Morning News Round-Up -- 11.9.09: 7-11 Bottle Replacement Edition

The Lehman Brothers bankruptcy trickles down to the Peninsula, sucking $216 million from San Mateo County through lost jobs and economic output. No end in sight, by the way -- or recourse...

Who would have thought Latin American cinema in the Bay Area is alive and well... on the Peninsula! Que Bueno!

A foul odor at Hoover Park swimming pool turned out to be a dead body. The pool has been closed and covered since July. Yikes! The decomposing body was found in a Redwood City swimming pool Thursday. The Coroner has identified the body as maintenance worker Gabriel Contreras from Palo Alto.

The historic Fox Theater in Redwood City was supposed to be auctioned off last week, but was put on hold... again. Hmmm... Redwood City Watch Dog Fox Theater. Admit it, it has a nice ring.

Granada Sanitary District candidate Lisa McCaffrey has pulled ahead of incumbent director Leonard Woren, according to a new vote tally posted by the San Mateo County Elections Office Thursday afternoon. It is like Florida in November of 2000...

And the horns are back to being quieter on Caltrain. One small step for Caltrain, one giant leap for NIMBY kind...

San Carlos wants its neighbor (Belmont) to pay more for fire service so it can pay less? Makes perfect sense, except of course you are Belmont. We would love to see a brawl between the San Carlos and Belmont City Councils. Watch Dog's money is in San Carlos, by the way -- Matt Grocott seems pretty tough...

Menlo Park Police arrested three men in connection with a bottle-throwing assault at the British Bankers Club night club Thursday night. Apparently, assault wasn’t enough for them, because they are also accused of robbing a nearby 7-11 store later that night. Well, they had to replace their bottles somehow...

A use-of-force expert testified Thursday that slain East Palo Alto police Officer Richard May was following proper protocol when he chased defendant Alberto Alvarez and struck him with a baton. Perhaps the baton-wielding experts in San Jose should weigh in...

Morning News Round-Up -- 5.4.09: Intergovernmental Disputes and Gray Mondays...

LOCAL HEALTH EMERGENCY... a.k.a. today's Swine Flu update...

While we are on healthcare... The Coastside Family Medical Center made it official, they filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy on Friday. This is just as three doctors who used to work at the Coastside Family Medical Center plan to open up shop in private practice...

And a check in on some intergovernmental disputes that Watch Dog likes so much...

• The dispute between the City of Foster City and the San Mateo-Foster City Elementary School District will take center stage on Thursday at the School District's Board meeting. You'll recall that the District's enrollment is due to grow a lot in the coming years and they need to new classrooms, so they are working with the City to identify City-owned land for new schools. Now, the City is a lot less interested in helping because the District would like the land at little or no cost. It seems the City Council in Foster City doesn't understand that when they approve new housing developments, the schools feel a brunt of the impact with new students... and those students need to go to school somewhere... If you want to follow this brouhaha, the City has its own webpage dedicated to the issue... Ironically, as the City of Foster City is pinching pennies when it comes to helping schools, they are spending money like drunken sailors on other capital projects -- up to $3 million worth will soon be fast-tracked...
• The Everest Charter School versus Sequoia Union High School District squabble is about to take another litigious turn. To refresh your memories: Sequoia said no to the Everest Charter School, which the Charter School appealed all the way to the State Board of Education, who finally said ok. The District then provided space in East Palo Alto for the Charter School, which the Charter School said wasn't good enough. Now there is about to be a legal battle as the Charter School prepares to sue because they don't want to be in East Palo Alto.
• Riptide has more details about the Sharp Park Golf Course hearing last week in San Francisco. The only thing that everyone can seem to agree on is that feelings were, and are, hurt as a result of the meeting... which is probably just how Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi wants it. See, in San Francisco, when wild public meetings happen, the focus is on the wild public meeting, not the policy that is about to be jammed down Pacifica's throat.
• And the intergovernmental dispute of all intergovernmental disputes (at least locally) -- Peninsula cities versus the High-Speed Rail Authority. The Chronicle is picking up where local papers (and bloggers) have been pointing out for some time: Peninsula cities want the train to be in a tunnel...

San Mateo County and the Silicon Valley Community Foundation are stepping up to help local nonprofits weather the economic storm...

While the County giveth to help local nonprofits, the passage of Propsition 1E will actually take $2.52 million from County coffers and hand it over the State... Not much of a selling point to local voters, Watch Dog would guess.

With ideas like 1E, some (all?) of the State propositions on the May 19th ballot are losing in the polls... perhaps it's because nobody trusts/likes/respects Sacramento?

The Devonshire Canyon annexation/development will take a big step on Tuesday when the Board of Supervisors will approve the "tax exchange" -- essentially handing the land over to the City of San Carlos... There has been no official word from the woodrats about their position on this new development...

If you like working on your call in your driveway and garage and you live in San Bruno, you could be SOL... The San Bruno City Council would like to put an end to excessive automobile work in your driveway...

Speaking of cars, it seems if you live in San Carlos, the chances are pretty good that you, or your neighbor, or someone on your street has had their car (or cars) broken into this year...

