Tag Archives: California

Explainer: California reopens, mostly, on Tuesday

By Jane Lanhee Lee

OAKLAND, Calif. (Reuters) – California is opening up from COVID-19 restrictions on Tuesday, but tech companies and other offices are not changing as fast as Disneyland, gyms and stores.

Here is what is changing for California offices, and what is not.

WHAT IS GETTING EASIER?

Governor Gavin Newsom issued an executive order to reopen the state on June 15, a decision ending physical distancing, mask requirements and capacity limits for restaurants, stores and other businesses that cater to consumers.

The state health department is requiring the continued wearing of masks in a few places, such as public transit and healthcare settings. Indoor concerts and events with more than 5,000 attendees will be required to confirm proof of vaccination or negative COVID-19 results.

HOW ABOUT OFFICES?

Workplace rules are dictated by the California Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board, which has debated keeping restrictions in place longer than the governor. Under the newest proposal, which will be voted on June 17, fully vaccinated office workers will not need to wear a mask in normal circumstances. However, businesses would have to confirm a person has been vaccinated before taking off a mask in an office, and some businesses have been reluctant to ask.

WHAT IS BIG TECH DOING?

Tech companies in Silicon Valley, which were among the first to go fully remote during the pandemic, are treading carefully. Many are waiting until after the Labor Day holiday, on Sept. 7, or even until 2022, to reopen offices fully.

While some like Twitter Inc have given employees the option to never return to the office, others like Alphabet Inc’s Google and Facebook Inc are allowing some employees to go remote permanently while setting minimum requirements for in-office work by many employees.

Apple is requiring workers return to the office on Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays from early September.

Many companies are also giving on-site employees the option to work remotely for several weeks a year.

Collaboration-app firm Slack Technology Inc’s latest survey released on Tuesday showed 93% of about 10,000 workers surveyed said they want flexibility in when they work.

Slack executive Brian Elliott said many employees want a set time during the day to collaborate but the ability to work other hours on their own terms. The survey also showed 21% were likely to jump to a new company in the next year and over half are looking, making flexibility a more important component for attracting or retaining employees.

DO COMPANIES HAVE A CHOICE?

Businesses such as restaurants can require vaccine verification or negative COVID-19 tests. Newsom said on Monday the state later this week would be announcing more about a digital version of the vaccine card issued by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

San Francisco’s first major conference in reopened California will be Dreamforce, an annual event by sales software company Salesforce.Com Inc, which drew over 171,000 registered attendees in 2019.

The conference this year, which will be both virtual and in person, is scheduled for Sept. 21-23, in cities including San Francisco, New York, Paris and London. Salesforce said those attending in person will be required to be fully vaccinated, in line with state regulations.

(Reporting by Jane Lanhee Lee; Additional reporting by Stephen Nellis and Paresh Dave; Editing by Leslie Adler and Bill Berkrot)

Brutal heatwave to descend on U.S. West, prompting fire warnings

By Dan Whitcomb

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – A heatwave already punishing parts of the U.S. Southwest on Monday was expected to move into California this week, prompting the forecasters to warn of health and fire dangers.

A high-pressure ridge that built over southwestern deserts over the past few days is responsible for the unusually blistering heat this early in the year, National Weather Service meteorologist Karleisa Rogacheski said.

“Today last day of seasonable weather in California,” Rogacheski said.

California saw balmy weather on Monday, with temperatures in the upper 80’s and low 90’s Fahrenheit (30-35°C), but forecasts called for warming on Tuesday, spiking into the triple digits by Thursday and lasting several days.

The weather service issued an excessive heat warning for parts of southwest Arizona, including Phoenix, on Monday, predicting “dangerously hot conditions” at least through Saturday.

“Very High Heat Risk. Increase in heat-related illnesses, including heat cramps, heat exhaustion, and heat stroke. Heat stroke can lead to death,” the NWS said in the advisory.

