Daily Republic, Monday, October 3, 2022

Make some chili worthy of Kevin from ‘The Office’ B2

Newsom’s call now: Tracking bills passed in 2022 legislature

By calM atters staff

SACRAMENTO — After eight months, California’s legislative session came to a close on Sept. 1 with a final flurry of frantic activity. Lawmakers rushed to pass hundreds of remaining bills before the clock struck mid night on Aug. 31. For a select few measures, with urgency clauses that allow them to take effect immediately upon the governor’s signature, the votes stretched into the wee hours the next day.

High-profile measures that went to Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom aim to establish Cali fornia as a progressive leader on abortion access, on measures to counter climate change and on transgender health care for minors. These votes took place as campaigns ramp up for 100 of the 120 seats in the Legislature. On several bills, the governor not only signaled his support, but lobbied lawmakers to approve them.

Not every contentious proposal made it through the gantlet: Bills to restrict bail costs, to allow leg islative staff to unionize, and to preserve California’s concealedcarry gun limits all went down to defeat in the final hours. And a bill that would have allowed teen agers to get vaccines without parental permission was pulled without a vote.

Newsom had until Sept. 30 to either sign or veto the bills that did pass – and his choices will likely be more closely watched than ever as speculation builds about whether he is positioning himself to run for president.

Here are some of the interest ing and consequential bills that CalMatters is tracking:

Boosting paid family leave

What the bill would do

SB 951 by Los Angeles Dem ocratic Sen. Maria Elena Durazo increases payments to workers

from the state’s disability and paid family leave programs. Starting in 2025, workers who earn less than about $57,000 a year would be paid 90% of their regular wages, an increase from the current 70%. Other workers also would get a boost, receiving 70% instead of 60% of their wages. The bill would offset some of these costs by removing a cap on workers’ contributions to the program, which currently shields earnings above $145,600.

Who supports it

Groups supporting workers’ rights, child and maternal health, gender equity, retirees, and ben efits for low-income Californians are pushing for the bill.

Who is opposed

No one officially. Last year, Newsom vetoed a similar bill over the costs, but his administration’s been silent on this year’s version. The Department of Finance in

See Bills, Page A8

Florida now worried about supplies after Hurricane Ian

By MiaMi herald

While most Florid ians woke up to a normal Sunday with plans for church, family gatherings and watch ing football, many people in the Southwest Florida coast, the areas most ravaged by Hurri cane Ian, spent the day growing weary, frus trated and angry as they waited for electric ity, gas, water, food and other basic needs.

Some took to social media to vent and plead for help.

“We do not have any help in St. James City, there are so many people here that have com pletely lost everything like elsewhere,” Denise Martinez posted on a Facebook group called The Pine Island Pros pect. “As of this morning, nobody has brought in supplies besides the people trying to get to the island themselves to

check on loved ones or if they still have a home. All of the people on the island need food, water, gas, propane, they do not even have a roll of toilet paper. Something needs to be done today or more people will die. It is a complete war zone down here.”

Gaby Gutman Hall’s post on that same Face book group said: “The devastation is horrific, however as I learned with Hurricane Andrew the first few weeks after the storm is when people need the most help. We are not sure why gov ernment agencies are not providing supplies even if it’s temporary until residents can wrap their head around what happened and what they need to do next.”

A woman on the Fort Myers Beach Island Life Facebook page wrote: “I’m looking for my

See Florida,

Another defeat in Ukraine hits Putin’s ‘forever goals’ in country

By ros K rasny BLOOMBERG NEWS

A new operational defeat for Russia’s forces – this time in a strategic eastern Ukrai nian town – casts further doubt on the “forever” annexation of four occu pied regions by President Vladimir Putin.

tary operation” when Russian forces invaded in February. Kremlin troops pushed westward through the Donbas in the summer, gaining ter ritory through extended ground battles.

By Michael M acagnone CQ-ROLL CALL

WASHINGTON — An empowered conservative majority of the Supreme Court begins a new term next week replete with cases that could reshape how the country consid ers social issues such as race in elections and higher education, after decisions from the last term brought the justices to the forefront of the nation’s politics.

The justices will hear arguments Monday in a courthouse open to the public for the first time since the start of the coronavirus pandemic. Gone is the protective fencing that went up in May when it became public that the conser vative wing would vote to wipe out the land mark 1973 ruling in Roe v. Wade.

Leading up to the term, Chief Justice John

G. Roberts Jr. was among justices who expressed concern in public com ments about damage to the court’s reputa tion from controversial decisions, as polls show Americans increasingly view the court as a polit ical entity pulling the country to the right.

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson joined the court as the nation’s first Black woman justice, but experts do not believe her addition to the court this term will temper the momentum of the 6-3 con servative majority.

Neither will the polit ical fallout from last term’s decisions over turning the constitutional right to an abortion or expanding gun rights, Supreme Court experts say.

‘Not inclined to act modestly’

David Cole, the legal director of the ACLU, said the slate of cases

the court chose to hear this term “shows that the court is not likely to act modestly, or at least is not inclined to act modestly” on hot-button issues like race, elections and free speech.

In October and November, the jus tices will hear cases to reconsider the constitu tionality of affirmative action admissions to col leges and universities; look at what the Voting Rights Act requires for racial represen tation when drawing congressional dis

tricts; and weigh the ability of state courts to rein in legislatures on federal elections.

Supreme Court experts said the court has set itself up to deliver on those issues championed by the conservative legal movement, and the main question is what legal conclusions will garner votes from at least five of the six conservatives.

Irv Gornstein, exec utive director of the Georgetown Law School’s Supreme Court Institute, said last week

See Court, Page A8

Outnumbered and increasingly encircled by Kyiv’s forces, several thousand Russian troops withdrew from Lyman in Donetsk province over the weekend.

Russia’s defense min istry said the troops were moving “to more favorable positions.” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Sunday declared the town, a key logistics hub for Moscow’s troops, “fully cleared.”

Control of Ukraine’s Donbas region, made up of the Donetsk and Luhansk provinces, was a stated goal of Putin’s “special mili

Following sham ref erendums a week ago that were denounced by Ukraine, the U.S. and Europe, Putin on Friday formally “annexed” the two eastern regions, along with Zaporizhzhia and Kherson in Ukraine’s south. Yet Moscow’s forces don’t fully control any of the areas, and are being pushed out of some towns they’ve held for months.

Zelenskyy vowed to press forward with efforts to recapture terri tory. “During this week, there were more Ukrai nian flags in Donbas. It will be even more in a week,” he said in an address to the nation on Saturday night.

Kyle Shanahan ready to lead 49ers against Rams B1

My dream of becoming a Nielsen family is closer than ever

I opened my mailbox last week and was as excited as when Navin Johnson in “The Jerk” saw his name and address (253⅛ Elm St.) in the new phone book. It was a postcard from Nielsen and it read in part:

“Please watch for our mail coming soon. When you’re among the few invited to participate, you’ll have the unique opportunity to take part in important research and have your voice count.”

The buzzwords and phrases leapt off the postcard and hit me in my TV-loving heart. “The few,” “unique opportunity,” “important research,” “have your voice count” – heady stuff! Plus, it was addressed to li’l ol’ me! It read “Fairfield Area Home” – that’s me!

For the uninitiated, Nielsen ratings are the audience mea surement systems operated by Nielsen Media Research that determine the audience size and composition of television pro gramming in the United States using a rating system.

Nielsen Media Research was founded by market analyst Arthur C. Nielsen. His company started releasing ratings for radio shows in 1947. They mea sured the top 20 programs in four areas: total audience, average audience, cumula tive audience, and homes per dollar spent for time and talent. In 1950, Nielsen then moved to television, developing a rating system using the methods he and his company had devel oped for radio.

I watched a lot of TV

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growing up.

Part of that was because, well, I love TV and part of it was because I was a pretty sickly asthmatic kid who was home from school a lot. Some of the shows I liked included, but were not limited to, “Gilligan’s Island,” “Julia,” “Room 222,” “Family Affair,” “Welcome Back, Kotter,” “My Favorite Martian,” “The Jef fersons,” “Bewitched,” “The Flip Wilson Show,” “The Brady Bunch,” “Good Times,” “The Courtship of Eddie’s Father,” “Lost in Space,” “Star Trek” and dozens more.

I remember years ago playing TV trivia with some friends, not a formal game, just us asking each other random questions we came up with about old-school shows, and I kept knockin’ each query outta the park. Finally, in exasper ation, one of my friends asked me, “Did you ever just, you know, go outside and play?”

I had heard about the Nielsen ratings and Nielsen families whose television viewing habits helped shape and drive adver tising and TV programming, but I had no idea how to become a part of such an important mission. One thing I did know that I learned in school, was that when teachers said they needed someone to do something, the overzealous ones who immedi ately shot their hands in the air and said “Pick me!” over and over were rarely chosen.

No, it was best to wait and eventually they would find you. And now it appears the Nielsen folks finally have.

Of course, television has changed dramatically since I was a wheezing third-grader ogling Adrienne Barbeau on “Maude” or laughing so hard I choked at the “The Carol Burnett Show” cast members making each other laugh. In September 2020, Nielsen started compiling a weekly top 10 list of most-watched shows on stream ing platforms.

I think in addition to provid ing information on TV shows that I now regularly watch, I can also offer granular insights and even suggestions that would be beneficial for Nielsen to track if they don’t already.

One thing I would love to weigh in is the whole outof-control Disney+ thing. While Walt Disney has turned several fairy tales into ani mated and live action motion pictures, including “Sleep ing Beauty,” “Cinderella,” “Beauty and the Beast” and

fable, “The Goose that Laid the Golden Eggs.”

Disney seems to think they need to pump out a new Marvel Studios and/or “Star Wars” series or movie every 15 minutes or something. Look, I love Marvel as much as the next guy, but I am now what feels like hopelessly behind. I have not seen “What If,” “Ms. Marvel,” “Hawkeye,” “Moon Knight” or “She-Hulk.” My wife Beth and I just finally watched the movie “Thor: Love and Thunder” a couple of weeks ago.

It is the same story with the “Star Wars” franchise. Back in the Day, we waited three years in-between new “Star Wars” movies. While I am not sug gesting it take that long, at least give us a li’l time to miss you. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, while familiarity breeds contempt. I mean, c’mon, Disney, I’m a geek through and through, but when I’m service, I’m doing this li’l thing I

Another thing I wonder is if they track how often folks pause a show because Mother Nature calls. Back in the day when doing such a thing was still science fiction, the “a commer cial is on sprint to go pee” was a hustling household choreo graphed art form.

Do Nielsen viewers let the powers that be know how many times they started watching something that looked good in the trailer but then they aban doned because at some point it insulted their intelligence?

Or what about this one: how many times viewers fall asleep when binge watching a show and wake up completely lost and have to backtrack?

Probably the biggest thing to track would be just how much time viewers spend hunting for something to watch over the lit erally hundreds of choices on various platforms, only to settle on watching a movie like “A Few Good Men” that they have seen a bajillion times?

So, yes, I want me and my wife to become a Nielsen family, but I am not lobbying for it. The fact that last week we had our names legally changed to Leslie Nielsen and Brigitte Nielsen is strictly coincidental.

Fairfield freelance humor col umnist and accidental local historian Leslie Nielsen aka The Artist Formerly Known as Tony Wade writes two weekly columns: “The Last Laugh” on Mondays and “Back in the Day” on Fridays. Wade is also the author of The History Press books “Growing Up In Fairfield, California” and “Lost Restau rants of Fairfield, California.”

Her beta fish wasn’t allowed to fly; an airline worker babysat it for 4 months

The WashingTon PosT

At the end of her fresh man year at the University of Tampa in May, Kira Rumfola packed her bags and headed to the airport with her favorite roommate: a colorful betta fish named Theo.

Rumfola, 19, was headed home to Long Island for the summer and was happy to be bringing home the little fish that she had bonded with during the months she’d had him. She figured there would be no problem taking Theo onboard the plane in a small portable fish carrier.

“I’d done it before over the holidays with another airline, so I filled the container with water and put Theo in it,” she said.

But there was a problem.

While she was checking her bags for her flight on South west Airlines, customer service agent Ismael Lazo noticed the deep blue and purple fish and explained to Rumfola that the airline’s pet policy allowed only small dogs and cats onboard in carriers. No other pets are per mitted on planes.

“All of my roommates had already gone home for the summer and I had nobody to leave Theo with,” said Rumfola, who is majoring in earlychildhood education at the university.

“I was really sad and won dered what I was going to do,” she said. “He’s my pet.”

Lazo, 35, said he understood Rumfola’s concern for Theo.

“I have two dogs – I wouldn’t want to abandon them some where,” he said. “And I also know how hard it is to leave them when I go out of town.”

So he made a split-second decision to offer his home and his fish-sitting services.

“How about if I take your fish home to live with me and my fiancee until you come back for college in the fall?” he said he told her. “You can text me over

know the first thing about caring for a pet fish, but he was willing to try.

“She gave me her fish kit – some food and some water conditioner – then told me how often to clean the water,” he recalled. “I told her I would do my very best to keep Theo happy.”

Rumfola said she was ecstatic about Lazo’s offer and promised she would check in often over the summer to see how Theo was faring in his tem porary home.

“It was so nice that he would take on the responsibility of watching my fish,” she said. “I knew I’d miss Theo over the summer, but I was thankful to know he’d be cared for.”

Rumfola said she bought Theo at a Tampa pet store last year to keep her and her new

“We’re allowed to have fish as pets, so I really wanted to get one,” she said, noting that she was immediately drawn to the shimmering blue and purple fish with a flowing tail.

“He was such a pretty color and when I got him home, I saw he had a fun little personality,” Rumfola said. “He liked to do laps around his fishbowl.”

Especially after meals.

“I put his bowl on the kitchen island and I noticed that Theo really liked to watch me do dishes,” Rumfola added. “He’d always get excited when I did that.”

It didn’t take long before she looked forward to seeing him after her classes each day.

To abandon him at the airport would have been cruel, Rumfola said. Sending him off to spend a few months with Lazo was the best option avail able and she said she was happy to take it. He seemed like a dependable person.

As soon as she arrived home in New York, she texted Lazo: “Hi Ismael, it’s the girl from the airport with the fish! I was just wondering how he is doing. If you have any questions about Theo please feel free to text me, thank you!”

Lazo quickly responded: “Hey! We are heading to the store to buy him a bigger tank.”

“We enjoyed having Theo around and we also noticed he got excited when my fiancee was doing the dishes,” Lazo said.

He said he didn’t feel sad, though, when Rumfola returned to classes in Tampa in late August and it was time to reunite her with Theo.

“To be honest, I was worried about something happening to him on our watch,” he said. “So I was happy for Kira to have him back.”

When Rumfola went to Lazo’s apartment to pick up the fish, she gave him and his fiancee, Jamee Golub, a store gift card and some candy as a gesture of thanks.

Lazo didn’t realize at the time that he wasn’t the first airport worker to volunteer as a fish-sitter.

In 2018, a customer service team at the Denver Interna tional Airport looked after a woman’s pink betta fish for several days while she took a vacation to California. She abandoned the fish and it ended up in the airport’s lost and found when she wasn’t allowed to take it on a Southwest Airlines flight. Airport employees eventually reunited the pair.

As for Rumfola, she is back on campus, relieved to be reunited with her small aquatic buddy. Theo is swimming laps around the bowl, just as he did at Lazo’s apartment.

“I’m really grateful that he stepped up to help,” she said about Lazo. “Four months is a long time, but Theo seems pretty happy.”

Tony Wade The last laugh

Courtesy illustration

Leslie Nielsen, aka The Artist Formerly Known as Tony Wade, trying to boost his low Nielsen ratings by watching himself.

roommates company in their on-campus apartment during

Kira Rumfola courtesy photo

Kira Rumfola said she’s happy to have Theo back home in her college apartment after their four-month separation.

Downtown Theatre marks return with LunaFest festival after hiatus

FAIRFIELD — Sorop timist of Central Solano County will host its ninth annual LunaFest film fes tival Thursday.

The film festival will return to the Down town Theatre, 1035 Texas St., after a two-year Covid hiatus.

LunaFest is a traveling film festival of award-win ning short films by and about women.

This year’s event includes a complimentary wine and cheese recep tion before the films are viewed. Local women artists and artisans have donated their wares for a prize drawing during the evening.

Proceeds benefit Soroptimist programs that support women and girls, such as domestic violence victim support, women’s literacy, family homeless ness, scholarships, and girls’ life skills.

