Woodruff plus, an interview with former new orleans mayor marc morial on the progress made in his city and the challenges that remain. New orleans has long been, like Many American cities, a tale of two cities. Woodruff and a game changer for the blind and visually impaired. Designing a smart cane that helps navigate the environment with ease. Ifill all that and more on tonights pbs newshour. Major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by moving our economy for 160 years. Bnsf, the engine that connects us. Supported by the john d. And catherine t. Macarthur foundation. Committed to building a more just, verdant and peaceful world. More information at macfound. Org and with the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations. Thank you. Ifill after taking a beating for six days, wall street stormed back and had its best day in nearly four years. The Dow Jones Industrial average gained nearly 620 points to close at 16,285. The nasdaq rose more than 190 points and the s p 500 added more than 70. The markets volatility has been driven by a sweeping selloff in china where the main index lost another 1 today. Well explore the chinese problem after the news summary. Woodruff two tv journalists in roanoke, virginia were shot dead today during a live morning newscast. Reporter Alison Parker and her cameraman, adam ward, were doing an interview when a former co worker Vester Lee Flanagan opened fire. He later posted his own video of the act online. Several hours later, after a highway chase, flanagan ran off the road, shot himself and died at a Northern Virginia hospital. And that left investigators with a mystery. Right now there has not been a motive per se. Lot of you have got emails that had been sent out, its obvious there was this gentleman was disturbed in some way, the way things transpired at some point in his life. It would appear things were spiraling out of control, but were still looking into that. Woodruff a man claiming to be the gunman sent a lengthy fax to abc news in new york. After listing grievances, he wrote that he was a human powder keg just waiting to go boom the woman being interviewed this morning was also shot. Shes in stable condition. Ifill the colorado Movie Theater shooter, james holmes, was formally sentenced to life in prison without parole today. He shot and killed a dozen people and wounded 70 others during the 2012 attack. Today, holmes wearing a red prison jumpsuit listened as his fate was pronounced. The life term became automatic when the jury could not agree unanimously on the death penalty. Woodruff in afghanistan, two men dressed as Afghan Security forces opened fire on nato troops, killing two american soldiers. It happened at an army base in helmand province. The shooters were killed by return fire. Its the third socalled insider attack so far this year. Ifill theres word the mastermind of the Khobar Towers bombing in saudi arabia has been captured nearly 20 years after the attack. Saudi reports and u. S. Officials say ahmed almughassil was arrested in lebanon and is now in riyadh. The 1996 bombing killed 19 american troops at a u. S. Military housing complex. Saudi officials blamed shiite extremists, inspired by iran. Woodruff hungarys border with serbia was a picture of chaos again today amid talk sending in the army. Desperate people mostly from syria, iraq and afghanistan climbed through razor wire. A scuffle broke out at a Refugee Center and Police Used Tear Gas while some lawmakers called for a hardline. The only solution is that hungary makes it clear for the international community, for serbia, for the European Union that it has closed its borders and we will turn everybody back who shows up at the borders. Woodruff meanwhile, in germany, protesters jeered chancellor Angela Merkel as she visited an asylum center. She condemned attacks on refugees as shameful and repulsive. The president of south sudan signed a peace deal to end 20 months of fighting thats killed thousands and driven two Million People from their homes. But salva kiir told regional leaders that he was signing despite serious reservations. The rebel leader already signed the agreement. Ifill in the u. S. President ial race, Republican Donald Trump defended his actions in a confrontation with tv journalist jorge ramos. The univision host challenged trump on his immigration plan, at a News Conference tuesday in dubuque, iowa and the candidate fired back. Sit down you werent called, sit down, sit down, go ahead. No you dont, you havent been called, go back to univision. Ifill with that, trumps security hustled ramos out. A short time later, he was allowed back, and the two resumed arguing. Today, on nbc, trump said ramos was totally out of line. Ramos, speaking on abc, said as a journalist, you have to take a stand. Ifill civil rights leader Amelia Boynton robinson died today, after shed suffered a major stroke in july. She was a key organizer of the 1965 Voting Rights drive in selma, alabama, and she was beaten unconscious there by state troopers on bloody sunday. This year, she joined president obama in crossing the Edmund Pettis bridge on the 50th anniversary of the selmato montgomery march. Amelia Boynton Robinson was 104 years old. Woodruff and one of two newlyarrived giant panda cubs has died at the Washington National zoo. The mother, mei xiang, gave birth to twins over the weekend, but focused her attention on the larger cub. The smaller one died this afternoon. Ifill still to come on the newshour what does chinas market meltdown signal for the future of its economy . Ten