>> building a better bay area, moving forward, finding solutions. this is abc 7 news. kristen: i am kristen sze. you are watching "getting answers." live on abc seven and wherever you stream. we asked experts your questions everyday at 3:00 to get answers in real-time. we have a new quiz devised by kaiser permanente to help parents assess whether their teens are at risk for drugs and alcohol. is a timely conversation as the pandemic has pushed young people into a mental health crisis. as we celebrate black history month we will introduce you to an artist whose latest public art in san francisco will have you walking down market street while learning black history. the california supreme court is weighing what to do about uc berkeley's appeal of a lower

court decision that may mean one of the top most competitive public universities in the nation have to accept 5000 fewer students for this coming school year. last week, a judge froze cow's enrollment after a neighborhood nonprofit sued over the university's expansion plan. yesterday, state senator scott weiner of san francisco stepped in with a bill that he hopes may be part of the answer. joining us today to discuss this is senator scott weiner and dan logue a lot, uc berkeley assistant chive -- vice chancellor. thank you for joining us today. >> thank you. kristen: dan, i will start with you. let's explain the situation. a nonprofit sued cal over its expansion plan, saying its environmental impact studies were insufficient and a lower court sided with that group. explain how that lededededededed sending about email warning applicants that you may have to

reject more applicants than you wanted to. connect these dots for us. dan: i should say the initial suit was not about stopping expansion. it was to stop construction of new housing. that will become important to us as we continue the conversation. as part of environmental impact report, we had provided information about the environmental impacts of our student population. that was contested in the litigation. the judge ruled we needed to freeze enrollment until we could conduct the environmental analysis of student and roland, in a way that it had never been done in the state of california. it was unprecedented. the judge asked the university to treat students almost as if they were pollution or a building construction project. we came to the conclusion that meeting his demands, the demands

of this unprecedented order, would be impossible and we appealed. we lost that appeal. we appealed the freeze on enrollment, the full appeal will not be heard until next summer. the judge's order stands. here is the problem. the judge froze enrollment at 2020 levels. 2020 was a really odd year, for one of the first times in history, shrunk due to the pandemic. students who have been enrolled for the 2020 years said, i don't want to come back to school and they did not the tricky late. they all came back in 2021. to go backwards to 2020, that was 2700 students, close to 3000 students who said we are not coming back, they came back. in order to come down to that 2020 level, we would have to reduce and roman next year by some 3000 students. meaning we would offer admissions to about 5000

students less. obviously, not every student we offer admission to says yes. that is a tragic consequence for young people who have worked so hard to get into suit -- into uc berkeley. we are doing everything in our power, including an appeal to the supreme court, to see if we can put this decision and a vance until the appeals court can hear our full petition. kristen: real quickly, what would that mean to the acceptance rate? that has all of the high school seniors panicking. it was at 13% or something. dan: given we had another remarkable increase in admissions this year, it would probably take our acceptance rate into the single digits. kristen: let me say, i never would have gotten in. that was a long time ago and the numbers are higher. senator weiner, i know that you have been an advocate for streamlining the process to make building housing in general easier in california. now you want to bring this to

the university level. talk about the bill you introduced. what would it do? sen. weiner: sure. if i may, i would like to start by saying that what the judge did in this case is completely outrageous. the fact that a judge would step in and try to decide as a matter of environmental law how many california children can be admitted to public universities, that is none of his business. that is a matter for the uc regents, for the governor, and for the legislature. because the u.s. and -- because the uc and csu are at the heart of our economy and who we are as a state. for this judge to use an environmental law to cap uc enrollment is outrageous. what we are proposing with this new bill we have introduced is

to help relieve the uc and csu and community college of this kind of meddling by judges, in terms of using environmental laws to stop student housing and faculty housing from being built. we know we have a massive shortage of student housing in california. 19% of community college students in california are homeless. 10% of csu students are homeless. 5% of uc students are homeless. the ones that are not, many are living in overcrowded situations. we need more student housing. and for our faculty. seek what is being used as a bludgeon to stop this kind of housing. we need to get it built. it is environmentally sustainable to have more students and faculty living on campus where they can walk to school or walk to work instead of having to drive a long-distance. kristen: by the way, uc berkeley is not the only university that

is undergoing a tremendous housing crunch. it is a very acute case. sen. wiener: it is all over the state. it is every uc campus, it is every csu campus, and it is community colleges. it is all of these public universities and colleges where kids are suffering. these colleges and universities are public higher education systems in california, it is at the heart of our economy. this is the pathway to the middle-class class for so many low income, working-class first-generation california families. we are making it so hard for them because there is nowhere for these kids to live. that is what we want to get done. kristen: dan, let me ask you, is the expansion of additional housing development, is that to accommodate more of the existing students? or is that to pave the way so you can bring on thousands more students? dan: uc berkeley at least is not

a growth campus. we do not anticipate by growing more than 1% a year, for the next 15 years. that is just a few hundred students. we has nate -- we have an emergency. we are trying to build more student housing. ironically, some of the same people behind this particular lawsuit have the suit us on every single housing project we have tried to launch in the city of berkeley. we desperately want to provide our students with the housing they have earned and they deserve. we can't do that, as the senator said, if we have judges and local groups who are fighting us every step of the way. this is just to keep the student body where it currently is, and to provide the current student body at its current level with housing that any kid needs to thrive. kristen: what do you say to those who say look, the university is maxed out in a built out city.

