Bakersfield
Political Playback: California Capitol News You Might Have Missed
News You Might Have Missed
Stefi Mar March 31, 2026
News You Might Have Missed
In the aftermath of mass layoffs in 2025, many Black women are turning uncertainty into opportunity by launching businesses, strengthening professional networks and being innovative. Through resilience, creativity and community support, they are carving paths to stability and success in a shifting economy.
On March 25, members of the California Legislative Black Caucus (CLBC), in collaboration with the California Legislative Women’s Caucus (LWC), stood in unity to present a 2026 legislative package aimed at advancing family-centered economic and social equity.
Twelve Inglewood Unified students left a school assembly last week with college acceptances — and for several, scholarship offers — after a visit from Dr. Anthony L. Jenkins, president of Coppin State University.
Last week, members of the California Legislative Black Caucus (CLBC), through their voices and votes, supported Assembly Bill (AB) 2156, which proposed renaming César Chávez Day to Farm Workers Day.
An Op-Ed for Passover and Easter in America
While the evidence is clear that pre-K makes a meaningful difference for children in the short and long term, children need access to high-quality programs to experience these benefits. Access, however, remains unequal, particularly to programs that provide high-quality experiences.“An Updated Look at Pre-K in Large American Cities,” research findings include:
My name is Marcia Claggett. I reside in Calvert County, Maryland , and work at the United Planning Organization’s (UPO) Office of Early Learning in Washington, D.C. As a child at the age of 3, I was enrolled in the Head Start program located at the Southern Maryland Tri-County Community Action Committee. The year would be 1970. I completed two years of Head Start with the program and I have to add that my mother was introduced to much-needed services that assisted her in making ends meet.
Russell Simmons is accusing HBO and its partners of ignoring civil rights leaders, burying evidence, and turning his name into a global spectacle, and he’s putting it before a Manhattan court.
Free health screenings and vendor exhibits draw a broad cross-section of residents; Assemblymember Jasmeet Bains, Rep. 35th District, warns Kern County has been a designated health care shortage area “for decades” with no remedy in sight.
The Fresno City Council is weighing whether to approve or challenge a $15.4 million jury award stemming from a racial discrimination lawsuit filed by former city employee La-Kebbia “Kiki” Wilson.
The American Foundation for the University of the West Indies (AFUWI) will honor two outstanding academic leaders whose work has changed access to higher education for many generations of minority students. Dr. Wayne J. Riley, President of SUNY Downstate Health Sciences University, and Dr. Wayne A. I. Frederick, Interim President and President Emeritus of Howard University, will be honored at AFUWI’s 29th Annual “The Legacy Continues” Awards Gala, which is scheduled for April 17, 2026, in New York City.
Sherry Tucker Brown’s family roots run deep in New York, and also in a familiar brand of alcoholic spirits.
On Easter morning in 1970, 4-year-old Rodney Goss sat on the stoop of his Trenton, New Jersey home waiting for a father he never knew. Goss was outside for hours, dressed in his thick-heeled platform shoes and green plaid jacket.
Nana Gyamfi, Sen. Lola Smallwood Cuevas, Kevin Cosney courtesy photo.
Frederick Douglass did not know the day he was born.
On behalf of the nearly 9 million people who are now in default on their student loans, a coalition of advocates from consumer, civil rights, and education organizations is appealing to the federal Education Department to halt its plans to begin garnishing borrowers’ wages this month. Default status connotes borrowers are 270 days or more behind on their payments.
The nation is right to hope and pray for the safe return of Nancy Guthrie, the 84-year-old mother of journalist Savannah Guthrie, co-anchor on NBC’s “Today.” Any disappearance is terrifying. Any family thrust into uncertainty deserves compassion, urgency, and relentless attention. But compassion should never be selective — and that is precisely where the media’s response exposes a troubling, long-standing inconsistency.
Today, across the United States of America, in some of the largest urban cities, Black Americans are having renewed nightmares about being taken for granted, ignored, and being erased in history and in the public square.
An investigation into cosmetic surgery chains by KFF Health News and NBC News has prompted consumer warnings from industry groups representing plastic surgeons and a call for more transparency around physician disciplinary actions in California.