The Bay

Berkeley unveiled new city limit signs this week that say “Welcome to the City of Berkeley - Ohlone Territory.” Colonizers have wiped away much Native American history in the Bay Area, but a few burial shellmounds are still around. Another sign that reminds us of who was here first and whose land we are living on. In this episode, originally produced by KQED's Bay Curious show, we review a part of the Ohlone shellmound history in the East Bay. Guest: Laura Klivans, KQED reporter Read more about Ohlone shellmounds from KQED’s Bay Curious show. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Fights over housing policies in the Bay Area often include these two sides: The NIMBYs (not in my backyard) and the YIMBYs (yes in my backyard). Let me introduce you to the PHIMBYs, who are bringing another level of nuance to the housing debate. They believe more public housing should be part of a solution to the Bay Area's housing crisis. And they see a contentious project in the Mission as having PHIMBY potential. Guest: Jessica Placzek, KQED reporter For more, read Jessica's full story on PHIMBY and public housing in San Francisco at KQED.org. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

People are outraged that two Sacramento police officers will not face criminal charges for killing 22-year old Stephon Clark last year, an unarmed Black man holding a cell phone. The state attorney general and the district attorney both say the officers' use of deadly force was legally justified. But two bills in the Legislature could change the standards when deciding whether to prosecute officers, and how police train to use deadly force. Guest: Marisa Lagos, political correspondent for KQED Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Bay officially launched on March 6, 2018. Since then, we’ve covered some of the biggest Bay Area stories: elections, ICE raids and all kinds of housing laws. Plus, we've had some real conversations about Bay Area culture. But one of our favorite things is listening to messages that listeners have sent us about our episodes. So today we thought we’d revisit some of our favorite calls. Let us know about an episode of The Bay that moved you! Call 415-553-2273 and leave us a message. Tell us why that particular episode spoke to you. Also, thanks for listening! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Oakland teachers strike is over. Teachers and other educators approved an agreement Sunday night to end the seven-day strike and give parents a reason to send their kids back to school. The agreement offers teachers a pay increase. But school board officials say the raises will come with future budget cuts in other departments. Plus, not everyone is happy with the new contract, especially nurses. Guests: Vanessa Rancano, education reporter for KQED and Julia McEvoy, education editor for KQED. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It’s cold in the Bay Area now. But in 2017, two heat waves killed 14 people in the Bay Area. KQED reporting has found that most of those people who died started getting sick from the heat while inside some place, instead of outside in the sun. State regulators are now in the process of coming up with rules to regulate how hot workplaces can be in order to protect people from heat-related illnesses and deaths. Guest: Molly Peterson, reporter for KQED Science Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chinedu Okobi died last October after being tased by San Mateo sheriff deputies. His death was one of three that happened last year involving tasers and police officers from different departments. Activists and the family of those killed in taser-involved arrests have demanded information about how law enforcement uses tasers and want to see changes to how they are used. Meanwhile, the San Mateo County district attorney's office is expected to release details of its investigation into Okobi’s death, which determine whether officers were legally justified to use force. Guest: Julie Small, KQED criminal justice reporter Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jeff Adachi died suddenly Friday night. While details of how he died are still under investigation, many are remembering Adachi and his tireless efforts as a public defender who provided fair legal representation to the people who needed it most. Adachi was the only elected public defender in the state of California, making his position fighting for and against the system unique. Guest: Scott Shafer, Senior Editor of KQED's Politics and Government Desk. Subscribe and listen to the full Political Breakdown podcast here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It's Day 1 of the Oakland Unified school teacher strike. Teachers, parents and students began picketing Thursday for more pay, support, and smaller class sizes. The strike directly affects thousands of families that must decide whether to send their kids to school or not. And it hurts the district's pocket book every day students are absent. Today, we check in with one school in Oakland to see how families are handling the strike. Guests: Julia McEvoy, KQED senior editor, Alejandra Gonzales, Oakland school parent Get tips, advice and coverage of the teachers strike from KQED by tapping here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lots of gig workers earn tips. So, when InstaCart started paying its full-service shoppers and deliverers on a sliding scale based on how many tips they got, the workers were pissed off. They took to Reddit and Facebook to complain and gained the national media's attention. This month, InstaCart changed how it pays its app workers. It's seen as a victory for gig workers that have been trying to get tech companies to be transparent about how they pay so-called contract workers. Guest: Sam Harnett, tech reporter for KQED Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