The Half Moon Bay bailout bill got altered a bit up in Sacramento. (This is Senator Leland Yee and Assemblymember Jerry Hill's effort to help Half Moon Bay stay out of bankruptcy court as it pays off its settlement to Chop Keenan.)

A man died while (apparently) trying to cross 101 in Redwood City on foot early Sunday morning...

And in 2010 election news:

• Sue Lempert breaks down the 2010 Governor's race in her weekly Daily Journal column. Of note, she seems to have a real beef with Attorney General (former Mayor, former Presidential candidate, former Governor) Jerry Brown. Also, by way of blogger correction, Republican Tom Campbell is actually from San Jose, according to our the Silicon Valley Dog...
• And while we are on big 2010 elections -- the Palo Alto City Council will see a shake-up in 2010. Two folks are termed out (Jack Morton and Yoriko Kishimoto - who is running for Assembly) and three more are coming to the end of their terms. Former Councilmember Larry Klein is expected to reenter the fray, but current Councilmembers Petere Drekmeier and John Barton have yet to declare their intentions...

The COWs of Woodside are clapping their hooves over MOOTube... seriously.

And in other local blogs... David Lim chimes in again on his run for San Mateo City Council, breaking down his trip to the Consumer Protection Conference hosted by the the California District Attorney's Association (who do not endorse his campaign...)

Finally: Watch Dog screwed up (again!) last week... the Lehman Brothers hearing in front of the House Financial Services Committee is tomorrow...

Morning News Round-Up -- 4.28.09: Swine flu everywhere (in the news...)

Swine flu is everywhere...everywhere in the news, the actual flu isn't everywhere...

But just because there is a possible pandemic flu going around, doesn't mean the Belmont City Council can't continue the Garbage Saga... Belmont doesn't really like the SBWMA, the folks that run the garbage contracts in most of the County. Belmont wants to replace the SBWMA Board, which is made up of City staff from each City/Agency in the jurisdiction, with elected officials.

The on-again, off-again House of Representatives Financial Services Hearing on San Mateo County's (and other communities') losses from the Lehman Brothers' fiasco is on-again, but it won't be local. May 5th in DC.

The Safeway/Roti credit card scheme trials continue...this time, a Safeway clerk pleaded no contest to helping use stolen credit card numbers (from Roti) to buy stuff (at Safeway)...

In other Safeway news...Burlingame's Safeway plans are taking shape. Last Thursday, the Burlingame Planning Division got an official application for demolition for the current Safeway and the Walgreens.

Michelle Durand gets into the 2010 Governor's race in today's Daily Journal...Who's running...Guess?

The City of East Palo Alto and developers that own apartments in East Palo Alto still aren't getting along...surprise, surprise...

The November Millbrae City Council election is taking shape. Former Mayor Nadia Holober is in the race... with the backing of Congresswoman Jackie Speier, no less... (and just about every other political big wig...)

The City Manager in Palo Alto sees big cuts on the horizon...with a $10 million budget gap, what else are you going to do...Perhaps raise taxes on businesses? They could foam-containers... but instead are just going to be ban them...

The COWS in Woodside remind us that the Woodside Elementary School District has a parcel tax on the May 5th (NOT MAY 19TH) ballot...

(Early Afternoon) Morning News Round-Up -- 1.29.09: Hell hath no fury...

Hell hath no fury like a County scorned...at least if that County is San Mateo and it was scorned by Lehman Brothers. In its ongoing pursuit of justice/money, the County is suing former Lehman executive Richard Fuld for trying to shield the money gained from the sale of his Florida home...you go County!

The Daily Journal has an introduction to Fred Hansson, the new unelected City Councilmember in San Mateo who was chosen to replace unelected Supervisor Carole Groom. How exciting...

Prowler Alert...Prowler Alert. Two dudes are following young girls home form school in San Mateo. Keep an eye out -- that's the word from the San Mateo police.

And if prowlers weren't worrisome enough, we have to worry about poison peanut butter in County schools...

Watch Dog has written about the Everest Charter School before. This Charter School was first denied by the Sequoia Union High School District, then by the County Board of Education. The Charter School is waiting for State approval which may/will happen next month. In preparation for the possible/likely State override of the local District, Sequoia officials are putting four temporary structures in East Palo Alto for Everest to use next year...Watch Dog is certain that is exactly where Everest wants the school to be...

The kitten-killer's sentencing has been delayed because the courts are crowded (apparently). He could get up to 16 months in prison, but we'll have to wait for February 6th to find out. This was one of several animal cruelty cases that happened in the County in December...

Michelle Durand discusses sex and football...sort of...

In a little tidbit in the Daily Journal's "Reporters' Notebook": a Daily Journal reporter rats out a Daily Post reporter for not standing up for the Pledge of Allegiance. Watch Dog thought there was some sort of "reporters' code" for not ratting each other out...(If you click through, it is the last item...)

Redwood City has until February 11th to resolve a legal dispute holding up its massive downtown development plan. That's a few short weeks to solve a complicated legal battle that has millions of dollars at stake. Good luck RC...

Taxi rates are about to go up in San Mateo. Begging the question: will anyone notice?

The Palo Alto Planning (and Transportation) Commission approved a 35-unit affordable housing development. Expect NIMBYs to pressure the full Council...