Mehserle makes bail, leaves jail Friday afternoon

Johannes Mehserle, the former BART police officer accused of murder in the January 1 shooting of an unarmed man at Oakland's Fruitvale BART station was released on $3 million bail Friday afternoon, the San Francisco Chronicle reports.

The 27-year-old man, who recently lived in Lafayette, left Santa Rita jail in Dublin without incident. He is accused of killing 22-year-old Oscar Grant while responding to an early morning New Year's Eve disturbance at the station. Grant was lying face down on the platform when Mehserle shot him. Mehserle's attorney has called the case an accident, saying Mehserle meant to stun Grant with his Taser gun not shoot at him with a pistol.

More Sully-Mania: Katie Couric in hero pilot’s Danville kitchen and on CBS Early Show in morning TV ratings smackdown

CBS will devote most of its Early Show this coming Monday to the heroic tale of Chesley B. “Sully” Sullenberger, who safely landed his disabled US Airways jet in the Hudson River, saving the lives of 155 crew members and passengers, the Huffington Post says.

Besides talking to Sully and other crew members, The Early Show will also talk to rescuers and survivors. Sully is also scheduled to appear on ABC's Good Morning America on Monday morning.

Actually, CBS and Couric are really milking their interview coup with Sully. He’ll be on CBS 60 Minutes with Couric Sunday night. You can watch a teaser to that here.

This Early Show Sully move is seen as a direct attack on the mighty Today show (Couric’s old stomping grounds) and its host Matt Lauer, Couric’s former partner. If you’ll remember, Lauer was originally scheduled to land the first exclusive interview with Sully, before Sully or his people backed out and went to Couric and CBS.

But Today show is striking back, with Ann Curry’s exclusive interview with that Southern California woman who—ewww—recently gave birth to octuplets.

As the Huffington Post says, it’s “the hero pilot vs. the tired mom.” Which interview will draw more viewers? Actually, the “tired mom” has touched off a hot debate about the ethics of when and how doctors use in vitro fertilization because Octuplets Mom is a single woman, who already had six kids before giving birth to these eight.

And what’s also weird, besides Octuplets Mom, is how Sully, a much-proclaimed humble, small town man, has wound up in the midst of this battle of the networks and the network stars.

And, as I asked earlier, is Sully-mania on the verge of “jumping the shark”? Has it already?

Is Contra Costa’s Sexiest Man Alive the Mayor of Claycord?

Move over George Clooney, Brad Pitt, and the perenially shirtless Matthew McConaughey. There could very well be a new guy, right here in our East Bay suburbs, who could push any of you off the cover of People magazine’s next Sexiest Man Alive issue.

Yes, I’m seriously beginning to wonder if a certain local blogger qualifies for this nationwide distinction. And, come on, some of you Ladies out there—and you Gents, who are so inclined—haven’t you also been wondering something along these lines?

Here’s my take on all this:

I was home sick Monday with a cold. To divert my attention from my sore throat and sniffles, I decided to watch something on TV starring a favorite Hollywood heartthrob. Curled up on the couch in my old sweatpants (I probably should say black lace teddy), I began to surf all those cable channels I rarely get a chance to visit. There was the above-mentioned George Clooney in an ER re-run, an episode I had seen before. I could have popped in one of my Russell Crowe DVDs—Crowe in tough-but-tender Gladiator and LA Confidential mode—but I was feeling too head-clogged to raise myself up from the couch to go searching through my special DVD stash. So, I searched Turner Classic Movies for a favorite old movie starring Gable, Bogart, or Brando.

Still, no luck.

So I picked up my laptop and began surfing local news websites and blogs in case there was anything worth blogging about.

And what do I come across? The Contra Costa Times profile of the Mayor of Claycord and the description of him as the mysterious, elusive author of the popular Claycord.com, which gets 3,000 hits a day. And then there was his online chat with Times readers.

I know this might sound loopy, but I thought, wow, a new local heartthrob was born.

Yes, I realize that a guy who apparently spends a lot of his day listening to a police scanner and gets all hot and bothered about “new crosswalks in Pleasant Hill” and other guys getting “tasered by police in Concord” might be a dweeb or a bit twisted. But, for now, I'm more than willing to put aside those initial impressions, and look at other qualities the Mayor possesses that give him People cover boy potential. Specifically, let's consider these qualities in terms of evolutionary biology and what women are hard-wired to crave in a man.

--First, when it comes to principles of natural selection and mating, women crave a man who has power. Look at even dweebie-looking guys who have attained power in their respective professions—rich guys, rock stars, and celebrities. Look how they end up getting hot-looking younger women to marry them and even bear their offspring. Donald Trump, Howard Stern, Mick Jagger, to name just a few. These men have power in terms of fame, talent, influence, and money.

(And, by the way, Mayor, I’m in no way suggesting you are dweebie-looking, I’m just trying to make a larger point about how a man's display of power can tantalize the female of the species).

--Okay, I’m not sure about the money part with regard to the Mayor. I did hear some rumor that he's a trust fund brat, or he cashed in on Google stock way back when. But even if he isn't Donald Trump rich, and even if he is just an "ordinary" citizen like the rest of us, he definitely has power in terms of fame, talent, and influence--certainly in the East Bay suburbs. Remember, also, there was that effort to draft him to run for president of the United States.

He gets all these visitors to his site and people commenting on his blog. He's even got Concord Mayor Laura Hoffmeister apparently spending an entire three-day weekend reading his blog, looking for clues to his true identity. And you know, unlike the Mayor of Claycord, I have never personally met or chatted with Mayor Hoffmeister. But, if I could coax her to a bar and feed her a couple Cosmopolitans, I bet she would spill her guts about her fascination for--and maybe even crush on--the Mayor of Claycord.

--And speaking of Hoffmeister's facination with the Mayor's true identity, this brings us to another key component of the Mayor's appeal. He is the Man of Mystery. More than Jane Eyre's Byronic man-with-a-deep-dark-secret Edward Rochester, the Mayor carries with him that deeply guarded sense of anonymity that women want to unlock and be privy to.

