Skip to page content

Southwestern States

Dissertation

Dissertation

The Criminal Justice System and More Lenient Drug Policy: Three Case Studies on California's Changes to How Its Criminal Justice System Addresses Drug Use

Explores California's recent liberal policies, mostly associated to drug-related crimes, to provide implications for future policymaking.

Apr 15, 2019
News Release

News Release

Seismic Safety Upgrades May Cost California Hospitals Billions, Increase Number of Hospitals in Financial Distress

After the 1994 Northridge Earthquake, in which 11 hospitals were damaged and eight were evacuated, California adopted SB1953, which aims to improve hospital resilience to seismic events. The law requires hospitals to reduce their buildings' risk of collapse by 2020 and to remain operational after an earthquake by 2030. California hospitals would need to make substantial investments to meet 2030 state seismic safety standards.

Mar 28, 2019
Report

Seismic Safety Upgrades May Cost California Hospitals Billions

California hospitals are required by law to reduce their buildings' risk of collapse by 2020 and to remain operational after an earthquake by 2030. Hospitals have to pay for the upgrades, which could cost between $34 billion and $143 billion statewide. One third of California hospitals are already in some form of financial distress.

Mar 28, 2019
Commentary

How to Ensure Quality Drinking Water Service for All? One Option Is Fewer Utilities.

California's Human Right to Water Bill declares that “every human being has the right to safe, clean, affordable, and accessible water adequate for human consumption, cooking, and sanitary purposes.” One clear barrier to reaching this target is the sheer number of small water utilities that pose service sustainability and public health risks to their customers.

Mar 26, 2019
Commentary

How Water Systems Can Learn From Smart Electric Grids

As drought and population growth place increasing pressure on water supply, the need to save and efficiently manage Southern California's water resources becomes increasingly critical. A single information and communication technology platform could go a long way toward moving water utilities from reactive to proactive maintenance practices.

Mar 22, 2019
Commentary

Increasing Groundwater Reliance in L.A. County Means Dealing with Extensive Contamination

As the Los Angeles region increases its reliance on groundwater sources to become more resilient in the face of drought and to reduce demand for imported water sources, advances in the information available on groundwater quality and contamination could help community water systems avoid health hazards and better ensure a safe drinking water supply.

Mar 12, 2019
Report

Decision Support Tool for the San Francisco Bay-Delta Levees Investment Strategy: Documentation and Use

This report describes the decision support tool and underlying methodology used to support the development of a levee investment strategy for the California Delta Stewardship Council.

Mar 7, 2019
Tool

Decision Support Tool for the San Francisco Bay-Delta Levee Investment Strategy

The Delta Stewardship Council commissioned the development of a risk modeling framework and decision support tool (DST) to aid in the formulation of a Delta Levees Investment Strategy.

Mar 7, 2019
Report

Report

An Examination of Recruiting and Selection Practices to Promote Diversity for Colorado State Troopers

The Colorado State Patrol (CSP) seeks to better reflect the demographic representation of the state of Colorado. This report offers an exploratory examination of how CSP's recruiting and selection policies and procedures relate to that objective.

Feb 28, 2019
Report

Report

Access to Medical Treatment for Injured Workers in California: Year 2 Annual Report

This Year 2 report updates the trends in care for injured workers in California that were examined in a Year 1 report -- all part of a three-year state effort. This study uses data from claims, a physician survey, and Medical Provider Network listings.

Dec 27, 2018
Report

Wage Loss Monitoring for Injured Workers in California's Workers' Compensation System: 2014–2015 Injury Year Findings (Second Interim Report)

This report presents new estimates of wage loss for workers in California who suffered a workplace injury or illness in 2014-2015 and compares these estimates with trends before, during, and after the Great Recession.

Dec 27, 2018
Report

Using Technology to Promote Postsecondary Success and Savings

In 2013, the University of Texas at Tyler began the implementation of the PATSS program, an initiative that seeks to increase the use of online technologies for instruction. What are the academic outcomes in PATSS courses relative to traditional courses?

Dec 13, 2018
Research Brief

Research Brief

The Big Lift Preschool, Two Years In: What Have We Learned So Far?

The Big Lift preschool-third-grade initiative aims to boost children's reading proficiency. This second in a series of descriptive analyses shares follow-up data on 2016-2017 kindergarten class participants and initial data on 2017-2018 participants.

Dec 12, 2018
Testimony

Testimony

Insurance for Wildfire Risk in California

Testimony presented before a joint meeting of the California State Assembly and California State Senate Committees on Insurance on October 30, 2018.

Dec 10, 2018
Commentary

Is Los Angeles County Successfully Creating a Youth Movement Around Mental Health Issues?

A new community engagement campaign called WhyWeRise seeks to increase awareness of mental health access as a civil rights issue and increase civic engagement. The campaign reached its target audience—people aged 14 to 24—and showed signs of changing attitudes toward mental illness.

Dec 6, 2018
Journal Article

Journal Article

Geographic Smoothing of Solar Photovoltaic Electric Power Production in the Western USA

We examined the geographic smoothing of solar photovoltaic generation from 15 utility-scale plants in California, Nevada, and Arizona and from 19 commercial building installations in California.

Nov 28, 2018
News Release

News Release

Youth-Oriented Mental Health Campaign Shows Evidence of Success

A community engagement campaign launched by Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health to address mental health barriers had an impressive reach with the younger audience it targeted and showed signs of changing attitudes.

Nov 14, 2018
Research Brief

Evaluating Los Angeles County's Mental Health Community Engagement Campaign

The WeRise/WhyWeRise campaign targeted young people to encourage them to engage with mental health issues and create a movement to lower barriers to mental health access. People exposed to the campaign reported more-supportive attitudes toward people with mental illness and greater mobilization toward action around mental health issues.

Nov 14, 2018
Report

Evaluation of Los Angeles County's Mental Health Community Engagement Campaign

The Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health conducted a community engagement campaign to increase awareness of mental health access as a civil rights issue and to increase civic engagement. Youths who took part showed increased supportive and understanding attitudes toward mental illness, and empowerment and mobilization toward activism around mental health issues.

Nov 14, 2018
Commentary

On Nurse Staffing Ballot Measure, Massachusetts Voters Should Look to Evidence from California

Massachusetts residents will soon vote on the Patient Safety Act, a mandate to increase nurse-to-patient ratios in acute care facilities. Evaluating existing data on the impact of a similar nurse staffing law implemented in California in 2004 may help inform voters as they head to the polls.

Nov 2, 2018

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
Next

Research conducted by