COVID in California: L.A. braces for new mask mandate amid ‘high’ virus levels
The Chronicle, AIDIN VAZIRI: "With so many respiratory viruses making the rounds in the Bay Area, it’s hard to know whether those sniffles and cough are a cold, the flu or COVID.
The latest thinking from health experts helps sort out which symptoms are typical of which illness. New case numbers from San Francisco show a sharp uptick — and also highlight longstanding disparities in which neighborhoods and demographic groups are suffering the most from the coronavirus.
Three Bay Area counties have moved back into the “medium” tier for community spread, triggering an automatic return of mask mandates for prisons and shelters."
‘A huge burden’: L.A. hospitals strained by COVID surge, very bad flu season
LA Times, EMILY ALPERT REYES/LUKE MONEY/RONG-GONG LIN II: "A “tripledemic” of COVID-19, the flu and RSV is hitting Southern California hard, sending patients to the emergency room in droves and presenting a steep new challenge for a healthcare system already worn thin by nearly three years of the pandemic.
“When you have the convergence of three very serious respiratory viruses, it puts a huge burden on emergency departments and also on the hospital itself,” said Dr. Kimberly Shriner, medical director of infection prevention at Huntington Health.
At Pomona Valley Hospital Medical Center, the emergency room recently hit a record high number of patients in a single day — 382 — according to Darlene Scafiddi, executive vice president of patient care."
Five new offshore wind farms coming to the California coast
The Chronicle, TARA DUGGAN: "Five companies won California offshore wind energy leases in an auction that closed Wednesday, offering a total of $757.1 million for five areas off the coasts of Morro Bay and Humboldt Bay capable of producing over 4.6 gigawatts of power.
The sales from the U.S. Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management were the first for California and the first for the United States involving floating offshore wind turbines.
Offshore wind has become a priority for the Biden administration — whose goal is to deliver 30 gigawatts of offshore wind energy capacity by 2030 — and Gov. Gavin Newsom, who said it will help the state move toward its goal of transitioning to 90% clean energy by 2035."
Thursday showers could lead into larger, harsher Bay Area weather system over the weekend, NWS says
BANG*Mercury News, AUSTIN TURNER: "Two separate weather systems, one coming Thursday afternoon and another Friday night, were forecasted to bring rain, wind and possibly even thunderstorms in the coming days.
Thursday’s system isn’t forecast by the National Weather Service to bring as much rain to the South Bay as to other parts of the region. San Jose, Fremont and the Peninsula all the way up through San Mateo aren’t predicted to see more than one-tenth of an inch of rainfall, but wind gusts as high as 24 miles per hours could be felt after sunset.
Forecasts were similar in Contra Costa County, with potential of 28 mph gusts hanging in the balance overnight."
Senate panel threatens to subpoena Bankman-Fried for hearing testimony
The Hill, SYLVAN LANE: "The top Democrat and Republican on the Senate Banking Committee have threatened to subpoena FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried if he doesn't agree to testify during a hearing on the cryptocurrency firm's collapse scheduled for next week.
In a Wednesday letter, Senate Banking Committee Chairman Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) warned Bankman-Fried he may be forced to testify before the panel if he does not cooperate with a request to appear at a Dec. 14 hearing.
"FTX's collapse has caused real financial harm to consumers, and effects have spilled over into other parts of the crypto industry. The American people need answers about Sam Bankman-Fried's misconduct at FTX," said Brown and Sen. Pat Toomey (Pa.), the panel's ranking Republican, in a statement."
Bill protecting same-sex and interracial unions clears Congress
AP, MARY CLARE JALONICK: "The House gave final approval Thursday to legislation protecting same-sex marriages, a monumental step in a decades-long battle for nationwide recognition of such unions that reflects a stunning turnaround in societal attitudes.
President Biden is expected to promptly sign the measure, which requires all states to recognize same-sex marriages — a relief for hundreds of thousands of couples who have married since the Supreme Court’s 2015 decision that legalized those marriages nationwide."
This San Francisco political group is taking over the Bold Italic
The Chronicle, ANNIE VAINSHTEIN: "GrowSF, a San Francisco political fundraising and advocacy group, said it has acquired the Bold Italic, a long-running San Francisco blog that has sputtered of late, from Medium. The publishing site had operated the Bold Italic since 2019.
GrowSF, launched two years ago by two former tech professionals seeking to confront civic issues by supporting politically moderate candidates and causes, said Medium approached them several months ago with an offer to take over the stewardship of the Bold Italic blog — for free."
Does your district have what it takes to significantly improve?
EdSource, JOHN FENSTERWALD: "The question struck Arun Ramanathan while he endured a nine-hour meeting of little consequence in Hayward Unified in the East Bay: Is there an inverse (or is it perverse) relationship between the length of a school board meeting and the effectiveness of a district?
As it turned out, probably not.
But the late-night musing of the CEO of Oakland-based Pivot Learning, a national nonprofit that works with school districts on improving classroom instruction, inspired a deep exploration into factors behind a successful school district."
New York Times journalists stage historic strike as labor tensions mount across media
LA Times, MEG JAMES/STEPHEN BATTAGLIO: "Taking a defiant stand, hundreds of New York Times journalists refused to work Thursday — the largest journalist-led labor action at the nation’s leading newspaper in more than 40 years.
The New York Times Guild’s 24-hour strike highlighted the mounting frustration of writers, editors, online producers, security guards and other staffers over the slow pace of negotiations for a new contract. The last contract expired in March 2021, and guild leaders this week said that “the company’s failure to bargain in good faith” prompted their walkout.
