Deadly wildfire near Hemet doubles in size, closes in on 20,000 acres
LAT, SUMMER LIN/SALVADOR HERNANDEZ: “Kenneth Baptista and his three children were at a friend’s house on Labor Day to go swimming when they looked up and saw black smoke.
It was coming from near Baptista’s Hemet house.
The family headed home, but when they got there, they found the area blocked off by authorities.”
Here’s the day experts say California’s historic heat wave will finally be over
The Chronicle, JACK LEE: “California has endured sweltering temperatures for seven brutal days. On Monday, temperatures in the Bay Area reached levels not seen in modern history, with an all-time high of 117 degrees in Fairfield. San Jose hit an all-time high of 109 on Tuesday. Even San Francisco — normally cooled by the coastal marine layer — surpassed 90 degrees downtown.
Fortunately, the end is near, meteorologists say. Temperatures will steadily drop beginning Friday and through the weekend with more cooling expected early next week. The high-pressure system currently parked over much of the western U.S. is weakening and moving away.
“I think the last hot day will be (today), then we’re going to be in a nice downward trend,” said Jan Null, a meteorologist with Golden Gate Weather Services and San Jose State University.”
Karen Bass got a USC degree for free. It’s now pulling her into a federal corruption case
LAT, MATT HAMILTON: “During the last decade, two influential Los Angeles politicians were awarded full-tuition scholarships valued at nearly $100,000 each from USC’s social work program.
One of those scholarships led to the indictment of former L.A. County Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas and the former dean of USC’s social work program, Marilyn Flynn, on bribery and fraud charges.
The other scholarship recipient, Rep. Karen Bass, is the leading contender to be L.A.'s next mayor.”
Zero waste: A battle in California against wasteful packaging
Capitol Weekly, AARON GILBREATH: “In 2019, a Californian named Zuleyka Strasner created a sustainable grocery delivery startup called Zero Grocery.
Previously an operations manager at a Bay Area venture capital firm, she got the idea for her low-waste grocery service after seeing a startling amount of plastic trash washing up on the tropical Nicaraguan beach where she’d honeymooned. Grocery delivery became popular during the COVID-19 pandemic, but the packaging waste generated from this widespread delivery service quickly became apparent, and that increase in waste dovetailed with consumers’ increasing interest in sustainable practices and their own carbon footprints.
Strasner had already been thinking about plastic waste and the supply chain. Applying her experience in tech to the trash problem back home, Strasner came up with a solution: work directly with suppliers and deliver Bay Area customers’ grocery orders in boxes, reusable glass jars, and compostable containers. When Zero Grocery returned to a customer’s address for a subsequent delivery, they would pick up the previous delivery’s glass jars to take back to the warehouse and clean.”
California approves microplastics testing of drinking water sources
CALMatters, RACHEL BECKER: “California water regulators today approved the world’s first requirements for testing microplastics in drinking water sources — a key step towards regulating tiny fragments that are ubiquitous in the environment.
After years of research involving more than two-dozen laboratories, the State Water Resources Control Board unanimously approved a policy handbook for testing water supplies for microplastics over four years. Under the plan approved today, up to 30 of the state’s largest water providers will be ordered to start quarterly testing for two years, beginning in the fall of 2023.
“There’s no other place in the world — literally in the world — that has standardized methods for how you do this or has a monitoring program to look at drinking water,” said Steve Weisberg, executive director of the Southern California Coastal Water Research Project, which has analyzed various testing methods for the state. “California is really getting out there and being first.””
PG&E warns over 500,000 customers of possible rotating outages as California heat wave drags on
LAT, GREGORY YEE: “For a second day, California’s largest utility is warning customers to prepare for the possibility of rotating power outages as a brutal heat wave continues to pummel the state.
Pacific Gas & Electric Co. said Wednesday that it had notified about 525,277 customers to prepare for possible outages.
As of this afternoon, the California Independent System Operator, which manages the state power grid, has not asked utilities to implement rotating outages, but the San Francisco-based company opted to notify customers “out of an abundance of caution,” according to a statement by PG&E.”
