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<meta content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0, user-scalable=yes" name="viewport"/>
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<title>24 May, 2021</title>
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<title>Daily-Dose</title><meta content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0" name="viewport"/><link href="styles/simple.css" rel="stylesheet"/><link href="../styles/simple.css" rel="stylesheet"/><style>*{overflow-x:hidden;}</style><link href="https://unpkg.com/aos@2.3.1/dist/aos.css" rel="stylesheet"/><script src="https://unpkg.com/aos@2.3.1/dist/aos.js"></script></head>
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<body>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-down" id="daily-dose">Daily-Dose</h1>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" data-aos-anchor-placement="top-bottom" id="contents">Contents</h1>
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<ul>
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<li><a href="#from-new-yorker">From New Yorker</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-vox">From Vox</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-the-hindu-sports">From The Hindu: Sports</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-the-hindu-national-news">From The Hindu: National News</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-bbc-europe">From BBC: Europe</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-ars-technica">From Ars Technica</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-jokes-subreddit">From Jokes Subreddit</a></li>
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</ul>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-new-yorker">From New Yorker</h1>
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<ul>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>How Violent Cops Stay in Law Enforcement</strong> - Derek Colling was fired from one police department after two fatal shootings and allegations of brutality. Less than a year later, he had a new badge. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/us-journal/how-violent-cops-stay-in-law-enforcement">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>The Tensions Inside a Mixed Jewish-Arab City in Israel</strong> - Cities such as Lod are experiencing the worst bouts of internecine violence since the country’s founding. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/dispatch/the-tensions-inside-a-mixed-jewish-arab-city-in-israel">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>The G.O.P. Looks for New Ways to Ignore the Capitol Riot</strong> - As a House vote on a bipartisan commission to study the insurrection made clear, it’s Trumpists vs. the truth. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/the-gop-looks-for-new-ways-to-ignore-january-6th">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>The High Price of a New York City Cop</strong> - One of the city’s star officers has cost taxpayers more than two and a half million dollars in police-misconduct settlements. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-local-correspondents/the-high-price-of-a-new-york-city-cop">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>How Hacking Became a Professional Service in Russia</strong> - The outfit behind the Colonial Pipeline attack had a blog, a user-friendly interface, and a sliding fee scale for helping hackers cash in on stolen information. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/how-hacking-became-a-professional-service-in-russia">link</a></p></li>
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</ul>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-vox">From Vox</h1>
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<li><strong>What happened to the $45 billion in rent relief?</strong> -
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<img alt="A person in a group of protesters holds a sign over their head that reads, “Cancel rent!”" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/N53nyl_QXzufuE--ZtTuCIOvCRQ=/60x0:2727x2000/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/69333392/GettyImages_1232637148.0.jpg"/>
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<figcaption>
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Activist groups and labor unions participate in a May Day march for worker and human rights in Los Angeles, California, on May 1. | David McNew/AFP/Getty Images
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</figcaption>
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</figure>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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Rent relief was the solution to a possible wave of evictions. It ran headfirst into reality.
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="XN9TqT">
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="934LPr">
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<a href="https://www.vox.com/21569601/eviction-moratorium-cdc-covid-19-congress-rental-assistance-rent-crisis">Everyone agreed</a> that rent relief was the only way to stop a wave of <a href="https://www.aspeninstitute.org/blog-posts/the-covid-19-eviction-crisis-an-estimated-30-40-million-people-in-america-are-at-risk/#comments">millions of Americans</a> from being evicted.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="h4zgVv">
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The logic was simple: Give people who were struggling during the pandemic the money to pay their rent, and landlords would have no reason to evict for nonpayment. That simplicity, and the remarkable unity from the landlord lobby and tenant advocates alike in calling for this type of relief, led Congress to allocate $25 billion in rental assistance in December. Less than three months later, in early March, they allocated another $21.55 billion for the same purpose.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="M7eJM7">
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But despite this unprecedented level of federal aid, people like Emilie Ashbes are still in crisis.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="lFz05S">
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“I’m terrified. I’m so terrified to spend money,” the 31-year-old Floridian told me as she shopped at Walmart for household supplies. “I literally donated eggs to [make rent]. I’m selling off body parts.”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="2sjfOv">
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Ashbes, who says she works 11- or 12-hour shifts without a break at a Texas Roadhouse to afford her $1,300-a-month rent, didn’t even know she could apply for rent relief.
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ENLzW5">
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Technically, she couldn’t, until <a href="https://www.tampabay.com/news/real-estate/2021/05/18/florida-renters-landlords-can-now-apply-to-state-for-rental-assistance/">the week before last when the state opened up its rent relief application process</a>, the Tampa Bay Times reports. Meanwhile, Miami-Dade County, where Ashbes resides, has already <a href="https://www.miamidade.gov/global/housing/emergency-rental-assistance-program.page">closed its program for applications</a>.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="x0l0DX">
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That disconnect between Ashbes’s situation and the federal relief that was supposed to help renters like her explains why people are <a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/2021/03/15/opinion/wave-evictions-is-not-inevitable-its-policy-choice/">sounding</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/patti_prunhuber/status/1393344426630516738?s=20">the alarm</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/MarkLevineNYC/status/1345167304171139072?s=20">about</a> a <a href="https://twitter.com/biggar_a/status/1393306679127658496?s=20">potential deluge of evictions</a> if the federal moratorium is allowed to expire (or is struck down) in the next few weeks.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="fvT00c">
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Getting money into the hands of renters has been exceedingly complicated — the National Low Income Housing Coalition has found <a href="https://nlihc.org/rental-assistance">over 340 different programs</a> attempting to administer the federal aid. Some programs require onerous documentation; others don’t make it easy for landlords to apply and most put the onus on tenants to provide extensive proof of need. And Ashbes is far from unique; many advocates Vox spoke with said tenants often don’t even know the aid is available to them. All of this underscores the difficulty of aiding those at highest risk of eviction.
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</p>
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<figure class="e-image">
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<img alt=" " src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/CaonXr0IKhwicKDSSvEc8EBu5do=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/22529139/GettyImages_1227991447.jpg"/> <cite>Angela Weiss/AFP/Getty Images</cite>
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<figcaption>
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Community members protest evictions outside the Bronx housing court in New York on August 10, 2020.
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</figcaption>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Vlv1PK">
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The context of this difficulty is that the federal government has never before provided so much aid to renters. The unparalleled action taken by former President Donald Trump’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to enact an eviction moratorium, in addition to the extended unemployment benefits, the economic impact payments, and <a href="https://nlihc.org/sites/default/files/Coronavirus-Relief-Fund.pdf">funding in the CARES Act </a><a href="https://nlihc.org/sites/default/files/CDBG-CV.pdf">for housing stability</a>, has kept millions of families afloat. Now, the tens of billions in rent relief is an opportunity to keep millions of people in their homes, and an extraordinary challenge to states and localities, many of which have never administered this type of aid before.
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="2F7Erq">
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But with the federal eviction moratorium expiring at the end of June, and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/05/us/politics/eviction-moratorium-biden.html">several</a> <a href="https://www.vox.com/2021/2/26/22302149/eviction-moratorium-trump-judge-campbell-barker-terkel-cdc-commerce-clause-constitution">judges</a> attempting to strike it down before then, states may have mere weeks to get money into the hands of renters before eviction processes start up again in earnest.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="4Mw4fc">
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Not a single expert or advocate Vox spoke with believes the money will be allocated by then.
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</p>
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<h3 id="YU17mS">
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Billions in back rent is owed. States are struggling to distribute a fraction of that in rental assistance.
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</h3>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="9S9Ny8">
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“The money came late,” Diane Yentel, president and CEO of the National Low Income Housing Coalition, told Vox. “The money came when tenants had already accrued nearly $50 billion in rent arrears. So now we’re playing a game of catch-up.”
