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CONCORD, Calif. - Concord High School turned into "Wonderland" Saturday for the second annual Pride Prom in Contra Costa County. The event is for students in the LGBTIQ+ community and allies.

A woke California school board member is calling for people to boycott the Fourth of July, claiming 'there is no reason to celebrate' America's Independence Day. AnaMarie Avila Farias, a third-generation Contra Costa County resident and member of the county's board of education, shared a fading blue and white image of the United States flag on June 28, along with the words 'BOYCOTT 4TH OF JULY,' on Facebook. 'I haven't celebrated 4th of July since 2016 and I don't think it's a holiday to celebrate' Farias wrote in a Facebook post. 'What do you think?' The elected official's stance on...

Four dead, others injured at Halloween party in Orinda The yellow house was rented on Airbnb for a private Halloween party. Elissa Harrington reports ORINDA, Calif. - Four people were killed and others were injured at a Halloween party in Orinda and the Contra Costa County Sheriff's Office said nothing about a shooter being in custody, Friday morning. The shooting was reported at 10:45 p.m. Thursday on the 100 block of Lucille Way near Knickerbocker Lane, not too far from Highway 24, according to sheriff's spokesman Jimmy Lee. The street is narrow and winding, lined with multimillion dollar homes. Three...

Reports of a tank farm fire at the refinery in Crockett, CA. The tanks are some ways from the main plant, however the fire is spreading to other tanks. Three are alight so far. Information comes from someone on site.

MARTINEZ — A man was convicted Thursday of kidnapping, raping and murdering an 81-year-old El Cerrito woman taking a morning walk seven years ago. “Oh, my God. … They got it wrong!” the defendant, Jonathan Jackson, cried out, sobbing and bowing his head as the guilty verdicts were read in Department 5 of the A.F. Bray Courthouse. A few feet away in the courtroom gallery, Jackson’s mother also began to sob. His victim, El Cerrito resident Sun Yi Kwon, was out on a morning walk in January 2012 when she was attacked, dragged into a secluded area in Richmond, raped...

The Contra Costa County Department of Children and Family Services (CFS, or CPS) in California appears to have a problem with the sexual abuse of children. The Epoch Times interviewed whistleblower parents, children, and a mental health professional in the county who say children are being sexually abused within a system that is meant to protect them. In July, a father–son duo, Simon Mendoza Chavez, 64, and Simon Magana Chavez, 31, in the Contra Costa County city of Antioch were arrested on charges of committing multiple crimes during their years-long tenure as foster parents, according to a little-publicized police department...

Mayor-Turned-Child-Sex Offender Arrested Near School for 3rd Time Former Pittsburg, California mayor Marcelino Vasquez — a convicted sex offender — was arrested outside a school last week for the third time in five months. Pittsburg police Capt. Ron Raman stated that Vasquez was arrested near Marina Vista Elementary last week, according to the Contra Costa Times. Vasquez was a rising political figure until 1972 ,when he was convicted for lewd or lascivious acts with a child under 14 years of age. The Times reports that Vasquez served on the Pittsburg City Council and “took a turn as mayor” in the...

There was a happy ending for some baby ducklings trapped in a storm drain near Interstate 680, in Concord Saturday. A Good Samaritan noticed them around noon near the Willow Pass off-ramp and called the fire department. When fire crews arrived, they successfully removed the eight ducklings from the storm drain and reunited them with their parent. According to a Contra Costa Fire Department dispatcher, the firefighters scooped them up and put them in a bag. Then they moved them to the other side of the road where mama duck was waiting.

Contra Costa County's finances resemble those of a family that ran up astronomical credit card debts by spending beyond its means. It's not a unique story. Local governments throughout the East Bay face similar problems. Contra Costa leaders deserve credit for starting to adjust their spending about five years ago, earlier than many other public agencies. They began trimming employee salaries, reducing benefits and significantly cutting the size of the workforce. These were painful, but essential, cuts critical to bringing annual expenses in line with income. For next fiscal year, county officials feel confident they have a balanced budget that...

David Dutcher met Sharon on Match.com in late 2008, a few months after separating from his wife. "We had a lot in common," he recalled. Sharon loved four-wheel-drive trucks and sports. They met for coffee, then dinner. Sharon was tall, slender, blond and beautiful. She moaned that she had not had sex in a long time. She told him he had large, strong hands and wondered if that portended other things. She described his kisses as "yummy." "It felt a lot like Christmas," said Dutcher, 49, a tall, burly engineer with wavy red hair.