years after katrina, improving access to health care for all patients, no matter their economic means. Plus, former mayor and National UrbanLeague President marc morial on the challenges that remain for new orleans and much more. Woodruff as we said, wall to break its long streak. But back in china, another volatile day led to big swing between stock gains and losses as worries mounted over the state of the worlds second largest economy. Thats our focus tonight and we begin with this report from paul mason of independent television news. The shanghai stock market ended down last night, again, and has now lost a quarter of its value in five days, and nearly half its value since june. That is the money of the chinese middle class, poured into shares after the property bubble burst. And because the government encouraged it, the Chinese Government is throwing everything it can at the problem. Its spent hundreds of billions on actually buying shares to keep the price up. Its devalued its currency, and yesterdays quarterpercent Interest Rate cut was the fifth this year. Nothing is working. In the Chinese Government to in this case, trying to up the market. Thats chucking 485 billion into directly buying shares and trying to persuade people theyll stand behind the market at this point in time. Cheap loans used to fundamental buildings, public money, massive infrastructure spending. The plan was the middle class profit from stock market gains and take over from driving growth. But its not happening. Now, Chinese People face the double nightmare of slowing real economy and financial meltdown. Woodruff we turn now to two people who follow events in china closely nicholas lardy is an economist and a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for international economics. He has written a number of books on chinas economic growth, including, most recently, markets over mao the rise of private business in china. And evan osnos, author of the book age of ambition chasing fortune, truth and faith in the new china. Hes also a writer for the new yorker magazine. Welcome to both of you. Thank you. Woodruff nick, let me start with you. You wrote in the New York Times today all this talk about china being in an economic and financial meltdown is just wrong. Why do you believe that . The evidence doesnt support it yet. They could be heading in that direction in the next several months or quarters, but the economy is actually growing reasonably well, about 7 , consumption demand is fairly strong, incomes and wages are growing about 10 per year. The Service Sector is the big driver of its growth, so it doesnt look like an economy thats going over the cliff as some have anticipated. Woodruff what do you think is happening right now . Well, i think whats happening is mostly a major correction in equity prices. The prices got way ahead in the year to the peak. The peak was in june six weeks or so ago, and in shanghai, prices were up 150 , in the shun jung markets, they were up by even more. Prices were in the stratosphere. A lot of leverage. People borrowed money to buy stocks. People were required to share the sells or the brokers sold them for them, so you had a big downward, sharp decline in equity prices. But the equity you know, priceearnings ratio which is a very common measure is still way ahead of what it would be in the u. S. In the china market its about 39, for example. So this was an overheated market that was going to correct sooner or later. Woodruff its still going on. Evan osnos, you were based there for years and still stay close with those in china. How do they see whats going on . Were so used to economic growth, both those of us here and people in china, that when we see this kind of turmoil as in the last few weeks, it feels radical. We have to separate in some sense what were seeing on the stock market and whats going on in the broader economy. In the broader economy, were in the midst of a major transformation and its a likely hard thing to do. I think the report mentioned in the leadin, china for 30 years, they succeeded on a certain recipe, which was exports, sending things to us here and building things at home, infrastructure. That recipe run its course. Theyre trying to move to an entirely different economic chapter. Chinese apple or google, something that can unleash power and put money in the hands of ordinary people. Doing that is difficult and were seeing the turmoil over that. Woodruff why has it been so hard for the leadership to get it right . There are shortterm reasons to want to go slowly. For instance, if youre one of the people who succeeds under the current system, a stateowned enterprise or provincial government that builds bridges, you have a lot of reasons to want to put the brakes on reform. We assume the chinese leadership is one monolithic group. There are a lot of different voice in there and a lot of people are saying, well, lets try to slow down and keep the market from collapsing. Woodruff to what extent have they made a decision to try to turn this monolithic economy which is in transition around and move toward some reforms that you have written about . Well, in principle, theyve made decisions to change to a new growth model, as evan has said. In practice, its difficult to carry out. Theyve made progress. Consumption has become a more important driver of economic growth, as opposed to building more property and infrastructure. And more money is filtering into the hands of people and you see a huge increase in expenditures on services, people are spending a lot of money