Morning News Round-Up -- 2.8.10: When the Saints...

Garbage Saga Coastside... the Garbage Saga for much of the County is pretty much over, unless of course the construction off of 101 goes over budget. But in Pacifica, they have their own Garbage Saga. Pacifica was having major problems with its garbage company, Coastside Scavenger. And by major problems, we mean that Coastside Scavenger wasn't paying Pacifica what it was supposed to. So... Pacifica went looking for another company. Instead, what Pacifica seems to be getting, according to Pacifica Riptide, is a company that is taking over Coastside Scavenger (and the contract). Recology will get the sweet contract -- which is the same company that got the original Garbage Saga contract for most of the rest of the County. It is turning into a one-garbage company County.

We all know that the Coastside Family Medical Center is in bankruptcy... but the medical records are about to be released to the good folks at the Phoenix Project who will then begin to distribute those records to former patients. Here is some more info about the Phoenix Project and how to get your records...

While some School Districts do everything they can to stop Charter Schools (Sequoia Union High School District, we mean you), others are embracing them, sort of. The San Carlos Elementary School District has converted all but one of its schools to a District-run Charter School and they want to do the last one soon too...

While the turf (legal) war continues in San Carlos, the City got back bids for the soon-to-be-turfed park and it looks like it will cost a lot less than originally expected. Which is good news. Too bad the extra money can't go to legal fees...

San Bruno daytime, home burglaries are on the rise... sort of like in Atherton. A public meeting is slated for February 17th.

Just as Spring Training is about to start, a baseball story... sort of. Barry Bond's son will stand trial in June on misdemeanor charges of battery, false imprisonment, vandalism, threatening a police officers, and obstructing a police officer... all of this from a fight with his mother.

While Congresswoman Jackie Speier is going to stay Congresswoman Jackie Speier for a bit longer because she isn't going to run for Attorney General, it (apparently) doesn't mean she won't jump the Congressional ship in the future. According to Matier and Ross in the Chronicle, Speier's "confidants" are looking ahead to Feinstein's seat...

Morning News Round-Up -- 7.6.09: Campaign Season Starts Early...

Election season... seriously, it is upon us. Usually the official season starts post-Labor Day, but 4th of July sounds good for the purposes of good blog material... The San Mateo Union High School Board of Trustees race could be a good one -- if Trustee Bob Griffin decides not to seek reelection. It would be for his fifth term...

Which brings up this question: Could there be worse time to be on a school board? Cut, cut, cut... then hold your breath that the State doesn't screw you any more than it already has...

While we are on campaign talk, David Lim, who is gunning for a seat on the San Mateo City Council, raised over $13k during the fundraising period that ended July 1st. We guess he must proud of that number (or it is intended to scare off folks) because he had a press release announcing it...

Sue Lempert writes in today's Daily Journal. Of note, she speculates that the recent findings of the Civil Grand Jury (District elections for Supervisor/Pay-Cut Gate) "...may stimulate action and change..." Perhaps she could help push the Civil Grand Jury to release the Grand Daddy of Civil Grand Jury reports (garbage) soon.

Craig Baker, the interim Superintendent for the San Carlos Elementary School District, gets a write up in the Daily Journal.

The "Susan Manheimer for San Francisco Police Chief" story also gets some ink in the Daily Journal, as the paper tries to unpack what happened because she wasn't even a finalist... the SF Chronicle's Matier & Ross come off as ill-informed gossip mongers. (But that is supposed to be Watch Dog's role...)

There is a new history book out about Atherton. Watch Dog has to wonder if the political in-fighting in recent history made it in. We doubt it...

A pipe-bomb was found during a traffic stop on 280. Seriously. But that's about all the information this story contains right now...

Morning News Round-Up -- 6.24.09: Atherton Politics...there is no substitute

The trial of accused molester Dr. William Ayres officially started. William Ayres Watch has this intro to the coverage that they will be providing on the trial:

"...If you are looking for strictly mainstream coverage of the Dr. Ayres trial, please go to the SF Chronicle or the San Mateo County Times. But if you are looking for a more complex and richer back story to the case, you will find it here..."

The Ayres' trial moves forward without one accuser testifying, however...

(While this trial could be viewed by some as a circus waiting to happen, there is a real circus (Circus Vargas) happening in San Mateo County...)

