ian cull spent the day checking out what's going on in santa clara county with their clearing there. he's going to join us in just a bit. we're also tracking other stories on this friday, including a new fire popping up in contra costa county. nbc bay area's sky ranger flew overhead, showing exactly what got cleared out there. what got charred there, i should say. we'll tell you how crews made quick work of it. also, another big cat scare in san jose. the warning from park rangers in the neighborhoods being told to keep their pets indoors and a better than expected jobs report. but it's not all good news. we're going to check in with our scott budman, who's got his pulse on the bay area's economy. but let's begin with what's on the minds of fire crews across the bay area as we head into summer. as wildfires risk begins to grow across our state, there's also work going on behind the scenes to prevent the fires in the first place. today, south bay nonprofits showcased their work to prevent dangerous fires while also trying to increase the forest health in the santa cruz mountains. nbc bay area's ian cull joining us now, after seeing that progress and exactly what are they doing? yeah. so, you know, terry, scientists have say have said that forests really have changed after decades of fire suppression around california. they're largely overgrown. and when a fire sparks, there's plenty of fuel to keep it going. you know, we often talk about making defensible space around your home, but the santa clara county fire safe council has just finished its first phase of thinning out the forest along the los gatos creek. this is up in the mountains on land owned by san jose water. they used a grant from cal fire to clear the heavy vegetation on the forest floor and high risk areas before and after pictures really show the difference. the fire safe council held a tour for agencies including cal fire to show their progress. yes, we are in a, a wildfire crisis period and there is no silver bullet to getting us out of the situation by doing treatments like this, we are removing a lot of the fuels that contribute to high intensity fire. we can't stop fires from getting in here from starting, but we can allow those fires to be more of a beneficial, nature rather than a catastrophe. and what i find absolutely amazing, i've heard they're using, i, i to help prevent those fires from starting. yeah. so they've installed these 15 fire sensors in that area which uses ai to detect smoke. we're told the n5 sensors use ai to learn the difference in the air quality and smoke particles. over time. it can distinguish smoke that's coming from a nearby chimney, from smoke caused by a growing fire. it uses machine learning and artificial intelligence to, in essence, take a fingerprint of what the air quality looks like. and so it picked up many fires. and they also say the next phase of this project may include controlled burns, which also helps clear the forest floor and can improve its health. we'll dive deeper into this issue coming up at 530. i and forest fighting. i just never thought i'd put those two together. there's a lot going on there, ian. thanks very much. well, speaking of which, a wildfire quickly contained in the east bay. nbc bay area's sky ranger was overhead as crews got a handle on those flames. fire sparked midday near albers court. it spread to right around 50 acres before cal fire and contra costa fire contained. it never reached any of the nearby structures. firefighters are trying to figure out exactly how that started. all right. weather always playing a big role in all of these things. vianey arana is here to talk about that much better than it has been. definitely. i mean, when you look at the 70s and 80s, just two days ago, we had triple digits on this map, which means we had low humidity. certainly not helpful when it comes to any sort of fire. now we're seeing a nice recovery in the humidity, but also we're noticing that cooling, thanks to the return of that marine layer. and let me show you the 24 hour temperature change in concord and livermore. we're about ten degrees cooler at this hour compared to where we were at yesterday. so definitely noticing that there this is what satellite radar looks like. look at the clouds right there hugging the coastline, some of that making its way into the interior. and i do want to talk about the temperatures overnight because you likely also noticed not only were we warm during the day, but we didn't get a lot of relief during the overnight hours. and right now in san jose, it's about 78 degrees. you'll notice what happens right around 9:00. yes, those are clouds. and the icons are going to definitely help cool us off just a bit nicer into the overnight early morning hours. could even see some 50s on there. and then if you're going to be out and about in the city, look at that. there it is, that marine layer. san francisco also expected to dip down into the 50s, although right now it is pretty warm. in the 70s, a light winds from the southwest at about nine miles per hour. now, of course, we've got to talk about your import and weekend forecast. look at saturday's daytime