Updating . .
'I had no idea the flames could go that fast': Goleta devastated by fire as record heat burns path of destruction -- Firefighters on Saturday were battling a destructive fire that snaked through a hillside area of Goleta, one of several blazes that destroyed homes amid a record-setting heat wave in Southern California. Fire personnel spent the night and morning in pitched battle against the Holiday fire, which exploded Friday night amid 100-degree temperatures and dangerous “sundowner” winds that made the blaze impossible to control. Andrea Castillo, John Wilkens and Teri Figueroa in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 7/7/18
Deadly Klamathon blaze doubles in size -- A deadly fire burning near the Oregon border more than doubled in size overnight and was threatening Saturday to overwhelm hundreds of homes, a railroad line and the Interstate 5 freeway, authorities said. Steve Rubenstein in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 7/7/18
The political futures of McCarthy and Pelosi could hinge on their home state of California -- The Central Valley Republican and the San Francisco Democrat are fighting to win the House majority and, with it, the right to try to round up enough votes to become House speaker. Paul Kane in the Washington Post$ -- 7/7/18
Abolishing a water district isn't easy — even when it's accused of nepotism, mismanagement and delivering brown water -- For its litany of problems, it’s been hard to kill the tiny Sativa Los Angeles County Water District. It has survived scandals involving financial instability, nepotism, poor maintenance and mismanagement. Angel Jennings and Ruben Vives in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 7/7/18
Willie Brown: Scott Pruitt is just the symptom. The disease is Trump -- Former Environmental Protection Agency chief Scott Pruitt isn’t the first Trump Cabinet member whose high living on the public dime and questionable ethics led to the hot-water pool, and he won’t be the last. Willie Brown in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 7/7/18
Uber and Lyft are forcing Southern California parking companies to adapt or die -- The rapid rise of ride-hailing services such as Uber and Lyft has taken a big bite out of businesses that rely on people who need to park their cars. Now they’re facing a choice: keep dwindling, or innovate. Jack Flemming in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 7/7/18
Curbs on Chinese investment could hit Detroit and Silicon Valley -- U.S. President Donald Trump’s threat to block Chinese investment in U.S. companies could be trouble for a number of American automotive and technology companies using Chinese funds to develop electric and self-driving cars and related services, from Tesla Inc to dozens of Silicon Valley startups. Paul Lienert Reuters -- 7/7/18
California Policy & Politics This Morning
Fires destroy homes and spark mass evacuations amid Southern California heat wave -- Record heat sparked several destructive brush fires across Southern California that burned numerous homes in San Diego and Santa Barbara counties. Powerful sundowner winds on the Santa Barbara County coast helped fuel the Holiday fire, which burned several homes Friday night in the hills above Goleta and threatened many others. Sarah Parvini, Ruben Vives and Pauline Repard in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 7/7/18
Abortion debate surfaces in California governor’s race -- The nation’s divide over abortion rights is expected to be a telltale flashpoint between the two candidates for California governor who embrace starkly different views on the issue, even though pro-choice protections have been cemented into California law for decades. Phil Willon in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 7/7/18
Gun rights group goes after Feinstein, which won’t bother Feinstein -- If Sen. Dianne Feinstein had to pick her political enemies, she couldn’t choose a better one than the Firearms Policy Coalition. John Wildermuth in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 7/7/18
Feinstein: Trump court nominee could ‘eviscerate women’s freedoms for generations’ -- President Trump’s Supreme Court nominee could “eviscerate women’s freedoms for generations,” Sen. Dianne Feinstein warned Friday, vowing to fight against any potential justice who would vote to overturn Roe v. Wade. Casey Tolan in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 7/7/18
