john: tonight on pbs news weekend, how americans are coping with rising electricity bills during this summer's extreme heat. >> it's a really horrible feeling because, you know, nobody likes to nohave enough money to pay their bills. people just think that because we chose at some point tlive in a hot state that we should just suck up. john: then, a new documentary examines the complex

relationship between men behind bars and their young daughters. and the story of the filipino-american union official who helped lead striking farm workers to a landmark victory. >> major funding for the pbs weekend has been provided by -- cellular, this is sam, how can i help you? get nationwide coverage with no contract. have a nice day. ♪ >> and with the ongoing support of these individuals and institutions. and friends of the news hour.

>> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting, and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. john: good evening, i'm john yang. in israel, an outpouring of grief and anger after israeli forces recovered the bodies of six more hostages overnight in gaza. among them was 23-year-old israeli-american hersh goldberg-polin. the bodies were fod in a tunnel beneath rafah, on the egyptian border. the health ministry says they had been shot at close range two or three days ago. there have been massive protests tonight as relatives of the remaining hostages accuse prime minister benjamin netanyahu of abandoning them because he hasn't negotiated their release

in months of talks. >> it's too late for us. it's too late for carmel. i will never hug her again. but 101 ople can still hug their families. for them, make the deal, save lives. john: organized labor has called for a general nationwide strile -- strike beginning in a matter of hours. the work stoppage is expected to shut down israel's international airport and disrupt health care, transportation, and banking. and in the occupied west bank, palestinian militants claimed responsibility for the deaths of three israeli police officers today near hebron. later, security forces killed a palestinian suspected of carrying out the shooting. across the west bank last week, israeli forces carried out raids searching for hamas fighters. from boston to san francisco, about 10,000 hotel workers walk off their jobs today, in the middle of a busy labor day weekend. contract negotiations between the union representing hotel

workers and thremajor hotel chains have stalled. the union wants changes in working conditions and higher wages. the strike is hitting 25 hotels in eight cities and is expected spread in the coming week. and at the paralympics in paris today, team usa picked up eight medals in rowing, archery, and track. that lifts the americans up to third in the medal count. in archery, army veteran jason tabansky and two-time paralympian matt stutzman each won gold. and in track, roderick townsend took first in men's high jump. still to come on pbs news weekend, a new film looks at the father-daughter bond when the dads are behind bars. and the story of filipino-american labor organizer larry itliong. >> this is pbs news weekend from weta studios in washington, home of the pbs news hour, weeknights on pbs.

john: as summer temperatures have soared across the nation, so have electric bills as air conditioners work overtime. a usa today analysis of government forecasts projected an average monthly bill this summer of $173. every year, nearly 3 million american households have their electricity shut off because of unpaid bills. we heard from a handful of people trying to navigate all this. >> my name is lisa harjo. i'm from bullhead city, arizona. and my energy bills have doubled from the previous year. >> my name is morgan tate. and i live in silver spring, maryland. i've lived in this area for seven years, and i've never had a summer this hot. >> i'm david hambrick. i am a registered nurse from dallas. today, the heat factor is going to be like 112 or 114, some ridiculous amount. it really affects the medical condition that i have. and so, we've got to run our air conditioner more than normal.

>> in previous years i wou run it at about 76. now, i usually will run it at about 80. if it's a really hot day, i will run it at about 82. i tell my daughter, just walk outside and come back in and it'll feel good in here. >> i'm fighting through the disability program, so my wages have been cut in half. and so, trying to manage increases in utilities on less of a salary is extraordinarily difficult. >> i have taken money out of my grocery bill. i've taken money out of my restaurant bill. >> i am planning on renting out a room because that is the only way i foresee having enough money to offset these huge bills. i only pay my water bill every other month, because if i try to pay that and my electric bill, then i'm in trouble. >> we've moved, you know, to generics. [laughter] except for my strawberries. smucker's strawberry preserves. that's my one.

that's my one luxury. [laughter] >> i literally have to decide whether i want to have air conditioning or have something to eat. >> one of the things that i like to do in order to stay cool and save money is go to the mall, go to the library, go to some place that i know is going to be air conditioned already. >> the first thing we do is just completely almost blackout the house. >> i have insulation in every window in my house so that i can keep it dark and try to keep any air from escaping as much as possible. >> i have found that when i'm able to mitigate some of this using ice packs, using fans instead of my central ac, that i save about $30 per month on my utility bill, and that can make a big difference. >> this is hitting us pretty hard. people, if they don't see it or until it affects them, they don't really understand. >> it's a really horrible feeling because nobody likes to not have enough money to pay their bills, you know?

