Feed aggregator

Lawmakers in at least a dozen states have proposed hiking taxes on the wealthy. By Kevin Hardy for Stateline While the idea of a special tax on millionaires is hotly debated across the country, Maine state Rep. Cheryl Golek characterized her state’s new tax as a modest and reasonable step toward fairness. That’s because, she said, working- and middle-class households in Maine…

Source

A Santa Cruz County cyclist is helping raise awareness about Parkinson’s disease in a unique – and strenuous – way: by joining other bikers in pedaling down the West Coast and across the desert to arrive at the seventh World Parkinson Congress, being held this year in Phoenix at the end of May.

David Kadotani, well known in South County as the longtime owner of Kadotani Auto Repair in Watsonville, will be joining the pack of riders in Half Moon Bay and continuing on to Phoenix. The riders maintain their own pace, averaging from 35 to 75 miles per day. 

Kadotani, 69, was diagnosed with Parkinson’s in May 2020. He joined a Santa Cruz County Parkinson’s support group, and later became board treasurer.

“Of course, everything was on Zoom at that point” because of COVID awareness, Kadotani said in a phone interview. “It was a couple years before I met a lot of these members in person.”

In preparation for the journey, Kadotani said he trains twice a week with a local group.

“The outdoor rides, we’re out there for about four hours, twice a week,” Kadotani said. He prefers riding outside instead of using a home trainer: “On an indoor trainer, it’s hard. You’re constantly pedaling. You can’t coast.”

The bike event – Pedal to Phoenix – is put on by the World Parkinson Coalition. It aims to raise awareness of Parkinson’s, highlight the importance of exercise for people with the disease and promote the World Parkinson Congress. 

The World Parkinson Congress is an international forum that brings together scientists, clinicians, healthcare professionals and people living with the disease.

Parkinson’s is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder that occurs when nerve cells in the brain die or become damaged. This damage reduces dopamine production, leading to movement problems and other issues. There is no cure, but extensive research has shown that exercise of any kind can forestall the symptoms. 

Teams of cyclists – some with the disease and others as support – from around the world will be cycling from various locations across North America to Phoenix.

Regardless of where the teams start, they all will meet at the welcome party in Phoenix on May 22. 

Kadotani’s group, Team West Coast, will be passing through Santa Cruz and Monterey counties on Tuesday, May 5. Supporters can gather to cheer them on and donate food and snacks from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Marina branch of the Monterey County Free Libraries, 190 Seaside Circle, Marina.

Have news that should be in Lookout Briefs? Send your news releases, including contact information, to news@lookoutlocal.com.

MORE LOCAL COVERAGE

The post West Coast to Phoenix: Pedaling to fight Parkinson’s appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

A month of eating across Santa Cruz County highlighted playful dishes, from a wild Tostilocos snack in Watsonville and indulgent French toast at a local coffeehouse, to sourdough with compound butter at Emerald Mallard, viral fruit-shaped desserts at Sugar Bakery and fresh spring rolls at Dharma’s Restaurant.

The post The best things I ate and drank in Santa Cruz County in April appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

As always, if you find value in this work I do, please consider helping me keep it sustainable by joining my weekly newsletter, Sparky’s List! You can get it in your inbox or read it on Patreon, the content is the same. Don’t forget to visit the Tom Tomorrow Merchandise Mall, and, if you’re so inclined, follow me on Bluesky!

Source

Pajaro Valley Unified School District reached a settlement with the family of a first grade special education student after acknowledging it failed to meet legal requirements outlined in the child’s education plan. The agreement includes compensatory services such as summer camp, behavioral support and speech therapy.

The post Pajaro Valley Unified settles with family over unmet services for special education student appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

When distinguished guests and A-listers gather tonight for this year’s Met Gala, two new faces will greet them on the receiving line: Lauren Sánchez Bezos and Jeff Bezos, both of whom will be at Monday’s event as honorary chairs, in addition to their roles as lead sponsors.

The appointment, which prompted a small outcry and calls for a boycott, is something of an apotheosis for the Bezoses, who have spent recent years effectively inviting themselves into some of the most exclusive corners in high fashion. There they were in January, sitting next to Anna Wintour herself, at the Paris couture shows. During the same visit, Sánchez Bezos was seen palling around with Zendaya’s stylist, the highly influential “image architect,” Law Roach. (The following day, Sánchez Bezos was spotted tripping in sky-high heels on her way to dinner with her husband.) And in June 2025, Sánchez Bezos became one of the exceedingly few brides to have their nuptials celebrated with a Vogue cover.

The enthusiasm with which the Bezoses have stormed the gates of the fashion world is the latest attempt among today’s oligarchs to seize cultural cachet. These titans of industry, apparently no longer satisfied with enormous wealth and power, now seem hellbent on sealing their reputation as fashion insiders.