--He's married. Or so he claims with his occasional references to Mrs. Mayor, and to the Times’ reference to his two kids. Hmm. I hate to accuse the Mayor of fudging on his marital status, but there's this part of me that wonders whether he is one of those guys you hear about: These are the cute guys at the office who are really single but who wear wedding rings because they figure it’s a turn-on for some of their female coworkers. These men know there are women who tend to go for married, unavailable men, either because of their own lack of self-esteem, or because they get turned on by the excitement of a forbidden affair, and, like the faux married guy they hook up with, these women aren't really looking for a long-term commitment.

--He's friends with cops, especially members of the Concord SWAT team, as shown by this story he posted back in September of his hunky SWAT friends in SWAT training. Speaking for myself, ever since seeing Keanu Reeves costumed in that SWAT team outfit when he played a cop in the 1994 action blockbuster Speed, I get weak in the knees whenever I see a cop in a SWAT team outfit. Personally, I've never seen the Mayor in a SWAT team outfit, but the thought of that image is pretty, uh, exciting.

-- The Mayor has his bad boy side, which definitely came out when he poked fun at Ruth Carver, the Walnut Creek mom who was trying to move several schools from the Mt. Diablo Unified School District into the Walnut Creek and Acalanes school districts.

--Ultimately, the Mayor has his sensitive, humble, and socially responsible side as well, shown, for example, by his expressions of concern about Katie Grace Groebner, the young girl who suffers from a rare disorder and needs a heart-and-lung transplant. Or his statements to the Times that he’s not a “big wig. … I’m just a regular guy.” And his proclamations in the same interview about how he started Claycord.com “because I love the community, and was never in it for the money. I started it just to keep the community informed, and didn't see dollar signs.”

--And, finally,the Mayor has a sense of humor, a quality in a man that us gals should never discount. In fact, I believe a shared sense of humor is the key to finding one's soul mate. The Mayor's playful sense of humor has shown up when he runs videos like “Stupid Kids Do Stupid Things at Sunvalley." Or when he talks about trying not to take any of this Claycord.com blogging business too seriously.

--And, really, finally, he'd be tech savvy enough to figure out a way to Photoshop his own mystery sillhouette onto the above People magazine cover. Women like men who are good with those technical things.

Big Ugly Houses, Chapters 4 and 5: Just $28,509 or $52,795 per month gets you one of these monstrosities

Chapter 4: A Walnut Creek tipster directed me to real estate listings for this "beauty" that sits in her neighborhood, prominently on display and on a hill near the city’s Sugar Loaf Open Space Recreation Area.

It’s a 8,300-square-foot faux Mediterranean villa with five bedrooms, seven bathrooms, a wine cellar, tasting room, game room, theater room, and exercise room.

Plus two master suites. Phew! I’m getting exhausted by all this excessive extravagance. And it has an elevator, room for a pool (what, no pool already?) and views from Mount Diablo to Lafayette!

And, it’s all yours for $5.4 million—or $28,509 per month.

In my demented way of thinking, I can see how the audacious hideousness of this house actually sounds perfect for some Merrill Lynch refugee who fled that firm just in time to, of course, cash in on his/her generous John Thain-approved accelerated bonus, which was paid for by the $15 billion in bailout money that Merrill Lynch and Bank of America received from U.S. taxpapers.

With our nation in a recession, or GD2 (Great Depression 2), as my pessimistic friends like to call it, and our world in GEC (Global Economic Crisis), I think that the only person who would be able to afford this sprawling mega house would be a recipient of some generous executive payout.

And, by the way, it appears that this home has been on the market for 65 days. Gee, why?

Big Ugly Houses, Chapter 5: In checking out this Sugar Loaf area home, I found that it was represented by a certain realtor who has a knack for representing some really prime examples of Big Ugly Househood.

Here’s this realtor's other prize property: a 16,000-square-foot, two-story, seven-bedroom monster of “luxury” on just one acre in Pleasanton's exclusive Ruby Hills neighborhood. It's available for $10 million, or $52,795 per month. And, it's been on the market for 86 days. (Again, I wonder why?)

“This estate has an amazing view,” this realtor’s ad reads.

It’s also got a six-car garage! A stunning iron- and bronze-cap floating staircase (whatever the hell that means)! Six fireplaces! An amazing kitchen with two large islands and granite counters! A game room!

A “teen room” (Wonder if this "teen room" would be useful for the after-school sex, pot, and meth parties that I often hear about occurring amongst ennui-afflicted teens in our affluent suburbs).

And a “banquet-size formal dining room" with an adjacent “incredible temperature-controlled wine cave.” Gosh, I get all tingly and pea-green with envy reading about all this superb luxury.

As for those seven bedrooms? All large and “en suite.” And the master suite has a separate exercise room, so that you, master and mistress of the manor, don’t have to mingle with all the riff-raff of the rest of your family. Or the housekeeper, gardener and nanny (who are perhaps in the country illegally and whom you pay under the table.)

Besides the wine cellar, another common feature of monster homes like this one seems to be a home theater, which this Ruby Hills estate has with a vengeance. Not only does it have seating for 20 guests, it also has “its own ticket taker booth!” Oh, goody!

Outside, there are "cascading waterfalls" to a pool, spa, and bridge over a 7,000-gallon koi pond, lush lawns, beautifully landscaped firepit and loggia with flat-screen TV.

Yeah, what F. Scott Fitzgerald said: "The rich are different from you and me." Or, I suspect, in the case of buyers of homes like these, out here in the East Bay suburbs, we're mostly dealing with the wanne-be rich, the ones who, Gatsby-like, are desperate for some fleeting idea of American respect and status. So desperate, that they choose to assuage this desperation by buying the garish and cheesy displays of supposed wealth and status that these homes offer.

Cascading waterfalls! Wine cellars! Home theaters!

Then again, if you consider one of these monstrosities a dream home for you and your family--well, good luck in life. You're gonna need it.