PG&E is under pressure to not spark a wildfire this summer. A federal judge overseeing the investor-owned utility's probation case is demanding they take prevention measures. This week, PG&E presented its wildfire safety plan to state regulators, which includes cutting back trees, replacing power poles, installing weather stations, and shutting off power when it’s hot, dry and windy. But PG&E says these plans are costly. And, the question of who will pay for it all, lingers as does PG&E's bankruptcy case. Guest: Dan Brekke, news reporter and editor for KQED Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The opioid crisis has dominated the news, but there is growing evidence that methamphetamine has made a return to San Francisco. Overdoses from meth have more than doubled and about half the people admitted to San Francisco General Hospital with a psychiatric emergency are high on meth. Some health experts think the two drug crises could be related. Guest: April Dembosky, health correspondent for KQED Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ten years is a lot of time. For the Bay Area, it's meant more money, new problems, and getting more serious about climate change. Today on the podcast, we apply the #10YearChallenge to the Bay Area and see how the past ten years has treated the politics, economy, arts and environment scenes in the Bay Area. To give us your take on the #10YearChallenge for the Bay Area ... Call us at 415-553-2273 and leave us a voice message. Be sure to tell us your first name and what part of the Bay Area you are from. Just be aware that your message may be played on the podcast. If you prefer email, we’re at [email protected]. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

BART will stop offering its 4 a.m. train service on Feb. 11 in order to retrofit the Transbay Tube to better withstand major earthquakes. Workers will install a new liner in the 3.6-mile underwater structure to prevent flooding after a big quake, a project that's expected to take three and a half years to complete. That leaves 3,000 people who ride BART during its first hour of service looking for another way to get to work -- including our very own early-morning news anchor Brian Watt. Guest: Brian Watt, morning news anchor for KQED. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

East Bay rapper Keak Da Sneak is credited with pioneering the Hyphy style. This Thursday he has to turn himself in to serve a 16-month state prison sentence. Since being shot in 2017, he’s confined to a wheelchair and needs round the clock care. He can’t expect that kind of care in prison. This has started a conversation about accessibility and medical care while serving time. Guest: Nastia Voynovskaya, music editor for KQED Arts Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

High school freshman Crista Ramos had no idea her mom was living under Temporary Protected Status, a federal humanitarian program that allows about 260,000 immigrants from El Salvador to lawfully live and work in the U.S. But when the Trump administration announced it would end the program, everything changed. Now, Crista’s the lead plaintiff in a class-action lawsuit. Everyday high school worries have been replaced with fighting to keep her family together. Guest: Farida Jhabvala Romero, immigration report for KQED Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chico is bursting at the seams right now. The ripples of displacement from the Camp Fire, which killed at least 86 people and destroyed about 14,000 homes, are far from over as people cram into Chico to stay living close to family, jobs and schools. But the city's vacancy rate is nearly zero, and some people are being evicted to make room. Guest: Sonja Hutson, covers wildfires, emergency preparedness and politics for KQED Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

