NOTE: We continue to highlight CSUSB faculty who are mentioned in the news through this ongoing feature. Faculty, if you are interviewed and quoted by news media, or if your work has been cited, and you have an online link to the article or video, please let us know. Contact us at news@csusb.edu.
Traffic, especially in Southern California, is always a challenge. A U.S. Department of Transportation program has picked Cal State San Bernardino as one of 18 institutions nationwide — and one of two in California — to study transportation issues facing the country. UC Berkeley is the other California campus taking part in the project.
“We’re really proud to be able to work with the DOT on this,” Kimberly Collins, director of CSUSB’s William and Barbara Leonard Transportation Center, said in an interview with The Press-Enterprise. Collins is a professor in the department of public administration since 2009, and became director of the transportation center about a year ago. The center is housed in the Jack H. Brown College of Business and Public Administration.
The project, announced by U.S. Secretary of Transportation Anthony Foxx, stems from a just-released study by the department, “Beyond Traffic 2045,” which analyzes expected traffic trends in the next three decades, the newspaper reported.
According to the US DOT, 'The centers are non-profit institutions of higher education and non-profit organizations, which convene leaders and other key decision-makers in each of eleven megaregions around the United States, as well as in rural communities, to discuss these challenges and coordinate related research, curriculum, outreach, and other activities.'
The project fits well with the work the center is already doing, Collins said. “This is part of the key conversations we’ve been working on and one of the reasons we invited Secretary Foxx to our campus” in October, she said.
The article, published Jan. 9, 2016, may be read at “Cal State San Bernardino picked to help find U.S. traffic solutions.”
When bomb threats reported at Jewish community centers in at least five states, as well as the United Kingdom, put federal agents on standby Monday, the newspaper contacted Brian Levin, criminal justice professor and director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism to offer his perspective.
The threats came in the midst of a surge in anti-Semitic activity. FBI statistics released in November show a 9 percent increase in anti-Semitic crimes between 2014 and 2015. Hate crimes against other groups are on the rise as well. The trend represents 'a virtual log jam of extremism targeting whole groups of people,' said Levin. “Our center believes the Jewish community is elevated on that threat level – along with Muslims.”
It’s hard to say why this is happening – there are many potential factors, Levin said – but he said political and social leaders could play a role in blunting the rise in hate crimes. “We need leadership to condemn anti-Semitism and to condemn those who try to enter mainstream legitimacy while expressing anti-Semitism,” he said. “That goes for any prejudice.”
The article, published Jan. 9, 2017, may be read at “Bomb threats reported at Jewish centers in Nashville, 4 states.”