Jeremy T. Ringfield's Blog, page 444

Monterey council approves more funding for shelters, announces boards, commissions candidates

The Monterey City Council voted unanimously to amend the Permanent Local Housing Allocation grant to fund homeless shelters, rather than rental assistance.

The 5-0 vote will provide 95% of fiscal years 2020-2024 funding to assist people by funding homeless shelter activities.

The grant is designed to help local housing, according to Monterey Housing Manager Anastacia Wyatt. When the city originally applied for the grant, the idea was to use it for affordable housing. However, city staff realized the funding could also be used for shelters and said this would be more beneficial to the city.

At first, the city was allocating 30% of the funding to rental assistance. However, Monterey already offers an assistance program.

“This rental assistance program is much different than what we have. It requires that we help people for six months and they have to be within the 30th percentile of the area median income,” Wyatt said. “It’s very limited, and with the allocation we received we wouldn’t even be able to help one person for six months.”

Mayor Tyller Williamson also announced candidates for several Monterey commissions and committees including the Appeals Hearing Board, Architectural Review Committee, Board of Library Trustees, Building and Housing Appeals Board, Disabled Access Appeals Board, Historic Preservation Commission, Measures P & S Oversight Committee, Museums and Cultural Arts Commission, Neighborhood and Community Improvement Program Committee, Parks and Recreation Commission, and Planning Commission.

The agenda item passed 3-2 with councilmen Ed Smith and Alan Haffa dissenting.

Several public comments were made, many focusing on the appointment recommendations for the Neighborhood and Community Improvement Program Committee.

Williamson took the time to address concerns, namely that there was discrimination involved by him selecting younger candidates, and accusations that Williamson did not contact the neighborhood associations.

“I didn’t reach out to any neighborhood associations and that was intentional on my part,” Williamson said. “If I reach out to any stakeholder, I’m opening up the door for everyone to reach out and engage in dialogue. I was intentional about keeping the process intact so it was fair and equitable for everyone that applied. I am also proposing in the future that we post the applications online as they come in, and anyone in the community can send the mayor feedback.”

At Willie Mays Plaza, SF Giants and baseball fans celebrate life of a legend

The Bay Area lost a son, father, friend and hero on Tuesday when Willie Mays died at age 93.

As with any loss, it mourns. Grieving Giants fans turned Willie Mays Plaza into a tribute. By Wednesday morning, his statue outside Oracle Park had collected dozens of flower bouquets — mostly orange roses — Mays baseball cards, peanuts, balloons, candles, notes, signed balls and hats.

A note is attached to flowers at the Willie Mays statue at Oracle Park in San Francisco, Calif., Tuesday evening, June 18, 2024, after the passing of the San Francisco Giants Hall of Famer at age 93. (Karl Mondon/Bay Area News Group)

The Giants are opening up Oracle Park Thursday to honor Mays during San Francisco’s game at Rickwood Field, the Hall of Famer’s first professional ballpark. But this tribute wasn’t planned.

Remembering Willie Mays: Where to find all of our coverage

“It was organic,” said Joey Bernal, a Dogpatch resident who dropped off flowers and planned to return with his son later.

“I think it just shows a reflection of him as a person,” said Bernal’s wife, Mariel.

Scores of fans stopped by 24 Willie Mays Plaza on Wednesday to pay their respects and celebrate Mays’ singular life. They dropped off mementos, shared stories and took pictures.

Flowers surround the Willie Mays statue at Oracle Park in San Francisco, Calif., Wednesday, June 19, 2024, after the death of the San Francisco Giants Hall of Famer yesterday at age 93. (Karl Mondon/Bay Area News Group)

Losing a titan like Mays generated more than memorializing from mere humans Mays inspired. Shortly after noon, the crowd noticed a rainbow formed over Mays’ statue high above the China Basin.

“It’s almost like a halo,” an onlooker said.

It was the universe paying tribute just like so many others who spent time around Mays’ statue.

A firefighter exited her fire truck to rub Mays’ bat and leave a bouquet of sunflowers. One man stood behind the statue and placed his cap on his heart as a sign of respect.

Omar Moore, a podcaster and lifelong Mays admirer, shared details of Mays’ life with anyone who asked. He discussed the horrible racism Mays endured, his civil rights activism, his time serving in the Korean War, his baseball career, his legacy in San Francisco.

“He means so much to me because he is someone who’s larger than the game of baseball,” said Moore, who has lived in San Francisco for the past 19 years.

“He’s someone who I identify with as someone who struggles every day to deal with racism in the country,” Moore said. “This man, here in San Francisco, as I am in San Francisco, dealt with that. It doesn’t matter where you are as a Black man in this country, you will feel this every day. And because he also prospered amidst all that. He excelled to the levels of brilliance and excellence as we, as Black people, do. When we’re put on a level playing field, we show that we not only belong, but we dominate the sport, dominate whatever it is.”

San Francisco resident Omar Moore poses in front of the Willie Mays statue (Danny Emerman/Bay Area News Group)

Moore, donning an authentic Mays jersey, noted that Mays inspired millions and mentored generations of ballplayers. As one of the first Black MLB players, he helped make it possible for Black Americans to succeed in institutions and society prejudiced against them.

That the tribute happened on Juneteenth — the holiday commemorating the official end of slavery in the U.S. — and a day before the Giants’ Rickwood game wasn’t lost on many at Mays’ shrine.

“All the African American kids, he gave them pride,” said Tommy Hampton, 72.

Hampton moved to the Bay Area with his family when he was six years old in 1958 — the same year Mays and the Giants arrived in San Francisco. He watched Mays, his idol, play at Candlestick Park and listened to games on his transistor radio. In both second and fifth grade, Hampton remembers, he did book reports on Mays in school.

Hampton and his wife, Tina, didn’t bring any flowers to the statue but the lifelong Giants fans came to purchase a No. 24 Mays jersey from the team store.

