‘The country is here for you’: Biden surveys California’s storm-ravaged Central Coast
The Chronicle, DUSTIN GARDINER: "With a birds eye view from Marine One, President Biden overlooked the devastation a recent procession of extreme storms have wreaked on California’s Central Coast: washed-out piers, waterfront businesses damaged by flooding, major landslides and beaches strewn with the trunks of redwood trees and other debris.
The president traveled to Santa Clara and Santa Cruz counties Thursday to tour damage from the storms that pummeled the region with record rainfall and high-speed winds for the better part of two weeks. Biden flew into the region around noon, landing at Moffett Federal Airfield in Mountain View, before heading to the coast for a helicopter and motorcade tour, during which he was accompanied by Gov. Gavin Newsom, Sen. Alex Padilla and federal emergency officials.
During a stop at Seacliff State Beach, a park and nature refuge that sustained heavy damage, Biden reflected on how a series of disasters exacerbated by planet-warming emissions, from flooding to wildfires to landslides, have hammered the state."
Biden arrives in Bay Area, surveys damage at Capitola Village, Seacliff State Beach
BANG*Mercury News, PAUL ROGERS/ETHAN BARON/JOHN WOOLFOLK/ALDO TOLEDO: "President Biden promised extensive federal help for storm-battered California on Thursday after surveying widespread wreckage in a visit to Capitola Village and Seacliff State Beach, two of the areas most heavily damaged by the recent string of atmospheric rivers that left much of the Golden State reeling.
“The country is here for you and with you,” Biden said at Seacliff, located near Aptos. “We are not leaving until things are built back and built back better than they were before. As you recover from these storms, we will be with you every step of the way. And I mean that sincerely. Every step.”"
For all their ferocity, California storms were not likely caused by global warming, experts say
LA Times, LOUIS SAHAGUN: "As California emerges from a two-week bout of deadly atmospheric rivers, a number of climate researchers say the recent storms appear to be typical of the intense, periodic rains the state has experienced throughout its history and not the result of global warming.
Although scientists are still studying the size and severity of storms that killed 19 people and caused up to $1 billion in damage, initial assessments suggest the destruction had more to do with California’s historic drought-to-deluge cycles, mountainous topography and aging flood infrastructure than it did with climate-altering greenhouse gasses.
Although the media and some officials were quick to link a series of powerful storms to climate change, researchers interviewed by The Times said they had yet to see evidence of that connection. Instead, the unexpected onslaught of rain and snow after three years of punishing drought appears akin to other major storms that have struck California every decade or more since experts began keeping records in the 1800s."
California went from drought to ‘epic’ snow. What it could mean for spring flooding
Sac Bee, RYAN LILLIS: "Nearly every square mile of California was in a severe drought four months ago. The first six months of 2022 were the driest on record and, in many corners of the state, the rest of the year wasn’t much better.
Now we’re worrying about whether we have too much water in some places.
California, always a state of extremes, rarely faces one quite like this. After three years of drought, the state’s snowpack is suddenly the deepest it’s been on record for mid-January. Most spots in the Sierra already have far more snow today than is usually measured on April 1, the date the snowpack typically peaks. In the central Sierra, the snowpack was 255% of normal for Jan. 17."
Photos: Before and after satellite photos of the Bay Area after string of atmospheric rivers
BANG*Mercury News, PUENG VONGS: "The wettest three-week period the Bay Area has seen in more than 160 years has brought a medley of colors to the region as seen from space. A series of atmospheric rivers have left behind white snow-capped mountains to teal coastal waters created by runoff from overflowing waterways.
The natural-color images were taken by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite. NASA’s Earth Observatory compared images taken from Jan. 23, 2022 and Jan. 17, 2023.
When the soil is saturated, water flows into nearby waterways often taking sediment with it and creating the green and teal coastal hue.The recent rains also left behind brown sediment in San Pablo Bay fed by runoff from the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers that run through Central Valley farmland."
State COVID testing sites begin to close
CALMatters, KRISTEN HWANG: "Sites that are operating under 50% capacity are scheduled to close before the end of January. Forty-four OptumServe sites will be shuttered this week, and 48 mobile “mini-buses” will begin closing in two weeks, according to the California Department of Public Health. OptumServe, a health care operations company, runs 123 testing and treatment sites along with four vaccination clinics through state contracts.
The health care giant has at least four contracts, under its former name Logistics Health, with the state totalling $1.05 billion to provide testing and vaccination services though it has been criticized in the past for its bumpy rollout. Another branch of the company signed an additional $47 million contract to design a data management system for COVID-19 test results.
“A final plan for demobilizing the remaining sites is being prepared, but we have not set a completion date,” an unidentified department spokesperson said in a statement. The state health department would only answer emailed questions and did not attribute the statement to a person."
A ‘very different January’: L.A. County drops to low COVID community level
LA Times, LUKE MONEY/RONG-GONG LIN II: "In a continuing sign of improvements in coronavirus case counts and hospitalizations, Los Angeles County on Thursday officially entered the low COVID-19 community level, indicating that the pandemic is not exerting undue stress on the local healthcare system.
