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"content": "\u003cp>Inside the modestly decorated Veterans Memorial Building in Solano County’s Rio Vista on Wednesday, representatives for a company aiming to build a new Bay Area city described their bold aspirations and promises they hope will win voter support for the project.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"https://downloads.ctfassets.net/ivxuf0dn6dhw/7HRDCpGCxsRHFXTv0ZxDVZ/ed92f55f60f182530fab988d382da028/East_Solano_Homes_Jobs_and_Clean_Energy_Initiative_-_Submitted_to_Solano_ROV.pdf\">83-page initiative\u003c/a>, which could be on the ballot in November, lays out a series of commitments to existing Solano County residents, as well as plans to construct row houses, apartments, shops, parks and industrial spaces.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Anyé Spivey, director of development planning, California Forever\"]‘Everything we need has to be paid for by the residents and employers in the new community and not by anyone who resides outside it.’[/pullquote]California Forever CEO Jan Sramek said the grandeur of his company’s ambitions reflects the state of the region’s housing affordability crisis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have a big problem to solve,” Sramek said. “In California, we have dug ourselves into such a deficit in terms of housing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The project – which aims to transform more than 60,000 acres of wheat, safflower, canola and other crop lands into a moderately-dense urban city, with as many as 400,000 new residents moving in over the next half century – would help solve that problem by taking advantage of economies of scale, Sramek said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We can deliver a big solution to the problem,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/09_A-zoning-map-of-the-new-community-and-relationships-to-Travis-Air-Force-Base-and-Rio-Vista_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-11972894\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/09_A-zoning-map-of-the-new-community-and-relationships-to-Travis-Air-Force-Base-and-Rio-Vista_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1650\" height=\"1050\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/09_A-zoning-map-of-the-new-community-and-relationships-to-Travis-Air-Force-Base-and-Rio-Vista_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG.jpg 1650w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/09_A-zoning-map-of-the-new-community-and-relationships-to-Travis-Air-Force-Base-and-Rio-Vista_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-800x509.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/09_A-zoning-map-of-the-new-community-and-relationships-to-Travis-Air-Force-Base-and-Rio-Vista_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-1020x649.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/09_A-zoning-map-of-the-new-community-and-relationships-to-Travis-Air-Force-Base-and-Rio-Vista_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-160x102.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/09_A-zoning-map-of-the-new-community-and-relationships-to-Travis-Air-Force-Base-and-Rio-Vista_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-1536x977.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1650px) 100vw, 1650px\">\u003c/a>The new community would include downtown centers, a rapid bus network, manufacturing and makerspaces that Sramek said would add jobs to the region, helping solve a twin problem of people commuting long distances into San Francisco, Oakland and other Bay Area cities for work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Neighborhoods would be a mix of row houses, apartment buildings and retail. Stretching from west to east between Travis Air Force Base and Rio Vista, it would double the security zone, or open space, abutting the base, and include a park separating it from Rio Vista.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=\"news_11970694\" label=\"Related Story\"]But before development can begin, the company must first secure voter approval. Solano County’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.solanocounty.com/civicax/filebank/blobdload.aspx?BlobID=6506\">Orderly Growth Initiative\u003c/a> requires urban development to be concentrated in cities where housing already exists. The proposed ballot measure California Forever released Wednesday is the first step to reclassifying its Solano County landholdings as eligible for this new development.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At a press conference announcing the initiative, Srameck told reporters he was confident the measure would pass and committed to spending “as much [money] as we need to win.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/10_An-illustrative-example-of-a-neighborhood-map-emphasizing-walkable-complete-and-connected-neighborhoods_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-scaled.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-11972895\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/10_An-illustrative-example-of-a-neighborhood-map-emphasizing-walkable-complete-and-connected-neighborhoods_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1862\" height=\"2560\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/10_An-illustrative-example-of-a-neighborhood-map-emphasizing-walkable-complete-and-connected-neighborhoods_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-scaled.jpg 1862w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/10_An-illustrative-example-of-a-neighborhood-map-emphasizing-walkable-complete-and-connected-neighborhoods_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-800x1100.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/10_An-illustrative-example-of-a-neighborhood-map-emphasizing-walkable-complete-and-connected-neighborhoods_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-1020x1402.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/10_An-illustrative-example-of-a-neighborhood-map-emphasizing-walkable-complete-and-connected-neighborhoods_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-160x220.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/10_An-illustrative-example-of-a-neighborhood-map-emphasizing-walkable-complete-and-connected-neighborhoods_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-1117x1536.jpg 1117w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/10_An-illustrative-example-of-a-neighborhood-map-emphasizing-walkable-complete-and-connected-neighborhoods_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-1490x2048.jpg 1490w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/10_An-illustrative-example-of-a-neighborhood-map-emphasizing-walkable-complete-and-connected-neighborhoods_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-1920x2640.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1862px) 100vw, 1862px\">\u003c/a>But outside the Veterans Memorial Building, curious residents expressed anger that they hadn’t been allowed inside the meeting, which was closed to the public.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They barred me from coming in,” said Rio Vista resident Bill Mortimore, adding he had hoped it would be an opportunity to learn more. “How can I make a decision? I can’t.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The project had been \u003ca href=\"https://www.timesheraldonline.com/2019/07/05/large-rural-land-purchase-near-suisun-city-draws-questions/\">shrouded in secrecy for years\u003c/a> as Flannery Associates, a subsidiary of California Forever, discretely spent upward of \u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/25/business/land-purchases-solano-county.html\">$800 million\u003c/a> to purchase some 140 properties between Rio Vista and the Travis Air Force Base, \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/mystery-company-buying-bay-area-land-new-city-18321807.php\">inviting\u003c/a> \u003ca href=\"https://www.wsj.com/articles/investors-bought-nearly-1-billion-in-land-near-a-cali%5B%E2%80%A6%5Dforce-base-officials-want-to-know-who-exactly-they-are-fd868e38\">speculation\u003c/a> about the investors’ intentions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Brian Brokaw, a spokesperson for California Forever, acknowledged the air of secrecy was one obstacle the company would have to overcome.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“People have a right to be skeptical,” Brokaw said. “Hopefully now, when people actually can see what we are putting forward, they just give it a fresh look, and see that this is not just a crazy idea on a website. This is something that’s real.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11969280\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-61-BL-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11969280\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-61-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-61-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-61-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-61-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-61-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-61-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-61-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jan Sramek, CEO of California Forever, speaks during a town hall meeting in Rio Vista on Dec. 5, 2023, for the proposed California city backed by Silicon Valley investors on farmland in eastern Solano County. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>As part of the ballot measure, the company is making a number of commitments to the community, said Anyé Spivey, director of development planning for California Forever.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Chief among them, Spivey said, is a promise to limit growth to 50,000 residents if the new city does not produce at least 15,000 jobs that pay 125% of the county’s average weekly salary.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This guarantee values the dignity of hard work and the concern that so many working families share: getting and keeping good paying jobs,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Spivey said California Forever would also pay the county $500 million for every 50,000 residents the new city adds – a community benefits package that includes $400 million in down payment assistance and affordable housing funds; $70 million in grants for college or vocational training, or to start new businesses; and $30 million for parks and ecological habitats.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A second fund, called Solano Downtowns, would contribute $200 million in for-profit investments for every 50,000 new residents to support infill development within the county’s existing cities, Spivey said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sarah Donnelly, a Rio Vista city councilmember, declined to voice support for or against the project but said she was skeptical of California Forever’s promised investments.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m skeptical about them guaranteeing anything when they’re doing what you already heard of – \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11970694/california-forever-lawsuit-looms-as-solano-county-farmers-fight-back\">suing our friends and neighbors\u003c/a> – so they can get their way,” Donnelly said after the meeting.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rio Vista will bear the brunt of the new developments impact on traffic, home prices, and water, Donnelly said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is where the most impact will happen, right up against us,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11969281\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-75-BL-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11969281\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-75-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-75-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-75-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-75-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-75-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-75-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-75-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Roxanne Stiles-Donnelly speaks during a town hall meeting in Rio Vista on Dec. 5, 2023, for California Forever, a proposed California city backed by Silicon Valley investors on farmland in eastern Solano County. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>To mitigate some of those impacts, Spivey said California Forever would be on the hook to supply the right-of-way and part of the financing to widen highways 12 and 113. The plan also includes a bypass along the portion of HWY 12 adjacent to the new city, as a means of redirecting local traffic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Finally, Spivey said California Forever would also pay to construct its own schools, which would be incorporated into local school districts, as well as its own utility infrastructure and municipal services.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Our taxpayer guarantee says that the new community has to pay its own way for both infrastructure and services,” he said. “Everything we need has to be paid for by the residents and employers in the new community and not by anyone who resides outside it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Envisioned as a moderately-dense urban area, the proposed city conflicts with anti-sprawl efforts the county first enacted more than four decades ago. Another attempt to override those restrictions failed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11972787\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-68-BL-qut-1.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11972787\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-68-BL-qut-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-68-BL-qut-1.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-68-BL-qut-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-68-BL-qut-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-68-BL-qut-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-68-BL-qut-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Local residents fill a town hall meeting in Rio Vista on Dec. 5, 2023, for California Forever, a proposed California city backed by Silicon Valley investors on farmland in eastern Solano County. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-san-francisco-examiner/131194680/\">In 1984, San Francisco developer Hiram Woo\u003c/a> proposed turning 886 acres of pasture land into a residential town called Manzanita, which promised to house almost 6,000 residents with 2,000 homes powered by solar energy with a matrix of bike paths and sidewalks connecting people’s homes with their jobs, restaurants and shops. The vision was not far off from what California Forever is proposing today.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The plan was struck down by voters, many who believed farmland should be protected from encroaching developers. But today, amidst California’s increasingly dire housing shortage, some Solano County residents are open to a new development that could provide them with affordable housing and nearby jobs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, the company is trying to win the trust of residents who wonder whether this new town will have a place for them, much less be built. Late last year, the company announced it was \u003ca href=\"https://californiaforever.com/news/grants/\">distributing $500,000\u003c/a> to local nonprofits, including a homeless shelter in Vacaville and two groups supporting people affected by domestic violence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The company also announced it opened offices in Fairfield, Vallejo and Vacaville, where people can ask questions and share concerns with staff members in person.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sramek has promised to host another series of town hall meetings in February, similar to those held late last year, to answer questions from residents about the ballot text and next steps on the road to election day.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "The company behind the controversial plan to turn more than 60,000 acres of Solano County farmland into a dense urban city released the ballot language for its plan, which voters must approve. \r\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Inside the modestly decorated Veterans Memorial Building in Solano County’s Rio Vista on Wednesday, representatives for a company aiming to build a new Bay Area city described their bold aspirations and promises they hope will win voter support for the project.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"https://downloads.ctfassets.net/ivxuf0dn6dhw/7HRDCpGCxsRHFXTv0ZxDVZ/ed92f55f60f182530fab988d382da028/East_Solano_Homes_Jobs_and_Clean_Energy_Initiative_-_Submitted_to_Solano_ROV.pdf\">83-page initiative\u003c/a>, which could be on the ballot in November, lays out a series of commitments to existing Solano County residents, as well as plans to construct row houses, apartments, shops, parks and industrial spaces.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>California Forever CEO Jan Sramek said the grandeur of his company’s ambitions reflects the state of the region’s housing affordability crisis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have a big problem to solve,” Sramek said. “In California, we have dug ourselves into such a deficit in terms of housing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The project – which aims to transform more than 60,000 acres of wheat, safflower, canola and other crop lands into a moderately-dense urban city, with as many as 400,000 new residents moving in over the next half century – would help solve that problem by taking advantage of economies of scale, Sramek said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We can deliver a big solution to the problem,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/09_A-zoning-map-of-the-new-community-and-relationships-to-Travis-Air-Force-Base-and-Rio-Vista_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-11972894\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/09_A-zoning-map-of-the-new-community-and-relationships-to-Travis-Air-Force-Base-and-Rio-Vista_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1650\" height=\"1050\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/09_A-zoning-map-of-the-new-community-and-relationships-to-Travis-Air-Force-Base-and-Rio-Vista_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG.jpg 1650w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/09_A-zoning-map-of-the-new-community-and-relationships-to-Travis-Air-Force-Base-and-Rio-Vista_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-800x509.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/09_A-zoning-map-of-the-new-community-and-relationships-to-Travis-Air-Force-Base-and-Rio-Vista_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-1020x649.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/09_A-zoning-map-of-the-new-community-and-relationships-to-Travis-Air-Force-Base-and-Rio-Vista_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-160x102.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/09_A-zoning-map-of-the-new-community-and-relationships-to-Travis-Air-Force-Base-and-Rio-Vista_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-1536x977.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1650px) 100vw, 1650px\">\u003c/a>The new community would include downtown centers, a rapid bus network, manufacturing and makerspaces that Sramek said would add jobs to the region, helping solve a twin problem of people commuting long distances into San Francisco, Oakland and other Bay Area cities for work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Neighborhoods would be a mix of row houses, apartment buildings and retail. Stretching from west to east between Travis Air Force Base and Rio Vista, it would double the security zone, or open space, abutting the base, and include a park separating it from Rio Vista.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>But before development can begin, the company must first secure voter approval. Solano County’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.solanocounty.com/civicax/filebank/blobdload.aspx?BlobID=6506\">Orderly Growth Initiative\u003c/a> requires urban development to be concentrated in cities where housing already exists. The proposed ballot measure California Forever released Wednesday is the first step to reclassifying its Solano County landholdings as eligible for this new development.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At a press conference announcing the initiative, Srameck told reporters he was confident the measure would pass and committed to spending “as much [money] as we need to win.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/10_An-illustrative-example-of-a-neighborhood-map-emphasizing-walkable-complete-and-connected-neighborhoods_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-scaled.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-11972895\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/10_An-illustrative-example-of-a-neighborhood-map-emphasizing-walkable-complete-and-connected-neighborhoods_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1862\" height=\"2560\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/10_An-illustrative-example-of-a-neighborhood-map-emphasizing-walkable-complete-and-connected-neighborhoods_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-scaled.jpg 1862w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/10_An-illustrative-example-of-a-neighborhood-map-emphasizing-walkable-complete-and-connected-neighborhoods_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-800x1100.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/10_An-illustrative-example-of-a-neighborhood-map-emphasizing-walkable-complete-and-connected-neighborhoods_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-1020x1402.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/10_An-illustrative-example-of-a-neighborhood-map-emphasizing-walkable-complete-and-connected-neighborhoods_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-160x220.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/10_An-illustrative-example-of-a-neighborhood-map-emphasizing-walkable-complete-and-connected-neighborhoods_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-1117x1536.jpg 1117w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/10_An-illustrative-example-of-a-neighborhood-map-emphasizing-walkable-complete-and-connected-neighborhoods_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-1490x2048.jpg 1490w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/10_An-illustrative-example-of-a-neighborhood-map-emphasizing-walkable-complete-and-connected-neighborhoods_IMAGE-CREDIT_-SITELAB-urban-studio_CMG-1920x2640.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1862px) 100vw, 1862px\">\u003c/a>But outside the Veterans Memorial Building, curious residents expressed anger that they hadn’t been allowed inside the meeting, which was closed to the public.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They barred me from coming in,” said Rio Vista resident Bill Mortimore, adding he had hoped it would be an opportunity to learn more. “How can I make a decision? I can’t.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The project had been \u003ca href=\"https://www.timesheraldonline.com/2019/07/05/large-rural-land-purchase-near-suisun-city-draws-questions/\">shrouded in secrecy for years\u003c/a> as Flannery Associates, a subsidiary of California Forever, discretely spent upward of \u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/25/business/land-purchases-solano-county.html\">$800 million\u003c/a> to purchase some 140 properties between Rio Vista and the Travis Air Force Base, \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/mystery-company-buying-bay-area-land-new-city-18321807.php\">inviting\u003c/a> \u003ca href=\"https://www.wsj.com/articles/investors-bought-nearly-1-billion-in-land-near-a-cali%5B%E2%80%A6%5Dforce-base-officials-want-to-know-who-exactly-they-are-fd868e38\">speculation\u003c/a> about the investors’ intentions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Brian Brokaw, a spokesperson for California Forever, acknowledged the air of secrecy was one obstacle the company would have to overcome.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“People have a right to be skeptical,” Brokaw said. “Hopefully now, when people actually can see what we are putting forward, they just give it a fresh look, and see that this is not just a crazy idea on a website. This is something that’s real.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11969280\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-61-BL-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11969280\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-61-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-61-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-61-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-61-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-61-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-61-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-61-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jan Sramek, CEO of California Forever, speaks during a town hall meeting in Rio Vista on Dec. 5, 2023, for the proposed California city backed by Silicon Valley investors on farmland in eastern Solano County. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>As part of the ballot measure, the company is making a number of commitments to the community, said Anyé Spivey, director of development planning for California Forever.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Chief among them, Spivey said, is a promise to limit growth to 50,000 residents if the new city does not produce at least 15,000 jobs that pay 125% of the county’s average weekly salary.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This guarantee values the dignity of hard work and the concern that so many working families share: getting and keeping good paying jobs,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Spivey said California Forever would also pay the county $500 million for every 50,000 residents the new city adds – a community benefits package that includes $400 million in down payment assistance and affordable housing funds; $70 million in grants for college or vocational training, or to start new businesses; and $30 million for parks and ecological habitats.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A second fund, called Solano Downtowns, would contribute $200 million in for-profit investments for every 50,000 new residents to support infill development within the county’s existing cities, Spivey said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sarah Donnelly, a Rio Vista city councilmember, declined to voice support for or against the project but said she was skeptical of California Forever’s promised investments.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m skeptical about them guaranteeing anything when they’re doing what you already heard of – \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11970694/california-forever-lawsuit-looms-as-solano-county-farmers-fight-back\">suing our friends and neighbors\u003c/a> – so they can get their way,” Donnelly said after the meeting.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rio Vista will bear the brunt of the new developments impact on traffic, home prices, and water, Donnelly said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is where the most impact will happen, right up against us,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11969281\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-75-BL-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11969281\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-75-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-75-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-75-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-75-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-75-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-75-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-75-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Roxanne Stiles-Donnelly speaks during a town hall meeting in Rio Vista on Dec. 5, 2023, for California Forever, a proposed California city backed by Silicon Valley investors on farmland in eastern Solano County. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>To mitigate some of those impacts, Spivey said California Forever would be on the hook to supply the right-of-way and part of the financing to widen highways 12 and 113. The plan also includes a bypass along the portion of HWY 12 adjacent to the new city, as a means of redirecting local traffic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Finally, Spivey said California Forever would also pay to construct its own schools, which would be incorporated into local school districts, as well as its own utility infrastructure and municipal services.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Our taxpayer guarantee says that the new community has to pay its own way for both infrastructure and services,” he said. “Everything we need has to be paid for by the residents and employers in the new community and not by anyone who resides outside it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Envisioned as a moderately-dense urban area, the proposed city conflicts with anti-sprawl efforts the county first enacted more than four decades ago. Another attempt to override those restrictions failed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11972787\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-68-BL-qut-1.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11972787\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-68-BL-qut-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-68-BL-qut-1.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-68-BL-qut-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-68-BL-qut-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-68-BL-qut-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-68-BL-qut-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Local residents fill a town hall meeting in Rio Vista on Dec. 5, 2023, for California Forever, a proposed California city backed by Silicon Valley investors on farmland in eastern Solano County. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-san-francisco-examiner/131194680/\">In 1984, San Francisco developer Hiram Woo\u003c/a> proposed turning 886 acres of pasture land into a residential town called Manzanita, which promised to house almost 6,000 residents with 2,000 homes powered by solar energy with a matrix of bike paths and sidewalks connecting people’s homes with their jobs, restaurants and shops. The vision was not far off from what California Forever is proposing today.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The plan was struck down by voters, many who believed farmland should be protected from encroaching developers. But today, amidst California’s increasingly dire housing shortage, some Solano County residents are open to a new development that could provide them with affordable housing and nearby jobs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, the company is trying to win the trust of residents who wonder whether this new town will have a place for them, much less be built. Late last year, the company announced it was \u003ca href=\"https://californiaforever.com/news/grants/\">distributing $500,000\u003c/a> to local nonprofits, including a homeless shelter in Vacaville and two groups supporting people affected by domestic violence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The company also announced it opened offices in Fairfield, Vallejo and Vacaville, where people can ask questions and share concerns with staff members in person.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sramek has promised to host another series of town hall meetings in February, similar to those held late last year, to answer questions from residents about the ballot text and next steps on the road to election day.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "California Forever Lawsuit Looms as Solano County Farmers Fight Back",
