DATASET #1
KEYWORDS: “air quality” “diesel” “particulate” “pollution”
SYNOPSIS: The findings of the data mining project of John Tavaglione resulted in very few attributed statements. Tavaglione is the County Supervisor to the 2nd District. From September 8th, 2006 to September 11th, 2008 Tavaglione had four attributed statements about the search strings “air quality”, “diesel”, “particulate”, and “pollution.” These statements could be found in newspapers in the Press-Enterprise and the San Bernardino Sun. The themes that Tavaglione focuses on have to do mainly with air quality. The big topic in the 2nd District is the battle between air quality and warehouses development. During any affirmative statements Tavaglione makes he is answering questions about the particulate pollution that the diesel trucks cause within his district. It appears as if he is trying to project the image that he is on the side of the people when protecting the air quality. However, the very few hits that were received in the search strings suggest he has a different motive. Any statements made about the search terms were in direct response to community complaints about air quality and warehouse development. He never made any clear statements, however, that this was an issue that he was going to focus on, mostly he was trying to put the issue on the back burner. Often he was trying to turn the attention of the media to improving the economy that had taken a turn for the worse with the recession. Tavaglione does not hesitate to communicate with the press when it suits the district’s economic issues. For example, he points out the improved air quality the district would receive when building a natural gas fueling station, however, also noting it was saving the community money. The major pattern seen throughout the searches is the silence from Tavaglione. This suggests he does not want to address the issue. The general community that Tavaglione represents is Latino, who have very little power, yet, are the ones most affected by the air quality problem. Rather he would prefer to side with big business in order to bring money to his powerful friends in the warehouses and trucking businesses. The only suggestion for future groups is to beware of the silence. At first we ran into trouble when doing the searches because Tavaglione said so little about any of the issues. But this is an important quality as it shows he prefers not to deal with such an enormous issue that negatively affects a group with little power, the Latino community.
Total number of articles in which official is represented at least once as an attributed source: 382
Time span between first and last attributed statement by official (2-13-01 to 9-11-08). [/tab]
RESEARCHERS: Brett Andrews & Charles Macharg
SPREADSHEET: Tavaglione Set #1
DATASET #2
KEYWORDS: “redevelopment” “developer” “real estate development” “growth”
SYNOPSIS: The Inland Empire has become very diverse and is continuing to grow. There is an increasing amount of Latinos, among other ethnic minorities, moving into the area. To keep up with this growth, the cultural political economy has begun to construct Latino identity and environments. 2nd district Supervisor John F. Tavaglione has contributed to the development of these environments. He has worked to provide planning and funding for redevelopment projects since being elected in the mid 1990s. As a Supervisor for Riverside County, he is very concerned with the redevelopment and growth of his district. Tavaglione is a part of the Redevelopment Agency and created the Jurupa Redevelopment Project. Tavaglione is using his power to change the space Latinos reside in, which is altering their identity in a way that will benefit future generations.
Tavaglione is attempting to breakdown the discourse on Latino representation by opening up the stereotypes and decreasing the chances of further stigmatization. Latino environments are associated with poverty and low economic status. With Tavaglione’s goals, efforts to improve this negative association are evident. By breaking down the stereotypes and improving the discourse the Latinos will be held in a higher regard.
Tavaglione’s goals to redevelop his district aid in constructing a positive Latino identity. By creating nice neighborhoods and communities the largely Latino population becomes more difficult to associate with negative stereotypes, such as barrios and general poverty. Tavaglione’s projects include many developments, such as an improved sports complex and a real estate development for foster children. With Tavaglione’s help, the representation of Latino’s in Riverside County has been improving and continues to improve. If the property values in the area continue to increase, how Latinos of that community are represented will change in a positive manner. If Latinos are seen by others as more affluent members of society, their identity will take on a new form that will raise their own image of themselves and their image to surrounding communities.
We found plenty of quotations from Tavaglione regarding redevelopment and growth, but very little regarding real estate development. However, compared with the amount of articles we looked through, there were few containing Tavaglione’s stance on these matters. This shows that even if Tavaglione is making efforts to change the community for the better, he still addresses these issues at a much lower frequency than one would expect. Although his plans and projects display efforts to increase positive Latino identity and environment, the absence of recognition of his actions in the media shows a lack of significance for his accomplishments thus far. This absence demonstrates the negative image of the Latino environment because it makes the issue seem unimportant to the community as a whole. The presence of Tavaglione’s recognition of the Latino community needing development signifies his objectives of changing the Latino stereotype in Riverside County. With this presence, we are able to see that even if his concern is not as pronounced as it should be, it still exists. However, overall concern for minority representation in the community is not increasing as fast as the population. Tavaglione may show some interest in redeveloping areas experiencing growth in the Latino population, but more needs to be done to enhance their environment and identities.
Total number of articles in which official is represented at least once as an attributed source: 14
Time span between first and last attributed statement by your official (1-10-1993 to 2-13-2009)
RESEARCHERS: Lea Hernandez & Ashley Prasad
SPREADSHEET: Tavaglione Set #2