In a less high profile molestation case where a tae kwon do instructor molested a 13 year-old student in San Carlos. The case has been settled. The instructor pleaded no contest and will serve no more than a year in jail. Dr. Ayres may not be so lucky...

The Jackling House in Woodside will be demolished, thanks to a 5-2 vote of the Woodside City Council. One condition, though: the house will be deconstructed first by a preservationist whose goal will be do reconstruct the house somewhere, sometime... This is good news for Steve Jobs, but somehow we think he has more important things going on in his life, like recovering from a liver transplant...

Here are today's obligatory local government budget cutting/fee raising stories

• Parks and public works, and a bunch of other services are getting hit in the County budget...
• The Palo Alto Unified School District is preparing to plug a $7 million budget gap. Yikes...

Watch Dog has expressed our love for Atherton politics before... very cut-throat, very small-town, very good for Watch Dog to cover. There is a now a fight brewing about how to get items get on the City Council's agenda. Three Councilmembers (seemingly) want to make it more difficult, two want to make it easier. Unfortunately, it will take three votes to make it easier, so we expect the agendas in Atherton to be as sparse as they ever were...

San Mateo Union High School District, also feeling a budget pinch, is not deterred from its plans to put solar on its schools...

San Carlos Elementary will get a new (interim) Superintendent today. Craig Baker, the head of the Gardner Center for Youth in Their Communities at Stanford will be named at tonight's meeting.

The 6 year-old girl pulled from the water off the coast of Half Moon Bay over the weekend after her boat capsized is being released from the hospital. That's good news.

Speaking of HMB... PP Examiner gets in on the action describing the demise of Assemblymember Hill's Half Moon Bay Bail Out Bill. (As an aside, Watch Dog was the first to coin that phrase, we believe.)

And more HMB news.

Mavericks Surf Contest will have a longer window this coming season, and the decision to go or not to go won't be made by Jeff Clark, who invented the contest. Clark will stay on the Board, but the decision about who will make The Decision hasn't been decided.

Morning News Round-Up -- 5.15.09: Drive to Work Day...

We are a little late today... apologies. We are blaming it on the CalTrain incident yesterday.

It was too good to be true... the San Carlos decision to lay down artificial turf (after 10 years of discussion) will head to court. Sounds like another decade of fighting, and huge legal bills, are on the horizon...

The State is screwed. That shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. But they are looking everywhere to raise money... and our local representatives in Sacramento, including Senator Leland Yee and Assemblymember Jerry Hill, are worried. The Cow Palace might be sold as part of State sale of land... Local governments are about to get pillaged too... Nobody is happy and this won't be good, especially with the Propositions (probably) going down in flames...

In an (un?)related note, another day, another Superintendent hitting the road. This time, San Carlos Elementary School District got word from Steven Mitrovich that he's heading out.

Speaking of the Lee/Hill gang, their Half Moon Bay Bailout Bill may be in jeopardy... as this bill goes, so goes HMB's finances...

Foster City's Hillbarn Theatre is on the ropes... they need $150K. Can you help?

Redwood City Elementary School District actually has a measure on the ballot next Tuesday... the Daily Journal wants you to vote Yes on E...

If you frequent downtown San Bruno (or can even find downtown San Bruno on a map), you should attend a public hearing on the topic this Saturday...

Morning News Round-Up -- 3.19.09: Supervisor Rich Gordon a candidate for Assembly...officially

If you read Watch Dog or PP Examiner or the Palo Alto Weekly or the Almanac, then this won't come as a surprise...Supervisor Rich Gordon is running for State Assembly next year. He made it official yesterday. Watch Dog can't wait for this race. Gordon is officially in. Palo Alto's Yoriko Kishimoto and Community College District Trustee Hal Plotkin (also from Palo Alto) are in the race as well. Supervisor Rose Jacobs Gibson is unofficially in the race at this point too. This is going to be a good one...As discussed previously, the District is split pretty evenly between San Mateo and Santa Clara Counties -- making this a double the pleasure double the fun type of race for the Watch Dog Network...

San Carlos Elementary School District got an unexpected surprise recently...nearly 70 more kindergartners signed up for next year's school year than expected. Expecting about 333, just over 400 little ones want into the Charter School district.

And while San Carlos Elementary School District is dealing with a rush of Kindergartners, the San Mateo-Foster City School District is working with the City of Foster City to find land and build some new facilities for the future influx of students...

