LA Times, CONNOR SHEETS/DIANA MARCUM: "Facing a global spread of the COVID-19 Omicron variant, U.S. health officials said it will probably take two weeks to fully determine the level of threat but pushed coronavirus booster shots as a key first stage in the battle.
President Biden met with top health advisors Sunday to map out a strategy as new cases were confirmed in more global locations, including Germany, Italy, Belgium, Israel and Hong Kong.
In Amsterdam, 13 people on flights from South Africa, in the region where Omicron is believe to have originated, tested positive. In England, officials imposed stricter mask rules in response to the discovery of two cases."
Hundreds of San Diego police officers unvaccinated as city prepares to impose mandate
DAVID HERNANDEZ, Union-Tribune: "Brandon Gibson knows just how serious COVID-19 is. He beat back the disease two months ago.
“It kicked my butt,” he said.
Yet he quit the San Diego police force earlier this month after 10 years because he is not ready to get the vaccine, an imminent condition of employment for city workers."
The GOP is blaming coordinated retail thefts on 7-year-old Prop. 47
The Chronicle, JUSTIN PHILLIPS: "Allegedly coordinated on social media, last weekend’s wave of smash-and-grabs at high-end retail stores set the Bay Area on edge. But what officials describe as organized retail crime sprees aren’t the only orchestrated attacks taking place.
GOP politicians opened up the opportunist playbook and started their favorite attack: California is under siege and the left is to blame, partly because of Proposition 47, which voters approved in 2014. The initiative raised the dollar amount by which theft could be prosecuted as a felony from $400 to $950.
So what does a 7-year-old initiative have to do with allegedly coordinated retail thefts in the Bay Area? The right is using it as a smokescreen for a power grab, one that seeks to regress California to a Reagan-era police state. The first step is to take people’s rational fears about public safety and inflame them beyond reason."
He believed the government had no right to tell him what to put into his, or his children’s, bodies. Many of his constituents agreed when it came to pandemic mandates.
And so, he came up with a grandiose, headline-grabbing nom de guerre for his small Northern California city."
As Bay Area residents voiced dismay at this latest possible wrinkle in their hopes for a more normal holiday season, local experts told The Chronicle on Sunday that it’s good to be aware, but not to panic about the new variant. They said that based on information so far, they have not changed their own plans. But they repeatedly stressed the importance of vaccinations, boosters and other COVID health precautions.
Developments surrounding omicron continue to evolve rapidly. It was first discovered in southern Africa and classified a “variant of concern” by the World Health Organization. No cases involving the new variant have yet been confirmed in the U.S., according to federal and state health officials."
Cal State requires students to be vaccinated for COVID-19 -- but it's not evenly enforced
The Chronicle, MICHAELLA HUCK/ZAEEM SHAIKH/JULIAN MENDOZA: "In July, with the delta variant of the coronavirus on the rise, California State University announced that all students and employees going to campus would need to prove they were vaccinated against the virus, or apply for a religious or medical exemption, no later than Sept. 30. The move by the nation’s largest four-year public university was driven by “the overarching goal of achieving population-level immunity throughout the CSU,” Cal State Chancellor Joseph Castro wrote.
But while the vaccine mandate likely has helped avoid large outbreaks of COVID-19, it is being unevenly enforced across the system more than a month after the deadline. Some campuses barred students from in-person classes and on-campus buildings after they failed to upload proof of vaccination or request an exemption, while others allowed them to continue attending.
The lack of enforcement makes some students feel unsafe, and public health experts say it risks undermining the rule’s effectiveness. Yet others, including the Cal State Student Association and some campus administrators, say the flexibility is necessary to avoid penalizing students who come from communities where they might have less access to the vaccine."
As LA prepares to enforce vaccine mandate, businesses expect some unpleasantness
LA Times, RUBEN VIVES: "Earlier this month, Milbet Del Cid used social media to put customers of her Guatemalan restaurant on alert. Soon, she would have to make sure they were vaccinated to let them in.
Almost immediately, the criticism poured in.
“If you’re obligated to ask,” one customer wrote in response, “then we won’t eat there anymore, so there.”"
SF may be small. but it's among America's most crowded cities
The Chronicle, NAMI SUMIDA: "Over the past decade, San Francisco’s population grew by 8.5%, or nearly 70,000 residents. Yet despite this increase, the city’s population remains tiny compared with giants such as New York and Los Angeles, which have nearly 9 million and 4 million people, respectively. With roughly 900,000 residents, San Francisco is only the 17th most populous city in America.
It’s a different story when you take geographical size into account. In addition to its modest population, San Francisco is also physically small. So when you look at residents per square mile, it’s the second-most densely populated major city in the country after New York.
That’s according to a Chronicle analysis of 2020 decennial census data on cities with at least 300,000 residents. We looked at which are the most crowded and which have gotten more or less so since 2010, when the previous census was conducted."
Can former Scientologists take the church to court? Or are religious tribunals the only recourse?
LA Times, MAURA DOLAN: "After Chrissie Bixler told the LAPD that Scientologist and actor Danny Masterson had raped her, strangers showed up at her home, filmed her family and peeked in her windows. Two of her dogs mysteriously died, one by eating meat laced with rat poison. Her security system was hacked. Someone posted ads in her name on Craigslist soliciting men for anal sex.
Bixler made these allegations in a lawsuit, charging that Scientology waged a campaign to terrorize her after failing to dissuade her from reporting Masterson to the Los Angeles Police Department. Other women joined the lawsuit after telling police that Masterson had sexually assaulted them — which he has denied — saying they too had been stalked and placed under surveillance.
But some of the women, including Bixler, formerly belonged to Scientology, and like other members signed agreements to submit any disputes to binding arbitration before a three-member board of practicing Scientologists. California courts are now trying to decide whether the agreements may be enforced and the lawsuit decided by a Scientology tribunal instead of a jury."
As abortion rights hang in the balance, East Bay doctor keeps making trips to Oklahoma clinic
The Chronicle, JOE GAROFOLI: "Hoodie pulled over her head, surgical mask shrouding her face, sunglasses covering her eyes, Rebecca Taub quickly veered through the gate of the Trust Women abortion clinic, parked her rented car in a secure spot, and ducked into the building through a private entrance.
She was safe.
The East Bay obstetrician and gynecologist takes those precautions to protect herself from the antiabortion activists outside the clinic’s 6-foot-high wooden stockade fence who yell snippets of Bible verses and wave signs saying, “We want to adopt your baby!” and “Okies kill their weakest and poorest!”"
How the theft of 44 firearms from an LA gun store exploded into an LAPD scandal
LA Times, KEVIN RECTOR/RICHARD WINTON: "Before it all came crashing down, Archi Duenas’ gun-stealing scheme was relatively simple, county prosecutors wrote in a memo. He just couldn’t go on vacation.
Duenas, manager of the gun store at the Los Angeles Police Academy, had been reprimanded over the years for tardiness and sloppy record keeping, but he never took time off, according to the memo. As the store’s closing supervisor, he was there each night to lock up — and hand count the inventory.
If someone else had been assigned that count, they might have discovered that dozens of guns were missing and that Duenas was stealing them and selling them for cash, prosecutors wrote in the memo. But since he was always there, the Los Angeles Police Revolver and Athletic Club was apparently none the wiser."
