California proposes a $24 flat fee on utility bills in exchange for lower electricity prices
The Chronicle's JULIE JOHNSON: "Millions of Californians could see a new $24 fixed charge on their utility bills in coming years if state regulators approve a plan that would reduce how much customers pay per kilowatt hour of electricity.
The California Public Utilities Commission estimates the new flat fee would allow companies like Pacific Gas and Electric to reduce electricity prices by about 5 to 7 cents per kilowatt hour, easing the expense for customers already paying some of the highest electricity prices in the country."
California may gut two CalWORKS programs helping thousands of families
CALMatters's JUSTO ROBLES: "Joy Perrin had been living in a van with her two children for several months when she walked into a welfare office in 2018. She had left an abusive partner and had failed her first semester at Laney College in Oakland.
A social worker told Perrin she qualified for the CalWORKS family stabilization program, which provides cash assistance, transitional housing and counseling to families experiencing crises such as domestic violence, substance abuse, or the risk of homelessness."
Former California Controller Betty Yee joins crowded Democratic field running for governor
Sacramento Bee's ANDREW SHEELER: "Nearly one year after she told the San Francisco Chronicle that she intended to run for governor, former California Controller Betty Yee, a Democrat, formally announced her campaign in a post on X Wednesday.
“While some worry we have no power over our future in California, I know that we do. We have the power to make California add up for all of us again. That’s why I’m running for Governor,” Yee wrote."
Cesar Chavez’s family wants nothing to do with Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s presidential campaign
LAT's BENJAMIN ORESKES: "During the 1980 presidential primaries, Fernando Chavez traveled for months with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as they worked on the presidential campaign of his uncle Sen. Ted Kennedy.
In living room after living room, Chavez said, he saw some combination of three framed pictures on the wall: portraits of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.; of Kennedy’s father, the late Sen. Robert F. Kennedy (D-N.Y.); and of his own father, Cesar Chavez, who had co-founded the United Farm Workers. The elder Kennedy had grown close to the labor icon in the years before the senator’s assassination in 1968."
California storm to bring thunderstorms, increased flood risk
The Chronicle's ANTHONY EDWARDS and JACK LEE: "April may quickly be approaching, but March is going out like a lion, not a lamb.
A strong low-pressure system is anticipated to nudge toward the California coast and stall about 100 miles west of San Francisco on Friday. The proximity of the system will result in a period of gusty wind, heavy rain and possible thunderstorms in the Bay Area during the afternoon and evening."
Northern California county supervisor who tried to get rid of Dominion vote-counting machines survives recall by 50 votes
AP's ADAM BEAM: "A local official in a rural Northern California survived a recall attempt spurred in part by his effort to get rid of the county’s vote-counting machines following unfounded accusations of fraud amplified by former President Donald Trump.
Kevin Crye was elected to the Shasta County Board of Supervisors in 2022. He and two other supervisors then voted to get rid of the county’s vote-counting machines, directing local officials to hand count ballots. The machines were made by Dominion Voting Systems, the company at the center of debunked conspiracy theories of how Trump lost the 2020 presidential election."
New citizenship fees go into effect on April 1. How the change will affect you.
Sacramento Bee's MARIA G. ORTIZ-BRIONES: "In recent weeks, the Central Valley Immigrant Integration Collaborative, which helps permanent residents in the Valley seeking naturalization, has been receiving more calls than normal from residents who are interested in citizenship.
The reason is that on April 1, the fee to become a U.S. citizen will increase; but only if the application is submitted in paper format. If the application is online the cost is less."
Sam Bankman-Fried’s parents ‘heartbroken’ for ’empathetic’ son who wanted to ‘do good on a large scale’
BANG*Mercury News's MARTHA ROSS: "Before a federal judge sentenced FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried to 25 years in a federal prison for stealing billions of dollars from his cryptocurrency exchange customers Thursday, it became clear that his loyal, steadfast parents, Joseph Bankman and Barbara Fried, were living in a different reality.
As the Stanford law professors stared at the floor in front of them, U.S. District Court Judge Lewis A. Kaplan issued a stinging rebuke of their beloved, first-born child, who was convicted in November in what has been described as “one of the largest financial frauds in history.”
Whooping cough sickens 65 in outbreak at Bay Area high school, California officials say
Sacramento Bee's JULIA DAYE: "Northern California has seen a dramatic spike in whooping cough cases since December, Marin County Public Health Officer Matt Willis warned in a March 22 advisory.
Since the end of 2023, county health officials have seen 93 cases of whooping cough, 65 of which have been tied to an outbreak ripping through Tamalpais High School, according to the Marin Independent Journal."
Juul anti-vaping settlement of $24.7 million will fund dozens of health-related jobs in S.F. schools
The Chronicle's JILL TUCKER: " Two of the biggest players in the e-cigarette industry will cover the salaries and benefits of 76 nurses, counselors and health educators in San Francisco schools next year in just the first of three expected rounds of funding from a legal settlement with the vaping giants.
District officials plan to spend the initial chunk of the $24.65 million deal with Juul Labs Inc. and Altria Group Inc. during the 2024-25 school year and the rest over the following two years. Altria, a major tobacco company and cigarette maker formerly known as Philip Morris, was a part owner of Juul but has since largely divested its stake."
California’s disabled students left behind during emergencies: ‘They just weren’t ready for someone like me’
CALMatters's AMELIA WU: "Ryan Manriquez opened the door of his second-floor apartment to a blaring fire alarm. It was September 2023, a few weeks into the school year at UC Berkeley, where he’s a graduate student studying public policy.
