Madeleine Scinto

By John Guenther and Madeleine Scinto

For six straight years, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa vowed he would take on the trucking industry and impose strict air quality rules that would reduce truck emissions at the Port of Los Angeles by 80 percent by 2012.

The Port of L.A. launched the Clean Truck initiative in 2008 in an effort to scrub clean the air at the country's largest port. By barring older trucks from the port, by requiring other trucks retrofit in stages, and by providing incentives for purchasing newer and cleaner trucks, the plan aimed to hit the port's emissions goal in five years.

What seemed impossible took on a sense of reality in October when the mayor and port officials called a news conference to announce they reached a milestone:  truck emissions had dropped 70 percent at the Port of Los Angeles by mid-2009, putting the port three years ahead of its aggressive schedule.

"This is the most successful effort to clean a port in the world," Villaraigosa said. "I mean, think about it. Nobody thought it was possible to retrofit 5,000 trucks in a year, and we're at 5,500 and growing."

No one at the news conference cast much of a skeptical eye. Headlines in the L.A. Times read the next day, "Diesel emissions down drastically at ports of L.A., Long Beach."

A Neon Tommy team of investigative reporters set out to document the progress being touted by all types of organizations,  from the Port of L.A. to the National Resources Defense Council.

In interviews with truckers, port officials, and cargo companies, the team discovered truck companies use new and cleaner trucks to pick up cargo at the port, while the old and dirty trucks wait just outside the port to haul the cargo through Los Angeles.

 

Anthony Rosario was the kind of guy who enjoyed helping people in the quietest ways. Never looking for praise or recognition. He just did it anyway.

At McDonald's he saw a mother trying to split a few meals among all her children. He overheard the mother explain to her still-hungry kids she didn't have enough money to buy more. So what did Anthony do? He quietly slipped $5 to the eldest, a 13-year-old boy. "Go get yourselves something," he said.

Another time he took a walk with his sibling when a hub cap flew off a car and hit his sister's leg. Their brother laughed. But not Anthony. He hoisted his little sister on his back and carried her the three miles home.

That was Anthony: a helper, a mender, someone who was ready to fix a problem at hand.

At his funeral friends and family filled a large cardboard poster with different memories, many of which related to how he had helped them. One friend wrote about the first time she met Anthony. She cried by herself as fellow high school students passed her in the halls, simply ignoring her. But not Anthony. He knelt down and comforted her.

They didn't know each other but that didn't matter. Because that was Anthony.

When people needed their car fixed, he fixed it. He loved cars and motorcycles and spent the last two years selling cars at North Hollywood Toyota. When people needed a haircut, he cut it. When his mother needed something from the grocery store, he bought it. And he never complained.

Anthony died July 30, 2009 of swine flu at age 28, a week before his August birthday. His mother says he had asthma as a child, but was healthy before he was admitted to the Providence Holy Cross Medical Center.  He stayed in the hospital three weeks after being admitted with 103-degree temperature.  The hospital struggled to keep his temperature down and could not figure out exactly what ailed him.  While doctors tested him for a series of different sicknesses, including swine flu, they also gave him a long treatment of antibiotics.  The death certificate says he died of adult respiratory distress syndrome and H1N1 virus.  

After his death Anthony's brother found a poem saved on Anthony's computer. The family reprinted the poem on key chains and T-shirts, which they wore for the funeral. The poem seemed to describe the way he lived his life, "The good you do today, will often be forgotten.  Do good anyway.  Give the best you have, and it will never be enough.  Give your best anyway."

The 8th Annual West Hollywood Book Fair. As diverse as the people who live there. Gay and lesbian books, Ayn Rand philosophy books, Russian children's books, baby tattoo books, Wizard of OZ interpretation books, and the list goes on. Lots of authors, lots of comics, lots of public readings and even some rapping about "A, B, C ing."

Two words: kick ass. That's Christiane Amanpour. She's a woman whose bold, adventuresome, battle zone crazy and over 50  Amanpour covers the hottest, most controversial topics and regions out there... Bosnia, Palestine, Israel, Iraq and Afghanistan to name a few. Bullets, mortar and genocide really don't seem to be a problem for the woman. And what's better, she doesn't mind sniffing around and asking big honchos about it either.