Peace, love and waterbeds: Richmond’s best sleep

There is a time machine in Richmond that will take you back. Way back. Where 80s crooners sing of careless whispers and sepia-tinted photographs bring you back to the better days of peace and love. This blast from the past is actually a mid-sized storefront in Richmond’s North and East neighborhood, where 16 waterbeds are…

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Police Chief Magnus visits Richmond Confidential

Richmond Police Department Chief Chris Magnus and Captain Mark Gagan came to the Richmond Confidential newsroom Friday to discuss police-media relations and answer questions. Magnus has been chief of the RPD since January 2006. He served as a cop in Lansing, Michigan for 18 years and then as the chief of police in Fargo, North…

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Marine flies in from NJ to take part in Occupy Oakland protest

As protesters trickled out of the Port of Oakland Wednesday night, after Occupy Oakland demonstrations shut down business at the port, scores of them filed into a retrofitted, former AC Transit bus that was giving free rides back to the encampments in downtown Oakland.

“Free rides for the 99 percent … Say hi to your bus driver, John, on your way in,” a man shouted from a megaphone, as he directed protesters to the bus.

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The Lunch Special

Whether it’s burgers and fries or crab cakes and cognac, Richmond has a restaurant for just about everyone. Maggie Beidelman takes you to three quintessential Richmond establishments — Casper’s Hot Dogs on Macdonald Ave., the Boiler House at the Craneway, and Hotel Mac in Point Richmond — to find out who’s there, and what’s cooking.

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Richmond offers new rebates for energy efficient homes

  When Judy Quittman had to take her 2-year-old daughter to the emergency room due to an asthma attack, she knew it was time to do something about the mold growing in her home. Quittman was one of the first Richmond residents to take advantage of Energy Upgrade California, a program assisting homeowners in upgrading…

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East Bay Center celebrates reopening

Music, applause and hundreds of community members filled the newly renovated East Bay Center for the Performing Arts Thursday night at the center’s Community Launch Party. The center raised nearly $16 million under director Jordan Simmons to rebuild the worn Winters Building on the corner of 11th Street and Macdonald Avenue. Home to after-school performing…

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Waking up in Richmond to Catahoula Coffee

Coffee fanatics from around the Bay Area have been requesting Richmond’s Catahoula Coffee since the shop’s opening in 2008. The clientele remains loyal, but owner “Timber” Manhart has begun to feel the strain of rising coffee bean prices while running a small business in Richmond’s North & East neighborhood.

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Changing California’s prison population

Continued overcrowding in California’s state prisons brought about a 2010 Supreme Court ruling that the state’s efforts to cram in more prisoners constituted cruel and unusual punishment, a violation of the Eighth Amendment. The state responded with legislation that shifts responsibility for state parolees to counties and redefines what constitutes a prison-worthy offense. That realignment…

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