Alameda County DAis coddling criminals

It should not surprise anyone that Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price dropped special circumstances against David Misch, one involving his alleged kidnapping and murder of Michaela Garecht in 1988, giving him the possibility of being paroled, instead of serving life in prison.

Soon after Ms. Price was elected, she said she would “seek to remove all 41 local cases from Death Row and to resentence people who were sentenced to life without parole.” She also said her “administration will begin an era of change that ultimately will make us (Alameda County residents) stronger and safer.” I beg to differ, not with the likes of Misch running around.

The voters and residents of Alameda County are being introduced to a new form of criminal justice — one that, in my view, is not going to keep them safe and favors the perpetrator.

Ninfa WoodWalnut Creek

Quarry plan willundermine rural road

The EBMUD plan to fill in the old quarry on Lake Chabot Road, located on county land between San Leandro and Castro Valley, with soil excavated during pipeline maintenance proposes to run 60 to 100 dump trucks a day along Lake Chabot Road for 40 to 80 years.

That’s right. If anybody now alive is here to see it, the site and adjacent hillside will eventually be seeded and planted with native plants.

Lake Chabot Road is currently closed because of landslides and erosion that have undermined the roadbed. It’s doubtful that it will ever be able to support the constant dump truck traffic.

Gary SloaneSan Leandro

Agencies must makebetter use of tax dollars

Re. “Prop. 13 proves costly to government programs,” Page A8, Jan. 13:

I disagree with the notion that local and state governments don’t have enough money already from other taxes and bonds for impoverished schools, understaffed government offices and infrastructure.

Our property taxes are plenty high in California and enough businesses have been run out of the state. We don’t need any more lost jobs and tax base.

The real problem is not a lack of funding but how all of these agencies use the money they have.

Herman BetchartFremont

Recount cost is worthelection integrity

The article “Are Alameda County elections actually headed to a recount?” (Page B1, Jan. 15) regarding “voters confusion about everything from the results of certain races to the future of ranked choice voting” helps me understand why people might question election results.

The District 4 Oakland Unified school board “snafu” demonstrates that our election systems are not infallible. That said, I believe that the seeds of doubt this might have cast is very troubling. The cost of letting any doubts remain will be much more costly to our society in the long run than any monetary cost of a recount now. We should not put a price on maintaining faith in election integrity.

Dennis CarlisleNewark

Predicting climate changeisn’t settled science

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) recently stated to “Expect record-shattering hot years soon, likely in the next couple years because of ‘relentless’ climate change from the burning of coal, oil and gas.”

Last October, this same NOAA released its U.S. Winter Outlook. Researchers predicted that through February 2023, “California will still have to contend with the ongoing drought and won’t see much precipitation.” Wrong.

Scientists admittedly can’t predict hurricanes a year out with any accuracy, but they want us to believe they can predict global temperatures and sea levels years out. Real science is never “settled.”

Jon RegoClayton

]]> https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2023/01/16/letters-1119/feed/ 0 8717708 2023-01-16T16:30:41+00:00 2023-01-17T03:58:22+00:00 https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2023/01/13/shakeup-at-alameda-das-office-prosecutors-placed-on-leave-inspectors-fired-as-new-district-attorney-takes-the-job/ https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2023/01/13/shakeup-at-alameda-das-office-prosecutors-placed-on-leave-inspectors-fired-as-new-district-attorney-takes-the-job/#respond Sat, 14 Jan 2023 05:21:53 +0000 https://www.eastbaytimes.com/?p=8716329&preview=true&preview_id=8716329 OAKLAND –  Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price has placed several seasoned prosecutors on administrative leave this week and fired two top inspectors, in what appears to be the start of an office shakeup by the newly-elected outsider.

Multiple sources told the Bay Area News Group that Price and her new leadership team in their first full week in office moved to place at least three deputy district attorneys, including senior prosecutors, on leave.

Deputy District Attorneys John Brouhard, Butch Ford and Colleen McMahon are among the attorneys Price placed on paid administrative leave — a status that opens the door for their termination.

Additionally, Chief of Inspectors Craig Chew and Assistant Chief of Inspectors Andrea Moreland were fired, according to multiple sources. Unlike prosecutors, inspectors are considered at-will employees and can be terminated without arbitration. The attorneys placed on leave could not be fired until after a two-pronged process, which ends with a ruling by either an administrative law judge or an arbitrator.

On Friday, the mood inside the DA’s office ranged from demoralization to panic. Multiple employees were asked to inform their colleagues, and in some cases their friends, that they were to be placed on administrative leave and other attorneys sat in their offices wondering if they would be next, according to the sources.

Matt Finnegan, an attorney with the local union representing Alameda County prosecutors, said his office is representing the attorneys and will continue to do so “as more slips come in.”

“The biggest downside is that they aren’t going to be able to handle any cases while they’re on administrative leave,” Finnegan said.

It is unclear exactly why the prosecutors were shown the door. A spokeswoman for the DA’s office declined to comment.

However, Price had criticized some of the prosecutors, including Ford, during her 2022 campaign.

Ford, a longtime prosecutor with more than 30 murder trials under his belt, prosecuted an Oakland man, Shawn Martin, who won an appeal of his murder conviction over Ford giving jurors a misleading instruction. Martin was found not guilty on retrial, and later became a volunteer for Price’s campaign.

Martin’s case became a sticking point because just before his second trial, his attorney filed a failed motion to recuse the entire Alameda County DA’s office for alleged rampant misconduct. Just days before Price’s victory in the Nov. 8 election, Martin was identified as a suspect in a nonfatal shooting outside an Oakland bar and remains at large.