California’s dry winter left forests and brush parched, prompting worries that the heat wave could touch off wildfires.

Wildfires scorched more than 6,500 square miles (17,000 square km) of land in 2020, destroying hundreds of Californian homes during a particularly fierce fire season.

The baking weather could also strain California’s power grid as residents crank up air conditioning units across the state.

Experts say the heatwave forecast for this week, brought on by the early high pressure system, could not be blamed directly on climate change.

“It difficult to tie any one particular event to climate change,” said Eric Schoening, a meteorologist in the Salt Lake City office of the National Weather Service. “But studies show that as the climate changes and it gets warmer, we will see more of these anomalous events over time.”

(Reporting by Dan Whitcomb; Editing by Marguerita Choy)

Heat wave drives U.S. West power prices to highest since February freeze

(Reuters) – Extreme heat expected to blanket the U.S. West next week caused power prices for Monday to soar to their highest since the February freeze when natural gas pipelines and wind turbines froze in Texas leaving millions without power.

High temperatures will reach the low 90s F (about 34 C) in Los Angeles on Monday-Wednesday, which is about 20 degrees higher than the city’s normal high for this time of year, according to AccuWeather forecasts.

Last summer, a heat wave in August forced California utilities to impose rotating blackouts that left over 400,000 homes and businesses without power for up to 2-1/2 hours when energy supplies ran short.

The group responsible for North American electric reliability has already warned that California is the U.S. region most at risk of power shortages this summer because the state increasingly relies on intermittent energy sources like wind and solar, and as climate change causes more extreme heat events, drought and wildfires across the U.S. West.

Power traded on Friday for Monday delivery jumped to $151 per megawatt hour (MWh) at Palo Verde in Arizona and $95 in SP-15 in Southern California, their highest since the February freeze caused prices across the country to soar.

In addition to soaring power prices, gas for the rest of 2021 in California has traded at its highest in years on expectations an extreme drought in the U.S. West will cut hydropower supplies and force the state to rely more on gas-fired power plants this summer.

That would make it tough for California to reduce carbon dioxide emissions this year and shows how difficult it would be for the most-populous U.S. state to keep the lights on if it starts shutting gas-fired plants in the coming years as it moves toward getting all electricity from carbon-free sources by 2045.

(Reporting by Scott DiSavino; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)

‘Big risk’: California farmers hit by drought change planting plans

By Norma Galeana and Christopher Walljasper

FIREBAUGH, Calif. (Reuters) – Joe Del Bosque is leaving a third of his 2,000-acre farm near Firebaugh, California, unseeded this year due to extreme drought. Yet, he hopes to access enough water to produce a marketable melon crop.

Farmers across California say they expect to receive little water from state and federal agencies that regulate the state’s reservoirs and canals, leading many to leave fields barren, plant more drought-tolerant crops or seek new income sources all-together.

“We’re taking a big risk in planting crops and hoping the water gets here in time,” said Del Bosque, 72.

Agriculture is an important part of California’s economy and the state is a top producer of vegetables, berries, nuts and dairy products. The last major drought from 2012 to 2017 reduced irrigation supplies to farmers, forced strict household conservation measures and stoked deadly wildfires.

California farmers are allocated water from the state based on seniority and need, but farmers say water needs of cities and environmental restrictions reduce agricultural access.

Nearly 40% of California’s 24.6 million acres of farmland are irrigated, with crops like almonds and grapes in some regions needing more water to thrive.

“I’m going to be reducing some of our almond acreage. I may be increasing some of our row crops, like tomatoes,” said Stuart Woolf, who operates 30,000 acres, most of it in Western Fresno County. He may fallow 30% of his land.

Del Bosque, who grows melons, asparagus, sweet corn, almonds and cherries, said his operation could lose more than half a million dollars in income, and put many of his 700 workers out of work. He and other farmers say drought has been exacerbated by California’s lack of investment in water storage infrastructure over the last 40 years.