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"headTitle": "California Forever Lawsuit Looms as Solano County Farmers Fight Back | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>Ian and Margaret Anderson’s lives revolve around their over 100-year-old farm, E.A. Anderson and Son Ranch., in the Montezuma Hills of Solano County. They raise thousands of sheep and grow grains like wheat, safflower and canola. Recently, they started growing malting barley, which can be used to make beer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Grains are the most productive crops here,” said Ian Anderson. “We’ve had really good crops over the last few years.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Andersons own about 1,500 acres, but have always farmed on thousands of acres more that they rent from relatives, neighbors and utility agencies. Each year, a third of the land is reserved for sheep grazing, another third for crops and the final third lays fallow to let the soil rest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11969277\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11969277\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-05-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"An older white man seen from behind with sheep and a farmhouse in the background.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-05-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-05-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-05-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-05-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-05-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-05-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ian Anderson walks through the farmland the Anderson family has owned for generations in Birds Landing, Solano County, on Dec. 5, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>But a few years ago, their world started to turn upside down. In 2017, Flannery Associates, a company backed by Silicon Valley billionaires, started buying thousands of acres of farmland around them \u003ca href=\"https://californiaforever.com/\">to build a new city from scratch\u003c/a>. The Andersons weren’t interested in selling their land when the company first approached them in 2019.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s not just about the money,” said Ian. “It’s about who we are and what we do. We have value in growing our crops and raising our livestock. That is more meaningful than cashing in on money and then trying to start a new life somewhere else.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, the Andersons and other landowners are embroiled in a bitter lawsuit with the company. Even if the case gets dismissed, the Andersons are unsure whether they can continue operating their farm as the hills change around them.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>A new California dream\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>California Forever, the parent company of Flannery Associates, wants to “bring back the California Dream” — a dream that includes offices close to homes, with restaurants and small businesses lining the streets in between. The details of how that city will be built are still hazy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Jan Sramek, the company’s CEO, envisions a sustainable city with plenty of bike paths and public transportation to rival Berlin or Paris. They aim to solve some of the state’s biggest problems: housing affordability, long commutes and clean energy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11969283\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11969283\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-92-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"An older white woman and a younger white woman to her left during a town hall, the older woman is speaking into a microphone.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-92-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-92-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-92-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-92-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-92-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-92-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Margaret Anderson and her daughter Maryn Johnson speak during a town hall meeting in Rio Vista on Dec. 5, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“People have been trying to solve these issues for 30 years,” said Sramek. “Every time someone says ‘I don’t like your project for these reasons’ we say, okay, what’s your proposal for fixing these issues? Because it’s really easy to be a critic.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sramek and his team have been coming face to face with some of their critics, as they have spent the past month campaigning across Solano County to get more residents on board with the planned community. Before it can be built, voters will have to approve the project when it appears on their November ballot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote align=\"right\" size=\"medium\" citation=\"Ian Anderson, E.A. Anderson and Son Ranch\"]‘It’s not just about the money. It’s about who we are and what we do. We have value in growing our crops and raising our livestock. That is more meaningful than cashing in on money and then trying to start a new life somewhere else.’[/pullquote]But the company has faced trouble earning trust among residents who have shown up to question Sramek at a series of town hall meetings. Some are unsure how it will make its proposed plans a reality, which show, among other things, a high-speed rail line running through this remote farmland. Others are still skeptical of Flannery’s motives after it started purchasing more than 60,000 acres in secrecy in 2017.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Though the Andersons say they were uninterested in selling their land to the company, the lawsuit Flannery Associates filed in May alleged they and about 35 farmers and landowners colluded with each other to price-fix their land and not sell to the company unless it met a specific price.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Though Ian and Margaret Anderson have held onto the land they own, many of the neighbors whose land they rented have sold to Flannery. Last season, the Andersons continued to farm on 1,200 acres of that land, renting it from Flannery on a monthly basis. In February, they received an eviction notice with a 30-day notice to vacate the land. They had been growing wheat and barley there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was really excited to have this over 2-ton crop of barley and wheat,” said Ian. “It’s kinda how you value your life when you’re a farmer, when you grow great crops, it makes you feel good, when the ground is suitable for growing really great crops. We fought and fought and fought to avoid losing the entire crop.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11969282\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11969282\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-88-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A white middle aged man gestures as he speaks to a woman.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-88-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-88-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-88-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-88-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-88-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-88-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jan Sramek, CEO of California Forever, answers a question from Maryn Johnson, daughter of Ian and Margaret Anderson, during a town hall meeting in Rio Vista on Dec. 5, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Eventually, they were allowed to harvest the crops, but had to pay 30% of the revenue to the company. Now, the Andersons have gone from grazing and planting on about 10,000 acres to just about 3,500.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They’re hoping the case gets dismissed, but they say the lawsuit, now seven months old, has been a financial drain. While they still have savings for retirement, they’ve reduced their farmhand staff from 10 employees to five and have started selling some of their sheep to keep their farm financially afloat.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re no longer looking to invest in new equipment,” said Ian Anderson. “We’re basically trying to figure out a downsized operation — if we can still keep doing it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>A farm that has adapted\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Ian Anderson’s great-grandfather moved from Denmark to the Montezuma Hills sometime after 1865. He secured farmland for himself and, ultimately, for each of his sons as they reached adulthood. One of those sons, Ian’s grandfather, started a farming operation that morphed into E.A. Anderson & Son.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside label=\"Related Stories\" postID=\"news_11959924,forum_2010101894493,news_11959390\"]The Andersons don’t rely on irrigation, instead practicing dryland or rain-fed farming, which requires large swaths of land to soak up the rain. As climate change has brought whiplash between heavy rainfall and intense drought, they have had to adapt their methods. Instead of plowing their fallow land, they now disk the fields, which just turns the soil over and conserves more moisture from one season to the next.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But now that most of the land is gone, the Andersons are unsure whether they can adapt enough to carry on. They had hoped their son Neil would eventually take over the family farm.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Since he was a toddler, he wanted nothing more than to be out on the farm,” Margaret said. “When Ian came back from college and was working with his dad, he took the farm to the next level beyond what his dad did. And Neil is doing the same kind of thing. But all of a sudden, it’s very questionable.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>The need for more housing\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Ian and Margaret Anderson understand the need for more housing and jobs in Solano County. They can respect where Jan Sramek’s desire for a truly dense city comes from. But to build all that in the middle of the Montezuma Hills, far away from highways, public transportation and most of the jobs people already have doesn’t make sense to them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11969279\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11969279\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-28-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A farmhouse with trees behind it and windvanes on a hill in the background. \" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-28-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-28-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-28-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-28-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-28-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-28-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A barn stands on the EA Anderson Ranch, farmland the Anderson family has owned for generations, in Birds Landing, Solano County, on Dec. 5, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“When we see our cities in Solano County that really could use a boost to increase the quality of housing and volume of housing, versus going out into a brand new area and starting every bit of infrastructure from scratch, it can’t be anything other than what could be called sprawl.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They are worried California Forever will turn the hills into another San José, a sprawling suburban city that used to be farmland too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to the \u003ca href=\"https://farmland.org/american-farmland-trusts-statement-about-solano-county-ca-model-city/\">American Farmland Trust\u003c/a>, the U.S. loses 2000 acres of farmland per day. California Forever justifies building their new city in the Montezuma Hills because the farmland is not considered “prime.” But the Andersons disagree.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For generations, we have grown crops that don’t further drain from California’s limited water supply,” said Margaret. “We can’t continue [developing] at this pace and expect our country to remain food secure.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Ian and Margaret Anderson’s lives revolve around their over 100-year-old farm, E.A. Anderson and Son Ranch., in the Montezuma Hills of Solano County. They raise thousands of sheep and grow grains like wheat, safflower and canola. Recently, they started growing malting barley, which can be used to make beer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Grains are the most productive crops here,” said Ian Anderson. “We’ve had really good crops over the last few years.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Andersons own about 1,500 acres, but have always farmed on thousands of acres more that they rent from relatives, neighbors and utility agencies. Each year, a third of the land is reserved for sheep grazing, another third for crops and the final third lays fallow to let the soil rest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11969277\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11969277\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-05-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"An older white man seen from behind with sheep and a farmhouse in the background.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-05-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-05-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-05-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-05-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-05-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-05-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ian Anderson walks through the farmland the Anderson family has owned for generations in Birds Landing, Solano County, on Dec. 5, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>But a few years ago, their world started to turn upside down. In 2017, Flannery Associates, a company backed by Silicon Valley billionaires, started buying thousands of acres of farmland around them \u003ca href=\"https://californiaforever.com/\">to build a new city from scratch\u003c/a>. The Andersons weren’t interested in selling their land when the company first approached them in 2019.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s not just about the money,” said Ian. “It’s about who we are and what we do. We have value in growing our crops and raising our livestock. That is more meaningful than cashing in on money and then trying to start a new life somewhere else.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, the Andersons and other landowners are embroiled in a bitter lawsuit with the company. Even if the case gets dismissed, the Andersons are unsure whether they can continue operating their farm as the hills change around them.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>A new California dream\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>California Forever, the parent company of Flannery Associates, wants to “bring back the California Dream” — a dream that includes offices close to homes, with restaurants and small businesses lining the streets in between. The details of how that city will be built are still hazy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Jan Sramek, the company’s CEO, envisions a sustainable city with plenty of bike paths and public transportation to rival Berlin or Paris. They aim to solve some of the state’s biggest problems: housing affordability, long commutes and clean energy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11969283\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11969283\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-92-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"An older white woman and a younger white woman to her left during a town hall, the older woman is speaking into a microphone.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-92-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-92-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-92-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-92-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-92-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-92-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Margaret Anderson and her daughter Maryn Johnson speak during a town hall meeting in Rio Vista on Dec. 5, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“People have been trying to solve these issues for 30 years,” said Sramek. “Every time someone says ‘I don’t like your project for these reasons’ we say, okay, what’s your proposal for fixing these issues? Because it’s really easy to be a critic.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sramek and his team have been coming face to face with some of their critics, as they have spent the past month campaigning across Solano County to get more residents on board with the planned community. Before it can be built, voters will have to approve the project when it appears on their November ballot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>But the company has faced trouble earning trust among residents who have shown up to question Sramek at a series of town hall meetings. Some are unsure how it will make its proposed plans a reality, which show, among other things, a high-speed rail line running through this remote farmland. Others are still skeptical of Flannery’s motives after it started purchasing more than 60,000 acres in secrecy in 2017.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Though the Andersons say they were uninterested in selling their land to the company, the lawsuit Flannery Associates filed in May alleged they and about 35 farmers and landowners colluded with each other to price-fix their land and not sell to the company unless it met a specific price.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Though Ian and Margaret Anderson have held onto the land they own, many of the neighbors whose land they rented have sold to Flannery. Last season, the Andersons continued to farm on 1,200 acres of that land, renting it from Flannery on a monthly basis. In February, they received an eviction notice with a 30-day notice to vacate the land. They had been growing wheat and barley there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was really excited to have this over 2-ton crop of barley and wheat,” said Ian. “It’s kinda how you value your life when you’re a farmer, when you grow great crops, it makes you feel good, when the ground is suitable for growing really great crops. We fought and fought and fought to avoid losing the entire crop.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11969282\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11969282\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-88-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A white middle aged man gestures as he speaks to a woman.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-88-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-88-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-88-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-88-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-88-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-88-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jan Sramek, CEO of California Forever, answers a question from Maryn Johnson, daughter of Ian and Margaret Anderson, during a town hall meeting in Rio Vista on Dec. 5, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Eventually, they were allowed to harvest the crops, but had to pay 30% of the revenue to the company. Now, the Andersons have gone from grazing and planting on about 10,000 acres to just about 3,500.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They’re hoping the case gets dismissed, but they say the lawsuit, now seven months old, has been a financial drain. While they still have savings for retirement, they’ve reduced their farmhand staff from 10 employees to five and have started selling some of their sheep to keep their farm financially afloat.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re no longer looking to invest in new equipment,” said Ian Anderson. “We’re basically trying to figure out a downsized operation — if we can still keep doing it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>A farm that has adapted\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Ian Anderson’s great-grandfather moved from Denmark to the Montezuma Hills sometime after 1865. He secured farmland for himself and, ultimately, for each of his sons as they reached adulthood. One of those sons, Ian’s grandfather, started a farming operation that morphed into E.A. Anderson & Son.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The Andersons don’t rely on irrigation, instead practicing dryland or rain-fed farming, which requires large swaths of land to soak up the rain. As climate change has brought whiplash between heavy rainfall and intense drought, they have had to adapt their methods. Instead of plowing their fallow land, they now disk the fields, which just turns the soil over and conserves more moisture from one season to the next.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But now that most of the land is gone, the Andersons are unsure whether they can adapt enough to carry on. They had hoped their son Neil would eventually take over the family farm.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Since he was a toddler, he wanted nothing more than to be out on the farm,” Margaret said. “When Ian came back from college and was working with his dad, he took the farm to the next level beyond what his dad did. And Neil is doing the same kind of thing. But all of a sudden, it’s very questionable.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>The need for more housing\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Ian and Margaret Anderson understand the need for more housing and jobs in Solano County. They can respect where Jan Sramek’s desire for a truly dense city comes from. But to build all that in the middle of the Montezuma Hills, far away from highways, public transportation and most of the jobs people already have doesn’t make sense to them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11969279\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11969279\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-28-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A farmhouse with trees behind it and windvanes on a hill in the background. \" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-28-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-28-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-28-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-28-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-28-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/12/231205-SolanoCountyFarmers-28-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A barn stands on the EA Anderson Ranch, farmland the Anderson family has owned for generations, in Birds Landing, Solano County, on Dec. 5, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“When we see our cities in Solano County that really could use a boost to increase the quality of housing and volume of housing, versus going out into a brand new area and starting every bit of infrastructure from scratch, it can’t be anything other than what could be called sprawl.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They are worried California Forever will turn the hills into another San José, a sprawling suburban city that used to be farmland too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to the \u003ca href=\"https://farmland.org/american-farmland-trusts-statement-about-solano-county-ca-model-city/\">American Farmland Trust\u003c/a>, the U.S. loses 2000 acres of farmland per day. California Forever justifies building their new city in the Montezuma Hills because the farmland is not considered “prime.” But the Andersons disagree.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For generations, we have grown crops that don’t further drain from California’s limited water supply,” said Margaret. “We can’t continue [developing] at this pace and expect our country to remain food secure.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"title": "Silicon Valley Investors Want to Build a New City. Can They Convince Solano County Voters?",
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"headTitle": "Silicon Valley Investors Want to Build a New City. Can They Convince Solano County Voters? | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">View the full episode transcript.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">California Forever, the group of Silicon Valley investors and billionaires who want to build a new city from scratch in Solano County, are on something of a public relations campaign.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The group held its first town hall meeting in Vallejo on Wednesday night. And it will be the first of many — because if they really want to build a new city on the county’s outskirts, they’ll need to win over the hearts and minds of voters first. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"card card--enclosed grey\">\n\u003cp id=\"embed-code\" class=\"inconsolata\">\n\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm/?e=KQINC6493768949&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\n\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Links:\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>LISTEN: \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11959845/the-silicon-valley-giants-who-want-to-build-a-new-city-in-solano-county\">The Silicon Valley Giants Who Want to Build a New City in Solano County\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>I’m Ericka Cruz Guevarra and welcome to the bay. Local news to keep you rooted. Over the last few months, the Silicon Valley investors and billionaires who want to build a new city in Solano County have been gearing up for something of a public relations tour, an elevator pitch to the public. You see, for years, these Silicon Valley giants had been secretly buying up a bunch of land in Fairfield and Rio Vista. And nobody, not even the U.S. government, knew their identities. But ever since The New York Times revealed who they were and their plans, these investors who formed the group California Forever have some big questions to answer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003cem> \u003c/em>\u003c/strong>\u003cem>[Solana County voter]\u003c/em> I mean, ultimately, they need our approval, right? So I guess in other words, we’re kind of asking what’s in it for us?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>If they want to see their plans through California forever is going to have to win over the hearts and minds of Solano County voters. Today, KQED housing reporter Adhiti Bandlamudi, takes us to Vallejo. And inside the very first town hall between California forever and Solano County residents.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>The meeting was at the Vallejo Naval and Historical Museum. To attend the meeting, you basically had to like reserve a seat through Eventbrite. It was 100% free. There were about like 50 people there. It wasn’t a full hall.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Adhiti, who was at this meeting, or specifically representatives of California forever, who was there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>So there were actually quite a few people from California forever. Not the investors necessarily, but the staff. The main person who is like the face of this project, who was the only one who would talk on the record, was Jan Sramek, who’s the California forever’s CEO? Jan Sramek is really interesting. He was born in the Czech Republic. He was educated at the University of Cambridge and then like London School of Economics. It was trading for Goldman Sachs when he was like 22. He definitely has a lot of sway. And that Sway has gotten him a lot of investment from billionaires like LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman, Stripe co-founders Patrick and John Collison. Andreessen Horowitz, founder Marc Andreessen and partner Chris Dixon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>So he definitely has a lot of influence. And this idea of building a city from scratch, this is really his idea, right? It is. Basically, the idea is pretty simple Build a walkable city where you can walk down the street and, you know, grab a cup of coffee, go to your work, and your work isn’t super far away. You know, in Solano County, a lot of the residents there travel two hours into the city or down to the peninsula or the South Bay. What Jan Sramek and the people at California forever are saying is, what if that wasn’t the case? What if we could also build the local economy out in farmland that we feel could be better used to serve the public?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Well, already this first meeting, as we were just saying, was in Vallejo, which, to be clear, is actually like nearly an hour away from the land that California forever plans or hopes to develop. So why does California forever seem to want Vallejo’s blessing in this as well?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>They’re going not only to Vallejo, but like, you know, Fairfield and Rio Vista. And the reason why is that the entire county has to vote to approve this project. And so they really can’t just to concentrate their efforts to where it really will be. They have to get everybody’s buy in. Audie, what did California forever share with Solano County residents at this meeting about their plans so far? The meeting started by basically introducing who is backing this. Where is this money coming from? And while the names of, you know, LinkedIn executives and Stripe executives are very interesting and impressive to a certain demographic in the Bay Area, to some people, they don’t really mean much. They just mean money.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>What they did talk about is water rights, where they’re getting water from. So they answered that they actually have their own water source and that’s going to be fine. They won’t have to siphon it off from another city transportation. The project is close to Highway 12, which is super heavily congested. It’s also one of the deadliest highways. And they talked about plans to potentially widen it or make it, you know, beneficial for all of Solano County while also being beneficial for California forever. They talked about the kind of housing that they want to build, not specifically, but more generally, talking about how, you know, they want to provide housing for all residents of many different income brackets.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>They talked a very big picture and made a lot of promises. And I think there were some people in the community who saw that and said, well, okay, I’m going to look further into this later on. And there were other people who heard that and said, this is really shady. They’re not telling us anything. What’s the deal here?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra \u003c/strong>Well, I mean, on that note, what was your sense of how people were responding to this presentation by California forever? Just generally, what how would you maybe characterize the mood?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>The mood was very skeptical. Anyone who was like supporting the project did so quietly. The California forever. People who are who are presenting this idea are very confident in their plan and they’re trying to sell it. Right. They’re trying to say like, hey, this is good for you, this is good for everyone. But that confident attitude was taken as arrogant and forceful by some in the audience.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>You know, the beginning of the meeting was informational and it was pretty tame. Then people were getting upset and they started yelling out questions and it got a little bit contentious. I could see Jan becoming, like, visibly aggravated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>I heard a lot of people at the meeting saying that, you know, look, we’re already competing for resources with other cities like water and electricity and even jobs. So why are you going to add a new city if things are already bad for us here? There were other people who are sort of like, why did you have a submit questions ahead of time if you really wanted to talk to us, like let’s talk now. You’re making all these big promises, but there’s no proven track record of what it’s actually going to do.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>So what happens when this fails? Like, are you going to leave us high and dry? I could feel these, like, old seeds of, like, maybe like betrayal or like just being promised big things too many times and those big promises not coming to fruition and people feeling like, you know, we’ve seen this song and dance before and we’re not having it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Coming up, we hear from residents about what they think of the plan and we hear directly from California forever. Stay with us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>I know you had a chance to speak to some of the people who went to the meeting to hear a little bit more about their perspectives. Tell me more about what those conversations were like.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>The first person I talked to was Paula Conley. And tell me how you’re feeling today.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Paula Conley: \u003c/strong>Well, I’m a native Vallejoen, and I’m very proud of our city, and it’s had a lot of disadvantages.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>She actually was holding a sign. It was a little cardboard sign. And I think it said something like, leave Solano County forever. Paula had a lot of concerns. One of them was mainly about California forever’s attitude about the project.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Paula Conley: \u003c/strong>But what bothers me is the incredible hubris of billionaires who think because they have money, they know everything and they can just come in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>You know, Paula was also really concerned about what happens if this fails. I mean, in Paula’s mind, just sort of like what happens when this fails. And she was kind of like, if this isn’t going to do anything for my town, why should I even support it?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Paula Conley: \u003c/strong>So we have a beautiful area. It’s not to say we don’t need development, but we have lots of towns struggling. And if you’ve got the money, help the people who are here. You’re talking about helping people. There’s people right here that need the help.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Did you talk with anyone who’s more open to this idea? Potentially.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>You know, I met Patrice Lewis. I actually saw her talking to one of the California Forever people. And she had like this notebook.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Patrice Lewis: \u003c/strong>A project like this is crucial and it’s going to be vital to Vallejo. And I’m just looking at how it’s going to be an event below because that’s my major concern here. So I’ve seen some things on the news.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>She kind of was like, either I can come to these meetings and engage in the process and try to tell them what I want or get left out entirely.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Patrice Lewis: \u003c/strong>I don’t know if I want to do anyway. They have the money. They already purchased the land. You know, I don’t want to go on to get along, but definitely be, you know, a voice in the room and be able to sit and listen and have a conversation so my city can get something. But also, like add to whatever the plan is going to be and to know what it looks like and not just be like totally against it, I guess.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>Yeah, Patrice is definitely one of those people who is sort of like optimistic that maybe things are going to happen, but also cautious and, you know, maybe a little bit realistic that like, they may not listen, but I have to do the best that I can.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sam Houston: \u003c/strong>My name is Sam Houston. Like the city. Oh, wow. Yeah.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>Yeah. Yeah. And where do you live?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sam Houston: \u003c/strong>I live here in Vallejo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>So there was one person who I talked to. His name is Sam Houston. How long have you all lived in Vallejo?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sam Houston: \u003c/strong>I’ve lived in Vallejo for five years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>Right now, his wife and him, they commute to San Francisco and spend two hours in traffic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sam Houston: \u003c/strong>Before that, I lived in Richmond and then lived in San Francisco. We’ve just kind of been progressively pushed out because of rent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>And I think they’ve been wondering if Solano County is a place where they can put down roots and they haven’t figured that out yet. You know.