The Daily Journal's Michelle Durand hasn't left yet...perhaps she wants to take Watch Dog up on our offer for coffee? She is Off the Beat today and writing about plastic bag bans (and pornography and smoking)...

Watch Dog remembers this story fondly. Here is what (allegedly) happened: An employee at an Indian restaurant (Mr. Singh) was ripping people's credit card numbers, Mr. Singh gave the credit card numbers to a middle man (Mr. Barkley), and Mr. Barkley would bring them to Safeway to buy stuff from Mrs. Singh, who worked there. Mr. Barkley just pleaded not guilty yesterday on 12 felony counts...

Dave Bohannon is a developer who has land and wants to build a big project in Menlo Park. To gauge support for his project, Mr. Bohannon conducted a poll of Menlo Park residents to see if they would support his $300 million plan. Unfortunately for Mr. Bohannon, news of the poll leaked out a while ago and now Menlo Park officials are forced to let everyone know that they will not give much credence to the poll results. That's an expensive oops for Mr. Bohannon...

The County Times' John Horgan gives us the 411 on the hugely popular Adult Education programs in the County and how budget cuts are having a major (negative) impact.

Investigators are still looking into what caused the big Peet's fire in downtown Menlo Park on Tuesday morning. One thing we all know is that it may take months for the affected stores (Peet's and Calla boutique) to reopen...

You have got to admire Rod Diridon. He loves walking into the lion's den to pitch High-Speed Rail. He was at it once again in Palo Alto at the Palo Alto Rotary Club meeting at Ming's. His speech came just as Palo Alto is asking the High-Speed Rail Authority to study underground tracks through the Peninsula...a dollar short and day late?

Former Menlo Park Mayor Lee Duboc is a thorn in the side of the Menlo Park City Council...perhaps that's why she wasn't invited to a breakfast with current and former Mayors and Councilmembers? Keep at it Lee, we like reading your stuff...

It looks like the County of San Mateo was helping keep the Coastside Family Medical Center afloat for a while before its eventual closure this month. The clinic was asking for more taxpayer money and the County just couldn't stomach it...

As if Half Moon Bay didn't have enough bad news these days (Coastside Family Medical closing, $18 million owed to a developer, cutting City employees, Coastside School District taking hits) Moon News will close its doors in April...

It is good to know that someone is watching the Woodside COWncil these days...check out Citizens of Woodside for a pun-filled round-up...

Finally, there is a story today in the Almanac with the headline: Hundreds apply for Charter Schools. Watch Dog is working on a bit about this story, thanks to some interested Watch Dogs following this closely...if you have any information about Everest/Summit or have a view, email me...

Morning News Round-Up -- 3.6.09: Saltworks development stories...again...

Having won the (nasty) ballot battle last year regarding their proposed development in Redwood City, DMB Associates is bringing their development plans for the former Cargill Saltworks site to the San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission. DMB needs the Commissions approval for development. The development review process in front of the Commission will also allow Save the Bay several more whacks at the project...

More teacher pink slips will be handed out to teachers next week...today's story is about the 20 pink slips to be handed out in the San Carlos Elementary School District...And good timing on the news story about pink slips, San Carlos Elementary School District. You have a ballot measure coming up for a parcel tax...the Daily Journal wants everyone to vote yes on this measure...

If it seems you know more and more people who have been laid off...you probably do. The County's unemployment rate jumped to 7.2 percent last month. This is still less than most/all of the rest of the State...but somehow that doesn't seem as comforting as it once did...

If you yell loud enough, you can get what you want. That is the lesson we are all about to learn in Belmont. I'm positive you remember the story: Belmont closed a traffic lane near Carlmont High School and parents freaked out in front of the City Council and in letters and in phone calls. (Including one person who went a little too far and is being investigated by the police.) Well, hysterically screaming has apparently paid off as Belmont officials prepare to undo what they did. Watch Dog remembers fondly the Profile in Courage quote by the Belmont City Manager about this issue: "...It’s a school zone — for those who think they have a right to get to work faster during that time, they don’t..."

The Palo Alto power outage was not caused by Federal agents raiding the Utility Department headquarters...it was caused by a duck...Speaking of the embattled Utility Department: the plan to raise electric/gas rates and transfer extra money into Palo Alto's general fund has hit a major road-block...namely, commonsense and public outcry...

Menlo Park's Mayor Heyward Robinson will deliver his much anticipated State of the City speech on Tuesday night. No word yet if the speech will be nationally televised...

