California sues Trump over census policy that could exclude 2M residents from count
Sac Bee's KIM BOJORQUEZ: "California Attorney General Xavier Becerra announced on Tuesday a new lawsuit against the Trump administration over a memorandum it released last week that aims to exclude undocumented immigrants from the 2020 Census formula used to calculate the number of congressional seats each state is given.
California, home to more than 2 million undocumented immigrants, could lose political influence and federal funding that is tied to the census count if the policy moves forward.
“There’s no state, no area in the country hit harder, hit faster by this than California,” Becerra said."
Free masks for all? Ro Khanna, Bernie Sanders propose mailing them out
The Chronicle's TAL KOPAN: "A mask in every mailbox — that’s what Rep. Ro Khanna wants to make reality under a new proposed law.
The Fremont Democrat and Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Vermont independent, have introduced legislation that would respond to the surge in coronavirus cases by distributing three “high-quality,” reusable face masks to all Americans through the Postal Service, for free. The bill would also provide medical-grade N95 masks to health care workers at no cost.
Although the face coverings would be provided through the Postal Service, the bill would also require that they be distributed to homeless people and that mask-pickup sites be designated in communities."
That email asking you to check your California voter info? It's legit
The Chronicles JOHN WILDERMUTH: "With the prospect of a virtually all-mail election looming this fall, more than 6 million Californians received an email from the secretary of state this week asking them to check online to make sure their voter registration information is up to date.
That sounds like a lot of emails, but California has 20.6 million registered voters, a number larger than the total population of all but two other states. With every active California voter getting a mail ballot for the November presidential contest, election officials need to have updated registration information.
“To make sure you get your ballot, we are asking all California voters to double-check their voter registration status at voterstatus.sos.ca.gov,” the email said. “You can ensure a smooth voting experience by confirming your mailing address.”"
California will be on the ballot, too, if Kamala Harris or Karen Bass is Biden's VP pick
The Chronicle's JOE GAROFOLI: "Joe Biden has said he’ll pick a running mate as early as Saturday, and two Californians — Sen. Kamala Harris and Rep. Karen Bass — are on his short list. If he chooses either one, it will be the first time a California Democrat has been on the party’s national ticket.
But it won’t just be Harris or Bass there. California will be on the ballot, too, with all the stereotypes about the state — some truer than others — on display for the next three months.
“‘California’ is a code word,” said Ken Goldstein, a professor of politics at the University of San Francisco who has analyzed political advertising for more than two decades. “‘California’ becomes a coded way for Republicans to attack Democrats."
City Council approves purchase of body and vehicle cameras for SLT police
Sac Bee's ROSALIO AHUMADA:"The South Lake Tahoe City Council on Tuesday approved a $470,000 purchase of body cameras and vehicle cameras for police officers, along with assigning a full-time employee to help with data storage and public record requests.
The purchase from a company called Axon will include 42 body cameras and 28 vehicle cameras, along with online cloud base storage for both. The City Council approved the resolution in a 5-0 vote at its meeting broadcast online Tuesday.
The cameras will have a feature that automatically starts recording even if an officer fails to turn them on, according to a news release from the city of South Lake Tahoe."
Stunning allegation against Vallejo police: Officers bent badges to mark people they killed
The Chronicle's ANNA BAUMAN/DEMIAN BULWA: "A former Vallejo police captain is accusing the department of firing him for flagging misconduct that included concerns that some officers bent their badges to mark fatal shootings and that a former police chief told an underling to “burn” a kidnapping victim he wrongly accused of orchestrating a hoax.
The captain, John Whitney, said that some officers would bend one tip of their seven-point star for each of their killings. He said he became aware of the practice in February 2019 after police fatally shot Willie McCoy in a Taco Bell drive-through, where he had passed out with a gun in his lap.
Whitney brought his misconduct concerns to Mayor Bob Sampayan, City Manager Greg Nyhoff and then-City Attorney Claudia Quintana, before he was released last August after 19 years on the job, his lawyer, Alison Berry Wilkinson, told The Chronicle."
California's recession could get worse if Congress cuts unemployment aid, studies say
Sac Bee's DAVID LIGHTMAN: "Unemployed California workers stand to lose about 43% of their weekly benefit — and the state’s already-reeling economy is likely to lose billions of dollars and tens of thousands of jobs — if the Republican plan to dramatically cut jobless payments becomes law, new studies reported Tuesday.
The median weekly benefit to unemployed California residents since late March has been $939, meaning the Republican-proposed cut would reduce it to $539, according to the nonpartisan California Policy Lab.