But is any of this landing with the public? Will serving as honorary chair at the top of fashion’s biggest staircase cement the Bezoses’ status in high fashion? I talked to Anne Higonnet, an art historian at Columbia University, for more.

Lauren Sánchez attends the 2026 Vanity Fair Oscar Party hosted by Mark Guiducci at Los Angeles County Museum of Art on March 15, 2026Daniele Venturelli/WireImage/Getty

Lauren Sánchez’s eagerness to join fashion royalty is well established at this point. Now, as honorary chairs for the Met Gala this year, a sort of “storming the gates” image is invoked.

I’m going to use that image to say that what we have been witnessing in our culture is that the gates have been moved to a new place, and the most visible peak of the phenomenon is the Met Costume Institute. We are witnessing a sea change in cultural values, with fashion rising in the hierarchy of the arts with lightning speed, and the power of the super-rich to control culture. And this is the moment where the change really becomes visible. You’re absolutely correct that Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sánchez have realized that this is the gate.

“We are witnessing a sea change in cultural values and the power of the super-rich to control culture.”

Can you point to any historical precedents for this? The rich and powerful attempting to gain further influence through fashion?

Yes and no. In the larger scheme of clothing history, every society has expressed its hierarchy through clothing. Societies used to be run by a very tiny group at the top, or even just one or two people. Basically, a king, who sometimes has a queen, would get to wear something different from what anyone else was allowed to wear. The birth of modernity overturned many of those rules, including what art forms were considered to have more prestige. Of course, there were other prestigious art forms, but before modern times, clothing was much more powerful as a marker of hierarchy than we tend to remember.

What’s happening now is that the hierarchies of the art world are tumbling around, and fashion is really rising in the cultural scheme. As it does that, the super-rich, who are smart, are increasingly involved in fashion. One very, very visible, important way to do that is to be the chair of the Met Gala. So, surprise, surprise: Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sánchez are the chairs of the Met Gala.

Relatedly, Big Tech is set to have a major presence at this year’s event. These are people who have enormous wealth and seemingly everything. Why are they so eager to conquer fashion?

Because fashion has become so much more visible and important, largely thanks to social media, where you see much more [content] about fashion than painting, sculpture, or architecture, which used to be the three dominant arts. This power is quantifiable, too. Just look at the number of followers fashion influencers have versus how many followers high art museums have. Consider that the floor plan of the Met has always been a map of cultural power. And now, with this gala, the Met recently decided to allocate its prime real estate on the ground floor to the Costume Institute because it is so commercially important. It will be the first thing people see when they enter, instead of the gift shop.

Amazon’s Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sanchez are the lead sponsors and honorary co-chairs of the 2026 Met Gala, taking place on May 4th.Angela Weiss/ AFP/Getty

At the same time, the announcement of the Bezoses’ honorary chair appointments was tucked into the end of a two-page memo. Is there an implication here that organizers, namely Anna Wintour, understand that this is a controversial appointment?

Anna Wintour rides controversy like the wind. She’s one of the great culture power brokers of our time, and perhaps the single most visible power broker today. She’s way too smart not to realize that something is changing. The way I would put it is that she understands the magnitude of the move she’s made with [the Bezos appointment]. It’s as big a change as people think it is, whether you approve of it or you don’t approve of it. She’s doing it, and she’s being bold. She’s riding the wind of cultural change.

Evidence number one is the Sánchez Bezos appointment to the gala. Evidence number two is the new location of the Costume Institute inside the Met. Evidence number three is the theme of the show and of the gala, “fashion is art.” Because while it is not historically specific or even thematically specific, it’s a power manifesto. It’s not begging for fashion to be recognized as art. It’s just announcing, painting, sculpture, and architecture—move over.

“The greatest style in the world is confident, understated style, which we call elegant or chic. Sánchez Bezos is not either. She’ll never be elegant, ever.”

Let’s talk about Sánchez’s fashion more broadly. How would you describe her style?  What is the story that Sánchez is trying to tell us through her clothing?

Her clothes are self-objectifying showcases of Bezos’ wealth. There’s this brilliant economic historian, Thorstein Veblen, who wrote these essays about what he called “conspicuous consumption.” Even though it’s from the 1890s, my students just love this concept and totally understand why it’s as relevant now as it ever was. He said clothing can manifest conspicuous consumption to show everyone that you have money to waste. Veblen also made a brilliant gender point by noting that we live in a world that is controlled by men, and the ultimate way in which [men] show their wealth is how their wives or mistresses dress. It was the ultimate show of power, because they got to do all the conspicuous consumption with none of the bother of having to wear the clothes that were not comfortable or practical in any way.

Some have argued that despite the expensive clothes, Sánchez often comes away looking cheap or tacky. Why?