highs. we've got 60s for san francisco, a bit more seasonable for this time of year. and then of course, down through the south bay still got a couple of upper 70s, low 80s and through parts of san jose still slightly warmer in areas like fairfield and concord. we're talking upper 70s and 80s. and then as we inch in towards that sunday forecast, just a look ahead. we do start to bump up in fairfield in areas like concord. but overall we're going to enjoy a nice range from 6070s and low 80s this weekend. much better compared to those triple digits. now we also have, in addition to the cooling over the weekend, what looks like could be another warm up into next week. so make sure to join us once again at 5:00. chief meteorologist jeff ranieri will have more details on the extended outlook. terry thanks very much. a wildlife alert is still in effect tonight after reports of a mountain lion spotted in several san jose neighborhoods. latest sighting was yesterday near kelly park. park rangers say the sighting happened at the nearby disc golf course. warning signs are now up in that area. back on wednesday, neighbors captured video of the big cat on l.a. drive. wildlife officials tell us most of the sightings have occurred near coyote creek, but it's unclear if this is one cat or a number of cats. today park rangers issued a warning and reminded people what to do if they encounter a mountain lion. act big, act loud, call 911 in that case and back away slowly. don't make yourself small. don't crouch down. pick up your children if you need to. yeah, wildlife worries are not limited to the south bay. earlier this week, we learned a 71 year old woman was killed. and what's being called the first fatal black bear attack in california history that happened near the small town of downieville on tuesday. this happened. a bear was spotted wandering through a football practice in truckee. but despite the multiple wildlife incidents, experts say the increase in wildlife reports likely has more to do with an increase in cameras than a rise in wild animals in urban areas. governor newsom has announced a new ballot measure to make same sex marriage a constitutional right. it's called the freedom to marry initiative. governor announced the measure earlier today at manny's in san francisco's mission district. it would ask voters to create a fundamental right to marry regardless of gender, ethnicity or sexual orientation. that's what this initiative represents. it's a recognition, again, of the urgency of the moment, the moment we are living in and states are on the front lines of those rights battles. and that's why it's imperative that states like california step up while marriage equality is now the law across the united states. but california's constitution still says same sex couples are not allowed to marry. the ballot measure would update the state constitution to reflect current laws. a mixed bag of economic news today. us added more jobs than expected last month, but unemployment edged up. we're in a different situation here in the bay area. let's bring our business and tech reporter in scott budman. scott, how about the latest numbers and the impact here in the bay area? yeah. and terry, these numbers are really strong. once again, we continue to add jobs as a country. 272,000 jobs added in the month of may quite a bit above economists expectations. and that's good news. all in all, the jobless rate did tick up higher to 4. but here in the bay area it's a little bit lower than that for california in general, it's a little bit higher. but the country is still pretty steady. 4% unemployment and again adding hundreds of thousands of jobs a month. and that's really good news. sounds like a strong economy, which is sounds like great news. but there's also the problem with when it's really strong, the interest rates, they don't tend to be lowered. exactly. and that's part of what's still going on. our economy stays strong despite the federal reserve having raised interest rates. why do they raise interest rates to make money more expensive, to literally slow down the economy. and so we've seen these rising interest rates. and if you're out there trying to find a home that also kicks the mortgage rate higher, sometimes your college loan rate higher, your car payment rate higher, that's bad news. but still, throughout it all, our economy has stayed strong. wages up, job growth up. really no sign of slowing yet. and that's why economists say it's not all that likely that we'll see interest rates come down. also, what tends to go up when the economy is strong prices. and that's why you're still seeing high prices at grocery stores. that also is not as likely to come down if our economy stays so strong and consumers continue to shop. well, you were you were talking to shoppers today about inflation. what are they saying to you? they're saying that they and we all do this. you look at the receipt and you think about it from a week ago or a month ago or a year ago, and the prices are still higher. food is still higher. just about everything we buy is still higher. that's what happens when inflation kicks up. the fed wants to see