The shakeup also comes just days after Price reduced charges against suspected serial killer David Misch, who was being prosecuted by McMahon. Already incarcerated at a state prison hospital for stabbing a woman to death, Misch is facing a new trial in the slayings of two Fremont women and the abduction and killing of 9-year-old Michaela Garecht in Hayward, all cold cases from the 1980s.

Price dropped special circumstances charges against Misch, stirring controversy while making good on a campaign promise to review cases where individuals face life without the possibility of parole. It is the first of many such cases Price is expected to evaluate.

The official reason for sidelining Brouhard along with McMahon would be more of a mystery, if not for a common denominator among the two veteran prosecutors. While running for DA, Price held a press conference calling out McMahon, Brouhard and other prosecutors for using their government email accounts to campaign for Nancy O’Malley in 2018. O’Malley — who defeated Price and won re-election that year — announced her retirement in May 2021, opening up the seat for the first time in decades.

Price at the time said the prosecutors used county resources “to gain an unfair advantage” against her. Price and an attorney representing her campaign filed a complaint with the Fair Political Practices Commission alleging attorneys violated a state government code prohibiting an independent expenditure committee from coordinating with a candidate — in this case O’Malley.

The Fair Political Practices Commission investigation of the complaint filed by Price remains open, according to the FPPC. Like Ford, McMahon and Brouhard have handled numerous felony trials and are among the office’s most seasoned prosecutors.

Other high-ranking prosecutors who worked under O’Malley have left or are rumored to be eyeing the exit.

Veteran prosecutor Terry Wiley, the O’Malley-backed candidate who ran against Price in the November 2022 election, retired from the office after the election.

One early departure, according to sources, is Assistant District Attorney L.D. Louis, a 20-plus-year prosecutor. Louis is said to have joined the County Counsel’s Office, which oversees legal matters for the civilian side of the county. Louis was most recently the head of the DA’s mental health unit, specializing in policy as well as collaborative courts and alternatives to incarceration.

Top-floor prosecutors and inspectors, like Wiley and Chew, are at-will employees, meaning they could be dismissed without a reason. Virtually all prosecutors, except for assistant district attorneys, are represented by the Alameda County Prosecutors Association and cannot be terminated without cause. Prosecutors began organizing in 2018 and were formalized as a union two years later.

Any prosecutor placed on leave is entitled to a so-called Skelly hearing, which provides employees an opportunity to hear and defend themselves against the employer’s allegations.

In announcing her new leadership team last Friday, Price appointed retired Oakland police Capt. Eric Lewis as chief of inspectors and former Marin County Assistant District Attorney Otis Bruce Jr. and Royl L. Roberts, a Peralta Community College administrator who recently became the district’s general counsel after passing the state bar in July, as her two chief assistant district attorneys.

Mountain View soccer player Laila Edris (37.76%) placed second and Menlo School basketball player Karen Xin was third.

Congratulations to all the candidates for this week’s recognition.

Fa’i averaged 18 points and nine rebounds in three games at the Newark Optimist Club holiday tournament. The senior scored 16, 24 and 15 points as Newark Memorial finished the tournament 2-1.

To nominate an athlete for next week’s poll, email highschools@bayareanewsgroup.com by Monday, Jan. 16, at 11 a.m. Please include stats and team results.

We also review stats submitted to MaxPreps.com by coaches/team statisticians for consideration.

Winners are announced each Friday on the Mercury News & East Bay Times websites and, starting Sept. 30, in the print edition of the Mercury News and EB Times sports sections.

Past winners

Dec. 12-17: Deanna Luna, James Lick soccer

Dec. 5-10: Sofia Bowes, San Ramon Valley basketball

Nov. 28 to Dec. 3: Kendall McClure, Heritage basketball

Nov. 21-26: Soo-Jin Berry, Clayton Valley Charter basketball

Nov. 14-19: Rachel Stephens, Los Gatos water polo

Nov. 7-12: Raquel Calderon, Mercy-Burlingame volleyball

Quarry project woulddestroy scenic road

EBMUD has applied for a conditional use permit from Alameda County to allow the deposit of trench soil extracted from pipeline replacement into the quarry site located at 13575 Lake Chabot Road.

EBMUD estimates that there will be 60–100 dump trucks five days a week on Lake Chabot Road for the next 40–80 years (this is not a typo), with trucks entering Lake Chabot Road in San Leandro and exiting on Foothill in Castro Valley every four or five minutes.

Lake Chabot Road, is very narrow with no shoulders, already heavy with 3,500 cars a day, bicycle traffic, wildlife and hikers. It is currently closed due to storm damage. This fragile but needed scenic road can’t support dump trucks which will make it unsafe for those of us who use it now.

Teri SchlesingerSan Leandro

Prop. 13 proves costlyto government programs

“Prop. 13 is vital to senior community” in the Jan. 10 East Bay Times (Page A6) misleads readers.

Yes, Proposition 13 is vital to the senior community of homeowners, but Proposition 13 is also unfair to them and others, as well. In fact, Proposition 13 has been exploited by the community of big businesses while also harming the senior community and others.

Proposition 13 was passed in 1978 — thanks to the deceptive slogans of Howard Jarvis and Paul Gann — as “a way to keep Grandma in her home.” But it was also a way to keep the property taxes of businesses low — especially big businesses like Chevron and Disneyland.

Because the low property taxes of Proposition 13 drastically reduced funding of local and state governments, seniors and others have suffered — impoverished schools, government offices understaffed with shorter hours, streets and other infrastructure in poor repair.

Prop. 13 needs fixing to fairly serve all.