That’s because her clothes have to be screamingly expensive. Style has to do with individuality and an affirmation of one’s aesthetic place in the world; it’s very much an affirmation of self. And the greatest style in the world is the most confident, understated style, which we call elegant or chic. Sánchez Bezos is not either. She’ll never be elegant, ever.

The mayor, who, at least to my mind, is on the opposite end of this, is not coming. What is he signaling here?

Well, first of all, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez got in big trouble for going in 2021. So he hasn’t forgotten that. I mean, if you’re a socialist, and you go to an event where the seats cost $75,000, you’ve got a lot of explaining to do.

But also, look at his wife, who is actually quite elegant because she conveys that she is a person in her own right and that her worth in the world does not depend on money.

Finally, things are bad out there. Economic inequality, war, constant dystopia. Parties like this can feel a bit strange. Historically, though, is there something to say about fashion’s role in class struggle?

Clothing’s role in expressing social hierarchy is the rule, not the exception, of history. Now, in our modern post-French Revolution, universal rights of man, way of thinking, we don’t think that clothing should necessarily express social hierarchy. But at the same time, as with all forms of art, some people do it better than others. I’ve seen homeless people with more style than some supermodels. Style is why I’ll never stop loving clothing as an art form. Clothing and style are also one of the most democratic of all the arts. We all do it. We all can do it.

This story was originally published by Inside Climate News and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.

Every spring, Florida’s Miccosukee Tribe observes its corn dance season on lands the tribe holds as sacred within the fragile Everglades. But this year’s festivities are different because of the migrant detention site that now looms among the tribal lands, Alligator Alcatraz.

One hindrance is that the light emanating for miles from the facility interferes with an important aspect of the Miccosukee’s religion, the orientation of the stars, said Curtis Osceola, the tribe’s chief operating officer. If not for the light pollution, the stars would gleam bright here in the night sky above the vast sawgrass prairies and cypress marshes of the remote river of grass.

“It’s hard to explain, and not everyone will understand our relationship with the land,” he said. “It’s as if someone went to a holy place, whether it was like church land, and said, ‘We’re going to raze this church land and put up a prison and put up a detention center.’ People would be up in arms. This is our place of worship. This is a sacred place. This doesn’t seem fair.”

“This is our place of worship. This is a sacred place. This doesn’t seem fair.”

The tribe, along with environmental groups, says they will continue their litigation over Alligator Alcatraz, where thousands of undocumented migrants have been detained since the facility opened last summer as part of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown. The 11th US Circuit Court of Appeals last week invalidated a preliminary injunction issued by District Judge Kathleen Williams, who had ordered in August a winding down of the facility. The case now will go back to Williams, who will decide the next steps.

The ruling means the detention site may keep operating while the environmental groups and the tribe’s litigation proceed. In this case, the Miccosukee and their fellow plaintiffs accused the federal and state governments of unlawfully rushing the facility to completion without a required environmental review under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). The government agencies have contended that the site is a state and not a federal one, and that the federal review is not necessary. The agencies also said the facility’s impact on the environment is minimal. The Everglades, which span central and south Florida, are responsible for the drinking water of millions of people in the state. A $27 billion restoration effort is among the most ambitious of its kind in human history.

The appeals court, in siding with the government agencies, said the plaintiffs failed to prove the federal government controlled the site. Judges William Pryor and Andrew Brasher also said Williams’ preliminary injunction violated, in part, a statutory prohibition on enjoining immigration enforcement. The judges reasoned that for the site’s Florida operators to follow federal immigration standards does not transform the facility into a federal one. They compared the situation with that of an office building owner who adheres to the Americans with Disabilities Act. Compliance with the federal law does not make the building federal, they said.

But Judge Nancy Abudu dissented. She characterized the federal and state roles in Alligator Alcatraz as one where the federal government enlisted the state not as an equal partner but as a “deputy of the federal government operating at its request.” She said her colleagues’ analogy involving the office building owner and the Americans with Disabilities Act was weak.

“Here, the detention facility’s only goal is to house thousands of people under DHS and ICE’s control, in a secluded area, away from the public, without any accountability,” Abudu wrote. “If not for its partnership with DHS and ICE, Florida’s housing of these individuals (and in some cases families) would be more akin to kidnapping and, at its most extreme, perhaps human trafficking. The state cannot detain a non-citizen without the proper authority to do so.”

The court’s ruling was disappointing, but the environmental groups and tribe remain optimistic they eventually will prevail, said Elise Bennett, Florida and Caribbean director and senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, one of the plaintiffs in the case.

“We were prepared for any potential outcome, but that doesn’t make it sting any less because we know that there is irreparable harm ongoing in the Everglades, from water pollution to impacts to the Florida panther and bonneted bat,” she said. “We were hopeful we would put an end to that harm in the early stages in the case. Now we’re reinvigorated to get back in there and win.”