Yeah, sorry to all those who think these houses are the epitome of good taste and inevitable rewards to people who work hard and smart for such privileges. To me, these homes absolutely reek of desperation, of a sad, sick longing to be respected, envied, and admired.

P.S. I e-mailed the realtor a copy of this post. Let's see if she chooses to respond.

Apparently, another Quincerñera gets out of control in Walnut Creek

Apparently another Quinceañera party held in Walnut Creek turned violent, the second in about a month. The Quinceañera is a traditional celebration in Hispanic culture to celebrate a girl’s 15th party, and it took place Saturday night at the city’s Shadelands Civic Arts Center.

The DUBC reports that a major fight broke out, involving 40 people. Police logs show that a major disturbance was reported just after 11 p.m. at a party attended by 200 or more people. But when police arrived the crowd had dispersed.

As I reported earlier, police also were called to a disturbance the night of December 27, this one at Heather Farm Community Center and also involving a Quinceañera. The Mayor of Claycord at Claycord heard from one of his tipsters that the fight involved a group of 30. Police received reports of participants yelling “Northside” and “Southside.” But when police arrived, they couldn’t find a fight. However, they did find graffiti, in white paint, spread throughout the community center. One of the words tagged on the center was “insane.” The other writing was unrecognizable.

The show trial of the former officer in the BART shooting case begins

I know that using the term “show trial” is inflammatory and conjures up images of Stalin-era style of jurisprudence. But show trial refers to a highly public trial, which certainly applies to the prosecution of Johannes Mehserle. He is the 27-year-old former BART police officer and recent Lafayette resident accused of murdering Oscar Grant, an unarmed, 22-year-old African-American man early New Year’s morning isturbance at Oakland’s Fruitvale BART station.

Show trial also has the strong connotation that the judicial authorities have already determined the guilt of the defendant and that the goal of the trial is merely to make an example, political or otherwise.

I gotta say it, but I think show trial is the correct term to apply to how Oakland’s legal and political establishment is handling this case. That is evident from reading news accounts of last Friday’s bail hearing for Mehserle—at which a judge set bail at $3 million—and then reading the defense attorney’s thorough and persuasive argument that Grant was the victim of a tragic accident—not murder—and that Mehserle meant to stun Grant with his Taser gun, not fire his pistol into his back.

Mehserle’s attorney, Michael Rains of Pleasant Hill, says that at most Mehserle should be facing manslaughter charges, not murder charges. From what I've read and seen so far, including the various grainy videos shot by witnesses, it sounds right to me.

In saying that I think Mehserle's attorney makes a strong argument, I realize that I come off as going against my usual lefty, liberal grain. On the other hand, I have strong views on the need for criminal trials to uphold principles of fairness and justice. Like a fellow Walnut Creek blogger, The DUBC, I strongly question whether Mehserle can get a fair, just trial in Alameda County.

This is a politically messy situation, one in which I open myself up to charges of racism and classicism in calling Mehserle's prosecution a show trial. I’m white and middle class, just like Mehserle, so naturally I will identify with him, or so that argument goes. I’m sure there is some truth to that. I have said before I have sympathy for Mehserle.

At the same time, I’ve made it clear that I don't have a starry-eyed view of police. I have covered crime as a daily news, web, and magazine writer in several jurisdictions for much of my journalism career. Most of the cops I’ve met are regular men and women, just trying to do their job the best that they can. They are decent people who want to help others and ensure public safety. Nonetheless, I’ve come across a few of those “bad apples” who spoil the reputations of their departments and contribute to rifts between themselves and residents in the communities they serve, notably in tough, urban towns like Oakland and Richmond. These are the cops who use excessive force, who conveniently misrepresent or deliberately lie about evidence to secure search warrants, who lie on the stand, and who speak disparagingly about, for example, grieving parents of young homicide victims.

I just don’t see one of those bad apples in Johannes Mehserle--not yet anyway. No information has yet emerged, even from what the judge or prosecutor said at Friday’s bail hearing, to convince me otherwise. In fact, I found the statements of Judge Morris Jacobson to be a little concerning. He convinced me even more that Mehserle’s trial is not going to be about justice—that is, getting to the truth of what happened on that BART platform—but about Alameda County’s legal establishment trying to prove their political correctness.

White cop; dead black detainee. In the “politically correct” view, Mehserle is probably a racist who exploded in some kind of sudden rage during that New Year’s morning confrontation on the BART platform, directing it at the young black man who, some witnesses say, according to the defense motion, was not being as cooperative with police as was earlier portrayed.

Jacobson attacked Rains’ account of the shooting as “inconsistent” and accused Mehserle of being willing to “make up something that's not true" to escape consequences for shooting Grant.

It sounds to me like Jacobson is one of those judicial authorities in the classic definition of show trial who has already determined the guilt of the defendant.

Here’s the Chronicle’s summary of Rains' motion and the bail hearing. You can also read the motion yourself here:

Mehserle and other BART officers detained Grant and four of his friends just after 2 a.m. while investigating reports of a fight aboard a Dublin-Pleasanton train. Two people on the train told police that about 20 people had been involved in what amounted to a "barroom fight" and that the participants were "hammered and stoned.”

Rains said Mehserle had been in a tough situation, trying to handcuff Grant after being told Grant was under arrest for resisting an officer. Rains quoted Officer Tony Pirone as saying Grant had disobeyed instructions and cursed officers. [Pirrone, by the way, is the officer who has subsequently been accused by John Burris, the Grant’s family attorney, of using excessive force by punching Grant.]

Grant, after learning he was to be arrested, ‘attempted to stand up, but was forced to the ground face-first.’ Mehserle and Pirone ordered Grant to put his hands behind his back to be handcuffed, but Grant resisted.

According to the motion, “Pirone said he heard Mehserle say, 'Put your hands behind your back, stop resisting, stop resisting, put your hands behind your back.'