people just think that because we chose at some point to live in a hot state that we should just suck it up, and then that's just, you know, that's just not right. john: people struggling with both the heat and with their electric bills. sonya carley is a professor of energy policy and city planning at the university of pennsylvania. sanya, i know you research coping techniques. how typical is what we just heard? >> unfortunately, john, 's very typical. at the energy justice lab, we find that over half of all low-income households engage in some of these so-called coping strategies, many of which we just heard about. these strategies are both financial in nature and behavioral in nature. we also know that over half of all low-income households engage in many of these at once, and it's the households that have particularly vulnerable members that reside within it, such as young children under the age of five or those who are medically compromised or elderly, that are more likely to engage in these kinds of strategies. we found that one in four households use some kind of

risky temperature strategy in order to cope. now, here, these are things such as burning trash in your home or running a space heater, which we know to be one of the leading causes of fire in the united states. or opening your oven or flaring your gas stove, or for space heating or running your dryer, but disconnecting the dryer vent and putting somebody behind it in order to warm your body temperature. we also know that one in four households carry debt across their energy bills, and approximately one in five households engage in this kind of bill balancing that you heard about just a minute ago, where one might pay down one energy bill or one mortgage bill, for example, one month, and then pay down a different bill the next month. and approximately one in five households have to forego paying for food in order to pay their utility bills. john: what are the consequences of either not having air conditioning or cutting back on the air conditioning to save money? >> it can lead to a variety of mental and physical health consequences, and some of the consequences can be quite dire. in the severe, but not at all rare case, it can lead to death. now, just generally, if you

don't have access to energy, you don't have access to electricity, for example, there are a variety of other impacts. you wouldn't be able to use your electronic devices, such as your phone, to seek help or to find information. you can't run a refrigerator, which limits the amount of healthy and perishable food that you can keep in your house. and you can't run an electronic medical devicesuch as an oxygen concentrator, which you might rely on for your life. but there are also developmental outcomes, particularly for young children who reside in these homes. in some places, if a house is deemed not habitable, if you can't actually live within those conditions, then that's grounds for a child to be removed from the home and put in alternative care until the house can resume their electricity use. john: are some people more affected by this than other people? >> yes, there are differences. we know that increasingly, it's common for more hot states to suffer from energy insecurity more than others. we also know that there are disparities by housing conditions. so, those who have older homes,

draft homes, less efficient homes tend to suffer from energy insecurity much more. and then there are social, demographic, and specific populations. so, those households that have vulnerable members that reside within, again, young children under the age of five or somebody who relies on an electronic medical device, they're much more likely to be energy insecure. we also find racial disparities, racial and ethnic disparities, where we find that households of color are significantly more likely to both suffer from energy insecurity and be disconnected. john: what programs are there to either help pay the electric bills or protect them from being disconnected? >> sure. i like to think of these in three bins, if you will. the first is kind of preventativeeasures. the second is more emergency relief, and the third is more of kind of long-term maintenance. in the preventative measures, i would put things that that lower the energy bill. so, weatherization assistance is one classic example where essentiallyou're helping a home weatherize to seal holes in the wall or gaps, or to repair or to swap out their appliances. residential solar is another

preventative solution that essentially can lower one's energy bill over time. the emergency assistance, one could seek out local bill assistance through their local government, but also the federal government offers the low-income home energy assistance program. and then finally, there's disconnection protections. these are at the state level. states declare whether there are certain times that utilities cannot disconnect certain customers. if, for example, the weather is above or below a certain teerature or at a certain time of year. now, i'll just point out that these policies are wildly inconsistent across the states. it's a patchwork, if you will. we know that less than half of all states actually have heat-based protection, so it's far more common for them to have cold-based protections. so, there's not only this patchwork, but it's also the case that these policies tend to favor, or at least not be sensitive to the increasing incidence of extreme heat. john: sanya carley of the university of pennsylvania. thank you very much. >> thank you so much.

john: the relationship between fathers and daughters can play a crucial role in a young girl's life. to strengthen that bond for black girls, an organization called girls for a change stages date with dad weekends that include a daddy daughter dance. but what if the fathers are behind bars? they just take the dance to them. a new documentary follows four girls and their fathers preparing for a daddy daughter dance in the washington, d.c. jail. it also looks at how the event affects them in the years after the dance. it's called "daughters" and is now on netflix. the directors are natalie rae and angela patton, who is also ceo of girls for a change. natalie, i read somewhere that this was a project eight years in the making. what drew you to this? >> so many things. the power of this story is so moving and incredible, the wisdom of the girls, the way

that girls can change the world if we just listen to them and create spaceor them. this is a profound example of that. our importance to our fathers as we grow up as young women, that relationship does impact what we pull into our lives, what we think about ourselves, what we know love to be. this film and this story really touched on everything that has been important to me as a filmmaker up until now. amna: angela, as the title suggests, this is told through the girls' eyes and from their perspective. why was it important to do that? >> i was championed to actually be the advocate for these girls wildest dreams. they did not belie that because they were locked behind bars that they should be locked out of the upbringing of their daughters. they were there greatest ambassadors and wrote this level to the ship -- letter to the

sheriff and asked what they needed in their community, in their homes, in their heart. that is why it is titled "daughters," because we are allowing the girls to be in the process. john: one of the things in the film is that the fathers to qualify for going to this daddy daughter dance go through 10 weeks talking to each other, talking with a leader about fatherhood, about their lives, their relationships with their daughters. let's take a look at this clip. >> part of the reasoning behind us doing this work is because for you guys it is a golden opportunity to see your children, to see your daughters and spend time with them. i will be very honest with you guys, it is going to be an emotional roller coaster. are you going to be able to hide when the dance passes and the clock ticks to the ending time? you will go through your own range of emotions. john: natalie, talk about what

