Sacramento mayor eyes group effort for Sacramento Bee purchase
Sac Bee's RYAN LILLIS: "Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg is working to form a local ownership group that could purchase The Sacramento Bee, separating the 163-year-old publication from its parent company and more than two-dozen sister newspapers across the U.S.
The Bee’s current owner, McClatchy Co., is moving through Chapter 11 bankruptcy in an effort to restructure its debt and shed pension obligations. If the restructuring plan proposed by McClatchy is approved by a judge, the likely owner of The Bee and 29 other publications would be Chatham Asset Management LLC, a New Jersey-based hedge fund.
Steinberg said it is his “responsibility as mayor to continue to fight for any community asset that is vital to the future of Sacramento."
California declares state of emergency to contain COVID-19 after 1st death
Sac Bee's SOPHIA BOLLAG: "California Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency over the coronavirus as a cruise ship that transported at least two infected passengers sailed toward the state Wednesday.
One patient who had traveled on the ship died Wednesday in Placer County, marking the first death in California connected to the viruses that has spread to dozens of countries.
Newsom described the man’s death as a “profound moment in our state."
READ MORE related to COVID-19 Pandemic: California's fight gets fed assistance to offset demand -- Sac Bee's CATHIE ANDERSON/DARRELL SMITH/ALEXANDRA YOON-HENDRICKS; United Airlines will cut overseas/US flights and freeze hiring -- Bloomberg's JUSTIN BACHMAN; Grand Princess passengers possibly exposed to COVID-19 last month -- LA Times's TARYN LUNA/MELODY GUTIERREZ; Colleges cancel study abroad programs, hundreds of students return -- The Chronicle's MALLORY MOENCH; Major tech companies encourage employees to work remotely -- The Chronicle's ROLAND LI
How California's wave of uncounted ballots could swing results
From Politico's JEREMY B. WHIT E: "Super Tuesday polls have long since closed, but a coming wave of uncounted ballots is poised to reshape California results from the presidential contest through legislative races.
America’s most populous state has sought to augment turnout by dramatically expanding the number of mail ballots to more than 16 million, allowing Election Day voter registration and accepting ballots that arrive up to three days after Election Day.
That means that there are likely millions of votes left to be tallied. While history suggests the late-arriving ballots will skew left, the fact that many Democratic primary voters may have waited to vote until the last possible moment in a fluid presidential primary injects extra uncertainty."
California GOP makes strong bid to flip back House seats it lost in 2018
From JOHN WILDERMUTH, Chronicle: "Republicans took a strong first step in the primary election toward grabbing back at least some of the seven California congressional districts that Democrats flipped in 2018.
With millions of late-arriving mail ballots still uncounted from Tuesday’s election, Republicans have so far combined for a majority of the votes in six of those seven districts. GOP candidates have solid leads in two of them.
The results show just how tough it’s going to be for Democrats to hang onto everything they won two years ago, when California victories helped them take back the House, said David McCuan, a political science professor at Sonoma State University."
L.A. County supervisors want answers to widespread voting problems
From the LAT's JAMES RAINEY, JOHN MYERS, DAKOTA SMITH, BENJAMIN ORESKES: "Inadequate staffing, poor communications and balky technology turned election day in Los Angeles County into an anxious quagmire for many voters, whose complaints triggered calls Wednesday by one member of the Board of Supervisors for a “forensic autopsy” on what went wrong.
Voters reported waiting four hours and longer in some locations to cast their ballots. Some bounced from one polling place to the next, searching in vain for shorter lines. At one polling station, a worker said she wept in frustration while desperate voters scratched out their choices on write-in ballots — written in languages they did not speak.
“This is a disgrace,” one voter, who did not leave a name, complained to The Times. He added that the electronic check-in system was “nothing but an unholy mess.”
How to track your Super Tuesday mail-in ballot through the counting process
Sac Bee's BRYAN ANDERSON: "Bernie Sanders has been declared the winner of California’s Democratic presidential primary, but the election is far from over.