Feinstein on Trump’s Supreme Court pick: Democrats can only do so much -- Enthusiasm is important, but in politics it’s hard to beat numbers, Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein told a group of Planned Parenthood officials and women’s health care advocates in Oakland on Friday. John Wildermuth in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 7/7/18
New questions arise over 2013 Asiana crash at SFO -- Video footage that surfaced Thursday raised new questions about the San Francisco Fire Department’s response to the Asiana plane crash on July 6, 2013, particularly its handling of a subsequent incident in which a fire rig ran over a 16-year-old girl. Rachel Swan in the San Francisco Chronicle$ John Woolfolk in the San Jose Mercury$ -- 7/7/18
High gas prices a sore subject for California Democrats -- It’s a long way from California to Washington, D.C., but that doesn’t mean Democrats inside the beltway shouldn’t pay attention to what’s happening on the other coast. John Wildermuth in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 7/7/18
Bay Area GOP candidate denies Holocaust, campaigns on anti-Semitism -- The Republican candidate running to unseat the congressman who represents much of Contra Costa County is a Holocaust denier whose campaign website contains anti-Semitic and racist writings. The California Republican Party says it wants nothing to do with its standard bearer in the 11th Congressional District, small-business owner John Fitzgerald. Steve Rubenstein in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 7/7/18
Holocaust Denier in California Congressional Race Leaves State G.O.P. Scrambling -- A Republican congressional candidate in a reliably blue California district managed to capture nearly a quarter of votes cast in the state’s open primary last month — just after the state Republican Party caught wind of his anti-Semitic comments and rescinded its automatic endorsement. Julia Jacobs in the New York Times$ -- 7/7/18
The votes from California’s primary are finally in. Here’s what we learned -- With nearly every vote tabulated, we now know that the 2018 primary had the highest number of votes in the history of California midterm elections — 6,955,089 votes cast in the primary for governor, up from 4,333,028 in 2014. (The previous record was 6,206,618 votes in 1998’s open primary.) David Weigel in the Washington Post$ -- 7/7/18
Five Counties Tried New Voting Method to Turbocharge Turnout. Here’s What They Got -- Automatically mail every registered voter a ballot, they said. Get rid of all those neighborhood polling places. Replace them with convenient dropboxes and a few “superstore” voting centers. That will boost turnout, they said, and hoped. Byrhonda Lyons CALmatters via KQED -- 7/7/18
State court agency has paid more than $800,000 since 2010 to settle legal claims, records show -- The state court system has paid out $645,410 in legal settlements alleging sexual harassment and discrimination by judges and court officers over the past eight years, new information from the state Judicial Council shows. Greg Moran in the San Diego Union-Tribune$ -- 7/7/18
More California pharmacies to distribute opioid overdose drug -- A month after the California Department of Public Health issued a statewide standing order for naloxone, the emergency antidote for opioid overdoses, the agency has authorized 27 organizations across the state — mostly pharmacies and addiction treatment centers — to distribute and administer the medication without a prescription. Catherine Ho in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 7/7/18
State high court strikes down rule requiring poor to pay for own court reporter in civil courts -- For more than a decade Barry Jameson fought for his day in court, a fight made more complicated because Jameson began it from behind prison walls, as an inmate at Richard J. Donovan State Prison. Greg Moran in the San Diego Union-Tribune$ -- 7/7/18
Southern California sets all-time heat records amid broiling conditions -- Many parts of Southern California hit new high-temperature marks Friday, with a few spots reaching the hottest readings ever recorded. Among the places that set all-time records were Van Nuys Airport (117 degrees), Burbank Airport (114), UCLA (111), Santa Ana (114) and Ramona (115), according to the National Weather Service. Riverside tied its all-time high temperature of 118. Ruben Vives, Victoria Kim and Sarah Parvini in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 7/7/18
Abcarian: Bird scooters — so much fun, so damn dangerous -- Daniela Rivera was standing in the alley in front of my garage in Venice, her eyes red and teary. Her knees were covered in blood, which was dripping down her legs. Robin Abcarian in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 7/7/18