Friends of the Everglades, the third plaintiff in the case, said public records obtained through a separate lawsuit filed by the advocacy group show the Federal Emergency Management Agency promised hundreds of millions of dollars to Florida to build and operate the facility. Friends of the Everglades and the Center for Biological Diversity filed the lawsuit last June in the U.S. District Court in the Southern District of Florida, with the Miccosukee Tribe joining later on. The Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, acting director of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, executive director of the Florida Division of Emergency Management, and Miami-Dade County, which owns the property, are named as defendants in the case. The government agencies did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the appeals court ruling.

During the First and Second Seminole Wars, in the first half of the 19th century, the Miccosukee were pushed deep within the watery wilderness of the Everglades and found sanctuary on the tree islands scattered here. For them, the land is sacred because it saved their tribe from annihilation. Osceola said the detention site’s close proximity to tribal lands and the Big Cypress National Preserve is a concern. Within a three-mile radius of Alligator Alcatraz are 10 Miccosukee villages, including one a mere 1,000 feet from the facility. A school is 10 miles away.

“We survived in the Big Cypress. It cared for us. The Everglades likewise cared for us and helped us survive. The plants and animals of those lands sustained our existence, and we were able to make it through that wartime period,” he said. “We have a very strong religious connection with the land. And so activities like this are going to disrupt that relationship, that sort of strong relationship we have with the sacred land.”

The Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission will consider a draft of this year’s list of unmet transit and paratransit needs at its meeting Thursday, an annual occurrence informed by members of the community.

The post Carmageddon: RTC considering list of transit and paratransit requests appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

Serious Linux VMs will enjoy big iron – if you can learn to love lock-in risks and skills challenges

VMware users considering a new home might find it cheaper to move to an IBM mainframe than adopting Broadcom’s new licenses, according to Gartner Vice President Analyst Alessandro Galimberti.…

This story was originally published by CalMatters. Sign up for its newsletters.

When California State University paid OpenAI $17 million last year to give campuses unlimited access to a high-powered educational version of ChatGPT, the goal was to help students learn to use artificial intelligence for their education and future careers. However, the announcement came as a surprise to faculty and students, who were left on their own to figure out how to use AI ethically. 

Afraid students would use ChatGPT Edu to cheat, many professors turned to in-class tests using bluebooks and scantrons, or employed faulty AI detectors like TurnItIn to catch AI-generated work. Meanwhile, other faculty have embraced ChatGPT and made it part of their curriculum. This all has left students confused over the use of AI in their courses.

A recent Cal State survey of over 94,000 students and university employees found 52% of faculty reported AI having a negative affect on their teaching, and 67% of students felt their professors don’t teach them how to use AI effectively.

As Cal State approaches the end of its 18-month contract with OpenAI this July, the university system has not announced whether it will renew the deal. Some faculty at San Francisco State University have begun a petition calling on Cal State Chancellor Mildred Garcia to end the partnership.

The Cal State Chancellor’s office points out that the AI survey found 64% of students, faculty and staff said AI has affected their learning experience at their university positively, and 63% said they’ve seen more opportunities on their campus to learn about AI. 

“Our systemwide AI survey results reflect what we are seeing across our universities — widespread engagement with AI tools and technologies,” wrote Cal State spokesperson Amy Bentley-Smith in an email. 

The university system left it up to campuses to dictate the proper uses of the chatbot while offering tools and training on a website called AI Commons. But students and faculty say those resources have not been enough. As of April, only 0.7% of students and 16% of faculty had completed the voluntary training, based on data provided by Bentley-Smith. 

Assemblymember Mike Fong introduced Assembly Bill 2392 in February, which would require Cal State and California Community Colleges, as well as request University of California schools, to provide training on any AI product deployed on campuses. 

Last fall, Fong and the Assembly Standing Committee on Higher Education questioned Cal State officials about planning around the AI initiative.

“During the joint hearing on higher education and privacy, discussions revealed that California State University campuses have adopted AI tools without consistent guidance or training, raising concerns around data privacy, academic integrity, and equitable use,” said Fong in an email to CalMatters.

While a few students and faculty testified at the hearing, others have continued to echo those issues.

“I’m not sure [Cal State] realized how much new work it would require, how much revision to the old way of doing things it would require,” said Ryan Jenkins, the chair of the AI Task Force for Cal Poly San Luis Obispo’s faculty union chapter.

Students want to be a part of AI decisions

Cal State Northridge communications major Katie Karroum was shocked when she saw the announcement about ChatGPT Edu last year. As the vice president of systemwide affairs for the Cal State Student Association, she would have expected the chancellor’s office to meet with the student organization that represents over 470,000 students throughout the state.      

“We were not consulted when the contract was signed, and we weren’t even given a heads up,” Karroum said.

