"Caltrans Launches Long-Awaited Study on I-580 Truck Ban and Pollution Impact" (KQED News) reported by Laura Klivans

After years of controversy surrounding a large truck ban on Interstate 580, a long-awaited Caltrans study on the ban’s impacts is finally underway.

For more than 70 years, trucks weighing more than 9,000 pounds, with the exception of passenger buses and paratransit vehicles, have not been permitted on a section of I-580 that runs along the base of the East Bay Hills in Oakland and San Leandro.

[...]

Former Oakland teacher Patrick Messac called into the meeting. In 2021, his sixth-grade class helped reignite the debate over the ban.

“My students were in sixth grade when district staff said that there was going to be a study, and now they are in high school,” he said during public comment. “I just really want to encourage the district to move forward with haste and intention.”

In 2021, Caltrans told KQED it would seek to undertake this study by 2023. At the Bay Area Air District meeting, the agency said the study would be complete by 2026.

[...]

The public can follow the study and weigh in on the Caltrans website.

"Bay Area brewer says tariffs already impacting beer business in multiple ways" (KPIX CBS News/Bay City News) reported by John Ramos

One local microbrewery feels caught in [Donald Trump's] global trade war. At Alameda Brewing, they should be thrilled with a holiday that centers around beer. 

Instead, co-owner Vincent Phua feels like a pawn in a game of chess over tariffs.

"It definitely concerns us," Phua told CBS News Bay Area. "We're going to find out in about two to three months how much of it's going to be passed down to us. We're fully anticipating it. I think we are a little bit more vulnerable than, say, some of the bigger companies."

As a small company, Alameda Brewing will feel the pinch when they have to purchase higher-priced aluminum cans from Canada, but the real expense will come when the price of Canadian malted barley goes up.

"I'm afraid this will go up by about 20% in the next couple months," said Phua. "Some styles of beer, this could account for way more than...I think it could be 60 to 80% or even more of the cost of the beer itself."

"High-profile East Bay apartment complex is bought for $150 million-plus" (Bay Area News Group) reported by George Avalos

After I wrote about how Alameda's Star Harbor complex isn't on a "secret mortgage blacklist" — despite being pictured as such in the Mercury News — a helpful reader pointed out that my own description of it as an apartment complex wasn't entirely accurate: Star Harbor is a condo complex; it's just currently looking like an apartment complex.

The complex's developer has been renting out the units as apartments until a 10 year period passes, after which they can no longer be sued by purchasers for many types of construction defects. I added a brief explanatory note to that previous blog post. And in the process of reading up on the topic, I also came across this news article from last month:

An East Bay apartment complex that gave an old cannery a new mission was purchased for more than $150 million in a sign that investors still hunger for top-notch sites in a tricky residential market.

Star Harbor Apartments, located along the Alameda shoreline, was bought by real estate firm Strada Investment Group for $153.7 million, according to documents filed on Feb. 5 with the Alameda County Recorder’s Office.

So even if office towers in downtown San Francisco may still be significantly below their pre-pandemic values, there's currently much value to be found in multi-family housing in the inner Bay Area.

According to the Strada Investment Group website [emphasis my own]:

In 2024, Strada partnered with a public pension fund to acquire Star Harbor Apartments, a 372-unit multifamily development in the waterfront community of Alameda that includes 44 townhomes, 10 live-work units and 24 moderate-income housing units.

[...]

Strada intends to invest in an improved amenity offering that includes reimagined roof deck lounges and carefully curated retail space.

While the Strada website doesn't name the public pension fund, other press releases and news stories describe hundreds of millions of dollars that CalSTRS has invested through Strada into Bay Area real-estate. Assuming that the California State Teachers' Retirement System is the new owner, best of luck to all those teachers earning increasing equity from Star Harbor — for now as rental apartments, and in the future selling them off as condos. And if Strada can get a tenant into the retail space on the ground floor, then they'll deserve their management fees.