“Fundamentally, a storage project is paid for by the people who want the water,” said Jeanine Jones, drought manager for California’s Department of Water Resources. “All we can do is deliver what mother nature provides.”

New dams face environmental restrictions meant to protect endangered fish and other wildlife, and don’t solve near-term water needs, said Ernest Conant, regional director of the Bureau of Reclamation, California-Great Basin region, the federal agency that overseas dams, canals and water allocations in the Western United States.

“We simply don’t have enough water to supply our agricultural users,” said Conant. “We’re hopeful some water can be moved sooner than October, but there’s no guarantees.”

Water scarcity threatens Del Bosque’s watermelon crop, which is due to be harvested in August. But it also has dire consequences for those planting it.

“If there is no water, there is no work. And for us farm workers, how are we going to support the family?” said 57-year-old Pablo Barrera, who was planting watermelons for Del Bosque.

Woolf said as the state continues to restrict water access, he’s exploring ways to generate income off the land he can no longer irrigate, including installing solar arrays and planting Agave, normally grown in Mexico to make tequila.

“You’ve got to absorb all of your farming costs on the few acres that you’re farming,” he said. “How do we maximize the value of the land that we are not farming?”

(Reporting by Norma Galeana in Firebaugh, California and Christopher Walljasper; Editing by Caroline Stauffer and Diane Craft)

Gunman kills 8 co-workers at California rail yard; attacker also dead

By Peter DaSilva and Jonathan Allen

SAN JOSE, Calif. (Reuters) -A transit employee shot eight co-workers to death and was himself killed at a commuter rail yard in San Jose, California, on Wednesday, authorities said, in the latest burst of deadly mass gun violence to grip the United States.

Authorities did not immediately offer many details or a possible motive for the shooting, which unfolded about 6:30 a.m. Pacific Time (1330 GMT) at a light-rail yard of the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority (VTA).

A bomb squad was searching the yard after at least one explosive device was found, Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Deputy Russell Davis said at a news conference.

Davis did not say how the assailant died or whether police officers called to the scene had fired their weapons.

San Jose’s mayor, Sam Liccardo, said authorities also had responded to a fire at the home of the suspect, though no one was found inside.

The gunman and all eight victims were employees of the transit agency situated near the city’s airport, officials said. Authorities did not give the gunman’s name or age.

The San Jose Mercury News and other media outlets identified him as Samuel Cassidy, 57, a maintenance worker at the yard.

Cassidy had worked for the transit authority since at least 2012, when he was listed as an “electro-mechanic,” and was promoted to “substation maintainer” in 2015, according to records posted by the nonprofit website Transportation California.

Last year, he earned a salary of $102,000, plus benefits and $20,000 in overtime, the records showed.

Local television station KTVU-TV reported that Cassidy had been married for 10 years and divorced in 2019, citing an interview with his ex-wife, who reportedly told the station she had little contact with him over the past decade.

‘ESSENTIAL WORKERS’

“A horrible tragedy has happened today and our thoughts and love go out to the VTA family,” Glenn Hendricks, chairman of the VTA board, said at the news conference.

He said the shooting took place in a section of the rail yard where workers perform maintenance on vehicles, and was not in the facility’s operations and control center.

San Jose, a city of about 1 million residents, lies at the heart of Silicon Valley, a global technology hub and home to some of America’s biggest high-tech companies.

“These are, and were, essential workers,” Liccardo said of the victims.

“These VTA employees helped us get through this horrific pandemic. They were showing up everyday to operate light rail and buses to ensure people could still go about their lives in the middle of the challenge of the pandemic. And they were taking risks with their own lives in doing so,” the mayor said.

He said he was aware of news reports of a fire at the house of the man the authorities believed to be the shooter.

“That is certainly the information that I have, is that there was a fire at the shooter’s home, there was nobody found inside the home, thank God,” Liccardo told CNN affiliate KGO in an interview. “This is every mayor’s worst nightmare.”