Recent metrics illustrate a “very different January than expected,” a top health official said this week, with continued steady improvements in data instead of a feared post-holiday spike.
Though some figures may be affected by lags in data over the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday weekend, the county has seen marked improvement in its pandemic metrics. And with the winter holidays behind us, it’s increasingly apparent that a much-discussed double COVID wave fueled by gatherings and travel has not materialized."
Did the Bay Area avoid a COVID-19 winter surge? Here’s what the numbers show
The Chronicle, AIDIN VAZIRI: "The Bay Area appears to have avoided another devastating winter COVID-19 surge — at least for now.
The pace of new infections has substantially slowed down across California after peaking in late November, despite the holidays and recent storms that kept people indoors. At the same time, concentrations of SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus that causes COVID-19, have fallen off sharply in most Bay Area wastewater samples during recent weeks."
California Senate sings the budget blues
CALMatters, BEN CHRISTOPHER: "In its first formal response to Gov. Gavin Newsom’s $297 billion spending plan, the Legislature offered some pointed feedback on Wednesday: The governor’s fiscal forecasters are being too optimistic and the state needs to prepare for a worsening budgetary outlook.
But Newsom shouldn’t cut climate spending. Or mental health programs. And especially not anything related to housing.
Nobody said balancing a budget during economic lean times would be easy."
Rendon announces committee assignments
Capitol Weekly, STAFF: "POLITICAL PULSE: Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon released the full list of Assembly committee assignments via Twitter yesterday.
Asm. Robert Rivas, who is on tap to assume the Speakership this summer following a tense series of negotiations last year, retained the Chairmanship of the Agriculture Committee. Asm. Tina McKinnor, elected last April in a special election to replace Autumn Burke, will head the Public Employment and Retirement Committee; A former capitol staffer, she has pushed to unionize legislative staff.
Other assignments of note: Asm. Chris Holden will lead Appropriations; Asm. Buffy Wicks continues as Chair of the Housing and Community Development Committee, which she assumed in 2021; Asm. Phil Ting continues as head the Budget Committee; and Asm. Miguel Santiago retained the Chair of Governmental Organization."
Kiley, Duarte among California Republican congressmen happy to land roles on key committees
Sac Bee, GILLIAN BRASSIL/DAVID LIGHTMAN: "California Republicans certainly scored what they wanted out of U.S. House committee slots. Take the state’s two new GOP congressmen, Reps. Kevin Kiley, R-Rocklin, and John Duarte, R-Modesto.
Kiley will be squarely in the center of congressional action when he joins the House Judiciary Committee. Kiley, a Yale Law School graduate, has worked as a private attorney.
The judiciary committee, led by conservative firebrand Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, is expected to launch a series of investigations and hearings into the Biden administration."
Former L.A. Councilmember Jose Huizar agrees to plead guilty in corruption case
LA Times, MICHAEL FINNEGAN/DAVID ZAHNISER: "Former Los Angeles City Councilmember Jose Huizar has agreed to plead guilty to racketeering and tax evasion, admitting that he extorted at least $1.5 million in bribes from real estate developers.
In a plea agreement filed Thursday in federal court in Los Angeles, Huizar acknowledged that sweeping corruption allegations that he has denied for years were actually true, saying he was “pleading guilty because I am guilty of the charges.”
Huizar’s unexpected capitulation caps a brutal downfall for a man who was born into poverty on a Mexican ranch, grew up in Boyle Heights, and went on to earn a master’s at Princeton and a law degree at UCLA before serving 15 years on the L.A. City Council."
University of California planning to expand outreach at 65 California community colleges
EdSource, MICHAEL BURKE: "The University of California is planning to expand outreach at more than half of the state’s community colleges in an effort to increase the number of students who successfully transfer from those colleges.
The 65 community colleges identified by UC serve a high proportion of low-income students and already have partnerships with UC, and UC plans to deepen those partnerships, according to a report provided Thursday to the academic affairs committee of UC’s board of regents.
The additional outreach could include UC expanding academic advising at those colleges or creating new faculty-to-faculty collaborations between UC campuses and individual colleges, said Yvette Gullatt, UC’s vice president for graduate and undergraduate affairs."
UC regents fire tenured professor after finding he sexually assaulted high school student
The Chronicle, KATHLEEN QUINN/JEREMIAH O. RHODES: "The University of California Board of Regents on Thursday fired a tenured UC Davis professor after an investigation found that the professor sexually assaulted an 18-year-old high school student he had mentored more than a decade ago.
“The regents made their decision at the request of UC Davis Chancellor Gary S. May and on the recommendation of UC President Michael Drake, in accordance with university policy,” said a UC Davis spokesperson in an email to The Chronicle."
Why California is urging people who got middle class tax refunds to withdraw the money ASAP
The Chronicle, KATHLEEN PENDER: "To prevent fraud, the Franchise Tax Board is urging Californians who receive their Middle Class Tax Refund on a Visa debit card to withdraw the money or transfer the funds to a bank account as soon as possible.
