California Divide

It's easy for volunteer counters to miss unsheltered people, especially when law enforcement clears camps just before counters arrive. And they're not even trying to count people living doubled up, or renting cheap motel rooms. So why is so much riding on a count so bad? 

It’s official: The gap between the Bay Area’s haves and have-nots is wider than anywhere else in the state. Top income earners in the Bay Area make 12.2 times as much as those at the bottom of the economic ladder, according to new research from the Public Policy Institute of California, which analyzed 2018 U.S. […]

Amanda Caballero wishes she could go back to work at Amazon. She made $15 an hour at the Fresno fulfillment center — several dollars more than the state’s minimum wage — and received more than three months of paid maternity leave. Her generous health insurance package covered her husband and five children, and she liked […]

A new Alameda County program focused on the connections between poverty, food and employment opened Friday morning, the latest in a countywide effort to help low-income residents by increasing access to jobs and fresh produce. The newly built, 3,300-square-foot space will provide a commercial kitchen for small, home-based food entrepreneurs, land to grow fresh produce […]

Fourteen states, including California, filed suit Thursday against the Trump administration to block a rule that would eliminate food stamps for an estimated 688,000 Americans. “No one should have to choose between a hot meal and paying their rent,” California Attorney General Xavier Becerra said in a statement. “Yet again, the Trump Administration has failed […]

Each year, the Fresno County Department of Social Services spends over a million dollars to house families in motels. Motel vouchers, good for two weeks at a time, are like a golden ticket for families with nowhere else to go. For many residents on the verge of homelessness, motels are often their last chance at […]

After vetoing a bill to reform the state’s child support payback system, Gov. Gavin Newsom has revived efforts to give families on public assistance a greater share of their support payments in his proposed 2020-21 budget. The changes, which if implemented would go into effect January 2022, would provide funding to boost the amount families […]

When Dontae Lartigue left foster care right before his 19th birthday in 2009, finding housing in Santa Clara County was one of his biggest obstacles. He struggled to find places he could afford on his $12 an hour wages at Walmart, and with a limited income and no rental history, landlords were often wary of […]

Updated Jan. 10, 2020 Lee este artículo en español. In 2017, Susanna Cardenas-Lopez left her home in Salinas to visit her brother in Idaho. Three days into her trip, she called her husband and told him they needed to move there. Back in Salinas, Cardenas-Lopez and her husband were left out in the cold after their […]

Nigel Duara, a national, multi-media journalist, will join CalMatters to cover poverty and inequality issues as part of the California Divide project, a unique collaboration among major state news organizations. Duara most recently worked as a Los Angeles-based national and climate correspondent at VICE News Tonight on HBO. Previously, he was a national correspondent based […]