“He’s a childhood hero,” Hampton said. “He’s the reason I like baseball. For a little Black kid, he was a hero.”

A hero for Hampton and for so many others.

“You’re never going to see the likes of him again,” Moore said. “He transcends the sport. He’s a cultural icon, and he means so much to me as a Black man. And I’d say he means so much to Black people in general because of what he did. A lot of people sit on his shoulders today.”

Flowers are brought to the Willie Mays statue at Oracle Park in San Francisco, Calif., Tuesday evening, June 18, 2024, following news of the passing of the San Francisco Giants Hall of Famer at age 93. (Karl Mondon/Bay Area News Group)

More than $5.7M in grants awarded to health centers in Salinas, Watsonville

SALINAS – Two health centers in Salinas and Watsonville will get a combined infusion of $5.7 million in federal funding to continue providing access to medical, dental, behavioral, and other health care services to the underserved.

Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-CA18, made the announcement of the funding on Tuesday that of the $5,712,770 from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, $3,404,718 will go to Clinica de Salud de Valle de Salinas to continue offering healthcare services in the Salinas Valley, and $2,308,052 will go to Salud Para La Gente to continue offering healthcare services in Watsonville and surrounding areas in Santa Cruz County.

“Federally-qualified health centers, like Clinica de Salud del Valle de Salinas and Salud Para La Gente, provide vital services to some of the most vulnerable families in the Central Coast,” said Rep. Lofgren in a press release. “I applaud robust investments that advance public health and expand access to needed care. I will continue to support federal funding that helps keep our communities healthy.”

Clinica de Salud del Valle de Salinas has been serving the Salinas Valley since 1980 providing comprehensive health care to men, women and children with an emphasis on farmworker families and the agricultural community, and has grown to 13 clinics in Monterey County serving more than 50,000 patients.

Since 1978, Salud Para La Gente has provided healthcare services to primarily farmworker families and become a federally qualified health center, which has grown to five clinics and four school-based health centers providing health care to nearly 27,000 patients.

The funding the health centers will receive comes from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Health Center Program which is overseen by the Health Resources and Services Administration, to support community-based and patient-directed nonprofit organizations that provide primary and preventive health care services to underserved populations in the U.S., according to Rep. Lofgren’s office.

Health centers have played a key role in the nation’s health care system for nearly 60 years. The Bureau of Primary Health Care funds nearly 1,400 health centers which provide affordable, accessible, and high-quality primary health care to underserved communities at more than 15,000 sites, according to the Health Resources and Services Administration Health Center Program website. Those community-based health centers serve more than 30 million people, providing access to medical, dental, behavioral and other health care services with special initiatives for people experiencing homelessness, agricultural workers and residents of public housing.

The funding for the health centers was included in the Fiscal Year 2024 consolidated appropriations package which was voted in favor of by Rep. Lofgren.

President Biden signed two appropriations acts into law finalizing the federal budget process for fiscal year 2024, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. The president signed the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2024 into law on March 9 representing $467.5 billion in government spending. The measure consists of six spending bills:

• Agriculture

• Commerce-Justice-Science

• Energy-Water

• Interior-Environment

• Military Construction-VA

• Transportation-HUD.

The Senate voted 75-22 and the House voted 339-85 to pass the measure.

In a second tranche of six bills, he signed into law the Further Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2024 on March 23 representing $1.2 trillion in government spending. The second measure consists of six spending bills:

• Defense

• Financial Services

• Homeland Security

• Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education

• Legislative Branch

• State and Foreign Operations.

The Senate voted 74-24 and the House voted 286-134.

SF Giants fall to Cubs 6-5, despite Soler’s late-inning grand slam

CHICAGO — Maybe it was the heavy hearts they were playing with, or perhaps it just took too long to wake up for the only matinee of their series at Wrigley Field.

Either way, it took until the sixth inning for the Giants to muster their first hit against Cubs starter Kyle Hendricks, who took an 8.20 ERA into the game, falling into such a deep hole that even Jorge Soler’s late grand slam wasn’t enough to resuscitate their chances in a 6-5 loss.

Now headed to Birmingham, Alabama, to celebrate the life and career of Willie Mays, who died Tuesday afternoon, the Giants will be seeking to rebound against the Cardinals after dropping two of three to their National League Central rivals. They will play one game at historic Rickwood Field, which predates 110-year-old Wrigley Field by four years, then head to St. Louis after an off day to wrap up their two-series swing through the Central Time Zone.

“It’s going to be very difficult for us because were hoping that (Mays) was going to be present there, and he’s not going to be there,” Soler said through Spanish-language interpreter Erwin Higueros. “But I’m sure his spirit is going to be there.”

Launching a 444-foot blast that would have landed on Waveland Avenue if not for a billboard impeding its path, Soler turned a 6-1 deficit into a one-run game with one two-out swing in the top of the eighth, making their defensive miscues the previous inning loom large.

The Cubs plated three runs in the bottom of the seventh, which started when Mike Yastrzemski lost a fly ball in the sun and ended with Wilmer Flores flubbing a rundown.

“The defense in that inning, period,” manager Bob Melvin said, dissecting the loss. “We lose the ball in the sun to lead the inning off. We don’t play very good defense there. It could have been a completely different inning as far as giving up a three-spot.”

With a runner on third and two outs in the seventh, Dansby Swanson broke from first base and got caught in a rundown. It would have been the third out of the inning and stranded Christopher Morel at third, but he wound up scoring the decisive run when Flores dropped a soft toss from Brett Wisely, allowing Swanson to sneak back safely to first.

“He just dropped it,” Melvin said. “That’s exactly how we want to run (that play). A lot of times in those situations you don’t even want to throw through (to second base), but I thought we handled that really well. We just didn’t finish it off.”

The game featured double plays of the 1-2-3 and unassisted variety on the Giants side — Spencer Bivens starting the first to escape a bases-loaded jam in the third and Brett Wisely snagging a line drive and stepping on second base in the fifth — as well as three ground-rule doubles, the third and final of which was the ball Yastrzemski lost in the sun in the right field, allowing it to bounce over the ivy-covered wall and kickstart a three-run seventh inning against Howard.

