KQED: San José Mayor Pushes To Arrest Unhoused Who Refuse Shelter
San José Mayor Matt Mahan is proposing that unhoused people who refuse multiple offers of shelter should face arrest, arguing that they have a “responsibility” to move indoors if the city has a bed available. Mahan’s plan would make San José the latest Bay Area city to escalate criminal enforcement against people experiencing unsheltered homelessness, in the wake of a Supreme Court ruling last year that allowed arrests for sleeping outside. (Marzorati, 3/6)

CalMatters: First-Of-Its Kind Order Halts Sweep Of California Homeless Camp 
The Bay Area city of Vallejo is putting California cities’ newfound power to clear homeless encampments to the test. A federal judge last month stopped the city from dismantling the makeshift shelter of 64-year-old Evelyn Alfred, which she erected nearly two years ago on an empty strip of land next to a residential neighborhood. The ruling proves that, even as more cities in California crack down on encampments with sweeps and criminal charges, there are pathways open for unhoused people to fight back.(Kendall, 3/5)

CalMatters: Bay Area City Backs Off Language For Encampments Ordinance
Fremont city council has revised a new city camping ordinance, removing what had become a controversial clause — first reported on by CalMatters — that could have punished those “aiding and abetting” encampments. “We’ve listened to and empathized with a multitude of community members,” said Councilmember Kathy Kimberlin at Tuesday’s meeting, where the council voted 6-1 to jettison the clause. “Clarifying this ordinance is especially important for us. For decades, I think all of us… have worked with and supported the critical work of our non profits and our faith-based organizations, who often work with government and often do what government cannot do.” (Procter, 3/5)

Los Angeles Times: How A Law To Ban Homeless Camps Threw A California City Into Chaos
Dominating one corner of a sprawling homeless encampment on an abandoned lot next to Fremont’s rumbling BART tracks, Michael Austin has built his own kind of palace. His makeshift home — a tent fortified with wood paneling, steel poles and chain link fencing — rises two stories high, with a day bed on the first floor and a queen mattress on the second, plenty of cushioning for his 18 cats to get cozy. He’s built a fire pit out front, and planted a long pole in the middle of camp to fly the American flag. Scattered throughout his camp, along with piles of dried cat food, is an assortment of tools, scrap metal and motor gear that Austin, 60, transforms into mini go-karts, motorized bikes and scooters. (Wiley, 3/6)

San Francisco Chronicle: Daniel Lurie's Plan To Expand S.F. Homeless Shelters Meets Resistance
The most ambitious part of San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie’s agenda — a pledge to add 1,500 homeless shelter beds in just six months — is running into its first political speedbumps. In the Tenderloin, Lower Nob Hill and Bayview districts, some community members are pushing back on plans from Lurie’s administration to either extend the operation of controversial shelter sites or build a large new shelter. (Morris and Angst, 3/6)

San Diego Union-Tribune: Lemon Grove Residents Speak Out Against Cabins For Homeless People 
After hearing from dozens of residents opposed to a county plan to build cabins for homeless people on state property in Lemon Grove, the City Council on Tuesday discussed meeting in closed session to consider ways to oppose the proposal. (Warth, 3/5)

LAist: LA Committee Explores Pulling Homelessness Funds From Regional Agency
A city of Los Angeles proposal is moving forward that would explore pulling hundreds of millions of dollars in annual funding from the region’s homeless service agency. Council members on L.A.’s Housing and Homelessness Committee voted, 3-0, Wednesday to approve a request for a report on how the city could contract directly with homeless service providers. (Wagner, 3/5)

The (Santa Rosa) Press Democrat: Santa Rosa, Nonprofit Organization Seek $14 Million For Downtown Housing For Homeless
Santa Rosa officials and Burbank Housing are seeking nearly $14 million in state funding to build 30 apartments reserved for homeless individuals at a growing services hub downtown. The project would be funded through California’s Homekey+ program, a 2024 expansion of a pandemic-era program focused on adding permanent supportive housing for homeless individuals with behavioral health needs and veterans. (Pineda, 3/5)

