Maddy Institute – June 30, 2020

30Jun

POLICY & POLITICS

North SJ Valley:

Manteca appointing millennial committee

Manteca Bulletin

Manteca’s elected leaders — in a bid to build a community that’s appealing to young professionals expected to shape the bulk of economic growth in the next 20 years — are asking millennials for advice.

As pandemic causes budget to crater, Modesto looks to cut 30 open police jobs

Modesto Bee

Modesto’s proposed budget for its new fiscal year includes eliminating 30 open police officer positions and eliminating or freezing about 18 open firefighter positions as the city has seen its tax revenue nose-dive in the new coronavirus recession.

Merced County being monitored by California for spiking COVID-19 cases

abc30

California’s Gov. Gavin Newsom will hold briefings on the state’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

● Stanislaus County records its highest case total in a day Modesto Bee

● Stanislaus County not closing bars to curb spread of coronavirus. Will the state do it? Modesto Bee

Opinion: Why It’s Time to Adopt MLK JR.’s Idea of Guaranteed Income (Stockton Mayor Included)

Time

Economic insecurity isn’t new and poverty itself is violent. We need a policy solution that is as bold as it is innovative and as simple as it is ambitious. We must fight every day for a more just economy, because what happens to one of us happens indirectly to all of us and we are in this fight together.

Central SJ Valley:

Fresno elected official’s son has COVID-19. That means big changes at City Hall

Fresno Bee

Fresno City Council President Miguel Arias announced on Monday that his young son tested positive for COVID-19 and he is awaiting his own test results, prompting this week’s city council meeting to revert to online.

507 inmates test positive for COVID-19 in Fresno Jail, 25 officers as well

Fresno Bee

A total of 507 Fresno County Jail inmates have tested positive for the COVID-19 virus in results released Monday by the Fresno County Sheriff’s Office. In addition, 25 correctional officers and one court deputy have tested positive.

Spread of COVID-19 continues in Tulare County

Visalia Times Delta

Tulare County’s spike in COVID-19 case is continuing. Public health officials report there are now 3,872 cases.

New sheriff ready for role

Madera Tribune

Throughout his 19-year tenure with the Madera County Sheriff’s Department, newly minted Sheriff Tyson Pogue thought he had had the best job and couldn’t see himself do anything else. However, that has lasted every step of the way for Pogue. From being a deputy on patrol to handling a K-9 unit, Pogue thought he had the best job in the world.

South SJ Valley:

Coronavirus strikes deep into Kern County’s budget

Bakersfield Californian

The Kern County Board of Supervisors will attempt to grapple with a coronavirus-sized hole in its budget during Tuesday’s meeting. The supervisors are slated to approve a preliminary budget that leaves many departments with 7.5 percent in reductions.

● Kern health department announces one more death, 70 new cases of COVID-19 Bakersfield Californian

Rep. McCarthy announces $11.1 million grant for Meadows Field Airport

ABC23

Meadows Field Airport has received $11.1 million from the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Aviation Administration has awarded an Airport Improvement Program. Local Representative and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy announced Monday that the grant consists of $7.5 million in discretionary funds, $2.6 million in formula funding, and $1 million in CARES Act funds.

BPD officer returns to duty following investigation of blackface photo

Bakersfield Californian

A Bakersfield Police officer has returned to duty after an internal affairs investigation regarding a social media post of a prior to 2010 photo depicting the officer dressed in blackface that was brought to BPD’s attention earlier this month.

State:

California Gov. Gavin Newsom signs $202 billion pandemic budget

LA Times

California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a $202 billion budget Monday with emergency pandemic funding, expanded unemployment aid and billions of dollars in cuts forced by the coronavirus-caused recession.

Newsom: Further restrictions possible if virus threat rises

Fresno Bee

Nearly three-quarters of California residents live in counties facing concerning coronavirus trends, Gov. Gavin Newsom said Monday as he warned he would impose further targeted shutdowns of counties or businesses if necessary and step up enforcement of his orders.

● Newsom expands county watch list as coronavirus spreads CalMatters

● Newsom threatens to reverse California reopening as coronavirus spreads LA Times

● Newsom hints at renewed restrictions in California: ‘We don’t like the trend line’ SF Chronicle

● California coronavirus spread took a turn on Memorial Day LA Times

● California COVID-19 mask order tests Newsom’s power limits LA Times

● ‘Our Luck May Have Run Out’: California’s Case Count Explodes NY Times

Here’s why some rural Calif residents aren’t following Gov. Newsom’s mask order

Sac Bee

Residents in Placer and El Dorado counties explain Friday, June 26, 2020, their reasons for not following Gov. Gavin Newsom’s order requiring people to wear face masks in public to slow the spread of the coronavirus.