“Now it’s a man on second to lead off the inning instead of an out,” Melvin said. “That’s a little different story as it goes along, too.”

Soler’s struggles with runners in scoring position have been well-documented, but he’s delivered two big hits of late. In addition to his grand slam Wednesday, he launched a three-run homer in the Giants’ 13-6 win over the Angels on Saturday.

Fouling off two prime pitches to hit earlier in his at-bat, Soler squared up a hanging curveball on the eighth pitch he saw from Tyson Miller.

“During that at-bat, he threw me a lot of breaking balls and I was able to make my adjustment,” Soler said. “I continue to work in the hitting cage. I go outside and I visualize hitting with men in scoring position. I just keep trying to keep my head up and try to compete. I’ve been feeling a lot better.”

Despite not registering one 90 mph reading on the radar gun, Hendricks struck out eight batters and generated 14 swings and misses, each his most in one game since at least 2022, and did so in only 74 pitches over 5⅔ innings. After issuing a walk to the Giants’ second batter of the game, Heliot Ramos, he didn’t allow another runner to reach base until Thairo Estrada doubles to lead off the sixth inning, eventually coming around to score their first run.

“He was executing all of his pitches. Every pitch that came out of his hand looked the same,” Soler said. “So he was just hard to hit today.”

If that sounds familiar, well, Hendricks took a no-hit bid two innings further at Oracle Park last June, until Mitch Haniger broke it up with a double in the eighth inning. In 13 career starts against the Giants, the 34-year-old right-hander owns a 2.30 ERA, his best mark against any opponent he’s faced at least 10 times.

“You know, it’s changeup-fastball where you kind of sit with him,” Melvin said. “Threw some curveballs, too, and we were kind of in between, I think. You kind of have to pick a pitch with him. Look changeup or look heater. And he located well.”

Despite his engorged ERA this season, Hendricks had strung together 8⅔ scoreless innings in three relief appearances entering his start against the Giants, whose amalgam of bullpen and bulk arms was no match for his crafty four-pitch mix.

In one of two vacant rotation spots, Melvin employed six pitchers, of whom only Sean Hjelle and Ryan Walker were able to record 1-2-3 innings.

Thanks to the pair of creative double plays, however, the Cubs plated all six of their runs in between the fourth against Bivens and the seventh against Spencer Howard.

Bivens, signed out of independent ball last fall, served up back-to-back home runs to Ian Happ and Swanson to begin the fourth, and a third run scored when Matt Chapman bobbled a bunt from Pete Crow-Armstrong and airmailed the throw to first base in an attempt to recover.

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Chapman was charged with two errors on the play — one for the bobble and another for the throw — which along with Flores’ raised their season total to 48, tied for the third-most in the majors.

“You know, the first 20 games of the season we were up there defensively,” Melvin said. “Since then, we haven’t been as good. It’s been some big innings and extra outs that cost us some ballgames, like today. So, we have the ability to be better.”

Up next

The Giants travel to Birmingham, Alabama, where they play the St. Louis Cardinals at historic Rickwood Field. Following an extensive slate of pregame ceremonies honoring the late Willie Mays and the other 180 future Hall of Famers to pass through the 114-year-old ballpark, RHP Keaton Winn (3-7, 6.66) will face off against RHP Andre Pallente (2-3, 4.61).

First pitch is scheduled for 4:15 p.m. PT, televised nationally on FOX. The game will also air on the scoreboard at Oracle Park, which will open its gates for fans at noon.

IndyCars return to Laguna Seca for mid-season race

LAGUNA SECA >> Scott Dixon won his first IndyCar race 22 years ago. He was 22 years old, competing in a new series in its season debut in Florida and en route to his first season championship.

Dixon, who will turn age 44 on Monday, has done little except accelerate since. He won three races in his rookie season and added 55 since, including last year’s Firestone Grand Prix of Monterey, in 392 career starts.

Victorious in the Grand Prix of Long Beach and the Detroit Grand Prix this season, Dixon, a New Zealander who lives in Indianapolis, will defend last year’s title at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca beginning Friday.

Scott Dixon

The eighth of the 17-race season has moved from its season-ending position in September to mid-season for the first of a two-year contract. Series organizers moved the finale to Nashville to better mix racing with the city’s “growing tech, food and culture scene.”

Further altering the IndyCar (and NASCAR) calendar is a pending three-week break beginning in late July for the Summer Olympics in France.

With the break and the new series schedule, this weekend’s race will also occur one month after the Indianapolis 500, two weeks after Road America in Wisconsin and one week after the 24 Hours of Le Mans (in France).

Alex Palou, Romain Grosjean, Nolan Siegel and Dixon all competed in the Le Mans. Dixon, who won the 2008 Indy 500, finished third this year and 21st in Wisconsin. He didn’t finish in Le Mans after the Cadillac he shared with Sebastian Bourdais and Renger van der Zande stopped after 18 hours with an oil leak.

Competition this weekend begins at 2 p.m. Friday with the first practice season. The second practice session is scheduled for 10 a.m. Saturday, followed by three qualifying sessions beginning at 1:40 p.m. Saturday.

The field of 27 is scheduled to start the 95-lap championship race Sunday at approximately 3:30 p.m.

Dixon, who drives for Chip Ganassi Racing, is now nine wins shy of the A.J. Foyt’s career tally of 67. The four-time Indy 500 winner, now age 89, last competed in 1993 at age 58.

Last year, Dixon endured crashes, flying car parts, flared tempers, peculiar pit stops, unique tire strategy and 35 laps raced under cautionary yellow flags, to win at Laguna Seca by more than seven seconds.

“It was a wild day; it was a tough day,” said Dixon after last year’s race. “We just decided to keep it simple working up from the back of the race.”

