist, Just Me. The song's hook is, "mindfulness will change your life."
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Landmark lawsuit filed in California to make trauma-informed practices mandatory for all public schools
A landmark first step was taken today to insure that all public schools in the United States be legally required to address the unique learning needs of children affected by adverse childhood experiences. A class action suit on behalf of...
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Los Angeles County Trauma and Resilience Network One Pager
Attached find a 2018 version of Los Angeles County community profile detailing information about your community ACEs initiative. This will be shared with CA legislators at the Trauma-Informed Policymaker Awareness Day on May 22nd in Sacramento. I attach it here as a PDF ready to print and share! I also have uploaded into 'Resources for Downloading' the same PDF, and an editable Word document so that you can update or otherwise improve it. If you have any questions, don't hesitate to reach...
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Los Angeles Tests the Power of ‘Play Streets’ [nytimes.com]
LOS ANGELES — The temporary transformation of Fickett Street in Boyle Heights began with yellow shades resembling huge kites suspended over the sun-scorched asphalt. Soon, a thoroughfare known for its speeding vehicles and gang activity became something else entirely — a “play street” in which women gathered for Lotería, or Mexican bingo, and kids fashioned seesaws out of giant snap-together plastic shapes in colors inspired by local Mexican-American murals. There are roughly 7,500 miles of...
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New farmers market tackles South LA's 'food deserts' at a local hospital (scpr.org)
A farmers market opening Wednesday at the Martin Luther King Jr. Community Hospital in the Willowbrook neighborhood of South Los Angeles is the first in the county to open on a hospital campus. The hospital serves over a million people in an area with the highest death rate related to diabetes in the county. It's also an "amputation hotspot" due to complications from untreated diabetes. The new farmers market is part of their efforts to knock this area off the list of L.A's "food deserts"...
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New study shows stark difference in child poverty among Long Beach’s regions (presstelegram.com)
The Geography of Child Poverty in California, a report and interactive map compiled by the San Francisco-based Public Policy Institute of California, offers a trove of information on variations within counties, much of which had never previously been analyzed. Long Beach alone shows the wide gulf in poverty between areas: In East Long Beach, which includes Belmont Shore, Belmont Heights and the Cal State Long Beach area, 5 percent of children live in poverty and 2 percent live in deep...
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SAMHSA's Concept of Trauma and Guidance for a Trauma-Informed Approach
Years in the making, this important piece of the trauma-informed pie is on the table! Check it out.
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5 bright lights in LA County that are helping Latino students achieve [laschoolreport.com]
Despite making up the majority of California’s public school students, Latinos are still facing major challenges to achieving in school and graduating from college, a new report finds. But the report also highlights five bright spots in the LA County area — schools, districts, and programs that are helping Latinos succeed. In Los Angeles County, two school districts, a high school, and an early education center are modeling what needs to be done to close the achievement gap for Latino...
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A New Documentary About Breaking the Cycle of Trauma is Launching This Fall!
We are thrilled to announce the premiere of Wrestling Ghosts , a documentary about breaking the cycle of trauma, at the LA Film festival on Sept. 27th. “Incredible. Haunting and strange and beautiful and incredibly moving.” -Dan Cogan, Founder Impact Partners Wrestling Ghosts follows the epic inner journey of Kim, a young mother who, over two heartbreaking and inspiring years, battles the traumas from her past in order to create a new present and future for her and her family. In this...
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Re: ACEs Connection Parent Handouts
The list of ACEs is a bit broader than that used by the CDC study. Except for this, I really like these posters and plan to make copies to facilitate my discussions with parents of pediatric patients. I also plan to pass along to educators in my area.