Ruby MacDonaldEl Cerrito

Feds overreach withtalk of gas stove ban

The federal government wants to ban gas stoves. I have a stove with an electric oven and gas burners.

I don’t like cooking with electric burners. It’s difficult to regulate the heat; with gas burners it’s so much easier. Gov. Gavin Newsom also wanted to do that but not for restaurants. The government always wants to come after the little guy and make our lives more difficult.

It’s bad enough already with inflation and high gas, food and energy prices. They blame everything on climate change. Enough is enough.

Cathy LedbetterNewark

The U.S. should joinnuclear weapons treaty

Jan. 22 is a historic day. It’s the day the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons entered into force in 2021, aka the “Ban-aversary.”

This year, over 100 events across the country (including in Livermore) will celebrate the treaty with banner hangings, bell-ringings, visits and letters to elected officials, public readings of the treaty, and more.

U.S. leaders have long said we will lead the way to nuclear abolition. It’s time to make that promise real — join the treaty and lift the nuclear shadow that looms over the world.

Scott YundtLivermore

Letter is wrong to paintthe GOP as a monolith

Re. “Let’s celebrate heroes of the Jan. 6 breach,” Page A6, Jan. 11:

Thanks to Sandy White, I know who I am.

I bicycle everywhere (to save lives and the planet) and maxed out my solar. I’m not “rich” but donate 15% of my gross income to charities, regardless of whether they lean “left” or “right.” They all help people.

She proclaims “Let’s remind everyone which party (Republicans) tried to destroy our democracy and which party (Democrats) saved it.” She implies the five deaths of Jan. 6 (three by natural causes) are comparable to the 2,403 who died at Pearl Harbor — a true “day of infamy.” This veteran disagrees.

Who am I? A Republican. Therefore I am also a “Destroyer of Democracy.” She mentions no exceptions.

We are individuals, not a mindless collective. I consider ridiculous generalizations and uncompromising narratives (like hers) to be the true “Destroyers.” Obi-Wan Kenobi observed, “Only a Sith deals in absolutes.” Sandy, welcome to the Dark Side.

Stacy SpinkCastro Valley

]]> https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2023/01/12/letters-1115/feed/ 0 8715206 2023-01-12T16:30:54+00:00 2023-01-13T03:56:52+00:00 https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2023/01/11/letters-1113/ https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2023/01/11/letters-1113/#respond Thu, 12 Jan 2023 00:30:08 +0000 https://www.eastbaytimes.com/?p=8713594&preview=true&preview_id=8713594 Submit your letter to the editor via this form. Read more Letters to the Editor.

Don’t settle for statusquo on climate change

I appreciate Lisa Krieger’s recent article, “When will we get a break from the storms?” (Page A1, Jan. 10), which provided both a thorough weather forecast and a historical perspective on California’s extreme weather events.

I was disappointed that it ended with the statement that “we should get used to [extreme] storm cycles,” as such a position ignores what actions we can take to minimize and mitigate climate change. A majority of Americans want Congress to act on climate change, and decarbonizing our energy supply is one of the most effective methods. Sixty-nine percent of Americans say developing alternative energy sources, such as wind and solar, is a priority for the country.

We must tell Congress to enact bipartisan legislation that supports the nationwide generation, distribution and use of clean energy, and support streamlined building electrification and permitting.

Sarah HubbardSan Mateo

Article mischaracterizesNicaragua immigrants

Re. “Biden walks stretch of U.S.-Mexico border,” Page A1, Jan. 9:

Your article repeats disinformation regarding Nicaraguans fleeing repression and crime. The truth is that Nicaragua is the safest country in Central America and one of the safest in Latin America. Plus, there is no gang-related violence there.

Nicaragua is a very poor country, but since the Sandinistas regained power in 2007, poverty has steadily decreased.

Nicaraguan migration had been very low but has increased due to economic reasons. Our country’s sanctions as well as other U.S. policies against Nicaragua, and the U.S. support of the 2018 coup attempt, have hurt the Nicaraguan economy and its people, especially the poor. If the United States wants to decrease Nicaraguan migration, it should lift the sanctions and stop trying to overthrow the democratically elected President Ortega and the Sandinista government. They are supported by the vast majority of Nicaraguans.

Arlene ReedDiablo

Bush set patternof increasing debt

We should all welcome the goal of eliminating our annual federal deficit. But what is the modern origin of our current federal debt, which is now more than $31 trillion?

Over the next six years, the annual federal deficit soared to more than $500 billion per year. The 2008-09 fiscal year was our first $1 trillion deficit. Under President Bush, total debt went from $5.8 trillion to $11.9 trillion.

The pattern was set for continued annual deficits through the administrations of Obama, Trump and now Biden.

George FulmoreEmeryville

The eighth and ninth storms to target California since Christmas are on the way this holiday weekend, making for volatile and treacherous conditions from the Bay Area to the Sierra.

The storms themselves won’t be as intense as those that devastated communities in the Santa Cruz mountains and along the beaches over the past week, but with rivers running high and soils already saturated, more flooding and mudslides are predicted across California. The Salinas River in southern Monterey County in particular is expected to flood Friday.

“We definitely appreciate the bounty, but we wish it was spread out over a longer period,” Jeff Lorber, meteorologist with the National Weather Service, said Wednesday.

So much snow has fallen already this season that sensors are registering what is considered the “full seasonal snowpack” normally expected by April 1, state climatologist Michael Anderson told reporters during a news briefing Wednesday. It’s still too soon to say whether the snowpack levels will hold until then, but if they do, they could provide ample snowmelt to continue to fill the reservoirs this spring and summer.

