California hits 1 million coronavirus cases as L.A. County urges travel quarantine
LUKE MONEY, LA Times: "Coronavirus infections in California are racing upward at a level not seen since the summer, with the state surpassing 1 million cases on Thursday, and health officials are warning dire action must be taken to stop the spread of the illness.
If the surge continues in Los Angeles County, “additional actions” could become necessary to bring the rate of transmission back under control, Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer said.
Though she didn’t elaborate on what potential new measures could be implemented, Ferrer emphasized that L.A. County remains on a knife’s edge and that everyone needs to do their part to keep conditions from worsening. The warning comes as California joins Texas in becoming the only two states to have officially surpassed 1 million infections."
A sudden surge in COVID-19 patients has Sacramento and California hospitals on edge
Sac Bee's TONY BIZJAK/MICHAEL MCGOUGH: "A new wave of coronavirus-infected patients has hit California hospitals this month, including a particularly sharp spike in the Sacramento region. With more cases expected this winter, the surge may soon pose the biggest pandemic challenge yet to the state’s emergency healthcare system, especially if people defy safety guidelines and gather in groups indoors during the holidays.
Statewide, virus patient numbers have steady climbed over the past four weeks, according to California’s online COVID-19 dashboard, landing 3,224 people in hospitals. That’s about 1,000 more than in mid-October. The number of patients in intensive care has also increase dramatically to nearly 900.
In Sacramento, where hospitals were treating 74 virus patients a month ago, the total jumped to 158 as of numbers reported mid-week. Of those, 35 are in intensive care units, more than double the number from just two weeks ago."
READ MORE related to Pandemic: California nursing homes see surge in coronavirus cases amid statewide spike -- The Chronicle's CATHERINE HO
Election maps show how LA has aligned with SF and Bay Area in progressive voting
The Chronicle's KELLIE HWANG: "The results are in for California’s November ballot initiatives, and the voting maps speak volumes about how the state’s politics have evolved over the past half-century.
In particular, Los Angeles has aligned more frequently with the liberal Bay Area than with the rest of Southern California — and sometimes the two have diverged from the rest of the state.
According to the Public Policy Institute, the Bay Area and L.A. have grown much more Democratic since 1980, while the interior of California still votes much like it did in the late 1960s."
Republicans argued Democrats would raise taxes. Did Proposition 15 prove their point?
Sac Bee's HANNAH WILEY: "Asked about California’s property tax law during a local radio interview in December 2019, Democratic legislative candidate Dawn Addis stopped short of endorsing a total repeal of Proposition 13.
Instead, she said she was open to an idea commonly known as “split roll,” or treating property taxes for commercial businesses differently than those for homeowners.
“I can see that with, on the commercial side repealing, on the business side,” Addis said. “But for property owners, I think that’s key in a context where housing is extremely difficult already. We wouldn’t want to repeal that for personal residential."
Parolee feels 'emancipated' as California votes 'Yes' on Prop. 17, allow right to vote
Sac Bee's MARCUS D SMITH/JASON POHL: "Shone Holmes didn’t get to vote in last week’s history-making election because she is on parole. She was devastated.
But now she’s thrilled that Californians decided that people in her situation can cast a ballot in the future.
Nearly 60% of California voters supported Proposition 17 and decided to restore voting rights to people with felony records immediately after they complete their prison term, despite being on parole. The changes are expected to extend voting rights to 50,000 people on parole."
California's gig worker initiative blew a giant hole in its landmark labor law. What's left?
Sac Bee's JEONG PARK/HANNAH WILEY: "California’s landmark labor law, Assembly Bill 5, isn’t going away anytime soon.
Despite the passage of Proposition 22, which exempts hundreds of thousands of gig drivers from the act that regulates who gets to be an independent contractor, supporters say they will protect what’s left.
“AB 5 still stands, and we’ll ensure it’s still defended by the state,” said Assemblyman Ash Kalra, D-San Jose, who chairs the Commi ttee on Labor and Employment."
SF DA Boudin dismissed charges against cops in infamous alley beating
The Chronicle's RACHEL SWAN: "Five years ago, two Alameda County sheriff’s deputies chased a car theft suspect across the Bay Bridge, from Castro Valley to an alley in San Francisco’s Mission District. There, they tackled him and beat him with batons, giving him a concussion and breaking bones in his hands and arms.
The incident drew national outrage after former San Francisco Public Defender Jeff Adachi released surveillance footage showing the two deputies — Luis Santamaria and Paul Wieber — knocking Stanislav Petrov to the ground, punching him and bludgeoning him, even after he appeared to surrender. In 2016, Alameda County agreed to pay Petrov a $5.5 million civil settlement.
Yet in March, the San Francisco District Attorney’s Office quietly dismissed the criminal case against the deputies, The Chronicle has learned. As a reckoning on police brutality swept the country this year, the case — which had bounced from one prosecutor to another since 2016 — remained shelved."
Sacramento leaders plead for restaurants, museums and gyms to be kept open in purple tier
Sac Bee's BENJY EGEL: "Sacramento restaurants won’t survive a winter of outdoor-only dining.
