California’s no party preference voters were no-shows in June 7 primary, report says
GILLIAN BRASSIL, SacBee: " Only 18% of the 6.4 million Californians who are registered Independent, third-party or without a preference voted in the June 7 primary, according to Political Data, which tracks voter trends.
That’s compared to 28% of Democrats and 30% of Republicans, Political Data counts as of July 11 show.
The results demonstrate again that primary candidates who hitch their fortunes to Independent voters, like Sacramento County District Attorney Anne Marie Schubert in her unsuccessful campaign for California attorney general, do so at their peril."
Washburn Fire in Yosemite: Mariposa Grove’s giant sequoias expected to survive, park officials say
DUSTIN GARDINER and KURTIS ALEXANDER, Chronicle: "The wildfire at the southern edge of Yosemite National Park was spreading quickly Monday as it chewed through some of the park’s thickest and most drought-damaged forest, sending heavy smoke toward the Bay Area and keeping the park’s usually buzzing south entrance closed to visitors.
Fire crews, however, were reporting success in stopping flames from devastating the giant sequoias at Mariposa Grove, a focal point of the mounting firefight.
Several of the grove’s ancient trees, which can live for more than 2,000 years and include the popular 209-foot-tall Grizzly Giant, were hit by fire. Some were left with 70-foot-high scars on their trunks, park officials said. But no big trees have been found dead."
That sound you hear — ka-ching! — is California’s November ballot
Capitol Weekly, WILL SHUCK: “With California’s statewide top-of-ticket races stacking up as weak-challenger romps, attention – and spending – turns to seven ballot measures, which taken together may well add up to the costliest state election ever.
Experts say this could be the year that election-related spending tops $1 billion – a figure more in line with a presidential campaign. But campaign spending is an arms race no one can step back from, even though bigger spenders don’t always succeed.
“You have to have enough money to buy a ticket to a game,” said political strategist Michael Wagaman, “but that doesn’t guarantee your team will win.””
California built a safety net for millions of undocumented residents. Here’s how it happened
MATHEW MIRANDA, SacBee: "Isabel Coronel, 76, walked in a hospital for the first time in almost 30 years last month. Coronel, an undocumented immigrant, had spent decades laboring in Inland Empire fields, picking watermelon, cilantro and radishes.
She didn’t have health insurance and feared deportation if she tried to access medical care.
She endured high cholesterol and blood pressure, severe knee pain, vision loss and the long-term effects of her January bout with COVID-19 rather than risk a hospital visit."
Gunfire at four 7-Elevens leaves 2 dead, in Brea and Santa Ana, 3 others injured including 1 in Riverside
JOSH CAIN, BRIAN ROKOS and ERIC LICAS, LA Daily News: "Gunfire at 7-Eleven stores killed a clerk in Brea and a 24-year-old man in Santa Ana and injured three others in La Habra and Riverside early Monday, July 11, authorities said.
Police said the description of the robbery suspect in three of the shootings match. A Riverside police official said the fourth shooting, in that city, was very similar to others.
Police in Ontario also reported Monday afternoon that a 7-Eleven in that city was victimized by an armed robber around midnight. The suspect displayed a handgun and demanded money, but did not fire his weapon. No one was injured."
Some seniors and disabled people will miss out on new California state payments
CALMatters, GRACE GEDYE: “Some 23 million Californians’ bank accounts will get a boost of $200 to $1,050, thanks to a new round of payments approved by state lawmakers.
But the payments, aimed at mitigating higher prices for gas and other goods, will leave out lots of low-income Californians. Among those passed over are some seniors, many living on disability benefits, and some of the lowest-income adults.
That’s because the direct deposits and debit cards — expected to begin arriving in late October and conclude in January 2023 — will be sent out based on tax returns.”
Democratic ads warn that the GOP wants a nationwide abortion ban
AP, WILL WEISSERT: “The Democratic National Committee is launching a digital ad campaign to energize its voters after last month’s Supreme Court decision overturning Roe vs. Wade, warning that Republicans’ ultimate goal is to outlaw abortion nationwide.
The committee is sponsoring a $10,000 ad buy beginning Tuesday on the websites of more than 20 lifestyle publications, including Teen Vogue, Refinery29, Glamour, Cosmopolitan, Elle, Essence, GQ, Men’s Health and Esquire.
The ads feature a picture of Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) alongside pink, white and blue text that says: “Republicans are pushing to ban abortion nationally. Join us in fighting back.””
COVID in California: BA.2.75 subvariant has been in Bay Area since June
The Chronicle, Aidin Vaziri/Anna Buchmann: “COVID-19 vaccine uptake among babies and toddlers in the Bay Area appears to be far outpacing statewide and national rates of 2.4% and 1.5%, respectively, according to early figures provided by several local health departments. Coronavirus hospitalizations in California and the Bay Area have reached their highest point since February, when the region was still coming out of the winter omicron surge.