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sam Houston: \u003c/strong>My wife and I are building a family now, and so also thinking about the future. Like, where can people that live here, where can they work? Is there opportunity? Is there like a path to success for people here if there are really great jobs in this new city? How can people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>California forever makes a good pitch for someone like him. So Sam said that he is actually going to attend some more meetings and he’s going to keep an open mind about what this project could do for him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sam Houston: \u003c/strong>I’m open minded. I think part of the challenge for for the company is that they did acquire all this land in secret, and I understand why they did do it in secret. But it’s just hard to build trust by doing what they did, I guess. So they’re just kind of starting on the back foot, so to speak.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Well, Adhiti if the whole point of this meeting was to really engage with the community, I’m curious how representatives of California forever responded to some of what was said at the meeting, particularly this idea that, you know, have the Silicon Valley outsiders coming into a community they know absolutely nothing about and that there is some fear there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>Yeah. So the last person I talked to that night was Jan Sramek. I asked him like, how how did you respond? Like it seemed like people were really upset about this project. And he responded with this glowing confidence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jan Sramek: \u003c/strong>I’m excited that we are out in the community talking to people. I mean, obviously there are other people in the room who have strong opinions, but we think it’s important that they hear the story from us. And then some of them are…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>Basically was feeling really confident that he can win people over, that this project is a net good. And he also mentioned that, you know, while there are some loud opponents of the project, he said most people came up to him and said, actually, I’m pretty open minded about this and I think I could be on board with this kind of thing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jan Sramek: \u003c/strong>So many people came and said, you know, I know that some people are against it and very vocal about we are in favor of the project and we actually kind of feel stifled by the loud opposition to the project, which is making it difficult.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>And I asked him to you know, look, I have heard from multiple people who say like, you’re an outsider and you’re coming in and like, you don’t know the history of this place. And he sort of said like, you know, actually for the past several years, like I’ve been doing a lot of research on Solano County and Vallejo and all of the cities. And I know more than you think I know.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jan Sramek: \u003c/strong>There is a lot that we understand about the county and we didn’t invest money here lately. And so before we ever started investing, we did a lot of research on the county. We read a lot of historical documents. We’ve spoken to little people. We’ve done a lot of surveys. And so, actually, we do know more about the county than almost any other developer that would come in here.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>There were people who are sort of like, this is not a good plan. While we agree that this kind of plan might be good for some people, we don’t like how you’re going about it and we don’t like what you’re about. And his response to that is. Fine. Then give me an alternative.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jan Sramek: \u003c/strong>There are very serious issues in Solano County that have been going on for a long time. And so overall, it’s a it’s a wonderful place to live. It’s in a great location. There’s there’s a lot of really great people and great communities. But there have been ongoing issues with housing affordability, with the lack of good paying local jobs. And so every time someone says, I don’t like your project, we say, okay, what’s your proposal for fixing these issues? Because it’s really easy to be a critic. It’s really hard to build something in the world today.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>I want to talk about what is ahead already. This is, of course, the first of a handful of town halls that California forever is hosting around the county. So what is the goal here?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>So there are five more stops all over the county, and the goal is to basically prime people for what’s to come ahead. Solano County has this policy that whenever they change the zoning in a particular district to build this kind of like dense urban development, that the voters need to approve it first. And voters are basically going to get a chance to decide whether they want to relax some of the restrictions on zoning that would make way for a dense urban project like this. There are a lot of steps before we’re actually going to see any like housing getting constructed here. So we have a long way to go.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Well, my last question for you already. I mean, there are fights about housing all over California all the time, but there is something that feels very different about this particular project, not just the fact that these are like tech billionaires and this like Silicon Valley element, but also the way that it’s like Silicon Valley sort of colliding with a place like Solano County, which I feel like can’t feel farther enough away from Silicon Valley. You know, so I’m curious how I guess this housing fight that you’re seeing here compares to other housing debates that you’ve seen or covered.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>You know, there’s like this disconnect. I think the people who live there who are like, I see what you’re saying, and I see how that would be good for some people, but I don’t see myself in that vision. That’s like not what I want. What’s more is that Solano County is one of the places where people who can’t find housing in the big cities are going out to to find housing there. And residents who already live there are already facing the pressures of like richer people moving in, driving up the housing prices like they’re already facing that. So when they see California for forever coming in and promising this big thing of even more change and potentially even more displacement, they’re really skeptical and honestly, really scared about it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Adhiti, thank you so much.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>Thanks for having me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>That was Adhiti Bandlamudi, a housing reporter for KQED. This 42 minute conversation with Adhiti was cut down by producer Maria Esquinca. Allan Montecillo is our senior editor. He scored this episode and added all the tape. It was pitched by me. By the way, we did another episode that dives deeper into the Silicon Valley giants behind California forever. We actually talked to The New York Times reporter who broke that story. It’s a really good episode. So if you are a Solano County resident and you are curious to know more, I’ll give you a link to that in our show notes. The Bay is a production of member supported KQED in San Francisco. I’m Ericka Cruz Guevarra. Peace.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"title": "Silicon Valley Investors Want to Build a New City. Can They Convince Solano County Voters? | KQED",
"description": "The group of Silicon Valley investors and billionaires who want to build a new city from scratch in Solano County, are on something of a public relations campaign.",
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"headline": "Silicon Valley Investors Want to Build a New City. Can They Convince Solano County Voters?",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">View the full episode transcript.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">California Forever, the group of Silicon Valley investors and billionaires who want to build a new city from scratch in Solano County, are on something of a public relations campaign.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The group held its first town hall meeting in Vallejo on Wednesday night. And it will be the first of many — because if they really want to build a new city on the county’s outskirts, they’ll need to win over the hearts and minds of voters first. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"card card--enclosed grey\">\n\u003cp id=\"embed-code\" class=\"inconsolata\">\n\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm/?e=KQINC6493768949&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\n\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Links:\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>LISTEN: \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11959845/the-silicon-valley-giants-who-want-to-build-a-new-city-in-solano-county\">The Silicon Valley Giants Who Want to Build a New City in Solano County\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-content post-body\">\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>I’m Ericka Cruz Guevarra and welcome to the bay. Local news to keep you rooted. Over the last few months, the Silicon Valley investors and billionaires who want to build a new city in Solano County have been gearing up for something of a public relations tour, an elevator pitch to the public. You see, for years, these Silicon Valley giants had been secretly buying up a bunch of land in Fairfield and Rio Vista. And nobody, not even the U.S. government, knew their identities. But ever since The New York Times revealed who they were and their plans, these investors who formed the group California Forever have some big questions to answer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003cem> \u003c/em>\u003c/strong>\u003cem>[Solana County voter]\u003c/em> I mean, ultimately, they need our approval, right? So I guess in other words, we’re kind of asking what’s in it for us?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>If they want to see their plans through California forever is going to have to win over the hearts and minds of Solano County voters. Today, KQED housing reporter Adhiti Bandlamudi, takes us to Vallejo. And inside the very first town hall between California forever and Solano County residents.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>The meeting was at the Vallejo Naval and Historical Museum. To attend the meeting, you basically had to like reserve a seat through Eventbrite. It was 100% free. There were about like 50 people there. It wasn’t a full hall.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Adhiti, who was at this meeting, or specifically representatives of California forever, who was there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>So there were actually quite a few people from California forever. Not the investors necessarily, but the staff. The main person who is like the face of this project, who was the only one who would talk on the record, was Jan Sramek, who’s the California forever’s CEO? Jan Sramek is really interesting. He was born in the Czech Republic. He was educated at the University of Cambridge and then like London School of Economics. It was trading for Goldman Sachs when he was like 22. He definitely has a lot of sway. And that Sway has gotten him a lot of investment from billionaires like LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman, Stripe co-founders Patrick and John Collison. Andreessen Horowitz, founder Marc Andreessen and partner Chris Dixon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>So he definitely has a lot of influence. And this idea of building a city from scratch, this is really his idea, right? It is. Basically, the idea is pretty simple Build a walkable city where you can walk down the street and, you know, grab a cup of coffee, go to your work, and your work isn’t super far away. You know, in Solano County, a lot of the residents there travel two hours into the city or down to the peninsula or the South Bay. What Jan Sramek and the people at California forever are saying is, what if that wasn’t the case? What if we could also build the local economy out in farmland that we feel could be better used to serve the public?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Well, already this first meeting, as we were just saying, was in Vallejo, which, to be clear, is actually like nearly an hour away from the land that California forever plans or hopes to develop. So why does California forever seem to want Vallejo’s blessing in this as well?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>They’re going not only to Vallejo, but like, you know, Fairfield and Rio Vista. And the reason why is that the entire county has to vote to approve this project. And so they really can’t just to concentrate their efforts to where it really will be. They have to get everybody’s buy in. Audie, what did California forever share with Solano County residents at this meeting about their plans so far? The meeting started by basically introducing who is backing this. Where is this money coming from? And while the names of, you know, LinkedIn executives and Stripe executives are very interesting and impressive to a certain demographic in the Bay Area, to some people, they don’t really mean much. They just mean money.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>What they did talk about is water rights, where they’re getting water from. So they answered that they actually have their own water source and that’s going to be fine. They won’t have to siphon it off from another city transportation. The project is close to Highway 12, which is super heavily congested. It’s also one of the deadliest highways. And they talked about plans to potentially widen it or make it, you know, beneficial for all of Solano County while also being beneficial for California forever. They talked about the kind of housing that they want to build, not specifically, but more generally, talking about how, you know, they want to provide housing for all residents of many different income brackets.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>They talked a very big picture and made a lot of promises. And I think there were some people in the community who saw that and said, well, okay, I’m going to look further into this later on. And there were other people who heard that and said, this is really shady. They’re not telling us anything. What’s the deal here?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra \u003c/strong>Well, I mean, on that note, what was your sense of how people were responding to this presentation by California forever? Just generally, what how would you maybe characterize the mood?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>The mood was very skeptical. Anyone who was like supporting the project did so quietly. The California forever. People who are who are presenting this idea are very confident in their plan and they’re trying to sell it. Right. They’re trying to say like, hey, this is good for you, this is good for everyone. But that confident attitude was taken as arrogant and forceful by some in the audience.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>You know, the beginning of the meeting was informational and it was pretty tame. Then people were getting upset and they started yelling out questions and it got a little bit contentious. I could see Jan becoming, like, visibly aggravated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>I heard a lot of people at the meeting saying that, you know, look, we’re already competing for resources with other cities like water and electricity and even jobs. So why are you going to add a new city if things are already bad for us here? There were other people who are sort of like, why did you have a submit questions ahead of time if you really wanted to talk to us, like let’s talk now. You’re making all these big promises, but there’s no proven track record of what it’s actually going to do.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>So what happens when this fails? Like, are you going to leave us high and dry? I could feel these, like, old seeds of, like, maybe like betrayal or like just being promised big things too many times and those big promises not coming to fruition and people feeling like, you know, we’ve seen this song and dance before and we’re not having it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Coming up, we hear from residents about what they think of the plan and we hear directly from California forever. Stay with us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>I know you had a chance to speak to some of the people who went to the meeting to hear a little bit more about their perspectives. Tell me more about what those conversations were like.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>The first person I talked to was Paula Conley. And tell me how you’re feeling today.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Paula Conley: \u003c/strong>Well, I’m a native Vallejoen, and I’m very proud of our city, and it’s had a lot of disadvantages.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>She actually was holding a sign. It was a little cardboard sign. And I think it said something like, leave Solano County forever. Paula had a lot of concerns. One of them was mainly about California forever’s attitude about the project.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Paula Conley: \u003c/strong>But what bothers me is the incredible hubris of billionaires who think because they have money, they know everything and they can just come in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>You know, Paula was also really concerned about what happens if this fails. I mean, in Paula’s mind, just sort of like what happens when this fails. And she was kind of like, if this isn’t going to do anything for my town, why should I even support it?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Paula Conley: \u003c/strong>So we have a beautiful area. It’s not to say we don’t need development, but we have lots of towns struggling. And if you’ve got the money, help the people who are here. You’re talking about helping people. There’s people right here that need the help.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Did you talk with anyone who’s more open to this idea? Potentially.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>You know, I met Patrice Lewis. I actually saw her talking to one of the California Forever people. And she had like this notebook.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Patrice Lewis: \u003c/strong>A project like this is crucial and it’s going to be vital to Vallejo. And I’m just looking at how it’s going to be an event below because that’s my major concern here. So I’ve seen some things on the news.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>She kind of was like, either I can come to these meetings and engage in the process and try to tell them what I want or get left out entirely.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Patrice Lewis: \u003c/strong>I don’t know if I want to do anyway. They have the money. They already purchased the land. You know, I don’t want to go on to get along, but definitely be, you know, a voice in the room and be able to sit and listen and have a conversation so my city can get something. But also, like add to whatever the plan is going to be and to know what it looks like and not just be like totally against it, I guess.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>Yeah, Patrice is definitely one of those people who is sort of like optimistic that maybe things are going to happen, but also cautious and, you know, maybe a little bit realistic that like, they may not listen, but I have to do the best that I can.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sam Houston: \u003c/strong>My name is Sam Houston. Like the city. Oh, wow. Yeah.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>Yeah. Yeah. And where do you live?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sam Houston: \u003c/strong>I live here in Vallejo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>So there was one person who I talked to. His name is Sam Houston. How long have you all lived in Vallejo?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sam Houston: \u003c/strong>I’ve lived in Vallejo for five years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>Right now, his wife and him, they commute to San Francisco and spend two hours in traffic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sam Houston: \u003c/strong>Before that, I lived in Richmond and then lived in San Francisco. We’ve just kind of been progressively pushed out because of rent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>And I think they’ve been wondering if Solano County is a place where they can put down roots and they haven’t figured that out yet. You know.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sam Houston: \u003c/strong>My wife and I are building a family now, and so also thinking about the future. Like, where can people that live here, where can they work? Is there opportunity? Is there like a path to success for people here if there are really great jobs in this new city? How can people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>California forever makes a good pitch for someone like him. So Sam said that he is actually going to attend some more meetings and he’s going to keep an open mind about what this project could do for him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sam Houston: \u003c/strong>I’m open minded. I think part of the challenge for for the company is that they did acquire all this land in secret, and I understand why they did do it in secret. But it’s just hard to build trust by doing what they did, I guess. So they’re just kind of starting on the back foot, so to speak.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Well, Adhiti if the whole point of this meeting was to really engage with the community, I’m curious how representatives of California forever responded to some of what was said at the meeting, particularly this idea that, you know, have the Silicon Valley outsiders coming into a community they know absolutely nothing about and that there is some fear there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>Yeah. So the last person I talked to that night was Jan Sramek. I asked him like, how how did you respond? Like it seemed like people were really upset about this project. And he responded with this glowing confidence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jan Sramek: \u003c/strong>I’m excited that we are out in the community talking to people. I mean, obviously there are other people in the room who have strong opinions, but we think it’s important that they hear the story from us. And then some of them are…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>Basically was feeling really confident that he can win people over, that this project is a net good. And he also mentioned that, you know, while there are some loud opponents of the project, he said most people came up to him and said, actually, I’m pretty open minded about this and I think I could be on board with this kind of thing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jan Sramek: \u003c/strong>So many people came and said, you know, I know that some people are against it and very vocal about we are in favor of the project and we actually kind of feel stifled by the loud opposition to the project, which is making it difficult.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>And I asked him to you know, look, I have heard from multiple people who say like, you’re an outsider and you’re coming in and like, you don’t know the history of this place. And he sort of said like, you know, actually for the past several years, like I’ve been doing a lot of research on Solano County and Vallejo and all of the cities. And I know more than you think I know.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jan Sramek: \u003c/strong>There is a lot that we understand about the county and we didn’t invest money here lately. And so before we ever started investing, we did a lot of research on the county. We read a lot of historical documents. We’ve spoken to little people. We’ve done a lot of surveys. And so, actually, we do know more about the county than almost any other developer that would come in here.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>There were people who are sort of like, this is not a good plan. While we agree that this kind of plan might be good for some people, we don’t like how you’re going about it and we don’t like what you’re about. And his response to that is. Fine. Then give me an alternative.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jan Sramek: \u003c/strong>There are very serious issues in Solano County that have been going on for a long time. And so overall, it’s a it’s a wonderful place to live. It’s in a great location. There’s there’s a lot of really great people and great communities. But there have been ongoing issues with housing affordability, with the lack of good paying local jobs. And so every time someone says, I don’t like your project, we say, okay, what’s your proposal for fixing these issues? Because it’s really easy to be a critic. It’s really hard to build something in the world today.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>I want to talk about what is ahead already. This is, of course, the first of a handful of town halls that California forever is hosting around the county. So what is the goal here?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>So there are five more stops all over the county, and the goal is to basically prime people for what’s to come ahead. Solano County has this policy that whenever they change the zoning in a particular district to build this kind of like dense urban development, that the voters need to approve it first. And voters are basically going to get a chance to decide whether they want to relax some of the restrictions on zoning that would make way for a dense urban project like this. There are a lot of steps before we’re actually going to see any like housing getting constructed here. So we have a long way to go.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Well, my last question for you already. I mean, there are fights about housing all over California all the time, but there is something that feels very different about this particular project, not just the fact that these are like tech billionaires and this like Silicon Valley element, but also the way that it’s like Silicon Valley sort of colliding with a place like Solano County, which I feel like can’t feel farther enough away from Silicon Valley. You know, so I’m curious how I guess this housing fight that you’re seeing here compares to other housing debates that you’ve seen or covered.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>You know, there’s like this disconnect. I think the people who live there who are like, I see what you’re saying, and I see how that would be good for some people, but I don’t see myself in that vision. That’s like not what I want. What’s more is that Solano County is one of the places where people who can’t find housing in the big cities are going out to to find housing there. And residents who already live there are already facing the pressures of like richer people moving in, driving up the housing prices like they’re already facing that. So when they see California for forever coming in and promising this big thing of even more change and potentially even more displacement, they’re really skeptical and honestly, really scared about it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Adhiti, thank you so much.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Adhiti Bandlamudi: \u003c/strong>Thanks for having me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>That was Adhiti Bandlamudi, a housing reporter for KQED. This 42 minute conversation with Adhiti was cut down by producer Maria Esquinca. Allan Montecillo is our senior editor. He scored this episode and added all the tape. It was pitched by me. By the way, we did another episode that dives deeper into the Silicon Valley giants behind California forever. We actually talked to The New York Times reporter who broke that story. It’s a really good episode. So if you are a Solano County resident and you are curious to know more, I’ll give you a link to that in our show notes. The Bay is a production of member supported KQED in San Francisco. I’m Ericka Cruz Guevarra. Peace.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>"
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"title": "Amid Book Bans, This Bay Area Librarian Is Focusing on Book Joy",
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"content": "\u003cp>Many librarians like Mychal Threets have rallied together in support of book freedom, as school districts and state legislatures across the country have attempted to establish book bans of themes related to race and gender.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Books must be accessible. Books are joy,” said Threets, who works at the Fairfield Civic Center branch in Solano County, in a social media video amplified by Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office recently. “Students deserve to see themselves represented on school bookshelves, on library bookshelves, to see their friends, families and classmates represented.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.instagram.com/reel/CxtbM38Sure/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igshid=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last week, Newsom signed a bill into law that will block school boards from banning certain textbooks for trying to be inclusive of race and LGBTQ topics. The proposal is meant in part to address situations like one over the summer when the Temecula Valley Unified School District’s school board \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11953735/task-force-says-california-textbooks-should-reflect-states-diversity\">rejected\u003c/a> a social studies curriculum for elementary students that addressed Harvey Milk — who became the first openly gay man elected to public office in California on San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=\"forum_2010101893478,news_11961363\" label=\"Related Posts\"]“This banning binge, this cultural purge that we’re experiencing all throughout America and increasingly here in the state of California where we have school districts large and small, banning books, banning free speech, criminalizing librarians and teachers, and we want to do more than just push back rhetorically,” Newsom said in the bill signing posted on social media.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The politics have been in the spotlight just as libraries around the country mark the annual Banned Books Week campaign, which runs Oct. 1–7 and highlights the historical and current efforts to censor books.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The American Library Association has been tracking attempted book bans for over 20 years, and its Office of Intellectual Freedom recorded nearly 1,270 attempted book bans last year — the highest number since the ALA began compiling this kind of \u003ca href=\"https://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/book-ban-data\">data\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For librarians, like Threets, who are caught in the middle of divisive politics, they see their mission just as vital now. He talked about all this and what libraries have meant to him with KQED’s Brian Watt.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s an excerpt of their interview which has been edited for brevity and clarity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>BRIAN WATT: You have taken your love of books and the library online. You have a huge social media following with over half a million followers combined across Instagram and Tik Tok. What made you want to do this?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>MYCHAL THREETS:\u003c/strong> When I first started posting those videos, I was hoping for a thousand views. I think the first one that went “viral” was about a library kid coming up to me at the children’s desk. They said, “Is it … is it a boy librarian or is it a girl librarian?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.instagram.com/reel/Cqo3bETAXot/\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You could just see, the mom’s eyes widened. I said, “I’m a boy librarian.” And that story just shook up my heart, shook up my soul. I was like, “That was a funny, honest encounter; let me share it with the world. Maybe a thousand people will see it.” It took off. Millions of people saw it. From then on, I started sharing more stories on a weekly basis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>You work at the same library that you grew up going to. What does it mean to see families coming in and asking for the same books that you once asked for as a kid?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I was a very shy kid, stricken by anxiety. I’m not as shy as an adult, but I’m still crippled by anxiety and other mental health things. Books and libraries, ever since I can remember, have been my first friends. They’ve been the way that I’ve made friends [and] connections. I feel like when I get around books, get around libraries, I become a whole different person. They just bring out whatever light is inside of me. Those books and libraries have the power to pull it out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Like you said, I got my first library card at the Fairfield Civic Center Library when I was 5 years old. That’s where I got my first library job. It’s where I’m now the supervisor. So to be able to see kids come in and ask for books by Louis Sachar and Beverly Cleary, or they want to check out \u003cem>Encyclopedia Brown\u003c/em>, it’s like a dream come true. It’s a full circle moment for me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Let’s talk about the politics. Politicians in the U.S. arguing for banning books is nothing new. That’s been happening for decades now, but this issue has heated up in the last couple of years. So I’m curious to know what you’ve been making of this from where you stand as a librarian.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>From my perspective, as a librarian, what you just asked is just so difficult. So books should not be something that is political. I always go on and on about the joy of books. We should just be talking about putting as many books as possible in the arms, in the backpacks and on the house shelves.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>How has this manifested in your library branch? This uptick in the tension in the issue of banning books.