This season includes eight short films featur ing a variety of stories of reflection, hope and humor, according to a press release. They are intended to challenge our perceptions about the world and our place in it, spark conversations, strengthen connections, and inspire us to be better versions of ourselves.

Soroptimist of Central Solano County is one of nearly 200 hosts of LunaFest this season in the United States and Canada, according to the press release. The festi val’s mission is to support and nurture the inspir ing and often unsung work of talented women film makers. Its goal is to raise money for causes that help, empower and give a voice to women in all walks of life.

Tickets for the viewing are $40, or $30 for viewing from the comfort of your home. For more informa tion, call Lynn Recknagel at 707-484-0321 or send email to legank cer@msn.com.

To purchase tickets or learn more about the films, visit www.lunaf est.org/screenings/ and search for the Fair field event.

Soroptimist of Central Solano County serves the cities of Fairfield and Suisun City and is part of Soroptimist International, a worldwide women’s service organization, the mission of which is to provide women and girls with access to the edu cation and training they need to achieve economic empowerment. Visit www. sicentralsolano.com for more information.

Nut Tree Plaza hosts Halloween fun

The Nut Tree Plaza will once again celebrate Hal loween with some family fun this weekend.

Nut Tree Pumpkin Trail Map will allow vis itors a chance to win a prize after following the Pumpkin Trail through the Nut Tree Plaza and visiting stores from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday.

The 2nd Annual Giant Pumpkin Weigh-off, from noon to 4 p.m. that day, is not just about who has the biggest pumpkin but also about allowing everyone to have some fun.

Planned activities include face painting, a petting zoo, balloon twist ers, a master pumpkin carver and an online drawing for the pumpkin carving class.

Visitors that day will have an opportu nity to donate new and unwrapped toys for the

week The ahead

annual Toys for Tots collection. People may also bring canned, non perishable and packaged donations through Sunday for Vaca Fish Food Pantry, The Vacaville Storehouse and the SPCA of Solano County.

The tally will be announced at the end of the day for the biggest pumpkin in Solano County.

For more information, visit nuttreevacaville.com.

Vaca council candidates face off

A number of commu nity groups have banded together to host a candi dates forum this week for Vacaville City Council candidates.

The forum takes place from 6 to 7:30 p.m. Monday for the District 2 and District 6 council seats in Vacaville.

It is open to the public and is expected to be streamed live.

The League of Women Voters Solano County, Solano Valley Alumnae Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Inc., Theta Pi Chapter of Omega Psi Phi Fraternity Inc., TriCity NAACP and Solano Youth Coalition are spon soring the forum but do not support or oppose any political party or candi date, the agencies said in a press release.

Moderator for the session is writer and col umnist Danette Mitchell. The forum takes place at IEBW Local 1245, 30 Orange Tree Circle in Vacaville. The session will be streamed on the League of Women Voters’ YouTube channel at https://www.youtube. com/channel/UCKsWzz fO8WOe8GB1HCn6FvQ.

The League of Women Voters and the American Association of University Women plan a candidates forum from 7 to 9 p.m. Oct. 12 for Benicia City Council candidates.

That forum will take place at the Benicia Senior Citizen’s Center, 187 E. L St. A recording of the forum will be made avail able a few days later on the League of Women Voters’ YouTube channel.

For more informa tion about the League of Women Voters, its partnerships and pro grams, send an email to lwvsolano@gmail.com or visit http://lwvsola nocounty.org.

Club offers prizes for scarecrows contest

The Fairfield-Suisun, Cordelia and Dixon Rotary clubs are offering big cash prizes for entries into their annual Scare crow Contest.

First place wins $1,000, second place $500 and third place $250.

“This is a great way to raise money for an organization or a school, while creating something truly fun and unique. We have had some great entries in the past includ ing Minion scarecrows, Darth Vadar scarecrows and even Harry Potter scarecrows,” Rotary club member and contest chairman Tom Myers said in a press release.

Businesses are encour aged to enter as well, but are not eligible for cash prizes.

The scarecrows will be displayed at the Rotary Annual Pumpkin Festi val held in conjunction with the Western Railway Museum on the weekends of Oct. 15-16, 22-23 and 29-30. There they will be judged and voted on by people who attend the festival.

There is no entry fee for the contest. Registra tion forms and contest rules are available at https://www.fsrotary.org.

All entry forms are due no later than Friday with scarecrows deliv ered Oct. 14. Only the first 50 entries will be accepted.

For more informa tion about the Western Railway Museum and the Pumpkin Festival, visit https://www.wrm.org.

Pinball show returns to Dixon

More than 200 pinball machines await enthusi asts who want to play at the 26th annual Pin-AGo-Go pinball show at the Dixon Fairgrounds.

The show runs from 2 to 10 p.m. Friday, 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. Saturday and 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday.

No quarters are needed for the machines. Entry fees range from $20 to $30, and half that for anyone 13 or younger or active military with identifica tion. Discounted weekend passes are available.

Proceeds benefit Solano County youth charities. For more infor mation, visit https:// dixonmayfair.com/ event/pin-a-go-go-pin ball-show-2.

Summitt Farm preps for vintage sale

The 10th annual Vintage Sale at Summitt Farm returns this week with repurposed antiques, artisan metal garden decor, pottery, kitchen ware, plants, hardware and other items.

Sellers will come from as far as Oregon and Southern California to display their products.

The Vintage Sale will take place from 4 to 7 p.m. Friday and 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday at Summitt Farm, 7478 N. Meridian Road, outside of Vacaville.

Parking is $10 per car. Admission is free.

For more informa tion, visit the farm’s Facebook page.

Fire council sets Free Green Waste Days

The Green Valley Fire Safe Council will hold the first of three Free Green Waste Days for residents in Green Valley and along Rockville Road.

The event is set for 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturday.

“The purpose of the Free Green Waste Days is to encourage resi dents to carefully remove dry, dead or dying veg etation, remove ladder fuels, and thin dense vegetation to create defen sible space and reduce the risk of catastrophic wildfire,” organizers said in a statement. “In addi tion, defensible space gives firefighters a fight ing chance to safely protect your property when threatened by wild fire and helps reduce the risk of bodily harm to them while they do so.”

Registration is required to participate.

To register, go to www.eventbrite.com/ cc/free-green-wasteevents-for-wildfire-pre paredness-1019699. The

location for the event will be provided to those who register.

Republic Services and Potrero Hills Landfill are sponsoring the event, and Safety Council members and community partners are dedicating their time.

Residents are encour aged to take steps now to prepare their homes for wildfire through home hardening and defen sible space activities.

To learn more visit, https://gvfsc.org.

Genealogy group talks Bay bridges history

The Genealogy Society of Vallejo-Benicia will host a presentation next month on Bay Area bridges.

The speaker will be John V. Robinson, an award-winning writer and photojournalist who has published eight books with a focus on the historic bridges of the San Fran cisco Bay Area.

Robinson specializes in photographing heavy construction work with a focus on bridge con struction and the men and women who do the work. He visits con struction sites and does detailed photo essays of the iron workers, pile drivers, carpenters, labor ers and crane operators who do this demanding and dangerous work. He frequently collects oral histories of the workers.

The presentation will occur in-person at 1:30 p.m. Thursday at the Vallejo Naval and Historical Museum, 734 Marin St., Vallejo. Masks are encouraged but not required. This meeting will not be avail able on Zoom.

For more information, go to https://gsvb.org.

Full roster of gov’t meetings this week

A full slate of gov ernment meetings are scheduled this week with the start of a new month. They are all open to the public.

The list of meet ings includes:

n Suisun-Solano Water Authority Board Execu tive Committee, 9 a.m. Monday, Suisun City Hall, council chamber, 701 Civic Center Blvd. Info: http://ca-sid.civicplus. com/AgendaCenter.

n Solano County Board of Supervisors, 9 a.m. Tuesday, County Govern ment Center, 675 Texas St., Fairfield. Info: www. solanocounty.com/depts/ bos/meetings/videos.asp.

n Fairfield City Council, 6 p.m. Tuesday, City Council chamber, 1000 Webster St. Info: www.fairfield.ca.gov/gov ernment/city-council/citycouncil-meetings.

n Rio Vista City Council, 6 p.m. Tuesday, City Council chamber, City Hall, One Main St. Info: www.riovistacity. com/citycouncil.

n Suisun City Council, 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, City Council chamber, 701 Civic Center Blvd. Info: www.suisun.com/govern ment/city-council.

n Vacaville Parks and Recreation Commission, 6 p.m. Wednesday, City Council chamber, City Hall, 650 Merchant St. Info: www.ci.vacaville.ca. us/government/city-com missions.

n Vacaville School Dis trict Board of Trustees, 6:30 p.m. Thursday, boardroom at Educational Services Center, 401 Nut Tree Road. Info: https:// go.boarddocs.com/ca/ vusdca/Board.nsf/ vpublic?open.

Here’s why Gov. Newsom wielded veto pen with vigor

by John Woolfolk THE MERCURY NEWS

SACRAMENTO —

California Gov. Gavin

Newsom spent the past week working through a stack of hundreds of bills, signing significant legislation on everything from housing to abor tion rights. But he also vetoed more bills than he had in the last two years combined while sending a particular message: Now is no time for California to go on a spending spree.

With inflation, war in Europe and higher interest rates pound ing the stock market, many of Newsom’s veto messages contained a refrain about the uncer tain future finances of a state that has enjoyed record budget surpluses in recent years: “With our state facing lowerthan-expected revenues over the first few months of this fiscal year, it is important to remain dis ciplined when it comes to spending.”

As Newsom wraps up his first term as gover nor, political observers say he’s learned from others’ experience of California’s boom and bust economic cycles.

“Gavin Newsom is clearly a progressive who’s worrying a lot about a recession,” said political analyst Dan Schnur. “He knows from watching his predeces sors that there’s no better way to destroy a gover nor than budget deficits.”

Among the legislation Newsom tackled before Friday’s midnight dead line were bills to crack down on retail thefts, increase family and dis ability leave, support the state’s hiring of people with disabili ties and make it harder to recall elected offi cials. Newsom’s track record on bill signings this year comes with the added scrutiny of not only his re-election bid in November, but also increasing signs that he is a potential presiden tial contender. That has raised speculation his actions on bills are tai lored to his White House aspirations.

The governor’s office

said Saturday that Newsom vetoed 169 of the 1,166 bills sent to his desk and signed the rest.

According to the gov ernor’s office and a comprehensive October 2020 veto survey by the California Senate Office of Research, Newsom vetoed 66 of 836 bills in 2021 and 56 of 428 in 2020, when the legisla ture cut back on its bill volume to devote time to the COVID-19 pandemic emergency. The Senate research office survey said Newsom vetoed 172 of 1,042 bills in 2019, his first year in office.

Newsom’s veto rates – 14% this year, 8% in 2021, 13% in 2020 and 17% in 2019 –have been more or less in line with his Dem ocratic predecessor, Jerry Brown, and lower than those of Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger, according to the Senate research office survey.

Newsom has previ ously cited concerns about reckless spending. In rejecting a bill last fall on part-time community college faculty, he said “this bill would create significant ongoing cost pressures on the state and community college districts,” and that “such a high expenditure is better addressed in the state budget process.”

But analysts say such comments have become more frequent this year. Newsom has noted in multiple veto messages that “the legislature sent measures with poten tial costs of well over $20 billion in one-time spending commitments and more than $10 billion in ongoing commitments not accounted for in the state budget.”

He used that language in rejecting a bill to make kindergarten atten dance mandatory. And he repeated those con cerns in vetoing SB 1387. The author of that bill, Sen. Monique Limon, a Democrat, hoped to boost diversity in state office by requiring a report with demographic information about people appointed by his office.

Newsom wrote that his office “makes an

By

Al Seib/Los Angeles Times/TNS California Gov. Gavin Newsom has gone on a veto binge at the end of September, and some attribute it to his rumored presidential ambitions.

My wife forgets to locks doors, causing me a lot of anxiety

Dear Annie: I’ve been happily married for 17 years to my wife, and we have two kids together, ages 9 and 14.

We live in a city that has seen a rash of petty crime, or worse, lately. It has become a commonplace occur rence for criminals to try to open windows and doors, entering homes and stealing things.

Annie Lane Dear Annie

My problem is that my wife has a habit of not locking doors when she goes to work or for getting to lock doors if she goes to bed later than me. Several times, I have come home to a wide-open front door that she forgot to lock and close all the way and a breeze opened it. This makes me have a mini panic attack, leaving the kids in the car as I then have to sweep through the house to make sure there isn’t an intruder inside. This obviously causes me a great deal of anxiety.

I’ve tried talking to her and showing her posts on the Next door app about people walking into houses. We had a friend three blocks away who found someone in their backyard with their daughters. All of these are met with, “I’ll try to do better.”

Then, a week later, I wake up to an open back door that she

forgot to lock.

Any advice on how to try to impress on my amazing wife that this is important to me and our family’s safety? — Anxious in Portland

Dear Anxious: You have a right to be anxious. I’m surprised your wife is putting yours and your kids’ lives at risk by not locking the door. She sounds very imma ture or just plain clueless.

Because she seems unable to “remember” to lock the door, you are going to have to take matters into your own hands. There are high-tech self-lock ing doors you could get. The reality is that until she gets the picture, you are going to have to lock the doors yourself.

Dear Annie: I suspect I’ve become hyper-sexual. I never really thought about it until my wife of 40 years entered menopause. As her libido has decreased, and activity has become sort of perfunctory, I’ve become more and more obsessed with performance.

I have not yet acted out on my impulses, but that is only because the opportunity has not presented itself. I’ve read up on sexual addiction, and I proba bly do share some symptoms, such as obsessive thoughts and

Horoscopes

ARIES (March 21-April 19).

There are two people you know who simply must meet. You could affect destiny by making the introduction. Just think about the implications, strange but true: The world is forever altered by people meeting people.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20).

There’s a battle of wills going on, but it’s so subtle it’s possi ble that only the insiders can detect it. You know better than to underestimate anyone. The gentle, sweet people can put up the toughest fight.

GEMINI (May 21-June 21). There are reasons you’re not inclined to ask directly for what you want. Trust your ability to read the room. You may still get what you want without asking. Your desire is obvious and there are many helpers around.

CANCER (June 22-July 22). People will want to do things for you today. You can ask the hard questions, enlist help with tedious tasks and get people to sign up for the race, contribute to the cause or buy what you’re selling – all thanks to your irre sistible charm.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22). No one is perfect. Accepting faults is about more than grace and forgiveness; it’s about saving time. Who needs the drama of warring against reality?

by Holiday Mathis

Today’s birthday

You won’t be the only one making sure your plans come to fruition. A powerful benefactor will speed things along. Efforts made in the name of love, like traveling to be with someone or finding novel ways to celebrate, will energize your world. What you give won’t just be reciprocated, it will lead to legendary experiences. Aries and Aquarius adore you.

When you avoid pettiness, you give yourself the gift of time and energy.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22).

You’ll be invigorated by the creativity flowing through you today, which you’ll apply to creating an easier, more har monious and lovely experience for yourself and others.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 23).

You’ll get into the zone of being at once relaxed and aware. You approach common activ ities with uncommon grace.

At the heart of good manners, best practices and success at so many things: paying attention.

SCORPIO (Oct. 24-Nov. 21).

In theory, your feelings happen inside you and therefore inde pendent of the behaviors of

a preoccupation with fantasiz ing about sex.

I guess what I’m asking is, are restraint and self-discipline the answers to this dilemma?

It is not a subject that is easy to talk about, and my spouse certainly has no inter est in discussing it. Part of me just says life is hard, and this is only the latest chal lenge. — Self-Discipline

Dear Self-Discipline: The fact that your wife does not want to discuss your feelings is not helping your situation at all. In marriage, both husband and wife should be willing and open to discuss such feelings, obses sions, etc. Ideally, she would support you in your concerns.

My first suggestion is that the two of you enter marriage counseling so she will under stand how serious this is. If she refuses, you might want to check out Sex Addicts Anon ymous. SAA is a wonderful online tool that might help you address some of your con cerns. https://saa-recovery.org/ am-i-a-sex-addict.