inflation go down to 2. it's still around 2.72.8. terry and that's higher. and that's why we haven't seen the interest rates or mortgage rates come down. it's sort of like watch what you ask for. we want a strong economy. we want lots of jobs. we want higher wages. we got all of that. but because we're spending that money, prices stay high and because we haven't kicked inflation, interest rates are still high. all right. interesting stuff scott. thanks very much for that. well, in a controversial turnaround for stanford university will once again require standardized tests for undergraduate admission. today, the university announced that applicants must submit either the sat or the act, beginning with those applying to enter next fall. stanford stopped requiring the exam in 2020, as did hundreds of colleges across the country, as the pandemic made it difficult for applicants to take the test, university says. faculty studies have found test scores to be, quote, an important predictor of academic performance at stanford. well, it is a growing problem for home and business owners in san francisco. insurance companies are increasingly canceling or refusing to renew their home and business insurance policies with almost no explanation. in march, san francisco resident jeremy salterbeck got a notice from safeco, his insurance company, saying it will not be renewing his homeowner's policy. he hired a private home inspector to dispute what the insurer said was a potential problem with his roof, and safeco reversed its decision without further comment . but when bay area insurance broker says homeowners who are not able to successfully dispute cancellations are finding it hard to get a new, affordable policy. i think the hardest thing, particularly for older homes, is meeting underwriting requirements. it's so, you know, if you've got knob and tube wiring or some other things that deferred maintenance on your property, that can make the placement very difficult and expensive. he says. there are several reasons why insurers seem to be thinning their policies in san francisco and the bay area really in general, among them the high home prices and the skyrocketing price of repairing or replacing a damaged home after a claim insurers say california regulations have also kept them from keeping pace with those higher costs. efforts at getting a handle on wildfires in california and new changes to state rules may help, but local insurance brokers say that won't happen immediately. driving full speed ahead the reason contra costa county leaders are eager to put autonomous vehicles on the roads, despite concerns from other bay area counties, also, it is a beautiful weekend to head to the beach, but are you leaving it in better shape than when you arrived? our vianey arana rejoins us to go over ways we can all be eco conscious while enjoying our time in the sun t-mobile “savings”, take one. guys, focus. here's the line... “at t-mobile, you get tons of benefits, and you can still save versus the other guys.” focus! hello t-mobile... hold on... you might want to just... ok stop! just say it like this, “at t-mobile, you can save on every plan, and you get great benefits with magenta status”. magenta status... yuh! i'll show you my magenta status. ok, i'll just do it. check out the t-mobile savings calculator to see how much you can save. and right now, we'll even pay off your phone when you switch! ♪ doo-doo-doo-doo-doo... ♪ i'm a chinese drone maker, says it has completed the first successful drone delivery on the highest mountain in the world. video shows the drone flying three oxygen bottles from everest base camp to what's called camp one. it also carried a backpack with trash back down to base camp. the hope is that the drone will make life easier for sherpas. everyday. sherpas risked their lives trekking through the ice to deliver supplies. the drone company says it thinks this could revolutionize mountaineering on everest. turning now to our climate in crisis, the ocean covers more than 70% of earth, and with the official start of summer just two weeks away, june also marks noah's world ocean month. so while many of you head to the beach to enjoy, it's a great opportunity to highlight how we can take care of our oceans here to give us more insight, meteorologist veena arana, you've been checking it out. i have, and you said it covers over 70, yet we've only explored about 5% of the ocean. terry and that means that there's a lot left undiscovered. but of course, there's actually a lot of benefits beyond looking beautiful to the ocean. so let's start with the first one. and we're talking about it helps with climate regulation. the ocean transports heat from the equator to the poles. this helps regulate our climate and weather patterns. the second is transportation. did you know that 76% of the u.s. transport involves some form of marine transportation? not only that, but the ocean also provides food. but it's more than just the seafood that we all enjoy eating. it also provides things like ingredients such as seasonings and soy milk. now, the reality is, is that there is a ton of microplastic debris and pollution all end up in