Good morning. It’s Tuesday, June 11.
- Fresno police chief accused of affair with officer’s wife.
- Apple finally jumps into artificial intelligence fray.
- And movie museum faces backlash over Jewish exhibit.
Statewide
1.
State data recently provided evidence of California’s enthusiastic embrace of accessory dwelling units, or ADUs, which comprised one of every five homes built in 2023. But the share of the backyard cottages is significantly bigger when you include illegally built units, an analysis of satellite images found. In San Jose, for example, official records documented 291 new ADUs between 2016 and 2020. The researchers found an additional 1,045 “informal” units built in that period. Mercury News
2.
The hidden costs of owning a home in California have surged 32% since 2020, an analysis by the personal finance website Bankrate found. In 2024, the average annual tab for expenses such as utilities, taxes, and insurance — excluding mortgage payments — was $28,790, or $2,400 a month, the second-highest total in the nation. “Until you own a house, it doesn’t dawn on you how much money you’re throwing into the house every month and year,” said Jeff Ostrowski, an analyst at Bankrate. Bloomberg | Bankrate
3.
Another round of blazing heat is taking shape across California’s valleys and foothills between Tuesday and Thursday. Millions of people were under heat warnings in the Central Valley, where highs above 100 degrees are expected from Redding to Bakersfield. Meteorologists said the weather was unusually hot for this time of year — and it may be just the start. The National Weather Service’s latest seasonal temperature outlook calls for higher than normal temperatures from June to August. S.F. Chronicle | Washington Post
4.
“Arguably the best gopher hunter of all.”
Great blue herons are among California’s most elegant creatures. They stand 4 feet tall with slate-gray plumage, often posing utterly motionless while stalking underground prey with their daggerlike bills. The wildlife videographer Jim Zenor has captured great footage of the herons expertly hunting gophers in Southern California parks. See a compilation of kills. YouTube (~15 mins)
Northern California
5.
Fresno Police Chief Paco Balderrama is being investigated over accusations that he had an affair with the spouse of one of his officers while seeking to undermine the subordinate’s career, law enforcement sources told the San Joaquin Valley Sun. Balderrama, a married father of three, sent a message to his officers Monday that pleaded for understanding. “I own my mistakes … and I will pay for those mistakes for the rest of my life,” he wrote. The police union president, Brandon Wiemiller, also issued a letter. “Trust has been lost,” he wrote. San Joaquin Valley Sun | KSEE
6.
In 2011, the Northern California Innocence Project helped win the release of Maurice Caldwell, an inmate convicted of murder who later collected an $8 million settlement from San Francisco. Now the witness who helped engineer that victory, Marritte Funches, has come forward to recant, saying he lied after having a romantic relationship with an Innocence Project lawyer on the case. What’s more, Funches claimed, the lawyer knew it was a lie. “It was the art of seduction at its finest,” Funches said. “All to get me to finally help Mr. Caldwell.” SF Standard
7.
Apple jumped into the artificial intelligence fray on Monday, introducing plans to weave the technology into its billions of devices around the world. During a presentation at its Cupertino headquarters, the company didn’t unveil any one feature that is new, per se. Rather it promised that its platform, dubbed Apple Intelligence, would synthesize all your disparate texts, emails, calendar invites, and photos, the Atlantic wrote: “This is Apple’s pitch distilled: the messy edges of your life, sanded down via Siri and brushed aluminum. You live; Apple expedites.”
8.
The chancellor of UC Davis issued an apology after a large contingent of students from the university trashed Lake Shasta over Memorial Day weekend. “I am disappointed by the significant amount of trash left behind, and the disregard these students showed,” Chancellor Gary May wrote to a Shasta-Trinity National Forest manager. Thousands of students from Davis and the University of Oregon rented about 130 houseboats and partied at one of the lake’s campgrounds. Park officials spent six hours hauling out trash after they left. Record Searchlight
Southern California
9.
Rebecca Grossman was sentenced to 15 years in prison on Monday for the murder of two boys she hit while speeding through a Westlake Village crosswalk in 2020. A jury convicted the 60-year-old philanthropist in February after hearing evidence that she was driving as fast as 81 mph and failed to stop after striking Mark Iskander, 11, and Jacob, 9. Dressed in a brown jumpsuit, Grossman fought tears as she addressed the courtroom. “I never saw anyone,” she said. “I would have driven into a brick wall. … I don’t know why God did not take my life.” L.A. Times | NBC Los Angeles
10.
More than 200 children are living on the streets of Los Angeles’ Skid Row. They sleep in tents and navigate sidewalks littered with needles and human waste. “Skid Row is violent,” said Estela Lopez, executive director of the Downtown Industrial District BID. “There’s rampant untreated mental illness on the street. High levels of drug addiction. It’s dangerous for anyone.” An L.A. Times report on the children of Skid Row includes powerful photos.
11.
When the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures opened in Los Angeles in 2021, there was barely a mention of the Jewish immigrants who helped establish the Hollywood studio system. Last month, it sought to correct the oversight with a new permanent exhibit. But on Monday, a letter signed by more than 300 Hollywood professionals called the exhibit “antisemitic,” saying it is “the only section of the museum that vilifies those it purports to celebrate.” The museum said it “heard the concerns” and would go back to the drawing board. N.Y. Times | Hollywood Reporter
California archive
12.
At the end of World War II, the U.S. Navy faced the problem of where to store its enormous fleet of newly inactive ships. A stretch of San Diego Bay became one of several watery parking lots along the U.S. coasts for the so-called mothball fleet. The aging ships, including 11 aircraft carriers, served as a local attraction for years, featured on postcards and harbor tours. By the 1970s, most of the relics were sold for scrap, while others became practice targets off the coast.
Scuba divers now count those sunken vessels as bucket-list destinations. A few years ago, the diver Brett Eldridge plunged 130 feet in the waters off San Diego to the wreck of the USS Hogan, a recipient of six battle stars for World War II service. He found the old destroyer blanketed in colorful strawberry anemones, pictured below, a sight calling to mind flowers on a grave. He got some fantastic photos. 👉 Wrecked in my rEvo
Get your California Sun T-shirts, phone cases, hoodies, hats, and totes!
Thanks for reading!
The California Sun is written by Mike McPhate, a former California correspondent for the New York Times.
Make a one-time contribution to the California Sun.
Give a subscription as a gift.
Forward this email to a friend.
Click here to stop delivery, and here to update your billing information. To change your email address please email me: mike@californiasun.co. (Note: Unsubscribing here does not cancel payments. To do that click here.)
The California Sun, PO Box 6868, Los Osos, CA 93412
Wake up to must-read news from around the Golden State delivered to your inbox each morning.