Los Angeles Times: Early Voting Centers Open Across L.A. County 
Traditionally, election day is the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November, but early voting in Los Angeles County has already begun. If you want to vote in person, you can now go to one of the 118 vote centers throughout the county. They’ll be open every day, including weekends, through election day, Nov. 3, from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. (Oreskes, Mason and Rainey, 10/24)

Southern California News Group: Early Releases, Safety Measures Help Reduce COVID-19 Infections In California Prisons 
The state had a prison population of 114,318 inmates on March 11. Now, after reduction efforts, it incarcerates 92,600 people, or about 23% fewer. The inmate population does not include county jails, which are operated by sheriff’s departments. (Valdez and Rokos, 10/26)

Bay Area News Group: Coronavirus: How Silicon Valley Cases Spread May Surprise You 
Silicon Valley has contained coronavirus outbreaks more than most of urban California and the U.S., but still reports an average of more than 100 cases a day. So how are they getting sick? Recent data from Santa Clara County health officials suggests people here are catching the virus at work or in carpools and spreading it to others at home. (Woolfolk, 10/25)

Marin Independent Journal: Marin Treatments For Coronavirus Similar To Trump’s 
“The monoclonal antibodies were definitely an experimental treatment,” said Dr. Gregg Tolliver, medical director of infection control at Marin Health Medical Center. “The other treatments are pretty standard care that we have been using at the hospital since they became available. ”Dr. Shilpa Marwaha, chief of infectious diseases at Kaiser Permanente San Rafael Medical Center, wrote in an email that Kaiser’s treatment regime includes “using high flow oxygen, dexamethasone for patients requiring high levels of oxygen, Remdesivir based on current national guidance, and proning techniques if a patient requires mechanical ventilation.” (Halstead, 10/25)

Patch: Grace Community Church Holds Service After COVID-19 Cases Arise 
A Sun Valley megachurch was holding an indoor service Sunday morning amid an ongoing legal battle with the county over a health order that bars such services due to the coronavirus pandemic. Three cases of COVID-19 were confirmed last week at Grace Community Church in Sun Valley. A judge issued an order requiring the church to stop holding such services, but the church has been defying that order, and it could be held in contempt at a court hearing next month. (10/25)

San Francisco Chronicle: ‘I Rely On BART’: Essential Workers Who Depend On Public Transit Fear Service Cuts In Pandemic 
Without BART, Kamyah Moses takes three buses and 45 minutes longer to get from her home in Oakland’s Fruitvale neighborhood to her job as a froster at Nothing Bundt Cakes in Emeryville. One day, five buses passed because they were already too full under COVID-19 restrictions, she said. If BART, losing a majority of riders and revenue under the pandemic, has to cut back service, it would affect “everything,” said the 17-year-old, who doesn’t have a car. “I just really hope they don’t do it,” she said as she shook her head on the Fruitvale Station platform Friday afternoon. (Moench, 10/25)

Los Angeles Times: California Farmworkers Face Homelessness Amid COVID-19
In a year without pandemic, fire and extreme heat, Jose Luis Hernandez by now would have saved enough money picking summer fruit from California fields to make it through the slow winter months ahead. This year, he is in debt to a friend and does not know how he will provide food and shelter for his wife and three sons as the final grapes are taken from the vines. “I haven’t saved anything,” he said, sitting on the walkway of an aging five-plex in south Stockton, one of the poorest neighborhoods in this San Joaquin valley city, where he pays $675 a month for an apartment with taps that sometimes spew black water. (Chabria, 10/26)

Oakland Tribune: Raiders Face Huge Fine, Possible Loss Of Draft Pick For COVID Violations
The Raiders will receive a significant fine from the NFL and could face the loss of a draft pick in the wake of another major COVID-19 protocol infraction this week, according to multiple reports Sunday. The league, which has sternly warned teams to follow protocols, sees the Raiders as repeat offenders following Trent Brown’s positive COVID test Monday and the necessary quarantining of five teammates who the league said weren’t wearing masks while interacting with Brown. Brown also was in violation of a rule that requires players to wear the tracking device that enables contact tracing for possible positive cases. (Becker, 10/25)

Ventura County Star: Simi Valley Trunk Or Treat Halloween Event Led To Drugs Found In Candy
A bag with powerful prescription painkillers and an anti-anxiety drug were found in a child's stash of Halloween-season candy Friday evening, prompting Simi Valley authorities to remind residents to inspect their children's treats. The incident was reported after a mother took her children to a "Trunk or Treat" event in a parking lot by the old Farmers Insurance building at Cochran Street and Galena Avenue, the Simi Valley Police Department said in a release. Children could get free candy at the drive-through gathering, where treats were handed to participants through their car windows, according to an announcement on social media. (Wenner, 10/25)

Los Angeles Times: How The Waters Off Catalina Became A DDT Dumping Ground 
Not far from Santa Catalina Island, in an ocean shared by divers and fishermen, kelp forests and whales, David Valentine decoded unusual signals underwater that gave him chills. The UC Santa Barbara scientist was supposed to be studying methane seeps that day, but with a deep-sea robot on loan and a few hours to spare, now was the chance to confirm an environmental abuse that others in the past could not. He was chasing a hunch, and sure enough, initial sonar scans pinged back a pattern of dots that popped up on the map like a trail of breadcrumbs. (Xia, 10/25)

Los Angeles Times: UC Berkeley Disavows A Recent Eugenic Research Fund 
In late 2018, UC Berkeley bioethics professor Osagie K. Obasogie received a campus email about a research fund available to faculty members in the School of Public Health. He was stunned by what he read. The Genealogical Eugenic Institute Fund, the email said, supports research and education in eugenics — a field discredited after World War II as a horrifying ideology that sought to use science to improve the human race by promoting traits deemed superior and breeding out those judged undesirable. The judgments aligned strongly with social biases that favored white, able-bodied and financially stable people. (Watanabe, 10/26)