>> building a better bay area, moving forward, finding solutions. karina: i am karina nova. every day, we talk with experts about the issues important to the bay area and get answers for

you in real time. today, we have state senator scott weiner to discuss the state assembly and the senate budget proposal for a $1.1 billion bailout for bart, muni, and other transit agencies. also, concerns over the surge in points and hemlock growing in the bay area. an expert will tell us how to identify it and the dangers it poses to people and pets. there were two mass shootings this weekend in san francisco's mission district. nine people were injured when they were struck by gunfire. in antioch, police say a woman is dead and several people injured following a shooting at a birthday party sunday morning. a new book explains the social roots of mass shootings in the united states. joining us is the co-author of the book and a lecturer teaching in the department of sociology at cal state l.a.. thank you for being here.

technical difficulties. karina: we can hear you loud and clear so we are good to go. before we get into details and discuss mass shootings, can you define mass shooting for us? >> my co-author define a mass shooting is when for more -- four or more people are killed. karina: you say this is -- yes. >> compared to the fbi who has a much stricter, more stringent definition when they say a mass shooting for them is four or more people who are shot and killed in an incident excluding the shooter and very comparatively few cases fall under that definition. karina: in doing research for your book, what did you find in terms of the statistics? it feels like we are seeing more

mass shootings happen in the united states. is that accurate? >> yes, it is. we have seen over 3000 mass shootings since the year 2012. we were averaging about one mass shooting per day until 2016 or 2017 and it has skyrocketed past one. it is going on for several years including into the covid years. karina: when we talk about gun laws after these mass shootings, your book looks into the social factors. why did you decide to look at that aspect? >> we saw that a lot of the time, the focus was on mental illness and there was not a lot of support for funding for mental health projects in terms of research, in terms of treatment. so it told us that may mental health isn't the end all, be all

. maybe there is something hit in that is pushing people over the edge and when we started combing through the data, we were looking at things like people losing their jobs, people going through bitter divorces, people going through bad breakups. and also people living in poverty, in impoverished communities where there are not a lot of opportunities for upward mobility and where there are not a lot of opportunities for safe recreation. karina: so what changed socially in the united states to fuel or impact the number of shootings we are now seeing? i guess the increase in the last few years? >> we are looking at increases in access to guns. we are looking at people who are more comfortable going to neighboring states and getting weapons. i remember a few years ago, i believe it was 2019. gilroy had a mass shooting where the shooter went to nevada and got the weapons there. he legally came back and used them illegally in california. we are also looking at the

increase of invention of guns in terms of 3d printing and we are looking at a lot of people being pushed out of their homes because of gentrification with very few resources devoted to helping them rehome and find housing either within the city or elsewhere in those stresses are taking tolls on people. karina: he looked at preventive measures and what might prevent someone from committing a mass shooting. can you expand on some of that research? >> absolutely. christian and i are big believers in the adage that one ounce of prevention beats one pound of cure. how can we prevent people's anger from reaching the boiling point where anger seemed -- where violence seems like it's a really good idea? part of it we know isn't going to be popular but it is focusing on restricting sales of refrigerated alcohol because we know that, just as we saw in the

mission district and in antioch, we are looking at parties. over the weekend, i want to say in maryland and annapolis, and one other place, we saw their mass shootings -- syracuse, excuse me. we saw shootings happening at graduation parties and birthday parties and scenes where alcohol is flowing in one of the things we know people do when they go on their way to a party's they will buy -- to a party is they will buy a chilled sixpack. we are hoping that limiting sales of refrigerated alcohol will force a little bit of a pause, to let people have that pause to make better decisions. karina: when we say limited, i want to clarify to better understand that. when you talk about limiting, you are not changing the age limit. how do you limit the sale of alcohol without changing that law? >> looking at what is available in convenience stores and

supermarkets. sales of alcohol, keep it at room temperature. we are looking at things like investing into communities. we talked about taking stuff away and that's not the only thing to do. you have to give people the opportunity to do the right thing. if you don't, they will do the wrong thing. that means there needs to be new investment in communities and that investment has to come in the form of jobs, in forms of volunteer opportunities. schools, counselors and workplaces, in schools, and just available to people in the county, funded through taxes and safe recreation. people need places to blow off steam safely and when one or more of these things are blocked , then it makes a person feel like where they live is telling them that they are devalued. if they are going to feel devalued, they will not value other people. karina: last week, we heard from

governor newsom who suggested the 20th amendment which would raise the minimum age to buy a gun to 21, mandate universal background checks, and ban assault rifles among others. in your field of expertise, can you talk about the impact of something like that? >> yes, so weapons is going to have both a concrete effect but also not a substantial statistical effect. most mass shootings are committed with handguns and pistols, stuff that is easy to buy, steal, and have on the body. where the banning of assault rifles is going to make a substantial difference is those are the weapons used in the mass shootings that generate the most deaths. so limiting or restricting access to those weapons means that hopefully, when there are shootings, that fewer people are going to die and that will be

