Bay Area’s biggest stories of 2019
For the third year in a row, the biggest Bay Area news story emerged from California’s wildfire emergency.
But there was a twist: After the Wine Country fires grabbed headlines in 2017 and the Camp Fire in Butte County followed in 2018, the No. 1 story in 2019 was not a deadly inferno — but rather the effort to avoid one.
Pacific Gas and Electric Co.’s precautionary move to black out millions of customers across Northern California brought a new and very personal dimension to the wildfire crisis, underscoring the dangers of climate change and the failures of the utility company that is central to our lives.
PG&E’s goal was to make sure electrical lines didn’t spark in high winds. Nonetheless, on Oct. 23, a Sonoma County inferno named the Kincade Fire kicked up in an area that hadn’t been part of the shutoffs, though the cause has yet to be determined. That was the second biggest local story of the year, according to a vote by our staff.
In reverse order, here are the top 10 Bay Area stories of 2019:
10. Teen vaping fuels ecig backlash and bans
The popularity of ecigarettes and market leader Juul of San Francisco had parents of high schoolers, and even middle schoolers, worried about a new path to addiction — as if parenting weren’t hard enough already.
San Francisco voters rejected a ballot measure that would have overturned a cityapproved prohibition on the sale of vapes. The legislation goes into effect next month and will suspend the sale of ecigs that have not passed a Food and Drug Administration review. The backlash comes as new research shows that vaping increases the risk of chronic lung illnesses.
The controversy also took a toll on Juul, which announced layoffs and saw its valuation slashed.
No. 10 in past years: Raiders announce move to Las Vegas (2017); San Francisco voters pass Prop. C, a corporate tax for homeless services (2018).
9. Chronicle reporting prompts planned closure of S.F. juvenile hall
The Chronicle’s series on the dramatic fall of juvenile crime in California, called Vanishing Violence, investigated the often inadequate response to the historic trend by public officials. Juvenile halls that were once expanded across the state emptied out, we found, while the costs per youth skyrocketed.
The series spurred the San Francisco Board of Supervisors to vote June 4 to close the city’s youth detention facility by the end of 2021.
No. 9 in past years: Nia Wilson, 18, fatally stabbed at an Oakland BART station (2017); commercial sale of recreational cannabis begins (2018).
8. Five slain at Halloween party at Orinda Airbnb
The national toll of gun violence grew on a cool October evening, when shots rang out at a Halloween event billed as a “mansion party” at an Airbnb rental in a wooded Orinda neighborhood. Five people were killed, and the mass shooting shocked neighbors in a town where homicides of any kind are rare.
Two people face weaponsrelated allegations, but the scene was described as a chaotic shootout, and nobody has been charged by prosecutors with homicide — despite a series of raids and police arrests. Under pressure over its role in the incident, Airbnb restricted house parties.
No. 8 in past years: Killer of Kate Steinle on San Francisco’s Pier 14 is acquitted (2017); Federal immigration sweeps meet resistance in Oakland (2018).
7. Jeff Adachi’s death leads to illegal search of journalist
San Francisco Public Defender Jeff Adachi, one of the city’s most powerful leaders, died Feb. 22 at age 59. One of the only elected public defenders in the nation, Adachi had expanded the traditional role of the office, fighting for legal reform and police accountability.
Three months later, it was the leak of a police report on Adachi’s death to local journalist Bryan Carmody that roiled San Francisco politics. Police with a signed search warrant stormed into Carmody’s home on May 10, even though California’s shield law protects journalists from being forced to reveal sources. The raid sparked a national controversy amid larger concerns about attacks on the press. Police Chief Bill Scott defended the raid for two weeks before conceding it was wrong and apologizing.
No. 7 in past years: After three trials, the Trump administration writes a travel ban that the courts do not ban (2017); DNA gambit cracks Golden State Killer case (2018).
6. BART struggles with crime, social problems, fare jumping and a homicide
A BART rider was charged with murder in November after walking away from treatment at a San Leandro hospital, boarding a train and allegedly stabbing a Good Samaritan multiple times. The attack left the Bay Area stunned — and more frustrated by an agency struggling to deal with property crime, homelessness, drug addiction and other societal problems proliferating on its rails.