on education, healthcare, entertainment, travel has become a big part of the economy, so were moving away from the industrial based growth that was so important for so long towards this more consumptiondriven model. But its challenging and theyve made some progress over the last few years, but there is still a substantial way to go. Woodruff what is it thought, evan osnos, that the leadership wants . How often are they willing to go and how do you know for a fact thats what they want because there was a lot of speculation last week that this was an effort to shore things up in shortterm and not at all evident theyre committed to reform. Xi jinping, head of the Chinese Party and military, has staked his name and reputation internally and abroad saying im going to transform the economic model. You know hes encountering resistance because he says i am encountering fierce resistance, to say we are in a fight. That tells us there are serious conflicts going on inside chinese politics. People who say lets not move too fast or well undermine all we have. So i think youre seeing less second thoughts among the leadership than it is a real war within to figure out how fast and far you can go. Woodruff how does that play out . If this is an internal debate, and there is every evidence that it is, nick lardy, how do you see this moving forward . I agree with evan, its a conflict between those who want to maintain control and those who want to rely more on the market. So thats the tussle. The evidence is as theyve relied more on the market over the last decades, their economy has been growing strongly. I think as they debasement this, they are not always going to go for control over the market. Attend of the day, the party needs to have reasonably strong growth to remain in power, and they recognize ultimately that the market is whats going to deliver that growth, not traditional state enterprises and a heavyhanded Government Intervention in the markets. Woodruff so evan osnos, whats going to be driving the thinking of the leadership of china in the coming months . Xi jinping is coming next month, they want to make sure things are as stable as they can when he comes. We sometimes think the Chinese Government is impervious to its own public opinion. Its an authoritarian government and dont have elections like we have. The truth is theyre very sensitive and sometimes very afraid public opinion. They know a dissatisfied public is precursor to political and social unrest. So they can look over the horizon and say, if we continue on this economy path, well stall economically and get trapped in the middle income trap, meaning we wont be able to make the final leap to being a fully advanced country, and that is the real risk for them over the long term politically. Thertheres the short term polil instability theyre trying to avoid by a stock market crash. They know theyre falling short of making the reforms theyre trying to make. Woodruff thank you for helping us understand better, evan osnos, nick lardy, thank you. Thank you very much. Ifill now, we turn to our weeklong series on how new orleans is faring after katrina, ten years later. The floodwaters that rose after the storm trapped hundreds of patients in the citys hospitals. More than 140 of them died in a slow motion evacuation that took days. Things went from bad to worse when officials declared the muchloved staterun Charity Hospital unfit to reopen. A major new hospital was dedicated in new orleans today a crucial part of a reimagined Healthcare System. But worries remain that some will still be left behind. Special correspondent jackie judd has our report. Hurricane katrina and all that the wind, the rain, the flooding destroyed or disabled allowed for a reimagining of what a modern Healthcare System in new orleans would look like. This is the centerpiece of that reimagining. University Medical Center new orleans is a place to heal, teach and discover for generations to come. U. N. C. New orleans, the future of healthcare is here. University Medical Center was a decade in the making at a cost exceeding 1 billion. Most of that from the federal government. The doors recently opened to a hightech trauma center, expensive artwork and whats promised to be hurricaneproof windows and internal systems. Early reviews are in. New innerside, clean. Orleans needs a good hospital. Charity was a good hospital. In the day when i was growing up, it was a good hospital, but this is way better. Actually built out for redundancy for one patient into something in case of a storm . Dr. Peter w. Who worked at Charity Hospital then in makeshift tents, a converted department for and finally the interim hospital is proud of what the city has built. This hospitals aim, he says, is twofold serve the poor as charity did, and those who pay full price. The vision of this hospital is not to be solely an indigent care or safety net hospital. Thats a vital portion of what we do, but sustainability of this hospital will be directly linked in our ability to attract all payers. Whats new and exciting is building destination services. So services that allow us to compete with the houston or birmingham, to keep regional patients here at home. From the windows of the new hospital, what came before is in clear sight. Charity hospital holds a storied place in the citys history because its where generations of residents came for care regardless of their ability to pay and, for many, the measure of success at the new hospital is whether that tradition will continue. And we put that together long before. This