Dixon led for 20 laps and averaged 92.6465 miles per hour. Nicknamed “Iceman” for his career of overcoming obstacles, Dixon faced a hurdle before the race started. He won for the third time on the season, but he started the finale with a five-spot starting position penalty Sunday morning for exceeding the engine change allowance. He started 11th on the grid.

“I was pissed off at times,” said Dixon, who won for the first time in his career at Laguna Seca after first visiting the track nearly 25 years ago. “But we won and that’s what matters. We won.”

Dixon also was assessed a drive-thru penalty for avoidable contact on the opening loop with Colton Herta and Rinus VeeKay. He started at the back of the field at the restart.
Scott McLaughlin, also from New Zealand, finished second. Palou, who won five races and the season title, finished third, more than 10 seconds behind Dixon. He dominated the race in 2022 when only one yellow flag was necessary.

“I think I hit everything but the pace car,” said McLaughlin. “It was one of the those IndyCar races. It was probably the craziest race I’ve had in my career.”
American Josef Newgarden, the two-time reigning Indy 500 winner, Herta, a two-time Monterey winner, and series leader Will Power are also in the field.

Nolan Siegel, 19, of Palo Alto, will also compete after Tuesday signing a multiyear contract with Arrow McLaren and as a teammate with Pato O’Ward and Alexander Rossi.
Siegel, the youngest driver on the circuit, won the LMP2 class in the prestigious 24 Hours of Le Mans last weekend.

The Grand Prix of Monterey will be televised by USA Network at 3 p.m. with a simulstream on Peacock and it will also be broadcast on the IndyCar Radio Network.

Column: AI is coming for Hollywood

Artificial Intelligence is primed to take over Hollywood with all the subtlety of the Kool-Aid Man busting through a wall.

Proponents of AI are making bold promises. That potentially means human creativity will be replaced by the theft — sorry, data scraping — of pre-existing words, sounds, images and ideas. Jobs will be lost as human actors and crew are eliminated from the process. Clean water will be wasted, with billions of gallons needed to cool data centers. What will be left is anyone’s guess.

Despite these concerns, AI has found (bought?) a berth at film festivals, which purportedly exist to celebrate the art of cinema. At Cannes this year, a producer was hawking AI translations of international films. Actors who make a living dubbing such films? Soon to be obsolete apparently.

Earlier this month, a Korean film festival in the city of Bucheon launched its first competition dedicated to AI filmmaking. And closer to home, the Tribeca Film Festival in New York featured a program of short films made with generative AI.

Among the filmmakers taking part was Nikyatu Jusu, the writer-director of the horror feature “Nanny,” which won the Grand Jury prize at Sundance in 2022. My colleague Michael Phillips called it an “eerie, assured feature film debut,” and it also got a home video release from the prestigious Criterion Collection. All of this is background to say: Jusu is respected and her work is well-regarded. So it came as a shock to many that she was embracing AI.

That’s because she expressed her own concerns a year ago on social media: “Can’t stop thinking about all the various ways AI will be used to replace living, breathing minoritized artists already struggling to tell their own stories. AI will become mock representation — an empty mimicry of Black and brown people’s light commodified and vomited back to us.”

These are valid concerns. But last week she was promoting her Tribeca premiere on Twitter with a still image from the film and the caption: “Crucify me now, get it out of your system.” Some people engaged in good faith. “Not an attempt to crucify: What made the plagiarism tool attractive as a filmmaker?” someone said. “Ask the people who created it and studio execs who are currently implementing it,” she replied. “Odd to ask the creatives at the bottom adapting to inevitable change … this is here whether you kick and scream or not.”

I don’t know that AI-made films are inevitable, but let’s table that for a moment.

“This is so depressing,” someone else said. “I know,” she replied facetiously, “so many Black faces.”

But of course, none of the faces in her film belong to actual Black people. Those images were constructed from real people who did not give their consent, nor did they receive compensation. How is that a win for representation? To quote Jusu’s own words, this is “mock representation” and “empty mimicry.”

Others were less polite in their comments and Jusu eventually deactivated her account. I reached out to see if she would be open to talking but did not get a response. Some questions I would have asked: What was it like making a film this way? Was it creatively fulfilling? What did she learn from using this technology? Is she allowed to talk freely about the experience, or was she asked to sign an NDA prohibiting her from discussing the tech in anything but glowing terms?

People make all kinds of decisions for reasons we aren’t privy to. Sometimes there are financial considerations. Sometimes people simply rethink where they stand: If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em. So I would have also asked: What changed her mind about AI?

I hope Jusu is given grace for what might have been a decision made under stressful conditions — funding and jobs have dried up for many in Hollywood at the moment, where everyone is encouraged to “stay alive until ’25” — but I also hope that, going forward, she gets more opportunities to make films the traditional way.

But we should be wary of AI for ethical and philosophical reasons alone. According to the Human Rights Watch, “personal photos of Brazilian children are being used to create powerful artificial intelligence tools without the children’s knowledge or consent.” According to another report, Google image search is “serving users AI-generated images of celebrities in swimsuits and not indicating that the images are AI-generated” and in some cases, those celebrities “are made to look like underage children.”

Even from a craven capitalistic point of view, does it seem odd that studios aren’t more vocal about potential copyright infringement?

What will remain of Hollywood if AI is embraced over human creativity and efforts? (LPETTET/Getty)

There are aesthetic concerns as well.

As of last year, Robert Zemeckis had plans for a movie starring Tom Hanks and Robin Wright that will use “new hyperrealistic technology including AI-generated face replacements and de-aging to allow its stars to tell a story that spans generations.”

Directors used to simply cast other actors to play different versions of the same character — and happily, many still do. That’s one of the more enjoyable aspects of “Interview with the Vampire” on AMC. The show didn’t opt for de-aging software to make 71-year-old Eric Bogosian look younger for scenes set in the past, but hired 36-year-old Luke Brandon Field, who looks a lot like Bogosian and has the talent to emulate his performance. One of my favorite examples is 11-year-old Mayim Bialik playing the younger version of Bette Midler’s character in 1988’s “Beaches.” As a viewer, I don’t want to lose that. I don’t want actors to lose those opportunities, either.