The nonpartisan Century Foundation estimated that under the GOP plan, the state’s economy would lose about $1.4 billion weekly because of the reduced benefit and $12.9 billion by the end of September. California’s losses, both in percentages and dollars, are among the nation’s biggest."
California could create its own $600 weekly unemployment benefit
LA Times's PATRICK MCGREEVY: "As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to damage the California economy, state lawmakers are weighing whether to provide a supplemental unemployment benefit with the extra $600 per week provided by the federal government expiring this month.
Assemblyman Phil Ting (D-San Francisco), the leader of a legislative working group, said there is support among Democratic lawmakers for providing up to $600 weekly to jobless Californians if Congress fails to act on extending the federal pandemic benefit.
“There are so many people who are relying on that money to pay rent, to buy food. I think the state has to do everything possible to help them pay their bills,” said Ting, chairman of the Assembly Budget Committee."
California can't keep up with demand for coronavirus test. Will Congress help?
Sac Bee's KATE IRBY: "The next coronavirus relief bill from Congress is expected to have billions of dollars for COVID-19 testing, but competing plans from Republicans and Democrats are far apart on how much money to provide.
The outcome matters in California, where medical labs can’t keep up with demand for coronavirus tests and patients are often waiting days for results. Contact tracing teams have been overwhelmed in some areas due to staffing shortages.
Republicans are offering $16 billion for testing and contact tracing money to give to states as part of a $1 trillion coronavirus aid bill."
READ MORE related to Coronavirus: Group puts up $5M in prizes to expedite development of fast, easy test -- Sac Bee's CATHIE ANDERSON; California to collect data gauging coronavirus pandemic's impact on LGBTQ community -- Sac Bee's MOLLY BURKE; California wants to know more about coronavirus and ethnicity after surge in Latino cases -- Sac Bee's KIM BOJORQUEZ; How each Bay Area county enforces health orders -- The Chronicle's KELLIE HWANG
California won't conquer the coronavirus, and fully reopen, until it can protect essential workers
LA Times's RONG-GONG LIN II/ANITA CHABRIA: "Five months into the pandemic, it’s becoming increasingly clear that California is not going to conquer the coronavirus until it dramatically improves safety measures for essential workers at the epicenter of the health crisis.
From farming communities to urban centers and suburbs, workers in retail, manufacturing, agriculture and logistics are bearing the brunt of COVID-19 outbreaks, and state and local officials are struggling to control the infections even as the outlook in more prosperous communities has improved.
A growing number of officials and health experts say it’s critical now for California to act more aggressively, including pushing for masks and social distancing measures inside workplaces as well as cracking down much harder on employers who don’t follow the rules."
Sacramento activists propose alternate 'strong mayor' measure. Council discussing tonight
Sac Bee's THERESA CLIFT: "Ahead of a Sacramento City Council discussion about whether to place a controversial measure on the November ballot to give the mayor more power, a group of community activists is presenting a counter proposal.
Mayor Darrell Steinberg and a group of community and business leaders Thursday presented a proposal for a ballot measure that would give Sacramento a “strong mayor” form of government along with a handful of other changes activists have been requesting for weeks that are aimed to uplift communities of color and increase transparency.
On Monday afternoon, activist Flojaune Cofer posted a link to a letter on Twitter, saying the item should be separated into two measures on the ballot – one on “strong mayor” and the other for the community equity pieces."
READ MORE related to Local: Bobbie Singh-Allen announces bid for Elk Grove mayor, challenging embattled incumbent -- Sac Bee's MICHAEL FINCH II
Black voter mobilization efforts begin to bear fruit
LA Times's MEGAN BOTEL/ISAIAH MURTAUGH: "After troubling signs this year that the COVID-19 pandemic had sharply cut into new voter registrations, stepped-up efforts by Black voter-mobilization groups have begun to show success.
In early June, citing protests as a driving inspiration, HeadCount, a national voter-mobilization nonprofit group that stages registration drives at concerts and other events, collaborated with the Black Voters Matter Fund, music industry leaders and grass-roots organizations to launch March on Ballot Boxes (M.O.B.B.). The initiative — its name drawn from a 1965 speech by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. — seeks to educate and empower Black voters to show up at the polls in November and is particularly focused on swing states.
“People I’ve been trying to work with for years through HeadCount are coming out of the woodwork,” said Mollie Farrell, HeadCount’s director of artistic relations. “The time is now.”
How to take advantage of national parks in California during pandemic
The Chronicle's TOM STIENSTRA: "Amid the Summer of COVID-19 and the strangest year ever for national parks, there is a series of hidden portals into Yosemite and other national parks in California that can save your summer vacation.