Kevin “Coop” Cooper, a longtime Tahoe area ski condition reporter and resort marketing consultant, said the abundant snow is a welcome change after several lean snow years during the state’s drought.

“Right now, I’m looking out of my house and it’s snowing lightly. We’re seeing a nice new amount of snow, temperatures are dropping,” he said Wednesday. “After my 30 years up here, this is one of the best MLK weekends we’ve seen in a long time.”

But that comes with a catch.

Video: California storms drop hail in the Bay Area, cause rockslides, sinkholes and more

With heavy snow and high winds predicted in the Sierra through the weekend, getting to the mountains could be dangerous. Travel in vulnerable areas, especially the Sierra, is not advised from Friday afternoon through Saturday, Lorber said, “when the winds and the rainfall will be at their peak.” The ninth storm is expected to roar in late Sunday through Tuesday.

It’s the kind of warning that weekend warriors amped to hit the Sierra slopes don’t like to heed.

“Fresh snow is like going through butter,” said Andrew Pham, 22, who stopped at Helm of Sun Valley ski shop in San Jose to attach bindings to his new snowboard and is planning to drive up Friday. “When you’re the first one on it, ooh.”

By Wednesday, snowpack levels reached 226% of average for this time of year, beating out 2005 which was 206% of average. All that fresh snow is giving experts reason to feel optimistic that drought conditions that have gripped the Golden State for three years could meaningfully ease by the end of the snowy season.

“The fact that we’re continuing to get this precipitation is just absolutely fantastic,” said Andrew Schwartz, lead scientist at the UC Berkeley Central Sierra Snow Laboratory near Donner Summit. “It’s still unlikely that we’re going to get completely out of this drought in a single year. But if the storm door stays open… we can put a serious dent in it.”

As of Wednesday, major Northern California reservoirs have registered “impressive gains,” Anderson, the state climatologist, said. But there’s still plenty of catching up to do. Lake Don Pedro east of Modesto is at 69% capacity, for instance, and San Luis Reservoir southeast of the Bay Area, which has risen 35 feet since Dec. 1, is 40% full. The Shasta and Oroville reservoirs, the behemoths of California’s water system, are at 42% and 47% respectively. Lake Oroville has risen more than 90 feet since Dec. 1, surpassing its 2021 and 2022 levels.

“We’ve had quite a deficit because of the drought,” said Molly White, principal engineer with the state water board. “So we’re seeing steep inclines right now in storage, and hope that continues.”

In the Bay Area, Mount Umunhum in Santa Cruz County registered the highest rainfall total in the 24 hours leading to 10 a.m. Wednesday — 1.03 inches. Concord recorded 0.97 inches of rain. About six-tenths of an inch fell in Los Gatos; a quarter-inch fell at Ben Lomond, and two-tenths of an inch fell in San Jose and at the San Francisco International Airport.

In Tahoe, business is booming at ski resorts, despite struggles to keep lifts operational as a series of snow storms continues to plow through the Sierras. So much snow has accumulated in the Sierras already that ski resorts are having to keep track of avalanche risk hour-by-hour.

Mark McLaughlin, the so-called “storm king” who keeps track of Sierra conditions, said he listened to the concussive pounding Wednesday morning of cannons pelting the mountain sides of the Palisades Tahoe resort to trigger avalanches to improve safety before skiers arrive.

“I bet you I heard 20 of them this morning, 20 blasts,” McLaughlin said Wednesday.

John O’Connell, spokesman for Caltrans in the Lake Tahoe area, recommended that skiers from the Bay Area hit the road Thursday if they can, as the storm may arrive earlier Friday than initially expected. They should be prepared to put chains on their car tires unless they have four-wheel or all-wheel drive vehicles with tires designed for rain and snow. Either way, if there are chain controls due to ice and snow, vehicles should drive no faster than 30 mph, he said. And temporary road closures are possible during the snowstorms.

“We recommend people bring blankets, bottled water and snacks, have their phone charged up and a full tank of gas,” O’Connell said. “If we do have to hold traffic, you might be stuck up there in traffic that’s not moving for a little bit. We just want people to be prepared.”

Pham, who was tuning up his snowboard in San Jose on Wednesday, is still hoping to hit that fresh snow.

“But Dad called and said the storm is coming and I shouldn’t go,” he said. “So I guess I’m 50/50. But it would probably be worth it.”

Staff writer Scooty Nickerson contributed to this story.

State and local officials on Tuesday began cleaning up from the half-dozen atmospheric rivers that have pummeled California since late December, killing at least 17 people and leaving 96,000 people under evacuation warnings or orders amid the risk of flooding and mudslides. Their work came amid a brief respite from the rain and the wind but with more strong storms expected to arrive later in the week.

Although none of the coming storms are forecast to be as big as the “bomb cyclone” that hit last week, residents have been warned to stay vigilant. While touring the storm and tide-ravaged community of Capitola on Wednesday, Gov. Gavin Newsom cautioned that even a little rain could cause outsized effects due to heavily-saturated soils.

“The magnitude of this is not isolated to smaller communities, it is scaled across the largest state in our union,” Newsom said. “We’re soaked. This place is soaked. And now just more modest amount of precipitation could have as equal or greater impact in terms of the conditions on the ground.”

On Tuesday, nearly every corner of the state had felt the impacts of the recent atmospheric onslaught that caused flooding and myriad downed trees in Northern California, mudslides and a major evacuation in the Southern California community of Montecito and heavy snow across the length of the Sierra Nevada.