There are other potential uses for AI floating around, one of which was recently touted by Ashton Kutcher: “You’ll just come up with an idea for a movie, then it will write the script, then you’ll input the script into the video generator and it will generate the movie. Instead of watching some movie that somebody else came up with, I can just generate and then watch my own movie.”

I can not imagine anything worse. After a long day, I have to do more work just to watch something entertaining? How bleak! “What if each time you watched a movie, it played out differently?” teased another news report. “The idea is to use AI to mix up scenes and create completely different versions of the same movie each time it is played.”

These are terrible ideas.

“Going all the way back to gathering around the fire, we like to be together to tell stories, it’s important to us,” technologist and media analyst Sydette Harry told me. “Cinema was another physical manifestation of that. Social media is the digital manifestation.”

Ashton Kutcher is one famous proponent of AI. (Kevin Winter/Getty Images)

The word community gets tossed around a lot and may have been flattened in the process. But experiencing entertainment together can be a cultural bonding agent, which has been fractured by the binge-release model on streaming. These proposed uses for AI will fracture the experience even further.

“Another thing about AI,” Harry said, “is that it likes to put a definitive stamp on things: This is ‘the knowledge’ because we’ve scraped all there is to know. Well, we really don’t know all there is to know.” There is an entire history of existence that has not been digitized, which means as far as AI is concerned, it doesn’t exist.

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“People’s discomfort with the human learning process — and the ability to play around — should not become the guide rails for our art forms,” she said. “We have to allow for it if you want any kind of culture. Putting it through a computer that has weighted judgments about what’s important? Well, that makes somebody in an executive office feel good and then nobody has to be accountable for what a show or film is saying because the black box of the computer said it.”

Even if AI is a cheaper way to make films initially, I suspect that will change; once studios become reliant on it, prices will go up (not unlike Uber’s pricing trajectory) but it will be harder for studios to go back to the “old” way because fewer people will have the necessary skills anymore.

It’s worth hearing out the concerns of people who don’t have a financial stake in AI’s domination. Privacy expert Meredith Whittaker recently described the AI business model this way: “It costs hundreds of millions of dollars to train these models, so there is deep pressure from companies — that are basically promising God and delivering email prompts — to make some return on investment in this technology.”

Timnit Gebru is a researcher in AI ethics and she is less convinced the technology is a fait accompli: “This ‘it is inevitable’ discourse is designed to disempower. It’s not inevitable. These dudes don’t need to be handed ridiculous amounts of money to realize their dystopian utopia.”

And according to at least one recent headline: “Payoff from AI projects is ‘dismal’, biz leaders complain.” Despite the marketing and propaganda, AI isn’t even the golden goose.

Nina Metz is a Tribune critic.

Oregon getaway: Shakespeare and foodie adventures await in Ashland

It was Shakespeare that brought us to Ashland, home of Oregon’s famous theater festival. But as we hiked through the city’s gorgeous Lithia Park on a recent June morning, one question kept resurfacing.

No, not “To be or not to be?” We were seeing “Macbeth” later, not “Hamlet,” and anyway, this query had higher stakes than any royal monologue. How many days in a row could we order the same outrageous raclette grilled cheese at Skout Taphouse and Provisions, just across from the park, before someone, you know, said something?

With its melty Alpine cheese, thick rashers of bacon and lingonberry jam — truffle fries on the side — the Ultra Meltathon ($15) is enough to make anyone mangle a monologue and start saying that all the world’s a sandwich or music be the love of food.

Twilight adds to magic of the open-air Allen Elizabeth Theater stage at Ashland’s Oregon Shakespeare Festival. (Jackie Burrell/Bay Area News Group)

The Bard first cast his enchanting spell over this city in 1935, when thespians gathered at the local Chautauqua in Lithia Park to stage “Twelfth Night.” But Lithia Park and the profusion of charming restaurants nearby spin a magic of their own, one with ties to the theater company that dominates not only the city’s economy but its very vibrancy. All those factors have inspired more than menu puns — yes, Midwinter Night’s Dram, we’re looking at you. They’ve also spun off a literary subgenre that includes 20 cozy, modern-day murder mysteries set in the Shakespeare theaters, the eateries, the hotels and this gorgeous park. (More on the books in a sec.)

Lithia Park was designed by landscape architect John McLaren, of Golden Gate Park fame. Today, it invites locals and visitors to begin their woodland wanderings just steps from the festival’s open-air Elizabethan theater and the city plaza. McLaren is not the park’s only tie to the Bay Area either. The park’s historic Butler-Perozzi Fountain was originally created for the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exhibition in San Francisco.

Ashland Creek tumbles down the length of Lithia Park in Ashland, Oregon. (Jackie Burrell/Bay Area News Group)

Here, trails wind up the canyon and into the woods. Ashland Creek tumbles by in all its splashy glory. There are rolling lawns and woodsy glades for picnickers, a play structure for tots, and pickleball courts, where the thwock of wiffleballs wafts through the air. A new Ashland Japanese Garden — complete with koi pond, waterfall, and sand and stone garden — opened in 2022. And on the main, paved trail near the duck pond, you’ll find cellist Daniel Perry beguiling passersby most mornings. It’s idyllic.

The park’s name, by the way, is a nod to Ashland’s mineral springs, which contain lithia salts. For the last century, anyone who was spa-curious – or had no sense of smell – could sample the, er, fragrant water as it burbled from the bubblers in the plaza drinking fountain. Oregon’s water authority closed the fountain last winter over concerns about other, less salubrious minerals in the water – barium and boron among them — although the city has argued that the bubblers are not a “public drinking fountain” in the conventional sense. The water’s sulfurous smell prevents anyone from actually chugging the stuff.