Cal State chose OpenAI as the least-costly option, according to assistant vice chancellor of academic technology services Leslie Kennedy. The contract aimed to give everyone free access to ChatGPT Edu across all 22 campuses. Previously, campuses and individuals were paying for their own upgraded ChatGPT accounts that allow users to generate content like images and research reports without the limitations of the free version. 

The contract with OpenAI was signed in January 2025, revealed later that month at a board of trustees meeting, and formally announced through a systemwide media release in February 2025, which is how Karroum found out.

Katie Karroum, communications major and vice president of systemwide affairs for the Cal State Student Association, at Cal State Northridge. Credit: Ariana Drehsler for CalMatters

In a meeting of the Cal State Student Association last October, student representatives from each campus told Karroum that they saw a lack of justice for students accused of using generative AI to cheat, and that they were concerned about the data collected from the chatbot being shared.

ChatGPT Edu at Cal State is defaulted to not use data for training models, but users can opt to allow their data to be shared, according to testing by CalMatters.

Students have also complained about the absence of a consistent AI policy in their classes, according to an open letter published by Karroum. At most campuses, professors get to decide their classroom policies, including about AI. 

Yagmur Wernimont, a sophomore at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, said that although AI is used for automation and robotics in her intended agriculture field, she still does not use the technology herself because she thinks “it’s making us dumber” and doesn’t promote learning. She also watched herself fall behind while a classmate used ChatGPT to get a 100% on an assignment. 

While her professor verbally told the class at the beginning of the quarter not to use AI, the rule was not on the syllabus, nor was a clear consequence for using AI. Wernimont said this might have given students a loophole for using it. 

At Cal State Bakersfield, Emily Callahan, dean of students for academic integrity, said there has been a steady uptick of students reported for improper use of AI. She said students are using the chatbot to gain an unfair advantage over others. 

Wernimont has also witnessed a divide between professors over AI. While one of her professors required the use of Google NotebookLM, an AI-powered note-taking app, an English teacher told Wernimont’s class that she was sad students would be using AI for writing, but shared a presentation on ways to cite the tool anyway.

“They’re all having different ways and ideas how to do it,” she said. “And it’s kind of conflicting as a student.”

Ryan Jenkins, a philosophy professor, sits in his office on the Cal Poly San Luis Obispo campus. Credit: Julie Leopo-Bermudez for CalMatters

Kennedy said the university system hasn’t excluded anybody from the discussion around AI. The Chancellor’s Office started a generative AI committee in 2024 that includes students and faculty. 

“It was the committee’s recommendations that served as the basis for the CSU to identify, evaluate, and negotiate with multiple companies who at the time offered plans designed specifically to help bring AI tools to higher education institutions,” said Cal State’s chief information officer Ed Clark in an email. “Their assessment and feedback have been and continue to be essential to how the CSU implements its AI strategy that is both cost-effective and secure.”    

A new board formed after the implementation of ChatGPT Edu focuses on California’s workforce by including representatives from technology companies. Cal State Student Association President Tara Al-Rehani said that while she is part of that board, it makes no final policy or guidance decisions on AI use.  

Karroum said although students need to learn how to use AI, she doesn’t like feeling part of an experiment.  

“I think that we’re being treated as, like, test rats right now because there’s no policy and there’s no guidance,” Karroum said.

Faculty introduce new classroom policies on AI

Faculty leaders said they also were caught off guard with the ChatGPT deal. According to the Cal State survey, 59% of faculty regularly use AI in teaching and research, and 68% said they include an explicit statement on AI use. 

According to a repository of more than 200 AI syllabus policies housed on Cal Poly San Luis Obispo’s website, one criminal justice professor from Cal State Fullerton describes in the syllabus when, why and how students should use AI. The professor also includes an example of a good AI disclosure statement from a student who outlined their use of ChatGPT for an assignment.

The AI Commons website states that faculty ultimately decide how they want to implement generative AI into their curriculum,taking into consideration whether it might improve teaching and learning in their classroom like any new technology.

Jenkins, who teaches philosophy at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, gives exams in class using blue books and scantrons to avoid any potential for students to cheat with AI. When ChatGPT was first released in 2022, Jenkins tested the chatbot by giving it a reading quiz. It gave all the right answers, alarming Jenkins that his students might use the technology while taking tests online. Today, Jenkins tells his students to treat AI like any other source when using its outputs for an assignment, but still proctors exams in-class.

“The bread and butter of philosophy is reflecting on your own ideas and trying to sort out what you believe and why,” Jenkins said. “If you have a tool that does that for you, then you’re being denied an opportunity to practice that skill.”

Ryan Jenkins, a philosophy professor, on the Cal Poly San Luis Obispo campus. Credit: Julie Leopo-Bermudez for CalMatters

Jenkins said he does not have an AI statement in his syllabus because neither the department nor Cal Poly has provided one to use. On its website, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo links to the AI Commons as well as an AI statement builder from Pepperdine University for faculty to use. But the university does not require any specific statement from professors. 