our oceans through our waterways. so how can you help? check out this video from noaa. the most common items we find when we do shoreline cleanups are plastics, but we also find rubber, cloth, glass, metal, and paper litter. sometimes the debris is so tiny, like a plastic microbead from your face wash that you can barely see it in the water. lose their gear like fishing traps, nets, and other forms of marine debris are things like fishing nets. and terry now were just mentioning. also cigaret butts. and of course all of those things are damaging to important habitats in our marine life. a study by the university of georgia estimated 8 million metric tons of plastic enter the ocean every single year. how much is that? well, for perspective, that is equal to one commercial garbage truck dumping into the ocean every single minute. that's a disgusting thought. it really is. i mean, you know, there's so many studies that show just how much really ends up in our oceans. and i do want to invite folks to check out this story on our climate crisis tab, because i'm going to include some links on if you want to participate in beach cleanup, things like that. if you're going to go out and enjoy the beach and you've got a lovely picnic set up, clean up after yourself. take everything back home with you. don't leave anything out and about that could potentially damage the ocean or the animals living inside of it. i got a sense in beach a lot over in marin county, and you see these people cleaning up. i walked up and i said, is this a what's the name of your group, your organization? there isn't one. they're just a group of in this case, it was a group of women just doing it every week. and they never have a dull moment. there's always plenty of stuff to find. i'm sure there is. so make sure to play your part. keep our beautiful coastline clean, and make sure to check out that climate crisis tab. excellent, arianna. thanks a lot, caltrans. i'm going to stop service this weekend between san jose and san francisco, so most of its route to test its new electric locomotives. it's also limiting the number of busses going from the san jose, diridon, palo alto and millbrae stations, caltrain says this will be the last public shutdown between now and september, when that new fleet takes over. a lot of cities and counties have lost their enthusiasm for self-driving cars. some severely restrict robo taxis and other autonomous vehicles, but contra costa county is eager to let them operate. it currently has autonomous busses up and running at bishop ranch, and this summer the county will be launching new wheelchair accessible shuttles for seniors at the contra costa regional medical center in martinez. now, this morning on today in the bay, we spoke with tim hale, the executive director of the contra costa transportation authority. our number one priority is always safety, you know, and one of the advantages, i think, that ccta has is we own and operate one of the largest autonomous vehicle testing facilities in contra costa county, in concord. and we've been operating this facility since 2014. and it really has given us a front row seat to the future to really understand and this technology, what it can when it cannot do, and how to really deploy it in a safe way on our roadways. in four years, county officials are looking to launch a 28 mile network of autonomous shuttles to connect pittsburg, antioch, brentwood and oakley. it will connect bart riders with the antioch station and other hubs. tonight, a sunnyvale man is working to help others make it in the bay. today, a ribbon cutting was held for newly constructed small homes there on helen avenue, and he says they're primarily meant to provide affordable homes to low income residents. however anyone is able to apply to live there. we spoke with arman bashi, the man whose company is behind the project. he got emotional as he talked about the goal of this project. it's really rewarding, really rewarding. sorry, i just, yeah, it really, really does make a big difference when two years later, not a single rent payment is missed, or even if they are struggling, they'll reach out. and because of the connections we have with other organizations that are willing to help, we'll connect them. now, santa clara county supervisors this week approved a new proposal aimed at speeding up the building process. when it comes to building actual adus on residents properties. hundreds of people lined up in chinatown today. they got a chance to take home some free groceries this morning, a nonprofit called chinese newcomers service hosted a food giveaway held in chinatown at the cameron house food distribution center. you can see 5000 bags of groceries given away today. mayor london breed, along with other local sponsors, say the giveaway is critical for people in chinatown . this is an opportunity for us to come together as a community and to support and to uplift one another, and there is nothing better to do that than with food and it brings people together, but it also allows people to take care of themselves with dignity and have the kinds of products necessary in order to ensure that the