“We are deeply committed to the success of the paper. ... [But] today, for the first time in decades, we’re fulfilling that mission in a different way,” the newspaper’s guild and its local, the NewsGuild of New York, said in a letter to readers."
With L.A. swearing in a new mayor, crews work to move homeless encampments near City Hall
LA Times, DAVID ZAHNISER/JULIA WICK: "During her campaign, Los Angeles Mayor-elect Karen Bass repeatedly promised she would make homelessness her priority on Day 1, with an immediate focus on the city’s most “challenging” encampments.
Three days before her inauguration, one particularly visible encampment — across the street from City Hall — was already receiving a swarm of attention from sanitation crews, outreach workers and other government employees.
Unhoused residents who have been living at 1st and Spring streets, some for several months, were loaded into vans Thursday and whisked to the L.A. Grand Hotel, a temporary homeless facility on Figueroa Street that is scheduled to shut down Jan. 31. Several said they were told that they needed to relocate in the run-up to Bass’ swearing-in, which had been scheduled for Sunday outside City Hall."
A year and a state investigation later, S.F.’s Stevenson lot housing project faces little opposition
The Chronicle, JK DINEEN: "It took 14 months, a new 732-page environmental study that cost $750,000, a state investigation, a flurry of national media attention and local political grandstanding. But Round Two of the fight over the redevelopment of a Nordstrom valet parking lot near Sixth and Market streets seems to be landing with more of a whimper than a bang.
On Thursday, the San Francisco Planning Commission got its first crack at the environmental impact report for 469 Stevenson St., a proposed 27-story tower that would add 495 apartments on a mid-block parking lot in the city’s Mid-Market neighborhood."
Bay Area home values are falling. Here’s why most homeowners still shouldn’t expect a break on their property tax bill
BANG*Mercury News, ETHAN VARIAN/MARISA KENDALL: "Bay Area home values likely will continue to fall in 2023 — with the San Francisco area set to take the biggest losses in the country — but that doesn’t mean homeowners should necessarily expect a break on their property taxes.
By next fall, home prices in the San Francisco metro area — which includes the East Bay and Peninsula — are forecast to tumble 3.6%, the largest decrease of any big population center, according to Zillow. In the San Jose metro, prices are expected to fall 1.8%."
Sacramento County to spend $450M for downtown jail improvements. Why it’s controversial
Sac Bee, ARIANE LANGE: "The Sacramento County Board of Supervisors approved a $450 million proposal to build a new intake and mental health clinic facility at the main jail, an “extraordinary expense” meant to bring the site into compliance with a court order regarding inmate care.
Supervisors voted 3-2 in favor Thursday, after rejecting similar proposals multiple times. Two supervisors balked at the expense, but they were outvoted by supervisors who said the county did not have another viable option.
Supervisor Phil Serna, who voted no, told his colleagues he was uncomfortable with the half-billion-dollar price tag for the building alone. “That,” he said, “is roughly five times our annual parks budget.”"
‘He used his authority to sexually prey’: Ex-Dublin federal prison warden guilty in sex abuse case
BANG*Mercury News, NATE GARTRELL: "The former warden of a Dublin federal prison was convicted Thursday of sexually abusing incarcerated women and lying to investigators.
Ray J. Garcia, who served as warden and associate warden at FCI Dublin, was convicted of sexually abusing three incarcerated women and lying to federal investigators. Garcia took the stand in his own defense during his weeklong trial, insisting that he accidentally snapped a nude photo of an incarcerated woman in a sexual pose during the course of his daily duties.
Jurors apparently didn’t buy it. After a full day of deliberations, they returned the verdict on all eight counts Garcia faced. The most serious charges carry a maximum of 15 years in federal prison."
Old sex-abuse claims bankrupt a Bay Area Catholic diocese. Will others follow?
BANG*Mercury News, JOHN WOOLFOLK: "Payouts for childhood sexual abuse claims have taken a financial toll on a host of venerable American institutions that provided youth programs where predators lurked, from the Boy Scouts of America to Penn State, Michigan State and numerous church organizations.
With a three-year window for new claims of decades-old abuse closing at the end of this month, the Diocese of Santa Rosa, one of five Roman Catholic dioceses serving the Bay Area, has announced it will file for bankruptcy protection early next year.
“It is the inevitable result of an insurmountable number of claims,” Bishop Robert F. Vasa wrote in an announcement this month that said the diocese is facing more than 130 abuse claims dating back to its establishment in 1962, mostly from the 1970s and 1980s."
DOJ seeks to hold Trump in contempt over documents
CNN, KATELYN POLANTZ//KAITLAN COLLINS: "The Justice Department is asking a federal judge to hold Donald Trump in contempt of court for failing to comply with a subpoena issued this summer ordering the former president to turn over records marked classified, two sources familiar with the matter told CNN.
e development comes azTrump’s legal team said it conducted searches at four locations just before Thanksgiving, finding two documents with classified markings at a storage facility in Florida. The Trump team turned over those two documents to the FBI and announced to a federal judge in Washington, DC, that they believed Trump was now in compliance with a 6-month-old subpoena.
But the Justice Department disagreed. And in an escalation last week, department prosecutors told DC District Chief Judge Beryl Howell, who oversees federal grand jury proceedings there, that the searches weren’t satisfactory. The contempt proceedings before Howell are under seal."
