Aid groups are rushing thousands of doses of emergency contraception to Ukraine amid reports that large numbers of Ukrainian woman are being raped by Russian troops. The International Planned Parenthood Federation says it has sent nearly 3,000 doses of the "morning-after pill" to Ukraine and other groups are doing what they can to boost supplies, the Guardian reports. Julie Taft of IPPF says the group is also collecting supplies of medical abortion pills, which can be used during the first 24 weeks of pregnancy. "The timeframe for treating victims of sexual violence is really essential," Taft says.

Joel Mitchell from aid organization Paracrew says most of the demand for emergency contraception is coming from hospitals in regions where large areas are occupied by Russian troops, the Telegraph reports. "There is a demand for emergency contraception, but very rarely from hospitals in the west. It is mostly hospitals to the east, in Kharkiv, Mariupol, those regions," Mitchell says. "As soon as we made contact with hospitals in those regions, we had standing orders for that medication." Refugees fleeing Ukraine have had trouble accessing emergency contraception in Poland and other countries with strict laws, reports the Guardian.

Earlier this month, Ukraine's ombudswoman for human rights said girls and women kept captive in a house in Bucha when Russian troops occupied the Kyiv-area town had been "systematically" raped and nine of them were pregnant. Doctors examining bodies found in mass graves in the region say they have found evidence some women were raped before they were killed, the Guardian reported earlier this week. Liz Truss, Britain's foreign minister, said Friday that the country will send a team to Ukraine to gather evidence of war crimes including rape, reports Reuters. "It’s done to subjugate women and destroy communities and we want to see it stopped," Truss said.
https://www.newser.com/story/319957/emergency-contraception-rushed-to-ukraine.html

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2022/apr/28/russia-ukraine-emergency-contraception-amid-rape-reports

The Brooklyn Public Library is fighting back against book censorship by allowing teens and young adults across the United States to access its extensive digital offerings.

The library, the sixth largest in the country, first announced the “Books UnBanned” campaign in a press release on April 13, responding to a rash of book bans in public schools and libraries that have primarily impacted LGBTQ+ titles and books by authors of color. While people around the country have always been able to apply to access BPL’s digital resources, the organization is now waiving the $50 annual fee that is typically associated with out-of-state cards.



Young people ages 13 to 21 can send a note to BooksUnbanned@bklynlibrary.org or to the library’s “teen-run” Instagram to receive their free eCard. The cards will provide people with access to 350,000 ebooks, 200,000 audiobooks, and over 100 databases, according to BPL.

“Access to information is the great promise upon which public libraries were founded,” said Linda E. Johnson, president and CEO of BPL. “We cannot sit idly by while books rejected by a few are removed from the library shelves for all.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/other/the-brooklyn-public-library-is-fighting-back-against-book-censorship/ar-AAWAmAK

TAMPA, Fla. (WFLA) - A 26-year-old woman who drove her SUV through a police pedestrian plaza and down a flight of stairs claimed she was “following her GPS instructions,” according to the Portland Police Department.


Officers didn’t buy the woman’s claim stating they “felt it was her excessive blood alcohol level” that led to the unusual crash.

Police said the woman, who appeared to be in a Toyota Highlander SUV, drove through the police department garage, across a pedestrian plaza, and down the stairs.

“We are fortunate that she didn’t strike anyone and this ended with just a small amount of property damage,” the Portland Police Department said in a Facebook post. “Please don’t drink and drive.”

The woman was issued a summons for operating while under the influence.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/woman-claims-she-was-following-her-gps-down-staircase-police-say/ar-AAWOyRd

The Bible was always Larry S. Buford’s guiding light, but it put the one-time Motown singer-songwriter in a dilemma, when he found himself defending his South Los Angeles neighborhood from encroaching development.

Buford became increasingly alarmed over the span of two decades, as he watched the single-family homes on his tranquil block of Avalon Boulevard replaced by multi-story apartment buildings with insufficient parking.

The apartment buildings were for people who are poor or homeless or aged or mentally ill. And the deeply religious 68-year-old, who has lived in Willowbrook for a quarter century, was in a quandary: His personal values were at odds with his concern for his neighborhood.

And then he found himself in conflict with a spiritual brother: the Rev. Andy Bales, head of the Union Rescue Mission, the downtown L.A. homeless shelter that vows to “embrace people with the compassion of Christ.”

======

That focus began around 2000, when a 42-unit home for seniors rose across the street from Buford’s house. In 2012, the man with the barbeque pit sold his property. A Community of Friends, a nonprofit that builds and operates apartments for people with mental illness, announced plans to construct the 55-unit Avalon Apartments on the land.

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-05-01/to-be-a-nimby-or-a-follower-of-isaiah-a-former-motown-songwriter-faces-a-moral-crossroad

I recently drove past the Amazon warehouse that provides the Orange county region ( I think it was in Rialto). that thing was HUGE. if you ever want take a route 66 drive...check out the warehouses along the way.


Forty percent of the nation’s goods now travel through the Inland Empire,

We mapped the warehouse takeover of the Inland Empire. The results are overwhelming

Over the last 20 years, I’ve watched open land and farmland in the Inland Empire become a gridlocked sea of warehouses. These giant boxes have worsened traffic, air quality, cancer rates and chronic health problems in the region and have cemented poverty here. The industry once touted as a blue-collar miracle is instead filled with temp jobs rife with health and safety issues, wage theft, little job security and a future in which robotic workers are predicted to reign supreme.

The Inland Empire is at a breaking point. More than a dozen groups throughout its vast 27,000-square-mile region are attempting to pass moratoriums on warehouse construction. But conservative politics and development money continue to win out. City councils in what are known as “diesel death zones” routinely sacrifice the health of residents for economic benefit in areas that often have Black and Latino populations.

Last year the Robert Redford Conservancy for Southern California Sustainability at Pitzer College, which I oversee, began creating an animated map of warehouse growth in the Inland Empire that reaches back to 1975. Recently published, the map makes warehouses in the Inland Empire look like the spread of a disease. What began at a couple of World War II military logistics sites in San Bernardino and Mira Loma, a town in Riverside County, has grown into a behemoth with millions of square feet of warehouse space.

Strategic land acquisitions near airports and rail yards created an Inland Empire logistics hub that is visible from space. By the 1980s, agriculture was considered a relic industry and the Inland Empire region had been deemed to be “dirt cheap.” The abundance of land combined with a large immigrant population of low educational attainment made for a narrative that warehousing was a natural fit. Besides, the nation’s largest port complex is an acceptable drive away. With the emergence of online shopping in the 1990s, warehouse construction began to skyrocket.

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2022-05-01/inland-empire-warehouse-growth-map-environment

two of the group arrested today have a manslaughter charge for that bullet proof vest killing of a friend that happened a few weeks ago.

out loose with manslaughter charge. Running around with guns shooting at houses

????

Naomi Judd, of Grammy-winning duo The Judds, dies at 76



Naomi Judd, the Kentucky-born singer of the Grammy-winning duo The Judds and mother of Wynonna and Ashley Judd, has died

“Today we sisters experienced a tragedy. We lost our beautiful mother to the disease of mental illness," the statement said. "We are shattered. We are navigating profound grief and know that as we loved her, she was loved by her public. We are in unknown territory." The statement did not elaborate further.

The Judds were to be inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame on Sunday and they had just announced an arena tour to begin in the fall, their first tour together in over a decade.

https://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/wireStory/naomi-judd-grammy-winning-duo-judds-dies-76-84419442