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="jZAdwm">
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Estimates about the amount of back rent owed across the country <a href="https://www.urban.org/urban-wire/many-people-are-behind-rent-how-much-do-they-owe#:~:text=How%20much%20do%20delinquent%20renters,to%20%246%2C000%20in%20back%20rent.">range from $8.4 billion to $52.6 billion</a>, meaning that the $45 billion allocated should cover the vast majority of need, especially considering that renters have indirectly received other forms of aid from the federal government.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="cMmyBl">
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The vast majority of renters <em>have</em> figured out how to make rent payments. According to the National Multi-Family Housing Council’s <a href="https://www.nmhc.org/research-insight/nmhc-rent-payment-tracker/?mkt_tok=Njc2LVVERC03MTQAAAF89ZCT8XDhr7UD4fHAkUwEh_MRgf1piEboENia8mHn32HlzZn99h8njn-K7x5Jl1xb_pMm0o_7PcY_1198EFVx7GZVTClunx_wNPRtNSBQKQ">rent payment tracker</a>, “80.0 percent of apartment households made a full or partial rent payment by May 6.” The previous month’s data shows that by the end of the month, 95 percent of renters had made a full or partial rent payment.
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Research by the Mortgage Bankers Association’s Research Institute for Housing America found <a href="https://www.mba.org/2021-press-releases/may/less-than-10-percent-of-homeowners-and-renters-have-missed-more-than-two-payments-during-the-covid-19-pandemic">similarly heartening news</a>: While 23.7 percent of renters have missed at least one payment over the past year, only 8.6 percent of renters have missed more than two payments.
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But that doesn’t mean that over 90 percent of renters are doing fine. In order to make those payments, many renters have had to deplete their savings, max out their credit cards, or take on loans from family, friends, or payday lenders.
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And it’s not clear when rental assistance will reach those people.
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="2b4qDH">
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While the Treasury Department does not require someone to be behind on their rent to qualify for assistance (according to its <a href="https://home.treasury.gov/system/files/136/ERA2FAQs%205-6-21.pdf">fact sheet</a>), programs may add their own requirements for eligibility. Some of those requirements might exclude renters like Matthew Turner, who went to extraordinary lengths to remain in that group who’ve missed only one or zero payments.
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Turner, a renter living in North Carolina, told Vox that his application for relief was initially accepted by a program in Wake County, but he was eventually denied aid after he paid rent.
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="jUuRrb">
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“We sold all of our belongings in our apartment to pay the rent,” Turner told Vox. Now, he says, he’s caught in an impossible place. If he doesn’t pay his rent, he’s at risk of receiving an eviction notice — a black mark on any renter’s history that can make it harder to get housing in the future<strong> </strong>— but without showing proof that he’s behind on his rent, he’s unable to get help to stay solvent.
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="htj3Hc">
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“[My partner and I] have debated whether we should leave independently or if we should stay and be evicted and never be able to get another apartment for the next 10 years,” he told me. The eviction moratorium hasn’t stopped some landlords from filing evictions or, in some cases, even harassing tenants to leave. Turner doesn’t want it to get that far, but if he doesn’t get help, he tells me that they will find themselves homeless once again.
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="YGxGMx">
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Turner’s story might seem to indicate that these programs are running low on funds, but all reports indicate that very little has actually made it into the pockets of at-risk renters. The Treasury Department is collecting data on how much states have allocated and to whom, but it has yet to be released. Tenant advocates I spoke with in California and Washington, DC, told me they didn’t personally know anyone who had actually received aid.
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<aside id="tiKBnl">
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<q>“I literally donated eggs to [make rent]. I’m selling off body parts.” </q>
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</aside>
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Georgia’s Department of Community Affairs told me that it has distributed more than $4 million in rental assistance funding to landlords and tenants; the state has received over $552 million for that purpose. Delaware’s State Housing Authority told me that it has distributed $40,000 in rental assistance — 0.02 percent of its allocated funds. Idaho’s Housing and Finance Association told me it has distributed $6.1 million of the $175 million it received from the federal government. Colorado’s <a href="https://public.tableau.com/profile/connor.everson5568#!/vizhome/HousingReliefProgramsDashboard/PaymentsApprovals">dashboard</a> shows $2.8 million has been approved from the $247 million it has received. <a href="https://des.az.gov/erap-dashboard">Arizona’s dashboard</a> shows $4.38 million has been disbursed out of the $289 million it has received.
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More has reached tenants — those state numbers don’t include the spending done by programs at the county and city level — but it<strong> </strong>indicates the pace of these programs may not be fast enough to meet the urgent, coming crisis.
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ARWNEM">
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The New York Times recently <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/25/us/politics/rental-assistance-pandemic.html">reported</a> that California has only paid out $1 million of its $355 million in apportioned funds, and Texas, which has received over $1 billion, had only paid 250 households after 45 days. Some states are not even accepting applications for emergency rental assistance, including South Carolina and New York.
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“Of the programs that are open, altogether they account for about $18 billion of the $25 billion allocation. That’s the amount of money that’s available from programs that are open, accepting applications, reviewing applications, and writing checks,” Yentel explained.
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Programs at the county and city level in these states have been operating, so it doesn’t mean all residents are completely without options, but it underscores how dire the situation is, just six weeks from when the moratorium expires.
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<h3 id="Gyc4na">
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Everyone agrees it’s an emergency. So what’s taking so long to get the money out?
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Time, knowledge, and bureaucracy: These are the challenges facing rent relief programs racing to dole out funds.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="JxDot4">
|
|||
|
|
States and localities have never before had to set up rent relief programs to distribute federal aid. To do so, programs needed to hire staff, set up websites, comply with any additional regulations or goals set by their state legislatures, and conduct outreach. Even with best efforts, most experts Vox spoke with were skeptical that it would have been possible for programs to move fast enough to get all the aid out the door before the end of June.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Q7a2qL">
|
|||
|
|
But that also reflects government’s lack of engagement with some of the most marginalized members in their communities.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="LIa3pO">
|
|||
|
|
“One of the things that this pandemic has made very clear is that there’s a lot that we don’t know about our housing market,” Vincent Reina, director of the Housing Initiative at the University of Pennsylvania, told me. “The vast majority of cities don’t have full registries of every owner in their city. … It shows we often don’t know who owns properties and what’s going on with these properties or which tenants are experiencing financial hardship.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="D2hNS1">
|
|||
|
|
If states had been collecting detailed information about where struggling tenants are and how much back rent was accumulating, it’s likely this process would have moved faster.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<figure class="e-image">
|
|||
|
|
<img alt=" " src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/LCqk8-H_5NkLJdm71VfQLFjf-fw=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/22529155/AP_21081608595089.jpg"/> <cite>Robert Bumsted/AP</cite>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
Candida Uraga, a renter in New York City, says she has drained her savings trying to keep up with rent after being laid off from her job as a teaching assistant.
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
<figure class="e-image">
|
|||
|
|
<img alt=" " src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/k9aPdU0mAm39t1bwUo3YB7Yc7bE=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/22529156/AP_21026043518934.jpg"/> <cite>Rich Pedroncelli/AP</cite>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
Demonstrators in California call for lawmakers and Gov. Gavin Newsom to pass rent forgiveness and stronger eviction protections on January 25.