At Cal State Fullerton, Shelli Wynants helps faculty decide how to use AI in their classrooms through her role in the university’s faculty development center. She also teaches students in her child and adolescent studies courses to critically review AI output, and make sure they are remaining “the thinker and the decision maker” in the process. 

Wynant said she refers to AI as an “assistant” or “teammate,” but emphasizes it should never replace human judgement. She has found that many of her students who plan careers in teaching want to learn how to use AI responsibly for the sake of their future students. “These students need to get up to speed because they’re going to be the ones teaching students digital literacy,” she said. 

In August 2025, the Assembly Standing Committee on Higher Education questioned Cal State officials about planning around the AI initiative. Representatives of the Academic Senate, Cal State Student Association, California Faculty Association and Cal State Employees Union spoke to the Assembly committee about their discontent over the contract with OpenAI.

“We understand all these criticisms and concerns, and they’re valid,” said Cal State’s chief information officer Ed Clark at the meeting. “The best way to deal with those concerns is to have our universities participate in helping to shape the future of these technologies. We can’t just sit back and let it go by.” 

Students still need support, even with AI chatbots

Staff at university tutoring centers are struggling to advise students who say faculty are blaming them for cheating by using the very AI tools the university system wants them to learn to use. According to the Cal State AI survey, 78% of students, faculty and staff said the ethical use of AI is a major concern.

Students walk through the Cal State Northridge campus. Credit: Ariana Drehsler for CalMatters

Seher Vora, the coordinator for San Jose State University’s writing center, created an AI Writer Toolbox after conversations with tutors about students who were being penalized by professors for using AI. The toolbox helps students work with AI responsibly, including how to properly cite AI use and not using the chatbot for generating work that is not their own.

The toolbox also includes a disclosure tool that allows students to fill out a form outlining their use of AI for an assignment. The form generates a certificate for students to submit with their work.

The writing center at San Jose State advises students to check with their professors if they are unsure what uses of AI they accept. Vora hopes her work with the toolbox will encourage education around AI, for both students and faculty.

“We have to stay on top of it,” she said. “It’s changing every day.”

Have something to say? Lookout welcomes letters to the editor, within our policies, from readers. Guidelines here.

The post Cal State struck a deal with OpenAI. Some students and faculty refuse to use it appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

This story was originally published by CalMatters. Sign up for its newsletters.

In what Gov. Gavin Newsom hailed as a major milestone, his $20 billion Delta tunnel largely cleared another chokepoint last week — but it still faces obstacles of a different magnitude.

For more than half a century, California’s leaders have debated rerouting water around, rather than through, the network of rivers, farmland and marshes of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. Newsom’s version would pipe Sacramento River water through a 45-mile bypass to a reservoir on the California Aqueduct, in an effort to shore up state supplies and send more water south. 

Delta communities call the plan a water grab that would devastate one of the country’s largest estuaries and destroy towns, wildlife and generational farms. State officials and major water suppliers say it’s necessary to safeguard water for two-thirds of Californians against the threats of climate change and natural disasters. 

Tasked with refereeing the fight, a state agency called the Delta Stewardship Council weighed opponents’ many challenges to the project and on April 23 voted voted 6-1 to require the Department of Water Resources to address just two of them. 

Newsom declared victory, saying, “We are closer than ever to seeing this important piece of infrastructure completed.” 

Maybe closer than ever, California water watchers say, but still far from complete. Far bigger obstacles loom: court rulings that have upended California’s financing plans, critical water rights decisions still to come from state regulators, and water agencies that have yet to decide whether the tunnel’s water will be worth the cost. 

“These are all existential,” said Jeffrey Mount, a senior fellow at the Public Policy Institute of California. “You’ve got some pretty tough hurdles ahead.” 

A dying Delta

The Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta is the heart of California’s nature-defying water systems, where state and federal pumps send Northern California river water coursing to cities and farms in the lower half of the state. 

The Delta is collapsing under the strain — wracked by algal blooms, degraded water quality and fish species spiraling toward extinction. Residents, environmentalists and the fishing industry fear that diverting freshwater through a tunnel will push it over the edge. 

Voters beat back the first-generation tunnel — a peripheral canal — in the 1980s, during Gov. Jerry Brown’s first stint as governor. But governor after governor has continued the push. The canal eventually became the twin tunnels that became Newsom’s Delta Conveyance Project, which remains mired in planning. 

Carrie Buckman, environmental program manager for the tunnel project at the Department of Water Resources, is optimistic that construction could start as soon as 2029 and would last around 13 years.

But with Newsom in his final year as governor, the clock is ticking. And the region’s residents continue in limbo — bracing for a project that would carve through their communities, farms and waterways.  