Over the next month, counties will count the number of outstanding ballots and calculate the final results. For the Californians who want to make sure their mail-in vote is counted properly, the state offers a tool. You can track the progress of your ballot in 25 counties, including Sacramento, Placer, El Dorado, Fresno, San Luis Obispo and Los Angeles.
Voters can get an automatic email, text or voice notification alerting them every step of the way through the process through the California Secretary of State’s office. Like a postal service tracking number, the “Where’s My Ballot” feature lets Californians who vote by mail know where their ballot is and its status."
READ MORE related to The Primary: Latest totals for Sanders and Biden -- Sac Bee's BRYAN ANDERSON; GOP ahead in two previously-lost House 2018 seats. Will it last? -- LA Times's SARAH D WIRE
Cannabis smell in vehicle by itself not sufficient grounds to conduct search, court rules
The Chronicle's BOB EGELKO: "The odor of marijuana in a car that police in Berkeley stopped for other reasons wasn’t enough to justify a full-blown search of the vehicle now that California has legalized possession of cannabis by adults, an appellate panel has ruled.
“Marijuana and alcohol now receive similar treatment under the law,” said the Appellate Division of Alameda County Superior Court in a ruling barring evidence of a loaded handgun that police found during the search. The ruling was issued in December and was published by the state courts this week as a precedent for future cases.
It is one of the first appellate decisions on the effect of Proposition 64, the November 2016 initiative that allowed adults over 21 to buy, possess and use marijuana. They can possess up to an ounce of marijuana and grow as many as six plants for personal use, but cannot smoke pot in public or drive while under the influence."
Biden/Sanders face stark challenges opposing Trump
LA Times's EVAN HALPER/JANET HOOK: "If there is one thing essential for Democrats as they look toward taking on President Trump in November, it is a nominee who can drive strong, perhaps historic, turnout, either by reassembling the coalition that twice elected Barack Obama or by mobilizing masses of new voters.
Yet the party is now barreling toward its nominating convention with the race mostly whittled down to two candidates in their late 70s who both have big weaknesses in reaching beyond their respective bases.
Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden will face a crucial test in the remaining states in the Democratic primary, where both will have to recalibrate and — to some extent rebrand — to broaden their appeal and unify a fractured party. It is a tall order for two men who are products of an earlier generation of politics."
These underdogs may force their better-funded opponents into runoffs for LA City Council
LA Times's EMILY ALPERT-REYES/DAVID ZAHNISER: "They didn’t have the campaign cash or the big-name endorsements of their rivals. Neither had been elected to public office.
But a pair of upstart candidates — nonprofit leader Nithya Raman and attorney Grace Yoo — could end up forcing their more established opponents into runoff elections in November, even as other political heavyweights were cruising to victory.
County election officials are still counting ballots. But if the numbers hold, Raman will face off against Los Angeles City Councilman David Ryu in a council district that stretches from Sherman Oaks to Silver Lake. Yoo could go head-to-head with longtime county Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas, an elected official for three decades, to represent a Crenshaw-to-Koreatown district."
Has the push to expand rail into the Bay Area's fringes reached the end of the line?
The Chronicle's RACHEL SWAN: "Suburban voters with long commutes have rejected two tax measures that aimed to drum up funding for roads and transit — raising the question of whether the push to expand rail into the outer reaches of the Bay Area has run its course.
The election results Tuesday night were devastating for the North Bay SMART train, which sought a 30-year sales tax renewal to help fuel its expansion to Cloverdale. The train may be on life support by the time its boosters return to the ballot for another try.
In Contra Costa County, the rout of Measure J marked the second time that politicians, businesses and labor leaders have tried — and failed — to pass a half-cent sales tax for transit, traffic signals and bicycle routes. That outcome, while less dramatic than the SMART train’s setback in Marin and Sonoma counties, still showed a low appetite for a new tax."