At Yosemite, for instance, where a day-use reservation system has kept many from making the trip, a ticket on a bus run by the Yosemite Area Regional Transportation System can get you into the valley without a park reservation.
In the Redwood Empire, well-known campgrounds are virtually booked into August. But six off-the-grid trail camps, some with a few as two to five sites, are available by permit."
Quarantine, social bubbles will define on-campus experiece for Bay Area college students
The Chronicle's DANIELLE ECHEVERRIA: "For UC Berkeley students, move-in day this fall will lack much of the commotion of a regular year. There will be no meeting roommates, no families unloading cars and carrying boxes through the halls. This year’s cohort will have an entirely new set of challenges.
Instead of one big day of arrivals, students will be assigned days and times to move in, with only two people permitted to help. After that, students will sequester themselves for a week to 10 days. They will all get tested for the coronavirus within 24 hours of moving in and again after the isolation period.
As coronavirus numbers continue to rise in California, Bay Area universities are making — and constantly revising — plans for the fall term. Like Berkeley, Stanford, St. Mary’s College, Santa Clara University, and San Jose and Sonoma state universities are all planning to bring at least some students back to campus, but with a host of new rules and restrictions. In their detail and complexity, they bring to light the practical challenges that come with reopening colleges."
Who should choose UC campus chancellors? Faculty protest proposal to reduce their role
LA Times's TERESA WATANABE: "In a highly unusual protest, University of California faculty leaders are collectively opposing a proposal to alter the search process for campus chancellors, which they believe will significantly reduce their role and potentially affect the quality of the UC system.
Twenty past Academic Senate chairs, who have served since 1994, have signed a letter asking UC Board of Regents members to reject the proposal, which will be debated Wednesday at the board’s online meeting. The Academic Council of current leaders has expressed similar concerns, saying the search process has resulted in diverse and “stellar recent recruitments,” according to a letter by Chair Kum-Kum Bhavnani to outgoing UC President Janet Napolitano.
The last four chancellors hired have been white women to head UC Berkeley and Santa Cruz, a Black male leader at Davis and a Latino at Merced. The other six campus chancellors are men: Asian Americans at Santa Barbara and San Diego and white leaders at UCLA, San Francisco, Irvine and Riverside."
SF passes sales tax measure to save Caltrain. San Mateo says it's DOA
The Chronicle's RACHEL SWAN: "The three counties that fund Caltrain have reached an impasse that may shut down the Peninsula rail line, which is limping through the COVID-19 pandemic while carrying 5% of the passengers it had last year.
On Tuesday, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors unanimously approved putting a ⅛-cent sales tax measure on the November ballot, with controversial conditions that would tie up most of the money until the counties resolve a conflict about governance.
Officials in San Mateo County have vowed to reject the measure in its current form, saying the conditions are illegal and could paralyze the 51-mile commuter railroad."
Former SF firefighter, engineer sue city for racial discrimination
The Chronicle's DOMINIC FRACASSA: "A former San Francisco firefighter and a marine engineer have sued the city, claiming they were subjected to racial discrimination, harassment and retaliation while working for the Fire Department.
David Hawkins, who resigned in June after more than 20 years with the Fire Department, and Lawrence Thomas, an engineer working on the department’s fleet of fireboats, claim they were passed over for assignments in favor of white colleagues with comparable or less experience and blocked from performing their duties. Hawkins and Thomas are Black.
Hawkins started working on a fireboat at Station 35 in 2009, making him only the second Black person to work a permanent assignment on a fireboat in a century, according to a lawsuit filed Monday in San Francisco Superior Court."
READ MORE related to Prisons, Police & Public Safety: SF offers broad outline for redirecting funds away from Policed Dept -- The Chronicle's DOMINIC FRACASSA
Office rents will likely drop -- but not apartment rents, survey finds
LA Times's TAYLOR AVERY: "California office spaces are expected to keep getting emptier and their rent prices will likely keep declining for years as the fallout of the pandemic persists, according to a new survey of commercial real estate developers and financiers.
Retail space will take an even more severe hit, while industrial real estate looks like a bright spot, and demand — and rents — for multi-family homes are expected to stay relatively high, said the Allen Matkins/UCLA Anderson Forecast survey, which focuses on expectations of what the next three years will hold for commercial real estate in Southern California and the Bay Area.
Survey respondents’ outlook was about as gloomy as in December 2008, “during the height of an implosion of economic activity,” according to the survey’s findings, released Wednesday."
