Gavin Newsom’s ‘vaccine czar’ resigns from California Government Operations Agency
SOPHIA BOLLAG and WES VENTEICHER, SacBee: "The woman Gov. Gavin Newsom called California’s “vaccine czar” is leaving state service for a job in San Francisco, she told employees Wednesday.
Yolanda Richardson, the secretary of the Government Operations Agency, will take over San Francisco’s Medi-Cal plan, she announced in an email. Her last day will be March 2.
Newsom appointed Richardson in January 2020. She was almost immediately assigned key roles in the state’s pandemic response."
READ MORE about vaccine czar: Omicron in California: State’s ‘vaccine czar’ resigns to take S.F. post -- The Chronicle, AIDIN VAZIRI/ANDY REINHARDT/ERIN ALLDAY/CATHERINE HO.
Anti-democratic extremists are set to take over this California county. Will more of the state be next?
LAT, Column, ANITA CHABRIA: "When conservatives fight one another over God and country, my general reaction is — have at it, and where’s the popcorn?
But the recent recall election in Shasta County that pitted a Republican ex-police chief against a far-right faction backed by a local militia is different. It’s a wake-up call ahead of the 2022 midterms that elections can go very wrong, even in liberal California.
What happened in Redding should be a big, blinking warning light to what’s left of the mainstream Republican Party, and to us all that we have an obligation as Californians to protect elections across the state, not just the ones in our backyard."
Six years in custody without trial: Black activists call attention to man in California jail
MARCUS D. SMITH, SacBee: "Harvest Davidson didn’t kill Dennis “Spike” Wright, but Davidson has spent past much of the past six years in jail awaiting trial in connection with the other man’s death.
Davidson, 26, of Sacramento is one of six men arrested on suspicion of participating in a robbery that led to Wright’s killing in January 2016. Davidson is one of the last two to go to trial, with the four others getting lengthy sentences of up to life in prison.
It’s uncontested that Davidson was not present when one of his co-defendants, Dion Vaccaro, shot and killed Wright in a South Lake Tahoe parking lot after a planned marijuana deal fell through."
These tracks aren’t from tires. Rangers solve mystery of strange tracks at CA beach
MADDIE CAPRON, SacBee: "Jabba the Hutt isn’t wandering a California beach — but mysterious tracks found in a parking lot made it seem possible.
Park rangers at Point Reyes National Seashore recently found a trail of sand tracks in the parking lot.
A long, thick line of sand with dots on both sides swept through the blacktop, photos posted Wednesday, Jan. 2, show. At first, what left them was a mystery. The tracks weren’t from tires, and park rangers followed the trail to find what — or who — could’ve left them behind."
No more gun shows at the state fair? California bill bans firearm sales at those venues
ANDREW SHEELER, SacBee: "Gun shows at the state fair could soon be a thing of the past in California. A proposed law would ban the sale of firearms or ammunition on state property, effectively barring gun shows from being held at any of California’s 73 state fairgrounds.
Senate Bill 915, introduced by Sen. Dave Min, D-Costa Mesa, was unveiled Thursday.
The bill has yet to be assigned to a committee, but Min said in an interview with The Sacramento Bee that he expects it to go before the Senate Public Safety Committee first."
U.S. employers shrug off Omicron, add 467,000 jobs in January
LAT, CHRISTOPHER RUGABER: "U.S. employers added a burst of 467,000 jobs in January despite a wave of Omicron infections that sickened millions of workers, kept many consumers at home and left businesses from restaurants to manufacturers short-staffed.
The Labor Department’s report Friday also showed the unemployment rate ticked up from 3.9% to 4%. Estimated job growth for December was also revised much higher, from 199,000 to 510,000.
The strong hiring gain, which was unexpected, demonstrates the eagerness of many employers to hire even as the pandemic maintains its grip on the economy. Businesses appear to have seen the Omicron wave as having, at most, a temporary effect on the economy and remain confident about longer-term growth."
As Earth warms, air conditioning use could exceed power supply in next decade
LAT, ALEX WIGGLESWORTH/RUBEN VIVES: "As climate change pushes temperatures ever higher, Californians could lose air conditioning for roughly one week each summer because the demand for cooling will have exceeded the capacity of the electrical grid, a new study has found.
Absent any improvement to the power infrastructure or the efficiency of air conditioners, researchers say the state could hit this sweltering mark by the early 2030s, when global average temperature is predicted to rise 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.
If that happens, residents can expect more rolling blackouts like those seen during the punishing heatwave of August 2020, or even prolonged outages like the ones that followed severe winter storms that hit Texas in February 2021, according to the authors of the study, which appeared in Earth’s Future, a publication of the American Geophysical Union."