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s rare for my library system. Solano County is one of the most diverse counties in the United States, but we still have issues there. A couple of years ago, we did a Banned Books Month celebration instead of Ban Books Week, where we were encouraging people to exercise their freedom to read. And that meant that we put the banned books on display in the library front and center. Many of the themes of banned books are people of color, LGBTQIA+ themes, and those are all things that people simply \u003cem>are\u003c/em>. And more often than not, we just got words of encouragement. But there were still instances where you could see people shake their head and say under their breath, “Not one of those books I know. I don’t know if the kids should be reading those books.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So for me, fellow like-minded library workers, we’re all just trying to do what we can to ensure that kids, teens, grownups, everybody continues to have access to all the beautiful books that are being created.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>People are people of color, they are LGBTQ+, and there’s nothing wrong with that. And when I hear books being banned, books being challenged, that is what you’re essentially telling kids, telling teens that there’s something wrong with what they’re reading about, especially in an age where in the last three or four years, libraries, schools have seen an uptick of authors of color, illustrators of color.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Many librarians like Mychal Threets have rallied together in support of book freedom, as school districts and state legislatures across the country have attempted to establish book bans of themes related to race and gender.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Books must be accessible. Books are joy,” said Threets, who works at the Fairfield Civic Center branch in Solano County, in a social media video amplified by Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office recently. “Students deserve to see themselves represented on school bookshelves, on library bookshelves, to see their friends, families and classmates represented.”\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Last week, Newsom signed a bill into law that will block school boards from banning certain textbooks for trying to be inclusive of race and LGBTQ topics. The proposal is meant in part to address situations like one over the summer when the Temecula Valley Unified School District’s school board \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11953735/task-force-says-california-textbooks-should-reflect-states-diversity\">rejected\u003c/a> a social studies curriculum for elementary students that addressed Harvey Milk — who became the first openly gay man elected to public office in California on San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“This banning binge, this cultural purge that we’re experiencing all throughout America and increasingly here in the state of California where we have school districts large and small, banning books, banning free speech, criminalizing librarians and teachers, and we want to do more than just push back rhetorically,” Newsom said in the bill signing posted on social media.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The politics have been in the spotlight just as libraries around the country mark the annual Banned Books Week campaign, which runs Oct. 1–7 and highlights the historical and current efforts to censor books.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The American Library Association has been tracking attempted book bans for over 20 years, and its Office of Intellectual Freedom recorded nearly 1,270 attempted book bans last year — the highest number since the ALA began compiling this kind of \u003ca href=\"https://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/book-ban-data\">data\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For librarians, like Threets, who are caught in the middle of divisive politics, they see their mission just as vital now. He talked about all this and what libraries have meant to him with KQED’s Brian Watt.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s an excerpt of their interview which has been edited for brevity and clarity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>BRIAN WATT: You have taken your love of books and the library online. You have a huge social media following with over half a million followers combined across Instagram and Tik Tok. What made you want to do this?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>MYCHAL THREETS:\u003c/strong> When I first started posting those videos, I was hoping for a thousand views. I think the first one that went “viral” was about a library kid coming up to me at the children’s desk. They said, “Is it … is it a boy librarian or is it a girl librarian?”\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>You could just see, the mom’s eyes widened. I said, “I’m a boy librarian.” And that story just shook up my heart, shook up my soul. I was like, “That was a funny, honest encounter; let me share it with the world. Maybe a thousand people will see it.” It took off. Millions of people saw it. From then on, I started sharing more stories on a weekly basis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>You work at the same library that you grew up going to. What does it mean to see families coming in and asking for the same books that you once asked for as a kid?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I was a very shy kid, stricken by anxiety. I’m not as shy as an adult, but I’m still crippled by anxiety and other mental health things. Books and libraries, ever since I can remember, have been my first friends. They’ve been the way that I’ve made friends [and] connections. I feel like when I get around books, get around libraries, I become a whole different person. They just bring out whatever light is inside of me. Those books and libraries have the power to pull it out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Like you said, I got my first library card at the Fairfield Civic Center Library when I was 5 years old. That’s where I got my first library job. It’s where I’m now the supervisor. So to be able to see kids come in and ask for books by Louis Sachar and Beverly Cleary, or they want to check out \u003cem>Encyclopedia Brown\u003c/em>, it’s like a dream come true. It’s a full circle moment for me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Let’s talk about the politics. Politicians in the U.S. arguing for banning books is nothing new. That’s been happening for decades now, but this issue has heated up in the last couple of years. So I’m curious to know what you’ve been making of this from where you stand as a librarian.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>From my perspective, as a librarian, what you just asked is just so difficult. So books should not be something that is political. I always go on and on about the joy of books. We should just be talking about putting as many books as possible in the arms, in the backpacks and on the house shelves.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>How has this manifested in your library branch? This uptick in the tension in the issue of banning books.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s rare for my library system. Solano County is one of the most diverse counties in the United States, but we still have issues there. A couple of years ago, we did a Banned Books Month celebration instead of Ban Books Week, where we were encouraging people to exercise their freedom to read. And that meant that we put the banned books on display in the library front and center. Many of the themes of banned books are people of color, LGBTQIA+ themes, and those are all things that people simply \u003cem>are\u003c/em>. And more often than not, we just got words of encouragement. But there were still instances where you could see people shake their head and say under their breath, “Not one of those books I know. I don’t know if the kids should be reading those books.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So for me, fellow like-minded library workers, we’re all just trying to do what we can to ensure that kids, teens, grownups, everybody continues to have access to all the beautiful books that are being created.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>People are people of color, they are LGBTQ+, and there’s nothing wrong with that. And when I hear books being banned, books being challenged, that is what you’re essentially telling kids, telling teens that there’s something wrong with what they’re reading about, especially in an age where in the last three or four years, libraries, schools have seen an uptick of authors of color, illustrators of color.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "the-silicon-valley-giants-who-want-to-build-a-new-city-in-solano-county",
"title": "The Silicon Valley Giants Who Want to Build a New City in Solano County",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"c-message_kit__blocks c-message_kit__blocks--rich_text\">\n\u003cdiv class=\"c-message__message_blocks c-message__message_blocks--rich_text\" data-qa=\"message-text\">\n\u003cdiv class=\"p-block_kit_renderer\" data-qa=\"block-kit-renderer\">\n\u003cdiv class=\"p-block_kit_renderer__block_wrapper p-block_kit_renderer__block_wrapper--first\">\n\u003cdiv class=\"p-rich_text_block\" dir=\"auto\">\u003c/div>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Some of the richest, most outspoken investors in the tech world are behind a company that has bought nearly 60,000 acres of mostly farmland in Solano County. They say they want to build a new city from scratch. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But who are they? And why do they want to do this? Erin Griffith with The New York Times explains.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"card card--enclosed grey\">\n\u003cp id=\"embed-code\" class=\"inconsolata\">\n\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm/?e=KQINC4817131855&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\n\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Links: \u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"css-1vkm6nb ehdk2mb0\">\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli id=\"link-1d6b8ab\" class=\"css-1l8buln e1h9rw200\" data-testid=\"headline\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/25/business/land-purchases-solano-county.html\">The Silicon Valley Elite Who Want to Build a City From Scratch\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli data-testid=\"headline\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11959390/elected-officials-to-meet-with-silicon-valley-investors-behind-800-million-solano-county-land-grab\">Elected Officials to Meet with Silicon Valley Investors Behind $800 Million Solano County Land Grab\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>I’m Ericka Cruz Guevarra, and welcome to The Bay. Local news to keep you rooted. I can’t think of another county in the Bay area that feels farther away from Silicon Valley than Solano County. I’m talking literally, but also culturally, economically and dare I say, spiritually. But Silicon Valley and Solano County are beginning to collide now that a who’s who of tech billionaires under the name Flannery Associates have bought up nearly 60,000 acres of agricultural land near Fairfield and Rio Vista with plans to build a new city. For years, their identities were a mystery, even to local leaders.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ron Kott: \u003c/strong>This big plan kind of all of a sudden drops on everyone’s doorstep. We were all wondering who these people are. Now we know what they are, and now we’re wondering now what, you know?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>But last Friday, the public finally learned who they were, and now they’re going to have to win over the hearts and minds of residents and lawmakers who are feeling a little skeptical.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>John Garamendi: \u003c/strong>They need to know that they have thoroughly, thoroughly soured the entire Solano County by their eyes towards bullying of landowners, by their unwillingness to talk to anybody for more than four years now and then to come out with a pie in the sky development program that will have enormous impact.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>So today we’re talking with Erin Griffith, one of the New York Times reporters who broke this news about the billionaires behind Flannery Associates and what we know about them. Stay with us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Erin, can you take me back to 2017 when this idea of a new city was first planted? Who was behind this idea?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>What we reported last week was that Michael Moritz, who was a longtime venture capital investor at Sequoia Capital, the top VC firm in Silicon Valley, was sending emails out to potential investors asking about this project. And that’s sort of the first thing that we have seen about this kind of seed of this idea. He is raising money on behalf of a different person, an entrepreneur named Jan Sramek, who is kind of this interesting figure. He was born in the Czech Republic. He came to the U.S. He’s a hotshot trader at Goldman Sachs, a rising star on Wall Street. But sometime in the mid 20 tens, he comes out to Silicon Valley to try to make it as a startup founder. He had a couple of startups that didn’t really take off, but at some point he connects with Michael Moritz and pitches him this idea on building a new city from scratch. And from there, Michael Moritz starts, you know, tapping his network of powerful, wealthy investor types to see if they’d be interested. The gist of the pitch that my colleague Connor Doherty and I saw and reported on is that this is going to be a brand new city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>And I know it’s sort of like has this utopian vibe. Can you describe a little bit of what we know about, I guess, the sort of vision for what kind of city this was going to be?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>In this pitch, it’s a walkable city like, you know, comparable to Paris. And it’s this idea of we’re going to perhaps rethink everything from governance to building and construction. We’re going to start with a blank slate. We’re not going to have any of the sort of entrenched, intractable problems that many cities, but particularly in California, have had. And that has kind of held them back from being able to build the housing that we need and that has contributed to this terrible housing and homelessness crisis that the state has been dealing with for a long time now.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Since then, this idea really has taken flight. And I know a company called Flannery Associates has been very busy in Solano County. Can you remind us, what have they been up to? Exactly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>Yeah. So the company that he was pitching at, he didn’t name it in his pitch, but eventually it turned out to be a company called Flannery Associates, which has been aggressively snapping up mostly farmland in Solano County. They started out buying land at just like $5 an acre. But as the locals have caught on to like this, this is the same company that’s buying land from everyone. And they’re making offers and it has the price has gone up and to to $20,000 an acre. So they’re wildly overpaying, but they have bought a lot of land. It has caused a lot of confusion because they have remained a mystery. You know, up until last week, we didn’t know who Flannery Associates was or what they were planning to do. So lots of rumors and speculation and investigations into who is actually behind this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>You and your colleague have since broke the story about who is behind Flannery. How would you, I guess, characterize this group of people behind Flannery Associates, these people buying up all this land in Solano County?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>It was a group of very powerful and very wealthy Silicon Valley investors. We have Michael Moritz, who I mentioned earlier, who was a journalist who became a venture capitalist as one of the most successful venture capitalists. He’s, you know, early investor in companies that, you know, like Google or PayPal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Michael Moritz: \u003c/strong>You absolutely have to have as the guiding force of an abiding, enduring technology company, a person or people at the helm who have products in their DNA.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>Reid Hoffman, who co-founded LinkedIn. He’s been a venture capitalist now for a while. Marc Andreessen and Chris Dixon, who are two investors at the end and Horowitz firm. They’re both also entrepreneurs who became venture capitalists. Patrick and John Collison, the co-founders of Stripe, which is one of the most valuable startups in Silicon Valley. It’s a payments company. Laurene Powell Jobs, who is the widow of Steve Jobs and who runs this nonprofit called Emerson Collective. She’s also very active in Democratic politics. And then now Friedman and Daniel GROSS, who are two entrepreneurs who are now angel investors. Now, Friedman is notable because he also is the co-founder of California Yimby, which is a political group that has been pushing for a lot of effort for California to build more housing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>I know you tweeted these are sort of the boldface names of Silicon Valley. Can you explain what you mean by that?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>Yeah, I mean, there’s just some of the most famous, partly because they’re among the most successful, but also because they are kind of thought leaders. You know, Marc Andreessen, he tweets, he blogs, he goes on podcasts. He has very strong and bold opinions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Marc Andreessen: \u003c/strong>What you need is if you want to replace the elite that you have today, what you need to do is you need to have a better elite. And there’s only one way out if you don’t like the current oligarchic elite. That doesn’t result in just mass deaths. The only way out is a superior elite.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>You know, Reid Hoffman is very well known.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Reid Hoffman: \u003c/strong>If you look at a lot of these companies that ten years ago were were ideas back on napkins in tiny and now are global transformational companies. This is the set of techniques that we’ve learned in Silicon Valley. In order to do that, and we would like to spread those techniques to as many places as possible.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>I mean, he’s a big, big donor to presidential campaigns as well as a local Democratic. These are just like if you were going to name the most famous venture capitalist, these are the ones that everyone kind of in the industry holds up as the most well known ones, the most successful ones and the wealthiest ones.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>I want to understand their motivation a little bit more here. Do we know anything about why an idea like this is something that would be of interest to this group of people?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>These investors all have differing politics, but I think they all agree on the Silicon Valley idea of taking big swings. They’re like, why can’t we, you know, take the ambition and outside the box thinking that we apply to our businesses and use it to solve this problem that’s right in front of our eyes. I think there’s a little bit of that. There’s also just this perennial attraction to this idea of building a new city from scratch. It’s not a new idea. Y Combinator, which is a startup accelerator that’s here, had this whole program to the idea of building a new cities in the mid 20 tens. There’s another 100 millionaire in New York who’s trying to build a new city somewhere in the Nevada desert. There is some kind of strange attraction to just starting over with a clean slate and not having to solve some of the hard problems that are really deeply entrenched today in our existing cities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>I know Michael Moritz is actually also someone who has written some op eds about San Francisco’s plight in particular that I know got a lot of big responses for how he sort of painted problems in the city. And yeah, I imagine for these folks, it’s maybe more appealing to build a city in your image than it is to try and fix these problems that you see in cities like San Francisco that it almost feels like no one is able to fix.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>Yeah, I think that that’s a part of it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>One question that I have been thinking about is, you know, if if this is an idea that they really believe in, that they think can help solve some of the these intractable problems that we see in California, why keep it a secret for so long?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>Yeah, I think that’s a question a lot of people have had because that, I think, fostered a lot of skepticism or distrust because of all these years of not knowing. My understanding is that I don’t think they thought they would have been able to buy the land that they have. And it wouldn’t have it wouldn’t have worked if they had said who they are. I mean, they already have escalated the price they’re paying from very expensive $5 an acre to $20,000 an acre. So I think they believe that was part of the only way that this could happen. But again, I think we’re going to have to wait and hear from them. And now. Obviously flipping. The charm offensive mode.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>That made my, I don’t know, my antennas tingle a little bit because I do imagine they have to be at least somewhat aware of the perception of them may be and what it might look like to to be billionaires coming into these like smaller communities. And I mean, I have to admit, I feel really protective of this place. As someone who is from Solano County, I mean, what reactions have you seen so far from locals?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>I think people are, you know, naturally skeptical as you would be in such an unusual situation like this. I think maybe a little baffled. And, you know, I think there’s a little bit of fear. They wanted to live there for a reason, you know, because they don’t want to live in a city. And so I think people are worried about maybe being priced out. And if you can imagine putting yourself in the position of these local officials who for years have been trying to figure out who this group is and had no idea, you know, it’s it’s a little awkward.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Local officials have mentioned several barriers to this idea. Fairfield Mayor Catherine Moyer told KQED that resources are going to be a huge deal. Like water and transportation, Moy says the single two lane highway in the area, Highway 12, just isn’t going to cut it for a new city. It’s notoriously deadly and would be difficult to expand because of existing protective species laws. Then there’s Congressman John Garamendi, who says Flanary is going to have to earn the trust of people in the area, especially farmers, some of whom are being sued by Flanary on accusations of colluding to jack up the price of their land, not to mention his concerns about what this is going to mean for Travis Air Force Base, which is now surrounded by Flanary owned land on three sides. So the people behind Flanary have got a lot of work to do if they want to win the hearts and minds of Solano County residents. But Erin says in the tech world, people have had a much more positive reaction to this news.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>It’s very interesting. Silicon Valley is a place where you can essentially go to a party and say, I’m going to build a new city from scratch and people will take you seriously and maybe even give you $1,000,000,000 to do it, you know? So I think people admire the ambition and are like, yes, it seems like a huge long shot, but. Good for them for trying. And I and I hope I hope they succeed. I think people are very curious about it. And there’s a lot of people who are interested in urbanism and new ways of doing things and, you know, bringing innovation to our cities. So I’ve heard, you know, from tech people who are are very curious and and interested and even want to work on it, which is, I think, different than the broader skepticism that I’ve that I’ve seen from non-tech people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>You report on venture capital. You’re familiar with the people behind Flannery, which most people who maybe aren’t in the tech world aren’t as familiar with. So how do you, I guess, foresee this group of people exercising their money and also their power to build the city in this place where honestly, I think a lot of people aren’t used to. I mean, one, the attention and then two big billionaires rolling through with big ideas like this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>These are tech titans of industry who all have very strong opinions. Oh, that is a very, very different world than politics. And, you know, dealing with people’s livelihoods in business, everything comes down to the bottom line. And things are a lot more emotional when it comes to your town and your life in the way and the way that you live. So yeah, they’re going to have to like really embrace some of that, like politics and soft skills kind of things. And they’ve already, you know, they’ve hired people in Sacramento to help do that. They’re going to dangle things like local jobs, you know, infrastructure, parks, other kinds of amenities, and hope that that will be enough to convince people that this is a good idea. It could work or it could backfire spectacularly. And maybe they’ll sell the land. I think that they believe that they will succeed where others have failed. But yeah, it’s it’s a wild one.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Well, Erin, thank you so much for for joining us and sharing your reporting with us. I really appreciate it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>Yeah, thanks for having me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>A representative with Flanary, told KQED that the company plans to launch a ballot initiative in Solano County to help speed up development. There are going to be many, many more political fights about this in the months and maybe even years to come. That was Erin Griffith, a reporter with The New York Times, covering startups and venture capital. At the top of this episode, you heard from Rio Vista Mayor Ron Kott and Congressman John Garamendi. Thanks to KQED and Alex Phinney and Billy Cruz for that tape. The interview you heard with Michael Moritz was from PBS. The interview you heard with Reid Hoffman was from CBS This Morning, and the clip of Mark Andreasen was from the Upstream podcast with Eric Kornberg. This 30-minute conversation with Erin was cut down and edited by senior editor Alan Montecillo. It was produced by Maria Esquinca to shout out to the rest of the podcast team here at KQED. That’s Jen Chien, our director of podcasts, Katie Sprenger, our podcast operations manager. We get audience engagement support from César Saldaña. And Holly Kernan is our chief content officer. If you liked this episode, consider sharing it with your homies. Word of mouth is the best way to help us grow. The Bay is a production of KQED in San Francisco. I’m Ericka Cruz Guevarra. Peace.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\n\u003c/p>\n",
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"description": "View the full episode transcript. Some of the richest, most outspoken investors in the tech world are behind a company that has bought nearly 60,000 acres of mostly farmland in Solano County. They say they want to build a new city from scratch. But who are they? And why do they want to do this? Erin Griffith with The New York Times explains. Links: The Silicon Valley Elite Who Want to Build a City From Scratch Elected Officials to Meet with Silicon Valley Investors Behind $800 Million Solano County Land Grab Episode Transcript This is a computer-generated transcript. While",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cdiv class=\"c-message_kit__blocks c-message_kit__blocks--rich_text\">\n\u003cdiv class=\"c-message__message_blocks c-message__message_blocks--rich_text\" data-qa=\"message-text\">\n\u003cdiv class=\"p-block_kit_renderer\" data-qa=\"block-kit-renderer\">\n\u003cdiv class=\"p-block_kit_renderer__block_wrapper p-block_kit_renderer__block_wrapper--first\">\n\u003cdiv class=\"p-rich_text_block\" dir=\"auto\">\u003c/div>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Some of the richest, most outspoken investors in the tech world are behind a company that has bought nearly 60,000 acres of mostly farmland in Solano County. They say they want to build a new city from scratch. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But who are they? And why do they want to do this? Erin Griffith with The New York Times explains.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"card card--enclosed grey\">\n\u003cp id=\"embed-code\" class=\"inconsolata\">\n\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm/?e=KQINC4817131855&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\n\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Links: \u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"css-1vkm6nb ehdk2mb0\">\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli id=\"link-1d6b8ab\" class=\"css-1l8buln e1h9rw200\" data-testid=\"headline\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/25/business/land-purchases-solano-county.html\">The Silicon Valley Elite Who Want to Build a City From Scratch\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli data-testid=\"headline\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11959390/elected-officials-to-meet-with-silicon-valley-investors-behind-800-million-solano-county-land-grab\">Elected Officials to Meet with Silicon Valley Investors Behind $800 Million Solano County Land Grab\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-content post-body\">\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>I’m Ericka Cruz Guevarra, and welcome to The Bay. Local news to keep you rooted. I can’t think of another county in the Bay area that feels farther away from Silicon Valley than Solano County. I’m talking literally, but also culturally, economically and dare I say, spiritually. But Silicon Valley and Solano County are beginning to collide now that a who’s who of tech billionaires under the name Flannery Associates have bought up nearly 60,000 acres of agricultural land near Fairfield and Rio Vista with plans to build a new city. For years, their identities were a mystery, even to local leaders.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ron Kott: \u003c/strong>This big plan kind of all of a sudden drops on everyone’s doorstep. We were all wondering who these people are. Now we know what they are, and now we’re wondering now what, you know?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>But last Friday, the public finally learned who they were, and now they’re going to have to win over the hearts and minds of residents and lawmakers who are feeling a little skeptical.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>John Garamendi: \u003c/strong>They need to know that they have thoroughly, thoroughly soured the entire Solano County by their eyes towards bullying of landowners, by their unwillingness to talk to anybody for more than four years now and then to come out with a pie in the sky development program that will have enormous impact.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>So today we’re talking with Erin Griffith, one of the New York Times reporters who broke this news about the billionaires behind Flannery Associates and what we know about them. Stay with us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Erin, can you take me back to 2017 when this idea of a new city was first planted? Who was behind this idea?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>What we reported last week was that Michael Moritz, who was a longtime venture capital investor at Sequoia Capital, the top VC firm in Silicon Valley, was sending emails out to potential investors asking about this project. And that’s sort of the first thing that we have seen about this kind of seed of this idea. He is raising money on behalf of a different person, an entrepreneur named Jan Sramek, who is kind of this interesting figure. He was born in the Czech Republic. He came to the U.S. He’s a hotshot trader at Goldman Sachs, a rising star on Wall Street. But sometime in the mid 20 tens, he comes out to Silicon Valley to try to make it as a startup founder. He had a couple of startups that didn’t really take off, but at some point he connects with Michael Moritz and pitches him this idea on building a new city from scratch. And from there, Michael Moritz starts, you know, tapping his network of powerful, wealthy investor types to see if they’d be interested. The gist of the pitch that my colleague Connor Doherty and I saw and reported on is that this is going to be a brand new city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>And I know it’s sort of like has this utopian vibe. Can you describe a little bit of what we know about, I guess, the sort of vision for what kind of city this was going to be?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>In this pitch, it’s a walkable city like, you know, comparable to Paris. And it’s this idea of we’re going to perhaps rethink everything from governance to building and construction. We’re going to start with a blank slate. We’re not going to have any of the sort of entrenched, intractable problems that many cities, but particularly in California, have had. And that has kind of held them back from being able to build the housing that we need and that has contributed to this terrible housing and homelessness crisis that the state has been dealing with for a long time now.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Since then, this idea really has taken flight. And I know a company called Flannery Associates has been very busy in Solano County. Can you remind us, what have they been up to? Exactly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>Yeah. So the company that he was pitching at, he didn’t name it in his pitch, but eventually it turned out to be a company called Flannery Associates, which has been aggressively snapping up mostly farmland in Solano County. They started out buying land at just like $5 an acre. But as the locals have caught on to like this, this is the same company that’s buying land from everyone. And they’re making offers and it has the price has gone up and to to $20,000 an acre. So they’re wildly overpaying, but they have bought a lot of land. It has caused a lot of confusion because they have remained a mystery. You know, up until last week, we didn’t know who Flannery Associates was or what they were planning to do. So lots of rumors and speculation and investigations into who is actually behind this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>You and your colleague have since broke the story about who is behind Flannery. How would you, I guess, characterize this group of people behind Flannery Associates, these people buying up all this land in Solano County?