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="SYRyb8">
|
|||
|
|
But there are some success stories. A representative from the Alaska Housing Finance Corporation, for instance, told me that by May 10 the state had paid out $18.2 million and 9,000 applications had been approved. When I checked back nine days later, the representative told me they had approved more than 1,300 additional applications and sent a total of $25.9 million in payments. The state’s total allocation is $200 million, so they still have a way to go, but they credit their progress to the fact that they “offered a unified application that was optimized for mobile” as well as measuring how long it was taking to process applications and making it “as easy as possible for applicants and landlords or utility companies” to submit required documentation.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="5a46mw">
|
|||
|
|
“It seems clear that the places that have really committed themselves to analyzing how things are going as they are going and making course corrections along the way have been most able to get dollars out the door,” Reina explained.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="hzMUxS">
|
|||
|
|
The second hurdle is knowledge. As Ashbes told me, even though she’d been trying to get help from the government over the past year (applying successfully for unemployment), she was unaware of the rent relief available to people like her.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="pPMSoF">
|
|||
|
|
When I told her about the opportunity to apply for rent relief, she sounded hopeless but said she would look into applying.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="PJ2CIm">
|
|||
|
|
“I feel like there’s something I’m supposed to be doing, but I have no idea what it is,” she said. “Like, somehow it’s my fault but I don’t know what I can do. I’m willing to do anything, I am doing everything I can do. It’s breaking down my body, it’s breaking down my soul. I considered going back to dancing, like stripping, but I’m scared that my substance abuse problem will return.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="GRobJg">
|
|||
|
|
Ashbes isn’t the only one who doesn’t know that billions have been allocated for rent relief. Shakeara Mingo, an organizer with ONE DC and a member of the Cancel Rent coalition, told me there are tenants who don’t know to apply.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="SJQXTy">
|
|||
|
|
She’s even more concerned, though, about how difficult it is to apply even when tenants are made aware. Because programs can be audited to ensure they spent the money in the way the federal government intended, administrators are pressured to collect a lot of information and invest resources and time extensively verifying that people are actually in need before they give them money.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<div class="c-float-right c-float-hang">
|
|||
|
|
<aside id="eYXvL6">
|
|||
|
|
<q>“One of the things that this pandemic has made very clear is that there’s a lot that we don’t know about our housing market”</q>
|
|||
|
|
</aside>
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="g7hK4Y">
|
|||
|
|
There are two parts to this problem. One is unnecessary bureaucratic hurdles, like Massachusetts originally <a href="https://shelterforce.org/2020/12/23/making-eviction-diversion-meaningful/">requiring applicants to produce their physical birth certificates</a>, and the other is necessary bureaucratic hurdles— there has to be <em>some</em> way for programs to determine who needs help and how much.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="y9tEoT">
|
|||
|
|
The interplay between getting money out fast and making sure that no one is gaming the system (or, more generously, that the money is getting to the people who need it the most) is <a href="https://www.vox.com/22250471/poll-1400-stimulus-checks-2000-means-test-covid-19-congress-undocumented-immigrants">not new</a>. Nor is it easy to simply cast blame on the individual programs or the federal government — it is inherently difficult to aid indigent residents. But it’s hard not to draw comparisons to the simplicity of depositing stimulus payments into the accounts of tens of millions of Americans, which did not require residents to prove anything to access the funds quickly. People are quick to point out that there have never before been rent relief programs in most states, but that begs the question — why not?
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="csqQYm">
|
|||
|
|
The Treasury Department <a href="https://home.treasury.gov/system/files/136/ERA2FAQs%205-6-21.pdf">put out clarifications on May 7</a> to help make the process less onerous and clarify what types of documentation are needed, but, for example, in Florida, where Ashbes lives, the following documents are required for all members of an applying household:
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<ul>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="IyicvV">
|
|||
|
|
Identification (driver’s license, birth certificate, or passport)
|
|||
|
|
</li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="4T7ka5">
|
|||
|
|
Current lease agreement or other proof of rental agreement
|
|||
|
|
</li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="KdN4xs">
|
|||
|
|
Documentation of annual income or monthly income
|
|||
|
|
</li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="HYT9Go">
|
|||
|
|
Proof of eligibility documents for SNAP, TANF, Medicaid, subsidized housing, or low-income housing if you qualify
|
|||
|
|
</li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="IHJo0q">
|
|||
|
|
Documentation of unemployment benefits or proof of reduction in household income or proof of increased costs due to Covid-19
|
|||
|
|
</li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0ICNOO">
|
|||
|
|
Notice of past due rent, lease termination, or eviction, or condemnation order or failed inspection report from local government
|
|||
|
|
</li>
|
|||
|
|
</ul>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="NSk7Th">
|
|||
|
|
Having these documents at hand is no simple feat, especially for people like Ashbes who have had to move during the last year or others who may not have formal documentation of their work or their rental agreement.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="qo6Y1r">
|
|||
|
|
“It’s a really convoluted process,” said Shanti Singh, communications and legislative director for the California organization Tenants Together. “People who are most impacted by economic hardship during Covid-19, they often don’t have extensive documentation of hardships or job losses.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="lBYRTP">
|
|||
|
|
The evidence that people are either unaware or discouraged due to an onerous application process shows in the application numbers. As of May 12, in Georgia, just 5,000 people had completed applications to the state program and<strong> </strong>Delaware had received 5,145 applications; by May 23,<strong> </strong>Arizona had received 2,889 applications. and Colorado had received 8,510.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="cP0XrF">
|
|||
|
|
“The intent of all of these reporting requirements is to make sure no one’s ‘gaming the system,’” Singh explained, “but the more requirements you put on these programs, [the more] people who really are in need fall through the cracks.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ZO51YZ">
|
|||
|
|
Mike Flood, senior vice president at the Mortgage Bankers Association, strongly agreed with the need to reduce documentation requirements: “Let’s understand that it’s most important to get money into people’s hands. … Every time we put a restriction on the program, it makes a borrower or, quite frankly, a renter hesitant about taking hold of the program.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<h3 id="o3BRmS">
|
|||
|
|
What will happen if the money doesn’t get out in time?
|
|||
|
|
</h3>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Z88AlM">
|
|||
|
|
Some advocates are pushing to extend the eviction moratorium until these programs can adequately assess who needs help and how to get it to them.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="hXFwoG">
|
|||
|
|
Even if the moratorium is extended again (and the numerous lawsuits against the order remain unsuccessful), the underlying debt will continue to accumulate, and at some point, landlords will reach their limit.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="IhdmZH">
|
|||
|
|
<a href="https://www.hud.gov/press/press_releases_media_advisories/HUD_No_20_071">According to the Department of Housing and Urban Development</a>, “41 percent of all rental units are owned by individual investors” or “mom and pop landlords.” That means these landlords are unlikely to be able to weather months of nonpayment and still keep up with their own expenses.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="nZDXkw">
|
|||
|
|
Benny is a landlord in California who bought his first house last year before widespread Covid-19 shutdowns. To make his mortgage payments, he rented out a spare room to a tenant. After the moratorium began, he says, his tenant stopped paying.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="26N4b5">
|
|||
|
|
“We needed an eviction moratorium,” Benny, whose last name is being withheld to protect his privacy, told me. “I definitely don’t think we should be allowing wide-scale evictions, but I also think the way that small landlords have been treated is unacceptable. … Candidly, I’m going to be forced to sell my house as soon as my tenant moves out. I’m never going to be a landlord ever again after this situation.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<figure class="e-image">
|
|||
|
|
<img alt=" " src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/mZ6tqibYjB-PLpil2jbyRCZI0JE=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/22529245/GettyImages_1304785059.jpg"/> <cite>Andrew Lichtenstein/Corbis/Getty Images</cite>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
On March 1, the day that New York’s Covid-19 moratorium on rent expired, tenant rights activists held a demonstration outside the court building where eviction cases are starting up again.