L.A. County unveils plans to drop some mask rules once COVID conditions improve
LAT, LUKE MONEY, RONG-GONG LIN II, EMILY ALPERT REYES: "Outlining how health and safety rules could be loosened as the coronavirus’ Omicron variant continues to wane, Los Angeles County officials said Thursday that face coverings no longer will be required in certain outdoor settings once COVID-19 hospitalizations drop, and indoor mask rules could be loosened after further gains.
The county would enter this “post-surge” phase when coronavirus-positive hospitalizations drop below 2,500 for seven straight days, about 26% below the current figure. As of Wednesday, just under 3,400 coronavirus-positive patients were hospitalized countywide, down 29% from the apparent high mark of the Omicron wave, set a little more than two weeks ago, when about 4,800 were hospitalized.
It’s unlikely L.A. County will reach that goal in time for the Feb. 13 Super Bowl, but it could come relatively soon after. Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer said the benchmark was developed in consultation with hospitals in the county, which agreed that they could return to most of their customary operations with fewer than 2,500 coronavirus-positive patients."
This is what San Francisco’s next homeless housing building looks like
The Chronicle, JD MORRIS: "After San Francisco’s attempt to buy a Japantown hotel to house homeless people failed amid intense neighborhood backlash, the city faced no meaningful resistance when it chose an alternate site less than a mile away.
Now, the 114-room Vantaggio Suites, once known as the Gotham Hotel, is preparing to become the latest addition to the city’s supply of permanent supportive housing. The Board of Supervisors on Tuesday agreed to spend $34.8 million — or about $305,000 per unit — to buy the single-room occupancy hotel at 835 Turk St., aiming to start welcoming new tenants this summer.
One day after the acquisition was approved, Shireen McSpadden, executive director of the San Francisco Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing, toured the Turk Street residential hotel."
Several Starbucks have temporarily closed in S.F. and Oakland. Here’s why
The Chronicle, ROLAND LI: "At least eight Starbucks stores have closed temporarily in San Francisco and Oakland as coronavirus has forced 10-day isolation periods for numerous employees who have tested positive or shown symptoms.
The fast-spreading omicron variant has shuttered Starbucks in downtown San Francisco’s 1 Market Plaza, 333 Market St., 555 California St., 580 California St. and 120 4th St.; and Oakland’s 1200 Clay St., 200 Broadway and 3013 Broadway, according to a Chronicle survey.
There are close to 50 Starbucks locations in San Francisco, according to the company’s website."
Mother of Mario Gonzalez files federal civil rights lawsuit against Alameda, police
The Chronicle, LAUREN HERNANDEZ: "The mother of Mario Gonzalez has filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the city of Alameda and the police officers who pinned him to the ground for five minutes, saying her son died after he was illegally and unjustifiably restrained last April.
In the 21-page lawsuit, filed on Wednesday in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, Edith Arenales alleges that Officers Eric McKinley, James Fisher and Cameron Leahy “used excessive force against (Gonzalez), and unjustified deadly force that included a suffocating restraint” that caused her 26-year-old son to die from restraint asphyxia.
The lawsuit said officers failed to de-escalate the situation and knew Gonzalez did not pose any danger and didn’t make any “threatening action toward any of the officers.”"
U.S. says new intelligence shows Russia plotting a ‘false flag’ attack
AP, AAMER MADHANI, LORNE COOK AND SUZAN FRASER: "The U.S. accused the Kremlin on Thursday of an elaborate plot to fabricate an attack by Ukrainian forces that Russia could use as a pretext to take military action against its neighbor.
Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said the scheme included production of a graphic propaganda video that would show staged explosions and use actors depicting mourners.
The plan for the fake attack on Russian territory or Russian-speaking people was revealed in declassified intelligence shared with Ukrainian officials and European allies in recent days. It is the latest allegation by the U.S. and Britain that Russia is plotting to use a false pretext to go to war against Ukraine."
Xi Jinping sees Beijing Olympics as validation of his power
LA Times, ALICE SU: "Chinese leader Xi Jinping views the Olympic Games — he has pored over venue blueprints and been involved in every aspect of planning — as a validation not only of his statecraft but also of the rise of a confident, economically robust nation that is rearranging the world order.
Beijing’s second Olympics, opening this week amid the world’s strictest COVID-19 controls, mass incarceration of minorities in Xinjiang, military threats to Taiwan and the dismantling of civil rights in Hong Kong, are a statement of defiance.
They are a declaration that Xi’s Communist Party no longer needs the acceptance of the West at a time when much of the planet is beholden to a patriotic and powerful China."
