San Francisco reportedly removed encampments sheltering homeless people in downtown ahead of an upcoming international summit where President Joe Biden will meet Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Homelessness has long plagued San Francisco, according to a 2022 count conducted by the city that showed around 3,400 people sleep in a shelter while about 4,400 people sleep on the streets on any given night in the northern California city. 

This week, homeless people have been moved to parts of the city far from the location of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit next week, the New York Post reported. 

The summit will be the city’s largest international event since dignitaries gathered to sign the charter creating the United Nations in 1945, according to the Associated Press.

“They started clearing the tents earlier this week and there is definitely a lot more police presence,” South of Market resident and activist Ricci Lee Wynne told The Post.

An aerial view of San Francisco’s first temporary sanctioned tent encampment for the homeless on May 18, 2020 in San Francisco, California.Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

San Francisco reportedly focused on moving encampments in South of Market and Tenderloin that sheltered the homeless as well as people reportedly abusing fentanyl and heroin. 

Crews working with the city and police officers asked homeless people to move away from the area surrounding the Moscone Center, NBC Bay Area reported. A video report published by the news channel showed a homeless man gathering his belongings to move presumably to a shelter.

“They’ve cleared out the tents that were near the Moscone Center on Howard Street, which tells me the city had the capability to do this all along — instead they just do the bare minimum,” Lee Wynne told the Post. 

Lee Wynne continued: “Once APEC is gone, police presence will start to simmer down again, the tents will return. And it will slowly flare up again. What we need is a permanent solution.”

The Messenger reached out to San Francisco Mayor London Breed’s office for comment.

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San Francisco opened a safe parking site at Candlestick Point in January 2022, saying it would hold up to 155 recreational vehicles and provide residents there with badly needed services.  

Since then, though, the Bayview Vehicle Triage Center has fallen far short of those projections. Lack of electricity has hobbled the site, necessitating the use of polluting diesel generators and limiting the vehicles it can serve to 35.

At that level, the annual cost per vehicle spot is roughly $140,000 — “by far the most expensive homeless response intervention” in San Francisco, according to a budget analysis prepared for the Board of Supervisors.

Still, the supervisors’ Homelessness and Behavioral Health Select Committee on Friday unanimously recommended the city extend the shelter’s lease for another two years, at a cost of $312,000 a year — not including millions in operating costs.

The move means San Francisco will shell out at least another $12.2 million to fund the site and its operations, assuming the full board approves the committee’s recommendation.

“This is an expensive endeavor, but it will be more expensive — and we cannot afford the alternative — of leaving the unhoused and housed, quite frankly, to fend for themselves,” Supervisor Shamann Walton said. He voted yes along with committee members Hillary Ronen and Rafael Mandelman.

The saga of the program and the tensions it has ignited highlight the city’s ongoing struggle to house its poorest residents. Last year San Francisco estimated that 4,400 people were homeless and unsheltered, with about a quarter of them sleeping in RVs or other vehicles. 

In July, city officials counted 1,058 inhabited vehicles across San Francisco — nearly half located in District 10, which includes Bayview-Hunters Point and Candlestick Point. Many vehicle owners had parked along Hunters Point Expressway near the site of Candlestick Park, which once housed the Giants and 49ers, leading to concerns from residents.

“We had an extremely untenable situation in the Candlestick area,” said Walton, who represents District 10. “Dozens of vehicles occupied by individuals and families as well. No restroom facilities, no showers, no coordinated services, blockage of roadways. Trash and waste also added to the issue.”

The city opened the Vehicle Triage Center, or VTC, in January 2022 at the boat launch parking lot of the Candlestick Point State Recreation Area, following a pilot project at another site on San Jose Avenue, which had spots for 29 vehicles. For the pilot project, the city spent $1,793,003 — or $61,828 per spot. 

“There’s a lot that goes into making it a safe, dignified location,” said Emily Cohen, deputy director of the city’s Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing.

That included buying or renting shower and bathroom trailers and hand-washing stations, and providing potable water and plumbing. “Those costs are expensive,” Cohen said.

The Bayview VTC ran into immediate problems. While it was supposed to hold up to 155 vehicles, the city lacked adequate electricity. The city contracted with Pacific Gas and Electric Co. to power the site, but nearly two years later, officials said it still doesn’t have power needed to run at capacity.

Both Walton and Supervisor Hillary Ronen blasted PG&E for its service at the site, criticizing the company as “evil” and “a big part of the problem.”

