ST. LOUIS – Bevor die Giants letzten Winter 171 Millionen US-Dollar für sechs Free Agents verloren haben, bevor sie ein einziges Treffen mit Carlos Correa oder einem Radiologen auf Abruf hatten und bevor sie damit begannen, ihren Kader mit elektrischen Impulsen eines aufstrebenden Spielers neu zu beleben Entwicklungssystem mussten ihre Hauptentscheidungsträger eine scheinbar unbedeutende Entscheidung treffen.

Ob ein 20-jähriger Outfielder geschützt werden soll, der im A-Ball .211 getroffen hat.

Die Giants beschlossen im November, Luis Matos in den 40-Mann-Kader aufzunehmen, und jetzt sieht diese kleine Entscheidung monumental aus. Matos kämpfte sich in knapp zwei Monaten durch die beiden höchsten Minor-League-Levels, er positionierte sich als offensichtliche Alternative, als sich Outfielder Mitch Haniger am Dienstag den Unterarm brach, er gab am Mittwoch sein Debüt in der Major League als Start-Centerfielder und Nr. 2 Batter, und er pfiff einen Single auf dem zweiten Pitch, den er beim 8-5, 10-Inning-Sieg der Giants über die St. Louis Cardinals im Busch Stadium sah.

Matos, der im Dezember 21 Jahre alt wurde, war der jüngste Giants-Spieler seit Madison Bumgarner im Jahr 2009, der sein Debüt gab. Der rechtshändig schlagende Mittelfeldspieler ist nach Jordan Walker von den Cardinals der zweitjüngste Positionsspieler in den Major Leagues. Sein Debüt war vielleicht das am meisten erwartete Debüt eines Giants-Outfielders seit einer oder vielleicht auch zwei Generationen, je nachdem, wie alt man sich durch Chili Davis fühlt.

Matos kam nach 43 Treffern in 107 Fledermäusen für Triple-A Sacramento. In seinen letzten sechs Spielen für die River Cats erzielte er sechs Homeruns, darunter einen in seinem ersten Schlag am Dienstag, bevor er aus der Aufstellung genommen wurde. Sein Begrüßungstext von Manager Gabe Kapler am Dienstagabend war eine Mischung aus Spanisch, Englisch und Feuer-Emojis. („Wie enthusiastisches Feuer“, stellte Kapler klar.) Matos nahm am späten Abend einen Flug nach St. Louis, kam am Mittwochmorgen an seinem Schließfach im Clubhaus der Giants an und wurde vom spanischen Dolmetscher Erwin Higueros flankiert, während er sich mit Reportern traf. Er wurde gefragt: Bist du dafür bereit?

Er wartete nicht darauf, dass die Frage übersetzt wurde. Er brauchte es auch nicht, um zu antworten.

„Ja“, sagte er auf Englisch mit fast schüchternem Selbstvertrauen. “Ich bin bereit.”

Aber die Entscheidung, Matos im November zu schützen, war nicht ohne Zweifel oder Debatte. Jeder einzelne dieser Kaderplätze ist wertvoll. Sich mit einem Interessenten auf niedrigerem Niveau zusammenzutun, selbst wenn dieser über enorme Fähigkeiten und Potenzial verfügt, ist, als würde man eine Keksdose auf das oberste Regal stellen. Wenn dieser Spieler immer noch einen Traum davon entfernt ist, Ihnen in den großen Ligen zu helfen, dann nimmt er einen 40-Mann-Raum ein, ohne Nutzen zu bieten. Wenn uns die Giants mit 107 Siegen im Jahr 2021 etwas beigebracht haben, dann ist es der Wert des direkten Kadernutzens.

Dann gibt es noch die Spieltheorie, die besagt, dass eine Organisation jedes Jahr im Dezember das Risiko eingeht, berechtigte Spieler dem Regel-5-Entwurf auszusetzen. Würde ein anderes Team wirklich einen so jungen Spieler wie Matos abwerben, wenn seine Leistung im Jahr 2022 so wenig auf die Bereitschaft für die große Liga hindeutet? Würde sich dieses Team wirklich dazu verpflichten, ihn die ganze Saison über im aktiven Kader zu behalten?

Die Giants glaubten das nicht. Aber sie wollten auch keine wochenlangen Verdauungsbeschwerden erleben, die nichts mit dem übermäßigen Verzehr an Thanksgiving zu tun hatten. Manche Risiken sind es einfach nicht wert, eingegangen zu werden.

„Die allgemeine Abstammung und das Aufwärtspotenzial haben dazu beigetragen, aber zwei Dinge haben uns dazu verleitet, ihn zu beschützen und zu glauben, dass jemand über ihn würfeln könnte“, sagte Giants-Präsident Farhan Zaidi am Mittwoch per SMS.