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>It was a group of very powerful and very wealthy Silicon Valley investors. We have Michael Moritz, who I mentioned earlier, who was a journalist who became a venture capitalist as one of the most successful venture capitalists. He’s, you know, early investor in companies that, you know, like Google or PayPal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Michael Moritz: \u003c/strong>You absolutely have to have as the guiding force of an abiding, enduring technology company, a person or people at the helm who have products in their DNA.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>Reid Hoffman, who co-founded LinkedIn. He’s been a venture capitalist now for a while. Marc Andreessen and Chris Dixon, who are two investors at the end and Horowitz firm. They’re both also entrepreneurs who became venture capitalists. Patrick and John Collison, the co-founders of Stripe, which is one of the most valuable startups in Silicon Valley. It’s a payments company. Laurene Powell Jobs, who is the widow of Steve Jobs and who runs this nonprofit called Emerson Collective. She’s also very active in Democratic politics. And then now Friedman and Daniel GROSS, who are two entrepreneurs who are now angel investors. Now, Friedman is notable because he also is the co-founder of California Yimby, which is a political group that has been pushing for a lot of effort for California to build more housing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>I know you tweeted these are sort of the boldface names of Silicon Valley. Can you explain what you mean by that?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>Yeah, I mean, there’s just some of the most famous, partly because they’re among the most successful, but also because they are kind of thought leaders. You know, Marc Andreessen, he tweets, he blogs, he goes on podcasts. He has very strong and bold opinions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Marc Andreessen: \u003c/strong>What you need is if you want to replace the elite that you have today, what you need to do is you need to have a better elite. And there’s only one way out if you don’t like the current oligarchic elite. That doesn’t result in just mass deaths. The only way out is a superior elite.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>You know, Reid Hoffman is very well known.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Reid Hoffman: \u003c/strong>If you look at a lot of these companies that ten years ago were were ideas back on napkins in tiny and now are global transformational companies. This is the set of techniques that we’ve learned in Silicon Valley. In order to do that, and we would like to spread those techniques to as many places as possible.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>I mean, he’s a big, big donor to presidential campaigns as well as a local Democratic. These are just like if you were going to name the most famous venture capitalist, these are the ones that everyone kind of in the industry holds up as the most well known ones, the most successful ones and the wealthiest ones.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>I want to understand their motivation a little bit more here. Do we know anything about why an idea like this is something that would be of interest to this group of people?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>These investors all have differing politics, but I think they all agree on the Silicon Valley idea of taking big swings. They’re like, why can’t we, you know, take the ambition and outside the box thinking that we apply to our businesses and use it to solve this problem that’s right in front of our eyes. I think there’s a little bit of that. There’s also just this perennial attraction to this idea of building a new city from scratch. It’s not a new idea. Y Combinator, which is a startup accelerator that’s here, had this whole program to the idea of building a new cities in the mid 20 tens. There’s another 100 millionaire in New York who’s trying to build a new city somewhere in the Nevada desert. There is some kind of strange attraction to just starting over with a clean slate and not having to solve some of the hard problems that are really deeply entrenched today in our existing cities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>I know Michael Moritz is actually also someone who has written some op eds about San Francisco’s plight in particular that I know got a lot of big responses for how he sort of painted problems in the city. And yeah, I imagine for these folks, it’s maybe more appealing to build a city in your image than it is to try and fix these problems that you see in cities like San Francisco that it almost feels like no one is able to fix.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>Yeah, I think that that’s a part of it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>One question that I have been thinking about is, you know, if if this is an idea that they really believe in, that they think can help solve some of the these intractable problems that we see in California, why keep it a secret for so long?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>Yeah, I think that’s a question a lot of people have had because that, I think, fostered a lot of skepticism or distrust because of all these years of not knowing. My understanding is that I don’t think they thought they would have been able to buy the land that they have. And it wouldn’t have it wouldn’t have worked if they had said who they are. I mean, they already have escalated the price they’re paying from very expensive $5 an acre to $20,000 an acre. So I think they believe that was part of the only way that this could happen. But again, I think we’re going to have to wait and hear from them. And now. Obviously flipping. The charm offensive mode.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>That made my, I don’t know, my antennas tingle a little bit because I do imagine they have to be at least somewhat aware of the perception of them may be and what it might look like to to be billionaires coming into these like smaller communities. And I mean, I have to admit, I feel really protective of this place. As someone who is from Solano County, I mean, what reactions have you seen so far from locals?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>I think people are, you know, naturally skeptical as you would be in such an unusual situation like this. I think maybe a little baffled. And, you know, I think there’s a little bit of fear. They wanted to live there for a reason, you know, because they don’t want to live in a city. And so I think people are worried about maybe being priced out. And if you can imagine putting yourself in the position of these local officials who for years have been trying to figure out who this group is and had no idea, you know, it’s it’s a little awkward.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Local officials have mentioned several barriers to this idea. Fairfield Mayor Catherine Moyer told KQED that resources are going to be a huge deal. Like water and transportation, Moy says the single two lane highway in the area, Highway 12, just isn’t going to cut it for a new city. It’s notoriously deadly and would be difficult to expand because of existing protective species laws. Then there’s Congressman John Garamendi, who says Flanary is going to have to earn the trust of people in the area, especially farmers, some of whom are being sued by Flanary on accusations of colluding to jack up the price of their land, not to mention his concerns about what this is going to mean for Travis Air Force Base, which is now surrounded by Flanary owned land on three sides. So the people behind Flanary have got a lot of work to do if they want to win the hearts and minds of Solano County residents. But Erin says in the tech world, people have had a much more positive reaction to this news.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>It’s very interesting. Silicon Valley is a place where you can essentially go to a party and say, I’m going to build a new city from scratch and people will take you seriously and maybe even give you $1,000,000,000 to do it, you know? So I think people admire the ambition and are like, yes, it seems like a huge long shot, but. Good for them for trying. And I and I hope I hope they succeed. I think people are very curious about it. And there’s a lot of people who are interested in urbanism and new ways of doing things and, you know, bringing innovation to our cities. So I’ve heard, you know, from tech people who are are very curious and and interested and even want to work on it, which is, I think, different than the broader skepticism that I’ve that I’ve seen from non-tech people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>You report on venture capital. You’re familiar with the people behind Flannery, which most people who maybe aren’t in the tech world aren’t as familiar with. So how do you, I guess, foresee this group of people exercising their money and also their power to build the city in this place where honestly, I think a lot of people aren’t used to. I mean, one, the attention and then two big billionaires rolling through with big ideas like this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>These are tech titans of industry who all have very strong opinions. Oh, that is a very, very different world than politics. And, you know, dealing with people’s livelihoods in business, everything comes down to the bottom line. And things are a lot more emotional when it comes to your town and your life in the way and the way that you live. So yeah, they’re going to have to like really embrace some of that, like politics and soft skills kind of things. And they’ve already, you know, they’ve hired people in Sacramento to help do that. They’re going to dangle things like local jobs, you know, infrastructure, parks, other kinds of amenities, and hope that that will be enough to convince people that this is a good idea. It could work or it could backfire spectacularly. And maybe they’ll sell the land. I think that they believe that they will succeed where others have failed. But yeah, it’s it’s a wild one.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Well, Erin, thank you so much for for joining us and sharing your reporting with us. I really appreciate it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Erin Griffith: \u003c/strong>Yeah, thanks for having me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>A representative with Flanary, told KQED that the company plans to launch a ballot initiative in Solano County to help speed up development. There are going to be many, many more political fights about this in the months and maybe even years to come. That was Erin Griffith, a reporter with The New York Times, covering startups and venture capital. At the top of this episode, you heard from Rio Vista Mayor Ron Kott and Congressman John Garamendi. Thanks to KQED and Alex Phinney and Billy Cruz for that tape. The interview you heard with Michael Moritz was from PBS. The interview you heard with Reid Hoffman was from CBS This Morning, and the clip of Mark Andreasen was from the Upstream podcast with Eric Kornberg. This 30-minute conversation with Erin was cut down and edited by senior editor Alan Montecillo. It was produced by Maria Esquinca to shout out to the rest of the podcast team here at KQED. That’s Jen Chien, our director of podcasts, Katie Sprenger, our podcast operations manager. We get audience engagement support from César Saldaña. And Holly Kernan is our chief content officer. If you liked this episode, consider sharing it with your homies. Word of mouth is the best way to help us grow. The Bay is a production of KQED in San Francisco. I’m Ericka Cruz Guevarra. Peace.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\n\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>"
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"content": "\u003cp>Elected officials in Solano County will meet this week with a group of Silicon Valley billionaires who want to construct a new city on \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11957208/near-1-billion-land-purchase-around-california-air-base-under-investigation\">nearly $1 billion worth of land they secretly purchased\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Over the last five years, Flannery Associates has purchased $800 million worth of land just outside of Travis Air Force Base. After the land was bought for much more than its present value, government officials started investigating the group due to homeland security concerns with the location next to a military base.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But \u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/25/business/land-purchases-solano-county.html?unlocked_article_code=lqPwMvckq8b2_rCBT3bCfqEBKHLRVLY1VceXY7F2eu_6gXn3srltmqkIDjuqfsIjsesKJTwxkRIMcYS93koSdXA7j9b-qkDPbOXgJq3-xayu_yOTctxF94n10TNymak_LDE-wxcHhKzHOWqhHauUR6DZXbVh4tDQPkv1YNkkrxuWRJxILgye0sQWYhBqdV6qlyVZTPU0UX9IAh0xh5_if3A_AqEdG0jXafrwMIpGCwz8jj3y0BM4waeBknRWEy9ZXtiXjXPH3OYDByTK9Feqgtv9FPYTfjWe4JztlkAt4iPg-CMWBxztH13SEZr5-7v34eCQyOBPw6XE21C3G9q0Sed6lnthR3w&smid=url-share\">The New York Times recently revealed\u003c/a> that, rather than a foreign adversary, Silicon Valley tech giants have been buying up the agricultural land — in hopes of starting a city from scratch. According to the Times, those backing Flannery Associates include Laurene Powell Jobs, entrepreneur and founder of Emerson Collective, venture capitalist Michael Moritz, Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn and Marc Andreessen and Chris Dixon, investors at the Andreessen Horowitz venture capital firm.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The revelation has not soothed the concerns of local officials and existing community members.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We were concerned it might be the Chinese. Well, we’re still concerned. A bunch of wealthy Silicon Valley billionaires putting together an initiative that suits their purpose may be a very serious threat to Travis Air Force Base and our national security,” U.S. Rep. John Garamendi, who represents Solano County, told KQED. “Flannery Associates have proven themselves to be terrible bad actors, using strong-arm techniques that you might find in the mafia, forcing people to sell their land even though they did not want to, and engaging in practices that are just despicable.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Representatives from Flannery will meet with elected officials, starting this week, to discuss their ambitious plans to build a new city in an area that’s about halfway between San Francisco and Sacramento.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We care deeply about the future of Solano County and California and believe their best days are ahead. We are proud to partner on a project that aims to deliver access to good-paying jobs, affordable housing, clean energy, sustainable infrastructure, open space and a healthy environment to residents of Solano County,” Brian Brokaw, a Flannery spokesperson, said in a text message to KQED. “We are excited to start working with residents and elected officials, as well as with Travis Air Force Base, on making that happen.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Before investors were revealed, Flannery sent out a poll to local residents asking about building the new city between Fairfield and Rio Vista.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The poll, obtained by KQED, suggested that Flannery Associates could try for a ballot measure as soon as next year to begin approving development plans, which are still very unclear.[pullquote size='medium' align='right' citation=\"Mayor Ron Kott, City of Rio Vista\"]‘Flannery has never contacted anybody in Rio Vista, nobody in the city government. Not a word. And we’re surrounded by it. So whatever decisions they make, it affects our city directly, both good and bad.’[/pullquote]A representative from Flannery told KQED that the company is looking to launch a voter initiative to change zoning laws on the land, predominantly used for agriculture.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In addition to building housing in the area, the company is interested in agricultural investments in the long- and short-term, correspondence from 2018 and 2019 between Flannery and Solano County’s Department of Resource Management shows.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The news has brought much confusion and concern for local leaders, like Rio Vista Mayor Ron Kott.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He acknowledged some opportunities that rezoning the area could bring, including an influx of property taxes and investment in renewable energies like solar or wind farms. But the covert nature of the operation has perplexed him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Flannery has never contacted anybody in Rio Vista, nobody in the city government. Not a word,” he said. “And we’re surrounded by it. So whatever decisions they make, it affects our city directly, both good and bad.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>U.S. Rep. Mike Thompson represents parts of Sonoma and Solano, along with Napa and Lake counties.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If they have a proposal or a plan to develop the properties that they purchased or plan to purchase, they’re going to need to work with the local community,” Thompson told KQED. “They’re going to have to be part of the community and they’re going to have to treat the local community with respect and work with them, not work against them.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Plans for the unnamed city have been in discussion as far back as 2017, when billionaire investor Michael Moritz wrote to potential investors about the chance to get in on the creation of an entirely new California community, \u003cem>The New York Times\u003c/em> first reported.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Flannery was then developed by former Goldman Sachs trader Jan Sramek, according to a pitch deck for the project that Moritz circulated, which outlined ideas such as a community built off the clean energy economy, robust public transportation and urban life.[pullquote size='medium' align='right' citation=\"Rep. John Garamendi (D-Calif.)\"]‘Never in all my years have I ever heard of somebody suing a group of farmers to try to force them to sell their land.’[/pullquote]Since then, Flannery has purchased nearly 140 properties, many of which were bought higher than their present value, totaling nearly $1 billion.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Flannery representatives would not say who they have been in discussions with in terms of actual city planning.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s going to pose some serious water issues and it’s going to cause some serious transportation issues, because our transportation system right now is already strained,” Kott said. “Their land purchases have pretty much surrounded the city of Rio Vista, including some parcels within the city limits.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Flannery’s land grab came under the microscope earlier this year when the company filed a lawsuit alleging local farmers were inflating land prices.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The lawsuit states that the company bought about 140 parcels of land from 400 landowners. Flannery accused a group of landowners, who held off on selling, of price fixing and violating anti-trust in order to collectively raise their prices.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the landowners have reached a settlement with Flannery, while others have motioned to dismiss the lawsuit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These are five-, six-generation family farmers in the area. Some refused to sell. So Flannery filed a lawsuit against seven family farmers, claiming that they were engaged in an illegal constraint of trade to raise the prices,” Garamendi said. “Never in all my years have I ever heard of somebody suing a group of farmers to try to force them to sell their land.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>KQED reporters Billy Cruz, Annelise Finney and Dan Brekke contributed to this story.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Elected officials in Solano County will meet this week with a group of Silicon Valley billionaires who want to construct a new city on \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11957208/near-1-billion-land-purchase-around-california-air-base-under-investigation\">nearly $1 billion worth of land they secretly purchased\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Over the last five years, Flannery Associates has purchased $800 million worth of land just outside of Travis Air Force Base. After the land was bought for much more than its present value, government officials started investigating the group due to homeland security concerns with the location next to a military base.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But \u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/25/business/land-purchases-solano-county.html?unlocked_article_code=lqPwMvckq8b2_rCBT3bCfqEBKHLRVLY1VceXY7F2eu_6gXn3srltmqkIDjuqfsIjsesKJTwxkRIMcYS93koSdXA7j9b-qkDPbOXgJq3-xayu_yOTctxF94n10TNymak_LDE-wxcHhKzHOWqhHauUR6DZXbVh4tDQPkv1YNkkrxuWRJxILgye0sQWYhBqdV6qlyVZTPU0UX9IAh0xh5_if3A_AqEdG0jXafrwMIpGCwz8jj3y0BM4waeBknRWEy9ZXtiXjXPH3OYDByTK9Feqgtv9FPYTfjWe4JztlkAt4iPg-CMWBxztH13SEZr5-7v34eCQyOBPw6XE21C3G9q0Sed6lnthR3w&smid=url-share\">The New York Times recently revealed\u003c/a> that, rather than a foreign adversary, Silicon Valley tech giants have been buying up the agricultural land — in hopes of starting a city from scratch. According to the Times, those backing Flannery Associates include Laurene Powell Jobs, entrepreneur and founder of Emerson Collective, venture capitalist Michael Moritz, Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn and Marc Andreessen and Chris Dixon, investors at the Andreessen Horowitz venture capital firm.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The revelation has not soothed the concerns of local officials and existing community members.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We were concerned it might be the Chinese. Well, we’re still concerned. A bunch of wealthy Silicon Valley billionaires putting together an initiative that suits their purpose may be a very serious threat to Travis Air Force Base and our national security,” U.S. Rep. John Garamendi, who represents Solano County, told KQED. “Flannery Associates have proven themselves to be terrible bad actors, using strong-arm techniques that you might find in the mafia, forcing people to sell their land even though they did not want to, and engaging in practices that are just despicable.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>A representative from Flannery told KQED that the company is looking to launch a voter initiative to change zoning laws on the land, predominantly used for agriculture.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In addition to building housing in the area, the company is interested in agricultural investments in the long- and short-term, correspondence from 2018 and 2019 between Flannery and Solano County’s Department of Resource Management shows.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The news has brought much confusion and concern for local leaders, like Rio Vista Mayor Ron Kott.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He acknowledged some opportunities that rezoning the area could bring, including an influx of property taxes and investment in renewable energies like solar or wind farms. But the covert nature of the operation has perplexed him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Flannery has never contacted anybody in Rio Vista, nobody in the city government. Not a word,” he said. “And we’re surrounded by it. So whatever decisions they make, it affects our city directly, both good and bad.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>U.S. Rep. Mike Thompson represents parts of Sonoma and Solano, along with Napa and Lake counties.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If they have a proposal or a plan to develop the properties that they purchased or plan to purchase, they’re going to need to work with the local community,” Thompson told KQED. “They’re going to have to be part of the community and they’re going to have to treat the local community with respect and work with them, not work against them.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Plans for the unnamed city have been in discussion as far back as 2017, when billionaire investor Michael Moritz wrote to potential investors about the chance to get in on the creation of an entirely new California community, \u003cem>The New York Times\u003c/em> first reported.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Flannery was then developed by former Goldman Sachs trader Jan Sramek, according to a pitch deck for the project that Moritz circulated, which outlined ideas such as a community built off the clean energy economy, robust public transportation and urban life.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Since then, Flannery has purchased nearly 140 properties, many of which were bought higher than their present value, totaling nearly $1 billion.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Flannery representatives would not say who they have been in discussions with in terms of actual city planning.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s going to pose some serious water issues and it’s going to cause some serious transportation issues, because our transportation system right now is already strained,” Kott said. “Their land purchases have pretty much surrounded the city of Rio Vista, including some parcels within the city limits.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Flannery’s land grab came under the microscope earlier this year when the company filed a lawsuit alleging local farmers were inflating land prices.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The lawsuit states that the company bought about 140 parcels of land from 400 landowners. Flannery accused a group of landowners, who held off on selling, of price fixing and violating anti-trust in order to collectively raise their prices.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the landowners have reached a settlement with Flannery, while others have motioned to dismiss the lawsuit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These are five-, six-generation family farmers in the area. Some refused to sell. So Flannery filed a lawsuit against seven family farmers, claiming that they were engaged in an illegal constraint of trade to raise the prices,” Garamendi said. “Never in all my years have I ever heard of somebody suing a group of farmers to try to force them to sell their land.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>KQED reporters Billy Cruz, Annelise Finney and Dan Brekke contributed to this story.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "The Bay's August News Roundup: San José Strike Averted, Henrietta Lacks’ Family Sues, and A Mysterious Land Purchase in Solano County",
"headTitle": "The Bay’s August News Roundup: San José Strike Averted, Henrietta Lacks’ Family Sues, and A Mysterious Land Purchase in Solano County | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">View the full episode transcript.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">We bring you 3 stories a week, but there’s so much more that’s happening in the Bay Area than we can get to. Today, Ericka, Maria and Alan each bring a story they’ve been following in a new monthly news roundup segment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"card card--enclosed grey\">\n\u003cp id=\"embed-code\" class=\"inconsolata\">\n\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm/?e=KQINC6539131865&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\n\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">\u003cstrong>Links:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli dir=\"ltr\">\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\" role=\"presentation\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11957208/near-1-billion-land-purchase-around-california-air-base-under-investigation\">Near $1 Billion Land Purchase Around California Air Base Under Investigation\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/li>\n\u003cli dir=\"ltr\">\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\" role=\"presentation\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11958290/san-jose-city-council-approves-agreements-with-unions-to-avoid-strike\">San Jose City Council Approves Agreements With Unions to Avoid Strike\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/li>\n\u003cli dir=\"ltr\">\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\" role=\"presentation\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/article/henrietta-lacks-lawsuit-18290615.php\">Henrietta Lacks’ Family Sues Bay Area Company Over Use of Stolen Cells\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>I’m Ericka Cruz Guevarra. And welcome to The Bay. Local news to keep you rooted. Today I’ve got senior editor Alan Montecillo in the studio with me. Hey, Alan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Hi.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>And I also have our producer, Maria Esquinca. What’s up, Maria?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>Hello.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>And here’s the deal. We’re kind of doing something a little different today. We only get three slots a week to bring you a story. And there’s so much happening in the Bay Area that we definitely cannot get into. Can you talk a little bit more about that, Maria?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>Yeah, so I think three slots sounds like a lot, but there’s a lot going on in the Bay Area, so we don’t always really get to talk about things that we’re really interested about. And so yeah, I think we are all news people and we all have other things that we want to talk about and we thought this would be like a cool idea to bring something a little bit different.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Right. So, today we’re bringing you a little peek into what we call the white board. Alan, can you explain what the white board is or was, I guess?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Well, until March of 2020, I was a literal white board, and I hold office, which included everything from our plans for the week, you know, meetings that we had to go to and stuff, but really story ideas. The white board is now a Google doc.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Thanks to the pandemic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Yeah. And so we wanted to just give listeners a peek into some of the other things that each of us individually has been following beyond the sort of three-day-a-week deep-dive kind of storytelling that folks are used to hearing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>All right. So today, me, Maria and Alan, the Bay team are going to talk about three stories that were on our radars this month. Alan, I will start with you. What story did you pick?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Well, my story is more of an update to an episode we did earlier this month, and that’s the San Jose City workers strike, or lack thereof. Actually, there was going to be a strike with about 4500 city workers beginning Tuesday the 15th. But at the last minute, the city council and the two unions representing those workers reached a tentative deal and the strike was called off.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>And it was actually going to be one of the biggest strikes in the city’s history, right?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Yeah, By some estimates, it would have been the largest strike of that size in San Jose since the 1980s. I mean, it would have been enormous. You’re talking about workers from the airport to the zoo to the libraries, not fire and police and not garbage. But there’s no doubt this strike would have had a huge impact.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>So, what happened? How did they what was the deal that they came to?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So, there are a number of things in the tentative agreement. I mean, these negotiations are always very complex with pay and benefits. But really the sticking point has always been about wage increases. And so initially the two unions wanted pay increases over three fiscal years of 7%, 6% and 5%. And then the city’s offer was 5%, 4%, 3% over that same period. So seven, six five versus five, four, three. In a literal sense, the two sides really did meet in the middle on this because the agreement that was reached was for 6% the first fiscal year, 5% the second fiscal year, and 4% the next fiscal year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>So, back when we did our episode on this with Guy Marzorati, I remember that the mayor wasn’t exactly too enthused about potentially reaching a deal. I think his concern was reopening the budget. And I think since the deal, he kind of came out with similar sentiments. But I’m curious, where does he stand now and where does the rest of the city council stand in there as well?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Yeah, I mean, I think Mayor Matt Mahan would have been happy if they did reach a deal and the deal stuck at 5% because that’s the number that he really wanted. Now, it’s important to note that the mayor is not the chief decider on this. It’s the city council. And actually that they’re the ones who empower the city manager to negotiate with the unions, I should say, voted to approve this sort of six, five, four compromise. And Mahan came out again and said he wasn’t happy with this deal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Matt Mahan: \u003c/strong>But our council did not do its job. Our leaders were elected to represent the people and the needs of the people took a backseat.