Good morning. It’s Wednesday, March 11.
- Sergey Brin backs cross-party rivals in governor race.
- Protracted heat wave expected to shatter records.
- And report finds signs of growing hospice fraud in L.A.
Statewide
1.
Sergey Brin is bankrolling the gubernatorial bids of both Matt Mahan, a San Jose Democrat, and Steve Hilton, a MAGA Republican, campaign filings showed. Brin, the Google co-founder and world’s third-richest person, had largely avoided California politics until this year. But after a union floated a ballot measure to tax billionaires, he emerged as one of the state’s largest political donors in upcoming elections. Among the few things Mahan and Hilton have in common: They both oppose the billionaire tax. Bloomberg
2.
California Democratic Party leaders, desperate to avoid a Republican being elected governor, unveiled a new approach to winnow the crowded field of Democratic candidates. The party said on Tuesday that it would spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to conduct and publish a series of surveys on the viability of each candidate. Rusty Hicks, the party chair, bristled at the suggestion that the effort was designed to shame weak candidates into dropping out. “If people are afraid of information,” he said, “you have to ask why.” S.F. Chronicle | L.A. Times
3.
California is about to experience an extraordinary heat wave over the next 10 days, with highs as much as 30 degrees above normal, forecasters said. Between Wednesday and early next week, temperatures are expected to surge into triple digits in the deserts and parts of Los Angeles, while the Bay Area and Sacramento Valley could hit 90 degrees. “Daily temperature records are a near guarantee,” wrote meteorologist Anthony Edwards. “Monthly records are likely.” S.F. Chronicle | L.A. Times
- The heat is certain to further diminish the state’s snowpack, already radically diminished by above-average warmth in late February. Satellite photos captured the melting event.
Northern California
4.
BART’s ridership cratered during the pandemic and remains less than half of what it once was. If Bay Area residents don’t agree to new taxes, BART directors have said they would be forced to take drastic measures: shuttering 15 stations, reducing the number of trains, raising fares, laying off a quarter of the work force. The situation is dire, wrote the New York Times: “The very future of the familiar white and blue trains, which have zipped around the Bay Area since 1972, is in doubt.”
5.
A brutal attack on two Israeli American men outside a San Jose restaurant that was captured on video Sunday is being investigated as a possible antisemitic hate crime, the authorities said on Tuesday. Witnesses said the victims were speaking Hebrew to one another while waiting for a table when three men approached and began punching and kicking them. Lior Zeevi, 47, one of the victims, said one assailant said “fucking Jew” during the attack. Israel’s consul general to the Pacific Northwest demanded accountability for the “vile, cowardly act.” The Jewish News | KGO
6.
On the edge of the Bay Area, there’s a 117,000-square-foot soccer training center where the skills of boys and girls are refined with Silicon Valley engineering while parents hover nearby on their smartphones. Chris Feliciano Arnold enrolled his 4-year-old son, but he is working through some feelings:
“COPA is a space where, like in so much of America, play and joy and the natural world — swimming in a lake or kicking a ball across actual grass — have been replaced by automation, surveillance, status, and award seeking.” The Believer
7.
Oakland’s Grand Lake Theatre just turned 100. Since opening its doors in 1926, the venue has become synonymous with Oakland, a hub for political activism and a home to filmmakers under a towering neon sign. With its Art Deco interior, full stage, and old-time snack bar, the Grand Lake is frequently named among the coolest theaters anywhere. The San Francisco Chronicle attributed its survival in an age of lackluster movie-going to owner Allen Michaan, a romantic who has pumped money into the building for decades.
Southern California
8.
Three years ago, an audit sounded the alarm about medicare fraud in Los Angeles County, where the number of hospice companies had skyrocketed. The state ultimately revoked the licenses of 280 hospices. But the problem has only worsened since then, a CBS News investigation found. An analysis found indications of fraud at 742 of the county’s roughly 1,800 hospices. Nearly 500 hospices are operating within a 3-mile radius, while 89 are registered to a single building. When reporters visited they found empty offices, piled-up mail, and dead phone lines.
9.
Pope Leo XIV announced the resignation on Tuesday of a San Diego bishop who was accused of embezzling at least $270,000 from his parish and making regular visits to a Tijuana brothel. Bishop Emanuel Shaleta, 69, was arrested last Thursday at San Diego International Airport as he was about to fly to Germany with more than $9,000 in cash in his bag, prosecutors said. He spent the weekend in jail, unable to make bail, before pleading not guilty on Monday to 16 felony charges at a courthouse packed with supporters from his parish. NBC San Diego | A.P.
10.
Chad Bianco, the sheriff of Riverside County and a Republican candidate for governor, reportedly presided over the seizure of ballots as part of an investigation into allegations of voting “irregularities.” The inquiry began after a group of residents calling themselves the Riverside Election Integrity Team said November’s election results included inflated vote totals. County election officials debunked that claim. Bianco, who has echoed Donald Trump’s “stolen election” obsession, is pressing ahead anyway. S.F. Chronicle
11.
In January, President Trump declared that he would “preempt” the building-permit process in Los Angeles fire zones. “I want to see if we can take over the city and state and just give the people their permits they want to build,” he said at the time. Nearly two months later, the administration has abandoned its takeover, Politico reported. Aside from one minor regulation change, the federal government took no action to usurp local control. A Gov. Gavin Newsom spokesperson called the retreat “typical.”
12.
After her mother died, the journalist Betsy Andrews made a pilgrimage with her family to an eight-island archipelago off the coast of Southern California. They dove into an underwater forest, where orange garibaldi fish and blue-banded gobies weaved through the filtered sunlight. Later, they hiked out to a peninsula, sang her mother’s favorite Grateful Dead song, and released her ashes into the water. Andrews wrote about “the life-affirming beauty of California’s Channel Islands.” Conde Nast Traveler
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