Good morning. It’s Friday, June 26.
| • | Governor pleads with Californians to take precautions. |
| • | Los Angeles Sikhs feed the masses during crisis. |
| • | And the bizarre deep-sea creatures of Monterey Bay. |
Statewide
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A Mariachi group played for an elderly resident who is quarantined at home in Long Beach.
Mario Tama/Getty Images
As of Thursday, Covid-19 hospitalizations have jumped 32 percent in the last two weeks. Gov. Gavin Newsom again pleaded with Californians take precautions. “I cannot impress upon people more the importance at this critical juncture, when we are experiencing an increase in cases that we have not experienced in the past, to take seriously this moment,” he said. L.A. Times | Mercury News
Among the hotspots: Marin, Stanislaus, San Joaquin, San Bernardino, Riverside, and Los Angeles counties. S.F. Chronicle
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Other coronavirus developments:
| • | Workers at a San Joaquin Valley pistachio farm went on strike after they learned from the media that dozens of their coworkers had tested positive. A.P. | KGET |
| • | Santa Cruz County fully reopened its beaches. An official explained: “People are not willing to be governed anymore.” Santa Cruz Sentinel | ABC7 |
| • | A San Diego woman tried to shame a Starbucks barista who demanded she wear a mask. Instead people set up a GoFundMe on his behalf. It raised more than $28,000. NBC 7 |
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Trucks lined up receive shipments at the Port of Long Beach in 2015.
Bob Riha, Jr./Getty Images
California adopted a first-in-the-nation rule that forces manufacturers to ramp up sales of zero-emission trucks and buses. As a result, the state estimates that 15 percent of the 1.2 million trucks on the road will run on electricity by 2035, cutting pollution in a state with notoriously dirty air. CalMatters | N.Y. Times
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☝️ Here’s a rarely observed anglerfish swimming at great depth in Monterey Bay.
It was filmed by one of the remotely operated vehicles of the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, a scientific group that has made an art form of sharing its discoveries with the public. That strange apparatus atop the anglerfish’s head is a lure, with a glowing tip used to attract prey. YouTube (~2:15 mins)
Also: The institute’s top 10 “bizarre, interesting, and wondrous encounters” of 2019. YouTube (~2:15 mins)
Northern California
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The Paradise High School football team stood for the national anthem in Paradise last August.
“After all of the accomplishments we’ve made in the face of adversity, I believe there is nothing that can stop us.”
In 2018, the teenagers of Paradise saw their community burned to the ground. Then the pandemic hit. Paradise High School’s class of 2020 is now entering a precarious world with an added credential: a degree in survival. The Verge
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The president of the Madera County Board of Education posted an image on Facebook of a Confederate flag with the words “I am proud to be white.” Within days, more than a thousand people had signed a petition calling for her to step down. On Thursday, that’s what she did. Madera Tribune | KFSN
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The Tesla’s Fremont factory after it reopened on May 12.
Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
When Elon Musk reopened his Tesla plant in Fremont, defying county lockdown orders, he promised that employees could stay home if they felt uneasy. Then last week the company started handing out termination notices. Two fired employees said the company cited “failure to return to work.” Washington Post
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A woman captured on video deliberately coughing on a baby at a yogurt shop has been identified — and she works with kids. Multiple parents and colleagues told San Jose Inside that she is Nancy Norland, a special education teacher at Oak Grove School District in San Jose. Police said they were following up on leads but had not yet arrested anyone. San Jose Inside
Southern California
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In the last 10 weeks, the Sikh Gurdwara in Pacoima has prepared more than 105,000 meals.
Sarah Reingewirtz, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG
Sikhs arrived in California in the early 1900s, as young pioneers from Punjab sought work at lumber mills, farms, and the railroad. Over the generations, the religious community has embraced a devotion to charity that has helped ease California through tragedy after tragedy. The pandemic is the latest example. Here’s an account of a Sikh temple’s work in Los Angeles, where every single weekday its members have been serving up meals to struggling families — no proselytizing and no strings attached. L.A. Daily News
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“Shaun King needs to be put down.”
Members of a private Facebook group for retired Long Beach cops discussed how to kill the Black Lives Matter activist Shaun King, according to screenshots published by King. The Long Beach Police Department issued a statement saying it was “appalled and deeply disturbed” by the report. It launched an investigation along with the FBI. Long Beach Post | Press-Telegram
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Connie Rice is a civil rights attorney and author of “Power Concedes Nothing.”
On this week’s California Sun Podcast, host Jeff Schechtman talks with Connie Rice, a long-time Los Angeles civil rights lawyer who has worked to transform the LAPD. She talked about cops she’s worked with who put their lives on the line to protect the vulnerable. “They are guardians, not gladiators,” she said. But sadly, she added, they are the minority. California Sun Podcast
In case you missed it
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Five items that got big views over the past week:
| • | Here is some hair-raising footage of great whites chomping down on a dead dolphin off the Southern California coast. Surfers paddling nearby look to be no more than 50 feet away. (YouTube ~7:45 mins) |
| • | California, a place the size of a country, is many things. Among the more unusual is Trona, a desert community that locals joke exists beyond the edge of the known world. Here’s a moving little portrait. Vimeo (~3 mins) |
| • | Angela Madsen, a Paralympic star from Long Beach, set off in a rowboat from Marina del Rey in April with the goal of reaching Hawaii within four months. She died at sea about halfway there. Long Beach Post | The Guardian |
| • | In 1967, long before “Planet of the Apes” gave rise to a blockbuster sci-fi franchise, a photographer wandered the film’s sets in Malibu and Hollywood and snapped pictures of the furry actors hanging out between scenes. Flashbak |
| • | In 1968, a high school student in Palo Alto reached out to Thelonious Monk’s manager and somehow talked him into booking the jazz giant to play at his school. Now the unlikely concert is being released. S.F. Chronicle | Jazzwise magazine |
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