Mineral water fountains take center stage on the plaza in Ashland, Oregon. The water flow has been turned off these last few months over concerns that the water contains not just lithia salts but other, less salubrious minerals. (Getty Images)

Historical appeal aside, who would want to drink that stuff when the alternatives include hoppy Oregon IPAs and pinot noir? You’ll find those beverages – along with nine types of Moscow Mules, a Best Damn Old-Fashioned and the aforesaid Midwinter Night’s Dram – at the venerable Oberon’s, a Shakespearean restaurant and whiskey bar on the plaza. Its Elizabethan decor conjures up Puckish whimsy with its twinkle-lit trees and wood-paneled booths, and a menu that ranges from giant roasted turkey legs to savory pies, sausages and flatbreads.

Puckish charm infuses Oberon’s, a Shakespearean restaurant and whiskey bar in Ashland, Oregon. (Jackie Burrell/Bay Area News Group)

If you were hoping to disentangle real life from the imaginary, you’ve come to the wrong place. This isn’t just Shakespeare central, it’s also the setting for Ellie Alexander’s cozy, best-selling “Bakeshop Mystery” series. If you’re a fan (raises hand), Oberon’s is the inspiration for Puck’s, where Torte pastry chef (and amateur sleuth) Juliette “Jules” Capshaw hangs out with the fictional director of the very real Oregon Shakespeare Festival company.

So yes, we’re here for the Shakespeare — a heart-stoppingly powerful production of “Macbeth” we’re still talking about and an utterly delightful “Much Ado About Nothing” — but we’re also here for Jules and her foodie finds. And Alexander, who lives in Sunnyvale now, understands our obsession with Skout’s Ultra Meltathon grilled cheese. She loves their gigantic Go Big Pretzel, too, served with beer cheese sauce, mustard custard, house kraut and pimento cheese.

At Ashland’s Skout Taphouse and Provisions, the irresistible Ultra Meltathon grilled cheese combines raclette, bacon and lingonberry jam. (Jackie Burrell/Bay Area News Group)

The Oregon-born Alexander only moved to Ashland after the book series took off, but her childhood summers had included forays to the city’s famous Elizabethan theater — her dad was a high school English teacher in the Portland area — and she certainly knew the area. So when her agent approached her about writing a mystery series, “I just knew,” she says.

“One of the things about cozy mysteries in general is that quintessential village vibe. There’s such an open, generous sense of community that reverberates through Ashland, and it’s been one of the themes through the series,” she says. “I love that that’s real. There’s nothing fictional about that piece.”

Alexander was still living in Ashland in 2021, when Tom and Lisa Beam opened the casual Skout Taphouse just across from the park. Giant roll-up doors and picnic tables, camping lanterns and a vintage camper bring the outdoorsy vibe indoors, while bright umbrella-shaded tables dot the expansive, creekside patio.

With a vintage camper and picnic tables dominating the dining room, Skout Taphouse and Provisions in Ashland, Oregon, brings the outdoors in. (Jackie Burrell/Bay Area News Group)

Just around the corner, you’ll find Jamie North’s Mix Bakeshop — the inspiration for Jules’ fictional Torte bakeshop — where you can enjoy a Stumptown Coffee latte with your flaky almond croissant ($5.25) or pick up sandwiches for a picnic at the park. Jules also hangs out with the Larks chef at the 1920s-era Ashland Springs Hotel, our home base for the week. Larks’ real-life chef, by the way, is Walnut Creek-native Franco Console, and everything on that menu is heavenly, especially the Warm Butter Cake with Pear Compote and Cereal Milk Ice Cream ($13).

We’re betting Jules would love Cocorico, too. Italian-inspired cuisine meets Pacific Northwest ingredients at Nat and Grace Borsi’s 2-year-old restaurant. Think burrata ($13) with baby carrots and snap peas, a Spring Campanelle ($22) with tomato confit, mizuna and grilled zucchini, and a Chickpea Tagine ($23) with rose harissa, dried blueberry and asparagus. It’s elevated but laidback all at once, with plenty to delight vegetarians, as well as omnivores.

Can we talk about the corpses, though? It’s true that the fictional Jules stumbles on them everywhere — in the park, at the theater, on snowy Mount Ashland and in a museum on the Southern Oregon University campus. Several locations were even suggested by Alexander’s Ashland neighbors, including “sweet little retirees with a basket of banana bread” who popped up on her porch to say, “So I was thinking about it, and a good place to kill someone would be …”

The only dead bodies we saw were onstage, thank heavens. And we know whodunnit — Macbeth and his wife. But those eerie witches just slayed.

If You Go

Lithia Park: Enter this public park, which is open daily, at 59 Winburn Way in Ashland. The Japanese Garden is open from 7:30 a.m. to 7 p.m. daily. https://ashlandparksfoundation.org/

Skout Taproom: Open from 11:30 a.m. to 8 p.m. Sunday-Thursday and until 9 p.m. Friday-Saturday at 21 Winburn Way; www.skoutashland.com.

Oberon’s: Open from 4 p.m. until midnight Sunday-Thursday and 1 a.m. Friday-Saturday at  45 N. Main St.; www.oberonsashland.com.

Mix Bakeshop: Open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. Sunday-Thursday and 8:30 p.m. Friday-Saturday at 57 N. Main St.; www.mixashland.com.

Cocorico: Open from 5 to 8:30 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday at 15 N. First St.; https://cocoricorestaurant.com/.

Ashland Springs Hotel: Rooms start at $197, including continental breakast. 212 E. Main St.; www.ashlandspringshotel.com The hotel’s Larks restaurant is open from 5 to 8 p.m. Tuesday-Sunday and until 8:30 p.m. Friday-Saturday; https://larksashland.com/.

Oregon Shakespeare Festival: Performances of “Macbeth,” “Much Ado About Nothing,” “Coriolanus” and several otehr plays run through mid-October. Prices vary by play, but tickets for “Much Ado” start at $35. Find details at  https://www.osfashland.org.