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="fguJrV">
|
|||
|
|
Benny says he and his tenant have applied for rent relief, but he’s skeptical that it will help. He’s also frustrated that in order to accept rent relief, <a href="https://housing.ca.gov/covid_rr/media_kit_20210315.pdf">California is requiring landlords to waive 20 percent</a> of what they’re entitled to in back rent: “To me, that’s kind of punitive for no real justification, other than just viewing landlords as some kind of bad entity.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="VoDCWN">
|
|||
|
|
This isn’t just bad because these small landlords are struggling; it’s bad because small landlords disproportionately provide affordable housing.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="GR5B5e">
|
|||
|
|
Research from the <a href="https://www.urban.org/urban-wire/owners-and-renters-62-million-units-small-buildings-are-particularly-vulnerable-during-pandemic">Urban Institute shows</a> that the average rent in small rental properties is less than “the median for single-family rentals, medium-size apartment buildings, and large apartment buildings.” And in 2018, “the median income for a two-to-four-unit landlord was $67,000.” Renters of these units are predominantly Black and Hispanic, and they have the lowest median household income when compared to renters of other types of properties.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="C2Ocu2">
|
|||
|
|
If landlords are not provided with enough relief, it could strain America’s already limited affordable housing stock, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/10/23/americas-affordable-housing-stock-dropped-by-60-percent-from-2010-to-2016/">which is approaching depletion following the Great Recession</a>.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="RNErYB">
|
|||
|
|
“It’s critical that we get the dollars out as quickly as possible to stabilize [landlords],” Bob Pinnegar, president and CEO of the National Apartment Association, warned. “We had a housing affordability crisis going into Covid-19; if we come out of this with substantially less rental units out there, we’re going to have a situation that’s going to be far worse than what we had before.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Wtft1i">
|
|||
|
|
But in all likelihood, the eviction moratorium will come to an end soon — increasingly accessible vaccinations have made the justification for the order (that evictions and overcrowding in homes would lead to the spread of Covid-19) less compelling.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="IOLemb">
|
|||
|
|
Jamie Woodwell, vice president of research and economics at the Mortgage Bankers Association, argues that even if there is a spike in evictions, it has to be contextualized in the remarkable decline in evictions over the past year: “It’s going to be really important to know what we’re comparing the new eviction levels to.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ExAAEi">
|
|||
|
|
However, even though the federal government’s policies are unprecedented, leaving millions of people vulnerable to evictions even as the money to keep them housed has already been allocated is a remarkable indictment of the government’s capacity to act.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<figure class="e-image">
|
|||
|
|
<img alt=" " src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/-MeWMAWGzVvzHewjXbP8xOPJrA0=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/22530111/Screen_Shot_2021_05_21_at_1.45.13_AM.png"/> <cite><a class="ql-link" href="https://files.consumerfinance.gov/f/documents/cfpb_Housing_insecurity_and_the_COVID-19_pandemic.pdf" target="_blank">Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, March 2021</a></cite>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="EWimYB">
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<ul>
|
|||
|
|
<li><strong>What will shopping look like?</strong> -
|
|||
|
|
<figure>
|
|||
|
|
<img alt="An illustration of a very crowded shopping mall." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/auadnhrgShEkFLbDTumb5Sz3Pmo=/1334x0:6667x4000/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/69333290/GettyImages_1043605040.0.jpg"/>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
Will the mall ever look the way it used to? | iStockphoto/Getty Images
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
|
The pandemic has changed how Americans shop, from wider aisles to curbside pickup.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="g7ObzP">
|
|||
|
|
With two shots of Pfizer in her arm, Bri Blair recently did something she hadn’t risked since before the pandemic: She went to the mall.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="EfQFgg">
|
|||
|
|
She met up with her mom at a shopping center near her home in North Carolina to try on clothes at Belk and Earthbound Trading Company, eat chicken and rice in the food court, and generally reimmerse herself in society. And though there were some notable differences compared with the Before Times — masked shoppers, hand sanitizer stations, plastic bags covering the water fountains — she says she was surprised by how many other people were there.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="bPfeeM">
|
|||
|
|
After more than a year of quarantining and social distancing, being out in such a public space was a strange experience.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="txel6j">
|
|||
|
|
“I felt like I was hyperaware of everyone, for sure,” Blair says. Still, that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing: She looked people in the eyes, took advantage of the dressing rooms, and appreciated the novelty of the store environment. “I was pretty immersed in the experience,” she added.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ixSSdj">
|
|||
|
|
With nearly 40 percent of Americans fully vaccinated — a share that is ticking up by the day — and most states easing pandemic restrictions and planning full reopenings, shoppers are slowly emerging from behind their screens and returning to stores. And even as some retail workers are hesitant to come back to (or continue with) what has been an <a href="https://www.vox.com/21400893/masks-walmart-enforce-coronavirus-health-ambassador">especially grueling job</a> this year, companies are also working on a <a href="https://www.businessoffashion.com/articles/retail/pandemic-may-permanently-replace-retail-jobs-with-machines">host of changes</a> that may one day make their jobs obsolete.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="FShfGd">
|
|||
|
|
US retail sales jumped 10.7 percent in March as a third round of stimulus checks padded consumers’ pockets, according to the <a href="https://www.census.gov/retail/marts/www/marts_current.pdf">US Department of Commerce</a>. Apparel sales more than doubled over the same month last year, while sales at department stores rose 13 percent above their February levels. In April, sales were flat as the stimulus bump receded, though economists point to the sustained improvement over 2020’s dismal figures — and Americans’ increasing comfort with indoor activities — as reasons for hope.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<div class="c-float-right c-float-hang">
|
|||
|
|
<aside id="xDcgJg">
|
|||
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|
<q>“When provided with the ability and the possibility of spending in a safe way, consumers have the desire to do so”</q>
|
|||
|
|
</aside>
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="b2LOmC">
|
|||
|
|
“What we’ve seen in the latest data is that when provided with the ability and the possibility of spending in a safe way, consumers have the means and the desire to do so,” says Gregory Daco, chief US economist at Oxford Economics.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ugcR1q">
|
|||
|
|
Already, the spending surge has contributed to rising prices in some categories, especially those where the demand for goods has most outstripped the supply of inputs, Daco says. Currently, inflation is hitting sectors such as tech and home building, which have been impacted by shortages in <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2021/4/7/22368552/global-chip-shortage-end-tsmc-samsung-ps5-supply-demand-intel">semiconductors</a> and <a href="https://www.vox.com/22410713/lumber-prices-shortage">lumber</a> alongside skyrocketing demand. As new parts of the economy reopen, though, Daco expects prices to adjust accordingly, with inflation shifting from goods to services such as flights, hotel rooms, and sporting events. (Though, as <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/22435400/economy-unemployment-inflation">other experts have admitted</a>, it’s impossible to say exactly what the economy will do in the pandemic’s aftermath.)
|
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</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="5nPla2">
|
|||
|
|
“Inflation at this stage of the recovery is almost unavoidable … but that does not mean that it’s uncontrollable,” he says, explaining it will take time for spending patterns to normalize and for supply to catch up to demand.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="r7A1Lt">
|
|||
|
|
While foot traffic in stores hasn’t caught up to pre-pandemic highs, the country’s best malls are seeing improvement. Among a sample of 52 Class A malls, foot traffic in April was down just 18.7 percent from 2019 levels, analytics company Placer.ai told Vox in an interview. That was a marked gain even from March, when traffic was off by 23.7 percent.
|
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</p>
|
|||
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="isN4iM">
|
|||
|
|
With new cases of Covid-19 on the decline across most of the country and plans for weddings, concerts, and vacations on the horizon again, retailers anticipate a spending boom. After all, as <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/07/business/media/post-pandemic-ads.html">ads for beer and shapewear</a> now suggest, what better way to get “back to normal” than to buy new stuff?
|
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|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="4K8NN6">
|
|||
|
|
But just because vaccinated Americans can safely shop like they used to doesn’t mean all of them will. Some have <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/suburban-homes-and-retail-are-the-budding-new-office-hotspot-11620129603">moved to the suburbs</a> and now <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/shopping-centers-occupancy-rents-retail-commercial-real-estate-2021-5">frequent strip malls</a> instead of street-level boutiques; others have changed jobs and routines. Some won’t be going back to the office every day, so they’re less likely to buy a new dress shirt or pop into the downtown shops after work. Many have also grown accustomed to the ease of curbside pickup and now expect their trips to the store to be as quick and convenient as checking out online.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<div class="c-wide-block">
|
|||
|
|
<figure class="e-image">
|
|||
|
|
<img alt=" " src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/mLVBMlBq_1u86T2c__Z8wjgo_9E=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/22528796/GettyImages_1317854955.jpg"/> <cite>Spencer Platt/Getty Images</cite>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
Masked shoppers inside a Manhattan mall.
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="hdJcGs">
|
|||
|
|
Even though e-commerce accounts for only <a href="https://www.census.gov/retail/mrts/www/data/pdf/ec_current.pdf">about 14 percent of consumer spending</a> in the US today, according to the Census Bureau, it may still be an existential threat to tens of thousands of existing stores. A recent UBS report forecasts <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2021/04/05/store-closures-ubs-predicts-80000-stores-will-go-dark-by-2026.html">80,000 retail store closures</a>, representing 9 percent of the country’s total retail footprint, by 2026. The report suggests more stores will close as Americans do more of their shopping online — a trend UBS says has only been exacerbated by the pandemic.
|
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|
|
</p>
|
|||
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="D92ONH">
|
|||
|
|
Back in February, as many as one in four US consumers said they no longer enjoyed the in-person shopping experience and didn’t feel safe shopping in stores, according to <a href="https://www.ibm.com/thought-leadership/institute-business-value/report/vaccine-consumer-behavior">a global IBM survey</a>.
|
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|
|
</p>
|
|||
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="dpTa4B">
|
|||
|
|
Karl Haller, a partner at IBM Global Business Services, expects these concerns to flag, though, so long as local public health outlooks continue to improve. “As people are getting vaccinated and as restrictions are getting relaxed, safety will probably slowly migrate down in terms of its active importance in the minds of consumers, unless or until there is an outbreak of some sort,” Haller says.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="n6XlmX">
|
|||
|
|
While conspicuous Lysoling, mandatory hand sanitizer stations, and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2020/09/08/robot-cleaners-surge-pandemic/">UV disinfection robots</a> roaming the aisles — which the Atlantic’s Derek Thompson called “<a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/04/end-hygiene-theater/618576/">hygiene theater</a>” — may assuage some customers’ aversion to germs, they don’t necessarily make for an enjoyable shopping experience. Do you really want to be reminded of the looming threat of plague when you’re trying to buy face cream?