was in charity . Yes. Sylviana history worked as a nurses aid and healed there as a patient. Every time i pass there i think about charity because thats what people know about in new orleans is charity. This hospital was run by a nonprofit private company adding that charitys serving the public no matter the cost will be lost. University is required to have 20 of uninsured in its patient mix, considerably less than charity. But officials promise to give care to those who need it. Singing Community activist jacques organized a lawsuit to get charity back up and running. Working for people who trusted charity to take good care of them and reassembling the intellectual capital for patients with the teamwork and know how is not like assembling leggos. It takes lots of time, work and money. Dr. W. Who once argued for the old hospital to reopen now says the quality of care at charity has been romanticized and concerns about the new hospital are unfounded. If you are so convinced of the success of this model, what did you fight hard to try to keep charity open . So what i tried hard to do was to keep open a facility that would meet on the safety care needs of our population, and i would continue that fight today if we walked away from that mission. Thats as strong as its ever been. What we hope for you to do between now and the next visit the other half of the reimagining is an Extensive Network of Community Health centers. The clinics dot poor and working neighborhoods throughout the city and provide primary care. Dr. Karen desalvo worked at a popup clinic near the french quarter. Leader as the citys health commissioner, she drove the effort to build permanent clinics where people live. Because the Healthcare Infrastructure went down, it caused many of us to literally stand on the street and say we can do better, we can come up off our knees and build a system thats going to meet the needs of this community. Looking at the evidence and listening to people that what they wanted was front line access to preventative and primary care in neighborhoods. Charitys emergency room had been a principal source of primary care but habits and services are slowly changing. I know where it is. Sylvias primary care doctor Keith Winfrey is primary care doctor in a community of africanamerican and vietnamese residents. Prior to katrina, it was more the traditional physicianpatient interaction and the population wasnt different. Since katrina, there is been a total transformation in primary care, more of a team model and the patients are home. Henry whose home on lake pontchartrain was badly damaged was cut off from her doctors, charts and medical records charting diabetes and high blood pressure. She returned to Electronic Medical records that will survive a storm. Every time i go, they get on the computer and they can tell me everything that is going on. When i go to see the doctor in the room, the doctor has a record that they can open, a paper record they can tell me what is going on. Now, its my understanding that you have been sent to be seen by your primary care doctor. Mental Health Services are woven in to Clinic Services and mobile vans offer on the spot support, but it is widely acknowledged here that far more is needed. The Police Department has long worked with the mentally ill who have had run ins with the law. She is incensed the new hopped has currently a third psychiatric beds that charity once held. Were standing in front of Orleans Parish prison today. This is our Largest Mental Health hospital in our community, which is so sad, because this is not where treatment is going to happen. The great uncertainty in sustaining the new hospital and the clinics is money. Governor bobby jindal did not expand medicaid under the Affordable Care act and so many uninsured patients need free care. As part of the law, the federal government is reducing the dollars it sends states for that care. I think we still mostly have questions in the area of how were going to finance this system long term that will be affordable for everyone. I think its going to take a lot of vigilance, a lot of advocacy and a lot of demand for accountability for all of this to work. And he got my medicines for me. Still, for people like sylviana henry, a far more robust system is in place to care for people than the fragile system that katrina washed away. For the pbs newshour, jackie judd in new orleans. Ifill the future of patient care is only one of the concerns casting a shadow over the Crescent City ten years later. A new report out today has a sobering assessment of other problems plaguing its majority africanamerican community. Among its findings in 2005, 44 of black children in new orleans were living in poverty. That number has gone up to 51 . And the earnings gap between black and white families has increased by 18 . African american households bring in roughly 25,000 a year. White households, 60,000. The National Urban league study on these and other disparities was released today in new orleans. I sat down with c. E. O. Marc morial to talk about it when i was in the city earlier this week. Ifill marc morial, thank you for joining us. You are the son of a mayor, former state senator, former mayor of new orleans. And now as head of the urban league, youve come out with a report in which you take stock of whats happened in the 10 years since katrina. It reads like a tale of two cities. It is a tale of two cities. New orleans has long been, like Many American cities, a tale of two cities. And i think its clear as you take this snapshot ten years