Horoscopes June 19, 2024: Macklemore, put your energy where it counts

CELEBRITIES BORN ON THIS DAY: Macklemore, 41; Zoe Saldana, 46; Jean Dujardin, 52; Paula Abdul, 62.

Happy Birthday: Don’t fear change; be willing to branch out and investigate the possibilities. Life is about living, exploring and finding your bliss. Refuse to let outsiders decide what’s next for you when your happiness depends on making the right and best decision for yourself. Put your energy where it counts, and your passionate attitude will make a difference in how others react to you. Pave a path toward personal joy and contentment. Your numbers are 9, 14, 26, 29, 33, 38, 45.

ARIES (March 21-April 19): A positive attitude and high-energy response will help you outmaneuver anyone trying to get in your way. Someone you least expect will withhold information, misinterpret you or lead you astray. When in doubt, go directly to the source, ask questions and address your concerns. 3 stars

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): Speak up, share your intentions and follow through. It’s up to you to initiate the necessary changes and be honest with those your decisions will affect. The support you gain from being aware of others’ needs will make life easier. 3 stars

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): How you earn and handle cash will help you gain leverage if you extend your skills and knowledge. Opportunity knocks. Being in the know and staying on top of trends will turn you into the go-to person and encourage communication with informative people and organizations that can further your goals. 3 stars

CANCER (June 21-July 22): Take care of professional responsibilities first. Ensure you have factual information before you debate or engage in a movement. It will be easy to misinterpret what’s happening if you need help understanding what’s at stake. Look inward and choose self-improvement over trying to change others. 5 stars

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): Observation is worth its weight in gold, especially when donating your time or cash to something that concerns you. Good partnerships depend on equality and reliability. With proper balance, opportunity and success will unfold. 2 stars

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): Don’t get trapped in someone’s drama. Walk away from situations that bring you down or hold you back. Be kind but direct regarding what you’ll do or put up with; spare yourself the grief of being taken advantage of. Positive change begins with you. 4 stars

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): Learn as you go and adjust what isn’t working for you. Don’t sit idle or wait for someone to make the first move. Do what feels right by addressing situations that hinder your happiness. Opportunity is apparent, but it’s up to you to turn it into something concrete. 4 stars

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): Take care of matters yourself. You’ll get poor advice if you allow someone to handle medical, financial or contractual matters. A hands-on approach will help you gain confidence and offer insight into the possibilities available to you. Romance and partnerships will require your undivided attention. 3 stars

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): Keep life simple and within budget. Problems at home or with joint ventures will surface if you ignore details. Look for the positive in everything, but don’t be naive if something sounds too good. Your power is in your ability to source the truth and act accordingly. 3 stars

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): Organizing your space will pay off. Address issues that improve your daily routine and give you the push to bolster up the courage and stamina to take hold of your life and make your dreams come true. Kindness will help you gain the respect and confidence you deserve. 3 stars

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): Broaden your horizons and branch out in directions that excite you. Take the initiative to participate in something that gets your blood flowing and encourages a healthy lifestyle. Refuse to let other’s negativity deter you from doing what’s best for you. 4 stars

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): Pay attention to domestic situations, and be willing to adjust and contribute to making life better for everyone, including yourself. Honesty will pay off when getting others to pitch in and help. Self-improvement and romance are favored. 5 stars

Birthday Baby: You are imaginative, explicit and changeable. You are ambitious and opportunity-driven.

1 star: Avoid conflicts; work behind the scenes. 2 stars: You can accomplish, but don’t rely on others. 3 stars: Focus and you’ll reach your goals. 4 stars: Aim high; start new projects. 5 stars: Nothing can stop you; go for gold.

Visit Eugenialast.com, or join Eugenia on Twitter/Facebook/LinkedIn.

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SF Giants, from one generation to the next, remember Willie Mays: ‘One of the true icons of the game’

CHICAGO — Logan Webb was all by himself, alone on the diamond, when the classic photo of Willie Mays, posing in a home cream Giants uniform with his bat cocked in his hands, appeared on the scoreboards beyond the ivy-covered walls of Wrigley Field and an announcement came over the loudspeakers.

Ladies and gentlemen, it is with great sadness that we announce that San Francisco Giants legend and Hall of Famer Willie Mays passed away peacefully this afternoon at the age of 93. Please join us in a moment of silence as we remember Willie Mays.

“That was the first I heard of it,” Webb said, recounting the moment he learned of the Tuesday afternoon passing of, in his words, “kind of the Giant. Like, he is the guy.”

Taking the mound to start the sixth inning, Webb removed his cap and stopped short of the rubber. He paused, gazing toward the outfield. Reality hit when he shifted his eyesight and saw the pitch clock counting down, a reminder that he still had pitches to throw and outs to record.

“I kind of looked at the umpire and I was like, ‘I think you need to stop the clock,’” Webb said. “I had to take a moment to think about it and be prideful for the jersey I was wearing, the hat I was wearing and know that Willie did the same.”

The Giants lost to the Cubs, 5-2, but the game played second fiddle to the news that many players and coaches learned of as it transpired.

“I found out when they announced it on the jumbotron,” said outfielder Mike Yastrzemski. “I didn’t even really know what happened. … It’s obviously really sad news. But Willie lived a great life and I was fortunate enough to meet him and have some great conversations with him.

“It’s a tough pill to swallow, but it’s a life to be celebrated, for sure.”

A 24-time All-Star, 12-time Gold Glove winner, two-time MVP and a first-ballot Hall of Famer, the credentials on Mays’ plaque in Cooperstown are unrivaled.

The depth and breadth of his impact could be measured by the outpouring of grief from all eras of baseball folk within the visitors’ clubhouse after the game. Manager Bob Melvin and pitching coach Bryan Price spoke of watching him in awe as children growing up in the Bay Area. Active players, such as Webb and Yastrzemski, were still two decades from being born when Mays retired in 1973 but glowed speaking of their interactions when he would come around the park.