Mayor Darrell Steinberg says Dixon Vice Mayor Ted Hickman should resign -- Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg has added his voice to the chorus of people calling for the resignation of Dixon Vice Mayor Ted Hickman. Hickman became the target of scrutiny after a controversial column he wrote in the town's newspaper – calling for a Straight American Pride Month and using a derogatory term to refer to gay men – went viral. Diana Lambert in the Sacramento Bee$ -- 7/7/18
Two-thirds of people banned from BART are black — and agency isn’t asking why -- Two-thirds of the people BART banished from its property last year were black, and a committee the agency set up to monitor potential civil rights violations in the unique exclusion program isn’t scrutinizing the racial disparity. Ted Andersen in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 7/7/18
Disabled placard violations soar in California -- Planning to use grandma's disabled parking placard to get a prime spot for that upcoming ballgame or concert? Better think again. During the fiscal year that ended last week, the California Department of Motor Vehicles cited 2,485 people for abusing the cards, designed to accommodate people with limited mobility. Cynthia Hubert in the Sacramento Bee$ -- 7/7/18
Economy, Employers, Jobs, Unions, Pensions
A record 2.45 billion-pound almond harvest could be hurt with Chinese tariffs -- Almond growers project a record crop forecast at 2.45 billion pounds for the 2018 season, up 7.9 percent from 2017’s crop yield. However, the booming crop faces uncertainty over possible retaliatory tariffs by China in response to President Donald Trump's trade policies. Julia Sclafani in the Sacramento Bee$ -- 7/7/18
In a Direct Challenge to Their Employers, Tech Workers Begin to Organize -- This was the theme of two unprecedented meetings earlier this week in San Francisco and Seattle. Tech workers, including engineers and programmers, gathered for a forum put on by the labor advocacy group Tech Workers Coalition. Sam Harnett KQED -- 7/7/18
Why Silicon Valley Doesn’t Mind Rising Gas Prices -- What's bad for the internal combustion engine-propelled vehicle owner could actually be good for tech, which has bet big on electrification. For Tesla, rising gas prices will be a welcome nugget of good news. The company has positioned itself as a full-service electric company with solar panels, batteries and, of course, all-electric cars. Eric Newcomer Bloomberg -- 7/7/18
Union workers picket in Las Vegas, worried about pay, security and robots taking their jobs -- After a month without a contract, union employees applied new pressure to casino properties Friday by running picket lines of hundreds of workers on Fremont Street in downtown Las Vegas. David Montero in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 7/7/18
Housing
In high-cost San Francisco, even professionals can qualify as low-income -- I’ve always thought there was something unseemly about the financial complaints of professional people who live in expensive places. Caille Millner in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 7/7/18
Water
San Francisco would face new limits under state water proposal -- California water officials announced an ambitious plan Friday to revive some of the state’s biggest rivers, a move that seeks to stave off major devastation to wetlands and fish, but on the back of cities and farms. Kurtis Alexander in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 7/7/18
Wildfire
Brush fires fueled by high heat, winds encircle San Diego County -- Fueled by scorching heat and strong winds, several brush fires encircled San Diego County on Friday, incinerating multiple structures and forcing the evacuation of 2,400 people. Pauline Repard, Teri Figueroa and Karen Pearlman in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 7/7/18
At least one dead as Klamathon Fire tops 9,600 acres, remains state of emergency -- The fast-moving Klamathon Fire raging through drought-stricken timber and brush near the California-Oregon border has killed one person and destroyed multiple structures as it burns largely out of control, authorities said Friday. Kellen Browning, Daniel Hunt in the Sacramento Bee$ -- 7/7/18
Immigration, Border, Deportation
Illegal border crossings decrease for the first time in 2018 -- Fewer people were caught crossing the U.S.-Mexico border illegally in June than in the previous three months, the first time the number of arrivals decreased in 2018. Kate Morrissey in the San Diego Union-Tribune$ -- 7/7/18
Also . . .