later after this tragedy of katrina that its still a tale of two cities. Yes, with great physical rebuilding, yes a city that survived a tremendous challenge. But thats why i think we have to look at this as a commemoration as a continuation, and not a celebration. Ifill theres been so much conversation over the years about bouncing back. We talked about resilience, about the ability of new orleanians to recreate what had been washed away. But lets talk about the issues one by one. Education. What does your report find . So our report finds certainly that youve got a Higher High School Graduation rate. But our report also finds that when it comes to children, there are more children in poverty today than there were before katrina. And that when it comes to education, while you see signs of progress. There are new schools, theres, if you will, improvements in schools. The truth is that its a School District with fewer students. Its true that these reforms have come at a tremendous cost to the city, and that cost was the layoff of some 7,000 mostly africanamerican unionized teachers almost ten years ago. And thats left, if you will, a scar. And pain on the effort to reform the schools. Now, its all about whats doing best for kids. But i think its important for people to be measured. At this point, its like halftime. Ifill as i drive through the city, i see new construction, houses with solar panels, along the riverfront, new levees. This all speaks to an incredible rebirth in the housing market. Yet a lot of people say they cant afford it. What happened is that, literally, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of units were either substantially damaged or destroyed, and that theres been a great rebuilding that we need to applaud. However, there isnt enough housing in the city, quality housing in the city, to accommodate what is now a growing population. And that is indeed the case. So the signs of physical rebirth are everywhere. And i absolutely applaud that. But what new orleans needs today is an effort to build more workforce housing. More Affordable Housing. More housing that people can both rent and own in terms of where we are. So that speaks, gwen, really to this point that this, in this 10th year, the focus should be on what needs to happen in the next ten to 15 years. And building more workforce and Affordable Housing i think is a must. Or, or, the recovery and the rebuilding will stall because itll simply be just too expensive for people to be able to afford a decent home. Ifill so apply that future looking orientation to Something Like unemployment, where especially black teen unemployment is high everywhere. But its especially grievous here. How can that be, how has that been overlooked, or has it . I think it has not had the emphasis. I think the issues of equity have not been center stage in the recovery. Lets just go back just for a minute. At the very beginning after the hurricane, there was a dallas plan. I call it a dallas plan, because it was actually written in dallas by certain Business Leaders for new orleans, that would have decommissioned, turned certain historic neighborhoods, middleclass and workingclass and poor African American neighborhoods into lagoons. And not only africanamerican neighborhoods, but neighborhoods like st. Bernard parish. Which were completely devastated, and which happens to be a neighborhood made up of mostly workingclass white people. So these decisions that were made stalled the recovery. Ifill you mentioned st. Bernards parish, where recently they voted against raising taxes to pay for the maintenance of the new levees. Every house in st. Bernard parish flooded. Isnt there some personal responsibility that the residents need to take in the recovery . Absolutely. I think absolutely. I think when people vote against taxes, in this part of the country, it sometimes is also a reflection of the reality of people believing they cant afford to pay. But no doubt, local governments in new orleans taxes have risen, a number of times over the last ten years, to pay for many, many things. Remember youve got a smaller population base in the city today than you had prekatrina. Ifill as you put out the results of this report and as a son of new orleans, do you, 10 years later, feel more optimistic or less optimistic about where the city is headed in the next 10 years . Im optimistic. Let me tell you why im optimistic. I stood on the ninth ward levee a week after this hurricane, and i questioned in my, in the depths of my heart and my soul, whether the city would ever be able to stand on its two feet again. New orleans could have been, become a modern pompeii. A modern herculaneum. A city lost to hurricane katrina. The fact of the matter is that the citys uniqueness, its music, its culture, its standing, its people said absolutely, this city must be rebuilt. So against that backdrop, im optimistic. But i realize its a very long journey, and what our report seeks to say is look, were all happy to be here at year number ten as new orleanians and as certainly champions of urban communities and champions of fairness and equity in america. However, the work that has to be done in the future, and the emphasis that needs to be placed on these issues in the future, has to be greater than its been in the first ten years if, in fact, this rebuilding and this recovery is not only going to be complete but is going to be something we can all be proud of. Ifill marc morial, c. E. O. Of the National Urban league. Thanks very much. Ifill welcome home. Thank you. Woodruff