CalMatters: CA Moves Fast To Spend Billions In Mental Health Housing Bond
The Newsom administration is moving swiftly to distribute by May billions of dollars from the 2024 mental health bond narrowly approved by voters, but concerns are emerging about whether areas of the state that have the greatest need will be left behind, according to testimony at legislative oversight hearing this week. Proposition 1, championed by Gov. Gavin Newsom, pledged to inject $6.4 billion into the state’s overburdened mental health and addiction treatment system. Newsom promised voters the move would help the state address its homelessness crisis, which is often publicly associated with unaddressed mental health and substance use issues. (Hwang, 3/6)

Times of San Diego: Vista Community Clinic Expands Online Resources To Highlight Mobile Services
Vista Community Clinic has unveiled its new online resource dedicated to its Mobile Care Services. Now available at www.vistacommunityclinic.org/mobile-care, this page provides a comprehensive guide to the mobile services offered by VCC, helping patients and community members easily access essential healthcare that is mobile. (Sklar, 3/5)

Index-Tribune: New Mental Health Director Lauded For Empathy, Resilience
Anna Lacey, the new clinical director of the Community Mental Health Hub in Sonoma, has an impressive professional background in the mental health field, but her personal touch with clients is perhaps what distinguishes her most. (Johnson, 3/4)

San Francisco Chronicle: Len Syme, ‘Father Of Social Epidemiology,’ Dies At 92
When Len Syme became convinced in the mid-20th century that societal issues like isolation and stress were contributing factors of disease and poor health, just about every other public health academic doubted it. But Syme had lived the theory himself, growing up on the harsh Canadian prairie, where about the only attention he got was from school bullies and an abusive father. Syme found sympathy in the public health faculty at UC Berkeley, where he became known internationally as “the father of social epidemiology.” (Whiting, 3/6)

Fierce Healthcare: House Passes Chronic Disease Bill To Expand Coverage Under HDHPs
New legislation advanced by a voice vote March 4 would codify 14 pre-deductible healthcare services through high-deductible health plans (HDHPs). It codifies guidance from President Donald Trump’s first term increasing flexible coverage options for HDHPs. The bill would allow medical products and services like beta-blockers, blood pressure monitors, glucometers, inhalers and cholesterol drugs to be more easily covered by insurance by letting insurers pay for low-cost services before a deductible is reached. (Tong, 3/5)

Fierce Healthcare: Court Approves $700M Opioid Class-Action Settlement For Hospitals
A federal court has signed off on a $700 million class action settlement that will see drug manufacturers and distributors pay more than 1,000 acute care hospitals over alleged misconduct regarding prescription opioids. The deal consolidates four class-action settlements involving, among other defendants, Cencora (formerly AmerisourceBergen), Cardinal Health, McKesson, Johnson & Johns, Teva and Allergan. (Muoio, 3/5)

San Francisco Chronicle: UC Davis Responds To Backlash Over “All Gender’ Locker Room Plan
UC Davis officials are responding to backlash from right-wing groups and concerned students after announcing plans to overhaul its locker room facilities, replacing traditional men’s and women’s sections with all-gender “universal” spaces. The $5 million renovation, announced last month and slated for completion in September, has sparked considerable opposition from conservative activist groups and some students. (Vaziri, 3/5)

Politico: State Department Further Scrutinizes Foreign Aid For DEI, Climate And Transgender Projects
The State Department’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor launched a review of its foreign assistance projects Wednesday to determine if they fund climate, transgender or diversity, equity and inclusion-related initiatives, according to an internal email obtained by POLITICO. The results of that screening via a questionnaire to organizations that receive State funding may determine the fate of the remainder of aid projects that President Donald Trump froze for 90 days with an executive order in January. (Kine, 3/5)

Axios: Pre-Trump CDC Website Revived By Volunteers
A team of volunteer archivists has recreated the Centers for Disease Control website, called RestoredCDC.org, as it appeared the day President Trump was inaugurated. A federal judge last month required the HHS to restore webpages and datasets that had been altered or taken offline to comply with executive orders that Trump issued on DEI and gender identity, but several links are broken and the pages are not easy to locate through web searches. (Singh, 3/5)

The Washington Post: GOP Must Cut Medicaid Or Medicare To Achieve Budget Goals, CBO Finds
The House GOP’s budget, which passed last week in a hairline vote, asks the committee responsible for federal health-care spending to find at least $880 billion in savings over 10 years. The Congressional Budget Office said Wednesday that reducing costs that much won’t be possible without cuts to Medicare, Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program. (3/5)