In a lengthy statement, a PG&E spokesperson pushed back, saying that the project was “not delayed in any way.”

The spokesperson said that initially, in July 2021, San Francisco applied for a temporary service connection at 500 Hunters Point Expressway for a COVID-19 testing facility. The project was delayed because the city didn’t get equipment delivered on time. Permits were issued to complete the work in January 2023, but a month later the city pulled its application for the project.

Months later, PG&E said, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission applied for a new service connection at the same address for a different use — a site serving people living in vehicles.

“The SFPUC’s application was missing key information and was not deemed complete until Aug. 15, 2023,” the PG&E spokesperson wrote. “PG&E is now estimating the cost of the requested interconnection for the SFPUC. Federal regulations governing interconnections between utilities allow 45 business days to complete estimates. PG&E is on track to provide its estimate within the regulatory timeline.”

Lacking power, the city turned to the diesel generators, sparking a federal lawsuit from residents who said they violate the Clean Air Act. The city subsequently began replacing the generators with solar-powered pole lights, but the site still does not have adequate electricity.

The city has spent at least $8.6 million on the program, according to estimates from the city homelessness department, and because of the lack of power has to deliver fresh meals to the site daily, which Cohen said “is very expensive.” 

The center has served 115 people since it opened, she said. According to a July city presentation, her agency has made 13 placements from vehicles at the site into permanent housing, with two more expected. It wasn’t clear how many people were housed in these placements.

Cohen defended the expenses, and residents of the shelter who attended Friday’s committee hearing said it provided security and services they wouldn’t find elsewhere.

“If I hadn’t found this place and been able to stay there, I would probably have 15 to 20 tickets for failing to move on time for the street cleaners,” said Charles Wesley Keener, a 63-year-old resident of the site.

Another resident, Mark Noti, said that but for the VTC, he would probably be living on the streets.

“It makes me feel safe that I have someplace to go, that my vehicle isn’t going to be towed — because it doesn’t run and they have people coming through there that are helping me to get it running,” he said.

“There’s good parts and bad parts in this thing,” he said. “I see more good in it than bad. So for me, it helps me because I’m safe here. And to move my vehicle — I couldn’t do it. They would tow it. And then what do I have? I don’t have anything.”

Some neighbors, though, have lost patience with the venture. Several called into the committee hearing, saying the center had failed to meet its basic objectives and was “fiscally irresponsible,” and criticizing the low number of referrals to permanent housing.

“At less than one placement per month, it would be more cost-effective to provide each VTC client with a monthly rental stipend,” wrote Marsha Maloof of the Bayview Hill Neighborhood Association in a letter to supervisors opposing continued operation of the site. “It is inconceivable that the City would continue to extend such a program with metrics of success at this level.”

Another caller noted that the average length of time residents stayed at the center was more than 200 days.

“It’s not triage,” he said. “This is basically warehousing folks, keeping them there for the long term.”

Reach St. John Barned-Smith: stjohn.smith@sfchronicle.com

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A proposed research and development biotech campus at 101 Gull Drive has received approval from the South San Francisco Planning Commission to add building height and parking to plans.

The changes call for increasing the building from seven to nine stories and adding two levels to the parking garage, according to a staff report. The site is on 3.8 acres of property in the city’s East Side neighborhood and proposes the building go from around 166,000 square feet to 281,000 square feet. The proposal now calls for 574 spots instead of 419, going from the minimum standards required in a project to the maximum. According to a staff report, the project will reach around 160 feet tall. Developer Sanfo Group asked the Planning Commission to amend its 2022 approved entitlements at an April 20 meeting. The commission agreed to the changes without any criticism.

“I do like the project, and I will approve it,” Vice Chair Norm Faria said.

The proposal would develop what is now a vacant 3.7-acre lot surrounded by industrial uses into a research and development site not far from Oyster Point Marina and Genentech. The lot was sold in 2020 for $14.9 million. The project developers received the first approval in 2022. Commissioner John Baker asked that the developer and tenants try to promote alternative transportation for people using the site. He noted that while he wanted to reduce parking, inconsistent developmental planning on the city’s east side makes it necessary. Chair Alex Tzang applauded the designs that made the massing look much smaller than it actually is.

“It’s quite easily an approvable project,” Tzang said.