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>He felt like the city couldn’t afford it. He had said in the past that if you go too high, the council would have to go back into the budget that they already approved to try and find the money to reach to go up from that 5% that they budgeted for up to 6%, and that that would mean cuts in important services. But in the end, I mean, Mahan was outvoted. You know, he is the mayor. He’s the most public face of the city. But he was only one vote on the city council. Another council member who was really pushing to bring the council back and negotiate over this was Pam Foley. She said, look, you know, this compromise was necessary to keep city services running.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Pam Foley: \u003c/strong>We really depend on public works, Department of Transportation, Parks and Rec, all of those staff to help make life easier for our residents.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>So I’m kind of curious, like what happens next, Alan?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Well, actually, as we’re taping on this, the union is voting on it right now. They’re widely expected to approve the deal. I mean, workers, that guy kind of circled back with from his original reporting said that they are pleased to see this increase. Assuming the union approves it and the council will have to go back into the budget that they passed and find ways to get up to that 6% pay increase. And we’ll see if what Mayor Mahan says is true, you know, whether or not the council really will need to make cuts in other areas that will harm residents in other ways, or maybe that won’t be the case. Maybe there will be money elsewhere and areas that residents won’t notice. We’ll just have to see how it goes. I mean, you know, budget stuff is is not the most exciting thing, but in the end, it’s about providing services to residents. So we’ll see what happens.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Okay. Now it’s actually my turn. And I’ve got this really interesting story out of Fairfield of Solano County, the 707 say it backwards. Basically, what’s happening is that there is a new land owner in Solano County. Actually, they’re now the biggest land owners in the entire county, and no one knows who they are. So this is a story that was actually first reported by The Wall Street Journal, and it’s about this investment firm called Flannery Associates. And this firm purchased 50,000 acres of land in Solano County for nearly $1,000,000,000, an amount that the investment firm itself has acknowledged is actually way over market value. So they spent a lot of a lot of money on this land. And what’s interesting about this story is that it’s. Not just any land. It’s actually this sort of dry, agricultural, grazing land that now surrounds the Travis Air Force Base on three sides.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>I’m curious, like, what are people saying or talking about?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>It’s actually raising a lot of red flags, especially among lawmakers who represent this area for them, like what’s happening here and the fact that there is so much that we don’t know about who is buying this land is raising a lot of actually national security concerns because of just the significance of Travis Air Force Base. So I have this clip from John Garamendi, who is a Democrat who represents this part of Solano County, just kind of talking about how important Travis Air Force Base is.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>John Garamendi \u003c/strong>Travis Air Force Base is absolutely a critical national defense. The munitions for Ukraine. A lot of that flights out of Travis Air Force Base all the way to Poland. And it is also the gateway to the Pacific. So what’s happening here? We don’t know.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Are there any theories as to who might be behind Flannery? Because that clip you played from Congressman Garamendi suggests that he – I mean, he specifically is suggesting that this is some sort of national security risk.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Right. The Wall Street Journal reported that Flannery had previously told the county that the entity is basically just a bunch of American and European families looking to diversify their portfolio. And The Hill reported that the firm is registered as an agricultural company. We also know from The Wall Street Journal that Flannery is registered actually in Delaware, where I didn’t know this, but L.L.C.’s don’t have to publicly disclose the identity of their owners in Delaware. So, that sort of adds to the like difficulty around figuring out who these people actually are. But yeah, it’s just sort of a weird story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>It’s spooky.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Actually, the FBI and the Treasury Department and the Department of Defense are all now investigating Flannery and its investments. And the reason why is because there is sort of context to this story, which is that there was a previous attempt by a Chinese owned firm to buy up land in North Dakota. And this was a purchase that the Air Force base there had opposed, citing national security risk. So, there is this fear that being so close to an an Air Force base like Travis kind of sort of opened the door for spying. But KQED has reported that there is no evidence so far to suggest that Flannery has ties with China.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Do we have any idea what these folks want to do with this land?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>The most we know is that earlier this week, the mayor of Fairfield, Catherine Moy, actually posted something on Facebook about how she’s been hearing from Solano County residents about this, a supposed poll that has been sent out by Flannery to Solano County residents that kind of outlines a sort of proposal for what they want to do with the land. And it includes a plan to build tens of thousands of new homes, a large solar energy farm, orchards with over a million new trees and over 10,000 acres of new parks and open space. I mean, I think it’s still kind of unclear what exactly is going to happen with this land. But I think at the end of the day, we still have no idea who is behind Flannery.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>It’s also a little strange that the most info we know is coming from a poll that the mayor is finding out secondhand.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Yeah, definitely. And also it’s kind of strange that this kind of came out on Facebook when there’s also like an FBI and federal investigations into this group. So, yeah, I guess it remains to be seen who exactly is behind Flannery and why are they so interested in Fairfield. So that is my story. Last but not least, Maria. What story is on your radar this month?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>So, a story that stood out to me was the story about the family of Henrietta Lacks. They’re suing a Bay Area company called Ultragenyx Pharmaceutical based in Novato.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Henrietta Lacks is a pretty, I’d say pretty famous name, but I don’t know if everyone remembers her story. So can you remind us about that?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>We have to go back to 1951 Henrietta Lacks. She was a black woman at the time that had cervical cancer, and she was being treated for Johns Hopkins. And basically doctors took her cells from her womb without her consent or without her knowledge. And the reason they they did that was because at the time, they were kind of trying to see if cells could survive out of the body. They had not been able to do this with anyone. But Henrietta’s cells were different. She she’s actually described as miraculous. Some people have called her cells an immortal cell line because once they were outside of her body, they didn’t instantly die and they were actually able to reproduce every 24 to 48 hours. Her cells have contributed, I think, to all of our lives. Her cells have been used to create the polio vaccine. They helped create the COVID vaccine. They’ve helped with genetic mapping, cancer care, HIV treatment. But this all happened without her consent. It was a very clear case of medical racism. And her family has obviously very strong feelings about this. One of her granddaughters, Kimberly Lux, spoke about just her grandmother just sitting there not knowing what was going on with her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Kimberley Lacks: \u003c/strong>I think about my grandmother, as I said before, laying and then hospital room and how they came in there when she had radiation going through her body in horrific pain. But all they were concerned about was taken cell tissues from her body.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>So you mentioned that this actually happened to Henrietta at Johns Hopkins, but what connection does the story have to the Bay Area?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>So, the connection to the Bay Area is that the family is suing this Bay Area pharmaceutical company that does gene therapy because they argue that they’ve benefited from her cells and they – this is like a multibillion dollar company and they have been successful with a similar case. In 2021, they sued another pharmaceutical company. And this year, actually the beginning of this month, they reached a settlement with that company.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>So, basically they’re suing this Bay Area company for profiting off of these cells.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>Exactly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Kimberley Lacks: \u003c/strong>Has the family or their attorney said anything about this case specifically against Ultragenyx in Novato?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>No, specifically about ultragenyx. The family attorney ben crump actually was on democracy now! And he does talk about how the lawsuit is based on this idea of genetic justice and this belief that justice should flow from like one family to the next.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Attorney for Henrietta Lacks’ Family: \u003c/strong>If you are unjustly rich from the wrong doing, then you should not be allowed to continue to benefit the pearl of the victim, which is Henrietta Lacks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>At the time they were specifically talking about this other settlement that just happened, but he did mention that they are that they plan to sue other other pharmaceutical companies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Well, that is it for the day’s first ever August news roundup. There’s still so much more on our whiteboard that we did not get to, but at least we got to do three more.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>We be here a long time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>We be here a real long time. Maria and Alan, thank you all so much.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Thank you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>Thank you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Before we go, just a little fact check. In this episode, Alan said that the agreement between the city of San Jose and its workers would provide a 4% raise in the fiscal year beginning July 2025. It’s actually 3.5%. Unless the city has a surplus of $10 million or more. If that happens, workers will get 4%. If you’re interested in reading more about the stories that we talked about today, peep the links in our show notes. The Bay is made by senior editor Alan Montecillo, producer Maria Esquinca, and me. Shout out as well to the rest of the podcast squad here at KQED. That’s Jen Chien, the director of podcasts; Katie Sprenger, our podcast operations manager. We also get audience engagement support from César Saldaña. And Holly Kernan is our chief content officer. We’re a production of member-supported, people-powered KQED in San Francisco. Thanks for listening. Peace.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"headline": "The Bay's August News Roundup: San José Strike Averted, Henrietta Lacks’ Family Sues, and A Mysterious Land Purchase in Solano County",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">View the full episode transcript.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">We bring you 3 stories a week, but there’s so much more that’s happening in the Bay Area than we can get to. Today, Ericka, Maria and Alan each bring a story they’ve been following in a new monthly news roundup segment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"card card--enclosed grey\">\n\u003cp id=\"embed-code\" class=\"inconsolata\">\n\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm/?e=KQINC6539131865&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\n\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">\u003cstrong>Links:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli dir=\"ltr\">\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\" role=\"presentation\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11957208/near-1-billion-land-purchase-around-california-air-base-under-investigation\">Near $1 Billion Land Purchase Around California Air Base Under Investigation\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/li>\n\u003cli dir=\"ltr\">\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\" role=\"presentation\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11958290/san-jose-city-council-approves-agreements-with-unions-to-avoid-strike\">San Jose City Council Approves Agreements With Unions to Avoid Strike\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/li>\n\u003cli dir=\"ltr\">\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\" role=\"presentation\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/article/henrietta-lacks-lawsuit-18290615.php\">Henrietta Lacks’ Family Sues Bay Area Company Over Use of Stolen Cells\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-content post-body\">\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>I’m Ericka Cruz Guevarra. And welcome to The Bay. Local news to keep you rooted. Today I’ve got senior editor Alan Montecillo in the studio with me. Hey, Alan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Hi.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>And I also have our producer, Maria Esquinca. What’s up, Maria?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>Hello.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>And here’s the deal. We’re kind of doing something a little different today. We only get three slots a week to bring you a story. And there’s so much happening in the Bay Area that we definitely cannot get into. Can you talk a little bit more about that, Maria?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>Yeah, so I think three slots sounds like a lot, but there’s a lot going on in the Bay Area, so we don’t always really get to talk about things that we’re really interested about. And so yeah, I think we are all news people and we all have other things that we want to talk about and we thought this would be like a cool idea to bring something a little bit different.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Right. So, today we’re bringing you a little peek into what we call the white board. Alan, can you explain what the white board is or was, I guess?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Well, until March of 2020, I was a literal white board, and I hold office, which included everything from our plans for the week, you know, meetings that we had to go to and stuff, but really story ideas. The white board is now a Google doc.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Thanks to the pandemic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Yeah. And so we wanted to just give listeners a peek into some of the other things that each of us individually has been following beyond the sort of three-day-a-week deep-dive kind of storytelling that folks are used to hearing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>All right. So today, me, Maria and Alan, the Bay team are going to talk about three stories that were on our radars this month. Alan, I will start with you. What story did you pick?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Well, my story is more of an update to an episode we did earlier this month, and that’s the San Jose City workers strike, or lack thereof. Actually, there was going to be a strike with about 4500 city workers beginning Tuesday the 15th. But at the last minute, the city council and the two unions representing those workers reached a tentative deal and the strike was called off.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>And it was actually going to be one of the biggest strikes in the city’s history, right?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Yeah, By some estimates, it would have been the largest strike of that size in San Jose since the 1980s. I mean, it would have been enormous. You’re talking about workers from the airport to the zoo to the libraries, not fire and police and not garbage. But there’s no doubt this strike would have had a huge impact.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>So, what happened? How did they what was the deal that they came to?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So, there are a number of things in the tentative agreement. I mean, these negotiations are always very complex with pay and benefits. But really the sticking point has always been about wage increases. And so initially the two unions wanted pay increases over three fiscal years of 7%, 6% and 5%. And then the city’s offer was 5%, 4%, 3% over that same period. So seven, six five versus five, four, three. In a literal sense, the two sides really did meet in the middle on this because the agreement that was reached was for 6% the first fiscal year, 5% the second fiscal year, and 4% the next fiscal year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>So, back when we did our episode on this with Guy Marzorati, I remember that the mayor wasn’t exactly too enthused about potentially reaching a deal. I think his concern was reopening the budget. And I think since the deal, he kind of came out with similar sentiments. But I’m curious, where does he stand now and where does the rest of the city council stand in there as well?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Yeah, I mean, I think Mayor Matt Mahan would have been happy if they did reach a deal and the deal stuck at 5% because that’s the number that he really wanted. Now, it’s important to note that the mayor is not the chief decider on this. It’s the city council. And actually that they’re the ones who empower the city manager to negotiate with the unions, I should say, voted to approve this sort of six, five, four compromise. And Mahan came out again and said he wasn’t happy with this deal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Matt Mahan: \u003c/strong>But our council did not do its job. Our leaders were elected to represent the people and the needs of the people took a backseat.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>He felt like the city couldn’t afford it. He had said in the past that if you go too high, the council would have to go back into the budget that they already approved to try and find the money to reach to go up from that 5% that they budgeted for up to 6%, and that that would mean cuts in important services. But in the end, I mean, Mahan was outvoted. You know, he is the mayor. He’s the most public face of the city. But he was only one vote on the city council. Another council member who was really pushing to bring the council back and negotiate over this was Pam Foley. She said, look, you know, this compromise was necessary to keep city services running.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Pam Foley: \u003c/strong>We really depend on public works, Department of Transportation, Parks and Rec, all of those staff to help make life easier for our residents.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>So I’m kind of curious, like what happens next, Alan?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Well, actually, as we’re taping on this, the union is voting on it right now. They’re widely expected to approve the deal. I mean, workers, that guy kind of circled back with from his original reporting said that they are pleased to see this increase. Assuming the union approves it and the council will have to go back into the budget that they passed and find ways to get up to that 6% pay increase. And we’ll see if what Mayor Mahan says is true, you know, whether or not the council really will need to make cuts in other areas that will harm residents in other ways, or maybe that won’t be the case. Maybe there will be money elsewhere and areas that residents won’t notice. We’ll just have to see how it goes. I mean, you know, budget stuff is is not the most exciting thing, but in the end, it’s about providing services to residents. So we’ll see what happens.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Okay. Now it’s actually my turn. And I’ve got this really interesting story out of Fairfield of Solano County, the 707 say it backwards. Basically, what’s happening is that there is a new land owner in Solano County. Actually, they’re now the biggest land owners in the entire county, and no one knows who they are. So this is a story that was actually first reported by The Wall Street Journal, and it’s about this investment firm called Flannery Associates. And this firm purchased 50,000 acres of land in Solano County for nearly $1,000,000,000, an amount that the investment firm itself has acknowledged is actually way over market value. So they spent a lot of a lot of money on this land. And what’s interesting about this story is that it’s. Not just any land. It’s actually this sort of dry, agricultural, grazing land that now surrounds the Travis Air Force Base on three sides.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>I’m curious, like, what are people saying or talking about?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>It’s actually raising a lot of red flags, especially among lawmakers who represent this area for them, like what’s happening here and the fact that there is so much that we don’t know about who is buying this land is raising a lot of actually national security concerns because of just the significance of Travis Air Force Base. So I have this clip from John Garamendi, who is a Democrat who represents this part of Solano County, just kind of talking about how important Travis Air Force Base is.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>John Garamendi \u003c/strong>Travis Air Force Base is absolutely a critical national defense. The munitions for Ukraine. A lot of that flights out of Travis Air Force Base all the way to Poland. And it is also the gateway to the Pacific. So what’s happening here? We don’t know.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Are there any theories as to who might be behind Flannery? Because that clip you played from Congressman Garamendi suggests that he – I mean, he specifically is suggesting that this is some sort of national security risk.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Right. The Wall Street Journal reported that Flannery had previously told the county that the entity is basically just a bunch of American and European families looking to diversify their portfolio. And The Hill reported that the firm is registered as an agricultural company. We also know from The Wall Street Journal that Flannery is registered actually in Delaware, where I didn’t know this, but L.L.C.’s don’t have to publicly disclose the identity of their owners in Delaware. So, that sort of adds to the like difficulty around figuring out who these people actually are. But yeah, it’s just sort of a weird story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>It’s spooky.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Actually, the FBI and the Treasury Department and the Department of Defense are all now investigating Flannery and its investments. And the reason why is because there is sort of context to this story, which is that there was a previous attempt by a Chinese owned firm to buy up land in North Dakota. And this was a purchase that the Air Force base there had opposed, citing national security risk. So, there is this fear that being so close to an an Air Force base like Travis kind of sort of opened the door for spying. But KQED has reported that there is no evidence so far to suggest that Flannery has ties with China.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Do we have any idea what these folks want to do with this land?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>The most we know is that earlier this week, the mayor of Fairfield, Catherine Moy, actually posted something on Facebook about how she’s been hearing from Solano County residents about this, a supposed poll that has been sent out by Flannery to Solano County residents that kind of outlines a sort of proposal for what they want to do with the land. And it includes a plan to build tens of thousands of new homes, a large solar energy farm, orchards with over a million new trees and over 10,000 acres of new parks and open space. I mean, I think it’s still kind of unclear what exactly is going to happen with this land. But I think at the end of the day, we still have no idea who is behind Flannery.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>It’s also a little strange that the most info we know is coming from a poll that the mayor is finding out secondhand.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Yeah, definitely. And also it’s kind of strange that this kind of came out on Facebook when there’s also like an FBI and federal investigations into this group. So, yeah, I guess it remains to be seen who exactly is behind Flannery and why are they so interested in Fairfield. So that is my story. Last but not least, Maria. What story is on your radar this month?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>So, a story that stood out to me was the story about the family of Henrietta Lacks. They’re suing a Bay Area company called Ultragenyx Pharmaceutical based in Novato.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Henrietta Lacks is a pretty, I’d say pretty famous name, but I don’t know if everyone remembers her story. So can you remind us about that?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>We have to go back to 1951 Henrietta Lacks. She was a black woman at the time that had cervical cancer, and she was being treated for Johns Hopkins. And basically doctors took her cells from her womb without her consent or without her knowledge. And the reason they they did that was because at the time, they were kind of trying to see if cells could survive out of the body. They had not been able to do this with anyone. But Henrietta’s cells were different. She she’s actually described as miraculous. Some people have called her cells an immortal cell line because once they were outside of her body, they didn’t instantly die and they were actually able to reproduce every 24 to 48 hours. Her cells have contributed, I think, to all of our lives. Her cells have been used to create the polio vaccine. They helped create the COVID vaccine. They’ve helped with genetic mapping, cancer care, HIV treatment. But this all happened without her consent. It was a very clear case of medical racism. And her family has obviously very strong feelings about this. One of her granddaughters, Kimberly Lux, spoke about just her grandmother just sitting there not knowing what was going on with her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Kimberley Lacks: \u003c/strong>I think about my grandmother, as I said before, laying and then hospital room and how they came in there when she had radiation going through her body in horrific pain. But all they were concerned about was taken cell tissues from her body.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>So you mentioned that this actually happened to Henrietta at Johns Hopkins, but what connection does the story have to the Bay Area?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>So, the connection to the Bay Area is that the family is suing this Bay Area pharmaceutical company that does gene therapy because they argue that they’ve benefited from her cells and they – this is like a multibillion dollar company and they have been successful with a similar case. In 2021, they sued another pharmaceutical company. And this year, actually the beginning of this month, they reached a settlement with that company.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>So, basically they’re suing this Bay Area company for profiting off of these cells.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>Exactly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Kimberley Lacks: \u003c/strong>Has the family or their attorney said anything about this case specifically against Ultragenyx in Novato?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>No, specifically about ultragenyx. The family attorney ben crump actually was on democracy now! And he does talk about how the lawsuit is based on this idea of genetic justice and this belief that justice should flow from like one family to the next.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Attorney for Henrietta Lacks’ Family: \u003c/strong>If you are unjustly rich from the wrong doing, then you should not be allowed to continue to benefit the pearl of the victim, which is Henrietta Lacks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>At the time they were specifically talking about this other settlement that just happened, but he did mention that they are that they plan to sue other other pharmaceutical companies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Well, that is it for the day’s first ever August news roundup. There’s still so much more on our whiteboard that we did not get to, but at least we got to do three more.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>We be here a long time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>We be here a real long time. Maria and Alan, thank you all so much.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Thank you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Maria Esquinca: \u003c/strong>Thank you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Ericka Cruz Guevarra: \u003c/strong>Before we go, just a little fact check. In this episode, Alan said that the agreement between the city of San Jose and its workers would provide a 4% raise in the fiscal year beginning July 2025. It’s actually 3.5%. Unless the city has a surplus of $10 million or more. If that happens, workers will get 4%. If you’re interested in reading more about the stories that we talked about today, peep the links in our show notes. The Bay is made by senior editor Alan Montecillo, producer Maria Esquinca, and me. Shout out as well to the rest of the podcast squad here at KQED. That’s Jen Chien, the director of podcasts; Katie Sprenger, our podcast operations manager. We also get audience engagement support from César Saldaña. And Holly Kernan is our chief content officer. We’re a production of member-supported, people-powered KQED in San Francisco. Thanks for listening. Peace.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>"
