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In the Bay Area, the number of homeless students has skyrocketed. What’s driving that trend?

Published Sun, 22 Dec 2024 19:03:33 GMT

A long line of families wrapped around the block at the Willow Creek Learning Center in Concord earlier this week, waiting patiently for their chance at an early Christmas.They were there for a Mt. Diablo Unified holiday fair, one specifically geared toward the school district’s homeless and foster youth. Inside, volunteers gave out jackets, blankets, toys, and food. A Spanish-speaking Santa Claus took photos with the children. A group of barbers offered free haircuts.But as heartwarming as the gift-giveaway was, the hundreds of families in line to pick out presents was further evidence of the homeless crisis in the Bay Area — something no one-time event can come close to resolving.“That is really a crisis situation,” said Rosie Reid, who leads the district’s program for homeless and foster youth. “And at the end of the day, we’re a school district. We can give you a backpack, we can give you school supplies. But how can we help you if you don’t have a place to go tonigh...

Hyperloop One to shut down after failing to reinvent transit

Published Sun, 22 Dec 2024 19:03:33 GMT

By Sarah McBride | BloombergHyperloop One, the futuristic transportation company building tube-encased lines to zip passengers and freight from city to city at airplane-like speeds, is shutting down, according to people familiar with the situation.Once a high-profile startup, Hyperloop One raised more than $450 million since its founding in 2014, according to PitchBook. It built a small test track near Las Vegas to develop its transportation technology, and for a time took the name Virgin Hyperloop One after Richard Branson’s Virgin invested. Virgin removed its branding after the startup decided last year to focus on cargo rather than people.ROBYN BECK/Agence France-PresseIn this file photo taken on July 22, 2018 SpaceX, Tesla and The Boring Company founder Elon Musk speaks at the 2018 SpaceX Hyperloop Pod Competition, in Hawthorne, California. - Tesla shares fell hard on August 17, 2018, after chief executive Elon Musk's comments about his struggles with exhaustion as he works to r...

Kurtenbach: Six months later, the Warriors’ trade of Jordan Poole is proving to be a true sports rarity

Published Sun, 22 Dec 2024 19:03:33 GMT

This past summer, the Warriors and Wizards pulled off a true rarity in sports.You’ve undoubtedly heard of a trade being called a “win-win.”Well, the Warriors’ trade of Jordan Poole to the Wizards for Chris Paul was a lose-lose.Poole and the Wizards will come to San Francisco for the first and only time this season on Friday, and while I don’t believe either team has a regret over the trade, neither team can honestly claim to be all that happy, either.Seriously, who is this trade working for at the moment?Ultimately, there’s a long way to go this season and in Poole’s career. It’d be ridiculous to think that the events of the last two-plus months of the regular season will extrapolate into perpetuity.And it was still right that the Warriors and Poole broke up — their relationship had no future.But just because that relationship needed to end doesn’t mean their respective rebounds are working for them, either.For the Wizards and Po...

Japanese tech company plans major upgrade, revamp of San Jose office hub

Published Sun, 22 Dec 2024 19:03:33 GMT

SAN JOSE — A Japan-based tech company will embark on a wide-ranging revamp of its San Jose campus, a move that is poised to solidify the office center as the firm’s major Silicon Valley jobs and business hub.Renesas Electronics is planning a big-time upgrade of its primary office complex at 6024 Silver Creek Valley Road ln south San Jose, documents on file with the city of San Jose show.The improvements will take place within an office and research complex that totals about 248,900 square feet, according to the San Jose planning documents.“Renesas has made a number of acquisitions over the past few years,” a Renesas Electronics spokesperson said in comments emailed to this news organization. “As part of the integration of those organizations, we are consolidating to the Silver Creek site.”The interior construction work to accomplish the upgrades is slated to occur inside a three-story office and research complex that consists of three adjacent bui...

Letters: Remembering ‘Mr. Roadshow,’ Gary Richards

Published Sun, 22 Dec 2024 19:03:33 GMT

Submit your letter to the editor via this form. Read more Letters to the Editor.Gratitude for yearsof traffic counselGoodbye, Gary Richards, we are going to be lost without you.He was such a good guy. Our deepest sympathy to his family and our gratitude for his years of traffic counsel and just being our friend.Joanne KoboriSan JoseShock and sadnessat columnist’s deathIt was with shock and sadness that we read of Gary Richards’ (Mr. Roadshow) passing.As long-time East Bay Times subscribers, we have gleaned so much useful information from his column. Although we were not personally acquainted with him, we, like many others I’m sure, feel like we’ve lost a friend.Condolences are sent to his wife and family.Rita GordonSan LorenzoAnne Richards and her father, Gary Richards, compare their DMV driving tests to see who knows the rules of the road better.Mr. Roadshow feltjust like an old friendJust when I thought the news couldn’t get any sadder, I read about the death of Gary R...

