Feature Archives

Newly elected Governor Jerry Brown’s 2011–2012 budget proposal slashes $12.5 billion dollars from essential health and human services. Brown himself characterized his new budget as "draconian." Immediately following the January 10th announcement of Brown’s new budget, health service agencies held a press conference in the Sacramento State House denouncing the proposal. Statewide actions included similar press conferences and rallies in San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, Riverside and Fresno.

Tim Hull, Courthouse News writes: The 9th Circuit on Wednesday [Dec. 15] revived the First Amendment claim of a man who was kicked out of a Santa Cruz City Council meeting for giving a Nazi salute. Chief Judge Alex Kozinski wrote that a councilman's ensuing "hissy fit" may have disrupted the meeting more than the silent gesture.

After web host Amazon and DNS host Dyn Inc. terminated service to WikiLeaks.org earlier this week, San Jose-based PayPal announced late last night that it has "permanently restricted" WikiLeaks' account. In a statement released on its blog, PayPal accused WikiLeaks of violating its acceptable use policy by "encourag[ing], promot[ing], facilitat[ing] or instruct[ing] others to engage in illegal activity." WikiLeaks has struggled to stay online after initiating the slow release of over 250,000 leaked US diplomatic cables known as Cablegate, and is now available on several mirrors such as wikileaks.indymedia.org.

In a dramatic "October Surprise" that community activists say is certain to decrease voter turnout in Fresno County, 200 out of the normal 400 polling places have been closed. Hardest hit is southwest Fresno, which is predominantly African American and Latino, where activists say that 75% of polling places have been eliminated. Sabina Gonzalez, who is the campaign director for Communities for a New California, says some residents in SW Fresno will be forced to walk over 2 miles to find a polling place that is open.

Protests in San Francisco, Palo Alto, and Berkeley at Chevron gas stations featured handmade "No on 26" placards, as environmental activists redoubled their efforts to defeat the initiative they are calling a "stealth" proposition. The demonstrations were part of a statewide action organized by the Sierra Club.

A week before the November 2nd elections, a group of artists liberated six San Francisco billboards and sixty bus shelter ads to defeat Proposition L, a ballot measure that would ban sitting on the sidewalk. The group, calling itself the Sit/Lie Posse, replaced ads throughout the city with handmade prints rendered in the style of corporate advertising. Confronting the backers of the proposition, the posse lavished attention on sites around City Hall, the Chronicle, the Haight-Ashbury district and many other neighborhoods.

Veterans of Foreign Wars "Bill Motto" Post 5888 announced that it is unable to hold Thanksgiving or Christmas Dinners, this year, at the Santa Cruz County Veterans Memorial Building. For 24 years, this event has helped needy people, veterans, seniors, students and lonely residents during holidays which are based in giving.