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"content": "\u003cp>Federal authorities are investigating a mysterious investment firm that bought nearly $1 billion worth of land surrounding Travis Air Force base, a prominent military base in Solano County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since 2018, Flannery Associates purchased 50,000 acres of agricultural land adjacent to Travis Air Force Base, the \u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.wsj.com/articles/investors-bought-nearly-1-billion-in-land-near-a-california-air-force-base-officials-want-to-know-who-exactly-they-are-fd868e38\">Wall Street Journal\u003c/a>\u003c/em> reports, located about halfway between San Francisco and Sacramento in Solano County. Little is known about the investment firm. But local and federal policymakers say they are concerned about potential national security threats.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They now surround three sides of Travis Air Force Base, which is a critical national security asset. That has raised significant concern for the Air Force,” Rep. John Garamendi (D-California), whose district includes the airbase, told KQED. “No one has been able to figure out where the $900 million has come from to purchase all the land in the area and what their intent is.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Treasury Department and the Department of Defense are all now investigating the group and its investments, Garamendi said. But because Flannery is incorporated in Delaware, a state with strong legal protections to shield corporate ownership, those probes have not yet uncovered who is behind the group.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Travis Air Force base contains the largest wing of the Air Force’s Air Mobility Command with aircraft regularly departing the site to send munitions to Europe and Ukraine. It’s “the Gateway to Europe and the Pacific,” Garamendi said. [pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Rep. John Garamendi (D-California)\"]‘They now surround three sides of Travis Air Force Base, which is a critical national security asset. That has raised significant concern for the Air Force.’[/pullquote] In May, \u003ca href=\"https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/legaldocs/zdpxdejmlpx/Flannery%20Associates%20-%20ED%20California%20-%202023-05-18.pdf\">Flannery filed a lawsuit against (PDF)\u003c/a> a handful of the family farms that the group wanted to buy up, alleging they were conspiring to hike up prices and deter a sale. But, Garamendi said, Flannery has already paid an unusually high amount for the dry, agricultural grazing land that it did buy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Flannery’s purchases are surrounding Travis Air Force Base, one of the most significant national security sites in our country, and it’s been devastating to family farmers due to related lawsuits,” Rep. Mike Thompson, whose district includes parts of Solano County, told KQED. “I will continue to work with local and federal partners to ensure that the concerns of our community are addressed and that we protect our national and food security.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Flannery purchased land where the majority of wind turbines in Solano County are located, along with other critical electrical transmission lines.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fueling the lawmakers’ concerns are recent attempts by Chinese companies to build a corn mill adjacent to the Grand Forks Air Base in North Dakota, another high-security base from which military aircraft take off for missions around the world. [aside label='More on Politics' tag='politics'] The project was initially boosted as an economic driver for the region, but has since halted after \u003ca href=\"https://www.hoeven.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/USAIRFORCE-FUFENG-LETTER-HOEVEN.pdf\">Air Force officials wrote to local government leaders with security concerns (PDF)\u003c/a> that the mill could be used to spy on the Air Force. The company denied those accusations, \u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/31/us/corn-mill-fufeng-china-north-dakota.html\">\u003cem>The New York Times\u003c/em>\u003c/a> reported.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There’s no evidence so far to suggest Flannery has ties with China, but little is known about the group at all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The lawyer representing the company says not to worry, these are American investors and a couple Europeans,” Garamendi said. “We just don’t know. And until we know, we will remain very concerned.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lawmakers in nearly two dozen other states have passed or are seeking to pass legislation in recent years limiting farmland Chinese investors from purchasing U.S. farmland.[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Rep. Mike Thompson (D-Napa)\"]‘Protecting national security and food security go hand in hand in our region — which is why it is vital to know who owns land around national security sites.’[/pullquote]Earlier this month, \u003ca href=\"https://mikethompson.house.gov/sites/evo-subsites/mikethompson.house.gov/files/evo-media-document/thompson-gallagher-land-purchase-bill-text.pdf\">Thompson introduced legislation (PDF)\u003c/a> to strengthen protections and reporting structures around national security sites, infrastructure and farmland. The bill would authorize the U.S. Department of the Treasury Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) to review certain foreign investment transactions to evaluate security risk for all land purchases — except some real estate like single housing units — by foreign adversary entities. It would also expand the list of types of sites under the CFIUS to include all military facilities, intelligence sites, laboratories and other defense-funded research sites.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The bill is co-sponsored by Mike Gallagher, Chairman of the Select Committee on Strategic Competition, between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Protecting national security and food security go hand in hand in our region — which is why it is vital to know who owns land around national security sites,” Rep. Thompson said in a press release when the legislation was announced. “The bipartisan legislation I am introducing with Chairman Gallagher will help identify foreign actors who are seeking to purchase land near military installations while maintaining food security throughout our country.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Federal authorities are investigating a mysterious investment firm that bought nearly $1 billion worth of land surrounding Travis Air Force base, a prominent military base in Solano County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since 2018, Flannery Associates purchased 50,000 acres of agricultural land adjacent to Travis Air Force Base, the \u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.wsj.com/articles/investors-bought-nearly-1-billion-in-land-near-a-california-air-force-base-officials-want-to-know-who-exactly-they-are-fd868e38\">Wall Street Journal\u003c/a>\u003c/em> reports, located about halfway between San Francisco and Sacramento in Solano County. Little is known about the investment firm. But local and federal policymakers say they are concerned about potential national security threats.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They now surround three sides of Travis Air Force Base, which is a critical national security asset. That has raised significant concern for the Air Force,” Rep. John Garamendi (D-California), whose district includes the airbase, told KQED. “No one has been able to figure out where the $900 million has come from to purchase all the land in the area and what their intent is.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Treasury Department and the Department of Defense are all now investigating the group and its investments, Garamendi said. But because Flannery is incorporated in Delaware, a state with strong legal protections to shield corporate ownership, those probes have not yet uncovered who is behind the group.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Travis Air Force base contains the largest wing of the Air Force’s Air Mobility Command with aircraft regularly departing the site to send munitions to Europe and Ukraine. It’s “the Gateway to Europe and the Pacific,” Garamendi said. \u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp> In May, \u003ca href=\"https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/legaldocs/zdpxdejmlpx/Flannery%20Associates%20-%20ED%20California%20-%202023-05-18.pdf\">Flannery filed a lawsuit against (PDF)\u003c/a> a handful of the family farms that the group wanted to buy up, alleging they were conspiring to hike up prices and deter a sale. But, Garamendi said, Flannery has already paid an unusually high amount for the dry, agricultural grazing land that it did buy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Flannery’s purchases are surrounding Travis Air Force Base, one of the most significant national security sites in our country, and it’s been devastating to family farmers due to related lawsuits,” Rep. Mike Thompson, whose district includes parts of Solano County, told KQED. “I will continue to work with local and federal partners to ensure that the concerns of our community are addressed and that we protect our national and food security.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Flannery purchased land where the majority of wind turbines in Solano County are located, along with other critical electrical transmission lines.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fueling the lawmakers’ concerns are recent attempts by Chinese companies to build a corn mill adjacent to the Grand Forks Air Base in North Dakota, another high-security base from which military aircraft take off for missions around the world. \u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp> The project was initially boosted as an economic driver for the region, but has since halted after \u003ca href=\"https://www.hoeven.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/USAIRFORCE-FUFENG-LETTER-HOEVEN.pdf\">Air Force officials wrote to local government leaders with security concerns (PDF)\u003c/a> that the mill could be used to spy on the Air Force. The company denied those accusations, \u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/31/us/corn-mill-fufeng-china-north-dakota.html\">\u003cem>The New York Times\u003c/em>\u003c/a> reported.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There’s no evidence so far to suggest Flannery has ties with China, but little is known about the group at all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The lawyer representing the company says not to worry, these are American investors and a couple Europeans,” Garamendi said. “We just don’t know. And until we know, we will remain very concerned.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lawmakers in nearly two dozen other states have passed or are seeking to pass legislation in recent years limiting farmland Chinese investors from purchasing U.S. farmland.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Earlier this month, \u003ca href=\"https://mikethompson.house.gov/sites/evo-subsites/mikethompson.house.gov/files/evo-media-document/thompson-gallagher-land-purchase-bill-text.pdf\">Thompson introduced legislation (PDF)\u003c/a> to strengthen protections and reporting structures around national security sites, infrastructure and farmland. The bill would authorize the U.S. Department of the Treasury Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) to review certain foreign investment transactions to evaluate security risk for all land purchases — except some real estate like single housing units — by foreign adversary entities. It would also expand the list of types of sites under the CFIUS to include all military facilities, intelligence sites, laboratories and other defense-funded research sites.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The bill is co-sponsored by Mike Gallagher, Chairman of the Select Committee on Strategic Competition, between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Protecting national security and food security go hand in hand in our region — which is why it is vital to know who owns land around national security sites,” Rep. Thompson said in a press release when the legislation was announced. “The bipartisan legislation I am introducing with Chairman Gallagher will help identify foreign actors who are seeking to purchase land near military installations while maintaining food security throughout our country.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "As Bay Area Eviction Moratoriums Expire, Local Lawmakers Scramble",
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"content": "\u003cp>George Wu is willing to die to end Alameda County’s eviction ban.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The San Leandro property owner launched a hunger strike Sunday to protest the moratorium, which he blames for $120,000 and counting in unpaid rent. Wu plans to camp out in front of the county administration building day and night, through cold and rain, until lawmakers lift the ban.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I need the rent to feed my family,” said Wu, whose triplex is his primary source of income. “I will continue there until the government listens to my story and until they have a new fair policy.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While COVID eviction protections are long expired in most cities and counties around the state, Alameda County is one of three Bay Area counties holding out — but not for much longer. \u003ca href=\"https://covid-19.acgov.org/covid19-assets/docs/press/press-release-2023.02.28.pdf\">The county’s local COVID-19 public health emergency expired Tuesday (PDF)\u003c/a>, the same day as the state’s. With it gone, the county’s eviction moratorium will sunset in 60 days.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tenants in Solano County, another Bay Area county with a moratorium in place, will lose their pandemic-era protections in 90 days. And in San Francisco, there’s no end date yet, but advocates speculate that will come in the summer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That has lawmakers and advocates in the three counties scrambling to put in place new policies to stem a wave of evictions they fear will follow, while property owners who desperately want out from under the bans are pushing back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wu wants Alameda County to fully reimburse landlords for lost rent and end its moratorium immediately. But local officials there have cautioned against an abrupt end to these pandemic-era protections.[pullquote size='medium' align='right' citation=\"Nate Miley, president, Alameda County Board of Supervisors\"]‘We know there’s going to be an eviction tsunami. I feel the board, because we’ve put ourselves in this hole, we also have an obligation to help vulnerable populations. We need to figure out how we’re going to mitigate the damage that we’ve caused.’[/pullquote]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We know there’s going to be an eviction tsunami,” said Alameda County Board of Supervisors President Nate Miley, who aims to develop a program to support tenants and landlords coming out of the moratorium. He sees it as causing harm to both landlords and tenants who’ve racked up debt. “I feel the board, because we’ve put ourselves in this hole, we also have an obligation to help vulnerable populations. We need to figure out how we’re going to mitigate the damage that we’ve caused.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In Sonoma County, where the local eviction moratorium ended in September of last year, attorney Sunny Noh of Legal Aid of Sonoma County said that surge of evictions never came.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We expected kind of a tidal wave of cases, and that’s not what we saw,” Noh said. Instead, she said they’ve seen a gradual increase, which they expect will ultimately top pre-pandemic eviction numbers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The moratorium reduced evictions by two-thirds compared to pre-pandemic numbers, said Margaret DeMatteo, housing policy attorney for Legal Aid of Sonoma County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to DeMatteo’s analysis of court data, in 2019, there were 932 unlawful detainers in the county. In 2021, the only full year covered by the moratorium, the figure dropped to 332. In 2022, with the moratorium in effect through September, numbers rebounded to 786. The figures don’t account for illegal evictions or notices that lead people to move before an eviction goes to court.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s our workforce. Those are vulnerable populations,” she said. “My takeaway is that the county has a lot of power to stabilize the community and improve the ability for our workforce to remain and our seniors and people with disabilities.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Leaders in Alameda and San Francisco counties are weighing their options to lessen the blow of losing eviction protections for tenants, but it hasn’t come without pushback.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>San Leandro City Councilmember Celina Reynes’ recent proposal to extend the city’s eviction moratorium was met with a threat, wishing for her to have a miscarriage and get hit by a car, according to a social media post she shared with KQED. But \u003ca href=\"https://sanleandro.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=1060044&GUID=D7E045C3-8D7C-4AAD-A2D2-8681EE919B4B&Options=info%7C&Search=\">last week city leaders backed her plan\u003c/a>, shielding renters affected by COVID from evictions through February 2024. Tenants must be able to prove that their inability to pay is due to the pandemic to qualify.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s a very narrow ordinance, but what it’s doing is protecting some of our residents who are most vulnerable to displacement and homelessness,” Reynes said, noting the city doesn’t have rent stabilization or just cause eviction protections in place. “It gives us time to work on more permanent solutions for both tenants and housing providers in our city.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_11920788,news_11919866 label='Related Coverage']San Leandro isn’t the first city to enact tougher renter protections in the wake of temporary COVID measures lapsing. These solutions have proliferated across the state over the past couple of years as cities adopted or strengthened rent control and just cause eviction laws, \u003ca href=\"https://www.oaklandca.gov/topics/understanding-evictions-in-oakland\">which limit evictions to those a city deems reasonable\u003c/a>, like failure to pay rent, significantly damaging a unit or violating the lease after receiving a written notice to stop. In the Bay Area, Antioch, Richmond and Oakland all increased protections last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“People are going back to the toolkit of policies that we’ve been advocating for years,” said Shanti Singh, communications and legislative director for Tenants Together.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In San Francisco, where Singh is based, there are already strong rules in place to protect tenants. What she hopes to see before the moratorium lifts is a new infusion of funding for city programs that offer \u003ca href=\"https://sf.gov/renthelp\">emergency rent relief\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://evictiondefense.org/services/right-to-counsel/#:~:text=The%20%E2%80%9CNo%20Eviction%20without%20Representation%20Act%E2%80%9D%20requires%20that%20all%20eligible,to%20Counsel%20program%20(TRC).\">provide attorneys for tenants facing eviction\u003c/a>. As for a policy solution, advocates in the city say they’re just beginning to think about what a phaseout of the eviction moratorium should look like.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In Berkeley, the city council adopted \u003ca href=\"https://berkeleyca.gov/city-council-special-eagenda-february-27-2023\">a proposal to stretch the city’s moratorium for an additional 60 days\u003c/a> after the end of the local emergency. The plan would create a transition period through the end of August during which only certain kinds of evictions would be allowed, including some due to an owner moving back into the property, those due to health and safety issues and those for nonpayment, unless a tenant has proof the delay is related to the pandemic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We just can’t end this right now. We have to have a plan,” Berkeley Mayor Jesse Arreguín said, adding that the proposal is meant to prevent people from becoming homeless. “We don’t need thousands more people on the streets just because we didn’t give them the time and the space and the resources to be able to pay back the rent that they owe.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He’s also asking for another $300,000 for the city’s COVID rent relief program, which now has a waitlist of six tenants seeking a total of $44,142.86, according to the resolution. He expects demand to grow when the eviction ban lifts.[pullquote size='medium' align='right' citation=\"Berkeley Mayor Jesse Arreguín\"]‘We just can’t end this right now. We have to have a plan. We don’t need thousands more people on the streets just because we didn’t give them the time and the space and the resources to be able to pay back the rent that they owe.’[/pullquote]In Oakland, City Council President Nikki Fortunato Bas is working on a plan to phase the city’s moratorium out. She said she’s listening to input from both tenants and small property owners as she drafts the proposal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I am hopeful that we will craft a proposal that helps provide housing security to tenants and balances the concerns of small property owners,” she said in an email.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As lawmakers consider ways to ease out of the bans, landlords are pushing to take back greater control over their properties.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These elected officials set these tenants up for failure by allowing them to continue to accumulate debt,” said Krista Gulbransen, executive director of the Berkeley Property Owners Association, “but they’re never, ever going to be able to pay [it] back.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The association recently surveyed members and found the average respondent had at least two units with tenants who hadn’t been paying rent for an extended period of time. The amount of debt ranged from $1,000 to north of $80,000, with an average of about $30,000 that wasn’t covered by rent relief funds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As Gulbransen sees it, the best solution is to require cities to cover any remaining debt through its rent relief program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That really is the only thing that’s going to keep tenants housed,” she said. [pullquote size='medium' align='right' citation=\"Krista Gulbransen, executive director, Berkeley Property Owners Association\"]‘These elected officials set these tenants up for failure by allowing them to continue to accumulate debt.’[/pullquote]Miley, the Alameda County Board of Supervisors president, has asked county staff to look into resources available to support the transition out of the moratorium.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We need to come up with programs that are going to help work with landlords and tenants to ameliorate and hopefully bring about some type of compromise,” he said, “so that we don’t have the level of evictions that are anticipated.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While the county may not have the money to make landlords whole, Miley said he’d like to see it cover a portion of the debt.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Leah Simon-Weisberg, legal director for the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment Institute, wants local leaders to think bigger. Housing affordability in California was a crisis before the pandemic. And, she said it’s still a crisis for millions of families in the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The real question is, what do we do for the folks who can’t pay for their housing on minimum wage, who can’t have three jobs now because there aren’t three jobs to have?” she said. “We’ve now returned to our regularly scheduled housing crisis.”\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"headline": "As Bay Area Eviction Moratoriums Expire, Local Lawmakers Scramble",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>George Wu is willing to die to end Alameda County’s eviction ban.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The San Leandro property owner launched a hunger strike Sunday to protest the moratorium, which he blames for $120,000 and counting in unpaid rent. Wu plans to camp out in front of the county administration building day and night, through cold and rain, until lawmakers lift the ban.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I need the rent to feed my family,” said Wu, whose triplex is his primary source of income. “I will continue there until the government listens to my story and until they have a new fair policy.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While COVID eviction protections are long expired in most cities and counties around the state, Alameda County is one of three Bay Area counties holding out — but not for much longer. \u003ca href=\"https://covid-19.acgov.org/covid19-assets/docs/press/press-release-2023.02.28.pdf\">The county’s local COVID-19 public health emergency expired Tuesday (PDF)\u003c/a>, the same day as the state’s. With it gone, the county’s eviction moratorium will sunset in 60 days.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tenants in Solano County, another Bay Area county with a moratorium in place, will lose their pandemic-era protections in 90 days. And in San Francisco, there’s no end date yet, but advocates speculate that will come in the summer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That has lawmakers and advocates in the three counties scrambling to put in place new policies to stem a wave of evictions they fear will follow, while property owners who desperately want out from under the bans are pushing back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wu wants Alameda County to fully reimburse landlords for lost rent and end its moratorium immediately. But local officials there have cautioned against an abrupt end to these pandemic-era protections.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘We know there’s going to be an eviction tsunami. I feel the board, because we’ve put ourselves in this hole, we also have an obligation to help vulnerable populations. We need to figure out how we’re going to mitigate the damage that we’ve caused.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We know there’s going to be an eviction tsunami,” said Alameda County Board of Supervisors President Nate Miley, who aims to develop a program to support tenants and landlords coming out of the moratorium. He sees it as causing harm to both landlords and tenants who’ve racked up debt. “I feel the board, because we’ve put ourselves in this hole, we also have an obligation to help vulnerable populations. We need to figure out how we’re going to mitigate the damage that we’ve caused.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In Sonoma County, where the local eviction moratorium ended in September of last year, attorney Sunny Noh of Legal Aid of Sonoma County said that surge of evictions never came.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We expected kind of a tidal wave of cases, and that’s not what we saw,” Noh said. Instead, she said they’ve seen a gradual increase, which they expect will ultimately top pre-pandemic eviction numbers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The moratorium reduced evictions by two-thirds compared to pre-pandemic numbers, said Margaret DeMatteo, housing policy attorney for Legal Aid of Sonoma County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to DeMatteo’s analysis of court data, in 2019, there were 932 unlawful detainers in the county. In 2021, the only full year covered by the moratorium, the figure dropped to 332. In 2022, with the moratorium in effect through September, numbers rebounded to 786. The figures don’t account for illegal evictions or notices that lead people to move before an eviction goes to court.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s our workforce. Those are vulnerable populations,” she said. “My takeaway is that the county has a lot of power to stabilize the community and improve the ability for our workforce to remain and our seniors and people with disabilities.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Leaders in Alameda and San Francisco counties are weighing their options to lessen the blow of losing eviction protections for tenants, but it hasn’t come without pushback.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>San Leandro City Councilmember Celina Reynes’ recent proposal to extend the city’s eviction moratorium was met with a threat, wishing for her to have a miscarriage and get hit by a car, according to a social media post she shared with KQED. But \u003ca href=\"https://sanleandro.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=1060044&GUID=D7E045C3-8D7C-4AAD-A2D2-8681EE919B4B&Options=info%7C&Search=\">last week city leaders backed her plan\u003c/a>, shielding renters affected by COVID from evictions through February 2024. Tenants must be able to prove that their inability to pay is due to the pandemic to qualify.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s a very narrow ordinance, but what it’s doing is protecting some of our residents who are most vulnerable to displacement and homelessness,” Reynes said, noting the city doesn’t have rent stabilization or just cause eviction protections in place. “It gives us time to work on more permanent solutions for both tenants and housing providers in our city.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>San Leandro isn’t the first city to enact tougher renter protections in the wake of temporary COVID measures lapsing. These solutions have proliferated across the state over the past couple of years as cities adopted or strengthened rent control and just cause eviction laws, \u003ca href=\"https://www.oaklandca.gov/topics/understanding-evictions-in-oakland\">which limit evictions to those a city deems reasonable\u003c/a>, like failure to pay rent, significantly damaging a unit or violating the lease after receiving a written notice to stop. In the Bay Area, Antioch, Richmond and Oakland all increased protections last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“People are going back to the toolkit of policies that we’ve been advocating for years,” said Shanti Singh, communications and legislative director for Tenants Together.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In San Francisco, where Singh is based, there are already strong rules in place to protect tenants. What she hopes to see before the moratorium lifts is a new infusion of funding for city programs that offer \u003ca href=\"https://sf.gov/renthelp\">emergency rent relief\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://evictiondefense.org/services/right-to-counsel/#:~:text=The%20%E2%80%9CNo%20Eviction%20without%20Representation%20Act%E2%80%9D%20requires%20that%20all%20eligible,to%20Counsel%20program%20(TRC).\">provide attorneys for tenants facing eviction\u003c/a>. As for a policy solution, advocates in the city say they’re just beginning to think about what a phaseout of the eviction moratorium should look like.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In Berkeley, the city council adopted \u003ca href=\"https://berkeleyca.gov/city-council-special-eagenda-february-27-2023\">a proposal to stretch the city’s moratorium for an additional 60 days\u003c/a> after the end of the local emergency. The plan would create a transition period through the end of August during which only certain kinds of evictions would be allowed, including some due to an owner moving back into the property, those due to health and safety issues and those for nonpayment, unless a tenant has proof the delay is related to the pandemic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We just can’t end this right now. We have to have a plan,” Berkeley Mayor Jesse Arreguín said, adding that the proposal is meant to prevent people from becoming homeless. “We don’t need thousands more people on the streets just because we didn’t give them the time and the space and the resources to be able to pay back the rent that they owe.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He’s also asking for another $300,000 for the city’s COVID rent relief program, which now has a waitlist of six tenants seeking a total of $44,142.86, according to the resolution. He expects demand to grow when the eviction ban lifts.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘We just can’t end this right now. We have to have a plan. We don’t need thousands more people on the streets just because we didn’t give them the time and the space and the resources to be able to pay back the rent that they owe.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>In Oakland, City Council President Nikki Fortunato Bas is working on a plan to phase the city’s moratorium out. She said she’s listening to input from both tenants and small property owners as she drafts the proposal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I am hopeful that we will craft a proposal that helps provide housing security to tenants and balances the concerns of small property owners,” she said in an email.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As lawmakers consider ways to ease out of the bans, landlords are pushing to take back greater control over their properties.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These elected officials set these tenants up for failure by allowing them to continue to accumulate debt,” said Krista Gulbransen, executive director of the Berkeley Property Owners Association, “but they’re never, ever going to be able to pay [it] back.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The association recently surveyed members and found the average respondent had at least two units with tenants who hadn’t been paying rent for an extended period of time. The amount of debt ranged from $1,000 to north of $80,000, with an average of about $30,000 that wasn’t covered by rent relief funds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As Gulbransen sees it, the best solution is to require cities to cover any remaining debt through its rent relief program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That really is the only thing that’s going to keep tenants housed,” she said. \u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Miley, the Alameda County Board of Supervisors president, has asked county staff to look into resources available to support the transition out of the moratorium.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We need to come up with programs that are going to help work with landlords and tenants to ameliorate and hopefully bring about some type of compromise,” he said, “so that we don’t have the level of evictions that are anticipated.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While the county may not have the money to make landlords whole, Miley said he’d like to see it cover a portion of the debt.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Leah Simon-Weisberg, legal director for the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment Institute, wants local leaders to think bigger. Housing affordability in California was a crisis before the pandemic. And, she said it’s still a crisis for millions of families in the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The real question is, what do we do for the folks who can’t pay for their housing on minimum wage, who can’t have three jobs now because there aren’t three jobs to have?” she said. “We’ve now returned to our regularly scheduled housing crisis.”\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Update, 5:30 p.m. Sunday:\u003c/strong> Santa Clara County officials are warning that the upcoming holiday season is expected to coincide with a spike in COVID-19, nearly as severe as the omicron surge last year. The county moved into the high-risk designation over the weekend, prompting the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to recommend people wear high-quality masks in public spaces. Dr. Sara Cody, the county’s health officer, says levels of the virus in San José’s sewer system — which draws from three quarters of the county’s population — are already at about 84% of the omicron peak.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We not only have COVID as we’ve had the last two winters, but we have flu and RSV and other viruses circulating as well,” said Cody. “So it’s like a winter of viral soup. There’s a ton of virus circulating and if you want to be healthy for the holidays, you need to take action and you need to do it now.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>RSV refers to respiratory syncytial virus, a respiratory infection common in childhood, that can potentially cause pneumonia and other serious lung ailments. Cody said the flu and RSV seasons also began early this year, though RSV is beginning to plateau.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Original story, 5:30 p.m. Friday:\u003c/strong> More stringent masking rules have been reinstated for certain high-risk settings in Alameda, Contra Costa and Napa counties to protect against the spread of COVID-19, health officials said Friday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Universal masking is now required for staff and residents in homeless shelters, emergency shelters and cooling and heating centers. It’s also now required in county correctional and detention centers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Per \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdph.ca.gov/Programs/CID/DCDC/Pages/COVID-19/guidance-for-face-coverings.aspx\">state guidance\u003c/a>, masking in these settings becomes required after the level of community spread of COVID-19, as defined by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, shifts from low to medium. Alameda and Contra Costa county officials said community spread moved from low to medium on Thursday, and that they will require high-risk settings to abide by the state’s guidance. Napa County officials on Friday said they also now are at medium, and will likewise require masking per state guidance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Masking continues to be required in health care and long-term care facilities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote align=\"right\" size=\"medium\" citation=\"Dr. Joanna Locke, COVID guidance lead, Alameda County Public Health Department\"]‘I don’t think we anticipate getting up to the peak of last winter, but I definitely don’t think we’ve peaked.’