HIV & AIDS
Volunteers spread open a panel of the AIDS Memorial Quilt during an opening ceremony on Saturday, June 11, 2022, at Robin Williams Meadow in Golden Gate Park. This was the largest display of the quilt since it was shown in Washington, D.C., in 2012.

After SF Visit, AIDS Quilt Heads to South to Raise Awareness

07.05.2022
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The AIDS Memorial Quilt was unfurled recently in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park for its largest display in a decade, marking the start of a campaign to educate the public about a disease that, since 1981, has infected 1.2 million people nationwide. 

While new HIV infections in the United States have been in decline, the disease continues to take a disproportionate toll on racial and ethnic minorities, men who identify as gay or bisexual, and other men who have sex with men. The highest rates of new infections and numbers of untreated people are found in the South. 

Organizers estimated that 20,000 people visited the San Francisco quilt display June 11 and 12. This fall, sections of the quilt will be taken on a tour of the South for “large displays in city centers, as well as smaller displays in rural, non-metro areas,” said Dafina Ward, executive director of the Southern AIDS Coalition. New names will be added to the 35-year-old quilt during the tour, she said. 

HIV & AIDS
Harold Phillips, director of the White House Office of National AIDS Policy, says the Biden administration is boosting HIV prevention and treatment initiatives after two years of concentrating public health resources on the COVID-19 pandemic.

Biden Administration Refocuses National HIV Response

07.05.2022
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After two years of focusing on COVID-19 pandemic response, the Biden Administration is renewing attention to other ongoing public health challenges, including HIV and AIDS. The response is led by Harold Phillips, director of the White House Office of National AIDS Policy. The San Francisco Public Press spoke with Phillips this month when he came to San Francisco to participate in events tied to the display of the AIDS Memorial Quilt in Golden Gate Park.

Environment
Half Dome was originally called “Tis-sa-ack,” meaning “Cleft Rock” in the language of the Ahwahnechee People, one of the seven tribes that lived in Yosemite. John Muir referred to the iconic monolith by its native name and Half Dome interchangeably. The mountain is prominently visible from Highway 120, a road leading up to the Hetch Hetchy Reservoir.

John Muir, Racial Politics and the Restoration of Indigenous Lands in Yosemite

05.26.2022
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John Muir has been honored extensively, with his name on many sites and institutions, including 28 schools, a college, a number of mountains, several trails, a glacier, a forest, a beach, a medical center, a highway and Muir Woods National Monument, one of the most visited destinations in the Bay Area. But in the time since the Sierra Club issued a nuanced statement in 2020 acknowledging some racist language in his early writings, some have come to believe that Muir’s legacy should be diminished, despite his contributions to the preservation of wilderness and later writings praising native tribes. 

Transportation
During the coronavirus pandemic, CalTrans was able to take advantage of the lull in traffic to completely close part of Interstate 101 in San Francisco in April 2020 to complete work on the Alemany circle in just nine days instead of the original 18 days scheduled for the project.

Bay Area Traffic Congestion Returns

07.28.2021
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Sean Nozzari, deputy director of traffic operations for the California Department of Transportation in the Bay Area told “Civic” that when the spring 2020 lockdown began, “the amount of travel initially dropped maybe 80%. But it started building up, and around December of 2020 it started going up steadily to a point that the amount of travel that takes place on our freeways is pretty much about what we had before.”

Social Justice
View of Alcatraz, approaching by ferry

Return to Alcatraz: 50 Years After Native American Occupation, National Park Service Considers Permanent Cultural Center

06.29.2021
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As California reopens to tourism, Alcatraz is once again drawing visitors from around the world and featuring an exhibit celebrating the 19-month-long Native American occupation of the island 50 years ago. And in a dramatic, if delayed, response to the occupation, the National Park Service is contemplating the installation of a permanent Native American cultural center on Alcatraz in collaboration with a group that formed with that as one of its key objectives more than 50 years ago.

“Civic” Podcast

BART Emerges From Pandemic Slowdown

06.03.2021
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Ridership on BART is slowly returning at about 20% of pre-pandemic levels. Starting next week the transit agency will begin adding trains with a return to a near normal train schedule by August 30. “Civic” learns more about BART’s plans, ongoing budget problems, new trains, the homeless and how BART is prepared for a mass shooting like the one at a light rail yard in San Jose last month.

“Civic” Podcast

The First Draft of 50 Years of LGBTQ History

04.12.2021
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The Bay Area Reporter distributed its first edition on April 1, 1971. While publisher Bob Aaron Ross may have chosen April Fool’s Day as a light-hearted start for the gay community’s latest bar “rag,” the newspaper would go on to do serious journalism, covering the major events of the post-Stonewall era.