enterprise THE DAVIS
FRIDAY, AUGUST 14, 2020
County takes input on Road 32A railroad crossing
Chris Scull, who was incarcerated at San Quentin for 22 years and released last month, tested positive for COVID-19 in June while in prison. Scull now lives in transitional housing in Hayward and experienced a second lockdown after one of his housemates tested positive for the virus.
BY ANNE TERNUS-BELLAMY Enterprise staff writer
known to be infected. Scull, 42, didn’t have time to finalize his parole plan before he was released. “It was very chaotic,” Scull said. “All my support team, my employment, everything is in the Bay Area.” But he was taken to the motel in Los Angeles County with little oversight or guidance on what to do. “When I got released, I took it on myself to track down the parole agent,” he said. While he quarantined in the
Nearly three years after safety concerns prompted the Union Pacific Railroad to ask the state to close the railroad crossing on County Road 32A just east of the city of Davis, designs have been drawn up for moving the crossing further east and the county is seeking the public’s input on those options. On the table are three preliminary alternatives, two of which are atgrade crossings moved closer to the Yolo Causeway and one of which is an overcrossing that would be located a half-mile east of the current crossing. Estimated construction costs range from $5.35 million for a new atgrade crossing to $18.5 million for the bridge crossing. The county will host an online open house on Monday, Aug. 31, where participants can ask questions of the project team and provide feedback on the various alternatives. Written comments will be accepted through Sept. 4. The road to this point began back in October 2017 when Union Pacific filed an application with the state Public Utilities Commission seeking to alter, close or relocate the crossing on Road 32A. In its application to the PUC,
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ANNE WERNIKOFF/ CALMATTERS PHOTO
Virus-hit prisons release thousands BY ROBERT LEWIS CalMatters Christopher Scull has vivid memories of early summer at San Quentin State Prison. During the worst of the prison’s coronavirus outbreak, which has infected more than 2,200 inmates, it seemed like the “man down” siren blared every half hour, signaling a medical emergency. The other inmates dropped to the ground while staff rushed by, carrying out a sick prisoner in a wheelchair or on a gurney.
Desperate to control the outbreak at California’s overcrowded prisons, state officials opened the gates to thousands of prisoners like Scull, including many before their scheduled release date. Scull, who tested positive for the virus in June but had minor symptoms, was released from San Quentin in mid-July after serving 22 years for carjacking and robbery. He said officials expedited his release by several weeks, sending him to a motel in Gardena, south of Los Angeles, to quarantine and recover.
From the start of the pandemic through the end of this month, California will release more than 11,000 prisoners early — largely nonviolent offenders with less than a year to serve — reducing the prison population to a 30-year low. Overwhelmed by the volume, California’s patchwork reentry system is scrambling to find transportation, housing, food and other services for released prisoners, many of whom were exposed to the virus. As of this week, the state had released more than 300 inmates
COVID update: Library opening up
Andrew Cullen enters contest for open school board seat BY JEFF HUDSON Enterprise staff writer Andrew Cullen filed candidacy papers for the Davis school board on Aug. 5. There are three Davis school board seats on the ballot in the Nov. 3 election — Cullen is seeking the “short term,” at-large position, which basically consists of filling the remainder of the term begun in 2016 by former trustee Cindy Pickett (who moved from Davis to Chicago this summer for a job at De Paul University). Cullen and the other contender who has filed
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candidacy papers (Vigdis Asmundson) are seeking to fill out the two years remaining in Pickett’s term. Cullen, 28, told the Enterprise that he grew up in the Marin County community of San Rafael, and attended the College of Marin (where he served as an instructional assistant and lab technician) and then UC Berkeley, earning an undergraduate degree in chemistry and a master’s degree in public health. He settled in Davis about four months ago. Cullen acknowledged that while he is not yet 30,
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BY ANNE TERNUS-BELLAMY Enterprise staff writer
“I’ve worked in CULLEN higher Two-year gig education, and now at a research institution for the last six years. I have a strong interest in public education, and I’ve done a lot of volunteering. Now I have some time to give back” to the field of education and the community, he said. Cullen has been working since 2018 at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. “I do emergency planning, mostly for emergency
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After reporting nearly 140 new COVID-19 cases on Monday and Tuesday of this week, the county reported a total of just 30 on Wednesday and Thursday.
County spokeswoman Jenny Tan had said Tuesday there might be spikes in the number of cases reported through the end of the week as a backlog of cases was cleared by the state, but 20 new cases were reported on Wednesday and just 10 on Thursday.
The county’s test positivity rate dropped to 5.97 percent at the same time. The backlog in cases was caused by issues with the state’s electronic data reporting system, resulting in the underreporting
SEE COVID, PAGE A5
UCD enrolling participants for vaccine trial BY CALEB HAMPTON Enterprise staff writer UC Davis Health announced Wednesday it will participate in a global study of an investigational vaccine against COVID-19. The study, which involves roughly 30,000 participants at 120 sites around
the world, is led by Pfizer, the American pharmaceutical giant, in partnership with the German company BioNTech. In the coming days, UC Davis Health anticipates enrolling as many as 200 participants for a clinical trial, the medical
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