„Erstens waren seine Defensivwerte im letzten Jahr wirklich gut. Und zweitens war die Kontaktrate trotz der Gesamtstatistik immer noch ausgezeichnet. Beides gab uns das Gefühl, dass er in die großen Ligen aufsteigen und schneller einen Beitrag leisten könnte, als es auf den ersten Blick in der letzten Offseason schien.“

Hier ist der andere Nachteil: Wenn Sie in der Lage sind, Ihr Farmsystem aufzufüllen, sind Sie weniger auf die Flexibilität von 40 Mann angewiesen, um Verzichtsansprüche geltend zu machen. Letztes Jahr forderten die Giants 15 Spieler von der Befreiung. Dieses Jahr haben sie ihren ersten Platz noch nicht erreicht. Klar, es gab einen kleinen Deal für einen Matt Beaty hier und einen Cal Stevenson dort. Darin Ruf kam zurück, um Hallo zu sagen, während bei den Giants mehrere Rechtshänder außer Gefecht waren. Aber zum größten Teil haben die Giants Kaderlücken – die kosmetischen Kratzer und die großen Schnittwunden – von Spielern innerhalb ihres Systems geflickt.

Matos war der achte Giant, der in dieser Saison sein Debüt in der Major League gab. Nur die Cincinnati Reds haben mehr Spieler debütiert. Matos schloss sich Casey Schmitt, Patrick Bailey, Blake Sabol, Ryan Walker, Keaton Winn, Tristan Beck und Brett Wisely an, die alle zu Siegen beigetragen haben und deren Leistung auf zukünftiges Potenzial schließen lässt. Auf dieser Liste gibt es keinen Quad-A- oder Organisationsplayer. Am Mittwoch hatten die acht Rookies zusammen 2,7 bWAR erreicht. Wisely war der einzige unter ihnen mit einem negativen Input (minus -0,1 bWAR), und selbst er wäre wahrscheinlich auf der positiven Seite gewesen, wenn er etwas mehr Glück beim Schlagen gehabt hätte.

Und da ist noch Kyle Harrison, der wohl beste Linkshänder-Pitching-Kandidat bei Triple A und von dem die meisten Vereinsfunktionäre immer noch erwarten, dass er in dieser Saison den größten Rookie-Einfluss auf den Major-League-Klub haben wird. Und da ist noch der Giants-Spieler, der auf den meisten Interessentenlisten immer noch an erster Stelle steht, Shortstop Marco Luciano, der nach einer hartnäckigen Rückenverletzung im Double-A Richmond endlich gesund ist.

Beeindruckender als die Höhe der Rookie-Beiträge ist nur die Entwicklung dieser Rookies in die großen Ligen. Die Aufstellung am Mittwoch umfasste drei Spieler – Matos, Bailey und Schmitt –, die die meiste oder die gesamte letzte Saison bei High-A Eugene spielten. Winn, der einen Tag, nachdem er bei seinem Major-League-Debüt eine Vier-Inning-Parade verbucht hatte, als Option ausgewählt wurde, startete letzte Saison ebenfalls in Eugene. Aber niemand verbrauchte mehr Raketentreibstoff als Matos, der letzte Saison mit einer Quadrizepsverletzung und seiner eigenen übermäßigen Aggressivität am Teller zu kämpfen hatte.

Als Matos begann, alles zusammenzustellen, gab es in den oberen Nebenfächern nicht viel, was seinen Aufstieg verhindern konnte. Und indem sie ihn im November beschützten, erlaubten die Giants sich vorzustellen, dass es möglich sei.

„Wir alle wissen, dass die Spielerentwicklung sehr schnell voranschreiten kann, insbesondere bei Spielern mit großer Herkunft“, sagte Kapler. „Als ich zum ersten Mal nach San Francisco kam, ganz am Anfang meiner Zeit hier, hörte ich von einem Jungen mit einem tollen Schwung, der den Baseball in alle Teile des Feldes lenken konnte, in der Verteidigung spielen konnte und ein guter Alleskönner war -rund um den Sportler.

„Wie Sie erwähnt haben, ging es bei ihm ziemlich schnell. Er hat kein tolles Jahr hinter sich. Wir waren uns also nicht sicher, was uns für das Jahr 2023 erwartet. Aber es ist wirklich gut für die Organisation, dass diese Leute so schnell vorangekommen sind. Es ist auch eine gute Erinnerung daran, dass die Spielerentwicklung noch im Gange ist. Und dies wird nicht ohne Unebenheiten und Wendungen verlaufen. Ich denke, wir sehen bei Casey, dass es Momente des Kampfes geben wird, selbst für Spieler, die sofort gute Leistungen erbringen. Ich bin mir sicher, dass Patrick Bailey nicht das ganze Jahr über perfekt sein wird.

