A state assemblymember from San Francisco introduced a new bill this week that aims to regulate kratom products sold in California. On Monday, Assemblymember Matt Haney, D-San Francisco, announced Assembly Bill 2365, the Kratom Safety Act, which would ban the sale of adulterated kratom in California, enforce rigorous testing and registration with the California Department of Public Health, and prohibit those under 21 from purchasing the product.  Often used as a stimulant to increase productivity, kratom is a tropical tree in the coffee family. Its leaves have historically been used in S ..read more

A MAJOR ANTITRUST class action landed in federal court in San Francisco last week, alleging that six major hotel operators colluded to fix prices for their rooms using AI-powered software that provides pricing recommendations. Plaintiffs and proposed class representatives are eight individual consumers who stayed at one or more of the hotel chains in the last four years. The 41-page complaint alleges that Integrated Decisions and Systems Inc. or “IDeaS” of Minnesota, and its parent company, SAS Institute Inc., created and licensed software called “G3 RMS,” that is the hotel industry’s leading ..read more

A first-class passenger beaten by famous boxer Mike Tyson in a widely publicized altercation on a JetBlue flight in 2022 has filed a lawsuit against the fighter and airline in San Mateo County Superior Court. The previously threatened suit was filed April 19, just a day before the two-year statute of limitations ran on some of the plaintiff’s claims. According to the complaint, Melvin George Townsend, then 36, was seated behind Tyson on a flight going from San Francisco to Fort Meyers, Florida. Townsend was a Tyson fan and before the flight departed, he engaged Tyson in conversation and bough ..read more

After years of delays, 16- and 17-year-olds in Oakland and Berkeley will finally get a chance to vote in school board elections. With an eye toward the upcoming November general election, the Alameda County Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday to approve a $113,000 contract increase with a third-party election services company and to add six positions in the Registrar of Voters’ office. The supervisors’ approval comes four years after 68 percent of Oakland voters approved Measure QQ, and eight years after Berkeley voters approved Measure Y1, both of which authorize the youth vote in those citie ..read more

A Cinco De Mayo free festival and parade is set to take place May 4 and May 5 in downtown Stockton. El Concilio, a nonprofit organization that offers a multitude of services primarily to the Hispanic population of the Central Valley, will be hosting the event at Weber Point Events Center located at 221 N. Center St. The nonprofit said the celebration is dedicated to showing off the region’s diversity and cultures with food, drinks, games, live music, dancing, fun for the kids, contests, live entertainment, car shows and more. Last year, over 22 vendors sold at the parade and filled the air wi ..read more

Violence broke out at an encampment at Sproul Plaza on the UC Berkeley campus after days of peaceful assembly in response to the Israel-Hamas war, a contrast to arrests and turmoil at other American schools. According to UC Berkeley police, just before 7 p.m. on Wednesday, a tussle occurred between two opposing groups and one group attempted to take a flag of the other, resulting in injuries to at least two people. Medical personnel were called to the scene. UC police also said additional injuries have been reported. The Berkeley student camp-in was called by a coalition of groups, including ..read more

The effort to remove Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price from office took a step forward Tuesday when the county Board of Supervisors accepted the certification of signatures to place a recall on an upcoming ballot. After a nearly four-hour hearing featuring more than three hours of ardent public comment, the supervisors voted to essentially confirm the finding of county Registrar of Voters Tim Dupuis that proponents gathered enough valid signatures — 74,757 — to place the recall of Price on a ballot. The board also voted to schedule a special meeting on May 14 to set a date for suc ..read more

San Francisco City Attorney David Chiu said online retailers will stop or restrict the sale of illegal license plate covers after he sent a cease-and-desist letter to four major companies last year.  Chiu announced Monday that Amazon, eBay, Etsy and Walmart all worked with his office to remove the covers from their platforms or added geographic filters to their sites to prevent them from being sold in California.  “The only reason someone would put a cover like this on their license plate is to get away with a crime,” Chiu said in a news release. “We appreciate that these online ret ..read more

The U.S. TikTok ban is raising questions about the app’s future in San Jose, where its Chinese parent company, Bytedance, is expanding its office space. President Joe Biden signed the ban into law on Wednesday, claiming national security risks, which would prohibit the downloading of TikTok from app stores if Bytedance doesn’t sell the app within nine months. Since 2022, the company has subleased more than 658,000 square feet of office space from Yahoo on Coleman Avenue in North San Jose, near San Jose Mineta International Airport, and expanded its footprint in March into the Roku building ne ..read more

Berkeley residents were surprised to see the furniture some of them normally play chess on at the corner of Telegraph Avenue and Haste Street was gone for the third time in five weeks.   Trash collectors supervised by a Berkeley Police officer allegedly took the furniture placed by Telegraph Avenue’s unofficial chess club Friday morning, according to chess club chairman Jesse Sheehan, who witnessed the incident.   Sheehan says that although the core patrons of the chess club generally continue to show up after furniture confiscations, he expects workers at nearby stores wi ..read more