Here are the latest updates:
BA.2.75 subvariant has been in the Bay Area since last month”
Stunning spread of BA.5 subvariant shows why this California COVID wave is different
LAT, RONG-GONG LIN II/LUKE MONEY: “With California suffering through another intense coronavirus wave, the stunning proliferation of the BA.5 subvariant is becoming a growing focus of scientific scrutiny, with experts saying it may replicate itself far more effectively than earlier versions of Omicron.
Compared to its ancestors, the latest Omicron subvariant, BA.5, may have an enhanced ability to create a large number of copies of the coronavirus once it gets into human cells, a possible contributing factor for why this summer’s Omicron wave has been problematic.
BA.5, which in the estimation of federal health officials is currently the dominant version of the coronavirus nationwide, is arguably combining aspects of last summer’s Delta variant with older versions of the highly contagious Omicron family, said Dr. Eric Topol, director of the Scripps Research Translational Institute in La Jolla.”
Gimme Shelter: Can California build millions of new homes amid drought?
CALMatters, MANUELA TOBIAS: “As state officials and experts continue to push for more housing to address the state’s worsening affordability crisis, people often bring up another issue gripping California: drought.
How is it that California Gov. Gavin Newsom can call for the creation of millions of new housing units while demanding that people cut back on long showers and watering their lawns?
In fact, new research shows there’s plenty of water to accommodate the growing population as long as the decades-long trend of diminishing water use per capita continues. To explain the disconnect, CalMatters’ Manuela Tobias and the Los Angeles Times’ Liam Dillon sit down with Ellen Hanak, director of the Public Policy Institute of California’s Water Policy Center.”
Despite uproar, few seek to use California’s new housing-density law. What’s stopping them?
The Chronicle, DUSTIN GARDINER: “The roadblock that prevented Christian Yang from using SB9, California’s new law that aims to increase housing density in residential neighborhoods, was one very, very big fee.
Yang, a software engineer from Sunnyvale, said he and his wife planned to build a second home in their backyard after they heard about the law. The couple was excited about the idea because she was pregnant with their second child and his parents, who live in Chicago, wanted to move to be closer to the grandkids.
Under SB9, homeowners with large enough lots are supposed to have an expedited path to build more units on their property by either splitting their lot and building another home or converting their home into a duplex — or both.”
Homes for people with severe mental illness are rapidly closing. Will help come fast enough?
LAT, LILA SEIDMAN: “Mark Samuel has calculated how long his willpower will last before he closes a home for people suffering from mental illness who have little money to their name.
Thirty-six months.
Then he’ll tear down Sepulveda Residential in Van Nuys and put up apartments, or sell. Plans and permits for the demolition are ready to go. Developers have tried to cajole him into selling with eye-popping offers. Once he pays for the building permit, it’s a done deal.”
Missed last month’s supermoon? There’s another one Wednesday
AP: “If you missed last month’s supermoon, you have another chance.
This month’s full moon is Wednesday. At the same time, the moon’s orbit will bring it closer to Earth than usual. This cosmic combo is called a supermoon.
That can make the moon appear slightly bigger and brighter, weather permitting.”
Brewers need cans. California’s broken recycling system is making them hard to find
LAT, SOFIA FERNANDEZ: “Cindy Le, the operations director at Almanac Beer Co. in Alameda, had customers lining up for her Black Magic IPA and Peaceful Pils this spring. She was just running out of ways to sell it.
Cans are in short supply nationally, creating an unforeseen headache for brewers and driving up prices for drinkers. A variety of factors are driving the shortage, including pandemic lockdowns that curtailed manufacturing, supplier upheavals and a canned cocktail boom that increased demand for aluminum.
Another reason: California’s creaking recycling system can’t collect enough cans, one consequence of a program that has been crippled by redemption center closures and out-of-date policies that have made it harder for people to recycle effectively.”
Around the world, night mayors help cities expand nightlife, culture and economic growth. Could it work in S.F.?
The Chronicle, EMMA SILVERS: “In 2012, Amsterdam’s nightlife was on the brink. As tourists poured in to partake of the region’s after-hours pleasures, the city center saw massive overcrowding. Between noise and safety issues, friction had reached a combustion point between bar and nightclub owners, local government and residents who just wanted a good night’s sleep.
Enter the nachtburgemeester: Mirik Milan, Amsterdam’s first “night mayor.” An independent position, funded in part by the city and in part by local club owners, his task was to advocate for and grow the city’s nightlife scene — all while working with residents, clubs and city officials to implement smart, forward-thinking policy around alcohol, safety, late-night transit and other infrastructure.
“There was an appetite for better communication between all the sides, to bridge the gaps. But it was also created to look at creative talent development,” said Milan, noting that at the time, many of Amsterdam’s young artists were leaving in droves for Berlin. “The mayor and I really tag-teamed on: What can we do to make Amsterdam a more attractive place to stay?””
D.A. Brooke Jenkins to review drug cases, may reverse decisions made under Chesa Boudin
The Chronicle, MEGAN CASSIDY: “Interim San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins has ordered a review of dozens of drug cases in which the office extended plea offers under her predecessor and may revoke some of those pending offers, she said in an interview Monday.