stay with us. Coming up on the newshour innovators design a cane of the future for the blind and visually impaired and from the south bronx to sesame street actress Sonia Manzano on becoming maria. But first, the battle over planned parenthood is heating up this week as opponents of abortion rights released more undercover videos and held weekend protests. Meantime, planned parenthood itself launched a lawsuit against the state of louisianas attempt to cut its funding. All of this is having an effect in the race for the white house. Political director Lisa Desjardins reports. A warning it contains some graphic images. We are standing in solidarity reporter Early Morning saturday, nearly 200 abortion rights activists protesting. Banners up, battle ready, this scene repeated across the country this weekend from portland, maine, to las vegas, nevada. Tens of thousands turned out, motivated by recent controversial videos on youtube. These videos were not made up. These videos are so powerful reporter planned parenthood opponents mean videos by antiabortion activist posing as businessmen trying to buy tissue. They say planned parenthood is heartless, motivated by money. Planned parenthood denied that, saying it cares for millions of patience. The organization points to edits in the undercover videos that left out the worker clearly saying they do not sell fetal tissue. Whatever you make of them, the videos are a match in a Heated Campaign year. There is absolutely no need for any public funding of planned parenthood. There is no excuse for it. There is no excuse. Planned parenthood must be defunded. Jeb bush caused a stir yesterday at a colorado town hall when he turned to say this i for one dont think planned parenthood ought to get a penny, though, and thats the difference, because theyre not actually doing Womens Health issues. Reporter planned parenthood shows the bulk of their services are Womens Health, std testing, carnes screening and that abortions are only 3 of their services. Democrats are jumping to the pro planned parenthood. I think it is regrettable that republicans are, once again, trying to undermine even and those services so many women have needed and taken advantage of. Reporter in other words, both sides are winning, by firing up their bases. David is the antiabortion activist behind the undercover videos building crowds on his side. Abortion politics and protests are not new, but he believes his videos have started a new shift in the debate. Its completely changing the way we talk about abortion and unborn children in america. I think its really causing a change in how that conversation happens, and thats a good thing, because its a conversation thats needed to happen for a long time. Reporter go to planned parenthood offices in washington and Vice President don mcghans will tell you the people are dropping off boxes of doants and bundles of flowers to our Healthcare Providers to say thank you for what you do every day. Thats what we see. The irony of these attacks on us is they tend to get more people saying, oh, i didnt know this is at risk, im going to stand up for it. Reporter you see donations going up . Everything is going up. Abortion became the key lit mutt test in the republican and democrat party. Reporter a professor at the university of california studies abortion politics. These videos, theres another factor at work, the videos touch the american middle ground. Youve had people who were very supportive of abortion rights, operate people who are very antiabortion, and in the middle a large number of americans, the majority of americans, who support their right of abortion but, you know, have some issues with abortion. Reporter enter risk for republicans like senator ted cruz who are hard charging against plrpt. I call on the United States congress right now today to stand up and plead and to defund planned parenthood cheers and applause reporter cruz held lal raleighs on the issue and announced last week he would push the u. S. Senate to defund planned parenthood in september. The federal government, cut the funding and you would potentially cripple planned parenthood. Thats no problem for republicans. What is . Other numbers. A recent reuters poll showed 54 of americans overall support funding planned parenthood. But now look at a key swing state, florida, which could decide the primary and the election. In a quinnipiac foul this week, Florida Republican voters overwhelmingly said they want to defund planned parenthood. But ask all the voters in the state, the majority switches, most want to keep the funding. Polls in ohio and pennsylvania show same potential risk, republicans go one way, general election voters the other. I think its interesting to watch the republican candidates try to outdo each other. That may provide leverage for senator cruz, for example, whos really the most radical on this issue. In terms of the general election, you know, i think this could advantage hillary clinton. Reporter back at that morning, protests in washington, ask about losing the white house if republicans push too hard to close planned parenthood . If that costs the election, then it does. Sometimes we do have to take the consequences that follow. Reporter both sides are gearing up for a hot september. Planned parenthood is considering a National Bus Tour and a new series of ads. Mean while, opponents planned a capitol hill rally, an issue in congress that could loom large in the president ial elections, both primary and general. Lisa desjardins, pbs newshour, washington. Ifill now, an