Calif health officers facing protests, even death threats, over coronavirus orders

SFChronicle.com

A colleague texted Dr. Erica Pan, the health officer for Alameda County, a photo of the yard sign. It showed a photo of her with the words “Financially destroyed families and businesses” and “#A–holeMD.”

Op-Ed: Why California needs affirmative action more than ever

LA Times

In November, a new generation of California voters will have the opportunity to restore affirmative action in the state. Assembly Constitutional Amendment 5 will be on the ballot, giving voters the chance to repeal Proposition 209, which banned the consideration of race, sex or ethnicity in public employment, contracting and education in 1996, nearly a quarter of a century ago.

Federal:

Supreme Court strikes down Louisiana law in major win for abortion rights

Fresno Bee

The Supreme Court struck down a Louisiana law that restricted abortions in the state, with Chief Justice John Roberts siding with the liberal justices in the ruling. The case of June Medical Services v. Russo questioned Louisiana’s requirement that doctors who perform abortions must have admitting privileges at a local hospital.

● Supreme Court liberals, with Roberts, strike down Louisiana abortion law LA Times

● Editorial: Why Roberts stuck with precedent in the abortion case LA Times

● Op-Ed: Data undeniably show why the Supreme Court’s June Medical abortion outcome is good for women LA Times

Supreme Court Gives President Power to Fire CFPB Chief

NPR

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled Monday that the president can fire at will the head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau but left intact the rest of the statute that created the agency. Congress created the independent agency in 2010 to protect consumers from abuses in the banking and financial services industry that led to the 2008 financial meltdown.

Supreme Court declines to hear border wall challenge

Bakersfield Californian

The Supreme Court is leaving in place a decision that rejected environmental groups’ challenge to sections of wall the Trump administration is building along the U.S. border with Mexico. The high court on Monday declined to hear an appeal involving construction of 145 miles (233 kilometers) of steel-bollard walls along the border in Arizona, California, New Mexico and Texas.

Democratic-led House passes expansion of Affordable Care Act, forcing Republicans on the record about the law during a pandemic

Wash Post

The vote was largely a political statement less than five months before the 2020 election, as Senate Republicans have no plans to consider the bill and the Trump administration has threatened a veto. But the measure — the first effort to significantly expand the reach of the ACA since its passage — highlights the parties’ differences on health care when millions of Americans have lost their health benefits and nearly 125,000 have died of the disease caused by the novel coronavirus.

Trump Got Written Briefing in February on Possible Russian Bounties, Officials Say

NY Times

The investigation into Russia’s suspected operation is said to focus in part on the killings of three Marines in a truck bombing last year, officials said.

Three Weeks That Changed Everything: How the White House Coronavirus Response Went Wrong

The Atlantic

Imagine if the National Transportation Safety Board investigated America’s response to the coronavirus pandemic.

Coronavirus Trackers:

Coronavirus (COVID-19) in California

Covid19.ca.gov

COVID-19 is a new illness that can affect your lungs and airways. It’s caused by a virus called coronavirus.

● Coronavirus (COVID-19) CDC

● Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) Pandemic – WHO

● John Hopkins University & Medicine John Hopkins University

● Tracking coronavirus in California LA Times

● Coronavirus Tracker SF Chronicle

● Coronavirus in the U.S.: Latest Map and Case Count NY Times

● How many coronavirus cases have been reported in each U.S. state? Politico

● Coronavirus Daily NPR

● Coronavirus tracked: the latest figures as the pandemic spreads Financial Times

● Coronavirus in California by the numbers CalMatters

Elections 2020:

Trump policy and coronavirus leave agency bankrupt, tens of thousands of potential voters in limbo

LA Times

Azra Nazir had a dress picked out, gray and blue. She had the subway directions. And in a rarity over two decades as an emergency room nurse, the 59-year-old had a few days off — her first in months of battling the coronavirus at its epicenter in Brooklyn.

Trump ramps up Facebook ad spend as Biden pulls ahead in polls

CNBC

President Donald Trump has ramped up his re-election campaign’s Facebook ad spending after falling behind presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden in numerous nationwide polls.