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="IJpSDe">
|
|||
|
|
A more subtle shift that could outlast the pandemic is more spacious store layouts, says MJ Munsell, chief creative officer at architecture design and strategy firm MG2. In the past 20 or so years, fixture spacing has tightened to accommodate more and more merchandise, she says. And while the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 sets some requirements for retailers — aisles must be at least 3 feet wide, for example — social distancing has awakened many companies to the value of a little extra breathing room.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="30ZfIy">
|
|||
|
|
“[Retailers] are realizing that it is a customer amenity to provide more space, to not feel crowded, to not feel like you’re going to bump into someone else when you’re shopping deeper into a store,” Munsell says.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="GVXTJ5">
|
|||
|
|
<a href="https://www.scmp.com/business/article/3116379/supermarkets-adopt-wider-aisles-contactless-payment-covid-19-pandemic">Grocery chains</a> and garden centers now tout their “<a href="https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=512735803234535">massive aisles</a>” alongside their low prices and merchandise selections. Contactless checkout sections are also here to stay, with Walmart rolling out its <a href="https://www.pymnts.com/news/retail/2020/walmart-unveils-pandemic-inspired-store-design/">self-checkout kiosks</a> in 1,000 additional stores this year. The country’s largest retailer is even <a href="https://www.pymnts.com/news/retail/2020/walmart-tests-store-without-cashiers-as-covid-19-accelerates-change/">testing a new format</a> that would eliminate cashier-staffed checkouts entirely.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="dDk3LV">
|
|||
|
|
Retailers that added or expanded their fulfillment options — among them curbside pickup; buy online, pick up in-store; and ship-from-store — during the pandemic are now finding that they have to more seamlessly integrate those processes into their store designs.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<div class="c-float-left c-float-hang">
|
|||
|
|
<div id="3KxuEI">
|
|||
|
|
<div>
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Lx7nmF">
|
|||
|
|
Grocery giant Publix, for instance, <a href="https://progressivegrocer.com/exclusive-publix-debuts-new-prototype-tampa">recently debuted</a> a new store format that includes a permanent online order hub, pharmacy drive-through, and designated parking spots for grocery pickup. The head of store operations at Ulta Beauty, meanwhile, told Morning Brew that it is <a href="https://go.redirectingat.com?id=66960X1516588&xs=1&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.morningbrew.com%2Fretail%2Fstories%2F2021%2F04%2F26%2Fshopping-centers-pandemic-era-debate-gets-curbside-parking-spot&referrer=vox.com&sref=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.vox.com%2Fthe-goods%2F22446093%2Fshopping-mall-real-brick-mortar-ecommerce-curbside-pickup" rel="sponsored nofollow noopener" target="_blank">renegotiating some store leases</a> to include parking spots for curbside pickup.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="r5gd8E">
|
|||
|
|
Convenience is just one feature that retailers are ramping up. Many are also recognizing that people need a good reason to shop in-store when the same products can be found quickly and easily online.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="NVdtHI">
|
|||
|
|
“There can no longer be what I would call a <em>Field of Dreams</em> mindset when thinking about stores. It is not a ‘build it and they will come’ philosophy,” says Haller.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="bxhXcU">
|
|||
|
|
At the arts-and-crafts chain Michaels, <a href="https://chainstoreage.com/first-look-michaels-unveils-new-concept-stores">new concept stores</a> will include “maker spaces” with free supplies, classes, and crafting tutorials. Dick’s Sporting Goods, meanwhile, opened its first <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2021/04/09/dicks-sporting-goods-new-store-has-a-driving-range-and-outdoor-track.html">House of Sport megastore</a> in April, featuring an indoor rock-climbing wall, batting cage, golf driving bays, and outdoor track and field that will be converted into a skating rink during the winter.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="GAnMwc">
|
|||
|
|
Lindsay Binette, director of field marketing at WS Development, says foot traffic is almost back at pre-pandemic levels at most of the company’s properties, which include the Boston Seaport and Tampa Bay’s Hyde Park Village. The Instagram-friendly ear-piercing studio Studs opened this month at The Current, the Seaport’s pop-up village, while Tampa customers are flocking back to the custom candlemaking shop The Candle Pour.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="sL9Yzi">
|
|||
|
|
“People are really looking for more of that sense of discovery that you can experience in-store that you can’t experience when you’re online,” says Binette.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="wo4OWD">
|
|||
|
|
While retailers were already making more efforts to tailor each of their stores to the unique tastes and demographics of local markets prior to the pandemic, that task became especially urgent in a year when people rarely ventured far from their homes.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="09xxV9">
|
|||
|
|
Nike is betting on this strategy with <a href="https://go.redirectingat.com?id=66960X1516588&xs=1&url=https%3A%2F%2Fnews.nike.com%2Fnews%2Fnike-live-launches-in-long-beach-and-tokyo&referrer=vox.com&sref=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.vox.com%2Fthe-goods%2F22446093%2Fshopping-mall-real-brick-mortar-ecommerce-curbside-pickup" rel="sponsored nofollow noopener" target="_blank">its Nike Live stores</a>, which leverage data about customers’ buying patterns and engagement to “provide the ultimate localized brick-and-mortar shopping experience.” To that end, shoppers visiting the Nike Live boutique in Tokyo will have an experience very different from those visiting the store in Atlanta.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="cPcSYL">
|
|||
|
|
“It’s no longer a rubber stamp from store to store. You’re starting to see a real different mix based on the patterns of purchase that are happening in a particular community, and that’s really going to help make brands more relevant,” says Lara Marrero, strategy director and retail practice leader at Gensler, a global design and architecture firm.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<div class="c-float-right c-float-hang">
|
|||
|
|
<aside id="35Ramn">
|
|||
|
|
<q>Only 1,600 mall-based department stores remain in the US, and half of them are expected to be shuttered by the end of 2025</q>
|
|||
|
|
</aside>
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="noVRYJ">
|
|||
|
|
If all retailers could be more like Nike, perhaps the outlook for America’s malls and brick-and-mortar stores would be brighter, but as it is, most experts predict that the glut of mediocre retail is unlikely to survive for long. Last year, a record 12,200 stores closed in the US, according to an analysis by the commercial real estate firm CoStar Group. About a third of them were department stores, clothing chains, and other mall-based properties. Department stores have an especially challenging road ahead: Only 1,600 mall-based locations remain in the US — down about 40 percent since 2016 — and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/04/16/half-countrys-remaining-mall-based-department-stores-are-expected-shutter-by-2025/">half of them are expected to be shuttered</a> by the end of 2025, according to Green Street Advisors.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="AtgIfr">
|
|||
|
|
Matt Anthony has seen what happens when a department store closes up shop. The Akron, Ohio, resident saw the writing on the wall when Macy’s left his local mall in 2016, and again when Sears and J.C. Penney followed suit soon thereafter. Last year, with no anchor stores remaining, the mall entered foreclosure proceedings, and just recently the property was bought by a developer who plans to turn it into a business park.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="NzM1ne">
|
|||
|
|
Anthony had witnessed this kind of decline a decade prior at the mall across town, which lost Dillard’s, Target, and Macy’s before shuttering in 2008. The property sat mostly vacant for years, earning its place in the annals of dead malls thanks to <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.com.au/entry/abandoned-mall-snow-dystopia_n_6656318">photos of its snow-covered atrium</a>, the skylights caved in from neglect. Today, though, the site of the former mall is once again bustling with activity: On November 1, 2020, Amazon <a href="https://www.beaconjournal.com/story/news/2020/11/10/amazon-announces-opening-fulfillment-center-former-rolling-acres/6231641002/">opened a distribution center</a> where it once stood.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="kwugVk">
|
|||
|
|
Akron has one remaining (and, fortunately, far more successful) mall, and Anthony and his wife recently drove there on a Friday night to run errands and enjoy a social experience after so many months hunkered down at home.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="yygErz">
|
|||
|
|
“It felt really good to be out among people again,” he says. “Just being able to meander and wander, given the fact that we’ve just spent the past year or more not being able to be near other people, was to me really refreshing.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="2h9k66">
|
|||
|
|
Going to Summit Mall was like “walking back in time to 20 years ago,” he says. The parking lot was full, Macy’s was open for business, and people seemed to be happy to be there. While he expects it will be a luxury one day to be able to, say, walk into a camera shop to ask a question rather than firing up a chat window with a faceless customer service person online, his trip to the mall that night reminded him that there are certain aspects of the brick-and-mortar experience that can’t be replaced online.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="1iNc7B">
|
|||
|
|
“It kind of harkens back to what it once was,” he says. “I wish we would have appreciated it a little earlier in the process before we gave our life over to Jeff Bezos.”