innovation that may help the blind become more independent. Its a new take on the familiar white cane that the visually impaired have been using for decades. The newshours april brown reports from the northeast region of france for the latest in our breakthroughs series on invention and innovation. Reporter lysiane perney doesnt see the world the way most people do. In fact, she doesnt see much of it at all. Perney, who lives in the city of nancy in northeastern france, suffers from retinitis pigmentosa. Photoreceptor cells in her eyes, the rods and cones, have been dying. And that causes the gradual loss of everything but central vision, and the ability to see colors. translated when you move around in a city when you are visually impaired, it is very stressful. Knowing where you are, having some landmarks, knowing this is the right bus line. Reporter nevertheless, perney is a busy, independent woman. An elected City Council Member and advocate for the disabled. She moves around with the help of a few smartphone apps and a white cane, the kind the visually impaired have been using for decades to avoid obstacles. But soon, she may be able to buy a new kind of cane, one that will tell her a lot more about her surroundings. You can have real time information during your walk like you can have information about public transportation, about the shops, public places, you can have at what time the shop open. Reporter Florian Esteves and Mathieu Chevalier are engineering graduates turned budding entrepreneurs who are developing an intelligent white cane. Theyve created a hightech box that fits on a traditional white cane. And uses infrared and ultrasonic sensors to detect obstacles triggering the handle to vibrate. Just by pressing a button you can hear the light is green, the light is red, you can cross, be careful about maybe a car wait a minute. Reporter their cane also incorporates Gps Technology to determine a persons location, and will share data from the city of nancy and elsewhere that will be relayed through a bluetooth headset. The idea for the intelligent white cane was hatched during esteves and chevalier studies at the university of lorraine. They entered le defi cisco, a contest designed to inspire Technological Innovations to solve social and environmental problems. We just observed that these people only use a simple stick every day to work in the city. And we had all the same reaction. With all of the Current Technology and the current object, we can do better. Reporter and their better stick won. The contest sponsor, cisco france, awarded the team the top prize and 70,000 euros, about 77,500. For the contest, what we were trying to choose is projects that are touching the life of people. Reporter remi sedilot is the companys sales and marketing director in france. He now mentors esteves and chevalier as they try to grow their new company handisco and get the intelligent cane ready for the market. Led for night visibility. And some buttons to interact. Reporter as trained engineers, esteves and chevalier admit they can use sedilots help on the business end. Im just trying to help them to identify the right contacts or the right things to do to be ready. To have a good market study, what is the pricing structure they should have so they have a chance to sell . Reporter but before they can sell, they have to refine their prototype. The pair has been working closely with the city of nancy to pursue additional funding, and find a way to get existing data about transportation schedules, accessibility and other services into a Computer Program that works with the cane. Esteves and chevalier are also collaborating with eventual users of their product. They tell us all the problem they can encounter in everyday life, so thats really help us to build our functionality around their problem. Like the problem of portability. Since the box fits on an existing white cane, it folds and unfolds just as easily. You can collapse it to put in your bag. Is that something that blind people told you was necessary . Yeah. Yes. Very, very important. Reporter that kind of insight has come from a partnership with association valentin huay, a French Organization supporting the visually impaired. translated the stick is a marvelous object because it provides with all that their eye cant give them. 75 of all information comes through vision. Reporter mariejose dieudonne has been working with nancys visually impaired for years and runs the associations office there. She believes there is a ready market for the cane, even at an expected cost of 500 euros. translated i think 30 of the visually impaired would go for such a product. So all the people between 30 and 75. With the baby boom, there are more and more seniors, and they will opt for a connected stick. It is an age group that is already connected and i think it could answer a need in that age group. Reporter meanwhile, lysiane perney has been testing the weight of the prototype model, and wishes it could be a bit lighter. And she is looking forward to playing a role in the next stage of the canes development, taking it for a real trial run as soon as the Computer Programming is finished. translated i was a bit skeptical about something new coming onto the market. But i wanted to test it because the best ones to try it out are us the endusers, visually impaired people. I rejoiced in discovering that it could bring us something more. Reporter and the hope is the cane will give the visually impaired more information and more confidence to successfully navigate the world on their