the ultimate effect of it. as far as raising the legal age to 21, we have seen plenty of people -- plenty of cases where the guns used in mass shootings were legally acquired already. i don't know if raising the age finally three years is a lot to cut into that because we have seen that a lot of the shooters tend to age out of shooting by about age 30 so we are delaying three years out of that period but that is still nine years where there are a lot of question marks and borrowing from psychology, we know rates -- brains don't fully develop until the mid-1920's so there are still a few years where a person may not have the full ability to comprehend what they are doing. karina: thank you so much for coming on the show and sharing your research and giving us your expertise. the title of your book is called critical mass, understanding and

fixing the social roots of mass shootings in the united states. thank you so much for your time today. still ahead, the state's largest public transit agencies say they are facing a major budget crisis which could mean severe service cut and even cancellations but now, state lawmakers are proposing a $1 billion bailout. scott weiner joins me to talk ab but do they really? do they see that crick in your neck?

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karina: welcome back. the state assembly and senate are offering more than $1 billion for state transit agencies like art and muni, part of the agreement that was reached just last night and will be voted on on thursday.

this is an attempt to postpone the massive service cuts that are projected as many of the agencies run out of the federal aid that was given during the pandemic. joining us live is scott wiener. thank you so much for being here today. >> thank you for having me. karina: let's paint the picture for our viewers. why are these transit agencies in such dire situations? >> -- scott: during the pandemic, ridership collapsed. it went down by 95%. it is returning. it's back up to 66% of pre-pandemic ridership and over 100%. bart has gone in the last number of months from 30% to 40% and increasing but is not increasing fast enough to make up for the end of the federal emergency aid so there is a mismatch so they need a lifeline for the next few

years so that they can continue to grow ridership and recover and not collapse. karina: we heard about the fiscal cliff that you are concerned about. when is it expected for agencies like bart and muni? >> if nothing happens, they will go over this fiscal cliff depending on the agency in the next 12 to 24 months. different agencies are in different situations so that is why it is important that the legislature, the senate, and the assembly have agreed to this three-year sustainable plan of $1.1 billion to support transit operations. it does not solve the problem completely. we have more work to do. this is a positive start. karina: let's talk about the details of the proposed budget in terms of how it will help save public transit. can you give us some more of the details? >> there are two aspects.

when the governor put out his proposal, it did not have any funding for the operational fiscal cliff so i am not criticizing. the governor had a big balancing act to do and we have a lot of priorities but there was nothing for it and there was proposal to s it was very problematic. what disagreement agreement between the senate and the assembly does is it restores the entire $2 billion in infrastructure funding. it adds in $1.1 billion over three years that our transit systems can use to backfill their operational deficit. it does not solve the whole problem but it solves a chunk of it. >> since the budget proposal was to cut funding, how confident

are you that it will be approved? >> the budget that we are passing on thursday is an agreement between the senate and the assembly and i am confident that shortly thereafter, we will have an agreement with the governor. there are so many points of back and forth in negotiation budget processes. it's totally normal. i am hopeful the governor will agree to this. i'll speak for him and i don't want to speak for him but this is a governor who supports climate action. i am confident he wants low income people to be able to get to work and he wants people to not have to drive their car everywhere because that will just increase congestion so i am hopeful that this will go through. karina: to follow up on the proposed budget, are there any strings attached for agencies if they receive this funding? scott: so we are going to be taking a number of budget actions over the next three months which is normal. we passed the main budget. the budget is a little uncertain

these days and then there are a number of accompanying bills: budget trailer bills so there will be some provisions around accountability. it is unclear what exactly they will be but we all want our transit agencies to be as good as they can be and to be safe, clean, and reliable. a number of systems are already doing this work. bart has doubled the frequency of deep cleaning of its vehicles and moved more bart police officers and unarmed ambassadors onto its vehicles so there's work happening and we need to continue always to improve people's transit experience. karina: as you know, our reporter, lyanne melendez, interviewed you last week about how few people are actually paying to ride muni and from what she saw, there's not much enforcement for people who do not pay. are you looking at other issue is like that to be addressed

that could help with funding? >> we want to make sure people pay their fares. it needs to have a robust inspector force out make sure people are paying. people can check. bart is replacing all of its gates, the turnstiles that people go through. they will all be replaced in the next few years with a model that is much, much harder -- makes it much harder for people to evade paying the fair so agencies are taking it more seriously, and they need to. we have discounts for people who cannot pay, particularly muni, and we need to make sure people are paying their fares. karina: the vote for this proposal is thursday. if approved, how quickly with the funds be released? scott: --would the funds be

released? scott: that's one piece of it and our budget process is a multistep process. this is the main piece to allocate some funds and we will put the structure in place for its disbursement in the coming weeks. we our budget works is once the governor signs the budget, it goes into effect july 1. that is when our fiscal year starts and when we make modifications, as soon as the governor signs it is in effect so we -- things can move fairly quickly but to be clear, the transit agency are not facing the fiscal cliff tomorrow or next month. the danger that we have been in is that these agencies have to plan for the future so they cannot just pivot on a dime so they are planning for what is going to be happening 18 months from now so having this money allocated and knowing that it is going to be there helps them avoid planning for service cuts.