“Nobody seems to care about the people out here on the ground,” said Duane Martin Jr., a third-generation cattleman in the Delta.

Duane Martin stands near the Sacramento County pasture, southwest of Elk Grove, where he has grazed cattle for 20 years, and where California water managers plan to build a major construction complex for the Delta tunnel.
Credit: Miguel Gutierrez Jr. / CalMatters

Martin steered his pickup down country roads, along the orchards and pastures of Sacramento County. Great egrets strutted the edges of fields to snatch small, struggling creatures from the grass, and red-winged blackbirds clung to golden stalks of mustard. 

Martin worries for his cattle operation. His father was a cattleman. His grandfather was a cattleman. Now a father himself, his daughters’ cattle graze in the pasture outside his home. 

He’s outraged by the prospect of the truck traffic, the noise, the churn of the concrete batch plant and the roughly 200-acre pile of tunnel muck planned for land where he’s been grazing cattle for decades. 

But more than that, he said, gruff beneath his Stetson, “It’s the community that they’re going to impact — those of us that have lived here most of our lives.” 

“They’re going to change the Delta area forever.” 

An unending water war

The Delta’s vulnerability is real: Levees are at risk of crumbling under age, earthquakes and climate-fueled storms; sea level rise threatens to flood the system with too much saltwater. 

For Buckman, it’s simple: As climate change makes California’s swings from wet to dry more extreme, “It’s about water supply.”

Mount, like the water suppliers supporting the project, believes construction is inevitable. “If you don’t build it in this generation, you’ll build it in the next,” he said. “Build a tunnel, or start a very painful process of really cutting back on water supplies from the Delta.” 

The costs are high; around $20.1 billion by the Department of Water Resources’ estimate, $60 to more than $100 billion per an economic assessment commissioned by opponents. 

California doesn’t yet have a way to pay for it. State water managers planned to issue revenue bonds, to be paid back by water agencies receiving water from the tunnel — and their customers. 

But a trial court said that the water code did not give the Water Resources “carte blanche to do as it wishes” and the financing plan “exceeded its delegated authority.” The Third District Court of Appeal agreed, and in April, the California Supreme Court refused to review the case. 

Buckman said that the department still plans to issue bonds and is figuring out its next steps. 

As yet, no water agency has committed to paying for a tunnel — and no agency likely will, until the department can finance it, according to Kelley Taber, an attorney representing tunnel opponents. 

The federal government and the powerful irrigation districts it supplies have already opted out, Buckman said.

The Delta community of Isleton, visible from the banks of the Sacramento River. Credit: Miguel Gutierrez Jr. / CalMatters

“Ag, at large, cannot afford to pay for large infrastructure projects,” said Jennifer Pierre, general manager for the State Water Contractors, an association of public water agencies that receive water from California’s massive delivery system, the State Water Project. But she said the costs don’t diminish the need. 

That leaves the bulk of the bill with urban water suppliers and their customers. 

Metropolitan Water District, the Southern California water import giant that supplies half the state’s population, is already paying nearly half the tunnel’s planning costs — but it’s also heavily investing in local recycled water supplies. 

Its board isn’t expected to vote on whether to shoulder much of the tunnel’s construction costs until 2027. No construction commitment before then means no commitment before a new governor takes office.

Meanwhile, major water rights questions remain unresolved. 

State regulators are holding hearings that could last through the summer about whether to allow the Department of Water Resources to divert Sacramento River water into the proposed tunnel intakes. 

Newsom has advocated for a Delta tunnel since his first days as governor. Four Newsom appointees sit on the seven-member Delta Stewardship Council that just advanced the tunnel project, minus a couple speedbumps. He has also championed unsuccessful legislative fixes to financing and other roadblocks. 

The question is whether the next governor will continue the push. Pierre said they must — the need for the tunnel is clear. 

Mount isn’t as sure. It will depend on the next governor’s priorities — and who they put in key leadership positions. 

“Whoever they appoint, that is really where it happens,” he said. “It’s hard for me to imagine that if Brown and/or Newsom weren’t all in on this, it would have gotten this far.” 

‘They’re gonna have to take it’

Martin pulls his pickup to the side of the road next to a lush pasture he leases that’s more prairie than Pacific. This is one of the next battlegrounds for the tunnel project. 

In the spring and summer, Martin grazes hundreds of cows and their calves here. And in the winter, the Sacramento Area Sewer District plans to pipe recycled water onto the fields, creating seasonal feeding grounds and rest stops for the protected sandhill crane and other birds traveling the Pacific Flyway. 

It’s part of the largest agricultural recycled water project in the state, Harvest Water, to provide highly treated wastewater to 16,000 acres of farmland in the region and take the pressure off local groundwater supplies. 