The (Santa Rosa) Press Democrat: Veterans Rally In Santa Rosa Against Federal Budget Cuts Affecting Benefits, Staffing
Outside Santa Rosa’s Veterans Affairs outpatient clinic Wednesday, a group of about 45, mostly older veterans rallied to protest news of mass firings and other cuts planned for the sprawling federal department serving millions of people who served in the country’s military. (Endicott, 3/5)

The Washington Post: VA Plans To Cut 80,000 Employees, The Latest In Trump’s Efforts To Downsize
The Department of Veterans Affairs announced plans Wednesday to cut roughly 80,000 jobs, more than 15 percent of its employees, the latest in President Donald Trump’s effort to slash the federal workforce. According to a memo obtained by The Washington Post, the cuts are meant to reduce the department’s workforce to just under 400,000 employees, its size in 2019. (Gupta, 3/5)

The New York Times: Guarded N.I.H. Nominee Faces Sharp Questions On Vaccines And Research Cuts
Under hostile questioning from senators of both parties, Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, President Trump’s nominee to lead the National Institutes of Health, said on Wednesday that he was “convinced” vaccines did not cause autism even as he urged more research on the question, which scientists say has long been settled. (Mueller and Gay Stolberg, 3/5)

Modern Healthcare: NIH Funding Cuts Blocked By Federal Judge
A federal judge blocked the National Institutes of Health’s grant funding cuts that academic health systems warn would stymie research. U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts Judge Angel Kelley on Wednesday granted a motion from attorneys general, medical schools and universities requesting a nationwide preliminary injunction. The injunction replaces a national temporary restraining order Kelley issued Feb. 10, likely setting up a win for the states and hospitals and a possible government appeal. (Kacik, 3/5)

Modern Healthcare: Trump's Price Transparency Executive Order Stirs Uncertainty
Health systems and insurers are bracing for tougher enforcement of price transparency regulations. President Donald Trump last week issued an executive order to bolster oversight of price transparency requirements enacted in 2021. Regulators have given too much leeway to hospitals and insurers, limiting the potential price-easing benefits of the law as healthcare companies have been slow to meet the requirements, Trump said in the order. (Kacik and Early, 3/5)

Salinas Californian: How Changes To Social Security Impact Californians In  2025
Changes are coming for Social Security that impact benefits and potential quality of service. In California, about 6.3 million people receive Social Security benefits—the most beneficiaries of all 50 states, according to the latest figures from the Social Security Administration (SSA). (Cattani, 3/5)

Inewsource: Restoration Projects In Polluted Tijuana River Valley No Longer Aim Of CA Bill
A state bill that could have paid for environmental restoration projects in the polluted Tijuana River Valley no longer has that goal, after the bill’s sponsor revised it to focus on what he says is a more pressing need. Last year State Sen. Steve Padilla introduced SB10 to allow the San Diego Association of Governments, a regional transportation agency, to use a portion of toll revenue from the future Otay Mesa East Port of Entry to clean up polluted lands in the valley, which lies along the U.S.-Mexico border. (Salata, 3/5)

Bay Area News Group: More Than 7,000 Gallons Of Hydrocarbon Materials Were Released In Martinez Refinery Blaze
A massive fire that broke out at a refinery last month released more than 7,000 gallons of hydrocarbon materials into the air and required medical treatment for six workers, according to the 30-day report the company sent to Contra Costa Health Services officials. (Hurd, 3/6)

The Desert Sun: Vegetable Products In California Recalled Over Botulism Risk
Multiple vegetable products sold in various California stores have been recalled due to the potential risk of bacteria that can cause a fatal illness. (Barraza, 3/5)

Los Angeles Times: How Kids Are Coping In The Aftermath Of The L.A. Fires
While adult fire victims can be better equipped to process and act on stressful circumstances in rational ways — assessing financial losses, planning next steps, wading through paperwork — children are more likely to express their grief and fear with raw emotion and behavioral regressions. In the two months since the fires, children have been are experiencing meltdowns, sleep issues and separation anxiety. For the youngest fire victims, this can include returning to earlier stages in their development, said Gregory Leskin, a psychologist and program director with the National Child Traumatic Stress Network at UCLA. (Gold, 3/6)