Alex Landau, who is African American, was raised by his adoptive white parents to believe that skin color didn’t matter. That all changed at 19, when he was pulled over by the Denver police for making an illegal left turn. In this StoryCorps animation, Traffic Stop, Landau recalls how police officers pulled him out of the car, began to hit him in the face, and threatened to shoot him. It took 45 stitches to close up the lacerations in his face alone. In this short film, which premiered last night at storycorps.org/animation, he and his mother, Patsy, remember that night and how it changed them both forever. "For me it was the point of awakening to how the rest of the world is going to look at you," Landau says. "I was just another black face in the streets."
Traffic Stop will make its national broadcast premiere on PBS’s documentary series POV alongside Don’t Tell Anyone (No Le Digas a Nadie), a film by Mikaela Shwer, on September 21, 2015.
The single largest commitment by a private employer to address the Bay Area’s acute affordable housing crisis is unique in its focus on land redevelopment.
Most of the time, a new study finds, landlords file for eviction because it tilts the power dynamic in their favor—not because they want to eject their tenants.
The 30th anniversary edition of the National Low Income Housing Coalition report, “Out of Reach,” shows that housing affordability is getting worse, not better.
The city plans to fill some small but treasured sites with trees—a climate strategy that may also change the way Paris frames its architectural heritage.