California has already awarded more than $400 million for Harvest Water, but the funding hinges on the environmental benefits like habitat the project will provide, according to the sewer district’s Jofil Borja. It’s an ideal spot, between the Stone Lakes National Wildlife Refuge and the Cosumnes River Preserve. 

And that’s where it runs up against the tunnel project. The pastures where Martin grazes his cattle and the sewer district plans to create seasonal habitat are also in the Department of Water Resources’ sights. State water managers plan to build a nearly 600-acre construction complex — with a permanent 214-acre mound of excavated tunnel materials up to 15 feet tall — right here.

“You tell me if you want to be the neighbor that lives right there, lookin’ out his front yard at this pile of muck,” Martin said, gesturing at a house across the road. Right now, its view is a sea of grass that disappears into a darker line of trees. 

Duane Martin, a third-generation cattleman, bought his first cows when he was 10 with money he borrowed from his grandfather. Now, his daughters’ cattle graze in the pasture outside his Delta home. Credit: Miguel Gutierrez Jr. / CalMatters

In refereeing the fight over this land, the Delta Stewardship Council last week ordered the Department of Water Resources to resolve its conflicts with Harvest Water over the site, or explain why that isn’t possible, the council’s staff report said. 

Kelley Taber, the attorney representing the sewer district, is celebrating the mixed victory. 

“I always thought that this was going to be [the department’s] Achilles’ heel,” Taber said. Among the “multitude of disastrous impacts to the Delta,” she said, it’s “the most obvious fatal flaw.” 

Buckman disputed staff’s assessment of the siting conflict in a letter to the council, saying that the tunnel project can’t avoid the entire Harvest Water footprint, and that the habitats don’t exist yet. But, she added, the department would “work promptly” to address the issue. 

If it does, to the council’s satisfaction, state water managers will still need to buy or seize the land. The landowner declined to speak on the record.

Martin expects it will be a fight — and he’s ready for it. Under eminent domain, the state can forcibly take property for a public purpose. The landowner can contest it. But he’s unlikely to stop it. 

“They’re gonna have to take it,” Martin said. “I’ve got a lot of friends that leave, but I ain’t about to quit. I’m a fighter, and I’m going to stay here and fight for it to the death.”

Have something to say? Lookout welcomes letters to the editor, within our policies, from readers. Guidelines here.

The post Will California ever build the Delta tunnel? Major battles ahead as Newsom era nears end appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

A sensor that can simultaneously capture depth and image data has long been a "holy grail," Ouster CEO Angus Pacala told TechCrunch.

Even limited voter rolls can be linked to identify people, research shows

Your voter data could be used against you. A foreign intelligence service that wished to identify the family members of deployed military personnel could do so by cross-referencing public voter record data and social media posts.…

The portfolio he has assembled since 2019 is dotted with technologies that have become more widely interesting to VCs over the last year:

That box-full-of-old-tech-you-should-probably-have-thrown-out-but-kept-just-in-case got a techie in trouble

Who, Me?  Monday is upon us once again and The Register hopes that when you arrive at your desk, all is well. We offer that sentiment because we use the first day of the working week to bring you a fresh instalment of "Who, Me?" – the reader-contributed column in which you confess to making mistakes, and explain how you survived them.…

Like actual butlers, this relic of the first dotcom boom has been a quaint anachronism for decades

In the mid-1990s, search engine designers settled on the user interface that dominates to this day: a text box into which users enter text, and a resulting list of websites.…

Prioritize resilience over productivity, say CISA, NCSC and their friends from Oz, NZ, Canada

Information security agencies from the nations of the Five Eyes security alliance have co-authored guidance on the use of agentic AI that warns the technology will likely misbehave and amplifies organizations’ existing frailties, and therefore recommend slow and careful adoption of the tech.…

The annual Cinco De Mayo Festival drew thousands of people to downtown Watsonville Sunday with live music, food booths, arts and crafts and information tables. 

The free five-and-a-half-hour event was put on by Fiestas Patrias. It drew to the stage the popular singer Graciela Beltran, folkloric dance troupe Esperanza del Valle, Mariachi Perla de Mexico and popular bands from Mexico, including La Calle Show and Banda S7.

A huge crowd takes in the music at the Cinco De Mayo Festival (Tarmo Hannula/The Pajaronian)

“The festivals of Fiestas Patrias bring residents together from throughout the Monterey Bay to celebrate and to learn about the heritage and culture of Mexico,” organizers said.

May 5  is the actual day of celebration for Mexico’s victory over the Second French Empire at the Battle of Puebla in 1862.

Within hours he'd thrown up a website — a janky, one-hour job, by his own admission — and by Sunday, 36,000 "founding patrons" had pledged nearly $23 million, crashing his servers in the process.

PLUS: Samsung cashes in on RAM prices; Booze from space fetches huge price; China's hyperscalers surge

A Chinese court has ruled that it’s illegal to replace human workers with AI.…