That was the main message of an open letter from the city core’s three main advocacy organizations — Downtown Sacramento Partnership, Midtown Association and R Street Partnership — and sent this week to Dr. Mark Ghaly, secretary of the California Health & Human Services Agency.
Co-authored by respective leaders Michael Ault (Downtown), Emily Baime Michaels (Midtown) and Michelle Smira (R Street), the letter requests state approval for restaurants, museums and gyms to continue operating under red tier protocols with limited indoor service."
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NorCal rapist explains items found by police
Sac Bee's SAM STANTON: "The handcuffs were for a particularly “wild” girlfriend. The zip ties were for working on his motorcycles. The condoms were for sex with women he met online.
NorCal Rapist suspect Roy Waller had an explanation Thursday for much of the evidence police found in his storage locker and Benicia home after he was arrested in September 2018 and charged with raping nine women over a 15-year span.
In his second day of testimony in Sacramento Superior Court on Thursday, Waller conceded he dated numerous Asian women over the years after meeting them using online dating sites, but said his sexual encounters were all mutual."
I traveled across the US during the pandemic. Experts weigh in on what I did right and wrong
The Chronicle's SARAH FELDBERG: "On Orange Skies Day, we turned to Southwest Airlines for salvation.
It was time, my husband and I decided, to book a flight —to flee smoky air and bring the baby, closing in on her first birthday, to visit East Coast grandparents who desperately wanted to see her beyond the confines of an iPad screen.
So on Sept. 9, we sketched the outlines of a coronavirus travel plan for late October: We would fly in before the holiday crush; we would stay long enough to quarantine on arrival; we would get tested before moving in with family; and we would be extremely cautious without driving everyone crazy. There would still be a risk of being infected with coronavirus, of course, but we would whittle it down to an acceptable level."
Bay Area injured inmate firefighter battling deportation by ICE
The Chronicle's SARAH RAVANI: "A California inmate firefighter who was injured while battling a wildfire near Redding in October faces deportation to Laos, a country he fled when he was 2, according to his attorney.
Bounchan Keola, 39, was battling the Zogg Fire on Oct. 2 when he was injured after a helicopter dropped water on a smoldering tree, causing it to fall on him and two others, records show. He suffered neck and back pain from the accident.
He was released from state prison on Oct. 16 after serving his full term and was immediately transferred to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Despite being a permanent resident of the U.S., laws signed by President Bill Clinton in 1996 make permanent residents and refugees with criminal convictions subject to deportations."
Sacramento got state funding to turn a hotel into homeless housing. The project was nixed
Sac Bee's THERESA CLIFT: "A controversial plan to convert a River District hotel into housing for the homeless has been nixed.
Sacramento had scored funding from a competitive state program called Project Homekey to convert the Hawthorn Suites into 100 units of homeless housing in a part of the city where the homeless crisis is dire.
Since the location was announced, the city has been hit with two lawsuits trying to block the project – one by the developer of luxury apartments across the street and one from an organization that represents businesses in the area."
These Southeast Asian snack boxes use food to share refugee and migrant stories
Sac Bee's ASHLEY WONG: "For those who have ever hankered for durian paste and want it delivered right to their doorsteps, Tuk Tuk Box is at their service — with a twist that uplifts Southeast Asian refugees and migrant stories.
Founded by Christy Innouvong and Sacramento State alumna Beatriz Aurelio-Saguin, Tuk Tuk Box is a monthly subscription snack box that delivers Southeast Asian snacks and ingredients like hot and sour seaweed and banana chili chips.
But for Tuk Tuk Box, food is also a vehicle to raise awareness about ongoing issues in the Southeast Asian community, such as racism, colorism and war trauma. Each box comes with a postcard featuring personal stories across the Southeast Asian diaspora, from Filipino American farmers to Hmong refugees in Thailand."
Schools in a large suburban Sacramento district reopen -- even as COVID-19 cases surge
Sac Bee's SAWSAN MORRAR: "Paisley Murphy stood outside her Folsom elementary school holding a chalkboard sign that read “First Day of Re-Do Kindergarten.”
It’s not really the 5-year-old’s first day. School has been in session – at home – for four months. But on Thursday, elementary schools in Folsom and Rancho Cordova reopened, bringing nearly 5,000 students back to 20 campuses. It was the first time students have been back since the coronavirus pandemic shut schools down in March.
Folsom Cordova Unified is the largest school system in Sacramento County moving forward with in-person learning, even as coronavirus infections and hospitalizations in the county are spiking and most businesses are being ordered to stop indoor activities."
Chilly temps, light rain in store for Bay Area
The Chronicle's NORA MISHANEC: "Another round of scattered showers is on the horizon for Friday as chilly temperatures persist throughout the Bay Area.
Drizzling rains are expected to move south from the North Bay beginning Friday afternoon and into the evening hours, according to the National Weather Service. Though it’s expected to be light, the rainfall could make roadways dangerously slick during Friday afternoon rush hour, meteorologists said.
The light showers will dry up overnight into Saturday, but cooler temperatures likely will linger. Meteorologists do not anticipate widespread frost conditions."