“Then Mehserle said, 'I'm going to tase him, I'm going to tase him. I can't get his arms. He won't give me his arms. His hands are going for his waistband,' " Rains wrote. "Then Mehserle popped up and said, 'Tony, Tony, get away, back up, back up.' "

Rains wrote that several witnesses described Mehserle as looking stunned after he shot Grant. One said Mehserle "had an expression on his face like, 'Holy s-, what happened, or what did I do, with his hands around his head,' " the attorney wrote.

According to the Chronicle, the prosecutor in the case, John Creighton, also questioned Rains’ portrait of the shooting as an accident.

"If he intended to pull his Taser and pulled his service weapon by mistake, why would he say to another officer after the fact, 'I thought he was going for a gun'?" Creighton said in an interview before the court hearing. "Why wouldn't he say, 'Oh, my God, Tony, I meant to pull my Taser' or something to that effect?"

So, what if Mehserle didn’t say “I meant to pull my Taser”? Just prior to pulling out his weapon, Mehserle was heard by several witnesses as saying he intended to tase him.
Isn’t it also possible that Mehserle intended to stun Grant to prevent him from going for a gun? Maybe Mehserle, even faced with the fear the Grant had a gun, still tried to avoid using lethal force—by going for what he believed was his Taser gun, not his pistol.

I remember talking to a police lieutenant and SWAT team commander about use of force, and he said you generally approach most confrontational situations in as calm and low-key way as possible, then step up the force incrementally as the situation demands. Unlike TV or movies, you don’t go into most situations with your gun drawn, unless you’re facing one of those rare instances when that action is required. You don’t immediately go to DEFCON 1.

And maybe that’s what Mehserle was trying to avoid: a cop’s version of DEFCON1.

Fellow East Bay blogger Mayor of Concord has some good photos showing the similarity between a Taser gun and the semiautomatic pistol Mehserle used to shoot Grant. At the same time, the Mayor of Concord notes that the two weapons weigh a lot different and would be carried on different sides of the officer’s belt. “The differences are what is going to be called into question.”

It will be interesting to see what additional facts come out at the trial. I’ve already seen enough to make me think the Oakland establishment so far is reverting to its usual mode of appeasing politically correct thuggery—those who allude to more riots and violence erupting if the white cop who murdered the African-American detainee isn’t convicted of murder.

This is the same kind of thinking that led the current mayor, Ron Dellums, Congresswoman Barbara Lee, and others in Oakland establishment to coddle a criminal enterprise, otherwise known as Your Black Muslim Bakery, that terrorized the city for years, under the guise of “empowering” poor African-American residents. That reign of terror ended when the Bakery's employees finally crossed a line and (allegedly, yeah right) assassinated an African-American journalist who had the guts to try and do what Oakland’s authorities long failed to do: expose the danger and hypocrisy in bowing to certain violent-laced forms of political correctness.

Paris Hilton's Economic Stimulus Plan

Okay, I haven't been posting very happy local economic news over the past few days: Walnut Creek's budget woes, Elephant Pharm closing, hundreds in the area to lose jobs, schools struggling with deficits and possible teacher lay-offs.

Thank goodness for Paris. In SFGate.com's Daily Dish, we learn that the multi-millionaire will help "the struggling economy by doing what she does best: shopping."

So, instead of more bad economic news, I can report on someone who is offering a solution to all our woes.

Unlike most of the rest of us, Hilton admits "her income has not been affected by the current international financial crisis, with many promoters still paying her thousands of dollars just to make an appearance at certain nightclubs. And Hilton is adamant that she can give the retail industry a boost by continuing her excessive spending."

"She tells British magazine Heat, 'It's really scary about the economy right now. So the way I'm playing my part in helping is doing a lot of shopping wherever I go.' "

Way to go, girl! And thanks for all you're doing for us! And you know what's really cool and patriotic about Paris? She has pledged to focus her stimulus plan on the American economy by vowing only to wear clothes by U.S. fashion designers.

And, hmm. I wonder if we could get Paris to come to Walnut Creek and spend some of her hard-earned dollars here. We need to get our mayor and city council to contact Paris's people and extend an invitation. Maybe give her a key to the city as an incentive. Good photo op for Paris, and what a morale booster it would be for all of us.

WC schools face teacher cuts, class-size reduction, $1 million in lost revenues

As California has sunk further in debt, with its deficit ballooning from $3.5 billion to $42 billion over the next 18 months, Walnut Creek’s school district is grappling with how to navigate this new uncertainty.

In a message to Walnut School district parents, Superintendent Patricia Wool says “It has become painfully clear to the education community that public schools will not be spared in the current round of budget reductions.”

The Walnut Creek School District, which manages five elementary schools and one middle school and 3,200 students, faces the fact that the state budget crisis is still unresolved.

In response, the district will conduct a series of meetings with district employees and parent groups. “We will brainstorm once again, and send our lists to the Budget Review Committee for consideration," Wool says.

Wool warns that the jobs of some teachers are at risk, as is class-size reduction for the early grades. Wool says tough decisions must be made this month because, by state law, lay-off notices must go out by March 15 to teachers who would face lay-offs.

As for class size reduction? Wool says: “It is inevitable that class size will rise in some grades. This is inevitable since salaries and benefits comprise over 85 percent of our budget.”

Wool says the district will host a series of meetings through March 17, so that teachers and parents can supply their input on which programs they are willing to let go of.

Here is the schedule for upcoming public meetings:

Indian Valley PTO, Thursday, February 5, 8:30 a.m.
Walnut Heights PTA, Thursday, February 5, 9:30 a.m.
Buena Vista PTA, Thursday, February 5, 7 p.m.
Walnut Creek Intermediate PTA, Wednesday February 18, 7 p.m.
Parkmead PTA/PALS PTO, Thursday, February 26, 9 a.m.
Murwood PTA, Tuesday, March 17, 7 p.m

Elephant Pharm stores in WC, elsewhere to close; company files Chapter 7

I can’t say I’m surprised. The parking lot at Trader Joe’s on California Boulevard is usually packed, but I doubt that many cars were there because their owners wanted to pick up something at Elephant Pharm, which billed itself as the healthy, natural alternative to mainstream drug stores.