„Aber es ist eine wirklich gute Erinnerung daran, dass wir an unseren Jungs festhalten und ihnen mehr Chancen geben werden, auch wenn sie Schwierigkeiten haben, denn es lohnt sich.“ Spieler, die sich auf Major-League-Niveau weiterentwickeln und besser werden, helfen den Teams, zu gewinnen. Ich glaube nicht, dass es für uns einen größeren Einfluss darauf gibt, zu gewinnen und möglicherweise in die Nachsaison zu kommen, als dass einige unserer jungen Spieler die Arbeit leisten, die sie gerade leisten.“

Die Giants haben Matos nicht befördert, um für einen vorübergehenden Funken zu sorgen. Sie haben plötzlich einen Mangel an rechtshändigen Außenfeldspielern, da Haniger, ihr teuerster Free-Agent-Zukauf im vergangenen Winter, vor einer saisonbedrohlichen Operation an seinem gebrochenen Unterarm steht. Austin Slater ist der einzige andere rechtshändig schlagende Outfielder im Kader, es sei denn, die Giants würden Thairo Estrada im linken Feld belassen. Matos ist also hier, um einen Bedarf zu decken, der, wie es aussieht, dauerhaft sein wird.

Matos klatschte vor Freude auf dem Weg zur ersten Base, nachdem er am Mittwoch im ersten Inning einen fehlerfreien Single ins linke Feld geschlagen hatte. Bei seinem nächsten Schlagangriff begab er sich auf die zweite Base. Bei einem Flyout am Ende des Schlages auf das linke Feld im sechsten Durchgang verfehlte er den Lauf nur knapp. Dann, wie Kapler es lachend beschrieb: „Er lernte den Giants-Baseball kennen. Wir haben hier in deinem ersten Spiel für dich getroffen.“

Die Giants lagen im siebten Spiel nach Mike Yastrzemskis RBI-Single mit 5:3 zurück. Kapler entschied sich für das Linkshänder-Matchup gegen Jordan Hicks und schickte den Pinch-Hitter Michael Conforto nach oben, der am Boden landete.

„Ich war nicht überrascht“, sagte Matos über Higueros. „Ich weiß, dass das Team das tut. Der Manager hat mit mir gesprochen und mir die Beweggründe und die Strategie dahinter erklärt, und ich verstehe: Holen Sie sich direkt jemand anderen mit mehr Erfahrung, der dem Team helfen kann, zurückzukommen und zu gewinnen.“

Bis zu ihrem letzten Schlag taten sie es. Yastrzemskis zweifacher Homerun glich den Spielstand aus und verwandelte die bekanntermaßen fröhlichen Fans der Cardinals in Buhvögel. Dann schlug Estrada Yastrzemski, der im 10. Durchgang der automatische Läufer war. Mit dem Sieg erreichten die Giants zum ersten Mal in dieser Saison vier Spiele über .500 und erzielten im Busch Stadium ihren ersten Drei-Spiele-Sieg. Um den letzten Drei-Spiele-Sieg der Giants in St. Louis zu finden, muss man zur vorherigen Version des Busch Stadium (das sich gegenüber dem aktuellen Stadion befand) und zur Saison 1998 zurückgehen.

Im Jahr 1998 waren es noch drei Jahre, bis Matos das Licht der Welt erblickte.

Mittlerweile ist er vollständig angekommen. Eine Gruppe von Onkeln, Tanten und Cousins ​​fuhr über Nacht zwölf Stunden lang von Denver, um dem Spiel beizuwohnen. Sie hielten handgefertigte Schilder auf einer neongrünen Plakatwand: FAMILIA MATOS PRESENTE und De Bobures para la MLB.

Die Familie Matos ist hier. Von Bobures bis zu den großen Ligen.

Seine wichtigsten Fans, die Menschen, die er zuerst anrief und die sich die Tränen aus den Augen wischten, als sie von seiner Beförderung erfuhren, waren zurück in Bobures, einer kleinen Stadt am Südufer des Maracaibo-Sees in Venezuela. Er bewahrt den Baseball von seinem ersten Schlag auf, um ihn seinem Vater Jose Luis und seiner Mutter Yoelis zu schenken. Sie waren nicht da, um das Debüt ihres Sohnes mitzuerleben. Möglicherweise können sie ihn für einige Zeit nicht persönlich spielen sehen.

In Caracas gibt es kein US-Konsulat, und angesichts der Massenmigration von Venezolanern aufgrund jahrelanger politischer und wirtschaftlicher Instabilität schränkt die US-Einwanderungspolitik die Anzahl der für die Einreise in das Land erforderlichen Touristenvisa stark ein. Matos sagte, seine Eltern hätten nächsten Monat einen Termin, um ihren Antrag beim US-Konsulat in Brasilien prüfen zu lassen. Sie müssen nach Brasilia reisen und persönlich am Vorstellungsgespräch teilnehmen. Matos hofft, dass sein 15-jähriger Bruder Luis David sie begleiten kann.

