Menlo Park Council Candidates Debate Measure P and Belle Haven Growth
Ahead of the Nov. 3 election, Menlo Park City Council candidates Wonman Lee and James Rohr in District 1 and Charlotte Reed and Laura…
4 min read
Civic life
Local reporting. The people, places and decisions behind the headlines.
Search and community filters apply to these 50 stories in this part of the archive. Continue to earlier reporting below.
Civic life
Secret Tapes Played on Day 9 of Oakland Trial as AC Transit Detours 28
On Day 9 of the Oakland federal public corruption trial, prosecutors played secret audio recordings made between November 2023 and…
3 min read
Pleasanton Launches Storm Watch Campaign With 24/7 Sandbag Station
Ahead of the winter rainy season and anticipated El Niño storms, the City of Pleasanton has launched its Storm Watch preparedness…
2 min read
Saint Mary’s Women’s Cross Country Chases First WCC Title Since 1990
After posting five consecutive top-10 team finishes—including 10th among 23 teams at the Oct.
2 min read
Masses Sports Bar & Grill Reopens at 1411 Locust St. in Walnut Creek
Masses Sports Bar & Grill has reopened in a new 3,522-square-foot downtown Walnut Creek space at 1411 Locust St., months after closing…
2 min read
Connie Chan’s Cantonese & English Messaging Draws Scrutiny in SF Race
Translated interviews reviewed ahead of the Nov. 3 congressional election show San Francisco Supervisor Connie Chan criticized Mayor…
3 min read
Palo Alto Down Payment Takes 50 Years as Square Pie Guys Closes Friday
Calculations using methodology from a new Center for Responsible Lending and Julian Bond Institute report show a typical Palo Alto…
3 min read
CTA Spends $65.5M on Prop. 3 and Barrera as Judge Rejects Ballot Bid
Campaign finance filings show the California Teachers Association has spent more than $65.5 million in the 2026 election…
4 min read
San Mateo Farm Hub Mobilizes With $2.5M Grant as King Tides Peak
On the San Mateo County coast, Brisa Ranch, Second Harvest of Silicon Valley, and the California Association of Food Banks have…
3 min read
Lima Nikkei Opens in Mill Valley’s 1947 El Paseo Space on Throckmorton
Novato contractor Edwin Sandoval and his family have opened Lima Nikkei, a 125-seat Peruvian-Japanese restaurant led by chef Wilmer…
3 min read
UC Faculty Petition Targets 25.5:1 Ratio as Cal’s Flores Wins ACC Nod
The UC Faculty Association—representing more than 14,000 Academic Senate faculty across all 10 University of California…
3 min read
Peninsula Campaign Filings Detail Final Push as Leyla Bakery Launches
Pre-election campaign finance disclosures released Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2026 detail fundraising and independent expenditures across the…
4 min read
Saint Mary’s Scholar Yuan Li Tracks How Rhetoric Shapes AI Adoption
Saint Mary’s College of California professor Yuan Li and scholars in the Moraga university’s 36-month Executive Doctorate of Business…
3 min read
Bay Area Groups Launch $11M Crab and Whale Collaborative
The Marine Mammal Center, The Nature Conservancy, and the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Associations unveiled an $11…
3 min read
Jurors Hear Recordings in Thao Trial; Oakland Artist Sabogal Profiled
Federal jurors in San Francisco listened to approximately 40 minutes of secretly recorded California Waste Solutions board meetings…
3 min read
Antioch Adopts October Health Proclamation as CSU Faculty Vote
The Antioch City Council unanimously proclaimed October 2026 as Breast Cancer Awareness Month to promote early detection across Contra…
2 min read
Dublin School Board Candidate Seema Badar Addresses Online Comments
Dublin Unified School Board Area 5 candidate Seema Badar addressed 256 comments posted on a social media share of her candidate…
3 min read
Walnut Creek’s The Foundry Food Hall Timeline Remains Uncertain
Eight years after Walnut Creek city officials approved The Foundry—also known as The Yard—at 1250 Locust St. and part of 1501 Mt.