Send your questions for Annie Lane to dearannie@ creators.com.

others. But of course, it doesn’t work this way. You’ll be sur prised and comforted by the ways in which you’re con nected to others.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22Dec. 21). Image matters, but how much? Just like everyone, you’d like to be seen in a certain way, though you’re usually too busy actually being that person to worry much about it. People will know you by your actions.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22Jan. 19). You can get a little wild when you let yourself. If the wildness in you were pre dictable, it couldn’t be called wildness. It’s not something you cultivate, it’s something you get to know. Sit back and observe and admire.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20Feb. 18). Someone gives you a tall order. What makes it chal lenging is the fact that you’ve never done it before. It won’t be difficult, just new. Don’t be too proud to ask questions. This will be your success key.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20).

As you get older you care less and less about being liked. You still do likable things, but it’s because they are the right, fun, easy and in many cases auto matic thing to do. Likability is in your nature.

Write Holiday Mathis at HolidayMathis.com.

Bridge

THE CARD LED TELLS THE KEY STORY

One thing you learn quickly about the Bridge Base Online robots is that their opening leads are not textbook (against no-trump, singletons, even in minors, are common), and their signals are nonexistent. So everyone is almost guessing what to do. This is not recommended. It is much better to follow basic principles. In

by Phillip Alder

particular, if you make the first lead from a long suit, a low card guarantees at least one honor in that suit. Without an honor, lead top of trash.

To see why this is so important, look at today’s deal. How should East-West card to defeat four spades after West has led a low heart?

North’s three-diamond response was a fit-showing jump by a passed hand. It showed a maximum pass with, usually, four spades to at least one honor and a good five-card diamond suit.

East wins the first trick with the heart ace and will clearly shift to a club. Typically, when leading from a weak suit, you lead the highest if the top two are touching or the second-highest when they are not. So, the textbook switch here is to the club four. However, there is a risk that West won’t be able to read the card. It is much better to lead the club nine.

Then West must do his part, playing the eight when declarer covers with the king or queen. West should see that if he takes the second trick and returns a club, declarer will win with dummy’s 10.

South draws trumps and runs the diamond jack, but East wins with the king and leads another club to give the defenders four tricks: one heart, one diamond and two clubs.

Sudoku by Wayne Gould

Bridge

10/03/22

THE CARD LED TELLS THE KEY STORY

Fill in the grid so that every row, every column and every 3x3 grid contains the digits 1 through 9, with no repeats. That means that no number is repeated in any row, column or box. Solution, tips and computer program at www.sudoku.com

One thing you learn quickly about the Bridge Base Online robots is that their opening leads are not textbook (against no-trump, singletons, even in minors, are common), and their signals are nonexistent. So everyone is almost

Difficulty level: BRONZE

Solution to 10/1/2022:

Word Sleuth

Mon.-Fri.,

Sat.,

Springsteen releasing soul music cover album in November

Tribune ConTenT AgenCy

The Boss is getting a chance to do what he always wanted to do.

Bruce Springsteen has announced that his next album will be a col lection of soul music covers that will pay homage to the old school.

Titled “Only the Strong Survive,” the project will be released Nov. 11 on Columbia Records.

On the 15-track opus, the 73-year-old Rock & Roll Hall of Famer will add his stamp to songs previously performed by Aretha Franklin, Diana Ross & The Supremes, The Temptations, Four Tops, The Commodores, Jerry Butler and trans gender pioneer Jackie Shane (“Any Other Way”), among others.

He recorded the album at his own Thrill

Hill Recording studio in New Jersey with the E Street Horns, producer Ron Aniello and backing vocalists Soozie Tyrell, Lisa Lowell, Michelle Moore, Curtis King Jr., Dennis Collins, and Fonzi Thornton (who performed on Luther Vandross’ biggest hits).

The album fea tures guest vocals from Sam Moore of “Soul Man” fame.

“I wanted to make an album where I just sang. And what better music to work with than the great American song book of the ‘60s and ‘70s? I’ve taken my inspiration from Levi Stubbs, David Ruffin, Jimmy Ruffin, the Iceman Jerry Butler, Diana Ross, Dobie Gray, and Scott Walker, among many others,” Springsteen said.

Pickles Brian Crane

Zits Jerry Scott and Jim Borgman

Pearls Before Swine Stephan Pastis

Dilbert Scott Adams

Baby Blues Rick Kirkman and Jerry Scott

Baldo Hector Cantú

to a Class 8 Big Rig Our team of Technician’s have over 150 years combined repair and diagnostic experience We treat your vehicle like it is ours. There is no job too big or small, we invite them all.

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Newsom steps up nonpresidential? campaign

Gov. Gavin Newsom continues to insist he has “sub-zero interest” in running for president should Joe Biden decide against a second term. However, Newsom continues to cement his place on the informal list of potential presidential candidates by grabbing oppor tunities to raise his national political profile.

Late last month, while dealing with the hundreds of bills passed by the Legislature in August, Newsom found time for cross-country dashes to two high-profile events, where he praised himself, criticized his own Democratic Party for being too timid and seemingly suggested the 79-year-old Biden is out of touch.

The first jaunt was to New York for two days of speeches and schmoozing at the Clinton Global Initiative conference on climate. He bragged publicly about Cal ifornia’s leadership on attacking climate change and met with top political figures, including several from other countries.

“California’s climate leadership was on display at the closing session, as Gover nor Newsom highlighted the state’s recent passage of world-leading climate mea sures,” his office declared while releasing a lengthy account of his appearances, com plete with pictures of him posing with other attendees.

Newsom barely had time to change his socks before he was off again to Texas, whose Republican governor, Greg Abbott, is one of Newsom’s top rhetorical targets, this time for the Texas Tribune’s annual political gabfest.

Declaring his party is “being crushed” by Republicans in the war of words, Newsom said, “These guys are ruthless on the other side. Where are we? Where are we organizing, bottom up, a compelling alter native narrative? Where are we going on the offense every single day? They’re winning right now.”

However, the most interesting, and perhaps most revealing, aspect of New som’s trip to Austin was an interview with Alex Wagner of MSNBC – progres sive Democrats’ favorite TV outlet – in which he indirectly suggested Biden’s not up to the job of confronting Republican “bullies” because he’s “hardwired for a dif ferent world.”

“It’s very hard for him,” Newsom said of Biden. “His decency, his honor, his charac ter, his moral persuasion . . . those are tools in his toolkit.”

Newsom said while Biden “wants to compromise, he wants to find our better angels, and he wants to find that sweet spot in terms of answering our collective vision and values but that’s not how the system is designed.”

Newsom’s very evident message was that to win, Democrats need a leader who is glibly confrontational – someone, it would seem, very much like the governor of California.

Newsom closed out his week of highoctane politicking with a final gesture indicating that despite his oft-repeated dec larations of noncandidacy, he’s at least keeping his options open.

Without advance notice, Newsom walked out of the Capitol to greet United Farm Workers Union activists who had been camped outside the building, beseeching him to sign legislation that would make it easier for the union to win representation elections by allowing mail ballots.

Although Newsom had vetoed a similar bill in 2021 and his office had declared opposition to this year’s version, he signed the bill while the UFW’s protesters looked on, saying union leaders had agreed to some tweaks that would be added to the law next year.

Biden and other high-level Democratic Party figures had been publicly urging Newsom to sign the bill and had he vetoed it, it would have angered not only the union but the progressive wing of the party that views unionization of low-wage workers as a holy grail.

It could have caused significant damage to a Newsom presidential campaign – if, of course, there would be such a thing.

CalMatters is a public interest journalism venture committed to explaining how Cal ifornia’s state Capitol works and why it matters. For more columns by Dan Walters, go to calmatters.org/commentary.

THE RIGHT STUFF

Mistakes and the lessons learned

Former U.S. Sen. Al Franken (D) said some thing worth paying atten tion to. “Mistakes are a part of being human. Appre ciate your mistakes for what they are: precious life lessons that can only be be learned the hard way.”

We have been taught hard lessons from the 2020 elec tion cycle. Frankly, we got played by the Democratic Party, which I like to call the Democrat Socialist Progressive Peoples Party, and the mainstream media. Examples: Keystone pipeline reversal, Russia hoax, inflation due to predictable overspending. The Demo cratic Party’s actions are coming home for all the world to see.

As much as it pains me to say it, Joe Biden may have really won the election by millions of votes cast by whatever method. The problem is we were fed continuous, carefully constructed pro paganda for four-plus years as reliable facts – lies designed to sway our votes by a cabal of dark money, the FBI, social media, educational institutions, the Democratic Party and the main stream media itself.

Many find this disturbing; we should. For generations our main stream media held a sacred and protected position by being the source citizens turned to for fair, unbiased reporting. Who believes them now?

Our forefathers, seeking to create a government the states could all live with, created the Articles of Confed

ON THE LEFT

eration. These were deemed inadequate, therefore a conven tion was called in Philadelphia to amend them.

That convention started in May 1787 and on Sept. 17, 1787, 39 of the 41 delegates signed a proposed Constitution, sending it to the states for ratification.

The result became our U.S. Con stitution, the basis of all law in America. The document was con troversial by giving more power to a central government.

Members of the convention deter mined a preamble was necessary.

Pennsylvania delegate Gouverneur Morris authored it. He believed the preamble should do what Thomas Jef ferson’s preamble to the Declaration of Independence did by clearly laying out intent and purpose. He did this in 52 words reflecting the documents’ intent and purpose as not one for the time written in but for all time.

The preamble states: “We the People of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, ensure domestic tranquil ity, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to our selves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”

The concepts and specifics written were not deemed to have enough con straint on central government power. So, before the document was ratified, a number of arguments were posed to

expand the power of the states and the people themselves to control the gov ernment. Debate raged between the Federalists (increasing power) and anti-Federalists (restraining power).

Our forefathers deemed binding of federal power so important it was enshrined into our Bill of Rights. The First Amendment guarantees freedom of the press. That’s how important accurate information was deemed for proper governance. Look where we are now.

We’ve learned FBI top leader ship conspired to undermine Donald Trump’s 2016 election with fabri cated lies, lies leaked to pet journalists, media companies, etc. who propounded the lie constantly and still do – resulting in desperate, intolerant leftists (liber als) destroying our society.

Look at every election from city council to county supervisor, state Assembly to congressional offices. Remember where we were in 2016 with Barack Obama and Biden. Remember the prosperity and safety we enjoyed under Donald Trump. Where are we now? Biden, his adher ents and the Democratic Party are in charge and responsible for this mess.

Common sense is the knack of seeing and doing things as they should be seen and done. Lessons learned? Hope so. Remember in November.

Jim McCully is a former chairman of the Solano County Republican Central Committee and former regional vice chairman of the California Repub lican Party.

Some picks on upcoming local elections

Election time is coming up. Here are my picks.

First, mayor of Fairfield.

I’m distressed. My old friend Harry Price has run low on steam. This was obvious at the Rolling Hills Forum last week. The main issue was homelessness, its impact on businesses and the city. Cath erine Moy answered questions energetically and directly. She had fire in the belly. She agreed with others at the forum that the city is more talk than action.

Jack Batson

I liked her concluding statement: “I get stuff done. That’s me. I’m active.”

For personal reasons, Price also may not be able to complete his term. He’s grooming Councilwoman Doriss Panduro as his successor. This shocks me. Panduro has only two years of experience and is more a follower than a leader.

With Councilman Scott Tonne son’s help, she got her present job in the same real estate firm. She claims a close alignment with him politi cally, suggesting her independence is compromised.

Moy has no such issues. It’s true she has a mercurial temperament, but she’s experienced, energetic and inde pendent. I’ll vote for Cat.

Next, the Solano County Board of Supervisors 3rd District (containing much of Fairfield and Suisun City).

Both Wanda Williams and Chuck Timm presently serve on city councils. But their stand on issues and their sup porters are worlds apart. We have a clear choice here.

Timm has raised an eye-popping

and objectionable amount of money for the run, $217,000 –enough for a state race. It’s an intimidating message to poten tial challengers: “Don’t even try.” Another big problem. More than $80,000 of his war chest comes from develop ers who want exactly one thing – development.

But Solano County has an orderly growth princi ple that directs housing and business development inside our seven cities. This ensures the protection of agri cultural land. So Timm’s eye on developing Suisun Valley threatens our city-centered, anti-sprawl county policy. Mr. Growth is a bad fit for this county position.

Williams has raised $107,000, a reasonable amount for a county run. Roughly $75,000 of that comes from the county employees’ union, SEIU. But there’s a difference between the two big donor groups. That union has a broad range of job titles and labor issues, diffusing influence. Developers, however, have one issue: development.

Timm’s funding screams, “I play with the big boys,” while Williams’ sug gests, “I’m here to support the people.” Big, big difference.

Finally, the supervisors already have one retired deputy sheriff. With the addition of another retired cop, the five-member board could tilt to dan gerously favor the Sheriff’s Office. Timm is also adamantly opposed to any citizen oversight of disturbing conduct in that department.

Williams is solid on protecting Suisun Valley. She is also proactive on the issue of homelessness – initi

ating the new 2X2 countywide task force on homelessness, the only action plan from any official to date. She gets my vote.

Let’s review the races for Fairfield City Council.

I’ll vote for George Kennedy for the Cordelia district. He has been a famil iar face at City Council meetings for decades, commenting intelligently and staying engaged. He’s served on many city committees, task forces and com missions, including the Mayor’s Budget Review Commission. He probably understands the city budget better than any City Council member. He’s run Little League programs and pushed the renovation of the city’s tennis and pick leball courts. He’s eminently qualified.

I endorse Dour Carr for District 3. His long experience as a Solano Court counselor screening parolees and pro bationers to get them straightened out for normal life would be invaluable for addressing the homeless problem that plagues the city.

For District 5, Scott Mulvey out shone incumbent Panduro at the recent Chamber of Commerce forum. He was well-spoken, passionate and experi enced about homelessness. He’s run a successful homeless shelter and recov ery program at City Church – housing up to 70 people who engage in a sixmonth recovery program. He criticized the council’s approach to homeless ness as “Too much talk, not enough walk.” Mulvey will also bring extensive business experience to the council. He has my vote.

Jack Batson is a former member of the Fairfield City Council. Reach him by email at jsbatson@prodigy.net.

Dan Walters

Jim McCully

San Bernardino residents worry about mudslides near mountains

TriBune ConTenT agenCy

For months, Oak Glen, California, resi dent Meg Grant emailed pleas to local officials: Residents needed help preparing for the next rainstorm.

planted two years ago when the El Dorado fire scorched 22,680 acres on Yucaipa Ridge, produc ing a burn scar that left the mountain bare and prone to rapid erosion.

Hackers release data after LA district refuses to pay ransom

By Howard Blume LOS ANGELES TIMES

LOS ANGELES — Hackers released data from the Los Angeles school district on Saturday, a day after Superintendent Albert Car valho said he would not negotiate with or pay a ransom to the crimi nal syndicate.

Some screenshots from the hack were reviewed by the Los Angeles Times and appear to show some Social Security numbers. But the full extent of the release remains unclear.

The release of data came two days earlier than the deadline set by the syndicate that calls itself Vice Society – and happened in apparent response to what it took as Carval ho's final answer regarding whether the district would pay the hackers to prevent the release of private information and also to receive decryption keys to unlock some dis trict computer systems.

"What I can tell you is that the demand – any demand – would be absurd," Carvalho told the Times on Friday. "But this level of demand was, quite frankly, insulting. And we're not about to enter into negotia tions with that type of entity."

In a statement released later that day, he added: "Paying ransom never guarantees the full recovery of data, and Los Angeles Unified believes public dollars are better spent on our students rather than capitulating to a nefarious and illicit crime syndicate."

The extent of the data theft is now being evaluated by federal and local authorities.

Carvalho said on Friday that he believed confidential informa tion of employees was not stolen. He was less certain about infor mation related to students, which could include names, grades, course schedules, disciplinary records and disability status.

Whatever the case, he said, the district will provide assistance to anyone who is potentially harmed by the release of data, including by

Newsom

From Page A7

intentional, transparent effort to build a diverse and qualified pool of candidates for these posi tions,” but noted that the bill “is estimated to cost millions of dollars not accounted for in the budget.”

Newsom’s frugality comes after California has enjoyed years of record budget surpluses, leaving many asking: What gives?

H.D. Palmer, spokes man for the California Department of Finance, said that the administra tion has been signaling caution for months in its budget documents about risks to the state’s revenue stream, and the veto messages shouldn’t be a surprise.