own. For the pbs newshour, im april brown in nancy, france woodruff finally tonight as she announces her retirement, an icon of Childrens Television looks back at her life and how she got to sesame street. Jeffrey brown has that story. Here we have it the part of the body we are going to talk about today dadadada brown its woven into the childhood memory of many generations. For much of her life, Sonia Manzano was part of sesame street as one of its writers and a character. Cookies and cupcakes are good sometimes but i want everyone to realize treats like this can be tasty, too oh, maria oh, come on this is very disappointing oh, come on brown she was a beloved figure who taught the basics of reading and math o toothpaste brown but also complicated life lessons about love, marriage, sickness dont you remember we told you, mr. Hooper died. He was sick. Oh, yeah. Brown for many viewers, she was also the first latina they saw on television. Television. How much of maria is you . Shes a better, kinder sonia, shes a more patient sonia, but its all i went exactly from myself. Brown and yet the safe, comforting world where maria lived and worked was very different from the one manzano grew up in, a story shes now telling in a new memoir, becoming marie yanchts when i started thinking about leaving sesame street, i started to think about my journey there and i wanted to examine where i went right and wrong and how is it possible a girl from my background could end up on this Iconic Television show. Brown monzano grew up in the working class tenments of south brokes and describes her father serenading her with puerto rican ballads on the guitar. But he was also an alcoholic with a violent temper who pete boo her mother, destroyed objects around the house and generally terrified monzano and her siblings. In order to escape whats going on inside the apartment, i used to look outside the window, comb my hair, do my nails, read by street light, finding the further place, like being on the end of the boat. Beaver, dont eat so fast. Brown she sought refuge in television that depicted serene family life as leave it to beaver and father knows best. Lost my husband brown and in queen for a day, invited down and out women to share stories. I thought my mother could have a big spot on that, queen for a day, and we would get something out of being miserable, but the other shows were in suburban environments, so i didnt see the neighborhood i lived in respected on television or people, and i have to say that, on some level, i wondered where i was going to fit into this society that didnt see me, what my contribution was going to be. I decided, no, thats it, im going to stand up for myself. Brown at school, manzano found lit reel leaf from her chaotic home life at this Junior High School getting into an early fight to prove herself. She said merely showing up was enough to pass. I think i lost myself in whatever books i could find. I had a feeling that there was Something Better than this. I just couldnt believe that this was life. singing brown and then came a revelation when manzano was 11 years old, a teacher took her to see the film westside story, set in a place she knew all too well but suddenly cast in a whole new light. I saw things i saw in my everyday neighborhood beautiful, exalted. All of a sudden the school yard fence i wanted to climb over was like a painting. The graffiti was like something in a museum. I couldnt articulate this but i think that gave me strength. Brown a drama teacher encouraged here to audition for manhattans high school for the performing arts and she was accepted. She struggled in a suddenly rigorous academic environment but her acting helped her gain entry to Carnegie Mellon university in 1968. One year later, the telling vision show designed to reach inner city children debuted on Public Television singing i never saw these cheerful attractive, black, friendly people in this environment that was recognizable to me with the stoop and the tenement doors. I thought, whats my stoop doing on the television . Brown in 1971, manzano auditioned and at age 22 landed the part of maria, a world she would inhabit for the next 44 years. So having written the book to figure out how you got from here to there, did you figure it out . No. Brown no . No. I think there is a connection that i found comfort in television and that i ended up providing comfort or wanting to provide comfort for children who were watching television that i love theater and i love stories. People say, oh, she overcame a terrible childhood. I said i didnt overcome my difficult childhood. I say that i used it. I made something of it. I never forgot it. I remembered myself watching father knows best and leave it to beaver. I remembered myself doing that and i kept that sensibility in my heart while i was doing sesame street, with the knowledge that there is another kid out there looking for that sanctuary. Brown in retirement, Sonia Manzano will continue that pursuit, among other things shes now working to establish a Childrens Museum in the bronx. From the south bronx, im jeffrey brown, with pbs newshour. Woodruff just after jeff spoke to Sonia Manzano, sesame street announced it will move to hbo. New episodes of the program will air there first and then on pbs stations nine months later. Woodruff and thats the newshour for tonight. Im judy woodruff. Ifill and im gwen ifill. Join us online and again here tomorrow evening. For all of us at the pbs newshour, thank you and good night. 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