President Biden pardons thousands convicted of marijuana charges on federal lands and in Washington DC

Published Sun, 22 Dec 2024 19:03:33 GMT

By ZEKE MLLER | Associated PressWASHINGTON — President Joe Biden is pardoning thousands of people who were convicted of use and simple possession of marijuana on federal lands and in the District of Columbia, the White House said Friday, in his latest round of executive clemencies meant to rectify racial disparities in the justice system.Biden is also granting clemency to 11 people serving what the White House called “disproportionately long” sentences for nonviolent drug offenses.Biden said his actions would help make the “promise of equal justice a reality.”“Criminal records for marijuana use and possession have imposed needless barriers to employment, housing, and educational opportunities,” Biden said. “Too many lives have been upended because of our failed approach to marijuana. It’s time that we right these wrongs.”The categorical pardon issued Friday builds on his categorical pardon issued just before the 2022 midterm elections that made thousands convicted of simple possessi...

Monterey County youth softball coach sentenced to prison for sex acts with minor

Published Sun, 22 Dec 2024 19:03:33 GMT

SALINAS – Richard Douglas Aldrete, a man who was once a San Francisco Giants minor league player turned revered youth softball coach, was taken into custody on Wednesday after being sentenced to two years in the California Department of Corrections and ordered to register as a sex offender for engaging in sex acts with a minor.Aldrete Aldrete, 58 of Monterey, ran a private coaching business where he met Jane Doe when she was 14 years old and he began coaching her in softball, according to the Monterey County District Attorney’s Office. He continued as her coach for several years and when she was 17, he began making sexual advances toward her and offering her drugs and alchohol. After a time of resisting his pressure, Doe did give in to his requests.Judge Stephanie Hulsey noted that Aldrete had established a position as a mentor and role model in the community for young softball players during her sentencing of Aldrete, and that he used his position to have sex with Doe when she...

Review: ‘Migration’ is a pretty wild goose chase

Published Sun, 22 Dec 2024 19:03:33 GMT

By Jake Coyle | Associated PressIllumination, maker of “Despicable Me,” “Sing” and “The Super Mario Bros. Movie,” has built its animation empire by mostly staying close to a child-like outlook. Illumination’s in-house mascots, the Minions, are basically themselves careening toddlers.But the studio’s latest, “Migration,” carries a faintly more parental perspective. Its central character is a father duck, Mack Mallard (Kumail Nanjiani), whose fears and paranoia have kept his feathered family rooted to a small New England pond. But after much cajoling from his wife (Elizabeth Banks) and two ducklings (Caspar Jennings, Tresi Gazal), Mack and company take flight for their first winter migration south to Jamaica.Related ArticlesEntertainment | ‘All of Us Strangers’ is devastating and compelling Entertainment | ‘Iron Claw’ is great, misses a chance to point fingers Entertainm...

Abcarian: Believe Trump when he vows revenge on the news media

Published Sun, 22 Dec 2024 19:03:33 GMT

Was it just a little joke when Orange Jesus declared to Sean Hannity that, in the event of his political resurrection, he would be a dictator on “Day One”? I didn’t take it that way. You shouldn’t either.Former President Donald Trump’s MAGA shock troops have been announcing all over the place that a second Trump term would be dedicated to punishing enemies real and imagined, especially journalists who have dared speculate about how he would set about torching the Constitution.In the dictator’s playbook, demonizing the press is Job No. 1, and it’s something Trump is long familiar with: He not only calls news he doesn’t like “fake,” he claims he invented the term “fake news.” (No hat tip to the Nazis, I guess.) Mainstream news outlets, he’s often said, are “truly the enemy of the people.” Reporters are “scum,” “the absolute worst.”For years, Trump has said he wants to weak...

San Mateo County supervisors approve incentive funds for sheriff's deputies

Published Sun, 22 Dec 2024 19:03:33 GMT

(BCN) -- The San Mateo County Board of Supervisors earlier this month approved the financial incentives for the county's deputies amid efforts to maintain staffing levels in the Sheriff's Office.The Board on Dec. 12 voted unanimously to pass a six-month temporary funding agreement to financially support the deputies this holiday season, Supervisor Ray Mueller's office said Monday.For the next six months, San Mateo County will be paying double time to officers who are working over 9 hours of overtime a week. According to Mueller's office, San Mateo County deputies have been working long periods of mandatory overtime. "While help is on the way, as new hire and lateral candidates are currently moving through the hiring process, ensuring public safety is maintained is a first priority. This investment is a message to our Sheriff's deputies that our community values them and honors their personal sacrifice, as they work long hours away from their families, to protect the community," Mue...