Kqeds Forum

It's been almost a year since Mayor London Breed has been on Forum. But what a year it's been. She and San Francisco's public health leadership were credited with implementing a shutdown that slowed the progress of the pandemic here. But eventually the virus caught up with us, and measures to control it have decimated small businesses especially downtown, the tourism and restaurant industries, and the city's budget. We'll talk to Mayor Breed about crime, homelessness, and other challenges facing the city.

Reports continue to surface this week of vaccine line-jumpers -- people who, knowingly or not, take advantage of loopholes that enable them to get a coveted COVID shot ahead of those who need one more urgently. In the Bay Area and in Los Angeles, vaccine access codes meant for vulnerable communities of color circulated by text message to some ineligible Californians, who used them at mass vaccination sites. Separately, “vaccine chasers” are gathering at some pharmacies and clinics in hopes of receiving a dose that would otherwise be thrown away. It’s all raising questions about the ethics and effectiveness of current state and national vaccine distribution systems. We’ll talk about what more can be done to promote equitable vaccine allocation.

Lawrence Ferlinghetti, a poet, writer, publisher and founder of City Lights Books, died on Monday at the age of 101. "I really believe that art is capable of the total transformation of the world, and of life itself,” Ferlinghetti once said, and his multifaceted career bore that out. As a poet, Ferlinghetti offered what one critic called, a “plain-spoken, often wry critique of American culture.” As a publisher, Ferlinghetti nurtured the Beat movement, publishing writers like Allen Ginsberg, whose poem “Howl,” defined a generation. And as the founder of City Lights Books, he created a haven for the literary minded. His North Beach bookstore remains a well-loved and revered San Francisco institution. We’ll talk about Ferlinghetti’s life and legacy. 

With the installation of a new police chief: Leronne Armstrong, the city of Oakland is hoping to end the musical chairs game at the top of the police department. Armstrong is an insider, a 22-year veteran of the department, born and bred in West Oakland, and a proud alumnus of McClymonds High School. The city is facing a spike in homicide rates, a rash of crime against seniors and businesses in Chinatown, and court-ordered department reforms overseen by a federal consent decree that's been in place for 18 years. We’ll ask him how he plans to build trust in the city’s diverse neighborhoods, the role of mental health crisis teams, and looming budget cuts.

Youth who age out of the foster care system often lose access to housing and services and are at increased risk of homelessness, food insecurity and incarceration. The pandemic has caused even greater instability, with 55% of transitioning foster youth citing food insecurity as a result of COVID-19 in a national study. A new bill in the California legislature aims to establish a safety net to youth leaving foster care by providing them with direct cash assistance on a monthly basis for three years after they leave the system. We’ll hear about the bill and the challenges youth face in transitioning out of foster care. 

San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo spoke earlier this week at a state senate hearing in support of reforming the California Environmental Quality Act. He says changing these regulations will lead to more affordable housing, transit and  jobs. We'll talk with Liccardo about CEQA reforms, San Jose's housing goals, the urgency of reopening schools, and removing regulatory barriers in order to create jobs. And we want to hear from you: which specific need of San Jose's should the Mayor prioritize?

On Tuesday, Senate confirmation hearings for the Health and Human Services Secretary nominee, California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, begin in Washington. Accused of being "famously partisan" by Mitch McConnell, Becerra faces intense Republican opposition for his stances on abortion and Medicare for All. Democrats remain largely in favor of his appointment, citing his long legislative tenure and experience crafting progressive health policy, including the Affordable Care Act. We’ll talk about the state of Becerra's nomination and what his confirmation could mean for California and the nation.

For the last two years, David Anderson has served as the top federal prosecutor in the Bay Area. During his tenure, he’s seen a side of the Bay Area that few people see. He’s led major criminal investigations into drug trafficking, pandemic-related fraud, and a wide-ranging corruption scandal involving San Francisco’s Department of Public Works. Anderson announced his resignation last month. We’ll talk to him about his time in office and the work that lies ahead for the Department of Justice.

Facebook cannot keep itself out of the headlines. On Monday, the social media company reached a deal to restore the news content it had banned from its Australian domain last week. This removal was in response to a proposed Australian law which would require social media sites and search engines to pay publishers for their content. And back in the U.S., in an ongoing 2018 class action lawsuit that alleges Facebook misrepresented its advertising data, documents were unsealed last week that plaintiffs claim demonstrate internal knowledge of this alleged misrepresentation. We’ll review all this news and analyze what’s ahead for Facebook as Mark Zuckerberg prepares to testify next month before Congress — his fourth appearance since last July.