California Storms video: Hail in the Bay Area, rockslides, sinkholes and more

On the Central Coast, where some of the storm’s worst effects were felt, a 5-year-old boy died Monday after being swept away in a San Luis Obispo County creek, authorities said. A woman also drowned the same day after driving onto a mile-long section of Central Coast roadway that had been closed due to flooding, according to the California Highway Patrol.

Visiting the Santa Cruz coast, Newsom vowed to provide assistance to Capitola, where huge waves stoked from a “bomb cyclone” last week tore out a section of the historic Capitola Wharf and smashed and flooded a half-dozen beachfront Capitola Village restaurants.

“We’re not walking away,” Newsom said, standing on the town’s waterfront where generations of Bay Area residents have gone to frolic on the sand, dine and drink on seaside patios. From Dec. 31 through Sunday, heavy rains and a devastating tidal event caused at least $28 million in damages to public property across unincorporated Santa Cruz County, said Jason Hoppin, spokesman for Santa Cruz County. In addition, five buildings were red-tagged, and another 131 were deemed significantly damaged but repairable.

That doesn’t include any damage sustained Monday when the San Lorenzo River flooded its banks and sent water rushing into numerous buildings. Nor does it include a line of gusty storms to tear through the county early Tuesday morning, which prompted dozens of 911 calls from people reporting trees falling onto their houses..

Newsom gave no specifics regarding state aid to businesses Wednesday, nor details about funding for rebuilding the wharf. He also did not reveal whether the Seacliff Wharf — a state facility just down the coast that once led to a now-damaged cement-filled ship — would be repaired after damage from the storm. “All that will be determined,” Newsom said.

Around the Bay Area, the true extent of the recent storms began coming into focus Tuesday, even as thunderstorms dropped pea-sized hail and yet more rain.

In Santa Clara County, at least $24 million in damages to public property had been tallied by city and county officials through midday Tuesday — a figure that was expected to evolve as more assessments were completed, a county official said. Much of that tally included damage to roadways — more than a dozen of which remained closed midday Tuesday.

The heavy rains also caused dozens of sewage spills around the Bay Area and other parts of the state as sewage systems became overwhelmed by huge amounts of water pouring into the ground and seeping into pipes. Since New Year’s Eve, for example, at least 22 million gallons of “unauthorized discharges” occurred in the Bay Area, said Eileen White, executive officer for the San Francisco Bay Water Quality Control Board.

About 150 calls a day have streamed into the dispatch center for Bay Area Tree Specialists of late, said Michelle Reulman, the business’ office manager.

“This is a state of emergency,” said John Gill, owner of Majestic Tree Service, just moments after helping to clear a tree that fell on three vehicles and a house Wednesday off Bascom Avenue in San Jose. “You drive every five minutes, and there’s a tree down on a house or the street or the road or it’s flooded.”

In the early morning hours of Tuesday, a falling eucalyptus tree topped a 137-foot tall transmission tower in San Jose’s Willow Glen neighborhood. The weight of the tower brought down three distribution poles as well as power lines and some transformers, Pacific Gas & Electric Co. spokesperson Mayra Tostado said in an update posted to Twitter. As a result, about 2,100 customers lost power.

“We’ve brought in additional resources to be able to restore power as quickly as possible to our customers,” Tostado said. “We understand how disruptive it has been to be without power and we’re doing everything we can to turn the lights back on as quickly as possible.”

Tostado said the region saw winds up to 70 mph and 100 cloud-to-ground lightning strikes.

The South Bay took a big punch from Mother Nature today. @PGE4Me responded to an outage in San Jose’s Willow Glen due to a eucalyptus tree knocking down a 137-ft. tall transmission tower. With its weight, it pulled down power lines and poles connected to it. Here’s my report. pic.twitter.com/HJUJm9tqDA

— Mayra Tostado (@PGE_Mayra) January 11, 2023

Many of the trees were felled during an onslaught of thunderstorms Tuesday that knocked out power to tens of thousands of people across the Bay Area, while dropping between .25 and 1.25 inches of rain across most of the South Bay, the East Bay and the Peninsula. Much of the Santa Cruz mountains received between .66 and 1.4 inches of rain overnight, pushing three-day storm totals to between 6 and 8 inches of rain across much of the area.

As of 4:30 p.m. Tuesday, 24-hour precipitation totals around the Bay Area included 1.21 inches in San Francisco, 1.18 inches in Oakland, 1.11 inches in Concord,.41 inches in San Jose and .40 inches in Livermore, according to the weather service.

More than 40,000 PG&E customers were without power as of 5 p.m. Tuesday — the majority of them in the South Bay where more than 27,000 customers remained without electricity, according to the utility provider.

To the east across the Sierra Nevada, a remarkable run of snowfall continued to push the state’s snowpack higher — reaching 215% of its average for this date across the state, according to the California Department of Water Resources. The southern Sierra already has received more than it normally gets by April 1, while the northern Sierra is about 75% of the way to that mark.

Another .1 to .25 inches of rain is expected to fall over much of the Bay Area on Wednesday, with higher amounts forecasted to hit the North Bay and the Santa Cruz Mountains, according to the National Weather Service. Some brief showers may hit the region on Thursday or Friday, but the area should remain mostly dry under cloudy skies those days.

Many residents found themselves whiplashed from the see-sawing weather. In Soquel, near Santa Cruz, Roman Bodnarchuk wondered aloud at the next curveball from Mother Nature after a dramatic two weeks of joy and catastrophe.

Just after Christmas, he had finally succeeded in getting his war-refugee parents out of Ukraine — where they lived near a power station under frequent Russian bombardment — and to his rented house by Soquel Creek.

