Good morning. It’s Monday, Dec. 11.
- Plan for high-rises in Santa Cruz faces backlash.
- Santa Rosa brings police officers back to schools.
- And a love letter to San Francisco’s realest neighborhood.
Statewide
1.
“Truly something else.”
“An absolute unit.”
“Looks like El Niño has been awoken!”
Meteorologists have been growing increasingly enthusiastic about models depicting a Pacific jet stream arcing thousands of miles from Japan toward California over the next two weeks. The climatologist Daniel Swain reminded readers of his blog that he can’t guarantee the forecast. “But right now, there are some pretty striking things appearing” in long-range models. “Will it make it all the way, and will it still be remarkably strong?” he wrote. “Will it direct a sequence of strong/moist storms into California in the days following? I’m leaning toward yes at the moment, but as always … things can change.” Weather West
2.
California developments connected to the Middle East crisis:
- On Oct. 12, Fresno raised an Israeli flag near City Hall in a show of solidarity five days after the attack by Hamas. On Friday, hundreds gathered to watch as a Palestinian flag was raised in the same square. The mayor attended the first flag raising, but skipped the second. Fresno Bee | KGPE
- An assailant hit an elderly man in a yarmulke with a belt as he walked with his wife to their Beverly Hills synagogue early Saturday, leaving him bloodied, police said. A suspect was booked on suspicion of assault with a deadly weapon and a hate crime. L.A. Times | NBC News
- Disneyland was forced to temporarily close an entrance on Saturday after roughly 1,000 protesters gathered outside the park to denounce what they said was the company’s favoritism toward relief efforts in Israel. SFGATE
- An Oakland coffee shop said on Saturday that it had parted ways with three employees who were seen in a viral video blocking a Jewish woman from entering a restroom to record anti-Israel graffiti. KRON | CBS News
3.
The Sierra Nevada’s Gold Rush towns are booming again, thanks in part to an influx of new residents who relocated during the pandemic. The travel writer Barbara Noe Kennedy explored an 80-mile drive through the foothills along Route 49. Among the gems is Nevada City’s National Exchange Hotel, pictured above, first opened in 1856 and completely renovated in recent years. Architectural Digest described it as “straight out of a Wes Anderson movie.” National Geographic
Northern California
4.
During the summer of protests after the police killing of George Floyd, Santa Rosa’s school board voted unanimously to remove police officers from the city’s schools, where they had provided security for more than two decades. On Sunday, after a series of violent incidents, school administrators announced the return of police officers to the city’s high schools through the end of December. The district board is under pressure to make the change permanent. Press Democrat | NBC Bay Area
5.
“It’s just too much, too fast.”
Santa Cruz County has the state’s highest rate of homelessness and, by one measure, its least affordable housing. Leaders are now pushing for a new housing plan that would allow high-rise downtown apartments roughly five stories taller than the city’s landmark Giant Dipper wooden roller coaster. Opponents are fired up, denouncing the proposal as out of character for a laid-back beach town. L.A. Times
6.
In Redding, a majority of the City Council belongs to a faith-healing church called Bethel, whose members claim to cure ailments including cancer and blindness through prayer. Last week, church members on the council rejected the lawmaker next in line to serve as mayor, Mark Mezzano, and instead chose a fellow Bethel congregant. Councilmember Michael Dacquisto, who is not a church member, lashed out: “It’s bullshit. It’s giving the finger to the 20,000 people that voted for Mr. Mezzano and saying to them, ‘We don’t care, we’re going to do what we’re going to do because we’re the Bethel juggernaut.'” Redding Record-Searchlight
7.
Meathead Movers, a Central Coast moving company known for its humanitarian efforts, stamps its trucks with the moniker “student athlete movers.” The federal government says that’s age discrimination. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission initially demanded $15 million to settle, then sued in September. “We had no idea we were doing anything wrong by being a moving company that hires a lot of student athletes,” owner Aaron Steed said. “We want to change and evolve, but we can’t agree to go out of business doing it.” Wall Street Journal
8.
In San Francisco’s realest neighborhood, there’s an International Style laundromat, a drugstore that’s been in business for more than 70 years, a Chinese restaurant famous for its Filipino food, and a deli that doubles as an alteration shop. Julie Zigoris wrote a love letter to the Excelsior District, also known as “The E.” SF Standard
● ●
See 25 photos of San Francisco’s last blue-collar neighborhood. 👉 California Sun
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Southern California
9.
San Diego has steadily risen in the ranks of the world’s great academic centers. San Diego State is now the second-most selective campus in the Cal State system, behind only Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. And a new analysis of research citations just ranked UC San Diego as the most influential public university in the U.S. Among all institutions, including government labs and private universities, the campus ranked No. 5 outside of China, behind only Harvard, Stanford, the NIH, and MIT. S.D. Union-Tribune
- Columnist Joe Matthews: San Diego could arguably be called America’s finest college town. Ventura County Star
10.
Shohei Ohtani is staying in Southern California. After a historic six-year stint with the Angels, baseball’s greatest two-way player announced Saturday that he agreed to join the Dodgers for $700 million over 10 years, the richest contract in American professional sports and the largest in baseball history by more than $270 million. The figure stunned the sports world. Ohtani is my favorite athlete, wrote Will Leitch. “But this contract is insane.” Intelligencer | ESPN
- Sports columnist Bill Plaschke: “Saying it brings chills.” L.A. Times
11.
In most places, the medical examiner’s office is a macabre necessity, wrote reporter Corina Knoll. But in Los Angeles, the office is known as “the coroner to the stars,” perpetually in the spotlight:
“For many years, the agency operated a small gift shop known as Skeletons in the Closet, a testament to the unique draw of the Los Angeles coroner’s office. Among its collection were beach towels imprinted with a chalk outline and mugs with the words ‘bodily fluids.'” New York Times
12.
A husband-and-wife fruit vending duo in the San Gabriel Valley have become a TikTok sensation with their masterful knife technique. Alejandro Isabel and Daniela Benítez, both immigrants from Mexico, began posting videos from their two fruit stands during the pandemic. Before long, they had more than 1 million followers tuning in to see them make lightning-fast work of mangoes, cucumbers, and watermelons. They’re known as the fruit ninjas. NBC News | @elninja17_
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