We hope you’re having a lovely Summer, Bay listeners.

We’re spending this month gaming out the next year of our show, and we need your help! It’s important to us to hear from you and what you want to hear more (or less) of on The Bay. Just fill out our listener survey. The deadline is Friday July 21. Just go to kqed.org/thebaysurvey

Breaking news from the Bay Team: we are taking our annual break from making new episodes for the month of July. We’re using this time to reset, rest, do some team bonding, and brainstorm what we want to make for you. We will be back with new episodes starting Wednesday, August 2.

You can still reach us on Twitter @TheBayKQED or via e-mail thebay@kqed.org. We always love hearing from you.

California’s Reparations Task Force, the first of its kind in the nation, wrapped up 2 years of work studying reparations for Black Californians on Thursday. The task force, made up of scholars, community members and politicians, held days-long meetings studying what reparations could look like. 

ca-reparations.pdf">The proposal is now in the hands of state legislators, who will decide whether to turn their recommendations into actual policy. So what’s in the plan? 

Guest: Annelise Finney, KQED reporter

Links:

• How California's Reparations Task Force Reached Its Final Proposal 
• The Bay Survey

This episode was produced by Jehlen Herdman and Maria Esquinca, edited by Alan Montecillo, and hosted by Ericka Cruz Guevarra.

One of the longest running pride celebrations in the country, SF pride has brought generations of queer communities together to march, celebrate, grieve, and organize. For this episode we hear from Gwenn Craig, a queer elder. She moved to San Francisco in 1975 as a young woman eager to explore her lesbian identity. She got involved in politics and was a close collaborator of Harvey Milk. She talks about her political organizing, what pride has meant to her over the years, and what she hopes for its future.

This interview was conducted by Annelise Finney.

This episode was produced by Alan Montecillo and Jehlen Herdman with production assistance from Maria Esquinca. Ericka Cruz Guevarra is the host. 

A generation of young people has been traumatized by gun violence. Mass shootings year after year, especially at schools, draw international headlines.

But students, and even young children, are also being exposed to everyday gun violence hat an alarming rate. In the city of Richmond — which is seen as a national model for gun violence prevention efforts — 40% of shootings over the past 10 years have happened near a K-12 campus, and out of those shootings, around 80% happened within a half mile of an elementary school, according to police data. 

Today, reporter Abené Clayton with The Guardian’s Guns and Lies in America project joins us to talk about her hometown, how kids are being affected by violence, and why Richmond isn’t an outlier.

This episode was produced by Jehlen Herdman, Alan Montecillo and Maria Esquinca, and hosted by Ericka Cruz Guevarra.

You’ve probably seen and heard the stories about downtown San Francisco. Fears about crime and safety, as well as low foot traffic because of the move to remote work, have left many buildings and businesses hollowed out. Downtown is in trouble, and the stakes (and dollar figures) are high. So what’s being done to save it from francisco-doom-loop-imprecise-thinkpieces-18106896.php">this so-called urban ‘doom loop’? 

Guest: Kevin Truong, business and economics reporter for The SF Standard

This episode was produced by Jehlen Herdman and Alan Montecillo, and hosted by Ericka Cruz Guevarra.

Fear of crime and blight in some of California’s biggest cities is increasing pressure on mayors to reduce visible street homelessness fast — even if it means not putting everyone into permanent affordable housing.

To do this, San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan and San Francisco’s London Breed have pushed for more funding for shelters and temporary housing in their city budgets. But homeless advocates worry that more funding for temporary solutions means less funding for permanent housing.

Guests: Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez, political reporter for KQED and Guy Marzorati, correspondent for KQED’s Politics & Government desk and producer of the Political Breakdown podcast

This episode was produced by Alan Montecillo, Maria Esquinca and Jehlen Herdman, and hosted by Ericka Cruz Guevarra.

If you have ever driven down Sacramento Street in South Berkeley, you have probably seen the statue of William Byron Rumford Sr that is prominently displayed on the median just off of Ashby Ave. Rumford was a civil rights advocate. He became the Bay Area’s first African American elected to the California Legislature in 1948. He also owned the pharmacy across the street from the site of the statue. Both are stops on the South Berkeley Legacy Project’s Black History walking tour. 

The tour is led by local historian and lifelong South Berkeley resident, Tina Jones Williams. The tour highlights cultural pillars in Berkeley’s Black community in effort to preserve their legacy. 

Episode transcript

Guest: Corey Antonio Rose, producer Its Been a Minute and Bria Suggs, a journalist at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism.

Links: 

• Walk Through History in the Heart of Berkeley’s Black Community
• South Berkeley Legacy Project Facebook Page

This episode was produced by Maria Esquinca and Jehlen Herdman, our intern, with production assistance from Alexander Gonzalez. Ericka Cruz Guevarra is the host. 

A spate of deadly shootings across the Bay are highlighting anarea-gun-violence-18148226.php"> ongoing surge in gun violence in the region, especially since the pandemic, which in part interrupted some of the work that had been trying to prevent gun violence.

In Oakland, community groups and the city’s Department of Violence Prevention (DVP) say it's going to take creative thinking to solve this problem — and that includes investing in arts and culture. Starting Friday and through July, DVP is bringing back Town Nights, a series of arts and culture events around Oakland that provide resources and positive social outlets. So why do some of the city’s leading gun violence prevention groups say this programming is effective at stopping gun violence? The Bay revisits this question in an episode featuring Nastia Voynovskaya, KQED associate editor of arts and culture. 

Episode transcript

Links:

• Town Nights events for Summer 2023

This episode first published October 10, 2022. It was produced by Maria Esquinca, Alan Montecillo, Alexander Gonzalez and hosted by Ericka Cruz Guevarra

The recent killing of Banko Brown by an armed Walgreens security guard has put a focus on the work of these employees. While they often take on similar roles to cops, armed security guards are not public employees but often low-paid civilians with few protections when they kill someone on the job, and they don’t get proper training on things like use of force or de-escalation either.

That’s all supposed to change after the 2019 killing of a man by a security officer in Sacramento, which led to a bill meant to increase the state training standards for security guards.

Episode transcript

Guest: Marisa Lagos, a politics correspondent for KQED and co-host of the political breakdown podcast. 

Links:

• ‘A Tragedy of San Francisco’s Marking’: The Killing of Banko Brown
• They Carry Weapons. So Why Don’t Security Guards Have to get Use-of-Force Training?

This episode was produced by Alexander Gonzales, Jehlen Herdman, Maria Esquinca, and Ericka Cruz Guevarra, and hosted by Ericka Cruz Guevarra