Residents descended the staircase, following lighted exit signs. The alarm was getting louder, urging Manriquez to leave. But he couldn’t. Sitting in his power wheelchair, he looked at the only way out of the building for him — an elevator down the hallway, its doors now shut and inoperable. There was no way out for him."
Oakland’s top employers put up $10 million for new downtown safety initiatives
The Chronicle's ELI ROSENBERG: "Four of Oakland’s biggest employers announced they are chipping in a total of $10 million for a security initiative downtown, as the city works to attract interest and economic energy to its central business district after a rise in crime in the past year.
Blue Shield of California, the Clorox Company, Kaiser Permanente, and Pacific Gas and Electric Company said Thursday that they will use the funds to strengthen a partnership with the Oakland Police Department, enhance the area’s “ambassador” program for “on-demand buddy escorts” to help people walk between destinations, and add transportation to and from transit hubs and parking lots."
Exclusive: S.F. to take over former big tech headquarters building in Mid-Market
The Chronicle's LAURA WAXMANN: "For months, the city of San Francisco has been talking about buying cheap real estate amid dipping office values and rents in the city. It may now be happening.
Landlord Hudson Pacific Properties has agreed to a discounted, long-term lease and the potential future sale to the city of a roughly 1 million-square-foot office building it operates at 1455 Market St."
With fewer options, South L.A. braces for bigger bills at fast-food restaurants
LAT's DANIEL MILLER: "McDonald’s. Yoshinoya. El Pollo Loco. Little Caesars. Panda Express. Taco Bell. And not a supermarket in sight.
On a six-lane stretch of Crenshaw Boulevard that thrums with traffic, the dining options within view highlighted a problem South Los Angeles has long faced — and one that could worsen when the minimum wage for fast-food workers is boosted from $16 to $20 on April 1."
READ MORE -- Starbucks, Chipotle, McDonald’s: Who’s raising prices in California to pay higher wages -- LAT's KAREN GARCIA; Which fast food workers will get paid more in California? -- CALMatters's JEANNE KUANG
L.A. promised to hire 200 Black workers from a job training program. That hasn’t happened.
CALMatters's ALEJANDRA REYES-VELARDE: "Tekoah “TK” Flory was thrilled to receive a job offer from the Los Angeles Bureau of Street Lighting last September. Flory had been directing traffic at Dodger stadium, a seasonal job that would be coming to an end soon.
After taking on a series of minimum wage jobs, Flory, 31, was looking forward to starting a career in a city job Flory believed would pay $40,000 to $60,000 a year."
Renting versus buying a home: Has the math changed for today’s Bay Area real estate market?
The Chronicle's KELLIE HWANG: "Spring is a popular time to buy and sell homes. But with a recent report out showing renting is still cheaper than buying across most of the U.S. — including in the notoriously expensive Bay Area — is taking the plunge into homeownership the right move right now?
Mortgage rates have come down from the highs set last fall, but are still more than double the 3% rates of 2021. Meanwhile, in the past year, rents have been continuing to decline while home values in the Bay Area have been rising. Real estate experts say they expect the real estate market to keep heating up from here, with interest growing in not only single-family homes but also condos and townhomes that took a big hit during the pandemic."
S.F. opened homeless housing in this wealthy neighborhood. Then the 911 calls began
The Chronicle's ALDO TOLEDO: "Residents at a Mission Bay condo complex are raising alarms over what they say are hundreds of violent and disturbing incidents at a recently opened permanent supportive housing site across the street.
Located midway between the Giants’ stadium and the Chase Center, HomeRise at Mission Bay is a 141-unit, four-story housing project run by the nonprofit HomeRise. It opened in late 2022 to great fanfare, touted as an example of a modern facility in a new, mixed-income neighborhood away from the Tenderloin, the location of most housing projects for the formerly homeless."
Ex-Caltrain pair accused of building themselves homes inside stations with public funds
The Chronicle's MICHAEL CABANATUAN: "Two former Caltrain employees — an executive and a station manager — face felony corruption charges for allegedly using public money to build themselves personal residences inside two stations on the commuter rail line, prosecutors say.
Joe Navarro, 66, of Oceanside, San Diego County, and Seth Andrew Worden, 61, of Newton, Penn., are accused of conspiring to build the dwellings without authorization — and using public funds to do so."
LAX’s long-promised rail link, the People Mover, likely delayed until late 2025
LAT's COLLEEN SHALBY: "When construction of the Automated People Mover at Los Angeles International Airport is finished, travelers will finally have an option to avoid the airport’s dreaded traffic loop that’s become the punchline of too many jokes.
But recently it’s only added to the chaos. And now it’s completion date is being pushed back, one more delay in the $30-billion overhaul of the fifth-busiest airport in the world."
Louis Gossett Jr., ‘An Officer and a Gentleman’ star who broke barriers in Hollywood, dies
LAT's STEVE MARBLE: "Lou Gossett Jr. was still a teen, fresh off a successful Broadway run, when he landed at LAX and headed to Beverly Hills in a cherry red Ford Fairlane, feeling on top of the world.
He didn’t get far before the cops pulled him over, saying he matched a description of someone they were looking for. A few miles later, it happened again. And then again. By the time he got to the Beverly Hills Hotel, a squad car rolled up and the officers handcuffed Gossett to a tree as they tried to figure out what a young Black man was doing in town."