[/pullquote]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We moved into medium [level] because we reached over 10 new COVID hospital admissions per 100,000 persons,” said Joanna Locke, COVID guidance lead for Alameda County’s public health department, on Friday. As of Thursday, 149 county residents were hospitalized with COVID-19, she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Right now we’re averaging a little over 20 cases per day per 100,000,” said Locke. “The peak of our spring-summer wave was around 50, and our winter peak last year was obviously much higher … I don’t think we anticipate getting up to the peak of last winter, but I definitely don’t think we’ve peaked.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Locke said with the high level of winter respiratory viruses circulating in addition to COVID-19, she thinks everyone should consider wearing a mask in indoor public settings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I definitely am masking up now when I go into the grocery store. I took a little break earlier in the year and now I’m sending my kids back to school in masks. Really, we all have these masks in our house now and I think [we’re] shifting our culture to the way that some other countries have been for a long time where, when there’s high levels of any virus, you put on your mask.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Alameda County Health Officer Dr. Nicholas Moss reaffirmed the importance of masking as numbers continue to rise in Alameda and Contra Costa.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have observed worsening increases in COVID-19 case reports and hospitalizations since October,” Moss said in a statement. “Taking actions like masking and staying home when sick can prevent spreading illnesses like COVID-19, flu, and RSV and help protect our health care system from strain.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Solano County also is now at the medium level of community spread, according to the CDC, but the county has not indicated whether it’s reinstating masking rules in those high-risk settings where it’s required by state guidelines. A message to the county’s public health administrator was not returned.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story includes reporting from Bay City News.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Update, 5:30 p.m. Sunday:\u003c/strong> Santa Clara County officials are warning that the upcoming holiday season is expected to coincide with a spike in COVID-19, nearly as severe as the omicron surge last year. The county moved into the high-risk designation over the weekend, prompting the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to recommend people wear high-quality masks in public spaces. Dr. Sara Cody, the county’s health officer, says levels of the virus in San José’s sewer system — which draws from three quarters of the county’s population — are already at about 84% of the omicron peak.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We not only have COVID as we’ve had the last two winters, but we have flu and RSV and other viruses circulating as well,” said Cody. “So it’s like a winter of viral soup. There’s a ton of virus circulating and if you want to be healthy for the holidays, you need to take action and you need to do it now.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>RSV refers to respiratory syncytial virus, a respiratory infection common in childhood, that can potentially cause pneumonia and other serious lung ailments. Cody said the flu and RSV seasons also began early this year, though RSV is beginning to plateau.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Original story, 5:30 p.m. Friday:\u003c/strong> More stringent masking rules have been reinstated for certain high-risk settings in Alameda, Contra Costa and Napa counties to protect against the spread of COVID-19, health officials said Friday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Universal masking is now required for staff and residents in homeless shelters, emergency shelters and cooling and heating centers. It’s also now required in county correctional and detention centers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Per \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdph.ca.gov/Programs/CID/DCDC/Pages/COVID-19/guidance-for-face-coverings.aspx\">state guidance\u003c/a>, masking in these settings becomes required after the level of community spread of COVID-19, as defined by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, shifts from low to medium. Alameda and Contra Costa county officials said community spread moved from low to medium on Thursday, and that they will require high-risk settings to abide by the state’s guidance. Napa County officials on Friday said they also now are at medium, and will likewise require masking per state guidance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Masking continues to be required in health care and long-term care facilities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We moved into medium [level] because we reached over 10 new COVID hospital admissions per 100,000 persons,” said Joanna Locke, COVID guidance lead for Alameda County’s public health department, on Friday. As of Thursday, 149 county residents were hospitalized with COVID-19, she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Right now we’re averaging a little over 20 cases per day per 100,000,” said Locke. “The peak of our spring-summer wave was around 50, and our winter peak last year was obviously much higher … I don’t think we anticipate getting up to the peak of last winter, but I definitely don’t think we’ve peaked.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Locke said with the high level of winter respiratory viruses circulating in addition to COVID-19, she thinks everyone should consider wearing a mask in indoor public settings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I definitely am masking up now when I go into the grocery store. I took a little break earlier in the year and now I’m sending my kids back to school in masks. Really, we all have these masks in our house now and I think [we’re] shifting our culture to the way that some other countries have been for a long time where, when there’s high levels of any virus, you put on your mask.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Alameda County Health Officer Dr. Nicholas Moss reaffirmed the importance of masking as numbers continue to rise in Alameda and Contra Costa.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have observed worsening increases in COVID-19 case reports and hospitalizations since October,” Moss said in a statement. “Taking actions like masking and staying home when sick can prevent spreading illnesses like COVID-19, flu, and RSV and help protect our health care system from strain.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Solano County also is now at the medium level of community spread, according to the CDC, but the county has not indicated whether it’s reinstating masking rules in those high-risk settings where it’s required by state guidelines. A message to the county’s public health administrator was not returned.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story includes reporting from Bay City News.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>In a number of primary races for district attorney in counties around the Bay Area, incumbent DAs — both liberal and more conservative — were holding on to their offices. Sitting prosecutors in Contra Costa, Santa Clara and Solano counties had strong leads over their challengers. But in San Joaquin County, the progressive DA was in a tight race with her Republican challenger. In the race for an open seat in Alameda County, a progressive and a more traditional candidate were the top two early vote-getters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>District attorney elections in California have become increasingly heated in recent years, with progressive candidates facing off against more traditional law-and-order prosecutors, in a bid to reduce incarceration and address systemic racism and economic inequality in the criminal justice system. But some of those reformers who were elected are now facing backlash from moderate and conservative voters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the most high-profile example, San Francisco’s progressive prosecutor \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11913102/we-are-all-more-than-our-worst-mistake-five-takeaways-from-sf-district-attorney-chesa-boudins-discussion-at-kqed\">Chesa Boudin\u003c/a> — a former public defender elected DA in 2020 — \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11916212/chesa-boudin-recall-sf-voters-on-track-to-oust-district-attorney\">was defeated\u003c/a> by a well-funded recall campaign that capitalized on voters’ anxiety about crime. In Los Angeles, meanwhile, opponents of progressive DA George Gascón are gathering signatures to put a recall measure on the November ballot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the state level, though, liberal Attorney General Rob Bonta, who was appointed last year by Gov. Gavin Newsom, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11916206/california-attorney-general-rob-bonta-easily-advances-to-november-election-to-face-republican-challenger\">was well ahead\u003c/a> of his more conservative challengers. He will face one of two closely matched Republicans in November.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In local district attorney races around the Bay Area and beyond, similar tensions are at play, as voters debate whether public safety is best achieved through tougher prosecutions and sentencing or an approach that favors rehabilitation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Voters want solutions, and that can mean services and treatment as much as it can mean incarceration,” said Cristine Soto DeBerry, director of the progressive Prosecutors Alliance of California. “It’s new for us to elect reform-minded candidates into prosecutor’s offices. I’m encouraged. Many of them won, and all of them stimulated a conversation.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In some counties, notably Alameda, the results won’t be clear until November.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under California’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/political-parties/no-party-preference#top-two-candidates\">“top two” primary system\u003c/a>, if one candidate wins a majority of votes in this election, the race is decided. If no one gets a majority, the two candidates with the greatest number of votes, regardless of political party, will face off in the November general election.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Contra Costa County\u003c/strong>\u003cbr>\nIncumbent DA Diana Becton, a former judge first elected district attorney in 2018, held on to her seat \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11914643/contra-costas-da-sent-a-sheriffs-deputy-to-prison-now-law-enforcement-groups-are-spending-big-to-defeat-her\">in the face of a strong challenge\u003c/a> from a fellow Democrat who’s a deputy prosecutor in her office, Mary Knox. Late Tuesday evening, Becton had 57% to Knox’s 43%.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Becton is considered a progressive prosecutor and made headlines last fall when she won a conviction against former Sheriff’s Deputy Andrew Hall in the fatal shooting of Laudemer Arboleda. Becton, along with Boudin and Gascón, was a founding member of the progressive Prosecutors Alliance of California, established in 2020 in the wake of the George Floyd murder. Knox had the backing of many law enforcement groups across the county.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Contra Costa County voters have spoken clearly to indicate that they really want a criminal justice system that is about safety, but that is always also about fairness and equality for everyone,” said Becton. “We’ve adopted new and innovative approaches that move us beyond a singular reliance on incarceration.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>San Joaquin County\u003c/strong>\u003cbr>\nTori Verber Salazar was running narrowly behind fellow Republican Ron Freitas, a prosecutor in her office. She is another incumbent DA who has staked out a progressive stance on fighting crime but was at risk of losing her seat. With votes still being counted, Freitas had 51% to Salazar’s 49%.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2020, \u003ca href=\"https://theappeal.org/politicalreport/prosecutor-quits-california-district-attorney-association-tori-salazar/\">Salazar quit the California District Attorneys Association\u003c/a>, saying it was resisting voter-backed criminal justice reform efforts aimed at reducing incarceration. She became another founding member of the progressive \u003ca href=\"https://theappeal.org/politicalreport/prosecutor-quits-california-district-attorney-association-tori-salazar/\">Prosecutors Alliance\u003c/a>. In his campaign, Freitas said he would work to lengthen prison sentences. But \u003ca href=\"https://www.huffpost.com/entry/ron-freitas-san-joaquin-county-district-attorney-black-juror_n_62955ce9e4b0415d4d89068d\">Freitas came under scrutiny\u003c/a> over a federal judge’s finding in 2009 that he had wrongly excluded a Black man from a jury on the basis of his race.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Solano County\u003c/strong>\u003cbr>\nDistrict Attorney Krishna Abrams appeared to \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11915246/solano-countys-race-for-district-attorney\">fend off a challenge\u003c/a> from her chief deputy, Sharon Henry, who has called for more independent oversight of law enforcement and an acknowledgement of racial bias in policing. Tuesday night Abrams had 61% to Henry’s 39%.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Abrams had strong backing from police groups. But she was widely criticized when she recused her office from pursuing charges in two fatal Vallejo police shootings, citing a lack of public trust. The state Attorney General’s office said she had abdicated responsibility. Henry, who claims support from liberals, \u003ca href=\"https://www.vallejosun.com/chief-deputy-to-challenge-krishna-abrams-as-solano-da/\">took Abrams to task\u003c/a> for the recusal and for the running of the office, which she complained is plagued by favoritism and a lack of diversity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Santa Clara County\u003c/strong>\u003cbr>\nDistrict Attorney Jeff Rosen won reelection without a runoff Tuesday, even though he\u003ca href=\"https://sanjosespotlight.com/election-2022-the-race-for-santa-clara-county-district-attorney-da-jeff-rosen-sajid-khan-daniel-chung/\"> faced two challengers\u003c/a>: Sajid Khan, a deputy public defender running to Rosen’s left, and deputy DA Daniel Chung, who cast himself as a tougher prosecutor. Rosen had 59% of the vote to Chung’s 24% and Khan’s 17%, on Tuesday night.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rosen, who has held the job since 2010, describes himself as a prosecutor who takes a balanced approach, citing endorsements from both police associations and civil rights groups such as the NAACP. Khan campaigned on his opposition to cash bail and gang enhancements, and his support for diversion programs and holding police accountable for misconduct. Chung opposes some progressive voter-approved reforms, including downgrading the penalties for drug possession.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Santa Clara County leads the way in technology, diversity and the smart and balanced way we strive to handle criminal justice,” said Rosen. “Today’s vote once again shows there is a mandate for safety and fairness — not one at the expense of the other, but both.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Alameda County\u003c/strong>\u003cbr>\nIn November, voters in Alameda County are likely to choose between outspoken progressive Pamela Price, a former public defender and civil rights attorney, and veteran prosecutor Terry Wiley, who favors many progressive approaches but is perhaps the most traditional candidate. In early returns, Price and Wiley were the top two vote-getters \u003ca href=\"https://oaklandside.org/2022/05/06/alameda-county-da-race-candidates-pimary-election-2022/\">in a four-way race\u003c/a> to succeed incumbent District Attorney Nancy O’Malley, who is retiring. Price had 40% and Wiley had 31% of the vote late Tuesday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wiley, in his three decades in the DA’s office, has overseen investigations of police shootings and touts his work on restorative justice, as well as his years of experience prosecuting criminals. Price has vowed to tackle racial disparities in the enforcement of justice and to scrutinize police shootings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>“\u003c/b>I’m very grateful to the people of Alameda County for standing with us on this journey,” said Price. “As a community, we are appalled when people find out that African Americans are 20 times more likely to be incarcerated in this county in 2022. \u003ci>S\u003c/i>o that’s what we have to begin to change.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Two other candidates — Jimmie Wilson, another deputy in the DA’s office, and Seth Steward, a former prosecutor in San Francisco who is currently chief of staff to Oakland Councilmember Dan Kalb — were lagging in early returns: Wilson had 21% and Steward 9% of votes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>In a number of primary races for district attorney in counties around the Bay Area, incumbent DAs — both liberal and more conservative — were holding on to their offices. Sitting prosecutors in Contra Costa, Santa Clara and Solano counties had strong leads over their challengers. But in San Joaquin County, the progressive DA was in a tight race with her Republican challenger. In the race for an open seat in Alameda County, a progressive and a more traditional candidate were the top two early vote-getters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>District attorney elections in California have become increasingly heated in recent years, with progressive candidates facing off against more traditional law-and-order prosecutors, in a bid to reduce incarceration and address systemic racism and economic inequality in the criminal justice system. But some of those reformers who were elected are now facing backlash from moderate and conservative voters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the most high-profile example, San Francisco’s progressive prosecutor \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11913102/we-are-all-more-than-our-worst-mistake-five-takeaways-from-sf-district-attorney-chesa-boudins-discussion-at-kqed\">Chesa Boudin\u003c/a> — a former public defender elected DA in 2020 — \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11916212/chesa-boudin-recall-sf-voters-on-track-to-oust-district-attorney\">was defeated\u003c/a> by a well-funded recall campaign that capitalized on voters’ anxiety about crime. In Los Angeles, meanwhile, opponents of progressive DA George Gascón are gathering signatures to put a recall measure on the November ballot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the state level, though, liberal Attorney General Rob Bonta, who was appointed last year by Gov. Gavin Newsom, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11916206/california-attorney-general-rob-bonta-easily-advances-to-november-election-to-face-republican-challenger\">was well ahead\u003c/a> of his more conservative challengers. He will face one of two closely matched Republicans in November.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In local district attorney races around the Bay Area and beyond, similar tensions are at play, as voters debate whether public safety is best achieved through tougher prosecutions and sentencing or an approach that favors rehabilitation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Voters want solutions, and that can mean services and treatment as much as it can mean incarceration,” said Cristine Soto DeBerry, director of the progressive Prosecutors Alliance of California. “It’s new for us to elect reform-minded candidates into prosecutor’s offices. I’m encouraged. Many of them won, and all of them stimulated a conversation.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In some counties, notably Alameda, the results won’t be clear until November.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under California’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/political-parties/no-party-preference#top-two-candidates\">“top two” primary system\u003c/a>, if one candidate wins a majority of votes in this election, the race is decided. If no one gets a majority, the two candidates with the greatest number of votes, regardless of political party, will face off in the November general election.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Contra Costa County\u003c/strong>\u003cbr>\nIncumbent DA Diana Becton, a former judge first elected district attorney in 2018, held on to her seat \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11914643/contra-costas-da-sent-a-sheriffs-deputy-to-prison-now-law-enforcement-groups-are-spending-big-to-defeat-her\">in the face of a strong challenge\u003c/a> from a fellow Democrat who’s a deputy prosecutor in her office, Mary Knox. Late Tuesday evening, Becton had 57% to Knox’s 43%.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Becton is considered a progressive prosecutor and made headlines last fall when she won a conviction against former Sheriff’s Deputy Andrew Hall in the fatal shooting of Laudemer Arboleda. Becton, along with Boudin and Gascón, was a founding member of the progressive Prosecutors Alliance of California, established in 2020 in the wake of the George Floyd murder. Knox had the backing of many law enforcement groups across the county.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Contra Costa County voters have spoken clearly to indicate that they really want a criminal justice system that is about safety, but that is always also about fairness and equality for everyone,” said Becton. “We’ve adopted new and innovative approaches that move us beyond a singular reliance on incarceration.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>San Joaquin County\u003c/strong>\u003cbr>\nTori Verber Salazar was running narrowly behind fellow Republican Ron Freitas, a prosecutor in her office. She is another incumbent DA who has staked out a progressive stance on fighting crime but was at risk of losing her seat. With votes still being counted, Freitas had 51% to Salazar’s 49%.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2020, \u003ca href=\"https://theappeal.org/politicalreport/prosecutor-quits-california-district-attorney-association-tori-salazar/\">Salazar quit the California District Attorneys Association\u003c/a>, saying it was resisting voter-backed criminal justice reform efforts aimed at reducing incarceration. She became another founding member of the progressive \u003ca href=\"https://theappeal.org/politicalreport/prosecutor-quits-california-district-attorney-association-tori-salazar/\">Prosecutors Alliance\u003c/a>. In his campaign, Freitas said he would work to lengthen prison sentences. But \u003ca href=\"https://www.huffpost.com/entry/ron-freitas-san-joaquin-county-district-attorney-black-juror_n_62955ce9e4b0415d4d89068d\">Freitas came under scrutiny\u003c/a> over a federal judge’s finding in 2009 that he had wrongly excluded a Black man from a jury on the basis of his race.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Solano County\u003c/strong>\u003cbr>\nDistrict Attorney Krishna Abrams appeared to \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11915246/solano-countys-race-for-district-attorney\">fend off a challenge\u003c/a> from her chief deputy, Sharon Henry, who has called for more independent oversight of law enforcement and an acknowledgement of racial bias in policing. Tuesday night Abrams had 61% to Henry’s 39%.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Abrams had strong backing from police groups. But she was widely criticized when she recused her office from pursuing charges in two fatal Vallejo police shootings, citing a lack of public trust. The state Attorney General’s office said she had abdicated responsibility. Henry, who claims support from liberals, \u003ca href=\"https://www.vallejosun.com/chief-deputy-to-challenge-krishna-abrams-as-solano-da/\">took Abrams to task\u003c/a> for the recusal and for the running of the office, which she complained is plagued by favoritism and a lack of diversity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Santa Clara County\u003c/strong>\u003cbr>\nDistrict Attorney Jeff Rosen won reelection without a runoff Tuesday, even though he\u003ca href=\"https://sanjosespotlight.com/election-2022-the-race-for-santa-clara-county-district-attorney-da-jeff-rosen-sajid-khan-daniel-chung/\"> faced two challengers\u003c/a>: Sajid Khan, a deputy public defender running to Rosen’s left, and deputy DA Daniel Chung, who cast himself as a tougher prosecutor. Rosen had 59% of the vote to Chung’s 24% and Khan’s 17%, on Tuesday night.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rosen, who has held the job since 2010, describes himself as a prosecutor who takes a balanced approach, citing endorsements from both police associations and civil rights groups such as the NAACP. Khan campaigned on his opposition to cash bail and gang enhancements, and his support for diversion programs and holding police accountable for misconduct. Chung opposes some progressive voter-approved reforms, including downgrading the penalties for drug possession.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Santa Clara County leads the way in technology, diversity and the smart and balanced way we strive to handle criminal justice,” said Rosen. “Today’s vote once again shows there is a mandate for safety and fairness — not one at the expense of the other, but both.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Alameda County\u003c/strong>\u003cbr>\nIn November, voters in Alameda County are likely to choose between outspoken progressive Pamela Price, a former public defender and civil rights attorney, and veteran prosecutor Terry Wiley, who favors many progressive approaches but is perhaps the most traditional candidate. In early returns, Price and Wiley were the top two vote-getters \u003ca href=\"https://oaklandside.org/2022/05/06/alameda-county-da-race-candidates-pimary-election-2022/\">in a four-way race\u003c/a> to succeed incumbent District Attorney Nancy O’Malley, who is retiring. Price had 40% and Wiley had 31% of the vote late Tuesday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wiley, in his three decades in the DA’s office, has overseen investigations of police shootings and touts his work on restorative justice, as well as his years of experience prosecuting criminals. Price has vowed to tackle racial disparities in the enforcement of justice and to scrutinize police shootings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>“\u003c/b>I’m very grateful to the people of Alameda County for standing with us on this journey,” said Price. “As a community, we are appalled when people find out that African Americans are 20 times more likely to be incarcerated in this county in 2022. \u003ci>S\u003c/i>o that’s what we have to begin to change.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Two other candidates — Jimmie Wilson, another deputy in the DA’s office, and Seth Steward, a former prosecutor in San Francisco who is currently chief of staff to Oakland Councilmember Dan Kalb — were lagging in early returns: Wilson had 21% and Steward 9% of votes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cb>Activism in Sports\u003cbr>\n\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Funerals began in Uvalde this week for the 19 children and two adults killed in the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School.\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">As we mourn those painful deaths here in California, professional athletes and coaches have also weighed in to express anger and dismay about the state of gun control laws — including San Francisco Giants manager Gabe Kapler and Golden State Warriors coach Steve Kerr. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Guest: \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Janie McCauley, Associated Press sports writer\u003c/span>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>California Primary Election\u003cbr>\n\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">As voting wraps up on Tuesday, June 7, what are the key races to watch? From San Francisco to Contra Costa County to Solano County, public safety concerns have made this cycle particularly interesting to track. Key issues have also included inflation and abortion rights. Our KQED politics and government team shares their insights.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Guests: \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Scott Shafer, KQED politics and government senior editor\u003c/span>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Marisa Lagos, KQED politics and government correspondent\u003c/span>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Guy Marzorati, KQED politics and government reporter\u003c/span>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Something Beautiful: Voting\u003cbr>\n\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We bring back a previous Something Beautiful with this look at democracy in action. Scanners and other machines have automated aspects of our voting, while adding a whole new element of visual interest.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"title": "Activism in Sports | California 2022 Primary Election | KQED",
"description": "Activism in Sports Funerals began in Uvalde this week for the 19 children and two adults killed in the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School. As we mourn those painful deaths here in California, professional athletes and coaches have also weighed in to express anger and dismay about the state of gun control laws — including San Francisco Giants manager Gabe Kapler and Golden State Warriors coach Steve Kerr. Guest: Janie McCauley, Associated Press sports writer California Primary Election As voting wraps up on Tuesday, June 7, what are the key races to watch? From San Francisco to Contra Costa",
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"info": "What kind of no sabo word is Hyphenación? For us, it’s about living within a hyphenation. Like being a third-gen Mexican-American from the Texas border now living that Bay Area Chicano life. Like Xorje! Each week we bring together a couple of hyphenated Latinos to talk all about personal life choices: family, careers, relationships, belonging … everything is on the table. ",
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"info": "Our flagship program, helmed by Kai Ryssdal, examines what the day in money delivered, through stories, conversations, newsworthy numbers and more. Updated Monday through Friday at about 3:30 p.m. PT.",
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"info": "The MindShift podcast explores the innovations in education that are shaping how kids learn. Hosts Ki Sung and Katrina Schwartz introduce listeners to educators, researchers, parents and students who are developing effective ways to improve how kids learn. We cover topics like how fed-up administrators are developing surprising tactics to deal with classroom disruptions; how listening to podcasts are helping kids develop reading skills; the consequences of overparenting; and why interdisciplinary learning can engage students on all ends of the traditional achievement spectrum. This podcast is part of the MindShift education site, a division of KQED News. KQED is an NPR/PBS member station based in San Francisco. You can also visit the MindShift website for episodes and supplemental blog posts or tweet us \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/MindShiftKQED\">@MindShiftKQED\u003c/a> or visit us at \u003ca href=\"/mindshift\">MindShift.KQED.org\u003c/a>",
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"info": "For decades, the process for how police police themselves has been inconsistent – if not opaque. In some states, like California, these proceedings were completely hidden. After a new police transparency law unsealed scores of internal affairs files, our reporters set out to examine these cases and the shadow world of police discipline. On Our Watch brings listeners into the rooms where officers are questioned and witnesses are interrogated to find out who this system is really protecting. Is it the officers, or the public they've sworn to serve?",
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"info": "Political Breakdown is a new series that explores the political intersection of California and the nation. Each week hosts Scott Shafer and Marisa Lagos are joined with a new special guest to unpack politics -- with personality — and offer an insider’s glimpse at how politics happens.",
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"possible": {
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"info": "Possible is hosted by entrepreneur Reid Hoffman and writer Aria Finger. Together in Possible, Hoffman and Finger lead enlightening discussions about building a brighter collective future. The show features interviews with visionary guests like Trevor Noah, Sam Altman and Janette Sadik-Khan. Possible paints an optimistic portrait of the world we can create through science, policy, business, art and our shared humanity. It asks: What if everything goes right for once? How can we get there? Each episode also includes a short fiction story generated by advanced AI GPT-4, serving as a thought-provoking springboard to speculate how humanity could leverage technology for good.",
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"radiolab": {
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},
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"title": "Rightnowish",
"tagline": "Art is where you find it",
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"tagline": "Real stories with killer beats",
"info": "The Snap Judgment radio show and podcast mixes real stories with killer beats to produce cinematic, dramatic radio. Snap's musical brand of storytelling dares listeners to see the world through the eyes of another. This is storytelling... with a BEAT!! Snap first aired on public radio stations nationwide in July 2010. Today, Snap Judgment airs on over 450 public radio stations and is brought to the airwaves by KQED & PRX.",
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"soldout": {
"id": "soldout",
"title": "SOLD OUT: Rethinking Housing in America",
"tagline": "A new future for housing",
"info": "Sold Out: Rethinking Housing in America",
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