School closures. Teacher strike. Budget cuts. It hasn’t been a great week for Oakland Unified. The school board voted to close Roots International Academy and will be deciding soon whether to merge two other schools. Plus, teachers – who want more money and better working conditions – are voting by Friday whether to authorize a strike. This week feels like the district’s woes have hit an apex. Guest: Vanessa Rancaño, KQED education reporter Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If you're a fan of The Bay, you can thank Vinnee Tong. She helped launch the podcast last year and has helped shape the shows from choosing what we cover and how we talk about it, especially around race, identity and class. Vinnee starts her new role as KQED’s new managing editor, which begins Jan. 28. Today, Erika and Devin sit down with Vinnee for her totally, unofficial exit interview. Guest: Vinnee Tong, KQED’s managing editor (forever Bay member) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kamala Harris announced this week she’s running for president. She's certainly not the first Californian to be groomed by Bay Area politics for the national stage. Harris has had to walk a line between left-leaning politics and her status as a former prosecutor. On Sunday she'll hold a rally in Oakland, the city where she was born. Guest: Marisa Lagos, KQED politics reporter Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What if we looked at solving the Bay Area's housing crisis from a regional lens? Could we come up with solutions that actually work? It's often said that solving the housing crisis requires a regional approach but no one has tried to define what that looks like, until now. A proposal on its way to the state legislature could give the Bay Area its own regional housing agency with the ability to set goals and taxes. Guest: Guy Marzorati, KQED politics reporter The Bay wants to get to know you better. Take our survey and share your opinion about the podcast. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The debate over whether gig workers are employees or contractors has been a slow, messy conversation. Now, California’s new governor, Gavin Newsom, is trying to help broker a deal between the two sides. But some drivers aren’t happy about where they think it's going. Guest: Sam Harnett, KQED Silicon Valley reporter The Bay wants to get to know you better. Take our survey and share your opinion about the podcast. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

PG&E says it has no choice but to enter Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection and that it's going to file papers around Jan. 29. A lot of things led to this: from deregulation in the 1990's, to the fatal San Bruno explosion in 2010 that put the utility on probation to the 2017 and 2018 deadly wildfires in Northern California. And it brings up the question of who should ultimately be responsible for the cost. Guests: Lisa Pickoff-White, KQED data journalist, and Marisa Lagos, KQED senior politics reporter Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Valero spent $200,000 in last year's Benicia city council election to help elect two candidates who were less critical of the company than others. That's created tension between the oil refiner and the city, leading people to question how much influence Valero should have in local politics. On Tuesday Benicia will discuss the possibility of new campaign finance laws that could limit corporate influence in its small town. Guest: Ted Goldberg, KQED News Editor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

About 40 percent of students in the Salinas City Elementary School District are considered homeless. This can mean living in a shelter or living in an overcrowded home, like multiple families co-existing in a single place. It's a problem that hurts schoolchildren and their ability to learn and retain information. And it stems from high and growing housing prices. Guest: Vanessa Rancaño, KQED education reporter To see more of Vanessa's reporting on Monterey County tap here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The San Mateo County district attorney is looking to reopen an investigation against a fired Burlingame police officer. The cop was accused by three women of asking them for sex in exchange for help with their alleged crimes. The case was made public this week after Bay Area reporters received police records under a new transparency law that went into effect on Jan. 1. Guest: Thomas Peele, investigative reporter with the Bay Area News Group Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Food says a lot about who we are. It can identify where we come from and what we like. In some cases, it may even let us know when we’re being racist. In a way, that’s a starting point for the San Francisco Chronicle's new restaurant critic Soleil Ho. The host of the podcast Racist Sandwich, Soleil tells The Bay about how food is a conduit for way more than what’s on our plates. ... Also, she likes the “gross” stuff, too. Guest: Soleil Ho, San Francisco Chronicle’s new restaurant critic, cohost of the Racist Sandwich podcast. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Getting access to police records has never been easy. Especially when the records involve allegations of police wrongdoing. A new California law - SB 1421 - introduced by a Bay Area state senator, is supposed to give the public access to documents related to police misconduct and accountability. But law enforcement is fighting to keep documents from the past, private. This week a judge rejected an attempt to block the law from going into effect, and KQED journalists are involved. Guests: Sukey Lewis and Alex Emslie, KQED criminal justice reporters Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