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By Jack Rogers

August 15, 2023 at 06:12 AM

Company sold 20-acre Bay Area property to e-retail giant in 2021.

San Mateo-based SteelWave has filed plans to redevelop a 20-acre site in Pleasanton that it sold to Amazon two years ago.

The developer is planning to build a 300K SF mixed-use campus at the Bay Area site on El Charro Road on the east side of Pleasanton, according to a report in the San Francisco Business Times.

The plans call for two industrial buildings encompassing 131K SF and 156K SF, respectively, and a two-story 12K SF commercial building that will be suitable for office or retail use.

In the fall of 2021, SteelWave and Lionstone Investment Group sold the Pleasanton property, along with six other parcels to Amazon, which at the time was planning to build a large distribution center there.

The plans filed this month will necessitate rezoning the property from agricultural use and will require approval from Pleasanton’s planning commission and the city council. The project also would require approval from Alameda County because it sits within an unincorporated portion of the county.

The company did not disclose whether it is planning to repurchase the land from Amazon.

Last fall, SteelWave unveiled plans to build a $241M life science on a site spanning two city blocks in West Berkeley. The project envisions the renovation of three buildings on a 3-acre site on 5th Street, between Bancroft Way and Allston Way, transforming them into campus that will be known as theLAB.

The developer also is planning to build a five-story, 415-space parking garage next doorto  theLab. Nine structures are being demolished or moved to make way for the project, including a 144-year home on Fifth Street.

According to a report in berkeleyside, SteelWave has lined up two tenants, Bolt Threats and Conception Bio for theLab, which is scheduled to open in 2024.

SteelWave acquired the West Berkeley site in January 2021, also is planning to build two more theLAB campuses in Emeryville and Foster City.

The design for theLAB Berkeley includes exposed bow-truss ceilings and an expansive indoor-outdoor mezzanine overlooking San Francisco Bay. The facility also will include an amphitheater lab and a boutique gym.

SteelWave is converting the Sherwin building in Emeryville into theLAB Emeryville. The adaptive reuse of the building will include large-scale cosmetic renovations, structural upgrades, full building core replacement and new installation of mechanical, electrical and plumbing infrastructure.

The Emeryville campus also will feature a penthouse and “pass-through” pedestrian and bicycle access.

The Foster City development will be home to a three-story Class A building on a 2.2-acre site. The campus will feature a third-floor rooftop terrace that offers extensive views of the San Francisco Peninsula.

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RENO, Nev. (AP) — Environmentalists, ranchers and others have battled lithium mining projects in Nevada for years. But opposition to mining a particular area of ​​desert to extract the silver-white metal used in electric car batteries comes from an unlikely place: outer space.

An ancient lake bed in Nevada beckons as a vast source of the coveted metal needed to generate clean electrical energy and fight global warming. But NASA says the same location — flat as a tabletop and undisturbed like no other in the western hemisphere — is essential for calibrating the crisp measurements from hundreds of satellites orbiting overhead.

At the request of the Space Agency, the US Bureau of Land Management has agreed to remove 36 square miles (92 square kilometers) of eastern Nevada Territory from its inventory of federal lands open for potential mineral exploration and mining.

According to NASA, the long, flat stretch of land above the undeveloped lithium deposit in Nevada’s Railroad Valley has been used for almost three decades to get just the right measurements to keep satellites and their applications working properly.

“No other site in the United States is suitable for this purpose,” the Bureau of Land Management concluded in April after receiving NASA’s information on the area 250 miles (400 kilometers) northeast of Las Vegas.

The bureau has spent nearly three years fighting mining challenges of all kinds from environmentalists, tribal leaders, ranchers and others seeking to de-permit a massive lithium mine in northwestern Nevada near the Oregon Line.

In December, the bureau initiated a review of plans for another lithium mine that conservationists oppose near the California border, where an endangered desert wildflower grows, about 230 miles (370 kilometers) southeast of Reno.

In Railroad Valley, satellite computations are critical for capturing information broadcast from space, with wide-ranging applications ranging from weather forecasting to national security to agricultural prospects and natural disasters, according to NASA, which said the satellites are “vital and often time-sensitive provide information on each aspect”. of life on earth.”

This increasingly includes the certification of measurements related to climate change.

Critics say this is the Nevada desert paradox. While lithium is the main ingredient in electric vehicle batteries and is a key contributor to reducing greenhouse gases, in this case the metal is buried underground. NASA says it needs to be left undisturbed to confirm the accuracy of satellites that monitor Earth’s warming atmosphere.