DISCOVERY BAY (KCBS) – Boaters and swimmers in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta are finally getting some help from the state in removing a non-native plant that is flourishing uncontrollably. The plant is called Egeria Densa, or Brazilian Waterweed. The South American aquarium plant is notorious for being almost impossible to eradicate. The problem is especially noticeable near Discovery Bay. ”There might not even be any room for boaters to navigate because it’s so thick,” said Gloria Sandoval of the California Department of Boating and Waterways. “And for swimmers, their feet could get tangled in the weeds.” Starting next month,...

Contra Costa Tax Assessor Gus Kramer used an arcane real estate transaction known as a gift deed to acquire millions of dollars worth of property in the county during the past decade despite an ethics law limiting gifts to a few hundred dollars a year that a public official can accept from any one person. Public records show Kramer obtained full or partial title to seven properties from 2000 to 2010 for which no money changed hands and no real estate transfer taxes were paid. Kramer didn't list three of those properties on his annual ethics disclosure statements, as required...

Contra Costa has reached a tentative agreement to spread over two years payment of an $18 million property tax refund it owes Chevron Corp., easing the blow to the county general fund and the budgets of cities and local agencies. The county and its agencies will make two payments. The first payment of $6 million will be due Aug. 1 and the second $12 million payment will be due a year later, said Supervisor John Gioia, who with county Administrator David Twa, negotiated the deal. The county counsel is reviewing the deal to make sure no complications arise. Cities will...

The National Weather Service has issued a rare tornado warning for Northern California's Contra Costa County after a trained weather spotter reported seeing a funnel cloud. The weather service says the cloud was seen about 9 miles south of Oakley and could touch down in a rural area of the east San Francisco Bay-area county. It's the second time in a week that a tornado warning has been issued. The first was issued Wednesday for Santa Clara county. The weather service urged people to go to a basement or interior hallway or room and lie down.

Police arrested 22-year-old Abdul Walid Hamid of Hayward on the evening of Wednesday, Nov. 4, after he reportedly tore a crucifix from a person's neck and scared others at Stoneridge Shopping Center. Hamid, an employee at a mall kiosk near Starbucks, has been charged with battery, terrorist threats and grand theft. According to reports, Hamid was yelling "Allah is power" and "Islam is great" while holding a pen in a fist over his head. Witnesses said he shouted anti-Christian comments, said police. Lt. Mike Elerick of the Pleasanton Police Department said the man was not provoked and didn't threaten violence,...

Emphasis on announces . I’ve read this piece three times and can’t convince myself that I’m not missing something obvious that makes it all perfectly rational. Surely if a D.A. were forced to turn his district into a free-fire zone for certain crimes, he wouldn’t broadcast to the public what those crimes are. Right? The decision not to go after any perpetrators of certain offenses, Grove said, amounts to “holding up a sign and advertising to the criminal element to come to Contra Costa County, because we’re no longer going to prosecute you.”Don’t even bother submitting the cases, Kochly said...

Hoping to save a strained medical system $6 million a year, Contra Costa County health officials announced a plan this week to exclude adult illegal immigrants from primary care services. About 5,500 undocumented adult immigrants are now eligible users of the county's Basic Health Care Program, which serves low-income residents who cannot obtain any other health insurance. A plan presented to the board of supervisors would make nonurgent county care inaccessible to illegal immigrants, with the exception of children and pregnant women. Also on the proposed chopping block is a $2.6 million program providing health care for inmates of the...

Federal officials have arrested 119 people in Contra Costa County in a weeklong illegal immigration crackdown, and they had deported 16 as of Monday. This portion of the yearlong "Operation Return to Sender" took place primarily in Concord and Richmond and targeted fugitives who had ignored final deportation orders, said Timothy Aitken, deputy director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement's detention and removal office in San Francisco. ICE is the agency that now performs the enforcement functions of the old Immigration and Naturalization Service. Agents also picked up 94 other undocumented immigrants they encountered in the process, he said. Latino community...

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - The Bush administration is siding with a Christian group in its lawsuit demanding rights to conduct prayer services at public libraries. The case concerns a Contra Costa County policy allowing the public to use free meeting rooms at its libraries, but prohibits "religious services and activities." The Sierra Club, Narcotics Anonymous and even the East Contra Costa Democratic Club have utilized the county's library facilities. The Faith Center Church Evangelistic Ministries, however, was denied access because of its religious preaching. "Because the county refused to permit Faith Center to use the meeting rooms solely because of...

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - An attorney for two seventh-graders and their families argued to a federal appeals court that a Contra Costa County school district violated the students' rights by forcing them to adopt Muslim names and recite Islamic prayers in a roleplaying exercise. "The children were supposed to become Muslims. They were acting as a Muslim would act," attorney Edward White of the Thomas More Law Center, a Christian defense organization, told a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco on Wednesday. The families were appealing a 2003 ruling by a federal judge...