|
|||
|
|
</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li><strong>The death of Ronald Greene in Louisiana police custody, explained</strong> -
|
|||
|
|
<figure>
|
|||
|
|
<img alt="A Black man in a black T-shirt, cap and white mask, carries a sign with a photo of Ronald Greene in front of a crowd at a large outdoor plaza." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/4DcS_6zgjoMqbGVnz7j0cVafa4U=/293x0:4629x3252/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/69331594/1228240156.0.jpg"/>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
Sean Greene, brother of Ronald Greene, at a Washington, DC, march against police brutality in August 2020. | Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
|
New body cam footage dramatically differs from the original 2019 police report.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="f9lbsb">
|
|||
|
|
Last week, the Associated Press <a href="https://apnews.com/article/ronald-greene-death-louisiana-eca021d8a54ec73598dd72b269826f7a">obtained</a> police body camera footage of the arrest of Ronald Greene, a Black man who died in police custody in Louisiana after a car chase in 2019. The footage has revealed shocking brutality toward Greene, undermining the police’s account of what happened during the arrest, and indicates, experts say, a police cover-up of serious misconduct.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="gVO68G">
|
|||
|
|
The incident, and the conflict between the official report and the video footage, also raise questions about the power and limitations of body cameras — a focal point of <a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/body-cameras-are-seen-as-key-to-police-reform-but-do-they-increase-accountability">some criminal justice reform efforts</a> — when it comes to ensuring that law enforcement is held accountable for misconduct.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="SgPO63">
|
|||
|
|
Greene, a 49-year-old barber, died in police custody outside Monroe, Louisiana, in May 2019, following a police chase that began after Greene did not pull over for an unspecified traffic violation.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="JXXru2">
|
|||
|
|
According to the AP, police <a href="https://apnews.com/article/ronald-greene-death-louisiana-eca021d8a54ec73598dd72b269826f7a">initially told</a> Greene’s family that he died on impact after crashing into a tree. Later, according to the same AP report, the state police “acknowledg[ed] only that Greene struggled with troopers and died on his way to the hospital.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="i7lGNF">
|
|||
|
|
But the newly released footage, which lasts more than 46 minutes, reveals a prolonged struggle during which police repeatedly tased, punched, and choked Greene as they put him in handcuffs. The videos also show that he became unresponsive after a physical struggle which use-of-force experts <a href="https://apnews.com/article/ronald-greene-death-louisiana-eca021d8a54ec73598dd72b269826f7a">say</a> violates protocols for safely handling someone in handcuffs.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Odney6">
|
|||
|
|
Greene died in police custody before arriving at a hospital, but the precise cause and timing of his death are unclear. Based on his condition upon arriving at the hospital, an emergency room doctor who saw Greene <a href="https://apnews.com/article/ronald-greene-death-louisiana-eca021d8a54ec73598dd72b269826f7a">was skeptical</a> of the troopers’ initial account that Greene had died during a car crash; <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/21/us/ronald-greene-video-louisiana.html">an independent autopsy</a> later commissioned by Greene’s family found severe injuries to his skull.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="000a9I">
|
|||
|
|
In May 2020,<strong> </strong>Greene’s family sued the police for wrongful death, and federal authorities opened a civil rights investigation into Greene’s death last fall. But Louisiana State Police declined to release the footage publicly for two years, saying that releasing it would undermine the investigative process into the incident.
|
|||
|
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="k2touP">
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However, after the AP released the body camera footage it had obtained <a href="https://apnews.com/article/ronald-greene-death-louisiana-eca021d8a54ec73598dd72b269826f7a">last week</a>, the state police released what it said was all the related video, just days later.
|
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="wOOfeB">
|
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With the release of the graphic footage, public scrutiny of the incident has reignited, and experts have weighed in on what appears to be misconduct at several levels of law enforcement.
|
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="asj2KC">
|
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|
Alec Karakatsanis, executive director of the Washington-based nonprofit Civil Rights Corps, told Vox that the effort to obstruct the reality of Greene’s treatment by police likely included “at least low-level police officers, high-level police officials, state politicians, government lawyers, and state and federal prosecutors.”
|
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</p>
|
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="f1dDYu">
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Karakatsanis also likened the incident to the high-profile allegations of a cover-up in the death of <a href="https://www.vox.com/2019/1/17/18184158/chicago-police-conspiracy-trial-verdict-mcdonald-van-dyke">Laquan McDonald</a>, who was shot to death by Chicago police in 2014. In that case, too, the official police report differed markedly from later footage, but while the officer who shot McDonald was <a href="https://www.vox.com/2019/1/18/18188086/jason-van-dyke-sentencing-laquan-mcdonald-chicago-81-months">convicted</a> in his murder, fellow officers who were charged with covering up evidence were <a href="https://www.vox.com/2019/1/17/18187043/laquan-mcdonald-chicago-conspiracy-trial-not-guilty-verdict">not convicted</a>.
|
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="fRaJFt">
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The release of the footage in the Greene case has brought national public attention to another incident of police brutality in which official accounts differ from other evidence of the events. Coupled with <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/04/23/poll-police-bias-floyd/">increased public support</a> for broad police reforms and a presidential administration <a href="https://www.vox.com/2021/4/20/22394823/biden-congress-george-floyd-act">sympathetic</a> to the cause, it’s possible that more substantial steps may be taken to hold law enforcement accountable in this case.
|
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="RK4NTh">
|
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At the same time, however, the manner in which the Greene footage was released — only after journalists forced the issue into the national spotlight, a full two years after the incident was obscured by false and inaccurate statements by the police — serves as a reminder that body cameras <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/7/21/15983842/police-body-cameras-failures">are far from a silver bullet</a> as an accountability tool.
|
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</p>
|
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<h2 id="6SI99s">
|
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|
|
Greene’s death is shrouded in mystery, but it’s clear he was brutalized
|
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</h2>
|
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Stw86u">
|
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|
The now-public footage, from body and dashboard cameras, doesn’t provide a clear picture of everything that happened to Greene the night that he died. Nor does a newly released autopsy report, also <a href="https://apnews.com/article/george-floyd-arrests-77dd5a8ceaf2f293efb83c0177d61c4f">obtained by the AP and released Friday</a>, which stated that Greene’s head injuries and the manner in which he was detained contributed to his death; the report also found cocaine and alcohol in his system.
|
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</p>
|
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="taTF58">
|
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The report does not give a manner of death, which the AP’s Jim Mustian described as “a highly unusual move that did not make it clear whether Greene’s death could be deemed a homicide, an accident or undetermined.”
|
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ZyFBO6">
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What <em>is</em> clear is that, at multiple junctures, Louisiana State Police did not accurately describe what happened — and they did deploy excessive force in handling Greene.
|
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="hAMHVi">
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After police tried to pull Greene over for a traffic violation, he sped away from them at high speeds. Troopers told Greene’s family he died when he hit a tree, but the footage shows Greene conscious, speaking, and moving after his car stopped; it <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2021/05/22/us/ronald-greene-louisiana-video-saturday/index.html">is unclear</a> based on reports and footage exactly how his car came to a stop. The New York Times <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/21/us/ronald-greene-video-louisiana.html">reports</a> that, according to Greene’s family’s lawyer, an accident reconstruction expert concluded that the marks on the car — mostly on the rear driver’s side — were inconsistent with a fatal collision.
|
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="aZSNf7">
|
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Footage shows that troopers opened Greene’s car door and immediately tased him.
|
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</p>
|
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Z1XlSC">
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As at least two troopers try to pull Greene out of the car, Greene can be heard saying, “Okay, okay. I’m sorry. I’m scared. Officer, I’m scared, I’m your brother, I’m scared.”