Multiple fire department, police and bomb squad vehicles were still parked outside the suspect’s house, along a cul-de-sac in southeastern San Jose, hours after the shooting.

An explosives-detecting robot sat in the street near the home while two bomb squad technicians entered the ranch-style house. Arson investigators along with agents of the FBI and U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives were also present.

U.S. President Joe Biden was briefed on the shooting, and his staff continued to monitor the situation while keeping in close contact with local officials to offer any assistance needed, the White House said.

“Our hearts go out to the victims and their families,” White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters.

Mass gun violence, commonplace in a country with one of the highest rates of firearm ownership in the world, has escalated considerably following a year-long lull as the United States emerged from the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic this spring.

Wednesday’s incident was the latest of at least eight deadly U.S. mass shootings in the past three months, including a string of attacks at Atlanta-area day spas in mid-March and a rampage days later that left 10 people dead at a Colorado supermarket. Last month, a former employee of an Indianapolis FedEx center shot eight workers to death and then took his own life.

(Reporting by Peter Szekely, Jonathan Allen and Maria Caspani in New York; Additional reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt, Barbara Goldberg and Brendan O’Brien; Writing by Steve Gorman; Editing by Howard Goller and Sonya Hepinstall)

New York lifts mask requirements for the vaccinated, California waits

By Jonathan Allen and Barbara Goldberg

NEW YORK (Reuters) -New York state this week will drop face mask requirements in most public spaces for people vaccinated against COVID-19, conforming with the latest U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidance, Governor Andrew Cuomo said on Monday.

In California, Governor Gavin Newsom said his state would keep its mask order in place for another month, despite the CDC’s new recommendations.

Cuomo and Newsom, both Democrats, have drawn criticism for their handling of the coronavirus pandemic. Newsom faces a Republican-led recall election.

New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy, also a Democrat, said he would lift mask restrictions outdoors but keep in place a mandate to wear them indoors. Murphy said schools would be required to provide full-time, in-person classroom instruction again in the fall.

On Saturday, the CDC said students in schools across the United States wear masks for the 2020-2021 academic year because not all will be inoculated.

New York will still order public transportation riders to wear face coverings and mandate them in schools and some other communal settings, Cuomo said, adding: “Unvaccinated people should continue to wear a mask.”

Cuomo said New York health officials decided to lift the mask order after reviewing the CDC’s new guidance. Some 52 percent of New York adults have been fully inoculated and 61.8 percent had received at least one shot as of Monday.

Cuomo, speaking to reporters at Radio City Music Hall, said it would be up to each business or venue how they should determine vaccination status

“I’m sure when people are coming into Radio City Music Hall, they are going to ask, ‘I’m sitting next to someone. I don’t know who they are. Are you sure they were vaccinated?'” he said. “That’s why it’s on the operator’s best interest to say ‘Yes! They had a card and they were checked when they walked in the door.'”

The three-term governor said he expected that some New Yorkers might keep wearing masks as a precaution after this week’s rule change.

Cuomo, 63, has resisted calls to resign in the face of probes by the state attorney general and legislature over accusations of sexual harassment, his office’s reporting of nursing home deaths and his use of staff members and resources in the writing of a book on his handling of the pandemic.

(Reporting by Jonathan Allen and Barbara Goldberg in New York and Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles; editing by Jonathan Oatis and David Gregorio)

U.S. weekly deaths from COVID fall to lowest in 14 months

(Reuters) – U.S. deaths from COVID-19 last week fell to their lowest in nearly 14 months and the number of new cases continued to decline for a fifth week in a row, according to a Reuters analysis of state and county data.

Deaths for the week ended May 16 totaled 4,165, the lowest weekly death toll since March 2020, when the country reported 2,293 deaths. On average about 600 people died from COVID each day, down from a peak of over 3,000 deaths per day for most of January.

