Kent German

Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao is “ready, willing and able to cooperate fully” after an FBI investigation resulted in a raid on her home, her lawyer told SFGATE Friday afternoon. In an emailed statement, attorney Anthony J. Brass said Thao “has nothing to hide” and that he has “no information” indicating that the mayor is a target of any investigation. Earlier on Friday, Thao’s office referred all questions from SFGATE to Brass. “It’s unfortunate that she has had to endure the bad optics of having thi…

For 11 years, it was San Francisco’s hometown airline, flying travelers across the country in shiny white aircraft with jocular names like “Let there be flight” and “Jefferson Airplane.” Purplish-pink mood lighting gave the cabin a fun, nightclub-like glow, and passengers could order food right from their seats instead of waiting for the flight attendant’s trolley to roll down the aisle. Virgin America perfectly fit the bold brand that Richard Branson created. But it also reflected the location…

Lake Merritt is one of Oakland’s loveliest spots, especially during the evening golden hour when the “Necklace of Lights”comes to life around the lake. But over the last few weeks, the 126 ornate lampposts that anchor the lake’s signature circle of lights have been the target of vandalism. The city believes thieves are toppling and stealing the almost century-old lampposts and ripping out the wires from the boxes at the bases. It’s a local chapter of a story happening around the country as valu…

Megan Twisk has a mission: to spread her love of the sausage roll throughout the Bay Area and beyond. As a British expat, it’s more than just about sharing good food. It’s a patriotic duty. “It’s the most delicious food on Earth,” she said. “When people talk about the national dish of the U.K., they’ll say fish and chips or chicken tikka masala. But I think, realistically, it’s the sausage roll.” Twisk made that mission a career in 2021 when she started Mrs. Miggins British Bakery with fellow Br…

Highway 1 between Monterey and San Simeon is rightfully one of the most beautiful drives in the country, attracting visitors from all over the world. But the road’s spectacular location, clinging to steep cliffs above the ocean, also makes it prone to landslides, particularly after stormy weather. Since January 2023, when a 500,000-cubic-yard slide closed a stretch of the highway at Paul’s Slide, crews have continuously worked to reopen it, all while dealing with other slides following periods o…

An equipment failure at a Guerneville sanitation facility late Friday and early Saturday morning night caused a nearly 277,000-gallon sewage leak, some of which flowed into the nearby Russian River, officials said. Pam Jeane, assistant general manager of operation and maintenance at Sonoma Water, told SFGATE that last week’s heavy rains caused a power outage at the plant that led to a failure in a valve. Though no one was present at the facility at the time, she said, staff were quickly alerted…

David Talbot knows San Francisco needs a morale boost to escape the “doom loop” headlines and conservative media schadenfreude over the city’s current malaise. And the author, former journalist and San Francisco historian is looking to a 49ers win in Sunday’s Super Bowl against the Kansas City Chiefs as the best vehicle to bring it. “I love San Francisco. I’ve lived here most of my life, and I think the city really is lost,” Talbot told SFGATE in a phone interview last week. “We need the Niners…

I discovered my first East Bay stairway long before I moved to Oakland while I was walking a friend’s dog on a warm spring evening in early 2015. On Oakview Drive, a quiet cul-de-sac in the city’s Oakmore neighborhood, I was delighted to find a public staircase spilling down a steep hill, much like the ones I relished climbing while living in San Francisco. Each creaky wooden step delivered a sweeping view of San Francisco Bay, awash in the honey-golden light of the setting sun. I was thrilled.…

When consulting a public transit map, most riders likely don’t spend much time pondering what they actually look like. But the design of those maps, and the signage that helps passengers find their way in a station, can spark fervent debate in passionate communities. Fonts, colors and how subway lines are arranged are all fodder for blogs, online forums and even books. A new proposal for uniform maps and signage to cover all of the 27 transit agencies around the Bay Area is no exception. Introdu…

The decadeslong battle over the future of People’s Park reached a new flashpoint early Thursday when UC Berkeley seized control of the site, walling it off with shipping containers. The operation, which began in the early hours, marks the university’s most brazen attempt to move ahead with its plans to build housing for students, unhoused people and low-income people on the 2.8-acre park. When the university had previously tried to secure it with a fence in August, protestors quickly pulled it d…

Protesters gathered on Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley on Wednesday morning rallying against the closure of People’s Park just hours before. Starting around 11 a.m., SFGATE saw about 50 people face off with a line of barricades, and a group of police officers blocking access to Haste Street and the park just beyond. Led by speakers with bullhorns, the protesters chanted slogans like, “Whose park? People’s Park!” and, “Hey, hey, ho, ho! These racist cops have got to go!” Organized by a coalition of…

If you’re looking for a sign that Mark Zuckerberg has been binging “The Last of Us,” you needn’t look any further than his massive Kauai estate. There on the northeast shore of Hawaii’s oldest island, the Meta CEO has embarked on a massive construction project that includes two mansions, a village of other buildings and an underground bunker larger than a basketball court. As Wired reported yesterday, the $270 million bonanza, which includes $100 million in building costs and $170 million in lan…

A gun buyback event in Santa Clara County last weekend secured a large haul of weapons far beyond just handguns. In a statement Thursday, Santa Clara County Supervisor Otto Lee said the event, held at San Jose’s Reid-Hillview Airport, collected 408 weapons, with $40,050 distributed to residents in return. County residents also turned in 20 ghost guns, 133 handguns, 275 rifles and one sawed-off shotgun. Also surrendered were a rocket launcher, an Uzi and a collection of assault-style weapons. C…