Wie Matos letzte Woche in einem Interview in Sacramento über seinen Vater sagte: „Er sagt, er wird im Stadion wohnen.“

Etwa eine Stunde vor dem ersten Pitch am Mittwoch, als die Giants ihre Früharbeit beendeten, bemerkte Qualitätskontrolltrainer Nick Ortiz, dass die Giants drei venezolanische Spieler – Matos, Wilmer Flores und Estrada – hintereinander schlagen würden in der Aufstellung. Ortiz erfuhr von den Problemen, die Matos‘ Eltern mit ihren Reisedokumenten hatten, und blickte über die Grasfläche hinaus. Er sagte, er hoffe, dass die Giants nun in der Lage sein könnten, einige Fäden in der Hand zu halten, da Matos ein großer Ligaspieler mit einem erhöhten Profil sei. Es ist nicht nur ein Spitzengehalt, das ein Leben verändern kann.

„Der Aufstieg in die großen Ligen ist für alle wichtig, aber es bedeutet nicht für alle das Gleiche“, sagte Ortiz. „Er ist nicht der Einzige, der es schafft.“

(Foto: Jeff Curry / USA Today)

The post The Giants protected Luis Matos, and it paid off in his MLB debut appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.

Note: GJEL Accident Attorneys regularly sponsors coverage on Streetsblog San Francisco and Streetsblog California. Unless otherwise noted in the story, GJEL Accident Attorneys is not consulted for the content or editorial alignment of the Sponsored Content.

Long-delayed construction of an elevated, sheltered bike path on a section of Fruitvale Avenue connecting BART to the Jingletown neighborhood is finally underway. From a city publication:

Fruitvale Avenue between E12th Street and Alameda Ave is a critical gap in the city of Oakland’s bike lane network. This stretch of road connects commuters and residents of Jingletown and the City of Alameda with the services, amenities and quality public transportation available around the Fruitvale BART station. This corridor is home to numerous railroad crossings, the I-880 underpass, and wide lanes that encourage high vehicle speeds. From 2014 to 2016, this corridor was the focus of a community planning and design initiative that saw the city hold several public meetings in the Fruitvale neighborhood.

Oakland’s first protected sidewalk-level bike path, entrance. Photo: Streetsblog/Rudick

While it’s great that it’s happening, the Fruitvale Alive project is really lagging behind. Even the city’s information page shows that construction should begin in the summer of 2022. In fact, studies and reports on this project began back in 2005, as evidenced by this tweet from Bike East Bay’s Robert Prinz.

Yes, community engagement with the project began in 2014 and funding came in 2016. The original Fruitvale Alive report was completed in 2005.

— Robert Prinz (@prinzrob) June 1, 2023

Streetsblog has reached out to the Oakland DOT to find out when the project will be complete and will update this post. Right now, “I heard ‘2024,’” Prinz wrote in an email to Streetsblog. “But nothing more concrete and no recent accounts.”

Big plus points of the project: the protected lane, of course. And the new connection to the Bay Trail, as shown in green on the map below. Currently, the Bay Trail is inaccessible from Fruitvale Avenue and the estuary without significant tracing. Even if someone wanted to overland it, thanks to the disused Union Pacific tracks, there are large fences blocking access.

Note the Bay Trail connection below in green.

“East Bay Parks is working on a separate Bay Trail connection project that will be built at the end of the Fruitvale project,” added Prince. “A protected Jughandle cycle path will be added between these two projects, which basically serves the same purpose as a protected crossing.”

A protected crossing is also planned at the intersection with East 12th. Unfortunately, none of the other intersections will be protected—and even on East 12th, according to the blueprints, only two of the four corners will have a protective island.

The only protected intersection is on East 12th. And only one side of it is protected.

Two of Fruitvale’s dangerous slip curves are removed, but others remain, apparently due to objections from AC Transit. Additionally, no provision has yet been made to protect the bridge over Fruitvale Avenue – cyclists will either be forced to dismount and use the sidewalk, as they must now, or have to contend with car traffic and no bike lane at all.

This sad situation will not be resolved. Photo: Streetsblog/Rudick

“Alameda is also working on its own project to continue the bike path over the Fruitvale Bridge and down the Tilden Way to Clement and Broadway,” Prince wrote. More on that in a future post.

Also, as is all too often the case, traffic control seems to have paid little attention to the needs of cyclists and pedestrians during construction, as Streetsblog found when photographing and surveying the area. Construction barriers that could have been used to protect cyclists and construction workers are instead used only to protect construction workers.

Photo: Streetsblog/Rudick

And not only could the crew not bother to create a pedestrian detour, they didn’t even put up the sign they were told about the closed sidewalk:

Photo: Streetsblog/Rudick

Of course, routes for cars are preserved because in the Bay Area, only drivers count (grrrrr).

No provision was made for pedestrians during construction.

Aside from the urgent work that was needed on Fruitvale Avenue, it’s great that this long overdue project is finally getting underway. In a year or two things should be a lot better for hikers and bikers between Fruitvale BART and Jingletown.

The post Development of Fruitvale Ave’s Protected Bike Lane – Streetsblog San Francisco appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.