The governor’s May budget revision noted uncertainty in the eco nomic forecast, especially as the plummeting stock market and cooling housing market squeeze

setting up an "incident response" line at (855) 926-1129. Its hours of operation are 6 a.m. to 3:30 p.m., Monday through Friday, excluding major U.S. holidays.

Since the attack, which was dis covered on Sept. 3, the nation's second-largest school district has worked closely with local law enforcement, the FBI and the federal Cybersecurity and Infra structure Security Agency or CISA.

CISA posted a warning to edu cation institutions about Vice Society immediately after the LAUSD attack without directly confirming that the syndicate was responsible for it.

The syndicate's original Monday deadline was posted on the dark web site maintained by Vice Society, which had informally con firmed to at least three reporters that it was responsible for the hack.

On Friday, Carvalho did not contest media accounts identify ing Vice Society. He continued his previous practice of not naming the amount that is being demanded.

The claim of responsibility became official with a posting on the dark web. A screenshot the Vice Society logo and its catchphrase "ransomware with love." The site lists as "partners" the entities that it claims to have victimized. These now include the L.A. Unified School District, which is listed along with the district logo.

"The papers will be published by London time on Oct. 4, 2022, at 12 a.m.," the webpage stated. That deadline would fall eight

one of the Golden State’s largest sources of revenue: capital gains taxes.

The finance depart ment’s latest revenue report said general fund revenues for the first two months of the fiscal year are $2 billion below the revenue forecast in the enacted budget. And the state ended the last fiscal year in June nearly $2.2 billion below fore cast. That means the state is “roughly $4.2 billion below projections in our most recent revenue fore cast,” Palmer said.

The overwhelming majority of the state’s dis cretionary surplus funds are committed to one-time measures such as boosting reserves, prepaying bil lions in state debt, making supplemental deposits into reserve funds and the $9.5 billion in infla tion relief payments set to go out next week to 23 million Californians.

And although Cali fornia has continued to add jobs, with an 11th month of increases, many

hours earlier in Los Angeles when adjusted for the time change. A countdown clock ticked down the time.

Hackers this year have attacked at least 27 U.S. school districts and 28 colleges, according to cyberse curity expert Brett Callow, threat analyst for the digital security firm Emsisoft. At least 36 of those organi zations had data stolen and released online, and at least two districts and one college paid the attackers, Callow said.

Callow was among the cyberse curity bloggers and professionals who confirmed Sunday morning that the data had been posted.

Vice Society alone has hit at least nine school districts and colleges or universities so far this year, per Cal low's tally.

When the attack was discovered, district technicians quickly shut down all computer operations to limit the damage, and officials were able to open campuses as scheduled on the Tuesday after the holiday weekend. The shutdown and the hack combined to result in a week of significant disruptions as more than 600,000 users had to reset pass words and systems were gradually screened for breaches and restored.

During this rebooting, techni cians found so-called tripwires left behind that could have resulted in more structural damage or the further theft of data. The restora tion of district systems is ongoing, but there also was another element of the attack: the exfiltration of data.

The hackers claimed to have stolen 500 gigs of data.

The district also has set up a cybersecurity task force, and the school board has granted Carv alho emergency powers to take any related step he feels is necessary.

The internal systems most damaged were in the facilities divi sion. Carvalho said it was necessary to create workarounds so that con tractors could continue to be paid and repairs and construction could continue on schedule.

have been lower-wage, while high-paying tech nology companies have seen recent layoffs and hiring freezes. Palmer said that has been reflected in lower with holding receipts from income taxes, where the top 1% pay account for nearly half the revenue.

“The likelihood of con tinued declines on the receipts side of the ledger means that we have to closely watch the expen ditures side,” Palmer said.

Newsom’s nod to tighten spending as the economy wobbles may also be driven by his ambitions. Although the governor has insisted he’s not planning a run for president, he has been mentioned frequently as a future contender for the Democrats, espe cially with President Joe Biden and Vice Pres ident Kamala Harris polling poorly.

The governor, who polls and last year’s failed recall suggest will easily be reelected, has helped feed those presidential

rumors by spending cam paign money on ads in Republican states blasting the GOP on abortion, guns and transgenders.

Schnur said an under water budget would undercut Newsom’s appeal to swing-state voters along with a per ception the state is awash in crime. Among the last bills Newsom signed Friday were a package aimed at tackling the retail smash-and-grab robberies that have made national headlines. He vetoed a bill Thurs day that would have eliminated solitary con finement, something that might not play well with a tough-on-crime crowd.

Newsom also vetoed a bill that would have allowed drug injection sites in cities as a treat ment approach, but signed bills to expand recycling and to protect people who seek abortions or transgender treatments in California from states where there are more restrictions.

In December, rain storms brought mud, tree limbs and debris into their yards, Grant told San Bernardino County Supervisor Dawn Rowe. Residents knew the risks of living in the mountains, Grant said, but the 2020 fire left them vulnerable to mudflow raging down Birch Creek, which runs through many of their properties.

The dreaded day arrived Sept. 12 when the remains of Tropi cal Storm Kay brought 2.4 inches of rain within an hour and produced an immense debris flow that damaged or destroyed 16 homes. Car-size boul ders came crashing down in Forest Falls, a small mountain commu nity north of Oak Glen. A 62-year-old Forest Falls resident died as the flood of rocks, sticks and mud overtook her home.

The seed of the disas trous mudslide – which overwhelmed a countyrun flood channel and buried some areas in 12 feet of mud – was

"They knew this was a problem," said Grant, who grew frustrated when the county said it could do little to help residents in fortifying their homes.

In the mountains, residents recognize the risks and rewards they trade for living in remote areas. For fresh moun tain air and acres of wooded land, they face wildfires, floods and debris flows.

But some residents in the unincorporated com munities of Oak Glen and Forest Falls feel especially vulnerable now. They are frustrated that San Bernardino County officials have told them the county is limited in how it can use public dollars to safeguard private land and residents.

"It's not like I'm asking the county to come and dig a pool for me," said Brenda Ebrahim, who believes the county should create a cata strophic fund to help residents. "I'm asking for help to recover from a disaster not of my making."

Company responsible for oil spill will repair pipeline

TriBune ConTenT agenCy

LOS ANGELES — The Houston-based company operating the oil pipeline that ruptured off Huntington Beach last fall announced Saturday that the government has greenlighted its plans to repair the pipeline, raising the possibility it will be operational again early next year.

In a press release, Amplify Energy Corp. said the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has granted it a permit to remove and replace damaged seg ments of the pipeline, a job that is estimated to take about a month.

The pipeline runs from a plant in Long Beach to the Elly plat form in federal waters off Huntington Beach. At least 25,000 gallons of crude oil gushed from the broken pipe last October, forcing a week long closure of beaches along the Orange County coast in October and a monthslong shutdown of fisheries.

In August, Amplify Energy and two of its subsidiaries pleaded

guilty to negligently dis charging oil and agreed to pay nearly $13 million in criminal fines and cleanup fees.

Amplify also said it had reached a settlement with businesses and property owners claim ing spill-related losses.

Amplify contends that the pipeline had been damaged by the anchors of container ships nine months before the spill, and that it had not been properly notified.

Last week, the Center for Biological Diver sity sued the Bureau of Ocean Energy Man agement in federal court, claiming the Biden administration was improperly allow ing rigs in the oilfield off Huntington Beach to continue operating under outdated safety plans devised in the 1970s and 1980s.

"It's time to get these rusty relics out of our ocean," Kristen Monsell, legal director of the Cen ter's Oceans program, said in a press release, comparing the aging oil platforms to "ticking time bombs."

Francine Orr/Los Angeles Times/TNS file

Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent Alberto M. Carvalho speaks during a press conference at Edward R. Roybal Learning Center on Sept. 6 in Los Angeles.

“This level of demand was, quite frankly, insulting. And we’re not about to enter into negotiations with that type of entity.”

— Albert Carvalho Los Angeles Superintendent

Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times/TNS file (2021)

An aerial view of oil spill cleanup crew members from New Jersey cleaning up the oil spill at Huntington State Beach in Huntington Beach, Oct. 10, 2021.

96-year-old grandmother, Julia Rodriguez. She was living in Sunshine Mobile Village. Last we heard she was evacuating on Wednesday but haven’t heard from her. She doesn’t have a cell phone. Any advice? We are very worried and live in NY.”

Miami native Tony Jankowski, who moved to Port Charlotte in 2015, works at the Gaspa rilla Marina in the town of Placida, where they lost 60 of 800 boats in the hurricane and suffered considerable damage. He said the mobile home park next to the marina was completely leveled, some of the trailers landed in the marina, and most of the residents there were retirees on fixed incomes.

Jankowski said he is concerned that people in that area are “in panic mode,” especially recent transplants who had never experienced a hurricane.

“Back with Andrew, we had been through hur ricanes before, so we knew what we had to do to prepare, and we knew to be patient after,” he said. “Over here on the West Coast, the best way to explain it is there are a lot of Northerners, snow birds. A lot of people who moved here recently since COVID, who used to live in Michigan, Chicago, Minnesota, they have moved here full time, made this their home, and this is their first hurricane so they’re panicking.

“Remember Andrew, we couldn’t get anything or get to stores for two or three weeks. I drove up to Fort Lauderdale to go get stuff and then drove back to Miami. Here, you have so many people that this is so new to them that they’re in a panic mode.”

Jankowski, whose house is still without elec tricity, said he had just returned from Publix, where he got a quarterpound of four different deli meats. The man in front of him ordered 3 pounds of each meat. He said cars lined up for more than two miles along Vet erans Way to get into a Home Depot.

“People are pulling up into gas stations, the ones that have power to pump, they’re filling up their cars and also filling not just a carrying con tainer but giant containers that fit in the back of their trucks and they’re filling those up with 200 gallons of gas,” Jankowski said.

“I’m thinking, ‘What are you doing? Try to save

some for the rest of the people.’ That’s where you see the panic. People think this isn’t going to end, they’re going to be without lights for months. We’re already getting lights back in some areas, but people are scared.”

The Florida District Medical Examiners, which reports hurricane deaths to the Medical Examiners Commission (MEC) following autopsy to confirm the death is storm-related, reported 44 deaths attributed to Hurricane Ian as of Satur day night. Thirty of those were in Lee County. Com bining tallies from the MEC with other deaths reported by sheriff offices on Saturday, Hurricane Ian has killed 71 people.

President Joe Biden will visit Florida on Wednesday to witness the damage caused by Hur ricane Ian, the White House announced Satur day night. The president will first go to Puerto Rico on Monday to view the devastation from Hurri cane Fiona two weeks ago.

The White House did not release exactly where Biden will go in Florida or who he will meet with during his visit. The pres ident has approved a Federal Emergency Man agement Agency disaster declaration for areas hit by the storm, includ ing enhanced individual assistance for residents in 13 counties.

FEMA announced it had sent 1.6 million liters of water to Florida and promised another 6.6 million liters in the coming days. They also are providing 5.5 million meals, more than 400 ambulances and four aircraft to evacu ate people from nursing homes and other facilities. Also, the agency said:

n Power restoration continues across Florida. Nearly 70% of peak power outages have been restored and fewer than 800,000 power outages remain.

n The state of Florida provided 4,000 gallons of diesel to Lee County to power emergency genera tors to supply water to nearby hospitals. The state is also delivering 1.2 million gallons of water from Lakeland to Fort Myers for hospitals without water.

n More than 550 U.S. Army Corps of Engineers personnel are conducting safety inspections, install ing generators and assess ing power needs.

FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell, speak ing on CBS’ “Face the Nation” Sunday morning, praised power companies for their work thus far

Bills:

August declined to take a position.

Why it matters

Supporters say few low-income workers can afford the 30% to 40% pay cut to take time off for a disability or to care for a new child or sick family member.

From 2017 to 2019, leave claims by workers making less than $20,000 a year declined while they rose for all other workers — increas ing the most for those making $100,000 and above, according to the Employment Devel opment Department. And under current law, lower-earning workers contribute a greater share of their paychecks to the program than higher earners because of the cap on taxing incomes above $145,600. More immediately, without this bill the current amount of benefits is set to expire and would return to 55% of a worker’s wages in January.

Governor’s call Newsom signed the bill on Sept. 30, the last day of his decisions.

Limiting enforcement of jaywalking

What the bill would do AB 2147, The Freedom to Walk Act, would allow law enforcement offi cers to stop a pedestrian for jaywalking only when “a reasonably careful person would realize there is an immediate danger of a collision.”

The Legislature passed, but Newsom vetoed, a similar bill last year that would have repealed the state’s jaywalking laws and prohibited fines until Jan. 1, 2029.

Assemblymember Phil Ting, a San Francisco Democrat and the bill’s author, is hopeful this version of the legisla tion meets Newsom’s objections.

Who supports it

The California Bicycle Coalition, the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights of the San Fran cisco Bay Area and other groups say the bill will prevent racially biased enforcement while still keeping pedestrians safe.

Who is opposed

The California District Attorneys Asso ciation and other groups say the bill will endanger pedestrians and unneces sarily tie the hands of law enforcement.

Why it matters

authored by Cupertino Democrat Evan Low, would classify disinfor mation as “unprofessional conduct,” allowing the board to take action. Dis cipline could include a public reprimand, pro bation, suspension, or license revocation.

Who supports it

The bill is sup ported by doctor groups including the California Medical Association, the California chapters of the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Ameri can College of Emergency Physicians. The groups argue that Covid disin formation is dangerous and undermines public health efforts.

Who is opposed

Some individual doctors and groups like A Voice for Choice Advo cacy argue that the bill infringes on doctors’ free speech and that physi cians should be allowed to share their professional opinions without fear of repercussions.

Why it matters

intent or clearly deviat ing from the required standard of care while interacting directly with a patient under their care,” he added.

Fewer remedial courses at community college

What the bill would do Assembly Bill 1705 continues Califor nia’s efforts to ensure more community college students enroll in classes required to transfer to a UC or Cal Statecampus.

The bill, by Democratic Assemblymember Jacqui Irwin of Camarillo, would order community col leges to enroll most students in a transferlevel math and English course if their program requires those subjects.

were likelier to pass the courses in a year than if they took a remedial class first. Following a 2017 change in the law, most students started taking gateway courses to eventually get into a UC or CSU, but still thousands – 20% of firsttime students – continue to take these remedial courses. In almost all cases, campuses couldn’t justify their policy of requiring that.

Governor’s call Newsom signed the bill and several other higher education propos als on Sept. 30, his last day to act.

Limiting solitary confinement

What would it do Assembly Bill 2632 from Democratic Assemblymember Chris Holden of Pasa dena would overhaul how California prisons treat inmates in solitary con finement. They would no longer be held in solitary for longer than 15 consec utive days, or 45 days in a 180-day period. The bill would also prohibit the California Department of Corrections and Reha bilitation from putting certain groups in solitary confinement, including inmates younger than 26 or older than 59, preg nant people or those with mental or physical disabilities.

From Page One

Regional officials have suggested that after Lyman, Kyiv’s army will push toward Kreminna, about 20 miles to the east.

“It is important to capture the area that opens up the way to liberate Donbas set tlements – Svatove, Kreminna, Sievierodo netsk and others,” Serhiy Cherevaty, a spokes man for Ukraine’s armed forces, said on Saturday.

Russia’s previ ous defeat — its troops retreated from a chunk of Kharkiv province in Sep tember – was thought to be the motivation for Putin’s partial mobiliza

tion of 300,000 reservists. Moscow’s forces have also suffered heavy casu alties in the seven-month war, although exactly how many is unclear.

Since the call-up, hun dreds of thousands of draft-age Russian men are believed to have left for Kazakhstan, Georgia and other locations. Videos have surfaced of mayhem among those who’ve been conscripted.

Partly for that reason, the additional reservists are seen as unlikely to turn the tide for Putin.

“The Ukrainians fight with purpose, have better leadership and have a learning culture that underpins adaptation,” said Mick Ryan, a retired Australian army general who tweets about mili tary strategy.

Last year, pedestrian fatalities in the U.S. hit a four-decade high, and California recorded the highest number of any state. At the same time, local law enforcement agen cies in California write thousands of jaywalk ing tickets every year, which studies find dis proportionately impact people of color.

Governors call Newsom signed the bill on Sept. 30 among his final decisions.