● Joe Biden Leads; He Still Faces Four Big Tasks Wall Street Journal

● Opinion: Biden and Democrats Are Set to Abolish the Suburbs National Review

Reddit bans pro-Trump forum in crackdown on hate speech

Politico

Reddit said Monday it has banned a long-time forum used by President Donald Trump supporters as part of an escalation of its efforts against hateful conduct, a move that arrives as the social media industry faces a public reckoning over its handling of incendiary posts by the president.

How to combat online voter suppression

Brookings

“As it stands, there is nothing compelling Facebook, or any internet company, to protect the bedrock of our democratic process: free and fair elections.” In a new article for TechStream, Yael Eisenstat calls on the U.S. government to establish rules that protect democracy, rather than allowing online platforms to govern themselves.

Other:

BET Awards Mistakenly Includes Willie Brown Jr. in Memoriam Segment

Hollywood Reporter

The BET Awards mistakenly included politician Willie Lewis Brown Jr. in its “In Memoriam” segment on Sunday night. Brown, the former mayor of SF, is still alive.

AGRICULTURE/FOOD

Grape growers turn a corner

Bakersfield Californian

Things are looking up for Kern County’s top crop. After a difficult two years for California table grape growers, conditions seem to be aligning nicely just in time for the start of the Central Valley harvest.

‘Everything is about humanity.’ Chico-area farm takes new approach to raising pigs

Sac Bee

Factory farms cause ongoing environmental impacts and can create new pandemics. So says hog-farmer Charlie Thieriot, whose Chico-area company is taking a different approach — staying small, selling locally and using ethical and sustainable practices.

CRIMINAL JUSTICE/FIRE/PUBLIC SAFETY

Crime:

Joaquin Castro Calls Police Violence A Major, If Underreported, Problem for Latinos

VPR
The deaths of 27-year-old Carlos Ingram-Lopez in Tucson and 18-year old Andres Guardado in LA have reignited calls to not only end incidents of police brutality against Black people, but also those against Latinx people.

Public Safety:

507 inmates test positive for COVID-19 in Fresno Jail, 25 officers as well

Fresno Bee

Employee at South County Justice Center in Porterville tests positive for COVID-19

abc30

The South County Justice Center in Porterville has been closed for cleaning after an employee tested positive for the coronavirus, officials said Monday. Further information on the employee’s condition or if any other employees at the Porterville courthouse have been exposed is not immediately available.

Sanitizer poses risk for July 4: Firefighters amid COVID-19

Fresno Bee

Using hand sanitizer could be a disaster waiting to happen this Fourth of July, officials say.

California Prisons Are COVID Hotbeds Despite Billions Spent On Inmate Health

California Healthline

From Corcoran and Avenal state prisons in the arid Central Valley to historical San Quentin on the SF Bay, California prisons have emerged as raging COVID-19 hot spots, even as the state annually spends more on inmate health care than other big states spend on their entire prison systems.

California to Release Some Inmates With Virus Ravaging Prisons

Bloomberg

California Governor Gavin Newsom is working to release more than 3,500 prisoners who are close to finishing their sentences as Covid-19 tears through the state’s correctional system, including an outbreak that has infected nearly a third of inmates at San Quentin State Prison near SF.

Fact Check: Trump falsely said Obama didn’t try to fix policing

Politifact

Amid continued calls from Americans for changes in policing practices and an end to excessive use of force, President Donald Trump signed an executive order that he said is intended to encourage police departments to adopt the highest professional standards.

COMMUNITY VOICES: Steps toward effective, safe, economic policing

Bakersfield Californian

Increasing money allocated to a police department that, by its own recent public admissions, is not meeting the needs of the community, is an insult to the hundreds of residents who have put their lives on the line to march for justice in our streets and an even starker insult to the memory of Robert Forbes and impacted community members. In Bakersfield Police Department Chief Terry’s own words, “Policing hasn’t done enough. For far too long, the police have decided what the community needs.”

Fire:

CAL Fire crews battling Pass Fire in Merced County, currently at 50% containment

abc30

CAL Fire crews are battling a large blaze in Merced County. The Pass Fire quickly spread to 2,192 acres Monday morning, and containment is now at 50%. The fire is burning off Highway 152 and Dinosaur Point Road, along the Pacheco Pass.

ECONOMY/JOBS

Economy:

Bar order raises concerns of more closures to come

Bakersfield Californian

Gov. Gavin Newsom’s order to close bars in Kern County affects about 70 individual establishments that operate as bars, and hundreds of restaurants that will have to limit bar service, said Kern County Director of Public Health Services Matt Constantine.