“It’s very stressful,” said Bodnarchuk, 30. “You can imagine how frustrating it was to leave the house when my mom is sick and having to deal with all these situations. Hopefully the house withstands all this damage.”

He couldn’t help but feel a sense of dread at viewing forecasts for additional rain in the coming week

“We’re very worried,” Bodnarchuk said. “It’s been difficult enough already.”

Rick Hurd, Julia Prodis Sulek, Jason Green and the Associated Press contributed to this report. 

The latest atmospheric river-fed storm is expected to pack damaging winds and drop several more inches of rain over much of the Bay Area — a double-whammy that forecasters say should peak Monday morning and linger through Tuesday. Even more storms are forecast to make landfall beginning later this week — threatening to further saturate soils during one of the Bay Area’s most waterlogged stretches in recent years.

On Sunday afternoon, Gov. Gavin Newsom implored Californians to avoid driving through flooded roadways and to prepare for even more water in the near future — noting that 12 people had died over the last week and a half due to storms across the state.

“Use your common sense,” Newsom said at a press conference. “Don’t test fate… just a foot of water and your car’s floating. So it’s really important that people are mindful, and again, just use their common sense.”

The National Weather Service issued a flood warning for areas along the Guadalupe River above the Almaden Expressway in San Jose. The river is expected to reach its flood state of 9.5 feet by 9 a.m. Monday before cresting at 11.5 feet at about 4 p.m. that day.

A flood watch also exists through Tuesday for almost the entire Bay Area. Alameda Creek near Niles Canyon and Sunol could reach its flood stage of 9 feet on Monday morning before cresting that afternoon, just shy of its 14-foot, 9-inch record. Also at risk of topping their banks were Arroyo de la Laguna at Verona in Alameda County and the San Lorenzo River in Santa Cruz County.

On Sunday afternoon, Santa Clara County officials issued evacuation warnings — essentially, advisements to be prepared to leave a moment’s notice — to people living in the watershed areas of the Uvas Reservoir and Pacheco Pass River Basin, due to flooding concerns. The warnings are impacting roughly 1,600 people, according to the county.

“This is going to be dangerous,” said Brayden Murdock, a National Weather Service meteorologist.

Updated forecast rainfall totals for round 2, expected to begin tonight between 10 pm and midnight. The heaviest rain will occur between 4 am and 4 pm Monday. Slight lowering of totals from the Bay Area northward and southern valleys. More details in follow up tweet.#CAwx

1/x pic.twitter.com/zs2HzaehAH

— NWS Bay Area (@NWSBayArea) January 8, 2023

Standing under a break in the clouds on Sunday in San Francisco’s Potrero Hill neighborhood, Becky Luong expressed fatigue at the unrelenting pace of storms. Her home’s garage in the Portola neighborhood was flooded with about an inch of water during Wednesday’s storm — ruining several pairs of shoes stored down there and leaving damaged a few bags of concrete.

“I’ve never experienced such a big storm like this,” said Luong, who has lived in the city for close to three decades. “It is the wind that makes it worse. This is different. I got scared.”

“I’m tired,” she added, about the recent wet weather. “I’m so grateful to see the sun today.”

Nearby, Nick Bulley waited in line for workers to fill his car with sandbags to protect his house in the hilly Twin Peaks neighborhood. The backyard and first floor of his newly renovated home were flooded during the New Year’s Eve storm with an inch of water, likely causing thousands of dollars in damage. On Sunday, he ran a dehumidifier to suck up all the moisture and limit the cost of repairs.

“This was just an unusual event,” Bulley said. “We weren’t prepared. We didn’t have sandbags. Now we’re making sure we have something to at least toss in front of the doors.”

The heaviest downpours should begin to subside by midday Monday, Murdock said, though chances for additional precipitation should linger through Tuesday. Most of the Bay Area — including San Francisco and Oakland — could see 2 to 3 inches of rain by Tuesday, the weather service said. San Jose is expected to see a little more than 2 inches from this storm.

The heaviest rainfall should fall over the waterlogged Santa Cruz Mountains, where 5 to 7 inches of rain is expected, with a few places seeing as much as 8 inches. To the south, the Santa Lucia Mountains along the Big Sur coast could see 8 to 12 inches of rain in some spots.

Winds of 25 to 35 mph are expected across much of the Bay Area’s lower-lying regions, with gusts potentially hitting 60 mph, the National Weather Service said while issuing a high wind warning. Along the coast and the Bay Area’s peaks, forecasters are expecting winds of 35 to 50 mph and gusts of up to 80 mph.

“This is also going to be a wind event,” said Murdock, adding that “when you do have strong winds after seeing plenty of moisture in the soil, you can see trees fall.”

The storm marks the latest atmospheric river to drench Northern California over the last couple of weeks, whipsawing the region from one of its driest three-year runs in recorded history to a state of perpetual flood risk. Oakland, for example, has received 15.84 inches of rain since Dec. 1 — almost all of it in the last two weeks. That’s more than two-thirds of the 22.89 inches of rain it normally gets in a calendar year.

Still, even though the recent wet weather has begun to alleviate drought conditions across Northern California, experts say even more moisture is needed to put an end the region’s historic drought. Water levels at some of the state’s largest reservoirs — including Lake Shasta, Lake Oroville and Trinity Lake — remain below historical averages for this time of year, even though some have started to tick upward in recent weeks.

He said that federal resources have been mobilized to help the National Weather Service’s forecasts. Five Air Force C-130s and a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration aircraft are flying over the Pacific Ocean – reaching as far as Hawaii – to gather data on the coming storms.

“These next storms are really going to start seeing some flood stages be reached,” said Anderson, during a call with reporters Saturday. “There’s a lot to keep an eye on and a lot to track.”