Imaging if a city closed a sidewalk during construction and told pedestrians to just walk in traffic for a month.

That’s tantamount to what San Francisco has done to cyclists on Howard Street between 5th and 6th–within sight of where Tess Rothstein was doored and killed while biking to work in 2019.

Well that was short lived. No more protected bike lane on Howard @sfbike pic.twitter.com/PctTPyCYTT

— Ms. Doreen (@MsDoreenReads) February 7, 2022

The move left cyclists understandably riled. Rothstein was killed precisely because the city left long stretches of unprotected bike lane in place for many years; she died in sight of where the protected bike lane used to begin, on the other side of 6th Street.

“They painted this unprotected lane on a street where three people were killed in three years!!” wrote People Protected Bike Lane advocate Matt Brezina, in an email to Streetsblog and public officials.

Fortunately, this is a temporary measure. “The protected bike lane that was there will be restored. The current configuration is made of temporary tape and related to the construction of the development there,” explained an official with SFMTA.

Where the bike lane bends around the construction site. The passing box truck is the same type of vehicle that took Rothstein’s life. Photo: Streetsblog/Rudick

That’s not going to help though, if someone is injured or killed in the meantime.

Unprotected human bodies, on bicycle or foot, should never be put in close proximity with fast moving, two-to-five ton cars and even heavier trucks that can snuff out a life in a millisecond. Motorists are encased in passenger compartments with crumple zones and seat belts and air bags for a reason. Why on earth would anyone think it’s okay to leave cyclists or pedestrians in traffic without protection, especially in construction zones, where things are already especially dangerous?

It’s not hard to make temporary protective barriers. In fact, SFMTA went through the trouble of putting in lightweight pedestrian barrier along part of the route (as seen above). How much harder would it have been to put down real barriers? Cities in Denmark, the Netherlands, and elsewhere find ways to keep cyclists safe, even in construction zones.

A construction zone bike and pedestrian lane in Copenhagen. Photo: Jason Henderson.

In fact, it’s occasionally done even in a far away city called Oakland:

A construction area on Broadway in Oakland. Photo: Streetsblog/Rudick

Is the above configuration in Oakland above really that hard to emulate, SFMTA? Is it really that hard to see why the arrangement used on Howard, seen below, is just not safe?

The Howard Street temporary lane as seen from the pedestrian area. Photo: Streetsblog/Rudick

That said, Streetsblog would be unfair not to point out some of the positives getting installed in the area. At the corner of 5th, SFMTA installed a great protected turn. So at least when the construction is done, things should be better than ever.

A protected corner is under construction at Howard and 5th. Photo: Streetsblog/Rudick

Let’s just hope nobody gets hurt during the remainder of construction.

The post Howard Protected Bike Lane Eliminated – Streetsblog San Francisco appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.

WASHINGTON (AP) – A unanimous Supreme Court ruled Monday that thousands of people living in the United States on humanitarian grounds cannot apply for permanent residence.

Judge Elena Kagan wrote for the court that the federal immigration law prohibits people who entered the country illegally and now have temporary protection status from applying for “green cards” to stay in the country permanently.

CONTINUE READING: When does your state’s unemployment benefit end?

The term applies to people who come from countries devastated by war or disaster. It protects them from deportation and allows them to work legally. There are 400,000 people from 12 countries with TPS status.

The outcome of a lawsuit involving a couple from El Salvador who had been in the United States since the 1990s revolved around the question of whether people who entered illegally and enjoyed humanitarian protection were ever “admitted to the United States under immigration law “Were.

Kagan wrote that it wasn’t them. “The TPS program gives foreigners nonimmigrant status, but does not allow them. So awarding TPS does not make an illegal participant … eligible for a green card, ”she wrote.

The House of Representatives has already passed laws that would allow TPS recipients to become permanent residents, Kagan noted. The bill is faced with uncertain prospects in the Senate.

President Joe Biden has said he will support the change in law. But his administration, like the Trump administration, argued that the current immigration law does not allow people who have entered the country illegally to apply for permanent residence.

On the flip side, there were immigrant groups who argued that many people who came to the United States for humanitarian reasons have lived in the country for many years, gave birth to American citizens, and put down roots in the United States

Federal courts across the country had come to conflicting decisions as to whether granting TPS status alone was sufficient to induce an immigrant to seek permanent residence.

CONTINUE READING: Body identified as a resident of San Leandro found at San Francisco International Airport

Former President Donald Trump tried to cancel the program for many immigrants because he was afraid they might be sent back to their home countries, where they have not lived for many years.

“All of these United States-based families who have lived in our communities for decades have been exposed to very real threats,” said Lisa Koop, attorney for the National Immigrant Justice Center, who also teaches at Notre Dame Law School.

In 2001, after a series of earthquakes in their home country, the US granted Salvadoran migrants legal protection to allow them to stay in the US.