It’s too bad. It’s never good to see any business close. And the Walnut Creek Elephant Pharm was a nice looking store, though I can’t say I ever shopped there much, except for purchasing an occasional lotion or health food bar. The store also sold unique, artsy stationery. But when I went in, I hardly saw many other shoppers.

Update: I stopped by Elephant Pharm a half hour ago, and there's a sign on the door that says "Closed indefinitely." However, the lights were on.  And two people walked up, expecting to go in and shop there and had to turn away. 

Anyway, what follows is a a press release about the company filing for Chapter 7 bankruptcy and closing its four stories, including its flagship location in Berkeley. By the way, news of Elephant Pharm filing for bankruptcy comes the day that the Contra Costa Times reported that it was having financial difficulties.

February 3rd, 2009, Berkeley, Calif. Elephant Pharm --the revolutionary one-stop health and wellness retailer with stores in Berkeley, San Rafael and Walnut Creek--announced today that it has closed all of its stores and will seek liquidation under chapter 7 of the United States Bankruptcy Code.

Elephant Pharm CEO, Kathi Lentzsch said, "The company has been burdened with obligations that were quite difficult for a company of our size to carry. The current management team and board of directors worked diligently to grow the company to a size that could bear these obligations, but due to the current economic conditions and the tightening of the credit market, it has not been possible to raise the capital required to continue the business."

Over the past twelve months, while Elephant Pharm was in continuous discussions with potential investors, the Company cut costs significantly, closing its Los Altos location and downsizing the corporate staff. In spite of these efforts, the Company was ultimately unable to meet its mounting obligations and regretfully had no choice but to close it stores.

"We are extremely proud of our team and what we were able to accomplish in the 6 years since we opened. We would like to thank our vendors and our very loyal customers for their support over the years." Lentzsch said. "Elephant has been both a leader in its industry as well as a reflection of a greater societal movement for healthy change."

Elephant Pharm employed 190 people across its three stores and at the Home Office.

Additional details are available at the company's website.

If there's any silver lining in WC's dismal budget report? More downtown parking?

Walnut Creek's City Council will be talking budget tonight, and the news isn't good. The city is facing a $3.4 million shortfall this year and a deficit of $5.2 million in 2009-10.

The Progress Report on the 2008-10 Operation budget reads:

"Last fall our country's economy experienced major events that underminded our collective financial security. Home foreclosures increased and home prices fell dramatically; car sales dropped preciptously; and economic activity, in general slowed. Local government activities are funded from various sources. In Walnut Creek, the three largest are sales tax, property tax, and fees and charges for services provided. All of these have been negatively affected by the economic downturn."

"Based on new information about our revenue sources, staff's preliminary revised estimate of revenue to the General Fund is aproximately $3.4 million (5.1%) lower for Fiscal year 2008-09 and $5.2 million lower (7.5%) for 2009-19 than the estimates contained in the 2008-10 adopted budget for the General Fund."

The city had adopted an operating budget for 2008-10 of around $136 million, which staff says was based on the best information available last spring, which projected only a mild recession in 2008-09 and a modest improvement for 2009-10.

No, this isn't good news for Walnut Creek. And, I don't mean to make light of any of this, because people's jobs and livelihoods are at stake. The new other Walnut Creek-based blogger, The DUBC has launched a "Buy Walnut Creek" campaign and cites some beloved locally owned businesses, stores and restaurants that have gone out of business. They include some of my favorites: Taxi's Hamburgers, Pinkys Pizza, and Bonanza Street Books.

But, yes, with consumer confidence down and people not spending as much on things they don't consider necessities, Walnut Creek's upscale retail scene is taking a hit. Which means, yes, it likely will be easier to park in downtown for a while, especially in terms of street parking. That benefit for all of us who have long complained about WC's parking crunch, of course, comes at a cost to city coffers and services upon which we rely.

With regard to parking, the report says: "Parking meter revenue is projected to be approximately $11,000 below what was estimated for the budget of 2008-09 and 2009-10, due to lower overall activity in the downtown area resulting from the downturn in the economy."

According to the Contra Costa Times report on the budget, to save money, the city is freezing five open positions for this fiscal year and six more in the next year. The city has also renegotiated lower rates for long-term disability and life insurance for employees and revised contributions for employee pensions.

The city will also look at the need to "involve the community" in finding solutions for balancing the budget. The report says: "Starting in March and continuing through May, Council members and staff would invite groups with common interests [business groups, arts organizations, environmental interest groups, social services, recreation organizations] to come together to hear about our budget situation and gain an understanding of the City's finances as a prelude to Community Conversations to be scheduled this fall."

(IMO, perhaps in involving the community city leaders could do a slightly better job than it did with regard to its Neiman Marcus approval process, which they kind of bungled, in their starry-eyed haste to bring this luxury retailer to Broadway Plaza. Yeah, yeah, city leaders will blame sneaky, unethical mall rivals for undermining their efforts to bring this prize of a department store to Walnut Creek, but those mall rivals were just tapping into what turned out to be some widespread concerns about the original Neiman Marcus proposal.)

The City Council meeting takes place at 7 p.m. at City Hall, 1666 N. Main Street. You can read more about the budget report in today's Contra Costa Times, or you can peruse the actual budget report here.

Speaking of Longs Drugs lay-offs in the next post, sad news about a longtime employee

Regular reader (and Claycord.com Council member) Mom's Exhausted sent along a copy of an obituary she came across about someone she knew who recently died, Walter H. Dere. He was a 40-year employee of Long's Drugs.

Mom's Exhausted says:
"Not that I expect you to report obituaries, but I knew this gentleman. He was a Long's Employee for over 40 years. A pharmacist. Very kind, gentle and likable man. Left behind a wife and three grown daughters. Must imagine that many in the Walnut Creek area would have known him. ... 40 years is an incredibly long time to work for any one company."

