Santa Cruz County News & Analysis Articles

Strikes by the Writers Guild of America and Screen Actors Guild have shut down Hollywood. As workers demand fair compensation and regulations on artificial intelligence, college students aspiring to break into the industry are caught up in the historic moment.

After a historic drop in enrollment during the COVID-19 pandemic, California community colleges are ramping up marketing efforts, spending more than $40 million in state and federal dollars to lure students back. Is it working?

Waste would undergo extensive treatment and testing before it’s piped directly to taps, providing a new, costly but renewable water supply. The state’s new draft rules are more than a decade in the making.

Three of the biggest housing bonds in state history are bound for the 2024 ballot. But with no shortage of crises facing the state, California can only borrow so much and voters may succumb to “bond fatigue.”

Renter protections and eviction bans put in place for the COVID-19 pandemic have expired. By keeping them in place, California could slow the spread of homelessness. But that's not happening.

Almost half of the jobs for doctors and psychiatrists in California prisons are unfilled. Now, their union says it’s ready to strike over pay even as the state faces a steep budget deficit.

California grants school boards much local control, but recent events have pushed the state to take steps to stop local school board meetings from turning into potentially dangerous culture war battlegrounds.

A new study shows women without legal residency face a lopsided pay gap. In California they take home 44 cents for every dollar that white, non-Latino men make and 87 cents for every dollar undocumented men make. Would raising the …

California still offers generous subsidies, but the rate hike signals that runaway health care costs are back after five years of low premium increases.

A workers comp study says one day above 100 degrees can cause 15 percent more accidents, costing workers and employers millions. A new advisory panel may help the state improve its work heat rules.

Transfer to a four-year institution is a benchmark for success among community colleges, but the numbers are low and disparities across the system persist, especially between colleges in rural areas and those in wealthy suburbs.

Many of the people who lost Medi-Cal are likely still eligible for health care coverage if they can get their paperwork to county offices in the next 90 days. Otherwise, the program that provides health insurance to low-income Californians just …

Through bidirectional charging, owners of electric cars can sell energy to the grid or use it to power their homes. But will the technology, which is costly, become widespread?

One California mental health crisis center grew its staff by almost 50 percent to handle that number of calls from people in need of counseling that it’s received since the state launched its 988 hotline a year ago.

Climate change caused by human use of fossil fuels is the major reason California wildfires have burned 172 percent more land than they would have over the last five decades, according to new research.

A new ban on flavored tobacco products is accelerating a decline in nicotine tax revenue that funds California’s early childhood services. Some programs are already making cuts.

Gov. Gavin Newsom wants to rethink how California spends its millionaires tax by directing more money toward housing. Some county-run mental health programs could lose out.

Los Angeles’ new homelessness solution is meant to quickly get people out of encampments and into housing—as the city grapples with the state’s largest population of unhoused residents. But the program is struggling to house people and connect them with …

The most sweeping bills to change California elections got shelved in the Legislature. Instead, lawmakers are focusing on ballot measure language, local redistricting, voting integrity and campaign finance tweaks before the 2024 election.

Housing First policy works to reduce homelessness, evidence shows. But in California the policy has proven ineffective. What is the state doing wrong?