“When I gave my acceptance speech... I indicated to the public that on day one, I will begin enforcing drug crime law,” said Jenkins. “That is something that I wasn’t just saying because it sounded great in a speech, but because that’s what I meant.”
The move by Jenkins, a former assistant district attorney who was sworn in Friday after her appointment by Mayor London Breed, signals that she may quickly seek to boost jail sentences or other punishments after she campaigned in favor of the successful recall of Chesa Boudin, whom she called too lenient.”
California-born Ada Limón is named the new U.S. poet laureate
AP, HILLEL ITALIE: “The country’s next poet laureate, Ada Limón, has long thought of her work as a public art form.
“I grew up with poetry being in the community,” says Limón, a native of Sonoma. “It wasn’t supposed to just be something read on [the] page; it was supposed be read out loud. I remember going to poetry readings at the bookstore where I worked when I was 16. It’s the oral tradition. That part of poetry has always remained true to me.”
On Tuesday, the Library of Congress announced that the 46-year-old Limón had been named the 24th U.S. poet laureate, officially called the Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry. Her one-year term begins Sept. 29 with the traditional reading at the Library’s Coolidge Auditorium, one of the laureate’s few formal obligations.”
‘Bad City’ alleges bad behavior — by a medical school dean, USC and within The Times
LAT, MARIA L. LA GANGA: “It would be hard to find a worse couple of years than 2016 and 2017 for two major Los Angeles institutions: the University of Southern California and The Times.
That’s when a young drug addict overdosed on crystal meth and GHB in a Pasadena hotel room while partying with Dr. Carmen Puliafito, dean of USC’s Keck School of Medicine. It also was when two high-level editors then at The Times were accused of trying to stop the paper’s own reporting team from covering the USC scandal.
The Times eventually published a lengthy piece on USC’s major ethical lapses. But to do so, a clandestine team of reporters had to hide their early efforts to cover the university from the paper’s top management, according to “Bad City: Peril and Power in the City of Angels,” out this month.”
Faculty perk at center of issues that led to Castro resignation in use on other CSU campuses
EdSource, ASHLEY A. SMITH: “The perk at the heart of a buyout of a Fresno State administrator in 2020 that led to the resignation of Joseph I. Castro as chancellor was not an isolated situation.
Since 2015, a handful of administrators across the CSU system have been offered the ability to retreat to the faculty, or exercise that right, despite investigations, allegations of misconduct or disciplinary actions made against them, according to an EdSource investigation.
Now, the California State University Board of Trustees is creating a policy to tighten the circumstances that would allow faculty who serve as administrators to take on tenured faculty positions. The new policy would bar administrators from faculty jobs in the system if they have been fired or are under investigation for misconduct or policy violations.”
Cal State’s Black students are falling behind other groups — and poor graduation data obscures the crisis
CALMatters, MIKHAIL ZINSHTEYN: “At the close of the first-ever California State University Juneteenth Symposium last month, the system’s top executive laid out an agenda for improving the Black student experience at the nation’s largest public university system.
The first item on Interim Chancellor Jolene Koester’s list? “We need to disaggregate the data,” she said.
Huh?”
Tech exec arrested for third time in 30-year-old killing of Mountain View woman
The Chronicle, MICHAEL CABANATUAN: “A familiar suspect was arrested in connection with a 30-year-old murder case Saturday as he arrived at JFK Airport in New York, authorities said Monday.
John Kevin Woodward, 58, president and CEO of online training company Readytech, was arrested after arriving from the Netherlands, where he’s lived since he was unsuccessfully tried twice in the strangulation murder of 25-year-old Laurie Houts, a computer engineer.
Houts’ body was found near a garbage dump, about a mile from her workplace in Mountain View, in 1992, with a rope around her neck and footprints on the interior of the windshield, the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s office said — “a sign of her struggle with Woodward.””
‘Meeting with the enemy’: Was the leader of the Mongols motorcycle gang a double agent for the feds?
LAT, MATTHEW ORMSETH: “Drunk and despondent, David Santillan called his wife to beg for forgiveness.
The president of the notorious Mongols motorcycle club promised he’d put his infidelities behind him, get sober and be a better father to their children.
Then the conversation, which she was secretly recording, turned to John.”
Judge won’t delay contempt trial for Trump ex-advisor Steve Bannon
AP, NOMAAN MERCHANT: “A federal judge Monday declined to delay the upcoming trial of Stephen K. Bannon, a onetime advisor to former President Trump who faces contempt of Congress charges after refusing for months to cooperate with the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection.
Bannon is still scheduled to go on trial next week despite telling the House committee late Saturday that he is now prepared to testify. It’s unclear whether Bannon will again decline to appear before the committee with the trial pending.
Bannon was also barred from asserting several potential defenses or calling House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) or members of the House committee to the stand. The series of rulings by U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols left one of his attorneys complaining that the former White House senior official, now host of the “Bannon’s War Room” podcast, wouldn’t be able to defend himself at all.”