At the center of some of the issues is rampant fare evasion. BART’s effort to crack down on fare cheats, though, had questionable results, and by the end of the year the agency was more focused on making its gates and fences more difficult to breach.
No. 6 in past years: White nationalist rallies converge on Berkeley and Oakland (2017); California blue wave in the 2018 election crashes on the state’s Republican Party (2018).
5. Gunman kills three at Gilroy Garlic Festival
For reasons that remain unknown, a 19yearold man went on a shooting rampage at the beloved Gilroy Garlic Festival in July, killing three people, including two children ages 6 and 13, and wounding 17 others before killing himself.
The killer, who cut through a perimeter fence, carried a semiautomatic weapon that he had bought legally in Nevada three weeks earlier. The purchase would have been impossible in California, highlighting the impact of less stringent laws across the state’s borders.
No. 5 in past years: Trump resistance rises (2017); cleanup scandal deepens at the former Hunters Point Naval Shipyard (2018).
4. Homelessness crisis expands across Bay Area and beyond
Homelessness spiked all over Northern California in 2019, with Oakland seeing a 47% jump since 2017 and San Francisco’s biennial count rising 17%. City leaders pushed plans for affordable housing, shelter space and better mental health and addiction treatment, but there was no end in sight to the misery on the streets.
In October, a row of boulders placed on a street in San Francisco came to symbolize the tension over what to do about the growing number of tents. In Santa Rosa, the flash point was an encampment a mile long that took over a popular walking and biking trail. In Oakland, a seemingly endless string of large encampments confounded city officials as they tried to address their unhoused population with ideas including tiny homes.
On a statewide level, Gov. Gavin Newsom added $1 billion in new funding for homelessness initiatives, and his principal advisers on the issue suggested ramping up shelters throughout the state, but President Trump appeared to be ready to force some kind of action for clearing the streets. A showdown seems probable in the new year.
No. 4 in past years: Extreme weather prompts floods and failure of the Oroville Dam spillway (2017); London Breed makes history as San Francisco mayor (2018).
3. Nancy Pelosi leads House Democrats in Trump impeachment
Pelosi had helped President Barack Obama enact landmark legislation, including the Affordable Care Act. Now, a big part of her legacy will be the impeachment of President Trump, shaping how she is remembered after more than 30 years in Congress. After the House voted mostly along party lines, Trump became only the third president impeached in American history.
No. 3 in past years: Across the U.S., brave victims say, “Me too.” (2017); Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination to the Supreme Court becomes bitterly fought drama (2018).
2. Kincade Fire burns homes and wineries, prompts mass evacuations
The Kincade Fire sparked northeast of Geyserville on the evening of Oct. 23, under PG&E lines that were still active despite the utility’s preemptive shutoffs. The blaze lasted 13 days, caused mass evacuations, burned 78,000 acres and destroyed 374 structures.
The year before, the Camp Fire in Butte County had killed 85 people, and the year before that, 41 people died in the Wine Country fires. But the Kincade Fire didn’t claim a single life. The reasons vary, from the nature of the fire to the vastness of the evacuations to a heroic move by a Cal Fire captain, Jason Dyer, who covered himself and two others with a personal fire shelter as flames raged overhead.
No. 2 in past years: San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee dies (2017); two cracked steel support girders close the Transbay transit center (2018).
1. PG&E’s preemptive shutoffs cut power to millions
The story of California’s blackouts captured attention for weeks. Everyone wanted to know whether they would lose power, when it would happen, and how long it would last.
Most agreed with the embattled utility company’s claim that it had no choice but to deenergize millions of customers to head off possible wildfires. But PG&E’s handling of the shutoffs was poor at times, as was its communication. The ordeal left customers with a range of questions, some practical and others a bit extreme: Should I buy a generator? Is California now an unlivable hellscape?
No. 1 in past years: Wine Country wildfires lay waste to the North Bay (2017); Camp Fire destroys Paradise, caps catastrophic fire year in California (2018).