An ironically timed press release from Assemblymember Hill's 'there out to be a law' contest just came out...the stuff that constituents came up with wasn't so bad, it is just that Jon Mays at the Daily Journal just got through writing his piece blasting Sacramento Legislators for introducing bills and not focusing on problems...like the State Budget...

Speaking of the Daily Journal...what Michelle Durand started this week, the Mercury News Editorial Board picked up. Today, the Merc. editors wrote about Ammiano's Yes We Can(nabis) campaign...

Morning News Round-Up -- 1.20.09: Obama-rific Edition...

The biggest news of the day? Daniel and Sophia are taking over in San Mateo...no, this isn't another undemocratic appointment in the County, rather, they are the most popular baby names.

Actually, that's not the big news story today...and everyone is getting in on the

Michelle Durand (as well as Pacifica Riptide) gets in on the Inauguration action in her "Off the Beat" piece...The Daily Journal couldn't foot the bill for her trip to DC? Someone who will be there is Congresswoman Jackie Speier -- and she discussed the Inauguration and new administration with the San Mateo County Times.

If you live in Burlingame, you should be paying close attention to your storm drain fee/tax that may go to a vote in May. It could cost you anywhere from $116 to $2,060 per year. Oh yeah, and don't forget that you'll be paying more for garbage too. 2009 might be a "burr in your saddle" type of year...(thanks Jesus Nava for making that Texas saying a Watch Dog staple...)

This story is getting old...and sad. The San Carlos Elementary School District is trying to plan for budget shortfalls.

If Congresswoman Eshoo and Speier get their way, the Secretary of the Treasury will buy municipal bonds that are held by Lehman Brothers...sort of bailout for local governments. In San Mateo County's case, that could be $150 million. Thank you Eshoo/Speier...

A highway, road-rage incident on Monday sent 3 folks to the hospital with gun-shot wounds. Who knew 101 could be so much fun?

Increased development at Stanford (hospital and mall) is going to screw up traffic even worse than it is now. These are the findings of a study that Palo Alto received this week. Consider this the next small chapter in the Palo Alto versus Stanford battle over development and its impact. It is going to be fun to Watch (Dog)...

Morning News Round-Up -- 12.16.08: Jerry's Seat and Garbage...what else is new?...

The Jerry Hill Seat-Filling Party started yesterday and continues today. The pool of applicants is down to 10 (one guy dropped out). Carol Groom is still the favorite, but her and 9 others made their case yesterday to the Board of Supervisors who will decide what to do today. Will they choose an undemocratic, 2-year appointment that gives the appointee a Supervisorial seat for a decade or will they choose a special election that costs $1.6 million but proves that we live a democracy? Watch Dog has a view on this...can you tell what it is?

Garbage. Enough said...well, not really. It was Burlingame's turn last night to blast/distrust the SBWMA, the joint powers authority that handles the County's garbage contracts. Burlingame was slated to review the proposed new contract, but instead questioned the SBWMA's actual operating budget (up $1.2 million in 2 years), the cost of the proposed contract (the recommended vendor came in above the incumbent), and if a $64 million renovation to the recycling center was necessary (some believe $20 million would do). The Burlingame City Council also wanted to know the status of the Civil Grand Jury investigation. It doesn't look good for the Burlingame/SBWMA relationship -- which must have Jesus Nava, Burlingame's Finance Director looking for interesting quotes to voice his discontent...remember this gem when Nava described the escalating costs of the proposed SBWMA facility as: "...a burr under my saddle..."

Longtime Millbrae Elementary School District Board member John Lynch passed away Sunday after "58 years in education"...

Mimicking the Sequioa Union High School District, the San Carlos Elementary School District is looking to cut $800K from their budget.

The San Mateo Union High School District wants to get its money out now from Lehman Brothers before the stock hits zero (or pennies). Why? Because if it hits rock bottom, "we're kind of screwed" -- according to Trustee Stephen Rogers...that sounds right.

The Daily Journal's Michelle Durand chimes in on the run of animal cruelty cases in San Mateo. Interestingly, the dog beater (as opposed to the cat stomper) is on the lamb.

Unrelated to animal cruelty, the DA is charging two folks for stalking two professors who research animals at UCSF but live in San Mateo -- the stalkers are anti-animal-research activists...

Palo Alto is launching a racial "action plan" to try to recover from the former Police Chief's racist "action plan"...