“As our country becomes increasingly impacted by an evolving and changing environment, it is critical to have reliable and accurate data and images of our planet,” said Mark Moneza of Planet Labs, a San Francisco-based technology company Satellite imaging that has relied on NASA site to calibrate more than 250 of its satellites since 2016.

A Nevada congressman introduced legislation earlier this month aimed at overturning the bureau’s decision to remove the land from potential mining use. Republican Representative Mark Amodei told a House subcommittee last week that the decision underscored the “hypocrisy” of President Joe Biden’s administration.

“Supposedly, a goal of the Biden administration is to advance the development of renewable energy technologies and reduce the carbon content in our atmosphere,” Amodei said. “Nevertheless, they support blocking a project to develop the lithium needed for their clean energy goals.”

Carson City, Nevada-based 3 Proton Lithium Inc., which owns most of the mining claims, had no formal project plans in 2021 when NASA requested the land withdrawal. However, the company said it was conducting extensive research into future plans to mine the brine-based lithium resource, which it said is one of the top 10 deposits in the world.

Chief Executive Kevin Moore said withdrawing from the area will likely prevent his energy company from pumping the “supersoles” out of about a third of its claims there, including the deepest and highest-producing reservoirs, which account for about 60% of the site’s value. Along with Amodei, he testified before the House Subcommittee on Mines and Natural Resources last week.

“This project is an integral part of transitioning to a green economy, creating high-paying American jobs, fighting climate change, ending America’s over-reliance on foreign adversaries, and securing a domestic supply chain for critical and rare earth elements,” Moore said .

Other opponents of the BLM push include James Ingraffia, founder of energy exploration company Lithium Arrow LLC. In previous public comments, he told the bureau that erecting barriers to lithium mining in Railroad Valley would undermine efforts to combat climate change.

“Basically what you’re doing is, ‘There is a problem that we want to continue to worry about, but we WILL NOT allow it to be solved,'” he said. “It’s contradictory.”

3 Proton Lithium insists its brine pumping operations would cause little to no land-surface disturbance. But NASA doesn’t think the risk is worth it.

The pristine nature of the area has enabled NASA to create a long record of images of the undisturbed topography to aid in the precise measurement of distances using radio signal propagation times and to ensure “absolute radiometric calibration” of sensors on board satellites.

“Activities that could affect the surface integrity of Railroad Valley would render the site unusable,” Jeremy Eggers, spokesman for NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, told The Associated Press.

“The final decision was to protect Railroad Valley, which in turn protects the critical scientific data that multiple sectors of the economy depend on,” he said in an email Thursday.

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Rescuers in a remote area of ​​the Atlantic Ocean fought against time on Tuesday to locate five people assigned to document the wreck of the Titanic.

Authorities reported Sunday night that the carbon fiber ship was overdue and launched an international rescue operation in waters about 435 miles (700 kilometers) south of St. John’s, Newfoundland. On board were a pilot, the famous British adventurer Hamish Harding, two members of a legendary Pakistani entrepreneurial family and a Titanic expert.

The submersible, named Titan, had 96 hours of oxygen when it set sail around 6 a.m. Sunday, according to David Concannon, a consultant with OceanGate Expeditions who oversaw the mission.

This means that oxygen supplies could run out by Thursday morning.

CBS News journalist David Pogue, who traveled to Titanic aboard Titanic last year, said the craft uses two systems of communication: text messages sent to a surface ship and security pings sent out every 15 minutes to indicate that the U-Boot da is still working.

Both systems stopped about an hour and 45 minutes after Titan submerged.

“There are only two things that could mean. Either they lost all power or the ship suffered a hull rupture and immediately imploded. Both are frighteningly hopeless,” Pogue told CBC on Tuesday.

The submersible had seven backup systems to return to the surface, including sandbags and lead pipes that fall down, and an inflatable balloon. A system is designed to work even when everyone on board is unconscious, Pogue said.

Experts said rescuers face major challenges.

Alistair Greig, professor of marine engineering at University College London, said submersibles typically have a drop weight, which is “a mass that they can release in an emergency to buoy them to the surface”.

“If there had been a power outage and/or communications failure, that would have happened and the submersible would then be floating on the surface waiting to be found,” Greig said.

Another scenario is a leak in the pressure hull, in which case the prognosis is not good, he said.