For more on the latest emergency warnings, go to aware.zonehaven.com.

High Wind Warning has been issued for our region starting tonight at 8 PM into Monday 4 PM. Expect southerly winds near 20 to 35 mph with gust up to 60 mph in the valley locations and 35 to 50 mph with gust up 80 mph along the coast and highest peaks. #CAwx #highwind pic.twitter.com/VbzaXV22ez

— NWS Bay Area (@NWSBayArea) January 8, 2023

But the Bay Area’s vast network of gauges, strategically placed and linked to powerful telecommunication lines and computers, offer early warning of rising waters, helping protect lives and property from flood damage.

“We can tell first responders, with some certainty, that our gauges are saying it’s going to be a flood-prone area in one hour and 45 minutes,” said Kevin Murray of the Palo Alto-based San Francisquito Creek Joint Powers Authority. “That gives them some time to get ahead of the disaster.”

This week, with a series of storms just past and more on their way, experts patrolled rivers and creeks to inspect and recalibrate their precious tools to ensure the accuracy of water data. After last Saturday’s fierce storm, they ask: Is the equipment still working? Have flow conditions changed due to downed trees, clogged bridges, eroded banks or blocked storm drains?

“We’ve been out with replacement equipment, assessing problems, assembling the pieces and doing repairs so that everything is operational,” said geologist Scott Brown with Berkeley-based Balance Hydrologics, a consulting firm that helps Bay Area agencies manage flood warning systems.

“With additional storms coming, we need to mobilize fast in order to get everything back up and running again,” he said.

Even as climate change increases the risk of floods, protection strategies are shifting away from structural measures, such as walls, gates and levees. The role of prediction, and warnings, is growing.

The gauges can provide days or hours of advance notice, giving residents time to sandbag, move cars, help the homeless, lift electronics and precious antiques off the floor — or seek higher ground.

On New Year’s Eve, a gauge on the Stanford campus alerted authorities at 8:43 a.m. that San Francisquito Creek, between Santa Clara and San Mateo counties, had reached “flood monitoring stage” and was continuing to rise. At 9:06 a.m., officials issued a public flood advisory. At 9:30 a.m., residents were alerted that within a half-hour, flooding was likely at Palo Alto’s narrow Pope-Chaucer Bridge. Water rose to about 21 feet, frighteningly close to overflowing the creek banks.

Other watersheds may allow more time, and earlier warning, said Jack Xu, senior engineer at Santa Clara Valley Water District. For instance, flooding along San Jose’s Guadalupe River can be forecast two to three hours in advance. Coyote Creek flooding may take a day. But in urban concrete channels, water may need only 30 minutes to flow from the mountains to downtowns.

Surveillance starts two to three weeks in advance of a storm, said Xu.

Weather is notoriously tough to predict in the Bay Area, a mountainous landscape perched on the edge of the cold ocean. Low and fast-moving jets of moist air scatter into a patchwork quilt pattern of precipitation, affecting locales differently.

Looking ahead at long-range weather forecasts, Xu said, “We see: ‘Is it a wet pattern? Is it a dry pattern?’ When you see back-to-back storms, you know you have to plan resources and think, operationally, about how you’re going to move water, if you need to.”

Plans get more targeted as time draws near, because forecasts improve within 10 days of a storm. “But if the forecast is inaccurate, everything downstream is wrong,” said Xu.

Using computer models, they calculate how much of the predicted rainfall will become runoff, based on past history, soil saturation and local geology.

The big decisions start five days before a storm, Xu said. There are regional conference calls with PG&E, other utilities and various cities, where they ponder: Should they release water from reservoirs to make room for additional runoff? Do they need to boost staffing? “We weigh the consequences with the risk,” Xu said.

Crews on the ground assess a creek’s condition, looking for debris and other risks. This effort is intensified if winds are forecast.

Once the storm lands, the role of rain gauges becomes critical. Perched in distant mountains, these gauges — pipes with a funnel, bucket and tipping mechanism at the top — measure precipitation. They tell officials what to expect.

Stream gauges have a membrane that precisely measures the depth of water and converts it into a flow rate. They transmit every hour and send a packet of four 15-minute time stamps. When a certain threshold is reached, the sensors can send data every five minutes.

Contra Costa County Flood Control & Water Conservation District manages 32 rain gauges and 16 stream gauges. The Santa Clara Valley Water District has a network of 70 stream and rain gauges. Alameda County has about 90 rain and stream gauges.

These gauges, powered by solar panels, send electronic signals to data loggers via radio, landlines, cell phone signals or satellites. With ever-increasing computer power, software processes the many signals into a computer database, which monitors the information as it is received. It triggers a warning when certain thresholds — say, water filling 80 percent of a creek’s capacity — are reached.

When waters run high, officials must decide whether to issue an electronic flood alert to local residents downstream. Because different locations have different flood risks, the warnings can be localized.

A revolution in technology is allowing for better forecasting. Over the past decade, the National Weather Service has developed weather models that are better suited to the West Coast, and widespread availability of cell services means it’s easier to transmit real-time information, Xu said. Supercomputing allows more advanced calculations, under many different scenarios.

New “X-Band Radar” is helping estimate rainfall in specific communities. In Contra Costa County, radar was installed last month on Rocky Ridge near Las Trampas Regional Preserve, according to hydrologist Mark Boucher. Radar for the Santa Clara Valley Water District sits atop the Penitencia Water Treatment Plant facility. They are part of a future regional network of radars — including Marin, Sonoma, San Francisco and Santa Cruz — that will provide local data about atmospheric rivers.