About 37% of the country’s population has been fully vaccinated as of Sunday, and 47% has received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

New Hampshire leads the country with 85% of its residents receiving at least one dose, followed by Vermont at 65% and Massachusetts at 62%.

The rate of vaccinations, however, has been slowing for four straight weeks. In the past seven days, an average of 2 million vaccine doses were administered per day, which is down 2% from the previous week after falling 17% in the prior week.

New cases of COVID-19 fell 20% last week to 233,000, the lowest since June, according to the Reuters analysis. Only four out of 50 states logged week-over-week increases in new cases, including Alabama which reported over 9,000 new infections last week after processing a backlog of tests.

Excluding that backlog, Colorado led the nation in new cases per capita, overtaking Michigan, although new infections are falling in both states.

The lowest rates of infection based on population were in New Jersey, Oklahoma and California.

Nationwide, the average number of COVID-19 patients in hospitals fell 12%, the fourth weekly drop in a row.

(Graphic by Chris Canipe, writing by Lisa Shumaker, editing by Tiffany Wu)

California governor seeks end to oil drilling in state by 2045

(Reuters) -California Governor Gavin Newsom on Friday directed state agencies to end new fracking permits by 2024 and to analyze how to phase out oil and gas extraction two decades later.

The move comes as Newsom has been under pressure from environmental activists and progressive politicians who say the state’s permitting of new drilling is at odds with its goals to move away from fossil fuels and combat climate change.

“I’ve made it clear I don’t see a role for fracking in that future and, similarly, believe that California needs to move beyond oil,” Newsom said in a statement.

The move was criticized by the oil and gas industry, which said the action would hurt drilling-dependent jobs and communities, as well as green groups who said the state needed to move far more quickly.

The Western States Petroleum Association, in a statement, pledged “to fight this harmful and unlawful mandate.”

Kassie Siegel, director of the Center for Biological Diversity’s Climate Law Institute, said the commitment was “historic and globally significant” but added that “we don’t have time for studies or delays.”

Newsom directed the California state oil and gas regulator, the Geologic Energy Management Division, to initiate a process that will halt the issuance of hydraulic fracturing permits by 2024. Fracking accounts for a small amount of oil extraction in California.

In addition, the governor said the California Air Resources Board, which writes the state’s climate change policies, will evaluate how to phase out oil and gas extraction by 2045.

(Reporting by Nichola Groom in Los Angeles, Sharon Bernstein in Sacramento and Valerie Volcovici in Washington, Editing by Franklin Paul and Cynthia Osterman)

U.S. weekly jobless claims hit one-year low; fourth-quarter GDP revised up

By Lucia Mutikani

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits dropped to a one-year low last week as economic activity rebounds after weather-related disruptions in February.

But the labor market is not out of the woods yet, with the weekly jobless claims report from the Labor Department on Thursday showing a staggering 18.953 million people were still receiving unemployment checks in early March. It will likely take years for a full recovery from the pandemic’s scarring.

“Things have improved over the last year, but there are still millions of people dealing with real economic pain,” said AnnElizabeth Konkel, economist at Indeed Hiring Lab. “Increased vaccinations are hopefully the beginning of the end.”

Initial claims for state unemployment benefits tumbled 97,000 to a seasonally adjusted 684,000 for the week ended March 20, the lowest level since mid-March. Data for the prior week was revised to show 11,000 more applications received than previously reported.

Economists polled by Reuters had forecast 730,000 applications in the latest week. The decline in claims was led by Ohio, which has been dogged by fraudulent filings. There were also large decreases in California and Illinois.

Claims shot up in the second week of March, likely as backlogs after severe winter storms in Texas and other parts of the densely populated South region were processed.

The deep freeze in the second half of February, which also gripped other parts of the country, depressed retail sales, homebuilding, production at factories, orders and shipments of manufactured goods last month.