2 min read
Upstairs Cafe Soft-Opens Above Snail Bar on Shattuck in Oakland
Creative Director Sammy Chang has opened Upstairs, a cozy daytime cafe and community lounge in a converted apartment above Snail Bar…
4 min read
Rebecca Black Sells Out SF’s Castro Theatre on Sophomore Tour
Pop artist Rebecca Black is headlining a sold-out, all-ages show at San Francisco’s Castro Theatre (429 Castro St.) behind her…
3 min read
San Jose Approves 3-Year Contracts for 4,000 Union City Workers
The San Jose City Council voted unanimously Tuesday to approve three-year contracts providing 3% annual base pay increases for roughly…
4 min read
Prop. 45 CEQA Ballot Measure Splits Bay Area Housing Advocates
Proposition 45 on California’s Nov. 3 ballot has divided pro-housing advocates: Oakland Assemblymember Buffy Wicks and Eden Housing…
4 min read
San Jose Renames Downtown Park “Plaza de San Jose” in Unanimous Vote
The San Jose City Council voted unanimously Tuesday to rename downtown’s 1797 park from Plaza de Cesar Chavez to Plaza de San Jose…
3 min read
Lurie’s $164M Network Reshapes SF as Prop. 40 Trails 46%–52%
San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie, his family, and allied donors have directed $164 million since 2023 across political campaigns,…
3 min read
SF Market Wins Approval for 64,000-Sq-Ft Bayview Produce Hub
The San Francisco Board of Supervisors approved lease amendments Tuesday allowing 63-year-old wholesale food hub The SF Market to…
3 min read
Oakland Dancer Samara Atkins Honored as Kaiser Earns 4.5 Stars
Oakland native and Mix’d Ingrdnts co-founder Samara Atkins received a 2026 Alameda County Arts Leadership Award for District 3, indie…
3 min read
OUSD Data Center Claim Debunked as Oakland Union Sets Nov. 5 Strike
An investigation by Oakland Report found zero evidence supporting campaign videos by OUSD Board President Jennifer Brouhard and Vice…
4 min read
Napa Registrar Tuteur Refuses Federal Demand on 42 Listed Voters
Napa County Registrar of Voters John Tuteur confirmed he has taken no action and will not respond to a Justice Department letter…
4 min read
Antioch Proclaims Filipino History Month; PG&E Outage Hits 1,956
The Antioch City Council voted unanimously on Tuesday, Oct. 27, to proclaim October 2026 as Filipino American History Month in…
3 min read
Ygnacio Valley Lane Closures Set as Bedford Shows Tufting Art
The City of Walnut Creek will close westbound lanes on Ygnacio Valley Road between city limits and Oak Grove Road from 9 a.m. to 3…
3 min read
SF Condo Prices Jump 23% as 15 Romolo and Levain Bakery Expand
San Francisco condo median prices rose 23% year-over-year in September with 66% selling above asking price, while North Beach bar 15…
4 min read
Fremont Recycling Firm Sues Ex-CEO as AC Transit Detours Routes
Silicon Valley Circular Material Inc.
3 min read
Napa Winemaker Bottles 1,500 Cases of 2026 Rosé After July Pick
In his 14th harvest as a winemaker, The Vice Wine owner Malek Amrani picked Pinot Noir grapes at Truchard Vineyards in Carneros on…
2 min read
DVC Launches Compass Mentorship as Court Halts DHS Student Rule
Diablo Valley College has rolled out its Compass Mentorship program pairing first-year students with experienced peers who have…
3 min read
Bay Area Election Chiefs Challenge Federal Voter Roll Demands
Contra Costa County Clerk-Recorder and Registrar of Voters Kristin B.
4 min read
Concord Weighs $17.4M Upgrade for Police HQ and Emergency Center
The Concord City Council is considering a $780,242 construction management contract with Cumming Group and $1.53 million in fund…
2 min read
Walnut Creek Sets Nov. 11 Veterans Day Ceremony at Lesher Center
The City of Walnut Creek will hold its annual free Veterans Day ceremony on Wednesday, Nov. 11, from 11 a.m. to noon at the Lesher…
3 min read
Billionaires Spend $300M Against Prop. 40 as Feds Probe SFUSD Course
Campaign finance filings show California billionaires have spent roughly $304 million opposing Proposition 40 and backing competing…
3 min read
Menlo Park Downtown Housing Plan Faces Up to $45M Funding Gap
Menlo Park’s plan to partner with Related California to build at least 345 affordable apartments on three downtown parking lots faces…
2 min read
King Tides Flood Mill Valley Roads After Golden Gate Bridge Crash
King Tide flooding closed portions of Miller Avenue, Camino Alto, and the Redwood Highway frontage road in Mill Valley on Tuesday…
2 min read
Alameda Delegates Reflect on Boys & Girls State as Altarena Opens
Nine Alameda high school seniors sponsored by American Legion Post 647 shared insights from the California Boys & Girls State civic…
2 min read
Defense Grills FBI Agent in Ex-Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao Trial
As the federal corruption trial of former Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao and her partner Andre Jones entered its second week Tuesday,…
2 min read
UC Berkeley Engineers Show Hula Hooping Relies on Full Lower Body
A new study in Nonlinear Dynamics by UC Berkeley mechanical engineering researchers Oliver O’Reilly, Chrystal Chern, and Theresa…
2 min read
Martinez Announces Marina Closures for King Tides Through January
The City of Martinez has announced temporary daytime closures at the Martinez Marina and Waterfront Park for five extreme high tide…
2 min read