California wildfire in Tahoe National Forest threatens historic Gold Rush town
The Chronicle, GERRY DIAZ/JORDAN PARKER: “The Mosquito Fire burning in Placer County quickly exploded Wednesday to more than 5,700 acres and was threatening the historic Gold Rush town of Michigan Bluff.
After eight days of an oppressive heat dome bringing dry air and triple-digit heat exceeding 110 degrees to much of California’s interior, the wildfire was exhibiting extreme behavior and had produced a massive cloud of smoke and debris that could be seen 60 miles away.
The Mosquito Fire had burned one structure, according to a video shown on KCRA 3 in Sacramento, however officials said they were aware of damage but they were unable to confirm any reports.”
Deadly Mill Fire possibly sparked by hot ash from power facility in Weed, company says
RYAN SABALOW, JASON POHL and DALE KASLER: "Roseburg Forest Products acknowledged Wednesday it is investigating whether a malfunctioning sprinkler system allowed smoldering ash from an on-site power plant to ignite Friday’s deadly Mill Fire in Weed.
The company has a wood-fired “cogeneration power” plant at its Weed mill that produces electricity. Leftover ash from the power plant was stored in a concrete bin inside a giant wooden warehouse known as Shed 17 on Roseburg’s property.
The ash was sprayed with water “using a third-party-supplied machine,” Roseburg officials said. Weed city officials and numerous residents have said the fatal wildfire began in or near Shed 17 before destroying at least 100 homes, most of them in Weed’s historically Black neighborhood of Lincoln Heights. The fire killed two women."
‘Operating under water’: Families trying to place loved ones in Medi-Cal assisted living program wait years
CALMatters, ANA B. IBARRA: “Former grad school classmates Kelsey McQuaid-Craig and Chelsea Oruche have recently bonded over a similar struggle — trying to place loved ones in assisted living.
McQuaid-Craig and her husband, Brandon, are looking to place his mother, Mary, 67, who has dementia and is deteriorating quickly, in a memory care program in Sacramento County. They are currently expecting their first child, and caring for Mary full time while juggling their careers has become overwhelming.
In San Pedro, Oruche is experiencing a similar stress. Caring for her 70-year-old mother, Peggy, who has multiple health issues, while raising a toddler, attending law school and working is leading to burnout. “
California vows to ban gas-fueled cars. But its record on big climate promises is mixed
LAT, HAYLEY SMITH/TONY BRISCOE: “It was the sort of bold, climate-focused initiative that California has developed a reputation for — an effective ban on the sale of new gasoline-powered cars by 2035.
But last month’s historic vote by the California Air Resources Board follows a number of sweeping state environmental actions that have met with varying degrees of success.
Now, as officials seek to fundamentally change California’s automotive culture — thereby reducing its largest source of planet-warming carbon emissions and air pollution — experts say those past initiatives may shed light on whether California’s nation-leading auto plan can work.”
Newsom just signed fast-food worker protections into law. There’s already an effort to overturn them
The Chronicle, SOPHIA BOLLAG: “A day after Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a law that aims to raise wages for California fast-food workers, opponents launched an effort to overturn the measure.
Opponents are seeking to block the new law by letting voters decide whether to create a council to set minimum standards for wages, hours and working conditions for workers at fast-food franchises.
They filed a request on Tuesday to begin circulating petitions to qualify the referendum, according to a copy provided by Attorney General Rob Bonta’s office.”
Workplace has changed forever — and the public sector lags (OP-ED)
Capitol Weekly, BILL HALL/IRENE GREEN: “As much as we all might yearn for everything to go back to just the way it was before the novel coronavirus uprooted the world, we know that there are things that can never go back.
Workplaces have forever been changed.
The advent of remote work, the effect of the Great Resignation in which workers asserted a new sense of mobility, a surge in retirements, the years of strain and burnout endured by the essential workers who got us through the worst of it – these things and more have forged a new reality. Workplaces must adapt.”