Disciplinary action for Covid disinformation

What the bill would do AB 2098 would make it easier for the Medical Board of Cali fornia to punish doctors who deliberately spread false information about Covid-19, vaccines and treatments. The bill,

The Covid-19 pan demic is ongoing and the virus has killed more than 94,000 people in California. Covid dis information has been linked to vaccine hesi tancy and in some cases has popularized unproven treatments. Since early in the pandemic, Cali fornia has dealt with its share of doctors who have made false claims about the virus. Disinformation can have serious conse quences. For example, last year the nations’ poison control centers saw a spike in calls after people reported taking ivermectin, an anti-par asite drug for animals, to cure Covid-19 after being persuaded by false information shared by influential people on the internet.

Governor’s call

Newsom signed the bill on Sept. 30, among his final decisions. In a signing statement, he sought to make clear that the measure “does not apply to any speech outside of discus sions directly related to C0vid-19 treatment within a direct physician patient relationship.”

“I am signing this bill because it is narrowly tailored to apply only to those egregious instances in which a licensee is acting with malicious

It would exempt shortterm credentials that have industry-specific math requirementsand adult programs that don’t require a math or English course (think: basic office software or fire-resil ient landscaping), among other carve-outs.

Who supports it Pretty much every one but faculty. The bill received not a single dissenting vote from lawmakers. Its champions include the Chancellor’s Office of the California Commu nity Colleges system, Lt. Gov. Eleni Kounalakis, various think tanks and a few individual commu nity colleges.

Who is opposed Faculty unions, associ ations and the academic senate, plus Mt. San Antonio College, who fault it for being too prescriptive. Faculty groups also say the bill comes with no addi tional funding to hire more tutors who work alongside faculty to help students during class and give faculty more training.

Why it matters

Until a few years ago, most commu nity college students had to take remedial math and English. For many, their goal was to eventually transfer, so remedial courses were a key hurdle. Over time research chipped away at that logic: Students with high school grades who enrolled directly into transfer-level math and English courses

Who supports it Civil liberties groups, immigration advocates and a constellation of criminal justice reform groups, including the Cal ifornia Public Defenders Association. A federal judge has ruled that the Department of Correc tions and Rehabilitation has systematically vio lated the due process rights of inmates, and continues to ignore a 2015 settlemen between the state and two Pelican Bay State Prison inmates held in solitary confine ment for decades based on their perceived gang affiliations.

Who is opposed

The people operating prisons and the Security Housing Units within them. The California Cor rectional Peace Officers Association wrote in a letter of opposition that forcing violent inmates back into the general prison population will lead to more violence, both to inmates and prison guards. “Inmates who have attempted, or succeeded in, murder ing their cellmates would be let right back into the population they pose a risk to.”

Why it matters

Solitary confinement is the Wild West of carceral regulations – there aren’t many rules in place, so prisons set many of their own. Horror stories abound from California and elsewhere of people kept for years in soli tary confinement, getting perhaps two hours of time outside their cell a day with little contact with the outside world. The bill would also extend its regulations to private Cal ifornia prisons that house federal inmates or immi gration detainees.

Governor’s call Newsom vetoed the bill on Sept. 29, but directed the Depart ment of Corrections and Rehabilitation to develop regulations to restrict the use of segregated confinement to “limited situations.”

From Page One

that “we’ve known for some time that the court was headed in a rightward direction, with the only questions being how far and how fast.”

“There’s no reason to think this coming term, or any term in the foreseeable future, will be any dif ferent on things that matter most,” Gornstein said. “Get ready for a lot of 6-to-3s.”

CourtRoman Martinez, a Supreme Court litigator at Latham and Watkins, said there’s “a lot of play in the joints” of the cases, as dif ferences between the justices’ approaches could increase or tamp down on the sweep of the opinions.

“With this court in particu lar, it’s not just who wins or who loses, right versus left, but some of the nuances and the distinctions between the six on the conserva tive side can really drive a lot of the outcomes,” Martinez said at a Fed eralist Society event last week.

In the two cases concerning

affirmative action, for example, Roberts and other conservatives could decide the case in a limited way, or in a broader way that might cast doubt on other non discrimination provisions of civil rights legislation, such as Title VII employment law.

Gornstein and others noted that Roberts has stated a preference for a “color blind” view of the Con stitution that may not allow for the challenged policies that con sider race in admissions decisions at Harvard and the University of North Carolina.

Robinson Kuntz/Daily Republic file College administrators celebrated graduates in a drivethru ceremony in May. AB 1705 would have California Community Colleges, like Solano, offer fewer remedial courses.

Robinson Kuntz/Daily Republic file (2015) California State Prison, Solano inmate audience members clap at the conclusion of Macbeth in May. AB 2632 to limit solitary confinement was vetoed by Gov. Newsom.

Giants earn walk-off win in home finale

By evan WeBecK THE MERCURY NEWS

SAN FRANCISCO —

Six months ago, on Opening Day, the Giants were still riding high from their 107-win season.

Brandon Belt was still “The Captain,” riding in on a boat along the warning track. Logan Webb looked the part of staff ace. Darin Ruf was on the move.

In their home finale Sunday afternoon, it was Wilmer Flores on the

move, hustling home from second base to score the winning run on a walk-off single from David Villar in the bottom of the 10th. The Giants beat the D-backs, 4-3, to win their final home series and finish the season 44-37 on the shores of McCovey Cove.

The beginning and the ending were the same. If only the middle could have gone differently.

Without the possibil ity of the playoffs, many of the 34,824 on hand Sunday stuck around long after

the final out, as manager Gabe Kapler addressed the fans and players tossed memorabilia into the stands.

The crowd stood and danced and cheered almost as voraciously as Austin Slater rounded the bases in the bottom of the seventh, after slugging a go-ahead pinch-hit home run. But when they settled back into their seats, they were reminded that this was it. There was nothing more to root for. Post season baseball will be

played in locales as close as Los Angeles and as far as Toronto but not at the corner of Third and King this season.

The Giants head to San Diego for their final three games – their first time since 2012 finishing away from home, a result of the lockout-delayed start to the season – where the Padres will be preparing for the playoffs, while the Giants will be checking in for their flights home.

Webb was supposed to start the home finale, but

he was shut down once the Giants were mathemati cally eliminated.

Ruf, one of the biggest among many platoon success stories from last year, was sent on the move one last time in a trade to the New York Mets (a deal that netted J.D. Davis and three pitchers, one surefire win this year).

Others of a similar mold –LaMonte Wade Jr., Mike Yastrzemski – endured the same struggle to repeat last year’s success.

Belt was on hand, but

his presence has been minimal since undergo ing season-ending knee surgery. There was no pageantry, no grand entrance, no makeshift ‘C’ taped to anyone’s chest – not after Belt posted the lowest OPS of his career (.676) in an injury-riddled season.

Evan Longoria, possi bly playing his final home game at Oracle Park (the Giants hold a $13 million club option), drove in the

Mariners flat after clincher as A’s win big

By Shane Lantz THE SEATTLE TIMES

SEATTLE — A weekend full of celebra tions, smiles and good vibes ended in dis appointing fashion for the Seattle Mari ners on Sunday at T-Mobile Park. A crowd of 42,465 fans wit nessed a subpar outing from Mariners start ing pitcher Robbie Ray, and a nearly nonexis tent performance from the Mariners offense in a 10-3 loss that weakens their chances of hosting a playoff game.

Rams’ McVay, 49ers’ Shanahan in search of offense for teams

By GiLBert M anzano LOS ANGELES DAILY NEWS

SANTA CLARA — It’s common knowledge that Rams coach Sean McVay and San Francisco 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan worked together as assistants in Washing ton, but that likely won’t stop the ESPNbroadcast from mentioning it a few times during the Monday Night Football matchup between NFC West rivals.

Oh, to be a fly on the wall while these two young brilliant offen sive minds designed plays together between 2010 to 2013 with Kyle’s father, Mike Shanahan, the thenhead coach in Washington.

Their connection has brought enthusiasm and attention to the rivalry since they both became head coaches in 2017, and it

won’t be any different for the 12th meeting.

“There’s a good competitive ness, but I know I have tremendous respect for everything that I’ve learned from him,” McVay said about Kyle Shanahan. “I enjoy when we get a chance to connect, but we are friends and we’re also competitors, but I’ve learned so much from him.”

Shanahan is known for his highly productive rushing scheme and for leading the 49ers to a Super Bowl appearance in 2020.

McVay instantly had success with his heavy use of 11 personnel and guided the Rams to a Super Bowl title last season.

McVay’s squad crossed paths with Shanahan’s in the NFC title game before hoisting the Lombardi Trophy to add another intrigu

ing layer to the competitive series between two of the best play-call ers in the NFL.

But the coaching gurus are heading into their Monday night battle at Levi’s Stadium with plenty of concerns about their respec tive offenses.

Shanahan struggled to adjust with second-year quarterback Trey Lance before getting a differ ent set of problems with Jimmy Garoppolo, the once-reliable quar terback who hasn’t provided reliability since returning as the starter following an injury to Lance. The 49ers’ offense is aver aging 15.7 points per game and hasn’t cracked 200 passing yards in a game this season.

But the 49ers have star edge

Kings coach gives hint at starting lineup prior to preseason opener

By JaSon a nderSon THE SACRAMENTO BEE

SACRAMENTO —

Coach Mike Brown offered a few clues to his plans for the start ing lineup and the team’s rotation as the Kings pre pared to play the Los Angeles Lakers in Mon day’s preseason opener at Crypto.com Arena.

Following Saturday’s practice, Brown con firmed he will start De’Aaron Fox at point guard, Harrison Barnes at small forward and Domantas Sabonis at center, but he said the shooting guard and power forward positions are somewhat undecided.

“Obviously, Fox is going to start for us,” Brown said. “Domas is going to start for us. HB is

going to start for us. But we’re kind of up in the air a little bit with the 2 and the 4 spot, and there are

some guys that we feel have a real good chance to start for us in those spots, but we’re going to keep mixing those two spots around to see what we can get.”

Kevin Huerter and Malik Monk are com peting for the starting job at shooting guard with Terence Davis likely vying for minutes off the bench. Rookie Keegan Murray is competing with KZ Okpala, Trey Lyles and Chimezie Metu at power forward.

When reporters were allowed to enter the team’s practice facility Saturday, the Kings were

After Toronto’s 6-3 victory over Boston on Sunday, the Blue Jays’ magic number to clinch the first wildcard spot is down to two, which means the Mari ners will need to win out and hope that the Blue Jays lose one of their three remaining games against Baltimore if they want to play the city’s first home post season game in over two decades.

While most of the Mariners’ starting lineup was back after a day of rest fol lowing Friday night’s playoff-clincher induced

postgame party, they still managed just three hits over the first eight innings and struck out 12 times against an Oakland pitching staff that ranks near the bottom of the league in ERA, opponent batting average and WHIP.

The only bit of Mar iners’ offense on the day came on a threerun, ninth-inning homer from left fielder Jesse Winker. The Mariners had no answers against Oakland starter James Kaprielian, who threw 5 2/3 no-hit innings to start the game with help from some spar kling defensive plays. With one on in the third inning, Adam Frazier was thrown out on a barehanded play from A’s third baseman Ernie Clement.

The A’s defense con tinued to shine in the fourth inning, when Seth Brown snagged a 108-mile-per-hour line drive off the bat of Eugenio Suarez, and Oakland shortstop Allen ended the fourth by throwing out Mitch Haniger on a diving play to his right.

Rookie Baldwin shows promise for Warriors

By M adeLine K enney BAY AREA NEWS GROUP

SAITAMA, Japan —

The Warriors’ pair of preseason games shared a glimpse at 2022 first-round pick Patrick Baldwin Jr.’s potential after he missed summer league with an ankle injury.

Baldwin showed great court awareness and solid decision-mak ing in both games.

After recording seven points on 2-of-3 shooting in eight minutes in his debut Friday, Baldwin was even more impres sive Sunday.

One highlight of his came in the fourth quarter when he inter cepted a Wizards’ pass and tossed the ball to Mac McClung who took it home with a fast-break dunk. Baldwin finished with 12 points, going 4-for-5 from deep, and he had six rebounds.

“He was terrific,”

coach Steve Kerr said after the NBA Japan Games finale. “He’s a really good basketball player. He understands the game, you can see with his flow, his moments, his shooting, his passing . . .He just gets it, he has a really good feel.”

Kerr didn’t know what to expect from Baldwin heading into training camp.

Baldwin was limited over the last two seasons due to an ankle injury. He was a top recruit out of high school but opted to play at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee for his dad rather than join a bigger program. There, he played in only 11 before being shut down and turned his focus on the upcom ing NBA draft as his injury persisted. Baldwin said his ankle was about 95%

Paul Kitagaki Jr./Sacramento Bee/TNS file

Sacramento Kings new head coach Mike Brown talks to the media with GM Monte McNair during a press conference at the Golden 1 Center in Sacramento.

Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group/TNS file

San Francisco 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan leads from the sideline against the Green Bay Packers in the second quarter of their NFL preseason game at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara in August.

Make a chili worthy of Kevin from ‘The Office’ with Brian Baumgartner

Every once in a while, we can pinpoint a pivotal moment that alters our lives. Actor Brian Baumgartner does just that in his new “Seriously Good Chili Cookbook.” He writes: “On April 30, 2009, at roughly 9:02 p.m., my life changed forever. I became known as the chili guy.”

Baumgartner, who played accountant and chili aficionado Kevin Malone on NBC’s “The Office,” captured hearts and spawned a multitude of memes in Season 5 when his character magnificently spills a giant pot of his precious chili on the gray carpet at Dunder Mifflin.

“I’m serious about this stuff,” his character says in a voiceover just before spilling a giant pot of his treasured creation.

In 2009, when the scene was filmed (in one take, by the way), Baumgartner, an avid cook, had never made a pot.

“That was Kevin who was serious at that time, but now Brian has definitely devel oped an appreciation,” he said by telephone from Scranton, Penn., where he was signing his new cookbook.

In that book, he, of course, shares “Brian’s Seriously Good Chili Recipe,” which we have dubbed “The Office Chili,” along with 176 other recipes from the International Chili Society’s collection of cook-off winners, chefs, bloggers and fans of the show. The book also includes fun facts about the dish, a “hot pepper heat scale” and a smattering of QR codes that take you to videos, includ ing one of him making his chili.

“They wanted 100 recipes,” he said of his publisher. “I thought, ‘Can we find 100? I don’t know.’ Once they started coming in, it was just incredible. The variety . . . veg etarian, vegan, poultry, beef. All the different kinds of flavors, chili verde, homestyle chili, Texas chili.”

Baumgartner’s foray into chili proficiency began inno cently enough. About five years after the hit sitcom fin ished its nine-season run, he decided to make a pot of chili. He posted it on social media and fans of “The Office” responded enthusiastically.

That whetted his appetite for the stuff, and he began doing what many home cooks do: tweaking, adding a bit of this, dropping in some of that, and adjusting cooking times until he got to the thick, meaty, beanfilled chili he calls his own.

In the process of develop ing his own recipe, writing the cookbook and judging chili cook-offs around the country, Baumgartner learned a lot not just about how to make chili but also of its lore and appeal.

Here are a few of his tips:

n That trick with the onions? If you’re a fan of the show, you’ll know that one of the first ques tions he had to answer was whether he discovered if it is true that “the trick is to under cook the onions.”

“The onion bit is true,” he said.

“We’re not looking for cara melization. I caramelize onions for a lot of different things, but not chili. It really changes the flavor. I’m attempting to get the onions translucent and then start adding stuff.”

n Layer your flavors. He rec ommends that when cooking a hearty chili like his, the vege tables get a light saute (getting those onions translucent), then the meat goes in with the tomato paste and cooks until the meat is brown and the paste darkens. The diced tomatoes and sauce go in for a long simmer, with occasional stirring, until about 20 minutes before you’re ready to serve. That’s when the beans get added.

The result: A rich, meaty sauce with intact, whole beans.

n Lean into convenience Unlike Kevin, who roasts his own ancho chiles for his fictional family’s generationsold recipe, Baumgartner uses ancho chile powder. He isn’t up the night before dicing fresh tomatoes, like Kevin, either. He uses canned diced ones, as well as canned sauce and paste. And, for a flavor boost, he adds two cans of beans in a mild chili sauce.

n Enjoy the journey. His chili takes him about an hour to make. Other recipes in the cook book that he has tested take as long as four hours.