“If it’s sunk to the sea floor and can’t get back up on its own, the options are very limited,” Greig said. “While the submersible may still be intact, once it’s beyond the continental shelf there are very few vessels capable of going that deep, let alone divers.”

Even if they could go that deep, he doubts rescuers could get stuck on the sub.

As of Tuesday morning, an area totaling 10,000 square miles had been searched, the US Coast Guard tweeted.

Canadian research icebreaker Polar Prince, which is supporting Titan, was to continue conducting surface searches with the help of a Canadian Boeing P-8 Poseidon reconnaissance aircraft, the Coast Guard said on Twitter. Two US Lockheed C-130 Hercules aircraft also performed overflights.

The Canadian military dropped sonar buoys to listen for Titan’s sounds.

Concannon, who said he should have been present at the dive but was unable to be, said officials are also working to get a remote-controlled vehicle to the site as soon as possible, which can dive to a depth of 6 kilometers.

Archaeologists and marine biologists take part in OceanGate’s expeditions to the Titanic wreck. The company also brings paid employees, known as “mission specialists.” They take turns operating the sonar equipment and doing other tasks in the submersible.

The Coast Guard said on Monday that the Titan had one pilot and four “mission specialists” on board. However, OceanGate’s website suggests that the fifth person may be a so-called “content expert” guiding paying customers.

Authorities have yet to officially identify those on board, although some names have been confirmed, including OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush, who the company says served as a member of the crew.

Rush told The Associated Press in June 2021 that the Titan’s technology is “very cutting edge” and was developed with the help of NASA and aerospace manufacturers.

“This is the only submersible — crewed submersible — that’s made of carbon fiber and titanium,” Rush said, calling it the “largest carbon fiber structure we know of,” with 5 inches of thick carbon fiber and 3.25 inches of titanium.

Harding, who lives in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates, was one of the mission specialists, according to Action Aviation, a company of which Harding is chairman.

Harding is a billionaire adventurer who holds three Guinness World Records, including the longest full-sea depth record in a manned ship. In March 2021, he and marine researcher Victor Vescovo descended to the deepest depths of the Mariana Trench. In June 2022, he flew into space on Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket.

According to a family statement, the Pakistani national Shahzada Dawood and his son Suleman were also on board. The Dawoods belong to one of the most prominent families in Pakistan. Her eponymous company invests nationwide in agriculture, industry and the healthcare sector.

Shahzada Dawood is also a member of the Board of Trustees of the California-based SETI Institute, which searches for extraterrestrial intelligence.

French explorer and Titanic expert Paul-Henry Nargeolet was also on board, according to David Gallo, a senior adviser on strategic initiatives and special projects at RMS Titanic. Gallo identified Nargeolet, a friend who has led several expeditions to Titanic, during an interview with CNN on Tuesday.

Greg Stone, a longtime California-based oceanographer and friend of Rush’s, called the lost submarine “a fundamentally new submarine design” that shows promise for future research. Unlike its predecessors, the Titan was not spherical in shape.

“Stockton was a risk taker. He was smart…he had a vision. He wanted to push things forward,” Stone said.

The expedition was OceanGate’s third annual voyage to document the disintegration of the Titanic, which struck an iceberg and sank in 1912, killing all but about 700 of the approximately 2,200 passengers and crew. Since the wreck was discovered in 1985, it has slowly fallen victim to metal-eating bacteria.

OceanGate’s website listed the “mission support fee” for the 2023 Expedition as $250,000 per person.

Recalling his own voyage aboard Titan, Pogue said the ship was turned around in search of Titanic.

“There is no GPS underwater, so the surface vessel is supposed to guide the sub to the shipwreck by sending text messages,” Pogue said in a segment aired on CBS Sunday Morning. “But on this dive, communication kind of broke down. The sub never found the wreck.”

___

Contributing to this report were Associated Press writers Danica Kirka, Jill Lawless and Sylvia Hui in London, Rob Gillies in Toronto, Olga R. Rodriguez in San Francisco, Jon Gambrell in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, and Munir Ahmed in Islamabad.

Follow @ktar923

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Thermo Fisher Scientific and the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) have partnered to open a new cGMP cell therapy manufacturing facility adjacent to UCSF Medical Center’s Mission Bay campus. The facility will be used by both UCSF researchers and Thermo Fisher Scientific customers.