karina: thank you so much for your time today. we appreciate you breaking it all down for us. it makes it a little bit easier to understand. after the break, proliferation of poison hemlock in the bay area. we will talk to an expert about why it is suddenly growing all over and what you need to know to protect yourself and your four legged here to tell you about life insurance through the colonial penn program. if you're age 50 to 85, and looking to buy life insurance on a fixed budget, remember the three ps. the three what? the three ps? what are the three ps? the three ps of life insurance on a fixed budget are price, price, and price. a price you can afford, a price that can't increase, and a price that fits your budget. i'm 54 and was a smoker, but quit. what's my price? you can get coverage for $9.95 a month.

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with your final wishes. and it's yours free just for calling. so call now for free information. >> a warning from wildlife experts about the abundance of a highly toxic plant looming all across the bay area. we are talking about poison hemlock which poses a threat to people and pets. joining us now is horticulture advisor stephen swing. thank you for being here. why is poison hemlock more of an issue this year compared to past years? >> one reason is we have got a lot of rain. poison hemlock will sprout just

about any time. it really likes water so when we have an abundance of rain in a year like this, we get a lot more poison hemlock. karina: we do know we got a lot of rain this year. are there specific areas in the bay area that have seen this surge in poison hemlock? >> it likes it disturbed areas so it doesn't do really well in deep forests or anything like that. it wants areas that are by roadsides that get plenty of sun so that is where you are going to typically see this stuff. it also likes water so you will find it near sunny banks and things like that. karina: wee hours -- we will see it if we are out for a hike or in our own backyard? >> you might see it in your own backyard. it doesn't show up in urban areas occasionally. it's more of a weed than anything else. it is a big problem there. karina: what happens if it is interested? is that the big concern? >> that is.

there are possibilities if you go out and told this by hand. some people can be relatively sensitive and it can cause irritation, rashes, numbness, those kinds of things if you get it too much on your skin but if you eat it, you are really in trouble and the challenge here is that it looks a lot like a couple other plants that people might gather like wild fennel when it is small. it's pretty easy to stay away from but the little plants can be challenging because they look a lot alike. karina: we are looking at videos and pictures of it and you are right. it does look like other common plants that are out there so can you give us good advice on how to identify, you know, when you're talking about poison ivy, you kind of know what to look for so what is the advice for this plan? >> it has got these little umbrellas of flowers that are

white. you can see the leaves. one of the big ones is the mature plant has purple blotches on the stems that are not necessarily showing up so great in that picture but that is the easiest way to tell it apart from other plants and that's why sometimes, people who do while gathering get into trouble because if you gather the immature plant, it does not have the purple splotches necessarily. karina: the big concern when we are talking about ingesting it is for our pets. what are the symptoms you should look for if your pet has eaten it? >> lethargy it tends to make people -- and animals -- i'm not a vet. it tends to disoriented and lethargic, not

energetic, and if you are concerned, you should say take a sample of the plant with youat , that your pet has eaten, take itthe vet and get them looked at quickly as psible because it's ptty dangerous, especially if something has eaten the route or the stem tissue down below. if it's just some leaves, it is still dangerous but not as urgent. karina: good to know. if you see your pet is acting a little differently, may be some of the symptoms you mentioned, take them straight to the vet. why is poison hemlock so difficult to remove? >> the plants terribly difficult to remove but they have a seed bank and they germinate all kinds of weather. as long as they have got water so the seed bank lasts for two or three years so even if you pulled every poison hemlock on your property, it is still coming back next year and the

year after it in the year after that so it's going to be a little bit challenging. it's not as bad as scotch broom or some of the other things but scotch broom is not poisonous. karina: thank you so much for your time. we appreciate your expertise and advising us on this. now, we know what to look for. thank you again. you can get our newscasts, breaking news, weather, and more, with our tv app. it is available on apple tv, google tv, fire tv, and roku. search abc 7

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>> number one priority is none of it makes its way back to the ocean. >> everyone has done their part. >> we are sticking with this story on our livestream. >> after months of uncertainty, business owners are seeing signs of progress. >> everyday, we are building towards something better. >> a better bay area. >> thank you s us for getting answers today. we will be here every weekday at 3:00, answering questions from with experts from around the bay area. ♪ >> tonight breaking news involving former president trump now in florida at this hour set to face a federal judge on 37 counts and what he's still doing tonight. also, new video in the fire erupting part of i-95 collapsing. and the deadly tour boat accident capsizing along the