Pandemic baby bust unprecedented in Bay Area, California history
The Chronicle, SUSIE NEILSON: "When the U.S. began shutting down in March 2020, some journalists and Twitter users speculated that the pandemic would lead to a baby boom as people spent more time at home with their partners. But economists, such as those at the Brookings Institution, predicted that such a globally disruptive event would instead cause a baby bust.
The economists were right.
U.S. residents are having fewer babies this year. And California’s birth rates in January and February — around the time when early pandemic babies would be due — declined by 15% compared to the same period last year, the steepest year-over-year decline for those months since at least 1960, according to a Chronicle analysis."
California is primed for a severe fire season, but just how bad is anybody's guess
LA Times, ALEX WIGGLESWORTH: "At this point, it seems like almost a given that California will see another historic fire season.
A meager rainy season is in the rearview mirror. Snowpack is depleted. Vegetation and soils are parched.
“All the indications are that we are heading into another really bad fire year,” said Safeeq Khan, assistant cooperative extension specialist of water and watershed sciences at the University of California Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources."
California COVID mask mandate could change following new CDC guidelines, Newsom says
Sac Bee, ANDREW SHEELER: "California’s COVID-19 mask mandate will remain in place for now, but state officials say changes could be coming in light of new federal guidelines released Tuesday.
The new guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention states that fully vaccinated people do not need to wear masks outdoors “except in certain crowded settings and venues.”
The CDC continues to advise wearing a mask when in an indoors public setting or when visiting indoors with unvaccinated people from multiple households. The CDC also continues to recommend avoiding “large-sized in-person gatherings.”"
READ MORE CDC MANDATE NEWS --- California follows CDC in relaxing outdoors mask guidance for vaccinated people -- The Chronicle, AIDIN VAZIRI; New CDC mask guidance draws clear line between vaccinated and unvaccinated Americans -- LA Times, AMINA KHAN/KAREN KAPLAN
Plans for 3-D ghost guns may be posted online, federal court rules
The Chronicle, BOB EGELKO: "Designers of self-assembled 3-D “ghost guns” may post their plans online without seeking permission from the State Department, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday, reinstating a Trump administration order that had been blocked by a federal judge.
The firearms, which do not require a gun-maker’s license, had been included in the State Department’s Munitions List, which required approval from the department to export any such weapons. Federal courts applied that requirement in 2015 to weapons posted online for production on three-dimensional printers.
When President Donald Trump’s State Department settled a suit with a 3-D gun company in 2018 and sought to remove the designs from the Munitions List, a federal judge in Seattle issued an injunction in March 2020 in a suit by California, 21 other states and the District of Columbia. Unrestricted publication of the designs would make dangerous weapons available to terrorists and thwart arms embargoes, said U.S. District Judge Richard Jones."
Capitol employees asked to submit vaccine status as California Legislature moves to reopen
Sac Bee, HANNAH WILEY: "Employees for the California state Assembly and Senate are being asked to submit their COVID-19 vaccination status as a way to assess whether the building is ready to safely reopen to more people.
In nearly identical memos sent to staffers on Tuesday, Assembly Rules Committee Chief Administrative Officer Debra Gravert and Secretary of the Senate Erika Contreras requested employees and members to electronically or physically submit their vaccine record cards to Capitol Health Services.
“As COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations continue to decrease, vaccination rates increase, and the state begins to reopen more broadly, the Assembly must once again take steps to assess health and safety in our workplace and determine safe and appropriate staffing levels,” Gravert wrote in her memo. “A critical factor in determining staffing levels is to identify the vaccination rate of our workforce in the State Capitol, the Legislative Office Building, and district offices throughout the state.”"
READ MORE VACCINATION NEWS -- Bay Area health experts denounce Joe Rogan's remarks on vaccinations -- The Chronicle, NORA MISHANEC; California has recorded about 1,400 'breakthrough' coronavirus cases in fully vaccinated people -- The Chronicle, ERIN ALLDAY
LA County hits yellow tier marker; widest reopening could be a week away
LA Times, LUKE MONEY: "Los Angeles County has one foot in the most lenient tier of the state’s COVID-19 reopening system, a momentous achievement for a region that was once so ravaged by the coronavirus that it was considered the epicenter of the pandemic in California.
According to state data released Tuesday, the county’s rate of new coronavirus cases — adjusted based on the number of tests performed — dropped to 1.9 per day per 100,000 people, low enough to enter California’s yellow tier, the final of four. The county would have to maintain its numbers until next week to advance.
“It’s so encouraging to see the work we’re doing together having such a profound effect on the health and well-being of people all across our communities,” L.A. County Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer said Monday, before the new data were unveiled."
Police video shows Bay Area Latino man died after police pinned him to ground
AP, JULLIET WILLIAMS: "Police in the Northern California city of Alameda released body camera video late Tuesday that shows officers pinning a Latino man to the ground for more than five minutes during an arrest last week that ended in his death.
Mario Gonzalez, 26, stopped breathing after the April 19 scuffle with police at a park in Alameda.
A police statement said Gonzalez had a medical emergency after officers tried to handcuff him."
Can serial killer's prosecutor end losing streak for GOP, independents in California elections?
Sac Bee, LARA KORTE: "California is in chaos, Anne Marie Schubert says, and she wants to be the person to fix it.
Surrounded by families of crime victims, Sacramento County’s district attorney on Monday launched her candidacy for California attorney general while slamming Democratic leaders’ progressive policies on law and order.
“The newly appointed attorney general has voted for and supported policies and laws that are not only destroying the rights of crime victims, but are destroying public safety in this state,” Schubert said referencing Attorney General Rob Bonta, who was sworn in Friday."
Biden's 'Families Plan' would tax rich to help schools, child care, community college and more
LA Times, ELI STOKOLS: "President Biden is proposing an ambitious $1.8-trillion, 10-year plan to subsidize American families’ education, child care, health insurance and job leave costs — an investment in workers intended to complement his earlier call for infrastructure spending and much more, to rebuild an economy hobbled by pandemic and economic inequality.
The “American Families Plan,” which Biden will describe in a prime-time address to a joint session of Congress on Wednesday, would subsidize two years of preschool and two years of community college for low- and middle-income families. It would also extend a number of tax credits and benefits to working families, while raising taxes on the wealthy to cover the costs.
Coming just weeks after his proposal to invest about $2 trillion in the nation’s deteriorating roads, bridges, airports and railways, it adds up to an over $4-trillion program in the coming decade — a Rooseveltian domestic policy agenda aimed at accelerating economic recovery and leveling the playing field."
Can NFTs fund local news? We're selling one to find out
The Chronicle, EMILIO GARCIA-RUIZ: "At The San Francisco Chronicle, we once buried treasure.
In an outlandish 1950s promotional push, Chronicle staffers hid the “treasure” of the 19th century eccentric Emperor Norton in a wooden box somewhere in San Francisco, encouraging readers to dig up the city in search of a $1,000 prize. (We can’t do that anymore on account of all the holes. You can imagine the havoc we caused by setting loose all those people and all those shovels.)
Over the paper’s 156-year history, The Chronicle has run all kinds of campaigns to boost the newsroom. We have given away watches, sewing machines, stadium seat cushions and San Francisco snow globes. In one particularly popular promotion in the 1880s, The Chronicle offered double-action pistols with an annual subscription to the weekly Chronicle, yours for just $3.90."