According to Thermo Fisher Scientific (and many others in the industry), challenges in manufacturing cell therapies — especially at scale — are impeding wider adoption. The partnership was first announced in 2021 with the aim of overcoming some of these difficulties.

“By bringing increased capacity and extensive cell therapy experience to the city of San Francisco, we hope to accelerate the development of advanced cell therapy at UCSF and with the surrounding life sciences community, which is home to more than 200 biotechnology companies.” said Dan Herring, general manager of cell therapy services at Thermo Fisher Scientific. “In the future, we also hope to expand our partnerships with academia and industry focused on cell therapies and industry in the development of novel cell therapies and other immune cell-based therapies to treat patients with blood cancers, as well as those with solid tumors.” to support. ”

The facility will provide process and analytical development capabilities, as well as clinical and commercial cGMP manufacturing services for autologous and allogeneic cell therapies. It includes six individual, user-configurable GMP production suites (with expansion capacity) and self-contained HVAC and associated infrastructure to protect against cross-contamination.

UCSF researchers will use the facility to develop new therapies, with an initial focus on treating glioblastoma, multiple myeloma and other cancers using CAR-T and CRISPR technologies.

As a writer and culture vulture, I have always been fascinated by the power of words to shape our understanding of the world. While initially pursuing a career in the music industry, beginning as a classical pianist and later producing electronic music for record labels around the world, my true passion has always been writing.

Now I write as Associate Editor for the pharmaceutical industry’s diverse audience, covering everything from exciting new scientific research to new facility announcements and more. I am particularly interested in cell and gene therapeutics and the societal impact of drug development.

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OAKLAND — Tensions rose early Thursday when a contractor at a site where an OUSD administration building is being built was confronted with a number of striking Oakland teachers.

The incident came at the beginning of the sixth day of the ongoing Oakland teachers’ strike. Teachers demonstrated outside the district’s new $57 million administrative center being built on the Cole campus at Union Street.

Oakland teachers confront contractors at OUSD Administration Building construction site.

CBS

A video shows the teachers marching in front of the entrance to the construction site. A contractor coming to work slowly pushed his truck towards the protesters as he tried to get in, causing a standoff.

“You can’t block this drive like that. It’s illegal!” The contractor is heard telling the striking teachers that they have refused to move and allow him to cross their border.

The contractor eventually got out of his truck and instead of escalating the confrontation, left the vehicle at the gate.

Teachers argue that the project misuses Action Y funds that could instead be used to address health and safety issues at school sites.

“They are spending $57 million on this project and at the same time the facilities in our schools are deteriorating and we are demanding much-needed facility upgrades,” said striking Oakland teacher Divia Faris. “We have pollutants in a lot of schools, we have sewage leaks, we have roofs that are falling apart. That’s just ironic.”

A sticking point in negotiations between the Oakland Unified School District and the Oakland Education Association — which represents about 3,000 teachers and other employees — remains the “common good” proposals that the striking Oakland teachers are demanding.

School district officials said Wednesday night that the OEA’s proposals would cost more than $1 billion to implement. The teachers claim the district has not held negotiations with them for seven months and that their public service demands include important upgrades for “dilapidated” school facilities that need immediate attention.

With 11 days left in the school year for 35,000 students in the district, time is running out for classes and end-of-year events while the stalemate continues.

The district’s wage proposal on the table includes a retrospective 10 percent increase and a one-time bonus of $5,000 for union members. In addition, it offers every teacher a salary increase of at least 13 percent and even 22 percent.

The offer also cuts the time it takes teachers to get to the top of the pay scale from 32 years to 20 years.

But county officials continue to insist that the union’s proposals to tackle homelessness, use vacant lots and drought-tolerant landscaping should not be part of the negotiation process and are too expensive.

Superintendent Kyla Johnson-Trammell said the teachers’ union would “trust the district with broader societal issues” that were outside their purview.

“While the district agrees that these issues should be addressed, and we are working on many of them, school district budgets alone cannot solve the problems. They require interagency government support,” Johnson-Trammell said in a statement released by the Quarter.

Measure Y, approved by ballot in 2020, allowed the district to issue $735 million in bonds to fund necessary improvements to schools and facilities throughout the district.

The teachers’ union says Measure Y funds will be used to fix sanitation problems that are causing raw sewage to enter classrooms, heating and cooling upgrades, and removal of hazardous materials on campus sites that have reported elevated levels of contaminants in water and soil. could be used.

Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao released a statement Thursday urging both sides to come to an agreement.

“One Oakland means we all work together to achieve the common goal of a unified city—a city where all residents have opportunities to live, work, play and learn. This includes our children, who deserve to be in classrooms and receive a quality education in a safe, just and joyful environment,” the statement said in part. “And that includes our teachers and school district staff whose job it is to educate our greatest asset: Oakland’s youth. We must support the needs of both for the benefit of our communities and the city as a whole.”

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Oakland teachers demonstrated Thursday outside the construction site of OUSD’s new $57 million administrative center under construction on Union Street, arguing that the money should be used to repair classrooms instead.

The district’s wage proposal on the table includes a retrospective 10% increase and a one-time bonus of $5,000 for union members. In addition, each teacher receives a salary increase of at least 13% and even 22%.

The offer also cuts the time it takes teachers to get to the top of the pay scale from 32 years to 20 years.

But county officials continue to insist that the union’s proposals to tackle homelessness, use vacant lots and drought-tolerant landscaping should not be part of the negotiation process and are too expensive.

Superintendent Kyla Johnson-Trammell said the teachers’ union would “trust the district with broader societal issues” that were outside their purview.

“While the district agrees that these issues should be addressed, and we are working on many of them, school district budgets alone cannot solve the problems. They are calling for multi-agency government support,” Johnson-Trammell said in a statement released by the district.

Meanwhile, the teachers claim the district has not held negotiations with them for seven months and that their public service demands include important modernizations for “dilapidated” school facilities that need immediate attention.

According to the teachers’ union, the district is spending millions on a new central administrative center instead of addressing pressing school safety issues.

“Educators wish to note that OUSD is spending $57 million from Measure Y funds on a project that will not directly benefit students or teachers on school sites,” the union said in a statement Wednesday night.

Measure Y, approved by ballot in 2020, allowed the district to issue $735 million in bonds to fund necessary improvements to schools and facilities throughout the district.

“OUSD has been guilty of massive administrative overspending for decades — external audits and reports have consistently confirmed this, but OUSD will not back down,” said Marika Iyer, a high school English and ethnology teacher. “It’s time to prioritize our students’ education, not more high-paying jobs and buildings we don’t need.”

The teachers’ union says Measure Y funds will be used to fix sanitation problems that are causing raw sewage to enter classrooms, heating and cooling upgrades, and removal of hazardous materials on campus sites that have reported elevated levels of contaminants in water and soil. could be used.

It would cost more than $1 billion to implement “common good” proposals called for by the striking Oakland teachers, school district officials said Wednesday night.

With 11 days left in the school year for 35,000 students in the district, the standoff between the Oakland Unified School District and the Oakland Education Association, which represents about 3,000 teachers and other staff, continues.

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Thermo Fisher Scientific continues to establish roots in the Bay Area.

The manufacturer opened the doors to a new cell therapy manufacturing facility adjacent to the University of California-San Francisco Medical Center’s Mission Bay campus and on the university campus.

Exterior view of Thermo Fisher’s new manufacturing facility

Click on the image to see the full-size version

UCSF and Thermo Fisher have partnered since 2021, with the new site focused on manufacturing cell therapeutics for certain cancers, including glioblastoma and multiple myeloma. The new site plans to leverage Thermo Fisher’s manufacturing services expertise to help UCSF accelerate the development of cell therapies and eventually bring them to the clinic, said Dan Herring, general manager of cell therapy services Thermo Fisher, in an interview with Endpoints News.

And herring

“CAR-T cell therapies are advancing at an increasingly early stage. They’re late-stage right now, but we want to be part of the team that pushes them to be more productive in the earlier treatment options,” Herring said.

The facility is 44,000 square feet and includes six production suites that are now operational. According to Herring, the building is a former plumbing parts warehouse and manufacturing facility that was acquired by UCSF. It was converted into a cell therapy manufacturing facility by Thermo Fisher.

There is also space to build six more suites, Herring said, adding that the site will be able to manufacture autologous and allogeneic cell therapies and will have analytical development, standard manufacturing processes and technology transfer capability. He did not confirm the headcount or the cost of the facility to Endpoints.

Herring is optimistic that Thermo Fisher will work even more closely with academic institutions in the future.

“The concept of being close to the patient is really difficult to implement, but also exciting when it succeeds. And I think we’ve achieved that,” he said.

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