Morning Splash: Bay Area Heat Advisory; AG Harris' 'Serious' Concerns on SJ Pension Proposal

The National Weather Service has issued a heat advisory for the Bay Area through 8 p.m. tonight, saying temperatures could reach triple digits in some places. The advisory covers Monterey, Santa Cruz and San Benito counties in addition to the Bay Area. Locations in the North and East Bay valleys could reach 100, while spots in southern Monterey County are predicted to reach 104, said Diana Henderson of the National Weather Service.

Controller John Chiang has blocked pay for lawmakers, putting state budget negotiations into uncharted territory and upping the pressure on legislative leaders to strike a deal. Chiang rejected his own party's spending plan as insufficient to satisfy a voter-approved law requiring timely budgets.

San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed's proposal to declare a fiscal state of emergency and seek a ballot measure to trim employee pensions raises "serious" legal concerns, the office of California Attorney General Kamala Harris says. The attorney general's assessment was in a preliminary response to a joint letter last month questioning Reed's proposal by state Assemblymen Paul Fong, D-Mountain View; Luis Alejo, D-Salinas; Richard Gordon, D-Los Altos; and Bob Wieckowski, D-Fremont...Reed, however, said the attorney general seemed to misinterpret the proposal. He said the city isn't attempting to use the Emergency Services Act or unilaterally alter contracts with employees, with whom the city is negotiating on the matter.

Council members announced the appointment Monday of a San Jose deputy city manager as Oakland's new city administrator. The appointment of Deanna Santana was announced after a closed council session Monday night. Mayor Jean Quan has been searching for a city administrator since her election in November. Former Fire Chief Lamont Ewell has been serving in an interim capacity since March when former City Administrator Dan Lindheim left the position.

The San Jose City Council on Tuesday voted to raise downtown parking rates at city-owned garages by as much as 33 percent, in addition to eliminating some of the free parking that downtown visitors have come to expect. But the bad news for many -- including retailers worried that the increases will deter people from visiting the city's core -- was tempered by some last-minute modifications to proposed hikes unveiled last month.

Six days before a college football player was arrested at San Francisco International Airport in a dispute that began because he tried to board a US Airways jet with sagging pants, a man who was wearing little but women's undergarments was allowed to fly the airline, a US Airways spokeswoman conceded Tuesday.

Answering a central question surrounding the San Bruno natural gas explosion that killed eight people and destroyed 38 homes in September, newly released documents show that PG&E employees, not outside contractors, installed the compromised pipeline as part of a construction job 55 years ago..."People are going to want to know where else in the PG&E pipeline system did this particular crew work," said Mark Toney, executive director of TURN, The Utility Reform Network, a consumer group in San Francisco.

...Local chapters of the Jewish Community Relations Council and Anti-Defamation League are teaming up with a couple of practicing Jewish and Muslim families to file a lawsuit demanding that San Francisco's elections director remove the highly publicized circumcision ban from the November ballot. The lawsuit, which is expected to be filed today in San Francisco Superior Court, argues that circumcision is a common medical procedure regulated by state law - and that it has no business being decided by city voters.

The city's first Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market opens this morning on 32nd Avenue at Clement Street in the Outer Richmond. Neighborhood residents should have already received their $5 coupon in the mail, and the promise of "wholesome food, not whole paycheck," a cheeky dig at you-know-who, whose nearest San Francisco store is at California and Franklin streets, in Pacific Heights.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency on Tuesday denied the state's request for a major disaster declaration - and accompanying financial assistance - in connection with storms that pelted California in March, causing $17 million in flooding, mudslides and road repairs countywide. In a letter to Gov. Jerry Brown, FEMA Administrator W. Craig Fugate said the agency determined, based on National Weather Service reports, that three separate storms occurred between March 15-27, impacting different portions of California at different times. The letter says the storms "were not severe, continuous and were not beyond the combined capabilities of the state and affected local governments." Local officials couldn't disagree more.

Alarmed at the prospect of being lumped into a congressional district that also includes Oakland and Berkeley, the City Council adopted a resolution Tuesday opposing the change. The state redistricting commission has come up with a legislative map that shifts Richmond out of the district held by Rep. George Miller, D-Martinez -- who has represented the city since 1975 -- into the Oakland-based district of Rep. Barbara Lee.

Support for building more nuclear reactors in California has tumbled dramatically since the catastrophic tsunami and accompanying nuclear meltdown in Japan earlier this year, researchers at the Field Poll found in a survey released today. Nevertheless, the survey also showed a majority of voters think California's existing nuclear facilities are safe and most of those who stated an opinion oppose phasing them out

(The) Bears parlayed effective pitching, aggressive baserunning and unlikely hitting heroes into a 7-3 victory over Texas A&M on Tuesday. That earned Cal a Thursday encore in the losers' bracket against Virginia and ended the Aggies' season. Virginia beat Cal 4-1 in the opener Sunday.

A week after Pandora's IPO, the euphoria has worn off. Investors seemed exuberant about the stock leading up to the IPO, and that led to a big first day of trading. And then ... splat! The stock hit a wall on the second day of trading as analysts set shockingly low price targets for the stock and investors made a hasty retreat.

(H)ustling hogs are one small part of the 72nd annual event, which runs through Sunday at the fairgrounds in Petaluma. The fair also boasts rides, food-sellers and vendors as well as concerts by acts like Rick Springfield, Tower of Power and The Charlie Daniels Band.
There is also a Demolition Derby, demonstrations by 10 chefs, a text messaging competition and the 23rd Annual World's Ugliest Dog Contest.