"Switching sides" (East Bay Insiders Newsletter) by Steve Tavares

—Former Alameda Councilmember Trish Herrera Spencer was appointed to be attorney for Steeltown Winery LLC, also doing business as Building 43 Winery.

—The request to substitute its legal representation was filed on March 6. Building 43 Winery was previously unrepresented.

—The Alameda Point winery has been in quarrelsome lease negotiation with the city for nearly a year.

—On Tuesday, an attorney for the city filed a motion to disqualify Spencer’s assignment as Building 43 Winery’s new attorney, asserting she is “subject to disqualification under the California Rules of Professional of Conduct.”

—The argument is Spencer gathered confidential information about the case as a public official. Under the State Bar’s rules of professional conduct, Spencer is prohibited from using the information to benefit her client.

"‘It’s electric’: Oakland Roots bring the Coliseum to life for season opener" (SF Standard) reported by Jungho Kim and Jennifer Wadsworth

Saturday night we were treated to a long fireworks show over the houses and trees of Alameda's East End. It wasn't until afterwards that I learned the occasion:

The Oakland Roots may have lost their season opener, but they brought the Coliseum roaring back to life with a sold-out crowd celebrating the team’s new chapter at the former home of the A’s and Raiders.

Nearly 27,000 people bought tickets to the Saturday night game — record attendance for the United Soccer League team — that featured a halftime show by Too $hort and ended in a 2-1 loss against San Antonio FC.

"Proposed Closure of U.S. Department of Education" email from AUSD Superintendent Pasquale Scuderi

A number of readers without school-age kids have written in to say that they've appreciate reading about how Alameda's school district is successfully navigating the nastiness of the Trump/Musk administration. Here's an update sent out to AUSD families very early this past Thursday:

Dear AUSD Community:

We are carefully following the President's reported plans to sign an executive order later today instructing officials to dismantle the U.S. Department of Education.

While the department cannot be closed without the approval of congress, today's proposed and forthcoming order is, like those issued previously, understandably sparking confusion and serious concern for many.

My aim is to strike a difficult, but hopefully effective balance, between putting the potential impact of this move in context relative to our local conditions, without downplaying the significant effects it could have outside our district, or on us directly further down the line.

This week we have been working on communications that detail both the amount of federal dollars AUSD receives annually, and where we apply those funds.

Federal categorical dollars make up only 3% of AUSD's overall annual budget, yet significant reductions in those funds would no doubt be impactful. We will hold and update the communications we had planned to send out late this week to see what else we learn in the next day or two and add additional details for our community.

The dissolution of the federal education department on the whole is, broadly in my view, a very bad idea. However, its closure would not in itself automatically cut the funding the department currently distributes to underserved students and specific student groups, including students with disabilities. 

Again, this is not to downplay or trivialize the magnitude of this proposition, but we have to at least note, for context, that there would be some remaining levels of protection for these resources despite the intense and aggressive overtures we are witnessing from D.C. 

Many of us in education do worry however that even if [C]ongress preserves funding, if the Department of Education is dismantled, finding new mechanisms to distribute those funds through another agency or department could bring a big margin of confusion, delays, and even potential reductions that will surely not benefit students and families.

A growing number of districts in California are also presently dealing with financial stress from non-federal factors — and now have to contemplate the potential ramifications of this federal direction. AUSD is in a comparatively more secure position because of our community and team, and therefore — I believe — we are positioned to navigate the federal uncertainties in question from a place of greater stability. 

We operate in a generous community that has passed two education parcel taxes and a major facilities bond in the past five years.

We benefit from a commitment seen in our classrooms and schools and departments, and on our school board, that has made that level of local support possible.

We continue to make long term resource management a strategic priority that is analyzed in some form daily. 

And while we will likely not be without problems to solve, nor be fully immune to the potential downstream impact of erratic political decision-making, I genuinely believe that we will manage whatever comes our way, collectively, in ways that preserve our commitment to educating all of our kids in a manner that remains unapologetically inclusive.

Thank you to Alameda Unified staff, as well as to Alameda voters and taxpayers for funding school services and facilities.