“I like preparing dishes that take a long time. I find it ther apeutic in a way. I’ve been likening it to golf, which I do a lot of. It’s kind of the only time that my mind goes away and I just focus on one single

thing for an extended period of time. Everything else kind of goes away.”

n Never stop tweaking “I love the exploring of it,” Baumgartner said of develop ing a chili recipe. “If you take the golf analogy, there’s no such thing as a perfect round of golf. It truly doesn’t exist. I don’t think my recipe is done. I don’t think it is ever done. I will con tinue to change it and tweak.”

n Eat lots of chili. Baumgart ner spent eight months trying and testing submitted and selected chili recipes. It is how he filled the pages of his book, but it also helped him improve his game dramatically.

“That’s what I liked about going to the world champion ship chili cook-off. They had all won a competition, and they explained what they do,” he said. “I picked up lots of tips along the way.”

He encourages others to do the same and to share their results. He describes the chili world as having a “culture of sharing” and the chili competi tors as “his people.”

“Why do you want it to be good? You want it to be good because you want people to like it, to enjoy it, to get together and eat it,” he said. “Chili, I view as very communal. It’s about friends and family.”

Last weekend, Baumgart ner wrapped up the main leg of his book-signing tour at the 55th annual World Championship Chili Cook-off in Myrtle Beach, S.C. Now, it is back to his “Off the Beat” podcast in which he talks to people about moments in their lives that helped make them what they are today.

It’s something he under stands well. He, at first, sought to distance himself from Kevin Malone, not wanting to be type cast, but once the show began to stream on Netflix, it developed a cultlike following, especially

during the pandemic. (It is now available on NBC’s Peacock streaming service, and you’ll find Kevin Malone’s chili recipe embedded in the service’s user agreement.)

“When they started releas ing the streaming numbers with ‘The Office’ on Netflix and, by any metric you could rea sonably calculate, more people were watching ‘The Office’ than any show on television. It turned that spotlight back onto us individually.

“I realized a palpable change once again, walking through an airport, sitting in a restau rant. The show was bigger than when it was NBC’s No. 1 show. It became: ‘You can’t just ignore this. It’s not going away.’ ”

And he realized he really didn’t want to. In 2021, he wrote the best-selling “Welcome to Dunder Mifflin: The Ultimate Oral History of The Office.”

“I really enjoy this,” he said of fans’ enthusiasm for “The Office” and his chili. “It means a lot to me.”

THE OFFICE CHILI

1 hour, 10 mins

8 to 10 servings (makes 14 cups)

“This is it folks. My own personal go-to chili recipe,” actor Brian Baumgart ner, who played chili expert and accountant Kevin Malone on NBC’s “The Office,” writes in his “Seriously Good Chili Cookbook.” Baumgart ner captured hearts in Season 5 when his character makes and magnifi cently spills a big batch of chili, but unlike that character, Baumgartner did not have a recipe handed down for generations. Instead, he created his own recipe after much testing and adjusting. He relies on Bush’s mild chili sauce beans for a flavor boost, but you can use your favor ite beans. His topping suggestions are: shredded cheese, sour cream, pickled jalapeños, avocado mash and crumbled tortilla chips. We liked it with chopped red onion, too.

Storage Notes: Refrigerate for up to 4 days or freeze in an airtight

container for up to 3 months.

1 tablespoon grapeseed oil, canola or other neutral oil

1 medium yellow onion (8 ounces), chopped

1 large green bell pepper (7 ounces), seeded and chopped

2 cloves garlic, chopped

2 pounds lean ground turkey or ground beef (90 percent lean or higher)

One (6-ounce) can no-saltadded tomato paste

One (24-ounce) can no-saltadded diced tomatoes

One (16-ounce) can no-saltadded tomato sauce

½ cup water, plus more as needed (optional)

4 teaspoons chili powder

4 teaspoons dried oregano

2 teaspoons ancho chile powder

2 teaspoons fine salt, plus more as needed

1 teaspoon granulated sugar

½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper, plus more as needed

One (16-ounce) can Bush’s Pinto Beans in Mild Chili Sauce, undrained

One (16-ounce) can Bush’s Kidney Beans in Mild Chili Sauce, undrained

Shredded cheddar cheese, avocado chunks, chopped red onion and/or pickled jalapeños and sour cream, for serving (optional)

In a large pot over medium-high heat, heat the oil until shimmering. Add the onions, green bell pepper and garlic and cook, stirring, until the onions are just translucent, about 3 minutes.

Add the meat and cook, stirring and breaking up any clumps, until still slightly pink, 3 to 5 minutes. Stir in the tomato paste and cook until the meat is cooked through and the paste darkens a bit, about 5 minutes.

Stir in the diced tomatoes, tomato sauce, water, if using, chili powder, oregano, ancho chile powder, salt, sugar and black pepper until well combined, and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to low, cover and simmer for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally. Stir in the beans, cover and simmer for another 20 minutes, or until heated through and at the desired consistency. Taste and add more salt and pepper, as needed. Also, you can add more water, ¼ cup at a time, if you think the chili is too thick.

Spoon into bowls and sprinkle with your choices of cheddar cheese, avocado, chopped red onion, pickled jalapeños and/or sour cream and serve.

Nutrition information per serving (1 1 3 cups) based on 10 | Calories: 331; Total Fat: 10 g; Satu rated Fat: 2 g; Cholesterol: 67 mg; Sodium: 699 mg; Carbohydrates: 37 g; Dietary Fiber: 8 g; Sugar: 13 g; Protein: 25 g

This analysis is an estimate based on available ingredients and this preparation. It should not sub stitute for a dietitian’s or nutrition ist’s advice.

Adapted from “Seriously Good Chili Cookbook” by Brian Baumgart ner (Fox Chapel Publishing, 2022).

Pantry-friendly veggie burger starts with canned mushrooms, beans

A Aron HutcHerson THE WASHINGTON POST

Black bean burgers have always been, and probably forever will be, my favorite type of plant-based burger.

While I do eat burgers made from animals too, those made from beans can be just as flavorful and satisfying – and sometimes even more so. (Take into account the environmental impact of replacing beef with beans and my love for black bean burgers is even stronger.)

While plant-based patties are widely available at grocery stores, here is a pantry-friendly recipe so you can have the pleasure of making your own.

I love the earthiness of black beans, and here I complement that with umami from canned mushrooms and tamari or soy sauce. The patties are seasoned with garlic powder and smoked paprika for even more flavor. Oats are a great pantry-friendly ingredient to use as a binder while adding texture. (Use glu ten-free oats and tamari if you want to make the patties

gluten-free.)

A food processor makes quick work out of mashing the beans and chopping the mushrooms, but you can just as easily make these burgers without one. One thing to note when preparing bean burgers is that it’s important to let the patties rest for a few minutes so they better retain their shape and are less likely to fall apart during cooking.

As good as these patties are, toppings are equally impor tant in determining the overall enjoyment of a burger. Feel free to grab a slice of cheese or your favorite condiments and call it a day. Or use the time while the burgers are resting to make bal samic-glazed onions that add acidity, a hint of sweetness and a little crunch.

MUSHROOM AND BLACK BEAN BURGERS WITH BALSAMIC-GLAZED ONIONS

30 minutes

4 servings

Canned mushrooms and black beans pack these pantry-friendly

veggie burgers with umami and earthiness. This recipe can easily be made gluten-free by using glu ten-free oats and tamari. You can serve the burgers however you like, but the balsamic-glazed onions add acidity and a little crunch.

Storage Notes: Refrigerate left overs for up to 4 days.

One (15-ounce) can no-saltadded black beans, drained and rinsed

1 (13.25-ounce) can mushrooms (pieces and stems), drained and rinsed

½ cup rolled old-fashioned oats

1 tablespoon tamari or soy sauce

1 teaspoon smoked paprika

½ teaspoon garlic powder ½ teaspoon ground black pepper ½ teaspoon fine salt, divided 3 tablespoons vegetable oil, divided 1 medium yellow onion (about 9 ounces), thinly sliced

1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar Hamburger buns

Toppings such as cheese, lettuce, slices of tomato, pickles, mustard and/ or ketchup (optional)

In the bowl of a food processor, combine the beans, mushrooms, oats, tamari, paprika, garlic powder, black pepper and ¼ teaspoon of salt and pulse until the mushrooms are finely chopped and the mixture is evenly combined, 10 to 15 seconds. (Alternatively, use a fork to mash the beans in a large mixing bowl until mushy but not totally smooth. Chop the mushrooms by hand. Add the mushrooms and the remaining ingredients to the beans and stir until evenly combined.) Form the mixture into 4 patties that are about 3 ½ inches in diameter, using about ½ cup of the mixture for each. Let sit for 10 to 15 minutes while you make the onions.

In a large skillet over medium heat, heat 1 tablespoon of the oil

until it shimmers. Add the onions and the remaining ¼ teaspoon of salt and cook, stirring regularly, until the onion begins to soften and turn translucent, about 10 minutes. Add the vinegar and cook, stirring regularly, until it reduces and coats the onion, about 3 minutes. Trans fer to a small bowl.

In the same skillet, add the remaining 2 tablespoons of the oil, increase the heat to medium-high and heat until the oil shimmers. Add the burgers and cook until nicely browned, about 4 minutes per side. Serve on buns, topped with some of the balsamic-glazed onions along with cheese, lettuce, slices of tomato, pickles, mustard and/or ketchup, if desired.

Nutrition information per serving (1 burger with 2 table spoons onions) | Calories: 374; Total Fat: 13 g; Saturated Fat: 2 g; Cholesterol: 0 mg; Sodium: 902 mg; Carbohydrates: 54 g; Dietary Fiber: 10 g; Sugar: 6 g; Protein: 13 g

This analysis is an estimate based on available ingredients and this preparation. It should not sub stitute for a dietitian’s or nutrition ist’s advice.

Recipe from Washington Post staff writer Aaron Hutcherson.

Scott Suchman/The Washington Post Mushroom and black bean burgers with balsamic-glazed onions.

tHe WAsHington Post

Scott Suchman/The Washington Post

The Office chili uses canned beans in a mild chili sauce.

‘We build each other up’ CARPENTRY CLASSES FOR, BY WOMEN

K erry Sheridan SPECIAL TO THE WASHINGTON POST

Igrip a piece of pale lumber, lay it atop a pair of sawhorses and nod at Siu-Sing Shantur, 66, a retired commercial banker. She aligns the blade to the penciled line and powers up her circular saw. The spinning blade roars. Sawdust flies and the discarded piece falls to the barn floor. We high-five, then she hands the saw to me.

A crew of women around us are hammering, drilling and raising the frame of a tiny house at Hammerstone, which is housed in an old red dairy barn nestled among rolling hills and apple orchards near Ithaca, N.Y. Hammerstone is one of a handful of small carpen try schools around the country where women teach other women skills that many of us missed out on, somehow.

Shantur has taken multiple classes here, building saw horses, a bookcase and a picnic table, and framing a sauna. But she tells me she’d prob ably never take a class with men, “because my brain is hard-wired to feel less in a male-dominated field.” Here, among women, the vibe is dif ferent. “We build each other up,” Shantur said.

Interest and enrollment in basic carpentry classes for women have increased in recent years, spurred on by the #MeToo movement and, more recently, the coronavi rus pandemic, according to the leaders of Hammerstone, Wild Abundance in western North Carolina, and Yestermorrow in Waitsfield, Vt.

“I saw a big desire in women to claim what had been largely taken away from them,” said Natalie Bogwalker, 43, the founder of Wild Abundance.

Bogwalker teaches tiny-house building and carpentry and said that about 2,000 students, ranging in age from 14 to 77, have taken classes at Wild Abundance in the past decade.

Hammerstone owner Maria Klemperer-Johnson, 47, who has worked as a carpenter for over 20 years, believes the pan demic also played a role in the uptick, as people sought greater control over their lives, work and living spaces. The three schools arose independently of one another; Hammerstone and Wild Abundance launched about a decade ago. Yestermor row, which was started in 1980, offered its first women’s car pentry course in 1999 and has since expanded its offerings and recently opened a second loca tion, in Bluff, Utah.

The women who teach at these schools have learned to navigate the male-dominated world of carpentry, where just 3 percent of carpenters are women, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Many have stories of sexual harassment they endured on the job.

“I know in my journey here, it was not easy,” said Lizabeth Moniz, 62, who teaches at Yes termorrow. “One of the ways that I have decided that I’m going to try to balance that is to teach women skills that I take very seriously.”

In class at Hammerstone, we talk about the reasons women are interested in these courses, whether it’s because they were corralled into cooking class instead of shop in school; because our fathers or broth ers didn’t think to teach us these skills; or simply because per sistent cultural tropes tell girls from a young age that carpentry is for boys.

“I’ve heard some mispercep tions about how women don’t like to get dirty. Well, that’s entirely imposed upon us from the outside,” said KlempererJohnson. “The problem is that all of us have internalized these stereotypes – women just as much as men – and we all have to work to undo it.”

nnn

A key obstacle to claiming power in construction trades like carpentry is knowing the language. Words like gussets, joists, speed square and worm drive saw can feel unfamiliar.

“We give them a big glossary with the highlighted words,” said Patti Garbeck, 66, a car

penter who teaches with Moniz at Yestermorrow. “The first day we start building, you have got to know what a joist is, a stud, decking, all those words.”

Courses at the schools last a few days or a week. They aren’t designed for vocational train ing so much as to provide the kind of mentorship and learning opportunities in carpentry that boys and young men often get from their fathers and uncles.

“They just want a new skill. They want to feel comfort able with tools. They want to do some things around the house,” Garbeck said. “Maybe they’re building a house and they can’t learn from their partner. I’ve heard that a lot.”

The other women in my class at Hammerstone talk about this, too – having fathers or spouses who wouldn’t teach them or who would just do it for them, or feeling frustrated when men overexplain small details.

“It just feels a lot safer to learn from a woman,” said Alexandra Haynes, 30, a web developer who took the tinyhouse course with me at Hammerstone and who hopes to build her own cottage in the woods someday. “I feel like I don’t have to worry about looking silly or asking silly questions or messing up.”

In my case, I never had someone to teach me beyond the one industrial arts class I took in junior high. My grandfather, Mel, was a skilled electrician and carpenter, but he died before I was born, and my dad was jeweler, not a tradesman.

At Hammerstone, stu

dents are encouraged to start with two days of basic skills. My class was led by Em Moss, 35, who began unraveling the mystery of the craft by telling us to examine the tools that lined our belts.

“Pull out your speed square. What do you notice about it?” Moss said. We raised our hands and shared observations about the triangular piece of metal with notches, degrees, a pivot point and a wider side made to hang securely over an edge.

Each time someone offered a detail, Moss nodded and offered praise and an explanation of the feature’s purpose.

It occurred to me that this was the opposite of “mansplain ing.” Rather than listening to a (likely male) expert lecture us about how to use a tool – or how not to use it – we were being encouraged to figure things out ourselves. Another teacher at Hammerstone, Christina Alario, 36, said this is deliberate.

“We teach a very logical way of approaching these tools and a safe way of approaching these tools, but it’s really about letting students know that they have the ability to try and mess up and then fix their mistakes,” said Alario. “For me, it’s really about teaching the confidence that then lets them open up to learning the tools.”

At Hammerstone, the tinyhouse building course includes learning some trigonometry: how to calculate the slope of a roof and how long the mate rials must be, based on that angle. The math and the spatial learning are a struggle for me at times.

We learn how to read plans,

how to measure and how to find the true line for cutting. We learn the word for the space that the saw eats up in the wood – kerf – and how to operate circular saws, routers, drills and drivers.

For every skill we learn, we are also silently unlearn ing whatever it was that held us back.

nnn

Over a week, we build the frame for a tiny house that stands on a trailer. The client is a woman who plans to live in it and who has paid for the mate rial costs, while we students pay Hammerstone for the instruc tion, then provide the labor while we learn.

As we nail together the pieces we’ve measured, Alario and Klemperer-Johnson coach us to hold our hammers loosely, rather than gripping the handle tightly. They tell us to swing them through the air in a natural arc, letting the weight of the hammer find the head of the nail.

I try, but I keep missing the nail, making crescentshaped divots in the frame. I get tense, and my jaw clenches as I make pathetic flink sounds instead of the solid whunk that results when your hammer really connects. Alario slides in front of me.

“I don’t care if you hit it 3 percent of the time,” she said. “Just work on that arc.”

Given clear permission to fail, I stop trying to hit the nail on the head. I focus on my swing. Soon, the hammer finds the nail with much more power than before, and the nail disap pears into the pine.