People from 11 other countries are similarly protected. These are: Haiti, Honduras, Myanmar, Nepal, Nicaragua, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria, Venezuela and Yemen.

Monday’s ruling does not affect immigrants with TPS who originally entered the U.S. legally and then, say, exceeded their visas, noted Kagan. Since these people were legally admitted into the country and later received humanitarian protection, they can apply for permanent residence permits.

Also on Monday the dish:

– Declined to contest the requirement that only men sign up for the convocation when they are 18 years old.

Agrees to hear a case where the Biden administration wants to close a lawsuit over the FBI’s surveillance of Muslims in California for risk of divulging “state secrets.”

MORE NEWS: Report: “Boogaloo” suspect in murders of law enforcement officers belonged to militia seeking war against police

– Denied an appeal challenging the US Food and Drug Administration’s authority to regulate electronic cigarettes.

The post Supreme Courtroom Guidelines Towards Immigrants with Momentary Protected Standing – CBS San Francisco appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.

On a cloudless February day, in the shade of a white tent set up in a small parking lot in San Francisco’s Mission District, Dina Gonzalez rolls up her left sleeve to receive her first dose of the Pfizer vaccine. She had recently recovered from COVID; after weeks of fever and sleeping in the basement and praying not to spread the virus to her husband or her kids, which, thank God, she didn’t, this shot could not come soon enough. “I don’t want to go through that again, no, no, no,” she says in Spanish. The 57-year-old runs a home day care, and she needs to protect herself and the kids as she reopens the business.

On the street outside the tent, vendors sell chicharrones and fruit cups, as a line of people signing up for a vaccination waitlist stretches to the end of the block. Alejandro Valencia, a 58-year-old cook who lives nearby, hopes a vaccine will help him get rehired at the Palace Hotel when it finally reopens. Maira Soto, 42, was told by the owners of the pharmacy where she works to sign up, but the rumors about the vaccine she’s read online make her nervous. Jon Jacobo, who helps run the site, overhears Soto fretting as he walks by. “I felt nervous the first time, too,” Jacobo tells her. “You’re gonna feel fine.”

“Epidemics come in and hit everybody, and then very quickly, people who are privileged figure out how to protect themselves,” says Diane Jones, one of Unidos en Salud’s coordinators.

This vaccination site is run by Unidos en Salud (United in Health), a collaboration between UC San Francisco and the Latino Task Force, a network of deeply rooted community organizations that banded together at the start of the pandemic. Over the past year, residents of the Mission have become accustomed to the flyers plastering the neighborhood’s doors and restaurant windows, encouraging them to get tested, and now, vaccinated, at sites set up by Unidos en Salud. The operations feel different from the sites run by the city. Clients can drop in, and they don’t need to show ID. Most are low-income Latino residents of the Mission and other neighborhoods in the city’s southeast quadrant, which has been particularly hard hit by the coronavirus.

Over the course of the pandemic, San Francisco has stood out for its ability to keep COVID at bay. As of March 15, about 450 people had died from the virus in a city of almost 900,000, the lowest rate of any major US city. Los Angeles’ and Manhattan’s death rates were more than four times higher. This success was due in part to aggressive actions by the local and state governments, and a populace that embraced mask-wearing and took social distancing seriously.

Jon Jacobo, LTF’s health committee chair

Jacobo, who grew up in the Mission as the son of Salvadoran immigrants, could relate. “We understand it because we come from it, right? I didn’t have to study poverty, and the pain of hunger and not eating, or living seven people in a one-­bedroom,” he says. “I lived the shit.”

Over the course of four days, each of the 1,400 houses in the neighborhood received an average of five door knocks. By the last day, “people were slamming the door, saying, ‘I have an appointment! Leave me alone!’” Jones recalls. Meanwhile, Havlir went about securing viral and antibody tests from the Chan Zuckerberg Biohub, a nonprofit research group funded by the Facebook billionaire.

So it was that just six weeks into the city’s lockdown, 3,100 Mission residents and workers—representing a remarkable 57 percent of households in the census tract—showed up for open-air tests over the course of four days. The study increased the number of tests administered within the city by 29 percent.

“We made the pain undeniable,” Jacobo says of the April surveillance study.

The results were as eye-opening as the testing effort had been herculean. Of the people tested, 41 percent were Latino, and 41 percent were white. Yet 96 percent of those who tested positive were Latino, 88 percent made less than $50,000 a year, and 93 percent worked in jobs that didn’t enable them to shelter in place. “We made the pain undeniable,” Jacobo says. Today, it seems obvious that the coronavirus’s path would map the city’s disparities, “but at the time, we knew so little about this virus, it floored us,” remembers Hillary Ronen, the city supervisor who represents the Mission. “It was looking at the results and saying, ‘Wait a minute, more than 90 percent of the people that tested positive worked outside of the home?’”