 The California Department of Public Health on Friday released updated guidelines for organized youth and adult sports. Outdoor high and moderate contact sports such as football and water polo may resume in counties with low coronavirus infection rates, which includes the entire Bay Area. In this hour, Scott Shafer talks to Dr. Nirav Pandya and Joe Bates about the updated guidelines and what safety measures will be taken

Over six years after a state audit found that college campuses in California lacked transparency in how they handled cases of sexual assault, big gaps in services and support persist. The audit largely targeted San Diego State University, UCLA, UC Berkeley and Chico State University and recommended yearly training of university employees. Rachael Myrow talks to KPCC reporter Adolfo Guzman-Lopez about what campuses are doing better and where they are still falling short when it comes to addressing sexual violence. We'll also hear how COVID-19 is impacting students who may experience sexual violence and their ability to seek support.

Singing can lift our spirits, and according to medical experts, because of the way COVID is spread, singing can also kill you. Its a dire, and unexpected, dichotomy and one that singers have grappled with during the pandemic. Rachael Myrow talks to KQED's Chloe Veltman and some Bay Area singers who are finding safe ways to bring live singing to audiences, big and small.

More than 30 California legislators sent a letter to Governor Gavin Newsom this week, urging him to allow museums to reopen indoors in the state. Nationwide more than 70% of museums are open in some capacity, according to the American Alliance of Museums, but, except for a short period starting in October, museums in California have remained closed throughout the pandemic. We'el talk with a panel of Bay Area museum directors about how they are surviving and adapting in the covid era.

Atmospheric warming, catastrophic sea level rise and mass extinction are just some of the monumental harms humans have inflicted on the planet. Pulitzer Prize-winning science writer Elizabeth Kolbert points out that while it might be prudent to scale back our polluting activities, we've become so numerous, and the damage so extensive, that we may need to do more. In her new book, “Under a White Sky,” Kolbert looks at some of the interventions -- such as geoengineering and gene editing -- that scientists say can reverse the environmental harms we've caused. We'll talk to Kolbert about what she learned during her reporting and whether the answer to the problem of our control of nature is, in fact, more control. 

Many see Silicon Valley Congressman Ro Khanna as a rising star in the Democratic party. He co-chaired Bernie Sanders’ national campaign, and is a big advocate for progressive causes like raising the minimum wage and Medicare for All. Congressman Khanna joins KQED's Scott Schafer to discuss the recent turmoil in Washington, including the impeachment trial of Donald Trump, and what’s ahead for 2021.

Amidst mounting pressure from parents, health experts and politicians in the Bay Area to reopen schools for in-person learning, the Berkeley Unified School District this week announced a plan to vaccinate all teachers and start getting most students back into class in mid April. On Wednesday, San Francisco's superintendent of schools said the district is gearing up to reopen but didn't offer specifics. We'll get the latest on the status of school openings across the region.

In the 1950s and 60s, when some towns faced integrating their “whites only” public pools, they drained the pools instead so nobody could use them. Economic and social policy expert Heather McGhee says this zero-sum thinking has impacted the U.S. economy and the public for the worse--and racism is at the root of it. For her new book, "The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Us and How We Can Prosper Together," McGhee journeyed across the country, including to California, documenting the stories of Americans who struggle with meeting their basic needs as a consequence of the “drained-pool politics” that keeps the country divided and vastly unequal. We'll talk to McGhee about what she uncovered in writing the book and her proposed plans for charting a more equitable path forward.

California agencies serving the homeless do not keep track of where billions of dollars are going, fail to follow federal guidelines and are so fragmented that they lose opportunities to people into stable housing. That’s according to a report by the state auditor’s office earlier this month on how state and regional housing agencies are handling the homelessness crisis. We’ll hear about the report and how the state could do a lot better in serving its 150,000 unhoused residents.

Katherine Seligman's debut novel, "At the Edge of the Haight" tells the story of Maddy, a young homeless woman living in San Francisco who is caught up in a murder mystery. As a journalist and a long-time resident of Haight-Ashbury, Seligman has witnessed the dehumanizing effects of homelessness up close. Her book, which is the winner of the PEN/Bellwether prize, has been praised as a work that "makes alive and visible the lives of people we often walk past, sometimes as quickly as we can." Seligman joins us to talk about her new novel, her transition from reporter to fiction writer, and what it takes to tell the stories of people who often feel invisible.

Latinos in California have been hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic with a disproportionately high number of infections and deaths -- a situation that state officials have been well aware of since last year. As the state rolls out the COVID-19 vaccine, Latino advocates, leaders and healthcare providers say officials have not made Latinos -- the state’s largest demographic group -- enough of a priority. One of the biggest problems with doling out the vaccine is simply limited supplies, but critics also point to how and where vaccines are distributed. We look at the challenges Latinos and other vulnerable Californians face in accessing vaccines.