By the end of the week, I’m balancing atop a ladder, drill ing screws into the sheathing around the tiny-house frame. Fears I had at the beginning – of heights, or of getting splinters –have dissipated. I feel strong, if exhausted, and more capable. As if most anything is possible.

Since my visit ended, my classmates have stayed in touch via text, sharing pictures of the tiny house’s progress over the summer as they installed windows and worked on the drywall, shingles and roof. I beam with pride, seeing women continue to work on what feels like our house.

“All of us came in with the fear of, ‘I don’t want to make mistakes.’ I’ve lost that fear,” said Ranna Bigdely, 36, the mother of a 3-year-old daughter.

“Hopefully her young eyes watching me will create a good framework, a good foundation for her to learn,” she said.

Heather Ainsworth/The Washington Post photos

Anu Rangarajan, left, gets help from instructor Christina Alario during a recent class at Hammerstone.

Marilyn Dispensa, left, with an apple crate she built at Hammerstone. Kim Ippolito uses a table saw during a class at Hammerstone.

‘Blonde,’ ‘Elvis’ and the challenge of telling the truth about our icons

SPECIAL TO THE WASHINGTON POST

‘B

londe” and “Elvis” aren’t just two epics about American icons. They’re also documents that force the public to consider what it means for the families of major figures to control the interpreta tion of cultural history.

The two films almost demand to be watched in tandem, which you can do if you have HBO Max (where “Elvis” is streaming), Netflix (where “Blonde” debuted on Wednesday), and 5 1/2 hours to kill. Elvis Presley and Marilyn Monroe were the two single greatest stars of their era, and their early deaths – hers in 1962, his in 1977 – bookended a period of enormous social and political upheaval in a trau matized America. And just as important as their legacies are the conditions under which those legacies are being inter preted today.

“Elvis” is best understood not as a musical biopic but as a superhero movie, the origin story for The Great Ameri can Entertainer. Director Baz Luhrmann, who can fairly be described as “a bit much,” poured all his energy and talents into crafting a vision of Elvis (Austin Butler) as a larger-than-life avatar of great ness. Luhrmann is not subtle about this. He hangs a Shazamstyle lightning bolt around the neck of our hero in a scene in which the young Elvis skips through the ramshackle town in which he lives. Hopping back and forth between a juke joint and a church, Elvis absorbs the skills and the talents of those around him, synthesizing them into their ultimate form.

Notably absent from “Elvis” is much in the way of Elvis’s later, decadent years, during which he got puffy and fat and drugged out. The film doesn’t depict Elvis hanging out with Richard M. Nixon. The villain here is not Elvis’s appetites or

Cryptoquotes

Here’s

excesses or treatment of his family but Colonel Tom Parker (Tom Hanks), the evil out sider with the malicious accent, the controlling puppeteer who trapped Elvis in Las Vegas as a way of paying down his own gambling debts.

None of this should be sur prising, given the need for Luhrmann and his collabora tors to secure the blessing of Elvis’s estate to gain access to his songs and other ele ments that made the movie the rousing, audience-friendly triumph it was. Gliding past inconveniences such as Pris cilla Presley’s extreme youth during their courtship is, appar ently, a small price to pay for the musical catalog.

All films take artistic license – see the contretemps about “The Woman King” - and the licenses taken here serve Luhrmann’s goal, which is mythmaking. Yet a hero with his flaws sanded down is less interesting than one forced to grapple with them, and there’s a smoothness to “Elvis” that undercuts the drama of his life and his role in the mainstream ing of Black American culture.

But while the King got a superhero story, our nation’s movie Queen gets a horror movie.

Based on the novel of the same name by Joyce Carol Oates, “Blonde” shouldn’t be taken for a pure biopic. It is, rather, an interpretation of the actress’s life designed to high light the ways in which fame can destroy a person. In the case of Norma Jeane Baker (Ana de Armas), the pursuit of fame was an effort to escape the meaninglessness and emptiness of her home life. Her mother was insane. Her father was non existent. She needed something to fill the void.

This is why Norma Jeane refers to husbands Joe DiMag gio (Bobby Cannavale) and Arthur Miller (Adrien Brody) as “Daddy” throughout the

Word

movie. It’s creepy and infan tilizing, but that’s the point: The love from the masses couldn’t fill the father-shaped hole in her heart. Whether or not the movie needed this display of desperation at such length (166 minutes), much less the sight of talking fetuses begging not to be aborted, is a question for another day.

Again, artistic license means that director Andrew Dominik is free to use Norma Jeane’s life story however he wishes. But doing so reduces a real woman who suffered real tragedies to little more than a cutout doll, a plaything for the amusement of filmmakers and audi ences alike.

Indeed, the very existence of “Blonde” proves Norma Jeane’s eagerness for family to protect her wasn’t pathetic; it was pre scient. While the Presley family controls Elvis’s assets and rights, Baker’s estate has been dispersed: Part of it is owned by a charity, and the wife of Baker’s acting coach even tually sold the bulk of it to a corporation.

Even if Baker’s legacy were controlled by family or friends who knew her and loved her as a person, there’s probably only so much an effective estate could have done to stop Norma Jeane’s life from being reduced to horrific NC-17 #content beamed directly into 200 million households glob ally. The estate wouldn’t have a back catalog of music under its control, and biopics don’t nec essarily need the approval of their subjects.

But somewhere between the whitewashed hagiography of “Elvis” and the garish night mare of “Blonde,” there rests a happy medium that better bal ances truthfulness and artistry.

Sonny Bunch is culture editor for The Bulwark, where he hosts The Bulwark Goes to Hol lywood newsletter and podcast and Across the Movie Aisle.

Bridge

KEEPING MATTERS UNDER COVER

Thomas R. Pickering, who was the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations from 1989 to 1992, said, “In archaeol ogy you uncover the unknown. In diplomacy you cover the known.” If he had been a player, he could have added, “In bridge you uncover the known.” It is important for declarer not to make it easy for the defenders to read his hand.

by Phillip Alder

In today’s deal, East opened with a weak two-bid in hearts. South, assuming his partner had 6 or 7 points, jumped to four spades. What happens after West leads the heart jack and East wins with his ace?

An archaeologist sitting South uncovers the unknown – he follows suit with the heart three. However, then East, knowing his partner led a singleton, returns the heart four, his lowest card being a suit-preference signal for clubs, the lower-ranking of the other two side suits. West ruffs South’s heart king, cashes the club ace and plays a second club to his partner’s king: down one.

Now suppose South is a good bridge player. He uncovers the known, smoothly dropping the heart king under East’s ace at trick one. What conclusion will East draw? Probably that it is South, not West, who started with the singleton. Looking at the club queen in the dummy, East is unlikely to return that suit. He is almost certain to shift to the diamond nine.

That is all the help South needs. He wins with the diamond ace, cashes two of his top spades, unblocks the diamond royals, crosses to dummy with a spade and discards a rounded-suit loser on the diamond jack.

Play the card you are known to hold. It keeps the unknown card(s) un known.

COPYRIGHT: 2022, UNITED FEATURE SYNDICATE

Sudoku by Wayne Gould

Bridge

10/04/22

KEEPING MATTERS UNDER COVER

Fill in the grid so that every row, every column and every 3x3 grid contains the digits 1 through 9, with no repeats. That means that no number is repeated in any row, column or box. Solution, tips and computer program at www.sudoku.com

Thomas R. Pickering, who was the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations from 1989 to 1992, said, “In archaeol ogy you uncover the unknown. In diplomacy you cover the known.” If he had been a player, he could have added,

Difficulty level: SILVER

Yesterday’s solution:

Dist.

Sonny Bunch

Ana de Armas as Marilyn Monroe in a scene from “Blonde.”

Rick Lagina joins the search for emeralds from the Atocha shipwreck on “Beyond Oak Island.”

Spine-tingling surprises await at theaters

Daily Republic Staff DRNEWS@DAILYREPUBLIC.NET

FAIRFIELD —

Several movies geared for Halloween, including the release of the classic movie “Trick ‘R Treat,” will be in local the aters this week.

Opening nationwide are:

“Amsterdam,” set in the 1930s, where three friends witness a murder and uncover one of the most outrageous plots in American history. The film is rated R. “Don’t Look at the Demon,” in which a team of paranormal inves tigators head for the highlands of Fraser’s Hill, Malaysia, to probe a series of alleged distur bances at a house with a dark past. The film is rated R.

“Lyle, Lyle, Croco dile,” in which the Primm family (Constance Wu, Scoot McNairy, Winslow Fegley) moves to New York City and young son Josh struggles to adapt to his new school and new friends. All of that changes when he discovers Lyle, a singing crocodile (Shawn Mendes) who loves baths, caviar and great music, living in the attic of his new home. The two become fast friends, but when Lyle’s existence is threatened by evil neigh bor Mr. Grumps (Brett Gelman), they all must work together to save the singing croc. The film is rated PG.

“The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry,” in which bookstore owner A.J. Fikry (Kunal Nayyar) drinks his woes away after his life hits a series of speed bumps. Things get worse when he loses his most prized book store item, a series of Edgar Allen Poe poems. But when a mysteri ous package appears at the bookstore, the unex pected arrival gives Fikry a new lease on life and love that are greater than he ever imagined. The film is rated PG-13.

“Trick ‘R Treat,” which tells the tale of five interwoven stories that occur on Halloween: An everyday high school principal has a secret life as a serial killer; a college virgin might have just met the guy for her; a group of teenagers pull a mean prank; a woman

who loathes the night has to contend with her hol iday-obsessed husband; and a mean old man meets his match with a demonic, supernatural trick-or-treater. The film is rated R.

Opening in limited release are:

“Spirit Halloween,” in which a new Spirit Hal loween store opens in a deserted strip mall and three middle school friends, who think they’ve outgrown trick or treat ing, make a dare to spend the night locked inside the store on Halloween night. Evil spirits make it one memorable night. The film is rated PG13.

“Terrifier 2,” in which Art the Clown, who has been resurrected by a sinister entity, returns to the timid town of Miles County where he begins to target a teenage girl and her younger brother on Halloween. The film is rated R.

“Bromates,” in which two friends, Jonesie and Sid, who both break up with their girlfriends at the same time, decide to move in together in a mis guided attempt to help each other through their respective breakups. The film is rated R.

“Operation Seawolf,” set in the last days of World War II. Germany is looking for some sem blance of victory using their navy and the last remaining U-Boats for one last mission to attack the United States. Capt. Hans Kessler (Raldph Lundgren), a grizzled submarine commander from both world wars, is called into service to help turn the tide of the war. The mission was soon to be known as Opera tion Seawolf. The film is not yet rated.

For information on Edwards Cinemas in Fairfield, visit www. regmovies.com/ theatres/regal-edwardsfairfield-imax. For Vacaville showtimes, visit www.brenden theatres.com. For Vallejo showtimes, check www. cinemark.com/theatres/ ca-vallejo. More informa tion about upcoming films is available at www.movie insider.com.

TAFB

Pickles Brian Crane

Zits Jerry Scott and Jim Borgman

Pearls Before Swine Stephan Pastis

Dilbert Scott Adams

Baby Blues Rick Kirkman and Jerry Scott

Baldo Hector Cantú and Carlos Castellanos

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Loscomentariosdebenhacerseporescrit oalaatenciónde:LaTanyaTerrones,HousingServicesDepartment-CDBGProgram,1000WebsterStreet,1stFloor,Fairfield,CA 94533oatravésdelcorreoelectrónicolterrones@fairfield.ca.govantesdelas5:00p.m. eloctubre9,2022.

Audienciapública:elConcejoMunicipalllevaráacabounaAudienciaPúblicaparaconsiderarelInformedeEvaluaciónyDesempeñoAnualConsolidado(ConsolidatedAnnual PerformanceandEvaluationRepor,CAPER)propuestoylasenmiendaselmartes15de marzode2022alas6:00p.m.,otanprontocomosepuedapresentarelasuntoenaudiencia,atravésdeZoom.DeconformidadconlasÓrdenesEjecutivasN-33-20yN-29-20 delgobernador,ydadoelriesgoparalasaludasociadoconlaCOVID-19,estaaudienciapúblicasellevaráacabomedianteteleconferenciaoreuniónvirtual,sinunlugar físicoalcualpuedanasistirlosmiembrosdelpúblico.Losmiembrosdelpúblicopueden accederalareuniónenComc astCableChannel26,ATTU-Verse99, www.fairfield.ca.gov/liveyverlatransmisiónporlawebenvivoen www.youtube.com/user/FFCATV/live.Consultelaagendadelareuniónparaobtenermás detallessobrelaparticipación.

LaciudaddeFairfieldsecomprometeaproporcionarinstalacionesparareunionesque seanaccesiblesparapersonascondiscapacidadesoquetengandificultades lingüísticas.Parasolicitarmaterialesdelareuniónenformatosalternativoso un intérpretedelenguadeseñas,subtítulosentiemporealuotrasadaptaciones, comuníqueseconKarenReese,secretariaadjunta,almenos72horasantesdela reuniónporel(707)428-7402.Parapersonasconlimitacionesauditivasodelhabla, marque711o(800)735-2922(inglés).Paraespañol,tagalouotroidioma,marque(800) 855-3000yproporcionealasistentedecomunicaciónelsiguientenúmerodeteléfonode laciudad:(707)399-4010.

DR#00058263 Published:October3,2022

APN:0167-772-050TSNo:CA08000493-22-1TONo:220284047-CA-VOINOTICEOF TRUSTEE'SSALE(TheabovestatementismadepursuanttoCACivilCodeSection 2923.3(d)(1).TheSummarywillbeprovidedtoTrustor(s)and/orvestedowner(s)only, pursuanttoCACivilCodeSection2923.3(d)(2).)YOUAREINDEFAULTUNDERA DEEDOFTRUSTDATEDMay4,2007.UNLESSYOUTAKEACTIONTOPROTECT YOURPROPERTY,ITMAYBESOLDATAPUBLICSALE.IFYOUNEEDANEXPLANATIONOFTHENATUREOFTHEPROCEEDINGSAGAINSTYOU,YOUSHOULD CONTACTALAWYER.OnOctober27,2022at09: 30AM,atSantaClaraStreetentrancetotheCityHall,555SantaClaraStreet,Vallejo,CA94590,MTCFinancialInc.dba TrusteeCorps,asthedulyAppointedTrustee,underandpursuanttothepowerofsale containedinthatcertainDeedofTrustrecordedonMay11,2007asInstrumentNo. 200700054184,ofofficialrecordsintheOfficeoftheRecorderofSolanoCounty,California,executedbyMILTONCHEEKANDSABRINACHEEK,HUSBANDANDWIFE,AS JOINTTENANTS,asTrustor(s) ,infavorofJPMORGANCHASEBANK,N.A.asBeneficiary,WILLSELLATPUBLICAUCTIONTOTHEHIGHESTBIDDER,inlawfulmoneyof theUnitedStates,allpayableatthetimeofsale,thatcertainpropertysituatedinsaid County,Californiadescribingthelandthereinas:ASMOREFULLYDESCRIBEDIN SAIDDEEDOFTRUSTThepropertyheretoforedescribedisbeingsold"asis".The streetaddressandothercommondesignation,ifany,oftherealpropertydescribed aboveispurportedto be:4480AVONDALECIR,FAIRFIELD,CA94533TheundersignedTrusteedisclaimsanyliabilityforanyincorrectnessofthestreetaddressandothercommondesignation,ifany,shownherein.Saidsalewillbemadewithoutcovenantor warranty,expressorimplied,regardingtitle,possession,orencumbrances,topaytheremainingprincipalsumoftheNote(s)securedbysaidDeedofTrust,withinterestthereon, asprovidedinsaidNote(s),advancesifany,underthetermsoftheDeedofTrust,estimatedfees,chargesandexpensesoftheTrusteeandofthetrustscreatedbysaidDeedof Trust.Thetotalamountoftheunpaidbalanceoftheobligationssecuredbytheproperty tobesoldandreasonableestimatedcosts,expensesandadvancesatthetimeoftheinitialpublicationofthisNoticeofTrustee sSaleisestimatedtobe$832,104.84 (Estimated).However,prepaymentpremiums,accruedinterestandadvanceswillincreasethisfigurep riortosale.Beneficiary sbidatsaidsalemayincludeallorpartofsaid amount.Inadditiontocash,theTrusteewillacceptacashier scheckdrawnonastateor

need to

done by 6:30 AM)

(Sun through Fri)