I can't say that I know him, but his name is somehow very familiar to me. My condolences to his family and friends.

Anyway, here is his obituary, as it appeared in the Contra Costa Times.

Walter H. Dere
Walter H. Dere July 16, 1941 ~ Nov. 23, 2008 Resident of Walnut Creek Walter Dere passed away peacefully on November 23, 2008, at the age of 67 following a long battle with cancer. A native of California, Walt was born and raised in Sacramento and moved to Walnut Creek where he resided for 37 years. He graduated from UCSF School of Pharmacy with a PharmD and worked for Longs Drug Stores for over 40 years. He is preceded in death by his father, William J. Dere. Walt is survived by his loving wife Patricia, his mother Bessie Dere, and daughters Karen, Lynda and Laura. He is also survived by his sisters Florence Fong and Beverly Hing, and his brother Willard Dere. Friends and family are invited to a visitation on Saturday, November 29, 2008 from 1-4pm at Oak Park Hills Chapel at 3111 N. Main St., Walnut Creek, CA. Burial will be private. In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations to the International Waldenstrom's Macroglobulinemia Foundation (IWMF) 3932D Swift Road, Sarasota, FL 34231 or Bruns House c/o Hospice of the East Bay 3470 Buskirk Ave., Pleasant Hill, CA 94523 in memory of Walter Dere. Oak Park Hills Chapel (925) 934-6500

At least 1700 face job losses in Suburbia in the next year

Note: I originally had "at least 900 face job losses" in the headline. This "900" number was based on job cuts reported to the state Employment Development Department under a state law that requires certain employers to give workers at least 60 days advance written notice of any plant closing or mass layoff. This 900 number comes from these California Job Cut Warnings at SFGate.com’s Data Center.

But there are also the 800 workers at Longs Drugs corporate offices in Walnut Creek and in Antioch who have been told they will need to start looking for work. An astute reader reminded me of the pending Longs lay-offs, which follow Longs' purchase by CVS, another drugstore chain, last year.

I went to SFGate.com's Data Center after reading the news that Macy’s Inc. is going to eliminate 7,000 jobs, about 4 percent of its 180,000-person workforce, due to slowing sales in a tough economy and following one of the worst holiday shopping seasons in decades. The stories say Macy's would also close 11 stores, but didn't name where. Moreover, the stories didn't pinpoint where Macy's would cut staff, and if these cuts would trickle down to Walnut Creek’s Broadway Plaza, Concord's Sunvalley mall, or Pleasanton’s Stoneridge mall.

Update 2/3: The San Francisco Chronicle reports that Macy's would slash 1,400 jobs in San Francisco, "where it will eliminate the Macy's West division that now handles buying, planning and merchandising for 259 stores in California and nearby states." Macy's will also cut "an average of five or six jobs at each of its many stores, distribution centers, and local offices."

The announcement of Macy’s job cuts come about two weeks after upscale home and kitchen shop Williams-Sonoma, which has a prominent storefront in Walnut Creek, would eliminate 1,400 positions, including 18 percent of its full-time staff. Williams-Sonoma was one of 10 retailers that made 24/7.com’s Black Friday 10: Retailers Who Might See 2009, which I reported back in November. Williams-Sonoma did make it to 2009, but it appears to be limping along.


As for the more than 900 East Bay suburban workers whose lay-off notices are listed on the Data Center site, about 860 work for JP Morgan Chase in Pleasanton, and the company plans to let these people go in stages throughout 2009. However, 654 of these people have been told that they won’t have a job after March 31.

Actually, these people were employed at Washington Mutual Inc.’s call center in Pleasanton, where they would answer customer inquiries about credit cards and consumer banking, the San Francisco Chronicle reported back in November. The Seattle-based Washington Mutual was seized by federal regulators and sold to JPMorgan Chase in September. In November, Washington Mutual announced that it would close this call center and cut hundreds of positions in San Francisco, eliminating a total of 1,600 positions throughout the Bay Area.

Sneaky Neiman Marcus opponents unmasked!

The Contra Costa Times' Elisabeth Nardi must have been right there at the very moment (or immediately thereafter) when documents were filed at 2 p.m. Monday with the Walnut Creek City Clerk. The documents reveal the identity of the mysterious key financial backer of a referendum campaign that could have stopped Neiman Marcus from coming to town.

And that mystery bankroller is? No, not forces supporting San Ramon's effort to build its new City Center, one of the suspects mentioned as recently as Sunday by Times Political Editor Lisa Vorderbrueggen.

The stealthy entity that refused to reveal itself to Times reporters is the Taubman Group. According to Nardi, the Taubman group is "a competing mall company based in Michigan that built Stoneridge in Pleasanton and still manages Sunvalley in Concord." The Taubman Group, Nardi reports, spent almost $95,000 to mobilize residents against the city's actions that would have allowed the luxury Texas-based retailer Neiman Marcus from building a new store in Broadway Plaza.

Last month, Marerich, the owner of Broadway Plaza, announced that it was scaling back its plans for the new Neiman Marcus in response to public objections to the project's proposed height and to the additional burden it would place on downtown parking.

The new (and maybe improved) project will be two stories instead of three. And, perhaps most important for anyone who attempts to shop in downtown Walnut Creek, the smaller, 92,000-square-foot project (as opposed to the original proposal's 107,000 square feet) will require fewer additional parking spaces, meaning it will not need the five-story Broadway Plaza garage to be transformed to valet parking during peak shopping times.

Hopes of solving 1988 cop killing in WC get deported

Or rather, the woman considered to be the prime suspect in the 1988 slaying of an off-duty San Francisco police officer is being sent back to her native Scotland.

The San Francisco Chronicle reported today that Catherine Kuntz, a former prostitute who was living in Concord at the time of Officer Lester Garnier's July 1988 death was being deported "because she had been convicted of a crime of moral turpitude."

Three years after Garnier, 30, was found slumped over the wheel of his Corvette, in the parking lot of the mall that houses Ross and Sunrise Bistro, Kuntz moved to Florida. She was later accused of attempting to murder her husband for his life insurance money--but she was acquitted after her husband testified in her defense.