|
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</p>
|
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<div id="Xlewn3">
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<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
|
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" dir="ltr" lang="en">
|
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Body cam footage shows officers tased, kicked and dragged Ronald Greene, a Black man who died on his way to the hospital after a high speed police pursuit. <br/><br/>Authorities reportedly told his family he’d been killed in an auto accident immediately after hitting a tree. <a href="https://t.co/q4kP3Pxupv">pic.twitter.com/q4kP3Pxupv</a>
|
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|
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</p>
|
|||
|
|
— Anderson Cooper 360° (<span class="citation" data-cites="AC360">@AC360</span>) <a href="https://twitter.com/AC360/status/1395537735138562048?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 21, 2021</a>
|
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|
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</blockquote></div></li>
|
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</ul>
|
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="k0vxhp">
|
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|
The troopers struggle to arrest Greene, and, as they do so, they repeatedly tase and punch him in the face and in the back, and appear to place him in a chokehold, the footage shows. Greene can be heard apologizing and crying out in distress throughout the situation.
|
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</p>
|
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="WjsksW">
|
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|
At one point after Greene is handcuffed with his hands behind his back, he is dragged by his ankles and left in a prone position for more than nine minutes. “I hope this guy ain’t got fucking AIDS,” one of the troopers can be heard saying as he cleans blood off of himself.
|
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</p>
|
|||
|
|
<h2 id="5dmF3I">
|
|||
|
|
Footage may reveal misconduct and even a cover-up, experts say
|
|||
|
|
</h2>
|
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ePvATK">
|
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|
Use-of-force experts say that being handcuffed in the prone position makes it difficult for someone to breathe, and police officers are told to prevent someone from staying in the position too long for that reason.
|
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|
|
</p>
|
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="V4ZhNs">
|
|||
|
|
“There’s nothing in any manual anywhere in the United States that allows for dragging an individual face down by their ankles,” Charles Ramsey, the former commissioner of the Philadelphia Police Department, <a href="https://twitter.com/AC360/status/1395537735138562048">said</a> on CNN last week after observing the footage. “Clearly this is a case of excessive force, between the tasing, kicking, beating. Having him in a prone position for that length of time … that is still a position that’s very difficult to breathe. Part of your training tells you, as soon as you get him cuffed, roll him over or sit him up, in order for them to be able to breathe.”
|
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</p>
|
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="37bRyh">
|
|||
|
|
One trooper can be heard discussing the arrest in a telephone exchange inside his patrol vehicle.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="pXpZwT">
|
|||
|
|
“And I beat the ever-living fuck out of him, choked him and everything else trying to get him under control, and we finally got him in handcuffs when a third man got there, and the son of a bitch was still fighting, and we was still wrestling with him trying to hold him down because he was spitting blood everywhere — and then all of a sudden he just went limp,” <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2021/05/22/us/ronald-greene-louisiana-video-saturday/index.html">the trooper said</a>.
|
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|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="8MAjpC">
|
|||
|
|
Not all of the troopers at the scene had their cameras on during the arrest, and Greene is not always visible in the available camera footage. The microphones are also not always on throughout the videos. And at one point, an officer actively turned his camera off. As a result, there are significant gaps in the details surrounding Greene’s death.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="9EphbI">
|
|||
|
|
The video footage eventually shows Greene covered in blood and appearing unresponsive as he’s loaded into an ambulance. It’s not clear when Greene died, but it happened before arriving at the hospital.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="39gp6P">
|
|||
|
|
As the AP reports, the troopers provided what appears to be some combination of incomplete and false information to medical professionals who handled Greene after the arrest:
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<blockquote>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="n3P8Kn">
|
|||
|
|
Union Parish Coroner Renee Smith told AP last year his death was ruled accidental and attributed to cardiac arrest. Smith, who was not in office when that determination was made, said her office’s file on Greene attributed his death to a car crash and made no mention of a struggle with State Police.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="2qgUyH">
|
|||
|
|
The AP last year also obtained a medical report showing an emergency room doctor noted Greene arrived dead at the hospital, bruised and bloodied with two stun-gun prongs in his back. That led the doctor to question troopers’ initial account that Greene had “died on impact” after crashing into a tree. “Does not add up,” the doctor wrote.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
</blockquote>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="t82P5R">
|
|||
|
|
Later the police <a href="https://apnews.com/article/lawsuits-us-news-ap-top-news-monroe-ar-state-wire-8149ba0410056b2f96b155b0d2e127d7">released</a> a single-page crash report which said that “Greene was taken into custody after resisting arrest and a struggle with Troopers,” It did not mention any use of force by troopers.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="fJkQOL">
|
|||
|
|
Ramsey, the former police commissioner, said on CNN, “If the reports are accurate … it’s a cover-up, the statements being made are not consistent with what the video is showing.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<h2 id="C2BKJ7">
|
|||
|
|
Troopers have so far faced few repercussions for their actions toward Greene
|
|||
|
|
</h2>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="NIc7Hk">
|
|||
|
|
There were at least six troopers at the scene of the arrest, and there are seven defendants in the Greene family’s wrongful death lawsuit. But Louisiana State Police have been reluctant to make critical details public and the repercussions so far for those involved have been limited.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="1hymjk">
|
|||
|
|
According to Louisiana State Police, the trooper who dragged Greene by his ankles, Kory York, was given a 50-hour suspension and returned to active duty, pending the outcome of state and federal investigations.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="5V4BFA">
|
|||
|
|
The officer who can be heard describing how he had beaten and choked Greene, Chris Hollingsworth, was notified last September that he was going to be fired as a result of an internal investigation into his handling of Greene’s arrest. Hollingsworth died <a href="https://apnews.com/article/police-us-news-la-state-wire-louisiana-monroe-0ad3c5761a0e5ea7f3ec1a67d5d10ac2">in a car crash hours afterward</a>.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="1qDWUg">
|
|||
|
|
And a third trooper, Dakota DeMoss, was <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/09/us/louisiana-troopers-charged-false-arrests-excessive-force.html">arrested in February</a> in an unrelated case on charges of using excessive force. <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/21/us/ronald-greene-video-louisiana.html">According to the New York Times</a>, DeMoss remains on leave pending the outcome of disciplinary proceedings but has been “notified of the agency’s intention to terminate him.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="6ek4jC">
|
|||
|
|
Meanwhile, the federal investigation of the incident and the Greene family lawsuit are ongoing. And <a href="https://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/news/crime_police/article_af140472-1401-11eb-9006-bb0838fe4cef.html">local protests</a> throughout last year — which took place against the backdrop of Black Lives Matter protests following the high-profile police killing of George Floyd — attempted to maintain attention on what local activists and Greene’s family alleged was a cover-up of police brutality. Now, with the widespread release of video footage, national scrutiny has been sparked.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<h2 id="2yftdW">
|
|||
|
|
Body cameras can capture abuse, but don’t ensure anything will be done about it
|
|||
|
|
</h2>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="yTulTi">
|
|||
|
|
The handling of Greene’s death is a reminder that, as some progressive criminal justice reformers have pointed out, the mere existence of<strong> </strong>body cameras is no guarantor of justice for people who have been wronged by the police.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="dtMVV0">
|
|||
|
|
Body cameras for police officers have <a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/body-cameras-are-seen-as-key-to-police-reform-but-do-they-increase-accountability">received bipartisan support</a> at the state and federal level and are often seen as a common-sense reform measure to enhance accountability for law enforcement.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="NmYgVF">
|
|||
|
|
But the reality is that the documentation provided by body camera footage alone doesn’t necessarily improve behavior. As P.R. Lockhart <a href="https://www.vox.com/2019/3/27/18282737/body-camera-police-effectiveness-study-george-mason">wrote for Vox</a> in 2019, “the research suggests that body cameras are only as successful as the departments they are implemented in.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
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|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="pKdmoE">
|
|||
|
|
<a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/1745-9133.12412">According to a study</a> published in <em>Criminology & Public Policy</em> that year,<em> </em>in<em> </em>one of the largest reviews of academic research on body cameras to date, scholars at George Mason University found that, in many police departments, cameras have not had a consistent or significant effect on officer behavior or citizen opinion of the police.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ykz7UB">
|
|||
|
|
And the existence of footage of police brutality or killings doesn’t alter the reality that law enforcement is <a href="https://www.vox.com/2021/4/21/22394134/derek-chauvin-george-floyd-trial-guilty-verdict-police-prosecution-investigation">structurally designed</a> to protect police officers from prosecution for misconduct. For example, <a href="https://www.vox.com/2021/4/11/22378584/maryland-police-reform-repealed-police-bill-of-rights">police killing investigations often move exceptionally slowly</a>, which criminal justice reformers say gives officers more time to conspire and fabricate a story as they prepare to be asked about alleged misconduct. And the frequent absence of civilian investigators makes investigations likely to be stonewalled by the “<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1985/06/16/weekinreview/the-unwritten-code-that-stops-police-from-speaking.html">blue wall of silence</a>” that encourages officers to avoid incriminating colleagues.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="DjMJaD">
|
|||
|
|
Even when alleged misconduct is examined in courts, <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/7/21/15983842/police-body-cameras-failures">video footage is often incomplete and ambiguous enough to create doubt</a> in juries. Moreover, the legal standard for use of force is so permissive that even compelling evidence won’t necessarily result in police convictions.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="wjTvO1">
|
|||
|
|
As President Joe Biden approaches <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/congress-will-likely-miss-deadline-floyd-police-reform-bill-advocates-n1268101">proposing criminal justice reform legislation</a>, advocates for more sweeping changes to policing are likely to emphasize the need to move beyond quick fixes like body cameras and look into dismantling <a href="https://www.vox.com/2021/4/11/22378584/maryland-police-reform-repealed-police-bill-of-rights">institutional arrangements</a> such as <a href="https://www.vox.com/2020/6/3/21277104/end-qualified-immunity-police-definition-george-floyd">qualified immunity</a> that are intended to shield police officers from being punished for the misconduct those cameras reveal.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<h1 id="Loof9j">