seniors, especially, don't remain food insecure. in san francisco, organizers say the food giveaway has taken place since the 1990s. personalized ads. we get them on our computers and our phones, but they're coming for you on your next flight. we'll explain a slow network is no network for business. that's why more choose comcast business. and now, we're introducing ultimate speed for business —our fastest plans yet. we're up to 12 times faster than verizon, at&t, and t-mobile. and existing customers could even get up to triple the speeds... at no additional cost. it's ultimate speed for ultimate business. don't miss out on our fastest speed plans yet! switch to comcast business and get started for $49.99 a month. plus, ask how to get up to an $800 prepaid card. call today! derry, boxer mike tyson and youtuber jake paul push back to november 15th. now, the fight was originally planned for next month, but the event was postponed after tyson had an ulcer flare up while on a flight last week. it will still be hosted at the at&t stadium in arlington, texas. fans can catch the fight live from home on netflix. this is tyson's first match since taking on roy jones jr. roy jones jr in an exhibition bout back in 2020. by the way, the age of mr. tyson, 57 years old, one one last spin. beloved host pat sajak took his final spin today on wheel of fortune. can you believe that? sajak joined the show in 1981, 41 years ago, alongside co-host vanna white. the dynamic duo became the face of the game show during his career. he won three emmy awards and a lifetime achievement prize. my gosh, look how young he was. but last june, sajak announced he's leaving the show. he says what started as a game turned into so much more. sajak thanked viewers for making the show a safe place for family fun. ryan seacrest is now going to take over as host, coming soon to your seat backs, personalized ads. that's if you are flying. united airlines, says it's launching a media platform meant to show passengers personalized ads on their seatback screens. the personalized ads will also appear on united airlines app. united says customers will have the chance to opt out. airlines in the midst of upgrading its narrow body planes to add screens to all its seats. the move comes as airlines try to drum up even more sources of revenue. we're now on streaming on pluto 24/7. you can watch nbc bay area news whenever you want. scan this qr code right there for our easy how to stream guide on your favorite streaming platform. you can watch our live newscast and breaking updates and other content. thanks for joining us at 430. kira and kris working on the 5:00 newscast next. we're back in two minutes. t-mobile “savings”, take one. guys, focus. here's the line... “at t-mobile, you get tons of benefits, and you can still save versus the other guys.” focus! hello t-mobile... hold on... you might want to just... ok stop! just say it like this, “at t-mobile, you can save on every plan, and you get great benefits with magenta status”. magenta status... yuh! i'll show you my magenta status. ok, i'll just do it. check out the t-mobile savings calculator to see how much you can save. and right now, we'll even pay off your phone when you switch! ♪ doo-doo-doo-doo-doo... ♪ 80 years. golden gate fields is closing down. why? some who were closest to horses push the hardest to have the tracks shut down. also south bay neighborhoods on alert for mountain lions. nowhere near the mountains. park rangers are going to show us how to keep ourselves and our loved ones safe, and beefing up police presence in downtown san jose. how recent graduates from the police academy are being used on their first days on the job. the news at five starts right now. thank you for joining us. i'm kira klapper and i'm chris chmura. we begin with breaking news in santa clara live video. rather, we have el camino real closed currently in both directions between calabasas and kylie because of a suspicious package investigation. that's a few miles from santa clara university. the santa clara police department is urging people to stay away from the area. we don't know when el camino will reopen. we will continue to follow this story online and on air if warranted. now to our other top stories. it is the end of an era. tonight at golden gate fields, the horses are running there for the last time this weekend, nbc bay area's jodi hernandez got an inside look at the final stretch . horses at golden gate fields are getting ready for their final races here. after more than eight decades, the track is set to close on sunday, and the new gates. it's off to the races for one final time at golden gate fields. sunday will be the last day the track will be open. it's incredibly sad. it's still hard to process, like it's not real yet. i mean, there's so much history here. frances jefferson's five thoroughbreds have called golden gate fields home for the past five years. she feels like her community is being uprooted. there's a whole world here. it's like the track is its own world. it's a bubble, right? the people who live here are incredibly dedicated to the welfare of
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