See ya, 2018. What up, 2019! We’ve produced almost 150 episodes of The Bay covering all kinds of local news from e-scooters, to housing policies and #GrillingWhileBlack. Today, we want to pause a moment to say thanks for hanging with us. And to give you a sense of how we’re approaching the new year (hint: Erika is optimistic; Devin is pessimistic). Guests: Yours Truly Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ten years ago, in the early morning hours of New Year’s Day, Oscar Grant was shot and killed by Bart police officer, Johannes Mehserle. This was one of the first police shootings caught on cell phone video and spread around the world. It began a decade of witnessing police violence in a new way that has sparked a national conversation around police accountability and racism. Guest: Sandhya Dirks, KQED race and equity reporter Check out KQED's Forum special on Oscar Grant's legacy. And KQED Arts is asking people to write letters to Oscar Grant. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We jump into a stranger's car and take a ride over the Bay Bridge in the "casual carpool lane" to talk about higher bridge tolls. Our carpool driver and rider join in on a discussion about Regional Measure 3, which 55 percent of voters approved in the June 5 election that increased tolls on seven state bridges in the Bay Area. Guest: Dan Brekke, KQED transportation editor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

#WhileBlack was a popular hashtag in 2018. This year we watched several videos on social media that included white people harassing black people doing just about everything. Oakland had a couple of racist moments at Lake Merritt this year, including one woman who became known as BBQ Becky. The city had its own response too. Guest: Sandhya Dirks, KQED race and equity reporter Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This was a big year for people of color in lead movie roles — especially for culture, language and accents that are not English or American. One of those films was Crazy Rich Asians, which resonated with the Bay Area, and our host Devin Katayama and our editor Vinnee Tong, as we discuss Asian American identity. Guest: Ricky Yean, writer of Asian-Americans Are Cultural Orphans (aka I hope Crazy Rich Asians isn’t a flop) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What happens when the people most invested in trying to make the Bay Area a better place decide to LEAVE entirely? Gabriel Metcalf is the outgoing president of the Bay Area think tank SPUR, and he's moving to take a similar job in Sydney, Australia. Metcalf says the Bay Area is one of the world's centers of wealth creation, but has struggled to meet some of the most basic needs. For instance, housing. Guest: Gabriel Metcalf, outgoing CEO and president of SPUR Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In December 2016, Lindsay McCollum and Eddie “Tennessee” Tate were shot and killed in San Francisco’s Mission District. The two were homeless and living together. Lindsay's mother, Carrie McCollum, reached out to a KQED reporter one year after he went searching for answers himself. The case remains unresolved, but Carrie doesn’t want her daughter to be forgotten. Guest: Peter Arcuni, KQED reporter Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mention electric scooters and people usually react with an eye roll. It's associated with the newness of the tech culture of the Bay Area. Some see scooters as a "micro-transit" tool; others simply see them as a nuisance. The city of San Jose thinks it's got the answer to managing them: geofencing. Guest: KQED Silicon Valley Senior Editor Tonya Mosley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Oakland is considering closing 24 schools. Most of these schools are likely in East Oakland, where many of the poorest students live. A group of parents is demanding that if Oakland Unified closes their kids' schools that they be given first dibs of any other school in the district. This includes charter schools, which have been part of the reason why some of the district-run schools have experienced a drop in enrollment. Guest: Julia McEvoy, KQED senior editor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Most landlords in San Jose don't take Section 8 housing vouchers. And housing advocates see the vouchers as a proxy for race, or keeping out people of color. As a possible remedy, the San Jose city council wants to tweak the law to encourage more landlords to take the vouchers. The proposal has some holes, though. Guest: Emily DeRuy, Mercury News reporter covering San Jose Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Veronica Aguilar crossed the U.S.-Mexico border seeking asylum from El Salvador earlier this year. She's staying with a host family in Pinole while she waits for an immigration court hearing. Today, one family's story of immigration. Guest: Farida Jhabvala Romero, KQED immigration and equity reporter Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Here’s a new one: stacking homes on top of a city bus yard. The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency wants to build housing on top of its Potrero bus yard right across the street from KQED studios. Their idea is that the housing would help pay for upgrades to the facility. It's kind of a wild idea. Guest: Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez, transportation reporter and columnist for the San Francisco Examiner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We need homes near transit. But the first time state Sen. Scott Wiener introduced a bill, SB 827, that would have required cities to approve dense housing near transit corridors, it died a quick death. This week he announced a new version. The bill, SB 50, includes changes that are supposed to help poorer neighborhoods stay more in tact and force housing into places with more wealth. Guest: Dan Brekke, KQED Transportation Editor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This isn't supposed to be your traditional tech campus. Google says it wants to build a village inside San Jose that will be open to the public, different from how most tech campuses operate. It's expected to have public parks, restaurants and other amenities. The plan, if approved, could more than double the population of San Jose’s downtown. The city council takes a big step Tuesday with a vote to sell off 21 acres for $220 million. Guest: Tonya Mosley, KQED Silicon Valley Senior Editor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