Here’s your guide to sports betting and everything else to know about gambling in California
CALMatters, GRACE GEDYE: “In California, you can bet on a horse race, buy a lottery ticket, put money on poker in a card room and play slots at a tribal casino all in the same – potentially expensive – day.
Nevada, right next door, is undoubtedly the national capital of all things gambling. But after Nevada, California has the most slot machines of any state – one measure of the state’s betting industry.
The gambling industry, like many, took a hit during the pandemic. Nationally, commercial gaming revenue after winnings shrank by more than 25% between 2019 and 2020. Then, in 2021, it came roaring back – even faster than the rest of the economy – and brought in more money than any previous year. Tribal casinos also had a record breaking year in 2021.”
This East Bay city will be first to allow an Indigenous group the exclusive right to use city land
The Chronicle, SARAH RAVANI: “Oakland leaders plan to allow an Indigenous group the right to exclusively use about five acres of city land, the first city in California to use municipal property as reparations for European settlers stealing Native American territories.
Mayor Libby Schaaf and the Sogorea Te’ Land Trust, an Indigenous and women-led nonprofit, will announce Thursday that the city will grant an easement for Sequoia Point to the land trust and the Confederated Villages of Lisjan Nation, which is the East Bay Ohlone tribe. The Point sits above the Sequoia Bayview Trail, one of the most popular trails in Joaquin Miller Park.
Oakland is creating a cultural easement at Sequoia Point, a legal arrangement that allows the city to transfer the right to use the land for cultural purposes, including ceremonial traditions, native habitat restoration and education activities. While the city retains the title to the property, the land trust has almost all of the rights of an owner, although the city can go on the property in case of an emergency.”
New data shows this East Bay city nearly doubled its homeless population
The Chronicle, SARAH RAVANI/KEVIN FAGAN/SAM WHITING: “Richmond had one of the biggest jumps in its homeless populations of any city in Contra Costa County with a 90% spike over three years, according to recently released data.
Richmond saw a jump from 333 unhoused people in 2019 to 632 people in 2022. The data comes from the point-in-time count conducted in late February. The county released a summary of its findings on Aug. 31 and plans to release the full report in a few weeks.
Other cities in Contra Costa County saw big increases, including Pinole, El Cerrito, Concord, San Ramon, Brentwood and San Pablo, but those cities had smaller overall numbers.”
Controversial S.F. supervisor candidate Leanna Louie can’t be on November ballot, judge rules
The Chronicle, J.D. MORRIS: “Leanna Louie has failed to convince a San Francisco judge to let her name appear on the November ballot as a Board of Supervisors candidate in District Four.
Superior Court Judge Richard Ulmer, in an order Wednesday, declined to reverse an earlier decision by the city’s elections director to remove Louie’s name from the ballot after concluding that she did not meet the necessary residency requirements.
Ulmer was not persuaded by Louie’s argument that she had her primary home in District Four — the Outer Sunset — nor did he accept her contention that the elections department had stricken her from the ballot too late.”
Former CSU baseball coach sexually and racially harassed players and staff, investigation found
EdSource, THOMAS PEELE/ASHLEY A SMITH/DANIEL J. WILLIS: “He called it story time.
But when former San Jose State University baseball coach Jason M. Hawkins gathered his team and staff around him for his pregame ritual during the 2017 season, the stories he told had nothing to do with what’s been called the thinking man’s game.
They had everything to do with sex.”
Seven words no home seller wants to hear: ‘There’s a human skull beneath this house’
LAT, JACK FLEMMING: “Architects design homes. Agents sell them. Kyle Tourje plunges beneath them.
Tourje is one of nine structural assessors for Alpha Structural, a Los Angeles company that specializes in engineering and constructing foundation repairs. In other words, these people make sure your house doesn’t slide down the hill and crush the ones below it.
His parents, David and Linda, founded the company three decades ago, and Kyle has been around the business most of his life. He’s one of 141 employees at Alpha, which recently outgrew its Eagle Rock headquarters and moved to a larger facility in Sunland.”
