San Francisco police have solved a 33-year old murder — one of the oldest in the department's history — through a database that matched the DNA of the suspect with a Stockton felon, according to police.Police arrested John Puckett, 71, Friday morning in connection with the death of Diana Sylvester, a 38-year-old University of California nurse, who was killed on Dec. 22, 1972 in her apartment in the 1200 block of 6th Street.
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A city bus ticket program intended to reunitehomeless people with family and friends to help them get back on their feet has sent a handful of homeless to shelters in other cities, according to documents obtained by The Examiner.Program officials also appear to have violated their own guidelines in hundreds of cases by not following up to see if the homeless people arrived at their destination or if they are being cared for.
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City officials have reached a pact with a developer to preserve the cultural character of two Japantown malls and a hotel whose sale had neighborhood residents worried about the demise of one of the nation's few remaining Japanese enclaves.This week, Mayor Gavin Newsom's administration finalized a covenant with Los Angeles-based 3D Investments, which is in the process of purchasing the Kintetsu and Miyako malls and the Radison Miyako Hotel and the Best Western Miyako Inn from Kintetsu Enterprises Inc.
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The California Gambling Control Commission granted Colma’s Lucky Chances card room a permanent license Thursday and found it in compliance with a state-imposed $200 betting limit, even as the club is preparing to fight that limit in court.Lucky Chances attorney Michael Franchetti plans to go back before the commission to get the $200 cap removed after the certification of an April 11 election in which Colma voters overwhelmingly voted to allow no-limits betting.
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OK, that qualifies as the mother of all double whammies. First we got the delayed Tax Filing Day on Monday followed by the Anniversary of the Quake on Tuesday. And by Wednesday everyone is shaken every which way. As far as the former is concerned, Sterling Bank's Steve Adams checks in with the following idea for the IRS: "Enclosed is my 2005 tax return showing that I owe $3,429.00 in taxes. Please note the attached article from USA Today, wherein you will see the Pentagon is paying $171.50 for hammers and NASA has paid $600.00 for a toilet seat.
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As many as 200,000 area residents could be infected with bird flu in the event a pandemic strikes the Bay Area, hospital and Health Department officials in the county reported Thursday.The overwhelming numbers, equivalent to about one in three people, came from a countywide exercise to prepare for a worst-case scenario. A pandemic on that scale could force hospitals to close to new patients, shut down schools and have far-reaching impacts on government services and the economy, officials said.
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Skipping long lines at airport security checkpoints will soon be more than a dream for some Bay Area frequent fliers under a new "registered traveler" program to be rolled in at airports across the country this summer.Mineta San Jose International Airport will be among the first in the nation to implement the registered travel program, which will be implemented using private companies, the U.S. Transportation Security Administration announced Thursday.
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Michael Brodeur, the pastor of Promised Land Fellowship church in San Francisco, has spent his April cutting back his hours, talking to lawyers and driving every day from a hotel in San Bruno to his abandoned home in Broadmoor to feed his cat. Now, he’s worried that this could go on for months.
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If Joan Barnes’ company gets too big, she has faith that the nature of her business will be her saving grace. Barnes owns a branch of yoga studios called Yogastudio. "I’m in the yoga business so my yoga practice comes first," she said. "I schedule a yoga practice before anything. That has really kept my balance. When I make myself come first, I have more energy for everything else and I feel more sane. I would be a crazy oxymoron if I were not in balance."
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After more than a decade in the works, a massive redevelopment plan for the Bayview-Hunters Point neighborhood in San Francisco is poised to receive final approval, kicking off a 30-year period that would transform a neighborhood that has suffered for decades from civic neglect and high crime rates.
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Three years ago, San Mateo High School teacher Ellyn Daugherty's husband told her the happy truth: no matter how dedicated and infectious a teacher she was, she just couldn't teach all the other teachers who wanted to learn her biotechnology curriculum.So she wrote the book instead. Now, two months after publication, "Biotechnology: Science for the New Millennium" has been adopted by schools nationwide and is likely to be adopted by the San Mateo Union High School District tonight.
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The importance of businesses to the vitality of our city is routinely paid lip service by local politicians. In reality, however, many of City Hall’s elected officials treat the business community less as an integral part of our city and more like a cash cow to be milked at every opportunity.A recent proposal to charge San Francisco businesses a new $39 annual fee is just the latest example of City Hall’s seemingly boundless enthusiasm for dipping into the pockets of local merchants whenever a new supply ofrevenue is needed.
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While millions of us are still struggling to shed those extra holiday pounds, food activists, personal injury lawyers and bureaucrats say we don’t have to make the effort — it’s up to Congress and the courts to produce a trimmer America.John Foreyt, director of the Behavioral Medicine Research Center at Baylor College, predicts that if trends continue, every American will be overweight or obese by 2040. Activists claim this crisis calls for government intervention, but government has waged a fight against fat for over 50 years — and to no effective end.
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Market Street is the Highway 101 for bicyclists in San Francisco, but faced with bicycle lanes that suddenly disappear and major potholes, as well as heavy traffic competition, a commute can often leave riders frazzled or worse.Now, the Board of Supervisors and city officials are taking action to make The City’s busiest bicycle route a little more bike-friendly. Supervisors unanimously approved on Tuesday adding a new sections of bike lane on westbound Market Street from Van Ness Avenue to Octavia Boulevard and eastbound from Gough to 12th Street.
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The third death on the Caltrain tracks in 12 days occurred Tuesday, when an adolescent boy was fatally struck south of the Broadway train station.The boy, 13-year-old Fatih Kuc, was playing along the tracks and appeared to have accessed the area from a nearby dirt path, officials said. Police interviewed other children who witnessed the accident, and a police chaplain was on hand to comfort the boy’s family and witnesses, Caltrain spokesman Jonah Weinberg said.
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