San Francisco Chronicle Bay Area – Spoken Edition

The San Francisco Chronicle provides an authoritative voice that lends context and depth to the conflicts and changes that shape the Bay Area. Our coverage aims to make readers smarter about the important issues of the day. Beats are covered through the prisms of change, conflict and power, without losing sight of the quirky and eclectic stories that make the Bay Area unique. A SpokenEdition transforms written content into human-read audio you can listen to anywhere. It’s perfect for times when you can’t read – while driving, at the gym, doing chores, etc. Find more at www.spokenedition.com

Latest Episodes:

While decorating a cable car, I discovered the magic of San Francisco — again Dec 21, 2018

Show notes

If children obsessed with buses and trains and all manner of public transportation could envision their dream office, it would be San Francisco’s cable car barn. Many of the people who work there grew up in the city, loved riding the cable cars as kids, and can’t quite believe they make their living tending to a fleet that doubles as a national historic landmark.

Trashing Trump: Pelosi takes ownership of the president Dec 20, 2018

Show notes

Nancy Pelosi did the impossible — she out-Trumped Trump on live TV. When it comes to media ambushes, our reality TV star president is the master. Just ask “Little Marco,” “Lying Ted,” “Low Energy Jeb” and the other Republicans he dispatched in 2016. So when President Trump decided to take on Pelosi and her fellow Democratic congressional leader Sen.

Volunteer ‘ministry of hospitality’ soothes seafarers with fellowship, supplies Dec 19, 2018

Show notes

The steel gangway from the pier in Oakland up to the main deck of the container ship Bai Chay Bridge was long, steep and a bit slippery, and Jamieson Prevoznak was having a tough time. He was hauling a heavy black plastic sack over his shoulder. The sack was full of Christmas presents. “Sometimes,” he said, “I think Santa Claus has it easy.

Bay Area’s first Shake Shack burger shop shakes up crowd with euphoria Dec 18, 2018

Show notes

Aparna Bhardwaj’s 15-year-old son, Nikash, and his best friend wanted to camp out all night in front of the new Shake Shack in Palo Alto before its opening. They wanted to be first in line. But it’s finals week, so the devoted mother made a deal with the boys. She would leave their house just 5 minutes away in Menlo Park at 6 a.m., she said, and save them a place at the front of the line — as long as they promised to study for their math final on Monday. Done, the boys said.

SantaCon in San Francisco: Ready or not, those ho-ho-hos are coming Dec 17, 2018

Show notes

A warning to all Santas. Don’t get plastered. And yet, Santa will get plastered. Hundreds of Santas. That’s what happens at SantaCon, the annual ad hoc gathering in downtown San Francisco of wobbly men and women in Santa and Mrs. Claus suits. It’s unofficial, it’s an institution, it’s either charming or obnoxious. Ready or not, it’s on for Saturday. In San Francisco, SantaCon is acknowledged if not sanctioned.

A longshoremen legend in SF honored for a lifetime of standing strong Dec 14, 2018

Show notes

Longshoreman Howard Keylor knew when to unload a ship and he knew when to refuse. A longshoreman for decades on San Francisco Bay, Keylor could unload the contents of a ship’s hold as fast as anyone on the waterfront. But he could also stand fast, lock arms, hold a megaphone and do nothing. That’s what he and his fellow longshoremen did for 11 days in 1984, when the South African cargo ship Nedlloyd Kemba came to the port of San Francisco, its hold full of fruit, wool and sugar.

San Francisco police keeping the heat on Tenderloin and SoMa drug dealers Dec 13, 2018

Show notes

They have become as much a part of the city streetscape as the homeless — drug dealers who sell hundreds of $10 bindles of cocaine, Fentanyl and heroin on Tenderloin and South of Market street corners while rolling in and out of jail. On the night of Nov. 29, for example, a suspect known as “Cena” was arrested at the corner of Turk and Larkin streets with 237 bindles of heroin, cocaine, methamphetamine and fentanyl.

Trump names new attorney general, and clock starts ticking Dec 12, 2018

Show notes

It doesn’t matter whom President Trump names as his new attorney general, or his ambassador to the United Nations, or as his chief of staff for that matter, because he is not likely to listen to any of them. Everything is about Trump. Period. And he doesn’t want anybody veering away from his one-man party line. And Trump is not alone. Politicians love to surround themselves with intelligent, talented people. But the real talent they are looking for is the ability to follow the leader.

Holiday bell-ringing: Salvation Army job is tough but rewarding Dec 11, 2018

Show notes

The holiday season has come to life in Union Square in the heart of downtown San Francisco. There’s a big menorah to celebrate Hanukkah, a lighted Christmas tree, an ice rink — and the gentle ringing of small white bells next to red Salvation Army kettles. The bell ringers are there with their kettles in front of Macy’s on Union Square in all weather — driving rain, the pale December sunshine, the chill of late fall — raising money the old-fashioned way.

Going above ground in Oakland can really get a cannabis merchant down Dec 10, 2018

Show notes

Selling weed on the black market is easy, Alphonso Blunt told me as he reclined in an office chair. Blunt (yes, that’s his last name), 38, started selling dime bags when he was 16, but he “retired” from street sales about four years ago because he wanted to sell cannabis legally. He’s learned that selling marijuana legally with a permit is hard. Permits don’t write business plans, acquire real estate or finance operations.

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