>> Ted: On Arizona horizon, we'll hear about a new investigative series on how Arizona prisoners are hired out to work for private companies.

On Cronkite news, Brittney Griner's teammates react and concerns over black and LGBTQ +.

Welcome.

Reports out of Washington indicate that President Biden is preparing to take executive action on climate concerns.

This after a Joe Manchin pushed by his fellow Democrats.

All options are on the table including declaring a national emergency which would give the administration broader latitude to use government resources to tackle government-related issues.

This has his fellow Democrats speaking out how a 50/50 senate is giving Mancion to much power.

>> A 50/50 senate sucks.

I would approve he support the president's agenda to a much clearer degree and so I am disappointed in his attitude to address climate change, but he seems to be going back on that and we shall see.

>> If they don't understand inflation is the number one factor we have and harming our economy, it's inflation.

And I'm very much concerned and I have never changed my position and not stringing all along.

Can't we make sure that we do does not add fuel to the fire.

Climate >> Ted: Climate concerns in Europe and 40° Celsius and hitting many parts of Europe with wildfires forcing thousands to be evacuated.

>>> The Omicron varient dominating in the U.S. and the BA5 subvariant causing 75% of Covid infections last week, up from 69% the week before and numbers from the CDC reporting that the rise in the subvarient is corresponding to similar increases, hospitalizations and deaths.

In Europe, theyen warn the public to pay attention and wear masks indoors and take Covid tests when needed.

The CDC met to look at a varient-specific vaccine by Novavax.

They granted emergency use last week and the chief medical officer told the panel that scientists are working to have variant-specific vaccines available by the end of the year.

>>> A new investigative series by the Arizona republic has uncovered a new practices including the use of Arizona's prison workforce.

The series focuses on poor treatment of prisoners and how much money the state and others make off of prison labor.

We welcome the Arizona republic the lead reporter in the series and Joseph, good to have you and congratulations on the work.

>> Thank you.

>> Ted: And we'll talk about that in a tech second and what got this started?

>> We wanted to do a small story about the use ubaty and it's quite vast of how many private companies use prisoners.

>> Ted: But you found out that wasn't the case, huh?

>> The official number we are giving is 150 and that's because that's what we were able to actually verify, but just going back to 2017, you know, we went over 11,000 quotes of hundreds more businesses that reached out to use prisoners for their labor.

>> Ted: Let's get numbers here, how much are the prisoners paid for this work?

>> So if you look at prisoners prisoners in Arizona, only a certain number work and everyone is required to work and the only people who can't work are the ones who medically can't work.

You have three tiers.

Those who make ten to 35 or 45-cents an hour.

They mop the floors and scrub the toilets and orange is the new black and doing the laundry.

Then you have people who are least out to what you seed on the side of the road.

They clean the highways and go to towns and villages and they mow the lawns.

And then there's a select number and that's what we focused on, two thousand prisoners who get paid anywhere from $4.25 an hour up to and above the state's minimum wage.

So at the face, it sounds great, minimum wage.

But what happens is the fact that all deductions are taken out of the pay and what we see is the number of prisoners, majority of the prisoners only make about 50-cents an hour while the companies are profiting off of the number.

>> Ted: The companies are getting a great rate and the state is getting the money back from the prisoners in terms of what, expenses and I don't want to say rent.

But it's like a rent, isn't it?

>> So there's a few things.

Companies are not getting a great deal off of this and in some instances they are.

What the state does, they charge every company the minimum wage.

Even these companies that, you know, might be only paying prisoners a negotiated wage of $3.25, $4.25 an hour, it state says, well, we need you to pay the minimum wage, which is $12.80 an hour and they charge the company $12.80 an hour and take the difference between the $3.25 or $4.25 and $12.80 and keep the rest.

A lot of businesses were what they call a surcharge and that difference that is going towards housing the prisoners.

Feeding the prisoners and anything like that.

It turns out, that's just completely untrue.

In fact, prisoners pay their own rent and out of that $4.25, you get 30% taken off for rent and amount for utilities and if you're in there for a DUI, 30% taken away immediately and we don't know where this goes and the department of corrections has fought it tooth and nail to see where this money is.

>> Ted: It has to go somewhere, though?

>> We know in theory where it goes but the Arizona public sued the department of corrections to get access to the documents.

>> Ted: Interesting.

What businesses are -- releasing these prisoners to whom, familiar businesses, landscaping businesses?

Is it white collar work?

>> Anything and everything you can think of.