Bay Area homicides plunge to historic lows in first half of 2018 -- Killings in the Bay Area’s biggest cities plunged by one-third in the first half of the year, a trend that puts the region on pace to possibly see less bloodshed in 2018 than it has in decades. Sarah Ravani and Evan Sernoffsky in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 7/7/18
Virus outbreak shuts down San Francisco’s Camp Mather -- San Francisco’s fabled Camp Mather near Yosemite has been shut down because of a virus that has swept through the family retreat, the San Francisco Recreation and Park Department has announced. Steve Rubenstein in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 7/7/18
POTUS 45
White House official’s wife tweeted about n-word, anti-vaccine conspiracies from now-deleted account: report -- The wife of Bill Shine, the new White House deputy chief of staff for communications, has come under scrutiny for racially charged remarks and unfounded medical theories posted to her Twitter account, according to a report by the website Mediaite. Eli Rosenberg in the Washington Post$ -- 7/7/18
-- Friday Updates
One dead after fire jumps I-5, Gov. Brown declares state of emergency -- The Siskiyou County Sheriff’s Office said Friday morning that a person was killed by the fire raging near the Oregon-California border. The Klamathon fire jumped Interstate 5 just south of the Oregon border on Thursday afternoon and Gov. Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency in Siskiyou County, noting that people are in “extreme peril.” Erin Stone in the San Francisco Chronicle$ Kellen Browning, Daniel Hunt in the Sacramento Bee$ -- 7/7/18
County Fire burns 88,000 acres, 110 structures threatened -- The massive fire burning in Yolo and Napa counties continues to challenge firefighters from across the state as they work to try and contain the northernmost part of the blaze, which on Friday entered its seventh day. The County Fire grew more than 300 acres overnight, engulfing 88,375 acres in total as of Friday morning. Erin Stone in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 7/7/18
L.A. gangs stockpile untraceable 'ghost guns' that members make themselves -- A small arsenal of weapons that authorities seized from gang members during a six-month undercover operation lay across the tables at LAPD’s Hollywood station Thursday. Richard Winton in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 7/7/18
Illegal Pot Shops Disrupt California's Budding Legal Market -- A slight marijuana smell wafted out as a steady stream of customers walked into a warehouse, its doors and windows covered by bars. Suddenly, police swooped in. Michael Balsamo Associated Press -- 7/7/18
How Control of Congress Could Swing on a Fight to Repeal California’s Gas Tax -- It was enacted by the thinnest of margins: A 12-cent gasoline tax passed by lawmakers last year to finance a multi-billion-dollar campaign to repair California roads and bridges hobbled by years of neglect and disrepair. But the tax, which took effect in November, is now the subject of a major battle with far-reaching implications for the state’s transportation network and the Democratic campaign to seize control of Congress in November. Adam Nagourney in the New York Times$ -- 7/7/18
How California's farm labor shortage made friends of old rivals -- D’Arrigo Bros. and the United Farm Workers once took more than 25 years to reach a contract, and for many years afterward they communicated mostly through court filings and job actions. Geoffrey Mohan in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 7/7/18
Shell refinery in Martinez has unplanned shutdown, health advisory issued -- A public health advisory was issued Friday in Martinez and Pacheco after an early morning “upset” at the Shell oil refineryy. The “unit upset” was reported at about 2:30 a.m. Friday. Erin Stone in the San Francisco Chronicle$ Amel Ahmed KQED -- 7/7/18
San Diego Mixes Up Traffic Death Data On New Vision Zero Webpage -- San Diego recently revamped the webpage for its Vision Zero campaign to end traffic deaths and serious injuries, adding graphics, videos and a map of crash data to make the site more readable. But the data in the crash map greatly understates the number of traffic deaths that took place over the past two years, based on a comparison with information from the city's Open Data portal. Andrew Bowen KPBS -- 7/7/18
Fox: Judge Upholds Most Sanctuary Laws But Business Concern Mollified -- As anticipated here after the hearing on California’s sanctuary state laws were argued in federal court, Judge John A. Mendez offered a split decision upholding the state’s ability to establish sanctuary laws but halting the state’s power to punish businesses for cooperating with federal immigration authorities. Joel Fox Fox & Hounds -- 7/7/18