Dec 28, 2020
Simon’s Bar & Café is not the oldest saloon in Sacramento. It’s not the biggest or most fancy. Simon’s is something else—a place that for the past four decades embodied and embraced Sacramento’s identity as a political town.
Despite efforts to diversify and pretend otherwise, Sacramento lives on politics. Without the legislators, staff, lobbyists and consultants who fill the Capitol and shape the work done there, Sacramento would be something like Fresno. Simon’s would never succeed in Fresno.
Dec 28, 2020
Despite legitimate concerns about gentrification, traffic and other potential downsides of big development projects, the plan to create Aggie Square at the UC Davis Medical Center campus is fantastic news.
Full disclosure: I worked for former UC Davis Chancellor Linda Katehi when she first advanced a new innovation and research campus in Sacramento about five years ago. At that point the project seemed headed for the Downtown railyards.
Mayor Kevin Johnson offered the university free land behind the city’s historic train station. Johnson saw the campus as a compelling development anchor. But the idea never went anywhere.
Now, under Chancellor Gary May and Mayor Darrell Steinberg, the project has shifted to Stockton Boulevard around Second Avenue. Traffic at the medical center is already an issue, but it makes sense to build on existing investment and infrastructure. It’s wise to strengthen one of the region’s great assets.
Dec 28, 2020
Sacramento has numerous boards, commissions and committees to help the mayor and City Council run the city smoothly. One of those entities is an advisory committee for the Front Street Animal Shelter.
Unfortunately, the Animal Care Services Citizens Advisory Committee, formed in 2002, has not met since 2018, mostly for lack of a quorum. The committee currently has one member and six vacancies—which is why the city is looking for a few good animal lovers to bring this board back to life.
Dec 28, 2020
Find out what is happening in Sacramento this January!
Dec 28, 2020
Sacramento Police have begun a monumental overhaul in culture, recruitment, training and response to establish the department as a national leader for progressive law enforcement.
From the trust its officers derive among community members to its reaction to gun violence, protest marches, mental health emergencies and homelessness, the police department is using data-driven research and street experience to reshape its practices and reform the way it does business.