and you don't need more students in the sense that, it can be hard to get classes at cal, it can be hard to graduate in four years. do you need or can you handle more students? dan: let me say again, we don't want more students, we are not slated to take on more students, we just want to maintain our current size, our current students. and provide them with housing. we have university owned property that is empty and undeveloped in the city of berkeley that we would love to build housing on for the students we currently have. we can't do that. we have judges and local organizations fighting us every step of the way. kristen: i know governor newsom and berkeley have sent letters supporting the university. what happens if no court action is taken before admissions decisions need to go out? and definite month, i think. dan: right. if the decision stands, we are

going to look to partner and work with our friends and colleagues and elected representatives in sacramento, such as senator weiner. we will explore the pop -- the possibility of a legislative remedy. in the meantime, we are not sitting on our hands, we are not complacent at the university. we are looking at every and any possible tactic that would allow us to lawfully mitigate this decision if it comes to pass that we need to wait until the summer to hear the appeal. if it stands we are not just going to sit back. we are going to continue to do everything we can to uphold our responsibility and commitment to the people of california, to enroll as many students as possible. kristen: could that mean creative solutions by not bringing those students who are accepted onto campus, may be you find another place for them, whether it is in program somewhere? is that a possibility? dan: that an every other conceivable option is on the table and being explored.

kristen: i do understand there is a budget consideration. if the university has fewer students, it takes in less in terms of tuition and fees. that could be $59 million or something like that. on the legislative and, what can you do to support the university if it were to lose a tremendous amount of money? sen. wiener: we have chronically underfunded uc and csu and community colleges over the years. we need to do more. we have been doing more in the last few years to support these amazing higher education systems. let's be clear. when we put more money into the uc, it should be because we decided as a policy matter, we want to put more money in, not because some judge of uses an environmental law to put a caps on uc berkeley enrollment and we have to backfill that money, not as a policy matter, but because a judge decided to distort an environmental law and

micromanage how many students uc berkeley can admit every year. we are counting on the california supreme court to hit the pause button here. so that we don't have this train wreck that is heading -- i don't want to say our way, but heading towards so many families and young people in california. it is really outrageous. i don't say that lightly. i am -- i was a lawyer for 15 years before i entered elected life. i have an respect for the judiciary. this judge just overstepped and got it wrong. kristen: senator scott weiner and dan mogulof, thank you for your time today. please do keep us posted. dan: absolutely. thank you. kristen: we have invited state berkeley neighborhoods to join our show. we expect him to appear tomorrow. when we come back, another important conversation about teen, drug, and alcohol

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kristen: now to the online quiz to help you determine the factors that can put your teen at higher risk for developing a substance abuse disorder. there are 19 questions. they cover everything from alcohol, tobacco, marijuana, and other drugs. dr. stacy sterling led the team that developed this tool. she is a research science at kaiser permanente and is codirector of its center for addiction and mental health research. dr. sterling, welcome to the show. why did your team devise this quiz? dr. sterling: we really wanted to develop tools to give parents and pediatricians evidence-based information to help understand the factors that raise a child's

risk of developing an alcohol or drug problem as a teenager, so that they can be proactive about preventing problems before they develop. kristen: how pervasive is teen drug or alcohol abuse? dr. sterling: luckily, it has gone down over the past few decades. but it is still probably about 5% of the adolescent population will develop an alcohol or drug problem. teenagers are especially vulnerable to the health and mental health problems related to substance use. things like suicide and motor vehicle accidents and sexual assault. it is really hard for pediatricians and parents to know what might make a child vulnerable to developing a serious addiction problem. kristen: any evidence the pandemic has made the problem worse? dr. sterling: you know, we are still learning about what is going on. we have seen some evidence that

there has been an uptick in the like binge drinking and cannabis use. but there is some conflicting information. that evidence is still coming in. kristen: i know your team has identified a strong predictors of substance abuse. can you talk about those main risk factors? dr. sterling: sure. some of the biggest ones are things like trauma and stress related disorders, oppositional defiant disorder, adhd is a predictor, conduct disorders. and then some things that might not be as intuitive like a headache, something that you might not think of. self-harm is also a ver ver predictor of developing a substance use disorder. kristen: let's take the last part of the quiz together. as we mentioned, there are 19 questions. we will not walk our viewers through all of that. here are some.