Since at least December, some card recipients who tried to withdraw funds or check their balance after activation discovered that they had been depleted by thieves, some of whom spent the money at out-of-state retailers. People who called the card issuer to complain often faced long waits on hold or never got through, according to KGO-TV in San Francisco."
Alec Baldwin and weapons handler to be charged with manslaughter in deadly ‘Rust’ shooting
LA Times, MEG JAMES/ANOUSHA SAKOUI: "New Mexico prosecutors said they are filing felony criminal charges against actor Alec Baldwin and the armorer of the low-budget western “Rust,” following the fatal shooting of the film’s cinematographer.
The charges represent a dramatic culmination of more than a year of speculation over who would be held accountable for the death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins, a rising star in the film industry. Hutchins was shot in the chest Oct. 21, 2021, as she rehearsed a scene with Baldwin and the film’s director, Joel Souza, who was wounded."
Intel cuts more Bay Area jobs as tech layoffs worsen in 2023
BANG*Mercury News, GEORGE AVALOS: "Intel has revealed plans for deeper employment reductions with a fresh round of job cuts that will affect hundreds of Bay Area workers, a disquieting sign that the tech sector’s layoffs have yet to run their course.
The tech titan is eyeing the elimination of about 200 jobs in Santa Clara, according to an official filing posted by the state Employment Development Department on its public site.
Intel had previously told the EDD in a WARN letter dated Dec. 2, 2022 that it was anticipating at that time that it would be cutting 90 jobs in Santa Clara."
Huge new BART housing development on the Peninsula will test whether transit is still a draw
The Chronicle, J.K. DINEEN: "For a quiet bedroom community known for its Chinese banquet halls, sleepy downtown and proximity to the airport, Millbrae plays an out-sized role in the Bay Area’s transportation network.
Millbrae Station is the only direct connection between BART and Caltrain. It is BART’s terminal station on the Peninsula, served by two lines, and is a major hub for Samtrans bus service. It’s also slated to be a high-speed rail station."
Bay Area lawmakers urge state for more transit funding to avoid ‘irreversible’ service harm
The Chronicle, RICARDO CANO: "A group of Bay Area and Los Angeles lawmakers warned state legislative leaders Thursday of a “long-term, possibly irreversible” downfall for BART, Caltrain and the region’s transit agencies if California doesn’t step in to fund their operations.
In California, public transit services are largely funded locally or regionally. However, the issue is becoming one of this year’s biggest legislative battles as transit agencies project drastic service cuts after they run out of the billions in federal funds that have propped up operations during the pandemic."
Affordable-housing quotas imperil new S.F. building projects, study says
The Chronicle, NOAH ARROYO: "San Francisco’s quotas for affordable-housing units in new construction projects are a major factor making the vast majority of them economically unfeasible, according to a study that strikes at the heart of city housing policy.
The study — conducted for a city advisory group — casts further doubt on the city’s ability to meet a state mandate for 82,000 new units to be built by 2031, and underlines the continuing struggle to ease the housing crisis. Even eliminating the quotas would not guarantee that developers would deem new projects profitable enough to undertake, the study shows."
Could S.F. gallery owner who sprayed homeless woman with a hose face jail time? Here’s what experts say
The Chronicle, BOB EGELKO: "The crime of misdemeanor battery — the “willful and unlawful use of force or violence upon the person of another” — is punishable by up to a year in jail and a $2,000 fine. But someone without a criminal record is rarely sentenced to jail, even for drenching a homeless woman with a garden hose.
Instead, the likely sentence for a first offender is a fine and probation, possibly with orders to perform community service and get counseling to avoid a recurrence."
Oakland police Chief LeRonne Armstrong placed on leave
BANG*Mercury News, DAVID DEBOLT/SHOMIK MUKHERJEE: "Police Chief LeRonne Armstrong was placed on administrative leave on Thursday, multiple sources have told the Bay Area News Group, in a move that comes on the heels of a report that found “systemic deficiencies” in how his department investigates misconduct cases.
Four law enforcement sources with knowledge of the situation confirmed that Armstrong was placed on leave.
Later Thursday, newly-seated Mayor Sheng Thao and City Administrator Ed Reiskin announced they put Armstrong on paid leave, following the release of an investigation by an outside law firm that concluded the chief had violated department rules for allowing officers to escape “serious misconduct” by failing to review an inadequate internal affairs investigation."
Accident or crime? Shocking new details emerge in death of O.C. public defender in Mexico
LA Times, ALEXANDRA E. PETRI: "The death of a deputy public defender from Orange County who was vacationing in Mexico with his wife last week has produced conflicting reports, with Mexican officials calling the death of the 33-year-old lawyer, Elliot Blair, an “unfortunate accident” while an attorney for the family said his wife was told he suffered a gunshot wound to the head.
On the night of Blair’s death, a plainclothes detective who was wearing a badge told Blair’s wife, Kimberly Williams, that Blair had suffered a gunshot wound to the head, Case Barnett, a lawyer representing the family, said Thursday.
Barnett also said that the family was informed that the district attorney had ordered Blair’s body be embalmed against the family’s wishes, which he added obstructed the family’s independent investigation and blocked efforts to disprove claims that Blair was drunk at the time of the incident."