The findings, which were among the first in the nation to quantify the disparate toll of the virus, garnered national attention. Shortly after the results were shared with the Department of Health, the city announced it was opening its testing sites to all essential workers and to symptomatic residents who couldn’t otherwise get tested, after having previously been open only to frontline medical workers and the most vulnerable. The LTF team began negotiating with city officials, advocating a permanent drop-in testing site in the Mission.

Volunteers with Unidos en Salud canvassed the Mission over the winter to sign up residents for coronavirus testing.

They also met with Ronen, relaying the hesitancy they had heard from so many residents. It wasn’t enough to offer testing, the organizers said. To quell the spread of the virus in vulnerable communities, you must ensure that residents have the ability to stay home. Based on suggestions from LTF, Ronen established a Right to Recover program in May, which used philanthropic money to provide two weeks of replacement wages, amounting to $1,285, to people who’d tested positive and had to isolate, regardless of their immigration status. “We made it up on the fly,” Ronen says. Alameda County, which includes Oakland, soon developed a similar program.

Meanwhile, the Latino Task Force blossomed, channeling the manifold skill sets and resources of its core members. LTF’s Roberto Hernandez, who orchestrates the Carnaval San Francisco festival over Memorial Day weekend, shifted gears to source pallets of food and 50-pound bags of rice and oatmeal to offer groceries to families in need from a former warehouse known as Latino City Hall. In early July, the group, in partnership with the city, established a flagship testing site outside the food hub, where, once a week, residents could drop in for a free test.

On Thursday mornings, Tulier-Laiwa, who is part Apache, leads a 9:15 a.m. prayer circle at the hub, burning sage in the middle of the street. By 10 a.m., tents have popped up, medical personnel have arrived in full PPE, and a line of people waiting to be tested has formed. The food pantry, which now serves 7,000 families a week, stocks pinto beans, cuts of meat, and the popular Maseca masa brand. On the second floor of the warehouse, volunteers on laptops help residents who drop by to apply for rental assistance, unemployment benefits, and food stamps. Translation is available not only for Spanish speakers, but also for people who speak Indigenous Mexican languages.

In September, Unidos en Salud introduced rapid tests. “When you think about it in terms of who’s coming to test here, you’re probably on your way to work, you’re probably on your way to a congregate living situation. So the sooner you know, the quicker we can help mitigate that spread,” Jacobo says. Test samples are sent to the Biohub for sequencing, generating data that has been key to tracking the infectivity of different viral strains.

Maria Del Prosario awaits a test at her home in the Mission.

Unidos en Salud tests Prosario and her family members at their home in the Mission.

People who test positive immediately receive a phone call from Unidos en Salud’s community wellness team. If someone doesn’t have a room in which to isolate, they’re offered a spot in a hotel, paid for by the city. If they live with at least five other people, the team will come to test everyone else in their household. The team also delivers food and other essentials, including diapers, formula, and cleaning supplies, to people who are self-isolating. “You have to get into people’s business,” Jones says. “You’re asking financial questions, asking if they need money help, food help.” In January, when the Mission experienced a surge of infections, the team provided support to 500 families, averaging 15 food deliveries a day.

Shortly after smoke from wildfires wreaked havoc on her asthma in September, Lizette, a mother of two, came down with COVID. After she tested positive at the food hub’s testing site, she worried about what would happen to her sons if she got seriously ill. “It was chaos in my head,” she recalls. The wellness team gave her $1,250 to get her through the month and delivered large bags of produce and meat for every person in her family for two weeks.

Over the past year, the Latino Task Force has also partnered with the city and other community organizations to expand to four more locations outside the Mission, including the Latino-heavy Excelsior and the predominantly Black Bayview. “We say, ‘Take whatever you want from us and make it fit for your community,’” Tulier-Laiwa says. “You throw your flavor on it.”

Testers swab 10-year-old Anthony Herrera as part of Unidos en Salud’s April 2020 surveillance study.

The initiative’s progress was not without its struggles, which mirrored the colliding interests of the residents of this gentrifying city. It took months of negotiations before the city’s Department of Health agreed to allocate coronavirus tests to the Latino City Hall site on a weekly basis. Even then, the number of tests that the city committed to changed week by week, depending on the city’s supply. “It was very contentious,” Tulier-­Laiwa says. “My blood pressure would go up every week because they were not giving us adequate resources.” Tests were in short supply, and “we were getting a lot of white folks in Patagonia,” Jacobo remembers. “We were trying to get undocs. We had to do some lifting [of] the social conscience. I’m like, ‘Bro, if you need it, I don’t care what color or creed you are. But at the same time, if you’re a tech worker and you want to see friends, this ain’t really for you.’”

“I’m like, ‘Bro, if you need it, I don’t care what color or creed you are. But at the same time, if you’re a tech worker and you want to see friends, this ain’t really for you.’”

