The IRE Resource Center is a major research library containing more than 23,250 investigative stories — both print and broadcast. These stories are searchable online or by contacting the Resource Center directly (573-882-3364 or rescntr@ire.org) where a researcher can help you pinpoint what you need. Browse or search the tipsheet section of our library below. Stories are not available for download but can be easily ordered by contacting the Resource Center:
Search results for "Department of Water and Power" ...
-
DWP Files
This series of stories on LA's Department of Water and Power, the nations' largest municipal utility, follows up on Anderson's report last year about racial discrimination at the utility company. He reports on price gouging by suppliers; dysfunctional management and extortion by the unions; whistleblowers being fired; shoddy workmanship and cost overruns.
Tags: City government; mismanagement; power supply; electricity; unions; corruption; Los Angeles politics
-
The black avenger: Milton Crawford exposes the DWP's big whitewash ... racism, intimidation and harassment
This investigation exposed a decades-long cover-up of racism and harassment by the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power. The story revealed how the nation's largest public utility and the city attorney's office used illegal confidential settlements to conceal nearly $10 million in outside legal costs and settlements stemming from workplace discrimination, harassment, and intimidation at the Department of Water and Power.
Tags: Los Angeles; Department of Water and Power; racism; workplace discrimination; sexual harassment
-
Pump Station #2
An investigation by KGO-TV revealed that "the emergency water supply for San Francisco's fire hydrants was in critical condition. If the water stopped flowing to the hydrants during a disaster such as an earthquake or firestorm, the engines that power the back-up system would blow up. There are two pumping stations in the city that, in an emergency, would draw water out of San Francisco Bay to send to the fire crews. But, the engineer in charge of the stations was failing to maintain the engines. He hadn't changed the oil in more than ten years on the job. (KGO-TV) commissioned independent tests that showed the engines were in critical condition -- that they would blow up, if run at full load for any length of time. (KGO-TV) also revealed that the chief engineer was busy with many other projects at the station that had nothing to do with public safety. The former appliance repairman used the fire department's building to store old washers, dryers, mattress springs, furniture, a bowling ball and other junk. He set up a putting green, and would drive golf balls off the walls. He parked his personal car inside the pumping station for weeks on end, to do body work. He tended a garden of vegetables and spices."
Tags: San Francisco Bay; earthquake; fire hydrants; pumping station; public safety; TAPE; TRANSCRIPT
-
Meaner Pastures
Westword reports on mistreatment of Peruvian sheepherders in Colorado working in the U.S. under the H-2A section of theImmigration Reform Act. Because of the workers' status and the power of the ranchers, numerous complaints of mistreatment, physical and emotional abuse and lack of food and water have been difficult to prosecute. Investigations by the Department of Labor have not changed basic conditions for the workers, Westword reported.
-
Dumped on
Nearly 35,000 metric tons of spent, but still deadly, fuel rods and other toxic waste are stowed in concrete casks and water-filled cooling pools at 70 commercial nuclear power plants across the nation. Since 1994, the federal Energy Department has been burrowing into the Yucca mountain, 100 miles north of Las Vegas and on the edge of a federal nuclear weapons testing site. The point of digging is to let scientists determine whether this ancient volcanic mound can safely contain highly radioactive waste for hundreds of thousands of years.
Tags: None
-
The Mono Lake Water War
Earth Journal reports that "After years of losing its fresh water to Los Angeles, California's Mono Lake has won what some say is a new lease on life: streams are flowing back into the lake. But was Mono Lake really dying?"
-
No title (id: 1109)
L.A. Weekly does a lengthy investigation of the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power and finds it was serving many of its customers water that exceeded California guidelines for a suspected human carcinogen; DWP officials never made the problem public, Oct. 11 - 17, 1985.
Tags: None