I think a lot of people understand that there are some companies that just -- they're public about their use of it.

You have televerder that uses business-to business and hickman's eggs which is popular.

But there's a number of them that you just wouldn't know.

So Ericson framing that does drywall and framing inside of homes and your apartment complex and Chassi building and they do a number of schools as parts of as part of their portfolio.

>> Ted: What happens if a worker get injured?

This is a bit of a mystery in this world.

>> Workers' compensation doesn't exist.

They don't have the same rights as you or other.

What we have seen and we have the medical documents of all of the of these people to have their arms mangled and body parts gone and fingers dismembered and not eligible for worker's comp and we know the system is completely amuck and not eligible for disable or unemployment and they are on public assistance.

>> Ted: That's the aspect and we have a couple of minutes left.

I think maybe the most work you did on this thing was the concept of recidivism.

I know the DOC says this helps train people and out of prison once they're released.

Is that a fact?

>> A complete lie.

First off, we're suing the department of corrections to get what exactly they're using to calculate the recidivism rates, the rates people go back to prison and fighting this tooth and nail.

We built a program that downloaded the prisoner information from their website and they used the number that if you work at the Arizona correctional industries one have a 10% less than from the general population to come back.

There's no way through any of our call coo cool cal calculations that's true.

We went through Ford and three different day organizations just to understand if we were correct in this.

>> Ted: Response from DOC, they've been fighting you but what are they saying the recidivism rate isn't what they say it is?

>> They took it off the website.

Your numbers around what they found, the next day they double-checked it and they said, oh, well, we took it off because of redundancy.

>> Ted: A lot of investigative work and important information and Joseph from the Arizona republic with KJZZ, thank you for share asking sharing.

Up next, a culinary medicine program studies ways that food can improve a patient's health.

We've heard an apple a day keeps the doctor away.

A program at the college of medicine in phoenix is putting that addage to the test.

Our producer and photographer show us how the concept of food is medicine and may soon be what the doctor orders.

>> Reporter: On a sunny Saturday morning, the down phoenix farmer's market is transformed into an open air classroom.

>> Yes, we should get some carrots.

>> Reporter: The treatments are a group of medical students from the university of Arizona phoenix and today, they're putting on a cooking demonstration for the market's customers.

>> The goal here is to really sort of showcase the vendors and what vegetables and what produce they have to offer and show people to use those vegetables and produce in health cree healthy ways.

>> Reporter: This includes classroom work and community-based projects.

He's wrapping up his first year at medical school and culinary medicine is two things he's passionate about.

A tennis star, he's always been interested in how bodies use food for fuel but not how it can use that to heal.

>> The number of drugs we're giving people and the more drugs we can cut down on, the better impact on the patient because drugs work, but they come with side effects and risk factors in ways that healthy diets don't.

>> Culinary medicine is the blending of the culinary arts of cooking with the science of medicine and nutrition.

It's a way of connecting those dots together so that we can use food as medicine to prevent, treat and reverse the diseases of our time.

>> Reporter: The prevention and health promotion at the school and he created the culinary medicine program on the principles of his own practice and student interest and most medical students only get about 19 hours of nutrition instruction during their four years.

>> These are critical because when you look at diet, it's the number one risk factor above smoking, above high cholesterol, weight, blood pressure, for premature disease and death that is totally preventable and what we eat can make us sick or heal us.

>> Reporter: Incorporating the cooking demo into the class gives students their first taste of interacting with the public.

>> The teaching kitchen like the unit lab is like a laboratory where students can learn and in this case, it's outward facing community engagement and we're trying to empower the community with tools.

>> These are some medical students, leaders of the interest group.

>> Reporter: The students are preparing a stir fry and work with this doctor to pan out recipes using products available at the market.

The dish is nutritional balanced and easy and quick to make and things a busy medical student can appreciate.

>> Fast food is convenient and cheap and I'm learning to incorporate vegetables in an easy way.

>> Reporter: The culinary medicine program examines issues beyond vitamins and good fat versus bad fat.

There are pane restaurants in many restaurants and the air where is area is a food desert didn't the marketandthe market is the only place to buy fresh foods and fruit and this is to the affordable.

This is one of the reasons for the partnership with the college says the market's executive director.

>> The downtown phoenix farmer's market is one of a few nonprofit organization farmer's markets in the valley and with that, we have more of an emphasis on serving our community and we have an ability to connect our community to healthier foods and healthier systems.

The best way to do this is to connect with educators and schools teaching those lessons.

>> Reporter: The farmer's marriagesmarkets applies with snap or program account.