In April, the city set up two large centralized testing sites, but they weren’t particularly easy to get to from highly affected neighborhoods, and they asked residents to make an appointment online and produce ID. A Mission Local review of a week’s worth of testing data in January found that one site, on the Embarcadero overlooking the bay, administered a little more than half of the city’s tests. Of those, just 4 percent were positive. Meanwhile, the Unidos en Salud site in the Mission, with a fraction of the testing capacity, accounted for between 16 and 46 percent of the city’s positive tests on any given day.

“It’s almost like having a fire in the southeast sector, but having a fire brigade over by the Embarcadero kind of put working on a little car fire,” Jacobo says. It wasn’t until November that the city opened a large drop-in site to serve the city’s southeastern neighborhoods. “It did take some time to get there,” acknowledged Dr. Naveena Bobba, the public health department’s deputy director. “I think we’ll have to look at Embarcadero on an ongoing basis and see: Do we want to keep that fully opened? Or do we need to shift our resources?”

San Francisco Mission community members line up outside of the LTF hub in the Mission, which provides free testing, vaccination registration, food distribution, and other essential services.

At the LTF food and resource hub, Lourdes Beltran of Mission Hiring Hall helps community members apply for jobs.

Another pain point was money. Unidos en Salud had managed to cobble together donations from philanthropies, but the community wellness teams relied predominantly on volunteers. The Right to Recover fund, paid for by private donors, repeatedly ran out of funding. Finally, in December, the city agreed to support the wellness teams; in February, it committed to funding the Right to Recover effort until the pandemic ends. “I am convinced that it’s the full credit of the Latino Task Force that the city moved towards bringing the testing, bringing the vaccines to the people, as opposed to making the people go to the vaccines,” Ronen says.

“I am convinced that it’s the full credit of the Latino Task Force that the city moved towards bringing the testing, bringing the vaccines to the people, as opposed to making the people go to the vaccines,” Mission District Supervisor Hillary Ronen says.

Unidos en Salud’s influence has stretched outside the city’s borders as it’s partnered with organizations serving a Latino neighborhood in the affluent, predominantly white county of Marin and a farmworker community in the Central Valley. The expansion is one of 69 projects across the country to receive funding from the National Institutes of Health to address coronavirus disparities. Taveras’ team, another grant recipient, rolled out a suite of coronavirus testing units that target predominantly Latino communities outside of Boston. Like Unidos en Salud’s, the model aims to break out of the confines of the brick-and-mortar doctor’s office. She says, “We are really, really focused on this idea of flipping that model of ‘The doctor will see you now’ to ‘The patient will see you now.’”

As vaccines started to trickle into San Francisco early this year, Unidos en Salud surveyed those coming in for testing about their attitudes toward vaccination. “You were seeing these narratives out there, that communities of color are anti-vaxxer, they have mistrust, they don’t want to get vaccinated,” Jones says. “You knew where that was going to go: It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, and it’s an excuse for why vaccine resources are not going to be in communities of color.”

Contrary to prevailing narratives, Mission residents are enthusiastic about getting vaccinated. Of more than 4,400 residents surveyed, 86 percent said they would probably or definitely get the vaccine when it became available—much higher than the national average. The survey also looked at who participants trusted to provide information related to the vaccine. In first place were doctors, followed by the Latino Task Force. When shots were about to be available, Unidos en Salud emailed qualifying people who had tested at their sites over the past year, following up with a phone call if needed. “We could slice and dice the information we gathered since April: Who the 65-year-olds were, who lived in these zip codes that we were prioritizing, who are people of color, or who were community health workers,” Jones says.

John Salisbury, a longtime Mission resident, came to the Unidos en Salud vaccination site after having trouble securing an appointment with his doctor.

After the year he’d just witnessed, Jacobo remained concerned that the same working class people from the Mission whose communities suffered disproportionately from COVID would also face barriers in getting the vaccine. As of March 1, only 9 percent of the vaccines administered to San Francisco residents 16 or older had gone to Latinos, even though they make up 14 percent of the city. So the Latino Task Force doubled down on its recruitment efforts. Volunteers canvassed restaurants in the Mission to sign up cooks, dishwashers, and other essential workers for upcoming spots.

By the first day that food workers were eligible, about 1,500 people were on the vaccination waitlist. Jacobo attributes these numbers to trust that the initiative has accrued, slowly but surely. “From the beginning, it was the credibility of some of the core organizers—before anybody knew what the Latino Task Force was—that gives it the trust,” he says. “Then people can say, ‘That’s a good place, they’ll take care of you.’ Which leads to the attitudes. It’s the secret sauce.”

Susana Rojas, who runs the Unidos en Salud community wellness team with her daughter, was among the canvassers. At one restaurant, the owner, who was working the register, told her he wasn’t interested in getting his employees vaccinated. As she walked away, a cook looked up and asked what she was doing. She explained she was signing people up for vaccinations. “He’s like, ‘You’re from the Latino Task Force, huh?’” Rojas recalled. She said she was. The cook said, “I’ll do it. Con ustedes, sí.” With you, yes.

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