let's pull that up so people can see what they will encounter. here is a question. as far as i know, my teenage child uses tobacco or nicotine. let's say you click never. met question. as far as i know, my teen uses alcohol. let's say you to. -- let's say used to. my teenage child uses marijuana. let's go with often. and then, as far as i know my teen child uses cocaine, methamphetamine. let's say never. let's finish this up. if you believe your child is using substances, how old do you think your child was when they started using? let's say 12 to 14. we see our results. what is this? you have identified risk factors. what does this tell us, this report card? dr. sterling: some of those the items you chose which are

ones asking about actual use of substances. some of the other questions are things like does your child have any of these mental health conditions? some of the things we identified as predictors. or is ther is ther is ther is tr family who has a substance use disorder? that is also something we identified as a predictor. at the end, you get a score. it can tell you if your child might get heightened risk. you can take that information and talk to your child's pediatrician. there are lots of prevention activities that you can engage in with your child. it is really about prevention and arming parents and pediatricians and their patients with information to be proactive. kristen: this information is great. lastly before we go where do folks go to take the quiz? dr. sterling: you can go to the

partnership to end addiction. they are the organization we partnered with to develop this tool. if you search for risk assessment, that quiz will come up, and parents -- it is free for anyone to use. i think it is a helpful tool for getting more information. kristen: other resources there. dr. stacy serling, -- sterling, thank you so much for your time. dr. sterling: thank you. kristen: we will explore the origins of a gallery of posters that has shown up along market

the'alys sometneto discover. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ come be a part of it. plan your next vacation at iloveny.com kristen: if you take a ride down market street in san francisco, you will notice a gallery of posters celebrating the city's black pioneers. some you may have heard of. . others he may learn about for the first time. oakland artist fred nolan created the series, and he is joining us now with more. hi, fred. nice to meet you. fred: good to meet you too. kristen: i have to get out there

to market street because i have seen the photos. you made this an entertaining way to learn about black history. how did this series come about? fred: i had a friend, justin, ji who did a similar series for the san francisco art council last year. . he is also a cartoonist. he did his on the gay liberation movement, or the gay rights movement. it inspired me to do mine. kristen: let's show folks some of the pictures of some of these amazing posters. i love your style, by the way. fred: thank you. kristen: how would you describe the style, first of all? fred: it's a comic. it is a cartoon style. kristen: i love it. talk about who we are seeing. you highlighted black pioneers. who are these folks you chose? fred: i chose -- there was maryellen pleasant, i did sid

look prodi, sylvester stewart, another sylvester, the disco pioneer. kristen: and who is mary ellen pleasant? fred: mary ellen pleasant, she is the mother of civil rights in california. . she actually is the reason why the trolleys were desegregated. and she had an amazing life. she is one of the wealthiest people in san francisco at the time, which is an accomplishment for anyone, but certainly for a black woman in the 1800s. just an amazing woman. kristen: you also have william cobb and josephine cole. they were educators. fred: yes. kristen: and there is a personal reason for that? fred: yes, that's correct. my mother was a teacher for many years. and i have also had my life very affected and influenced by teachers. so they are close to my heart. kristen: they are certainly

unsung heroes. talk about how you went about creating each of those pieces. fred: there was a great deal of research that went into it. you see one page and each page probably has a minimum of like 50 hours of research and reams of paper behind it. what i did was i did a search on black history in san francisco, and came up with a few people that were more noteworthy, like more well-known. i decided i wanted to try to mix that up with people who were less well-known, because i had never heard of beads door for pleasant. they were amazing people. that is the route i took. kristen: that the way, i love the summer of love one. fred: thank you. kristen: i just love it. what surprised you most when you were working on the project? fred: what surprised me most was just how deep the roots for black people go.

some of the stuff i didn't even feature goes back to the world war ii era san francisco, the large influx of people to bayview and different neighborhoods to help with the war effort. hearing that alexander leads dorf, one of the founding fathers of the city, was a black person was amazing and completely unexpected. kristen: we don't often learn about that in school. so through your art, you are able to highlight the impact of these black pioneers. here is the big question. where can we see your amazing posters? ? i know it is down market street. is at bus stops, side of buildings, which section of market? fred: it is on market street starting at stewart, down at the embarcadero. and it is on the shelters for the muni stops going up about six blocks. there are 37 different installations. kristen: wow.

that must have taken you quite a while to do 37. fred: seven repeating. i would still be working if it was 37. kristen: i was going to say. i and vote -- i invite folks to check out your work. i know you have your website. where else can they see your work? fred: they conceived me on instagram at fred nolan, that is where i update my artwork. kristen: thank you. looking at your stuff makes me so happy. i don't know why. it just has that effect. congratulations. thank you for all that you do. folks, take that ride down market street to see fred

kristen: thank you for joining

us on this interactive show "getting answers." we will be here every weekday at tonight, breaking news as we come on the air. the pentagon tonight saying on vladimir putin and russia, we believe they are ready. that there are signs a full-scale russian invasion of ukraine is imminent. my interview just moments ago with secretary of state antony blinken, what are they seeing in ukraine right now? a senior u.s. defense official telling abc news russia now has about 80% of its fors in forward positions, ready to move in. more than 150,000 russian troops amassed among ukraine's borders, the north, the east, the south. and late today, in the middle of the night moscow time, russian state news now reporting that those two accept are cyst regions inside rue crane have now requested help from vladimir putin and the russian military in taking on ukrainian forces.