Warmer weather, the White House’s $1.9 trillion COVID-19 pandemic rescue package and increased vaccinations are expected to boost activity in March. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell struck an optimistic note on the economy at an appearance before lawmakers this week.

U.S. stocks opened lower. The dollar rose against a basket of currencies. U.S. Treasury prices were higher.

CORPORATE PROFITS FALL

But the massive fiscal stimulus, which extended government-funded unemployment aid, including a $300 weekly supplement, through Sept. 6, could keep claims elevated as some people reapply for benefits. Rampant fraud has also pushed filings higher. Claims surged to a record 6.867 million in March 2020.

Just over a year after the pandemic barreled across the United States, jobless claims remain above their 665,000 peak during the 2007-09 Great Recession. In a healthy labor market, claims are normally in a 200,000 to 250,000 range.

Employment is 9.5 million jobs below its peak in February 2020. Economists say it could take at least two years for the economy to recover all the 22.4 million jobs lost in March and April last year.

It could even take longer for the labor force participation rate, or the proportion of working-age Americans who have a job or are looking for one, to rebound significantly. The participation rate is near a 47-year low, with women accounting for the biggest share of dropouts.

The claims report also showed that people receiving benefits after an initial week of aid dropped 264,000 to 3.870 million in the week ended March 13. But the decline in the so-called continuing claims was partly due to people exhausting their eligibility for benefits, limited to 26 weeks in most states.

At least 5.551 million people were on extended benefits during the week ended March 6, up 734,692 from the prior period. Another 1.068 million were on a state program for those who have exhausted their initial six months of aid.

The government also confirmed on Thursday that the economy lost considerable momentum at the end of last year amid a flare- up in new coronavirus infections and delays in providing more fiscal stimulus.

Gross domestic product increased at a 4.3% annualized rate, the Commerce Department said in its third estimate of fourth-quarter GDP growth. That was up from the 4.1% pace reported last month but a sharp deceleration from the record 33.4% rate logged in the third quarter.

Corporate profits were weak last quarter. After-tax profits without inventory valuation and capital consumption adjustment, which correspond to S&P 500 profits, contracted at a 1.7% rate after accelerating at a 36.1% pace in the third quarter. Profits fell 3.3% in 2020 after rising 1.8% in 2019.

But that is all history. The economy is forecast to grow by as much as a 7.5% rate in the first quarter. Growth this year is expected to top 7%. That would be the fastest growth since 1984 and would follow a 3.5% contraction last year, the worst performance in 74 years.

“We believe there is ample room for corporate profits to rise as company revenues pick up markedly and margins remain well supported,” said Lydia Boussour, lead U.S. economist at Oxford Economics in New York. “Improving health conditions, expanding vaccine distribution, and generous fiscal stimulus will form a powerful growth cocktail.”

(Reporting by Lucia Mutikani; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Andrea Ricci)

Disneyland theme parks in California to reopen April 30

(Reuters) – Walt Disney Co’s two theme parks in California will reopen on April 30 to a limited number of guests, the company said on Wednesday, over a year after they closed because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Attendance will initially be capped at roughly 15% of capacity, Disney Chief Executive Bob Chapek said on CNBC television.

Advance reservations and an admission ticket will be required for entry. Guests age 2 and up will need to wear masks, except when eating, drinking or swimming, and follow other safety measures including temperature checks before entering and social distancing on rides and throughout the parks.

Under state guidelines, capacity may increase if the prevalence of coronavirus in the area continues to fall.

The Disneyland Resort, located in Anaheim 35 miles southeast of Los Angeles, closed in mid-March of 2020. The resort includes the original Disneyland, nicknamed “The Happiest Place on Earth,” and the adjacent California Adventure theme parks.

Florida’s Walt Disney World parks reopened to visitors in July 2020 and Disney officials had been urging the state of California to ease reopening restrictions.

(Reporting by Lisa Richwine in Los Angeles and Eva Mathews in Bengaluru; Editing by Richard Chang and Steve Orlofsky)