Wall Street indexes are mixed following last week’s slump

LA Times

Stocks are drifting up and down in early trading on Wall Street, following up on last week’s slump with more tentative trading. The S&P 500 was up 0.4% early Monday after wobbling between gains and losses shortly after trading began, following up on mixed moves overseas. European stocks inched higher, while many Asian markets finished with losses. Treasury yields were holding steady.

The coronavirus could send hundreds of small banks to the ICU

AEI

While the Federal Reserve may believe that the largest banking institutions have sufficient capital to weather a COVID-19 recession, the forecast for community banks is more pernicious.

PPP Loan Window Is Closing, With $134 Billion Still on Offer

Wall Street Journal

Congress weighs options for leftover funding, including allowing businesses to take out a second loan.

Jobs:

FedEx hiring 800 new employees for warehouse in Tracy

abc30.com

FedEx Ground is hiring 800 new employees for their warehouse in Tracy, the company announced.

Calif unemployment agency set limits on requests to help ‘hardship’ cases

Merced Sun-Star

The state’s Employment Development Department told senators and Assembly members concerned about special constituent “hardship requests” they could ask for help with only one each week – but after an uproar from some lawmakers the agency has changed its mind.

Interns: How’s your summer going?

Roll Call

Things feel weirdly quiet in Wash without crowds of interns flooding the short-term housing market and filling the halls of the Senate and House office buildings. You can still see a smattering of intern badges, but most of the pipelines that typically bring young people to the Hill have temporarily shut down.

EDUCATION

K-12:

Clovis students faced ‘unchecked’ racism, NAACP says. Schools confront troubled history

Fresno Bee

Clovis schools are changing. But are they changing fast enough? District leaders are making efforts to hire teachers from more diverse backgrounds. Recently, elected officials have acknowledged the community’s history of racist and insensitive incidents and pledged to be part of the solution.

District removes Black Lives Matters signs from Visalia school, seeks new forum for students

Fresno Bee

A row of Black Lives Matter signs posted along the fence line at El Diamante High School will be removed on Friday following several confrontations outside of the Visalia school.

Will VUSD be ready for the fall semester? Here’s where the district stands

Visalia Times Delta

Here’s where the district stands on other critical components for one-to-one learning.

Want to keep kids studying at home? Time has come to let Modesto City Schools know

Modesto Bee

With just six weeks until the Modesto City Schools academic year begins, and with Stanislaus County on the state’s watch list for COVID-19 hot spots because of an increase in cases, the deadline is here for families to state their preference between having their students study from home or return to campuses.

KHSD board weighs community divisiveness on reopening schools, defunding district police department

Bakersfield Californian

The Kern High School District board of trustees heard various comments from district leaders and the community Monday night regarding reopening schools in the fall and providing funds for the district’s police department. Brenda Lewis, associate superintendent of instruction, and others shared just some of the challenges the district faces if students return in the fall. A vote did not take place Monday night, and the board will reconvene for a special board meeting in the next few weeks.

California parents weigh risks, benefits of sending kids back to school

EdSource

As schools plan to reopen, California parents are asking themselves if it is better to send their children back to school and risk them getting the coronavirus or keeping them at home to do distance learning.

U.S. Pediatricians Call For In-Person School This Fall

VPR

The nation’s pediatricians have come out with a strong statement in favor of bringing children back to the classroom this fall wherever and whenever they can do so safely. The American Academy of Pediatrics’ guidance “strongly advocates that all policy considerations for the coming school year should start with a goal of having students physically present in school.”

Higher Ed:

Napolitano says farewell to UC, advocates for affirmative action and Covid-19 research

EdSource

Most university presidencies end quietly as major decisions are deferred for campus successors and outgoing leaders don’t rock the boat. However, Janet Napolitano’s final months as president of the ten-campus University of California have been tumultuous.

‘We Could Be Feeling This for the Next Decade’: Virus Hits College Towns

NY Times

Opening bars and bringing back football teams have led to new outbreaks. Communities that evolved around campuses face potentially existential losses in population, jobs and revenue.

ENVIRONMENT/ENERGY

Environment:

Supreme Court allows Trump to override environmental laws to build border wall

SF Chronicle

While President Trump’s authority to spend money on his border wall remains uncertain, the Supreme Court rejected a challenge Monday to the administration’s power to override environmental laws during construction of 145 miles of barriers in California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas.