$700-$1,200

NoticeofSelfStorageSale PleasetakenoticeCentralSelfStorage-EastTravis837ETravisBlvdFairfieldCA 94533intendstoholdanauctionofthegoodsstoredinaself-servicestorageunitbythe followingpersons.Thesalewilloccurasanonlineauctionviawww.storagetreasures.com on10/19/2022at12:00PM.Unlessstatedotherwisethedescriptionofthecontentsare householdgoodsandfurnishings: LeoPassion WalterMapp FedrickGiannuzzi SuePierce MichaelaRivers ChalagneHenderson KendraWillis SuePierce AysjhaMcAfee Allpropertyisbeingstoredattheaboveself-storagefacility.Thissalemaybewithdrawn atanytimewithoutnotice.Certaintermsandconditionsapply.Seemanagerfordetails. 10/3,10/10/22 CNS-3628109#

THEDAILYREPUBLIC DR#00058116 Published:October3,10,2022

nauugnaysapaglahokngmamamayanparasaMgaProgramasaPagpaplanoatPagpapaunladngKomunidad(CommunityPlanningandDevelopmentPrograms)sailalimng U.S.DepartmentofHousingan dUrbanDevelopment,atmganaaangkopnapagsusukongginawangavailablesamgakinakailangangiyonsapamamagitanngCoronavirus Aid,Relief,andEconomicSecurityAct(CARESAct),PublicLaw116-136,inaabisuhan ngLungsodngFairfieldangpangkalahatangpublikotungkolsamgaoportunidadna magbigayngpampublikongkomentohinggilsamgasumusunodnaipinapanukalang pagkilos:

1)MahalagangPag-amyendasaCDBGngFY2019-20saTaunangPlanongPagkilos ngFY201 9-2020;BabaguhinngmahalagangPag-amyendangitoangmgapagkukunan ngpondoatangtaonngpagkukunanparasamgapondosailangsitwasyon,ngunithindi itomagtatalaganganumangkaragdagangperasamgasumusunodnaproyekto:

CityofFairfieldCOVID-19PalletShelterProjectCDBG-CV$120,000

CityofFairfieldCOVID-19PalletShelterProject2019-EN$5,840

2)MahalagangPag-amyendasaPlanongPagkilossa2020-21–BabaguhinngMahalagangPag-amyendaangmgapagkukunanngpondongmgaproyektoatangtaonng pagkukunanparasamgapondosailangsitwasyon,athindiitomagtatalaganganumangkaragdagangperasamgasumusunodnaproyekto:

CityofFairfieldCOVID-19PalletShelterProject2020-En$73,160

PanahonngPagkomentongPubliko:AngipinapanukalangMahahalagangPag-amyendaaymagigingavailableparasa5arawnapanahonngpagsusuriatpagkomentong publikosimulaOktubre3,2022atmatitingnanitosawebsitengLun gsodngFairfieldsa www.fairfield.ca.gov.AvailableangmgaaktwalnakopyasamgasumusunodnalokasyonsaFairfield:

CityHall1stFloorLobby,1000WebsterSt.

AngmgakomentoaydapatgawinsapamamagitanngpagsulatsaAttn:LaTanyaTerrones,HousingServicesDepartment-CDBGProgram,1000WebsterStreet,1stFloor, Fairfield,CA94533osapamamagitanngpag-emailsalterrones@fairfield.ca.govbago ang5:00p.m.saOktubre9,2022.

PampublikongPagdinig:AngKonsehongLungsodaymagsasagawangPampublikong Pagdinigupangmaisaalang-alangangipinapanukalangCAPERatMgaPag-amyendasa Martes,Oktubre18,2022nang6:00p.m.,osalalongmadalingpanahonkungkailan maaaringmagsimulaangpagdinig,sapamamagitanngZoom.AlinsunodsaMga EhekutibongKautusanN-33-20atN-29-20ngGobernador,atdahilsamgapanganibsa kalusugannanauugnaysaCOVID-19,isasagawaangpampublikongpagdinignaitosa pamamagitanngteleconference/virtualnapulong,nangwalangpisikalnalokasyonna mapupuntahanngmgamiyembrongpublikokungsaansilamaaaringdumalo.Maaaring i-accessngmgamiyembrongpublikoangpulongsaComcastCableChannel26,ATTUVerse99,www.fairfield.ca.gov/liveatsalivestreamingsawebsa www.youtube.com/user/FFCATV/live.Pakitingnanangagendangpulongparasamga karagdagangdetalyetungkolsapaglahok.

NakatuonangLungsodngFairfieldsapaglalaanng mgapasilidadparasapulongna maaaringmagamitngmgataongmaymgakapansananat/omayibangwika.Upanghumilingngmgamateryalparasapulongnanasamgaalternatibongformat,oupanghumilingngsignlanguageinterpreter,real-timenacaptioning,oibapangtulong,makipag-ugnayansaDeputyClerknasiAmberAlexander72orasmanlangbagoangpulongsa (707)428-7402.Parasamgaindibidwalnamaymgalimitasyonsapandinigopagsasalita,i-dialang7-1-1oang(8 00)735-2922(English).ParasaSpanish,Tagalog,oibapang wika,i-dialang(800)855-3000atibigaysaassistantsapakikipag-ugnayanangsumusunodnanumerongteleponongLungsod:(707)399-4010.

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CALENDAR

Monday’s TV sports

Baseball

• MLB, San Francisco vs. San Diego, NBCSBA, 6:30 p.m.

• MLB, L.A. Angels at Oakland, NBCSCA, 6:30 p.m.

Football

• NFL, L.A. Rams vs. San Francisco, 7, 10, ESPN, ESPN2, 5:15 p.m.

Golf

• College, Blessings Collegiate Invitational, Round 1, GOLF, 1:30 p.m.

Soccer

• EPL, Nottingham Forest vs. Leicester City, USA, Noon.

Tuesday’s TV sports

Baseball

• MLB, Philadelphia vs. Houston, TBS, 5 p.m.

• MLB, San Francisco vs. San Diego, NBCSBA, 6:30 p.m.

• MLB, L.A. Angels vs.Oakland, NBCSCA, 6:30 p.m.

Basketball

• NBA Preseason, Detroit vs. N.Y. Knicks, TNT, 4 p.m.

• NBA Preseason, New Orleans vs. Chicago, TNT, 6:30 p.m.

Golf

• College, Blessings Collegiate Invitational, Round 2, GOLF, 1:30 p.m.

Hockey

• NHL Preseason, San Jose vs. Eisbaren Berlin, NBCSCA, 10:30 a.m.

A’s

From Page B1

The Mariners finally got their first hit in the sixth when Ty France followed a J.P. Craw ford walk with a two-out single into left field, but Suarez struck out to end the inning.

Kaprielian ended his day with seven strike outs, two walks, and just one hit allowed over six innings. In the seventh, the A’s brought in lefty A.J. Puk in relief.

Puk allowed a leadoff double to Mitch Haniger and walked Jesse Winker, but escaped trouble by strik ing out Jarred Kelenic, Abraham Toro, and Luis Torrens.

On the other side, Mariners starter Robbie Ray started off the day in historic fashion, as his first strikeout of the day put him at 1,500 for his career. The strikeout, which came against Dermis Garcia in the first, made Ray the second fastest pitcher

in MLB history to reach the 1,500 strikeout mark at 1,220 innings, behind only San Diego Padres’ hurler Yu Darvish, who accomplished the feat in career 1,216 1/3 innings on June 21, 2021.

But other than his historic strikeout, there wasn’t much for Ray to celebrate on Sunday.

He finished the day with six runs allowed over 5 2/3 innings, with the A’s tattooing him for eight hits, three walks, three homers, and six runs.

Ray’s troubles started when he walked three straight batters to start the second inning, though he got out of that inning unscathed after a force out at home, a fly out to center field by Ernie Clement, and a strong defensive play by Jesse Winker in left field, with Winker running down a fly ball off the bat of Nick Allen near the warning track.

After escaping another jam in the third inning, Ray’s luck ran out in the fourth.

Scoreboard

BASEBALL American League

SAN

OAKLAND 10, Seattle

Detroit 5, Minnesota 2 Philadelphia 8, Washington 1 Baltimore 3, N.Y.

Houston

Miami

National League

49ers

From Page B1

rusher Nick Bosa on their side, and he’ll face a Rams’ offensive line that will be without its starting guards.

“I think he’s one of the best players in the league,” McVay said about Bosa. “He’s complete. They do a great job of accentuating his skill sets, moving him around in some of the pass downs.”

The Rams’ counter move for Bosa might involve second-year wide receiver Ben Skowronek, who became the team’s fullback after the sea son-opening loss to the Buffalo Bills. McVay has rarely utilized a fullback in his coaching career, but he adjusted after the slew of injuries to the offensive line by having Skowronek be an extra

From Page B1

Tampa

Milwaukee

Pittsburgh 7, St. Louis

Chicago Cubs 8, Cincinnati 1 L.A. Angels 8, Texas 3 Colorado 4, L.A. Dodgers 1 Chicago White Sox 2, San Diego 1 Atlanta 5, N.Y. Mets 3 Monday’s Games L.A. Angels at OAKLAND, 6:40 p.m.

SAN FRANCISCO at San Diego, 6:40 p.m. Kansas City at Cleveland, 3:10 p.m. St. Louis at Pittsburgh, 3:35 p.m. Chicago Cubs at Cincinnati, 3:40 p.m. Atlanta at Miami, 3:40 p.m. Toronto at Baltimore, 4:05 p.m. N.Y. Yankees at Texas, 4:05 p.m. Washington at N.Y.Mets, 4:10 p.m. Tampa Bay at Boston, 4:10 p.m. Arizona at Milwaukee, 4:40 p.m.

Philadelphia at Houston, 5:10 p.m. Minnesota at Chicago White Sox, 5:10 p.m. Detroit at Seattle, 6:40 p.m.

blocker while still playing out of the Rams’ staple 11 personnel.

The Rams (2-1) will be without center Brian Allen for the third con secutive game because of a knee injury, and left guard David Edwards was ruled out after entering the concussion protocol on Saturday. Right guard Coleman Shelton has filled in for Allen at center, and the team will start Bobby Evans at left guard and Alaric Jackson at right guard versus the 49ers (1-2).

“A lot of moving parts,” McVay said. Edwards said Rams players had an animated reaction when they reviewed Skowronek’s memorable block on Car dinals star defensive end J.J. Watt last week.

Skowronek, the Rams’ undersized fullback, chipped the 6-foot-5, 288-

Colorado at L.A. Dodgers, 7:10 p.m. Tuesday’s Games L.A. Angels at OAKLAND, 6:40 p.m. SAN FRANCISCO at San Diego, 6:40 p.m. N.Y. Yankees at Texas, 10:05 a.m., first game

N.Y. Yankees at Texas, 5:05 p.m., second game Kansas City at Cleveland, 3:10 p.m. Detroit at Seattle, 3:10 p.m., first game Detroit at Seattle, To Follow, second game St. Louis at Pittsburgh, 3:35 p.m. Chicago Cubs at Cincinnati, 3:40 p.m. Atlanta at Miami, 3:40 p.m. Toronto at Baltimore, 4:05 p.m. Washington at N.Y. Mets, 4:10 p.m. Tampa Bay at Boston, 4:10 p.m. Arizona at Milwaukee, 4:40 p.m. Philadelphia at Houston, 5:10 p.m. Minnesota at Chicago White Sox, 5:10 p.m. Colorado at L.A. Dodgers, 7:30 p.m.

FOOTBALL

NFL

American Conference East W L T Pct. PF PA Miami 3 1 0 .750 98 91 Buffalo 3 1 0 .750 114 58 N.Y. Jets 2 2 0 .500 76 101 New England 1 3 0 .250 74 98 North W L T Pct. PF PA Cleveland 2 2 0 .500 105 95 Cincinnati 2 2 0 .500 91 70 Baltimore 2 2 0 .500 119 100 Pittsburgh 1 3 0 .250 74 90 South W L T Pct. PF PA Jacksonville 2 2 0 .500 105 67 Tennessee 2 2 0 .500 75 101 Indianapolis 1 2 1 .375 57

pound Watt off the edge and managed to get back on his feet to haul in a pass from Matthew Stafford.

“I think everyone was just like, ‘Holy crap,’ ” Edwards recalled. “You wouldn’t expect a receiver to generate that type of power, but he did. He’s giving us another element to our offense.”

That added element with Skowronek playing wideout and fullback has helped the Rams’ offen sive line adjust during a two-game winning streak. The Rams allowed seven sacks in the loss to the Bills, but that number has dwindled to only two combined sacks against the Atlanta Falcons and Arizona Cardinals.

The Rams’ patch work creativity will be truly tested Monday night against the 49ers’ fero cious defensive front that features Bosa. The

Cincinnati 27, Miami

Thursday’s

Sunday’s

Carolina

Green Bay 27, New England

Las Vegas 32, Denver 23 Kansas City at Tampa Bay, (N) Monday’s

L.A. Rams at SAN FRANCISCO, 5:15 p.m.

Rams had success versus Atlanta’s Grady Jarrett and Watt the past two weeks, but the 49ers’ front is on a different level because of their depth with former first-round selections Arik Arm stead and Javon Kinlaw and former Rams pass rusher Samson Ebukam. Armstead and Kinlaw, however, have “question able” game-day statuses because of injuries.

If the 49ers have most of their key defenders, they likely won’t need to blitz to create pres sure on Stafford, who has struggled to push the ball downfield this season. With only four players rushing the quarterback, that would give San Francisco the numbers advantage in the second ary. Stafford ran into this issue versus the Bills and the offense generated only 10 points.

Kingsrunning a 5-on-5 scrimmage with general manager Monte McNair and assistant general manager Wes Wilcox looking on. Fox, Huerter, Barnes, Okpala and Sabonis led one group against a second group that included Davion Mitchell, Monk, Murray, Lyles and Richaun Holmes.

Brown likes what Okpala brings to the team as a strong and versa

tile defender, traits he displayed while locking down Murray on one of the scrimmage’s final pos sessions. Okpala, who came out of Stanford as the 32nd overall pick in the 2019 NBA draft, appeared in 63 games for the Miami Heat over the past three seasons. He aver aged only 11.4 minutes per game, but he could be on the verge a bigger opportunity in Sacramento after signing a partially guaranteed two-year deal with the Kings over the summer.

Brown said he wants to go deep

into his bench in the team’s first pre season game with starters logging limited minutes.

“Everybody’s been busting their behinds here, so if I can I’m going to try to play everybody this first game,” Brown said. “We’ll give guys that are probably going to be in the starting lineup and be in the heavy mix, we may give them one or two goes in the first half, but if we can we’d like to get everybody on the floor, especially in this first game.”

Brown said he will tighten up his rotation as the Kings get closer.

Giants

From Page B1

Giants’ first run with a sacrifice fly to left, after Wilmer Flores doubled and the Giants loaded the bases behind him in the first.

Regional forecast

Shortstop Brandon Crawford, who also battled health troubles for much of the year, continued to flash his once-famous leather that has reappeared in the past month. With the D-backs mount ing scoring threats in the third, fourth and sixth innings, Crawford fielded ground balls to start three inning-ending double plays.

The first, on a ground ball from Christian Walker with runners at first and second in the third, was most impres sive. Crawford ranged well to right, pivoted and fired to second baseman

Thairo Estrada, who completed all three of the double plays. Slater’s home run was his first since June and the Giants’ fifth of the pinch-hit variety this season. Although that is tied for the second-most in the majors, San Fran cisco will end this season far off last year’s pace, a record-setting 17. No matter what happens this week in San Diego, the Giants will make history.

With a sweep or a series win, they’ll clinch a .500 record and become the first team since 1925 to avoid a losing record after being at least eight games under water with 16 or fewer games left. A series loss or a sweep in the other direction would clinch the fourth losing season in majorleague history by a team that won 100 games the previous year.

From Page B1

healed when the War riors picked him No. 28 overall. He wasn’t cleared for summer league but gradually increased his workload this summer to prepare himself for training camp. And now, he said he’s “confident” in his ankle.

In the weeks when Kerr was away from the

team’s practice facil ity, he heard rumblings about how good the 19-year-old could be.

“At the end of the summer, all of the coaches who were working with him when I was out of town, they were raving about him,” he said. “They prepped me for it, said this guy has good feel and be a really good fit with us.”

But it wasn’t until last week that Kerr could see for himself the promise.