Yahoo

New court budget could eliminate Richmond truancy program

A budget that the Contra Costa Superior Court will consider adopting Friday would close six courtrooms, including the Juvenile Law Courtroom in Richmond. For the 2012-2013 fiscal year, more than $7 million is estimated to be cut from the county court’s budget.

Chevron failed to check pipes despite internal policies

Chevron failed to check pipes despite internal policies. The U.S. Chemical Safety Board has found that sections of pipe that were measured following the August 6 fire at Chevron’s Richmond refinery had thinned in thickness by 80 percent. Chevron would have had to replace those sections to comply with its own standards, but the company did not inspect these sections in November 2011, despite internal policies to check all segments, CSB’s Don Holstrom said Tuesday night at the City Council…

City Council swings into election season

At its first public meeting since the Aug. 6 Chevron refinery fire and a Measure N—referred to as the “soda tax”—lawsuit filed against the city, Tuesday night’s hotly anticipated City Council meeting painted for the Richmond community a clear portrait of its pending election season. “Trends are already beginning to form,” said Councilmember Tom Butt after the meeting about the strong positions taken by many of the candidates. Butt was ready to define his own reelection campaign as the middle…

Campaign flyer flawed

Seven members of the community listed in a campaign flyer for City Council candidate Bea Roberson as supporting Roberson said last week that they had not explicitly endorsed the candidate. Roberson said she had done her best and, if the information was wrong, “It was not done with malice.” Roberson has been a resident of Richmond since 1964, and this is the first time she has run for public office. In a previous interview with Richmond Confidential, she said she…

Solano stroll draws Richmond crowd

Richmond residents Lesley Riley and Pam Pruitt have visited the Solano Stroll on the Berkeley and Albany border for many years, and while they said they’d love to see a similar event in Richmond, they enjoyed seeing Richmond groups expanding their reach to the 38-year-old street fair. Lesley Riley feels that the Solano Stroll is mostly for the residents of Albany and Berkeley, as many of the vendors are from there, however she also feels there is plenty to enjoy…

Rent increase squeezes small businesses at Richmond port

Doug Kidder, the owner of a small Richmond boat company, said he wasn’t surprised when the Port of Richmond called him last summer to let him know it was going to increase the rent on his small lot in the Richmond Shipyards. It had been a few years, and Kidder said he was probably paying slightly below market value. But he said he was shocked when the new lease terms arrived — the Port was nearly tripling his rent. Port…

Wildcat Marsh Trail combines nature and industry

As hikers crunch down the gravel pathway of the Wildcat Marsh Trail, 89 solar panels tower over a grid of wastewater treatment ponds. But over the other shoulder, coastal birds soar above the wide-open tidal marsh and pickleweed. The Wildcat Marsh Trail takes it all in in a gauntlet of manmade-meets-nature-made. Across the marsh, a factory’s steam billows at the base of the mountains. The trail feeds into the Landfill Loop trail, where trucks buzz around on Garbage Mountain pulverizing…