In the past year, she had been in prison in Florida, where, according to the Chronicle, she was first convicted of cocaine possession and then failed a drug test.

She became a suspect in 2002, when a partial fingerprint, "that had been lifted from the Corvette was determined to belong to Kuntz, but that discovery presented investigators with a whole set of new questions," the Chronicle says.

"Kuntz, the ex-wife of a Navy petty officer, had a history of drug abuse and prostitution arrests. She had never been arrested in San Francisco, however,
and police have never been able to establish that she and Garnier were acquainted.

At the time of his death Garnier lived in Concord with his parents. He joined the San Francisco police department in 1980 and was working with the vice squad when he was killed.

The case has been filled with intrigue and mystery ever since Garnier was found dead, shot twice at close range with a .380-caliber semiautomatic pistol, possibly by his own gun. But that murder weapon has never been found.

The case also caused friction between Walnut Creek and San Francisco police, because Walnut Creek detectives guarded information about their investigation, out of possible concern that other San Francisco officers had something to do with Garnier's killing.

Walnut Creek police have submitted their findings about Kuntz and other information to the District Attorney's Office several times for review. But prosecutors said there has not yet been enough evidence to bring Kuntz to trial.

Walnut Creek detectives publicly announced Kuntz's possible connection to the case in June. They also had received an okay from Kuntz to be interviewed, but she was deported in December, before they got the chance to talk to her.

$24 glass of wine? No thanks--not while we're in the midst of GEC and GD2

"Go ahead," my husband said. "It's a special occasion."

Yes, it was a special occasion. My dear, sweet husband had taken me out for dinner for my birthday, to the very special occasion restaurant, Prima Ristorante in Walnut Creek. We were splurging on a nice dinner at this much-acclaimed upscale Italian restaurant, which is also famous for its wine selection.

But silly me: I decided to ask the waitress for a recommendation on which glass of wine to order with my dinner, which would include a pizzetta appetizer (with black truffle and prosciutto, yum), and a nice hunk of halibut (grilled and served over little potatoes and a puree of celery root, yum some more). Now, traditionally, one should have white wine with fish, correct? But foodies these days say that many lighter reds go perfectly well with seafood.

Since I favor red wine, I asked the waitress which glass might go best with my dinner choices. Her finger moved down the Wine by the Glass menu to a choice near the bottom, a Napa Valley Pinot Noir that went for $24. She assured me it was an excellent wine.

Gasp.

I know this was a special occasion and my husband and I were splurging, but I could not justify spending $24 for a glass of wine, especially on myself. Let's just say I don't have a very refined palate. I'm not what they call in wine world "a supertaster." A Trader Joe's Two Buck Chuck Cabernet Sauvignon is my idea of a decent wine (yes, you wanna-be Robert Parkers out there, I am pathetic). So, a $24 glass would really be wasted on me. I immediately told, "I'll try this Pinot," a glass that cost about $9--one of this restaurant's cheaper selections.

Now, today, I'm wondering, was that waitress directly steering me to the higher-priced glass? Or was she genuinely advising me to try the one she truly liked the best and thought I would adore, too? Was she mistaking me for someone who has genuine taste?

Restaurants supposedly are hurting, like all other businesses, especially businesses that sell luxury goods. Not sure if that goes for Prima, too, which is one of the East Bay suburbs' most popular upscale dining destinations. I don't know if my husband had as much trouble getting us 7 p.m. reservations for a Saturday night as he would have in the past. As we walked into the restaurant and as we left, I noticed some empty tables, but perhaps those were tables in between dining parities and waiting for their reservations to arrive.

Don't know. But to Prima, if you're hurting, and to other restaurants that are definitely hurting, here's a tip: be sensitive to the fact that even if you do have patrons who are willing to spend on eating in your establishment, these patrons are not splurging like its 2007. We're in the middle of Global Economic Crisis (GEC); or, as some of my doomsdayer co-workers like to call it, Great Depression 2 (GD2). Even very wealthy people--which my husband and I are not--are being careful with how they spend their money. So, I'm guessing you'll have more and more patrons bypassing that $24 glass in favor of the $9 glass.

The death of Danville’s Rylan Fuchs: Was it really all that different from those drug killings we hear about—and try to ignore—in Richmond?

No, it turns out that it probably wasn’t, despite the disproportionate media attention given to Rylan Fuchs' January 20 death in front of his home in affluent Danville. Fuchs was in the news again today, with the Times covering his memorial service Saturday in Dublin.

The immediate details about Fuchs' death, reported the morning of Wednesday, January 21 were pretty limited. He was shot in the throat in front of his home the night before by an unknown assailant.

Both, oh those details: Shooting. Homicide. Danville. Teenager. White teenager. All the ingredients to get the Bay Area media frothing were there.

Things like this don’t happen in Danville. Yes, that is true, violence of this sort rarely occurs in Danville, whereas in Richmond—shooting, homicide, teenager, black or Hispanic teenager—seems to be a fairly regular occurrence.

Actually, I once heard from a Contra Costa County Coroner’s deputy that he and other Coroner’s deputies and the Richmond cops have a nickname for the killings of young Richmond males of color. They call them “Richmond Naturals.”

So, the unusualness of such a crime in Danville meant that Fuchs’ death would in no way constitute a “Danville Natural,” and its rarity made it into a big, big story. But even with those initial sketchy details, we had to assume that the shooting of Fuchs wasn’t random. As with all those deaths in Richmond, and as with all murders in general, most homicide victims are killed by people they know. But since this was Danville, not Richmond, my immediate assumption was that Fuchs was killed by someone with whom he had some personal beef—over a girl or over some perceived sign of disrespect or social rejection. I, like most other people, probably didn’t jump to the conclusion that it was drug- or gang-related. But this is where my own personal biases about race and class initially came into play.