As new storms approach, “we’re watching, because every day it might change,” Xu said. “Because it’s nature, there are a lot of unknowns, so our response needs to be ready.”

The worst of the fast-moving tempest was expected to pass late Wednesday night, leaving Northern California windswept and reeling from its third major storm in just over a week. Fueled by a meteorological phenomenon known as a “bomb cyclone” churning over the Pacific, the storm was expected to pummel a broad swath of California from Crescent City to Los Angeles, while raising the threat of mudslides and debris flows over inland burn scars and causing dangerous, near-impossible travel conditions over the Sierra.

“We anticipate that this may be one of the most challenging and impactful series of storms to touch down in California in the last five years,” said Nancy Ward, director of the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services.

Across the Bay Area, powerful winds left thousands of people without power Wednesday afternoon, while forcing one school district in South San Francisco to cancel classes Thursday. In San Jose, local authorities fanned out in a last-minute push to evacuate unhoused people living along creek beds — a warning that some people refused to heed, citing an unwillingness to leave their make-shift homes. Others thought the dangers were overblown.

Hours before the storm’s arrival, Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency to hasten the state’s response. Authorities in Santa Cruz County issued mandatory evacuations for areas near Felton, Soquel and Watsonville, while Alameda County sheriff’s deputies went door-to-door urging people to leave their homes near Sunol, due to the risk of flood waters or felled trees.

A few hours before the storm began whipping the coast, Rio del Mar sisters-in-law Mary and Maureen Sztenderowicz fled their house just down the coast from Santa Cruz, where Aptos Creek meets the ocean. The two planned to stay for a night or two with a relative in Santa Cruz — but were uncertain of what they’d return to find at their home a few blocks from the ocean.

“We don’t want to be stuck and not able to get out,” said Mary Sztenderowicz, who is in her 70s.

Elsewhere in the neighborhood, Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office deputies posted red evacuation orders outside homes in the Rio del Mar flatlands Wednesday afternoon. “We’re not going to make people leave,” said Deputy Ryan York. Instead, he told people that if they don’t evacuate, they may not be able to get help in case of emergency.

Of primary concern was Aptos Creek, York said. Although the waterway was not raging Wednesday afternoon, ocean swells and tides — both forecasted to be very high Wednesday night and Thursday morning, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration — are expected to surge in, and by blocking outflow of stream water, raise the creek’s level even higher, York said.

Wednesday’s storm did not appear potent as the New Year’s Eve deluge that dropped record amounts of rain in some parts of the Bay Area and caused mudslides that left some roadways, including Highway 9 near Felton, closed.

But soils in the area appear to be increasingly saturated, compounding the risk of flooding. Oakland, for example, received 13.16 inches of rain in December – the vast majority of it in the last week, when 8 to 11 inches of rain fell over the city. That’s two and a half times the amount received over the previous 11 months – an astonishing amount for a city that normally only gets about 22 inches of rain every calendar year.

And this time, meteorologists feared the storm’s potential for damaging winds more than rain.

One gust on Wednesday along Soda Springs Road above Los Gatos reached 78 mph, while another near Kahler Court in Milpitas hit 75 mph, according to the National Weather Service. Another gust hit 56 mph in Salinas, a town that sits less than 100 feet above sea level, where the winds from such storms are normally less severe.

“This is a wind event as much as it is a heavy rain event,” said Brayden Murdock, a National Weather Service meteorologist. “And some of these (winds) are filtering into lower elevations, which means they’re going into areas that are populated. That means trouble for power lines in particular.”

More than 11,000 Pacific Gas and Electric customers were without power early Wednesday afternoon — a number that forecasters feared would rise as the storm came ashore. That included 8,295 customers in the South Bay and 1,169 people in the East Bay.

PG&E dispatched 2,900 workers Wednesday to tackle downed power lines and other outages throughout the Bay Area. That included 800 people to monitor electric incidents, 360 four-person electrical crews and 397 so-called trouble-men, who are distribution line technicians, system inspectors and first responders from the utility.

Seventy-four flights — or about 8% of the day’s schedule — were cancelled at San Francisco International Airport due to wind and rain that reduced visibility and caused flight controllers to stagger airport landings and departures on some runways, said Doug Yakel, an airport spokesman. Another 174 flights were delayed an average of 35 minutes, impacting about 20% of the day’s flights, he said.

To the south, Caltrans closed a sprawling section of Highway 1 along the entire Big Sur coast amid concerns of debris falling onto the roadway. The closure extended from just south of Deetjen’s Big Sur Inn in Monterey County to Ragged Point in San Luis Obispo County. The agency gave no estimate for when the roadway would reopen.

Concerns about mudslides extended to several communities across the Bay Area.

Santa Clara County closed several roads due to mudslides, flooding and downed trees, including parts of Calaveras, Felter, Mines, and Sierra roads.

In Richmond, the residents of 15 homes along Seaview Dr. and Seacliff Way were urged by police to evacuate after the hillside behind the development started to slide along a walking trail on the slope. A local contractor immediately began mitigation measures on the hill, including spreading plastic tarps over the fissures to prevent additional hazards, according to an online post from Mayor Tom Butt.

The prospect of a waterlogged hillside growing unstable during the storm left other nearby residents on edge. It’s common to see soil carried down the hillsides of this Richmond neighborhood when it rains heavily, said Faith Miller, who lives on nearby Flagship Place.

“We have retaining walls, but that’s a lot of dirt up there,” Miller said as the brunt of the storm hit Wednesday afternoon. “We’ve been looking and keeping on eye on our backyard.”

Austin Turner and Harry Harris contributed to this report.