By:
Rachel Swan
05/19/13 6:14 PM
Traditionally, Menlo Park’s JobTrain vocational school served the various populations left behind during the boom years — meaning community college dropouts, people with rap sheets or folks who just didn’t have the connections to talk their way into the tech sector.
But the school’s student body has changed, JobTrain Vocational Counselor and Assessment Coordinator John MacGowan said. Now he’s seeing an influx of older professionals who may even possess graduate degrees or impressive resumes, but who somehow backslid.
He ticks off a list of unusual characteristics:
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By:
Max Cherney
05/19/13 6:07 PM
In response to a steady increase in the price it pays to buy water from San Francisco, Redwood City wants to increase its monthly water and sewer rates by 9 percent a year for the next three years.
Sewer and water services require rate increases to maintain and pay for the complex system that delivers services to residents, city spokesman Malcolm Smith said. While the city’s rate increases don’t vary widely year over year, the actual costs of running the system fluctuate dramatically.
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By:
Rachel Swan
05/19/13 4:00 AM
It’s unclear whether Mark Zuckerberg’s FWD.us campaign to reform U.S. immigration is destined to fail, but it’s certainly a hot mess. Squabbles over red ink have blurred the original message and led to several high-profile defections — including that of Tesla founder Elon Musk. Meanwhile, journalists have pilloried the Facebook founder as a modern-day Rockefeller, a dissolute magnate and a “shady One Percenter,” according to one headline in The Daily Beast.
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An obsolete ban against suitcases on a SamTrans express line to the San Francisco airport will finally be lifted next month.
The remnant of a legal claim filed in the 1970s, the SamTrans KX has barred passengers from carrying luggage due to its unfair competitive advantage over private shuttle providers. San Francisco Airporter, which operated regular runs to San Francisco International Airport for years, filed the lawsuit, arguing that it couldn’t compete financially with a publicly subsidized service like SamTrans.
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An interim chief was named to take the reins at a Peninsula fire agency that leads a task force of a nationally recognized search and rescue team while the head of the fire district recovers from a back injury.
Menlo Park Fire Protection District Chief Harold Schapelhouman is recovering from injuries sustained while doing yard work at his home last weekend.
The Menlo Park Fire Protection Distict’s board of directors voted in Douglas Sporleder, the chief who preceded Schapelhouman, at a special meeting Thursday, according to fire district President Steve Nachtsheim.
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San Mateo-based SolarCity Corp. announced Thursday that Goldman Sachs Group Inc. would finance more than $500 million of its solar power projects.
The funding for U.S. residential solar leases is the largest such deal ever announced, SolarCity said in a statement. The agreement was initiated last year and the funding expanded in April.
SolarCity has raised similar funds from banks such as U.S. Bancorp and from corporations including Google Inc. and Honda Motor Co Ltd.
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By:
Rachel Swan
05/16/13 7:12 PM
The firm that screens baggage at San Francisco International Airport could lose its decadelong contract this fall as the Transportation Security Administration requests proposals from other bidders two years ahead of when the contract was originally supposed to expire.
Covenant Aviation Security, America’s most prominent private aviation security company, has a national reputation for efficiency and customer service. But it also has been accused of neglecting passenger safety in pursuit of lower costs.
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By:
Max Cherney
05/15/13 9:34 PM
A Colorado developer’s plan to rehab a Redwood City harbor is encountering delays on many fronts.
On May 6, the City Council concluded that the Denver-based Pauls Corp.’s altered plan to redevelop Pete’s Harbor — a small commercial marina a couple of miles from downtown Redwood City — requires an amended environmental impact report, Redwood City Planning Manager Blake Lyon said.
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By:
Rachel Swan
05/15/13 9:28 PM
After four years of austerity, the tide may finally be turning for San Mateo County’s park system.
In early May, the county Board of Supervisors approved seven new positions to fill a leadership void and handle a mounting set of responsibilities. Revenues generated from San Mateo County’s new Measure A sales tax should add millions to the coffers of the county Parks Department, which will help pay for the added personnel. Interim Director Jim Nantell says he’s cautiously optimistic.
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The Peninsula’s only ice skating rink is scheduled to close its doors at the end of the month, but a surging public movement has been fighting to have a say in what happens to the Bridgepointe shopping center in San Mateo.
The shopping center’s developer, San Francisco-based SPI Holdings, has submitted a plan to replace the ice rink with retail space. The city’s Bridgepointe master plan, drafted in 1998 when SPI developed the site, includes a requirement that a recreational space be included.
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URL: http://www.sfexaminer.com/archive/100296/100296?type[story]=story