|
|||
|
|
</h1>
|
|||
|
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="2JDLDb">
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-the-hindu-sports">From The Hindu: Sports</h1>
|
|||
|
|
<ul>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Japan opens mass vaccination centres 2 months before Games</strong> - Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga is determined to hold the Olympics in Tokyo after a one-year delay</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Juventus thrash Bologna to seal Champions League spot</strong> - Andrea Pirlo’s Juve side moved one point above Napoli into fourth place as Gennaro Gattuso’s team could only muster a 1-1 draw with mid-table Hellas Verona.</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Juventus and AC Milan qualify for Champions League, Napoli miss out</strong> - Atalanta have also booked a place in the Champions League</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Liverpool, Chelsea ensure top-four finish</strong> - Last-day blues return to haunt Leicester yet again as it loses to Tottenham</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Lyon Open | Tsitsipas wins with ease</strong> - It is his second title of the season in the claycourt swing</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
</ul>
|
|||
|
|
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-the-hindu-national-news">From The Hindu: National News</h1>
|
|||
|
|
<ul>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>I will be in politics as long as I am alive: Kamal Haasan</strong> - The founder of the Makkal Needhi Maiam said those who have left the party would not be allowed to contaminate the well</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Awards for GPs combating COVID-19</strong> - Urging the district officials to work towards making villages COVID-free, Rural Development and Panchayat Raj Minister K.S. Eshwarappa on Monday said</p></li>
|
|||
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<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>There is no safety for Dalits in State, alleges Nara Lokesh</strong> - He meets the family members of anaesthetist who died of cardiac arrest</p></li>
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<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Farmers assemble at Hisar to protest police action during Khattar’s visit</strong> - Police effort to prevent them from entering the city proves futile.</p></li>
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<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>BCCI to donate 2000 10-litre oxygen concentrators to medical organisations battling COVID-19</strong> - Over the next few months, the Board will distribute the concentrators across India</p></li>
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</ul>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-bbc-europe">From BBC: Europe</h1>
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<ul>
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<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Western powers voice outrage as Belarus accused of hijacking plane</strong> - The EU considers sanctions after Belarus forced a plane carrying a dissident journalist to land.</p></li>
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<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Mottarone cable car crash: Italy investigates cause of accident</strong> - Operators of the cable car near Lake Maggiore said maintenance and checks were carried out regularly.</p></li>
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<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Germany’s quiet Catholic rebellion on gay blessings and women preachers</strong> - German Catholics challenge the Vatican’s conservative teaching on gay blessings and female preachers.</p></li>
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<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Covid: UK passes 60m jabs milestone after 762,000 in a day</strong> - Health chief urges people to get their second jab, as more than 760,000 doses are given in a day.</p></li>
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<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Sniffer dogs may help Covid screening at UK airports</strong> - Trials suggest dogs could contribute to efforts to prevent the spread of Covid at mass gatherings.</p></li>
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</ul>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-ars-technica">From Ars Technica</h1>
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<ul>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>After Virgin Galactic’s success on Saturday, how soon can it fly again?</strong> - “We will immediately begin processing the data.” - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1767069">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Eternally five years away? No, batteries are improving under your nose</strong> - Under the hood, lithium-ion batteries have gotten better in the last decade. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1761885">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Review: Zombie heist thriller Army of the Dead is Zack Snyder at his best</strong> - Snyder reined in his worst impulses in this entertaining twist on a zombie apocalypse. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1766503">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Google’s I/O Adventure was almost as good as being there</strong> - Holding a trade show inside an online game is actually pretty fun. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1766729">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>When is a Porsche 911 not a Porsche 911? When it’s a Ruf</strong> - The cars have starred in <em>Gran Turismo</em> and on the Nordschleife. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1767000">link</a></p></li>
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</ul>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-jokes-subreddit">From Jokes Subreddit</h1>
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<ul>
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<li><strong>A black guy in a library asked me where the colored printers were.</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
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<div class="md">
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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I said, “Dude, it’s 2021, you can use any printer you want.”
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</p>
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</div>
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<!-- SC_ON -->
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/MudakMudakov"> /u/MudakMudakov </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/njn6ux/a_black_guy_in_a_library_asked_me_where_the/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/njn6ux/a_black_guy_in_a_library_asked_me_where_the/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
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<li><strong>I just got a job in a factory making plastic Draculas</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
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<div class="md">
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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There are only two of us on the production line, so I have to make every second count
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</p>
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</div>
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<!-- SC_ON -->
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/NondenominationalToy"> /u/NondenominationalToy </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/njh192/i_just_got_a_job_in_a_factory_making_plastic/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/njh192/i_just_got_a_job_in_a_factory_making_plastic/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
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<li><strong>Today, a psychic told me I’d witness an unbelievable pain in 12 years.</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
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<div class="md">
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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To cheer myself up, I bought a puppy!
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</p>
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</div>
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<!-- SC_ON -->
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/ProwessDumbo"> /u/ProwessDumbo </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/njl3rx/today_a_psychic_told_me_id_witness_an/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/njl3rx/today_a_psychic_told_me_id_witness_an/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
|
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<li><strong>A blonde walks into a dry cleaners and tells the woman at the counter, “I need to have an outfit washed.”</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
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<div class="md">
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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The clerk was busy and slightly distracted, so she looked up from her work and said, “Come again?”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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The blonde said, “No, it’s toothpaste this time.”
|
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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</p>
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</div>
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<!-- SC_ON -->
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/Zero-Trick-Pony"> /u/Zero-Trick-Pony </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/njet0b/a_blonde_walks_into_a_dry_cleaners_and_tells_the/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/njet0b/a_blonde_walks_into_a_dry_cleaners_and_tells_the/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
|
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|
<li><strong>A teacher asked a student “If there are four birds sitting next to each other on a tree, and you shoot one, how many do you have left?”</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
|
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<div class="md">
|
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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The student replies “None.” Curious, the teacher asks the student about his answer, and he explains that if you shoot one bird, it startles the other birds into flying away, so you’re left with none.
|
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</p>
|
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|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
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The teacher replies “Not what I was looking for, but I like your answer.”
|
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</p>
|
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|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
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|
|
The student then asks the teacher “Ok, let me ask you a question. There are three women all eating ice cream, one is biting her ice cream, one is licking her ice cream, and the other is sucking her ice cream. Which one of these women is married?”
|
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|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
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|
The teacher thinks for a moment before replying “The one sucking her ice cream?”
|
|||
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|
</p>
|
|||
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|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
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The student shakes his head and replies “No, the one with the wedding ring, but I like your answer.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
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|
<!-- SC_ON -->
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/ArmigerKnight"> /u/ArmigerKnight </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/njjqug/a_teacher_asked_a_student_if_there_are_four_birds/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/njjqug/a_teacher_asked_a_student_if_there_are_four_birds/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
|
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</ul>
|
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