Will California’s push on electric vehicles reduce inequality — or deepen it?
Steve Douglas , vice president of energy and environment for the Alliance for Automotive Innovation: “You can’t ask low-income residents to spend an hour, three hours, six hours away from their families, every week, just to charge their car, while affluent people pull in, plug in and wake up to a full car.”
Ted Lamm , senior research fellow in the climate program at UC Berkeley’s Center for Law, Energy, & the Environment: “When charging is installed in an area where there is no demand for the vehicles and no local desire to use them, it’s this sort of dead infrastructure. It has no use to the local population and local community, and so it is more likely to be subjected to vandalism, or just disuse and disrepair.”
Orville Thomas , CALSTART’s state policy director: “We have to reduce the amount of cars on the road — that’s transit, that’s micro mobility, that’s clean mobility options, that’s e-bikes. We need to plan better if we’re talking about the economic divide.”
To transition to electric vehicles by 2035, the state is shifting EV purchase incentives to focus on low-income consumers and those in communities impacted by air pollution, said Lisa Macumber, chief of the Equitable Mobility Incentives Branch at the California Air Resources Board. Though private chargers can have high upfront costs, it can cost three to five times more to plug into public chargers, Douglas said. In another example of the “ it’s expensive to be poor ” phenomenon, Thomas said EVs with longer ranges are pricier, yet many lower-income people typically have longer commutes. Thomas also said there would be more money for all kinds of EV programs if voters last November had approved Proposition 30 , which would have imposed a 1.75% income tax increase on Californians making more than $2 million a year, but was opposed by Gov. Gavin Newsom.
The average cost of an electric car as of July was $53,469 — about $5,000 more than the average car. Lower-end fully electric cars start around $27,500 .Atherton, located in Mateo County, has the state’s highest percentage of electric cars (about one in every seven) and the average household income exceeds $500,000. In the 20 ZIP codes where Latinos make up more than 95% of the population, 1% or less cars are electric. In 17 of the 20 communities with the highest percentage of Black residents, less than 3% are electric.
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Gun violence, by the numbers
140,000: The projection of how many fewer gun-related deaths there would have been nationwide if the U.S. firearm mortality rate had matched California’s between 2013 and 2022. While California’s rate was once 50% higher than the national average, it’s now 33% lower and ranks seventh lowest. And if its rate had been as high as the rest of the nation during that decade, nearly 19,000 more Californians would have been killed by guns.
50%: How much California’s youth gun homicide rate dropped between 2006 and 2022, despite increases during the COVID-19 pandemic. Over the same period, the rate rose by 48% in Texas and by 23% in Florida.
Bonta , in the report: “Gun violence is America’s disease — a sickness that is traumatizing our communities and tearing our families apart….While California is not immune to this disease, thanks to our nation-leading, commonsense gun laws and prevention policies, we’ve made substantial progress.”
Kris Brown , president of Brady, in a statement. “Solving a problem as complex as gun violence requires nuanced solutions, and our approaches only stand to benefit from more data.”
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More life for natural gas plants
Kyle De La Torre , Oxnard resident with the Central Coast Alliance United for a Sustainable Economy: “Please don’t see us as just a number, or just a location on a map. We are humans just like you are. We deserve a safe and clear and clean environment just like you do.”
Newsom , in a statement: “California and Australia are on the front lines of the climate crisis. From extreme heat and historic drought to catastrophic wildfires and rising sea levels, the last few years have further crystallized the need for urgent action. It’s not enough for us to act alone.”
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Storm aid lost in translation?
Pérez : “I think the most important question is why can’t we make this relatively easier? What are the barriers that make this the best that we can do?”
Murray , in an email: “It’s important to remember that the undocumented community can be fearful of accessing benefits and assistance through Government entities.”
