The opening of the $6.4 billion Bay Bridge, which had been scheduled to open on Labor Day, has been pushed back a few months because of concerns over some busted bolts.
From the Chronicle's Michael Cabanatuan: "State legislators were informed of that decision in Sacramento by the Toll Bridge Program Oversight Committee, a group overseeing construction of the span. The committee, made up of the executive directors of the Bay Area Toll Authority, California Transportation Commission and Caltrans, called off the scheduled Labor Day weekend opening and party after learning that lead contractor American Bridge/Fluor expects construction of a saddle to secure the bridge where 32 steel rods failed to take until about Dec. 10."
"What we're not saying is the bridge is going to open on Dec. 10 or Dec. 13," said Randy Rentschler, a spokesman for the toll authority. "What we are saying is the contractor's schedule says Dec. 10. It will be up to the (oversight committee) to determine when it should open."
"The $6.4 billion eastern span had been scheduled to open to traffic Sept. 3 after a 3 1/2-day closure to put on finishing touches and shift traffic and throw a public party. But in March, construction crews tightening rods to secure seismic stability structures beneath the bridge deck discovered that 32 of the steel fasteners had cracked."
Thousands of California prison inmates launched a hunger strike to protestt conditions, an action prompted by solitary confinment at far north Pelican Bay.
From the LAT's Paige St. John: "California officials Monday said 30,000 inmates refused meals at the start of what could be the largest prison protest in state history."
"Inmates in two-thirds of the state's 33 prisons, and at all four out-of-state private prisons, refused both breakfast and lunch on Monday, said corrections spokeswoman Terry Thornton. In addition, 2,300 prisoners failed to go to work or attend their prison classes, either refusing or in some cases saying they were sick...."
"The protest, announced for months, is organized by a small group of inmates held in segregation at Pelican Bay State Prison near the Oregon border. Their list of demands, reiterated Monday, center on state policies that allow inmates to be held in isolation indefinitely, in some cases for decades, for ties to prison gangs."
Mountain liions -- or bobcats, or cougars, or pumas -- face a new enemy from civilization -- rat poison.
From the San Bernardino Sun's Steve Scauzillo: "Caught between the green lawns and the brown hills of Southern California is the North American bobcat, Lynx rufus.While not technically endangered, scientists as recently as June have watched healthy bobcats die of severe mange, a common skin disease caused by parasitic mites normally afflicting canines. Local scientists believe the tuft-eared wildcats are being poisoned by eating gophers or ground squirrels that have ingested rat poison left in yards by homeowners or near dams and other government structures. The rodenticide, an anticoagulant, enters the bobcat's digestive system as a prolonged secondary exposure, making them unable to fight off common diseases such as mange."
"We feel, what might be going on, which at this point is still a theory, is the rodenticide is compromising their immune system in some way and that is may be associated with them getting mange disease," explained Joanne Moriarty, research ecologist with the U.S. National Park Service in Thousand Oaks who has been studying bobcats theresince 2004. Moriarty is the first scientist to connect dead bobcats to prey that ingested rat poison. "We saw a statistical correlation between the anticoagulant (rat poisons) and mange disease," she said Tuesday."
"Indeed, necropsies done on bobcats since the NPS study began in 1996 produced this astounding statistic: 92 percent of the dead bobcats analyzed tested positive for rodenticides, she reported. "Some are trace, but some are high levels," she said. This deadly connection at first was confined to the Simi Hills, Thousand Oaks, Agoura Hills and Oak Park, where the collared bobcat population dropped by 50 percent from 2003 to 2006. Since then, mange has overtaken vehicle collisions as the No. 1 cause of death for bobcats in Southern California, the NPS reported."
The clout of AT&T in the state Capitol was demonstrated anew when a Senate panel sided with the company in a dispute with regulators.
From the LAT's Marc Lifsher: "A key state Senate committee is backing phone giant AT&T Inc. in a clash with regulators over how to update the state's LifeLine program that provides cut-rate phone service for 1.2 million low-income consumers who now must use old-fashioned land lines."
"The Senate Energy, Utilities and Communications Committee voted 6 to1 on Monday to support a bill turning LifeLine into a voucher system, providing discounts on phone services and getting rid of most oversight by the California Public Utilities Commission. The bill goes to the Senate Appropriations Committee in August."
"Users now pay about $7 a month for a LifeLine package of basic services determined by the PUC. Lifeline, similar to other state programs providing lower-cost electricity and natural gas service for the poor, is financed by ratepayers through a small surcharge on monthly bills."
One of the two fatalities at the crash of an Asiana plane at SFO was a 16-year-old girl -- and authorities are investigating whether she had been run over by an emergency vehicle.
From the Chronicle's Jaxon Van Derbeken: "The San Francisco Police Department's hit-and-run detail is investigating the death of a 16-year-old girl who may have been run over by a fire truck after the crash of Asiana Airlines Flight 214, authorities said Monday."
"The girl's body was found near an evacuation slide after the plane crashed Saturday at San Francisco International Airport. Fire ChiefJoanne Hayes-White said the girl suffered injuries consistent with being struck by a fire truck or other vehicle."
"Law enforcement sources said the Police Department's major accident investigations team has checked tires from several San Francisco fire trucks that responded to the crash."
And finally from our "Justice is Blind" file comes word of a juror who called the court to say she couldn't make it in that day. She wasn't sick, she was snockered.
"Nicola Glen, 35, called the court last Thursday to say she had been out drinking until 4am and was too drunk to go in."
"She had spent the previous nine days sitting on a jury considering evidence against 18-year-old Grant Farquhar. She missed the closing speeches when she called in drunk."
Her actions could have potentially jeopardised the trial and judge Michael O'Grady QC ordered Ms Glen to appear in court on Friday. On Tuesday, he decided not to proceed against Ms Glen, from Edinburgh, on a charge of contempt."
"He came to the decision after hearing how Ms Glen had recently split from a long term partner and she had gone out because she had been "stressed" from hearing the "harrowing" evidence."