Gloria Hillard

Dr. Kwane Stewart is known as the "Street Vet." He makes rounds in Los Angeles' Skid Row and provides free care to homeless people's beloved pets.

East of Los Angeles, giant warehouses and distribution centers are replacing farms in an area known as the Inland Empire. The logistics industry is changing what was once an agricultural landscape.

One of the nation's busiest marine highways in southern California is trying a new program to help cargo ships avoid whales. "Whale Safe" is kind of a crossing guard to save marine mammals.

The Los Angeles Fire Department depends on help from amateur radio volunteers when fire threatens communications infrastructure. NPR looks at how ham radio operators are keeping residents safe.

One of Hawaii's most threatened seabirds, the Newell's shearwater, makes its home on the island of Kauai. Conservationists there are fighting to keep the iconic bird from disappearing.

Not all women in the commercial sex industry have been victims of sex trafficking. But that's where many victims of trafficking end up. One woman who got out has begun a program to help others.

Once considered a paradise for the colorful songbirds, Kauai has lost more than half of those native species due to invasive species and a warming climate.

In the city of Santa Barbara, north of Los Angeles, the demand for senior housing is so great the wait list is now closed. For many of those seniors, their only safe living option is in their cars.

There are now 47,000 homeless people in and around Los Angeles. The number of homeless women living on the streets has increased dramatically, and many are at risk of violence and sexual assault.

In Southern California, a section of the high speed train linking San Francisco to Los Angeles would have to navigate through mountains, fault zones and what may be even more daunting: cowboy country.