“To be able to transcend and bring the club from New York to San Francisco and be able to get people so excited about absorbing the Giants into the San Francisco Bay Area community was huge,” said Price, who was born in San Francisco in 1962 and raised in Mill Valley. “There was no better ambassador than Willie Mays.”

Price remembers the first game he attended, against the Pirates at Candlestick Park, and Mays was “one of the reasons to go to the ballpark.

“There’s lots of guys (in that era) that were really influential Giants, but none bigger than Willie Mays. … It was on a whole other level of play and ambassadorship for the game and love and spirit of baseball. Nobody connects the Bay Area to baseball more than Willie Mays.”

Melvin, born in Redwood City in 1961, said he “loved baseball because of Willie Mays.”

It didn’t take eye-witness accounts of Mays to appreciate his generational ability, though Yastrzemski — who knows a little something about the previous generation of all-time greats — said, “I’m glad there was film for it. Because it’s something that is going to be watched and studied for the rest of time.

“The things that he did we’ll never see again. I truly believe that. He was such a talented player and he played the game as purely as anybody could.”

More than any of his 660 home runs, Mays is perhaps most famous for his spectacular defense in center field — no one play more so than his over-the-shoulder basket catch just shy of the 483-foot center field wall at the Polo Grounds in Game 1 of the 1954 World Series — which only made his remarks to a rookie Yastrzemski all the more memorable.

“(He told) me that I had no business being in right field. That I should’ve been playing center field when I first got called up,” Yastrzemski said, smiling. “It was pretty funny because he told me he couldn’t really see much of the game but he could see that. That was pretty cool. It’s about as good of a compliment that you can get.”

Price only got the chance to meet Mays once, when he was in Cincinnati and Reds manager Dusty Baker called him into his office one day.

When Price entered the room, there was Mays, his childhood idol, sitting at the table in front of him. A photographer captured the moment, and Price has the image framed and hanging on the wall inside his house.

“These are the moments you never forget, being around someone you grew up admiring,” Price said. “He’s the type of player that you could never really use as a role model to say, ‘Hey, I want to be the next Willie Mays.’ Because you already knew that there was no one who was ever going to reach that level.”

Mays was 17 years old when he debuted for the Birmingham Black Barons of the Negro American League, the same age as Webb when he showed up for his first instructional camp for newly drafted players. At the time, then-manager Bruce Bochy would line up the Giants’ living Hall of Famers to come speak.

“I got a picture of him, Gaylord Perry, Willie McCovey, Dave Dravecky, Barry (Bonds), all them sitting together,” Webb said. “That’s the first time I got to meet them and listen to them. You feel like a little kid listening to these guys’ stories and their baseball memories. I can tell you, Willie had the best stories. He was the most energetic.”

In recent years, as he first navigated the COVID-19 pandemic and then his own health problems, Mays’ presence became rarer and even more cherished.

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He paid a visit to Oracle Park last May to celebrate his 92nd birthday, which was the last time many current Giants interacted with him.

“I got to say hi to him,” Webb said. “You could tell he was struggling a little bit. It was sad.”

Melvin, who got to know Mays after being traded to the Giants in 1986, said he had “so many (memories) we’d be here for a long time.” They had their final conversation in November, when Melvin gave him a call after being hired to become the Giants’ next skipper.

“He was great. The fact that he even remembered me was an honor,” Melvin said. “He was talking about my career and how happy he was to have me here again. He knew I’d played before. It was just an honor to talk to him. …

“So it’s heavy hearts for not only the Bay Area, New York, where he started, but the baseball world. This is one of the true icons of the game.”

The murky origin of Willie Mays’ ‘Say Hey Kid’ nickname

Willie Mays was well known as “The Say Hey Kid,” but other than on a 1954 record that served to promote his burgeoning legend, Mays never actually uttered the words “say hey” in public.

There is some dispute about how Mays, who died Tuesday at 93 years old, actually got the nickname. Most Mays historians credit Barney Kremenko, a reporter for the New York Journal American, with giving Mays his most famous nickname. Kremenko noticed Mays had a habit of greeting people with “hey” as opposed to “hello” or “hi.”

Mays used a high-pitched “hey” with most people he met because he was terrible at remembering names. Hence, Kremenko noticed how often Mays would say “hey” and dubbed him “The Say Hey Kid.”

It’s that version of the nickname’s origin that is recognized in Mays’ own authorized biography written by James L. Hirsch and published in 2010.

But another version of the nickname’s genesis is that famed New York sportswriter Jimmy Cannon popularized it when Mays arrived in the minors.

“You see a guy, you say, ‘Hey, man. Say hey, man,’” Mays reportedly told Cannon. “Ted (Williams) was the ‘Splinter’. Joe (DiMaggio) was ‘Joltin’ Joe’. Stan (Musial) was ‘The Man’. I guess I hit a few home runs, and they said there goes the ‘Say Hey Kid.’”

Whichever version is correct, the Mays biography states that the nickname was misunderstood. Mays did chant the words “say hey” for a record by a vocal group called the Treniers, but according to Hirsch’s biography, Mays told him he never used the phrase in any conversation.

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In 1970, it was lamented in a Sports Illustrated article that Mays had not uttered “say hey” in more than 15 years. Mays himself made no effort to set the record straight.

That said, Mays approved of the nickname and even named his charity for underprivileged and disadvantaged children “The Say Hey Foundation.”

Mays had a number of nicknames in addition to “The Say Hey Kid.” Early in his career, he was called “Willie The Wonder,” “The Amazin’ Mays” and “the Minneapolis Marvel.” Teammates often simply called Mays “Buck” or “Cap,” short for captain.

Carl Steward is a former sportswriter for the Bay Area News Group. Follow him on Twitter/X at twitter.com/stewardsfolly.