The world’s climate catastrophe worsens amid the pandemic

Wash Post

We may be living inside the biggest annual carbon crash in recorded history. The quarantines, shutdowns and trade and travel stoppages prompted by the spread of the coronavirus led to a historic plunge in greenhouse gas emissions. In some places, the environmental change was palpable — smog lifted from cities free of traffic congestion, rivers ran clear of the murk that long clogged their banks.

Opinion: Climate change is a racial justice problem

Wash Post

Normally, I use this column to respond to questions from readers about climate change. But — amid our ongoing national reckoning with racism prompted by the unequal impacts of the covid-19 pandemic, the recent killings of African Americans at the hands of police, and 400 years of history — this was the question on my mind.

Energy:

PG&E Gets on Board With All-Electric New Buildings in California

GreenTechMedia

Pacific Gas & Electric has become the first combined natural gas and electric utility in California to express support for an emerging plan to require “efficient, all-electric new construction” in the state, telling regulators that it wants to “avoid investments in new gas assets that might later prove underutilized” under the state’s long-term decarbonization goals.

The TAP-Plus approach to anti-corruption in the natural resource value chain

Brookings

With bribery alone costing the world $1.5 trillion a year, it is clear that corruption is a massive global challenge. In a new report, experts explore how the oil, gas, and mining industries succumb to corruption and explore ways to address the problem and improve overall governance in resource rich countries.

HEALTH/HUMAN SERVICES

Health:

Merced County being monitored by California for spiking COVID-19 cases

abc30

California’s Gov. Gavin Newsom will hold briefings on the state’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

● Kern health department announces one more death, 70 new cases of COVID-19 Bakersfield Californian

● Stanislaus County records its highest case total in a day Modesto Bee

● Sac County smashes records with 228 new coronavirus cases, 87 total in hospitals Sac Bee

Fresno County adds 337 COVID-19 cases as state closes bars. Jail has more than 500 cases

Fresno Bee

Fresno County Jail has had its own difficulty keeping the spread down inside a building full of people in tight quarters.

Spread of COVID-19 continues in Tulare County

Visalia Times Delta

Tulare County’s spike in COVID-19 case is continuing. Public health officials report there are now 3,872 cases.

Coronavirus herd immunity ‘unlikely’ if too many people refuse a vaccine, Fauci says

Sac Bee

Herd immunity against COVID-19 is unlikely if not enough Americans get a vaccine, a top health expert says. Dr. Anthony Fauci, the White House’s top infectious diseases expert, said Sunday on CNN that he would “settle” for a coronavirus vaccine that’s 70% to 75% effective, as that would bring the United States to “herd immunity level.”

The Virus Is Still There, Whether We Like It or Not

National Review

We don’t have precise numbers for perhaps the second-most consequential measure of the pandemic, hospitalizations, but hospitalization rates are increasing in quite a few states.

EDITORIAL: Juul wants to hook kids on nicotine. This California leader just complicated that plan

Sac Bee

It’s been a rough few years for Juul, the California-based corporation that specializes in hooking American schoolchildren on fruity-flavored nicotine products. Credited with sparking a national epidemic of youth nicotine addiction, Juul now faces hundreds of lawsuits and multiple federal investigations.

Human Services:

‘Masking’ Agents?: How exactly can mask requirement be enforced? For now, it’s pretty much voluntary

Porterville Recorder

It’s been more than a week since Governor Gavin Newsom issued a mandate effectively requiring almost all Californians to wear a face covering in public, but the question persists. Just how exactly is the mandate going to be enforced. For the most part so far across the state any kind of enforcement of the mandate has been voluntary.

● Masks for COVID-19 are effective, as a six-part Facebook takedown fails PolitiFact

● Medical workers frustrated with public’s lack of face mask use, social distancing NBC

● Virus Spikes While Local and State Officials Bicker Over Face Mask Mandates PEW

● National mask mandate would avert 5% GDP loss: Goldman Sachs TheHill

CVS in Visalia and Tulare to offer rapid COVID-19 testing

Visalia Times Delta

Select CVS Pharmacy stores are now offering rapid COVID-19 testing in Tulare and Visalia.

Gilead’s $2,340 price for coronavirus drug draws criticism

Bakersfield Californian

The maker of a drug shown to shorten recovery time for severely ill COVID-19 patients says it will charge $2,340 for a typical treatment course for people covered by government health programs in the United States and other developed countries.

● Gilead prices coronavirus drug remdesivir at $2,340 for five-day treatment LA Times

● Column: Is Gilead ripping us off with a COVID-19 treatment topping $3,000? LA Times

Houchin extends coronavirus antibody testing

Bakersfield Californian

Houchin Community Blood Bank will continue its free coronavirus antibody testing until further notice, the organization announced on its Facebook page.

Reinvent health care to beat COVID-19

Wall Street Journal

For reopening to succeed against a relentless virus, we need more help from the health care industry. This doesn’t mean stopping all elective services.

The economic cost and spatial diffusion of the opioid crisis

AEI

This report estimates nationwide, regional, and county-level economic costs associated with the opioid crisis.

IMMIGRATION

5 (more) times California fought Trump on immigration — and what happened

Sac Bee

California had two big victories this month with The Supreme Court ruling in favor of the state’s sanctuary laws and Deferred Action for Childhood Arrival protections for immigrants brought to the U.

Supreme Court declines to hear border wall challenge

Bakersfield Californian

LAND USE/HOUSING

Land Use:

First California theme park set to reopen — without rides

Orange County Register

The first theme park in California to reopen after the COVID-19 pandemic shuttered parks for months will swing open its gates without one key ingredient: rides. Six Flags Discovery Kingdom in Vallejo will reopen the Marine World Experience with reduced capacity in time for the Fourth of July holiday.

Housing:

Coronavirus: Landlords begin challenging state eviction moratorium

Mercury News

Suits across the state threaten tenants protections.

Some homeowners struggled to pay PACE improvement loans. The coronavirus made it harder

LA Times

It wasn’t until the work was done that Marcelino and Josefina Rodriguez said they learned the truth. They had been signed up for a roughly $45,000 PACE home improvement loan at nearly 10% interest — even though they said a woman working with the contractor told them their new roof and water heater would be free through a government program.

PUBLIC FINANCES

California Gov. Gavin Newsom signs $202 billion pandemic budget

LA Times

California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a $202 billion budget Monday with emergency pandemic funding, expanded unemployment aid and billions of dollars in cuts forced by the coronavirus-caused recession.

Calif state maintenance workers take one-year pay-cut deal in hope of better times ahead

Fresno Bee

California workers who maintain the state’s buildings, roads and equipment would take a 9.23 percent pay cut in exchange for two flexible days off per month in a proposed contract agreement with Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration.

SF is piling tax hikes on the ballot. Will voters embrace them in a recession?

SF Chronicle

SF voters could be weighing as many as five tax hike measures this fall, in what will be a test of how the coronavirus-fueled recession influences attitudes on economic growth and whether the city’s big businesses are paying their fair share.

TRANSPORTATION

State road workers from at least nine Caltrans stations test positive for COVID-19 in 2 weeks

Sac Bee

At least 10 state road workers at Caltrans maintenance yards have tested positive for COVID-19 in the last two weeks, according to notices sent to employees.

FAA starts Boeing 737 Max test flights, key to returning planes to service after deadly crashes

LA Times

A Boeing Co. 737 Max lifted off from a Seattle airfield with a U.S. Federal Aviation Administration pilot on board, the first of several flights to test whether the revamped jetliner is safe following two deadly crashes.

Is it safe to fly? Far-flung Bay Area families weigh coronavirus risk

SF Chronicle

When Kyle King heard his grandmother had stopped eating, his first instinct was to book a flight to Tennessee.King lives in Berkeley, but he grew up in Greeneville, Tenn., a “beautiful but economically depressed” town known for its abundant churches and as the home of President Andrew Johnson.

$1.6 billion in California High-Speed Rail contracts deferred to December: Is this a funds diversion capitulation or simply a COVID-19 delay?

California Construction News

The California High-Speed Rail Authority (CAHSRA) is delaying$1.6 billion of construction contract signing from September until December, SF Streetsblog reports.

WATER

Developer to Pay Penalty for Stormwater Violations

California Water News Daily

The Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board announced a settlement has been reached with Lewis Land Developers for violating a construction stormwater general permit at a 122-acre project in Placer County that led to an uncontrolled discharge of sediment and stormwater into a nearby ravine.

“Xtra”

Bay Area Fourth of July: No fireworks, but here’s how to celebrate anyway

Datebook

Mass gatherings and fireworks shows that bring communities together have always been at the heart of Fourth of July celebrations across the country. As the U.S. continues to grapple with the COVID-19 pandemic, this year’s commemoration of Independence Day will not be business as usual.