it was like in that room. >> i would stay out of the room. angela and i both gave the fathers the space to work with chad, anyone that was in the room, like our cinematographer was also a father and also experienced incarceration and his family so it was also able to join the circle and talk about what he had been through. protecting that space was really important to allowing everyone to open up and go through the work with chad. but it was beautiful to see how quickly these fathers wanted to talk, and this was a very rare opportunity to bond about their children and talk about their own childhood and potentially their own fatherhood wounds. john: natalie, you never say in the film why these men are behind bars. i assume that was intentional. >> yeah. this film is from the daughter'' perspective. when you are the child of an incarcerated parent, you are innocent. that opportunity for love fm a parent should not be taken away from you.

we wanted to honor and be true to that and experience these relationships, this love story with a father and daughter. john: we also see a lot of the mothers of these young gir, although once the dance begins, th can't go in. we have a clip of you talking to the mothers. >> we are here for you and your daughters. we love you and we celebrate you. one of the hardest things for us to do as humans. so, i am clear that this is probably one of the hardest decisions that you moms had to make today. so, moms, thank you for getting out of the way. when you go to the dance, what are you looking forward to? honestly. >> honestly, bonding. that is hard for someone to tell you you are in the way when you are the one showing up every

day, doing all of the work. john: angela, showing up every day, doing all the work. how difficult is it for mothers to build up to this and then just sort of send their daughters in and go off somewhere else? >> the goal here is to make sure they are not left out. we understand in doing this work that it is family bonding, family unification, strengthening everyone. we understand there is disappointment, heartache, anger, and how we need to address that is by creating a safe space for the mothers as well. what they are doing that is the greatest part of this is letting go and allowing that girl to form this relationship that is necessary between the daughter and her father. and the mother tends to understand that and support that, and that is the end goal. john: natalie, there's a lot of raw emotion in this film. a very intimate look at both the young girls and their fathers.

were you surprised by the openness? >> i was really moved by how much the girls wanted to share, and really the film took on their spirit very quickly. in some of the earliest interviews, you have santana being like, i want to keep talking. i've got more to say. she talks for three hours, then wants to turn that interview around and ask me some questions. so, these girls really wanted to open up. they have a lot to say, a lot to share, and that was really eye-opening and beautiful to be part of. john: another feature of is film is you followed these girls and their fathers for three years after the dance. you show the conversations. angela, what struck me is how these young women were sort of laying down the law to their fathers. there is one who says, do you have a job? are you changing? talk about this power of wanting toe with their daughters. what does that do to these men? >> oh, it changes them.

they have this moment of vulnerability, honesty, and trust that most of them have not had. it is not typical for them to get together and do this work of self-awareness first, accountability, being responsible, and then also becoming an active listener. so when they ask me why is the dance not just a dance but dinner too, it is so at some of the richest conversations can happen at the table when you are breaking bread with your family. so we are bringing back what is not what i would say is old-school, it is the right school, and that his family first. john: angela patton and natalie rae, thank you very much. >> thank you for having us.

john: finally tonight, for labor day, an animated story from our partners at storycorps. in 1965, filipino-american labor organizer larry itliong helped lead the delano grape strike and boycott for better wages and working conditions. it was the birth of the farmworkers labor movement and led to a landmark contract. his son, johnny itliong, talked to his son aleks about larry's legacy. >> one of his nicknames was seven fingers because when he was rking in alaska he lost three of his fingers. he was small in stature, but he was very, very strong man. helways wore pocketed shirts, thick ray-ban glasses, and he would always have his cigar. and i remember i would have to get up at 3:00 in the morning and we would jump in the back of the truck, load it up full of boxes, and we would stack them

10, 12 feet high. i could carry about eight of them stocked up. there were so many good men living in boxcars, sheds, whatev they could make out of the elements. and i remember maybe one guy had one suit, and whoever would get a date would wear that suit. so, they would share the suit. 20, 30 guys, that is the brotherhood. and when they would pass, they didn't have family in the united states. they had no one to say gooye to them. and it was just us, me and my father and my brother. men who worked the fields. they fed the united states. you know, my father stood up for the people who need help. at five years old, i remember running around, getting the sticks. i would bring sticks to the ones who were kneeling, the picket signs. that was probably the earliest

memory. he sacrificed a lot of his family time to make a better world for us. we have big shoes toalk in, man. >> yeah. >> i don't feel like i am even close. but your demeanor reminds me of him because he was very calm. he always listened. when it was time for him to speak, what he said was important. and already, you follow those footsteps. ♪ john: that is pbs news week and for this sunday. i'm john yang. for all of my colleagues, thanks for joining us. have a good week. >> major funding for pbs news weekend has been provided by -- ♪

and with the ongoing support of these individuals and institutions. this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting, and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. ♪ >> you're watching pbs.

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