Small businesses owned by Black, Indigenous and People of Color are being disproportionately crushed by the weight of the pandemic – and many aren’t positioned to survive the next few months. So, when Gov. Gavin Newsom announced $500 million in grant funding and a temporary tax relief package for small businesses last...
What the Federal Stimulus Package Means for California
The federal stimulus package that lawmakers in Washington have agreed to is “very encouraging news” for California, Gov. Gavin Newsom said Monday as he outlined how much of the $900 billion federal package is likely to flow to the Golden State. “While it’s a lower number than we had hoped for, it...
Opinion: California Farmers Looking for Regulatory Sanity
In his sequel to “Alice in Wonderland,” Lewis Carroll depicts a fantastical world in which his heroine finds that, like a reflection in a mirror, everything is reversed, including logic. Since “Through the Looking-Glass” was published in 1871, the idiom has come to describe situations where you find the opposite...
Opinion: Don’t Fall for Fossil Fuel Propaganda
The consequences of climate change do not impact all Californians equally, and here in the San Joaquin Valley, community members and agricultural workers are on the frontlines of the air pollution, water scarcity and increased heat that are inextricably tied to climate change. Our health, well-being and future prosperity depend...
A Bumpy Ride for California Amtrak as Pandemic Surges
Gabriella Choe has been a regular Amtrak passenger for the past four years, traveling from Oakland to Sacramento to see her parents. Before the pandemic, she rode the train nearly every other weekend. But as the pandemic worsens, her visits are now infrequent, and she doesn’t plan on traveling for...
Can California Protect COVID-19 Vaccine From Cheaters and Fraudsters?
What seemed like a Herculean task just months ago is now here: the COVID-19 vaccine. For the next several weeks, vaccines will be available in limited amounts in California and across the nation — and only to high-risk individuals, with supply expected to ramp up in the months to come....
What Does Poll Show About Vaccines, Mask Mandate and a Replacement for Harris’ Senate Seat
Californians overwhelmingly want Gov. Gavin Newsom to appoint the best person possible to fill Vice President-elect Kamala Harris’ Senate seat regardless of race or sex, and people are more overwhelmed by living with COVID-19 than they expected, according to a recent poll by Public Policy Polling. Though the governor wrestles with whom...
Some Lessons for Newsom and Democrats From the Last Recall Effort
Gov. Gray Davis made history on Oct. 7, 2003, by becoming only the second governor in the lifetime of the U.S. to be recalled by voters. The only other was a governor of faraway North Dakota in 1921. With Gov. Gavin Newsom now under threat of recall himself, Democrats would...
Opinion: How to Create an Easier Path to Climate Goals Through Electric Vehicles
California has led America’s climate fight by pioneering solutions here at home like cap-and-trade and tailpipe pollution reduction targets that the federal government and other states have adopted. We can once again play this role, paving the way for President-elect Joe Biden’s goal of building 500,000 electric vehicle charging stations,...
COVID Tests Lagging: Slower Turnaround Times Creeping Back for Californians
Seven days a week, San Francisco’s public health laboratory operates until midnight. Workers are exhausted, their director says. And still, the COVID-19 specimens keep coming in their little plastic tubes, with test results expected quickly to help manage California’s alarming surge of infections. The lab was set up earlier in...