San Francisco Mayor London Breed and Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff announced a $6 million donation he is making to subsidize five years of rent for formerly homeless residents who will move into a renovated apartment building in the Tenderloin next year. Benioff used the occasion to push other wealthy Bay residents to pitch in. Guest: Kevin Fagan, reporter at the San Francisco Chronicle Kevin has done a lot of reporting on homelessness in San Francisco. You can read his coverage as part of the SF Homeless Project. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The city of Oakland wasn't pleased when a group of homeless people moved to a vacant lot in East Oakland in October. After the city posted a notice to vacate, the homeless residents went to court to stop the eviction. Now a judge must decide if the group of mostly women can stay on city land. Guest: Sandhya Dirks, KQED reporter Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Harvey Milk and the city of San Francisco gives many people the "permission" they need to fight for gay rights in other places. The Castro became a symbol of this permission and Milk's legacy has since spread across the world. Today, a day before the 40th anniversary of his death, we look at Harvey Milk’s message of hope through the eyes of one man who watched, admired and acted on that message. Guest: Greg Carey, Chief of Patrol for Castro Community on Patrol Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When rain begins to fall on Butte County this week, some will be sleeping on the streets. The Camp Fire displaced tens of thousands of people, many of whom are struggling to do basic things: find shelter, see a doctor, pay the bills. Today, we'll show you how picking up the pieces is about more than finding a new home. Guests: Raquel Maria Dillon and Peter Arcuni, KQED reporters Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A small number of people -- spouses of H1B visa holders -- were given the right to work under a special type of visa created under President Obama in 2015. Now President Trump wants to eliminate those spousal visas. How doing so threatens Silicon Valley's competitive edge, Bay Area diversity, and immigrant families. Guest: Rachael Myrow, KQED Silicon Valley reporter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Paradise was a city where a lot of people already carried more than their share of trauma from childhood. Now, as many work to piece their lives back together they have the added weight of trauma from the Camp Fire. Our reporter was in Paradise this past summer and tells us about one woman who is now struggling with both kinds of trauma. Guest: Laura Klivans, KQED health reporter Tap here to see pictures of Sabrina and her daughter Aroara. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

After two fires burned right up to the edge of town in 2008, the town of Paradise made a plan. It divided itself into evacuation zones. It went so far as to hold a mock evacuation during morning rush hour. People knew what they were supposed to do if fire came back. And yet last week's Camp Fire was moving so fast that all the residents fled at once, exit routes clogged, and more people died than in any other fire in state history. Visit KQED.org or SacBee.com to see more wildfire reporting. Guest: Ryan Lillis, Sacramento Bee reporter Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Caviar, Postmates, Uber Eats…the Bay Area’s tech family gave us food delivery apps. And there are plenty of gig workers willing to drive us this food. These delivery apps allow us to hole up in our office, work harder, faster and avoid human interaction. At least, that’s what one tech reporter fears. He says it’s not just consumers who are being conditioned by these apps. It’s the restaurants too. Guest: Sam Harnett, KQED Silicon Valley reporter Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices