Environment

Who'll Pay for the Climate Change Refugees?

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Island and coastal nations are grappling with rising sea levels attributed to global warming — and some want industrialized nations to help foot the bill for an expected surge in evacuations, refugee crises and other impacts. Papua New Guinea’s Carteret Islands are quickly becoming a paradise lost, with ocean waters expected to submerge the seven low-lying atolls by 2015. Already, rising tides and storm surges have polluted freshwater supplies and devastated crops. Evacuation of the 2,700 residents is underway, and will continue over the next five years, reports Australia’s The Age. Climate change could force as many as 75 million people from their homes in Asia-Pacific over the next 40 years, Radio Australia reports.

Economy

Consumers Feel the Credit Card Slam

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With new federal credit-card regulations on the horizon, banks and card providers are boosting interest rates, fees and minimum payments, according to news reports. Before the Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility and Disclosure Act takes full effect in February 2010, credit-card issuers are “raising annual percentage rates, slashing credit limits and hiking minimum payments,” writes Dallas Morning News columnist Pamela Yip. She also cites a loophole on a regulation set to kick in Aug. 20, requiring companies to issue a notice 45 days in advance of any rate increase. Yet the law only applies for cards with fixed rates; variable rate cards, which account for two-thirds of all cards issued, are excluded.

Smarter on Crime

Prisons & Public Health: Lois Davis Connects the Dots

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By Bernice Yeung | Crowdfund this with Spot.Us
Part of the Prisons & Public Health news blog
Fresh from lockup and battling a host of health problems — including chronic illness, addiction and mental illness — a majority of California parolees wind up in a handful of cities like Los Angeles, Oakland and San Diego. But here’s the rub: Parolees often can’t get the services they need because they’re going back to low-income communities where health services are “severely strained,” according to a recent RAND Corporation study. The study also says that access to care for minority parolees also tends to be uneven. For example, African Americans living in Los Angeles and Alameda counties had less access to hospitals than Latino or white parolees, while in Kern and San Diego counties, Latino parolees had the least access. I spoke with Lois Davis, the lead researcher on the RAND study, which mapped where parolees go after they’re released, and analyzed — for the first time — California’s safety net of medical, mental health and addiction services available to parolees in their communities.

Featured

After Sotomayor, Puerto Rico's Big Question

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Sonia Sotomayor’s nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court has focused attention on her Puerto Rican roots, at a time when the question of the island’s political future — statehood or independence? — is turning up again in Congress and the United Nations. Photo: Puerto Rico Day, New York City/Tom Giebel

Democracy & Civics

After Sotomayor, Puerto Rico's Big Question

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The nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to the U.S. Supreme Court has focused attention on her Puerto Rican roots — at a time when the question of the island’s political status is turning up in Congress and the United Nations. Sotomayor is regarded with almost universal pride in Puerto Rico, Inter Press News Service reports — and many there also hope her time in the spotlight will impact the ongoing debate over U.S. statehood or independence. Puerto Rico Gov. Luis Fortuno took his case in favor of statehood to Congress in June, when he endorsed a bill to hold an island-wide vote on the question, the Latin American Herald Tribune reported. Almost simultaneously, the United Nations special committee on decolonization approved a resolution in support of Puerto Rico’s right to self-determination and independence, the Daily Kos notes. That resolution was proposed by Ecuador, Venezuela and Cuba, a long-time advocate of Puerto Rican independence.