Within just a few hours of hearing about Fuchs’ death, I, like many others, discovered his MySpace and Facebook pages and learned that the San Ramon Valley High senior and his friends were very fond of using and distributing marijuana. Those pages showed him and friends posing next to what appeared to be marijuana. They also showed that he claimed affiliation to the “SRV Pot Smokers 09” and an organization that supports the decriminalization of marijuana.

Two days after the shooting, KTVU finally reported what those of us who had seen Fuchs’ Myspace and Facebook pages had come to suspect: that his death was drug-related. KTVU, citing a law enforcement source, said that Fuchs was killed in a dispute over a quarter-pound of marijuana. The next day, police publicly confirmed that his death could be “drug-related” when they announced the arrest of a 15-year-old boy who had once attended San Ramon Valley High.

Finally, it became clear that this killing in affluent Danville wasn’t all that different from those drug and gang killings that plague neighborhoods in Richmond.

As it happens, just as media coverage of Fuchs’ death began to wane, two students at Kennedy High in Richmond died in shootings within three days of each other.

Kudos to the Contra Costa Times reporters in Richmond for making a strong effort to give the deaths of these two boys equal time to that of Rylan Fuchs.

In a series of stories of these killings in Richmond, the reporters described the grief that those deaths caused their families and the shock and horror ripping through Kennedy High School. The Times published similar stories in the wake of Fuchs’ death. So did other media outlets. But the other media outlets, unlike the Times, gave scant notice to these Richmond killings or the amount of devastation that these deaths created.

Here are the basics about the killings in Richmond, as reported by the Times:

Cameron Russell, 15, a freshman at the south Richmond high school, died Friday, January 23 in an apartment where police say a group of teenagers were fooling around with a shotgun. The kid pulling the trigger was a Kennedy High junior, but the police are calling the shooting accidental.

Three days later, late on Monday afternoon, at about 5:40 p.m., Aaron Beltran, 16, died after he went to meet someone near a public park. As his girlfriend sat in the car waiting for him, he walked out view, and she heard the blast of multiple gunshots. Beltran died at the scene.

Police records show Beltran was recently released for previous brushes with the law. This bit of news would confirm the view of many that Beltran, like other Richmond homicide victims, was mixed up in something risky that got him killed. Gangs or drugs. Or maybe Beltran had disrespected someone in a way that we would consider trivial, but that kids over there regard as a matter of life and death.

Some might even say that Beltran and other poor, young minority males are asking to be killed.
But now some are saying similar things about Rylan Fuchs. I agree that such views are harsh in all three of these cases. No young person deserves to die like this. It might be more accurate to say that, just like Cameron Russell and Aaron Beltran, Fuchs was apparently engaging in risky behavior that put his life in jeopardy.

Not surprisingly, the public reaction to this Richmond sort of crime invading fair Danville hasn’t been pretty. There were reports that the suspect in Fuchs’ killing had relatives in Oakland and came from Alameda County,that he left high-achieving San Ramon Valley and briefly attended equally high-achieving Monte Vista High in Danville before being expelled for mysterious, unknown reasons in October. There were also reports that the suspect was living in a group home in Danville. Group homes, by their definition, according to state records, exist to house “troubled youths.”

It’s been interesting to follow what people have been writing on the Times’ message boards about Fuchs’ death: the race and class biases that have emerged. Some posters are angry that authorities are placing “troubled youths” (translation: poor, minority kids from tough towns like Oakland and Richmond, with legal problems or very dysfunctional family backgrounds) in group homes in their fair suburban communities. Some want the “little bastard” prosecuted to the full extent of the law. At least one poster blames single mothers in inner cities for raising future murderers.

But other posters have offered some good perspective and a dose of reality to suburbanites about the extent to which many of our kids are engaging in risky behavior. After all, kids in our affluent communities have access to more disposable income than kids in poor communities. And our kids aren’t spending all that extra cash on the latest Apple gadget. From the Times message boards:

"Open your eyes. Danville has dope running around its streets. If it didn’t, this would not have happened. Only difference is the youth have mommy and daddy’s money to openly appear clean and drug free."

“Dope and coke in Danville? DUH!! It’s been like that for 30 plus years in ALL of the Diablo Valley towns."

“If you play with fire, it is only a matter of time before you get burned. It doesn’t matter what city you live in, who your parents are, how much money you have, and so on. Look at the kinds of pictures [Rylan Fuchs] and his friends flaunted. They live a lifestyle that is ignored by the community either because everyone is in denial it can happen to their child, their family, their community, etc., or everyone is completely ignorant and blissful. I guess when all else fails, point the blame somewhere else. Oakland is always a good cop-out!”

“If [Fuchs] didn’t deal drugs with one person, he would have dealt it with another. Don’t you get it yet? Everyone involved is culpable … group home kids didn’t bring this to the [Danville]. It has always been going on in the city. As someone else suggested, maybe Danville should be named Denialville.”

A February 2007 news report, citing the most recent California Healthy Kids Survey, confirms that kids in our affluent suburbs are using alcohol and drugs pretty frequently and much more than kids over the hills in Oakland or Richmond:

“Correlating state Healthy Kids Survey results for school districts in Alameda and Contra Costa counties with data on free lunches that indicates relative levels of wealth in school districts, reveals youthful substance abuse is more common in the East Bay's richer areas.

"More-affluent districts generally had higher rates of juniors who admitted to binge drinking or consumed alcohol within 30 days of the survey. They also had higher rates of juniors who admitted having been high from drugs.

"In the state health report, 29 percent of 11th-graders in Lafayette's Acalanes high school district reported binge drinking in the previous 30 days. In the San Ramon Valley district, 26 percent of 11th-graders reported the same.

"In the less affluent Oakland and West Contra Costa districts, the number of juniors reporting binge drinking were 14 percent and 17 percent, respectively.

" 'You can make some general assessments that affluent areas have higher alcohol and marijuana use," said Sean Slade, regional manager for the California Healthy Kids Survey. He said he is confident the results are accurate: Studies show students are likely to answer truthfully when surveyed anonymously."