In fact, every snap dollar is worth double when makes a purchase.

And because the farmer is usually the one Manning the booth, prices are negotiable.

Having the demos prove proving that with the right ingredients, the recipe for good health is achievable.

>> Ted: This is at fifth street and pierce and visit every Saturday if the summer from 7:30 to 11:30 Pam.

11:30 a.m. For more information, head to their website.

>> It's the 50th anniversary of title 9 banning sex decision discrimination in U.S. schools.

The law's title 9 recognizing gender equity.

It changes of most notely women's sports.

The director of Cronkite news phoenix sport's bureau and thank you for joining us.

Victoria, give me a better definition.

What is title 9?

>> Equal education opportunity and a civil right's law, I don't know what I'll say now.

Ted is nailing this.

Preventing a negative and preventing dis-grim discrimination and this is a creating a positive and equal educational opportunity on the basis of gender and we have these opportunities in the United States, the equal opportunity to participate in sports is massively important.

>> Ted: We'll talk about your participation coming up.

Paula, let's talk about your participation.

As a woman journalist, title 9 changed the landscape, didn't it?

>> 100%.

For journalists, it changed who we were recovering.

Title 9 came into effect and maybe 2% of teams in colleges and female sport's teams and the access for one and also, it spread a greater message for female journalists that this is a possibility for career and opened the door for so many people.

I was at the sun's recently and watching Booker and how Paul treated the journalists.

It was impressive and I asked why this is and they said this is all they know.

>> Ted: Yes.

I remember you would go into locker rooms and maybe one woman in the locker room, and guys would be upset about it and this was a long time ago.

But that was the landscape back then and it has changed.

>> Oh, my gosh.

I was telling my students this story.

I would go into baseball clubhouses, looking down at my feet and I wouldn't wear perfume and did everything I could to pretend I wasn't female.

>> Ted: As far as athletics are concerned, athletic opportunities that is the big point here, isn't it?

>> Yeah, the way we talk about it in our classroom, the law is both about the quality and experience of equal opportunity.

We're talking about participation numbers and right now, nationwide in the collegiate states, the ratio here is about 55 men, 45 women across college sport's campuses.

The qualitative experience is access to the experience and elite coaching and publicity and promotion has been a large part of what it means to feel like a legitimate athlete.

To a certain degree, the parts of the law, the the limitations to things like promotions.

>> Ted: And things like scholarships, Victoria, and that's a big deal as far as college athleticses.

>> This.

>> So if you're a ratio of students playing sports is 55/45, the scholarship amounts must be 55/45 and that's good torfor athletes, elite, academic while they're in college.

>> Ted: Paula, for women in journalism, an explosion, especially here of late, like with the past five to ten years.

>> It's incredible and it's just so important and you know, newsrooms in general to have repsesrepresentations, whether it's gender and female entering sport's journalism and you know, it used to be they wanted to be sideline reporters and that's just fine and net want to do play-by-play and behind the camera and all of these other areas of sport's journalism which is awesome.

>> Ted: Are there still areas where you get the gruff and what are they doing with this business?

>> There's a few -- I think the biggest concern for women in sport's journalism now is, we're not seeing as many in leadership positions and I think that's really important in sport's journalism for women, young women to have somebody to look up to and net seem they seem to be leaving quickly and that's something, I think, this business needs to work on and as far as getting into clubhouses and locker rooms, it's far, far better.

>> Ted: VictorVictoria, how much further does it need to go?

>> Continuing what Paula was talking about, employment opportunities and intercollegiate activities have waned.

This existed and operated out of women's physical education and 90% were women and there are more men coaching women more unanimous women coaching women.

Elites has moved over to males for 75 years and as the amount of money has grown and accelerated and ballooned in the last, you know, 30 years, especially, the salaries have increased, too, across all sports and we hire women in leadership positions reflective of women and all sorts of categories and identities.

>> Ted: Last word, Paula, next 50 years, what do you want to see?

>> More women in these leadership positions, whether it's athletic directors or whether it's sport's editors at newspapers.

I want young girls continuing to care about sports and having that opportunity.

You talk about how important body image is for young girls are.

Its was a couple of years ago, the way you got on sport's illustrated for a woman.

We're seeing that change.

>> Ted: Thank you so much both and good conversation.

And that is it for now.

I'm Ted Simons and thank you for joining us and you have a great evening.

Coming up in the next half hour, on Cronkite Cronkite news, healthcare inequality for black and LGBTQ + individuals.