building a better bay area, moving forward finding solutions, this is abc7 news. hello, i'm kristen sze and you are watching getting answers live on abc7, who live in wherever you stream. we ask experts your questions every day at 3 pm to get answers for you in real time. first breaking news, this just in so we want to update you on a major announcement by dr. mark galli california's health and human services sec. on june 15 when we fully reopen the state he says unvaccinated people will still be required to wear masks in most indoor settings. california is also requiring vaccinated people to still wear rat masks in high risk settings including in transit and in schools. that is coming down this past

half hour and we aren't sure what this means for the osha meeting tonight, they are having a last-minute meeting to talk about workplace rules and whether if one person is unvaccinated that means everyone must wear a mask but that is still happening and we will have more on what this new rule means from dr. mark galli at 4 pm. you can read more about the guidelines at from dr. mark galli at 4 pm. you can read more about the guidelines@tran02.com. today we will talk about a dilemma popping up in businesses across california and the bay area. should employees returned to the office full-time and can they be required to? believe it or not this is popping up in silicon valley and also we will take you on a live tour of the san mateo county fair. it's back after being canceled last year but it won't be business as usual. but first the calls for common sense gun laws louder especially in the bay area after the mass shooting in the vta railyard that left 10 people dead including the gunman. with that as backdrop the mayor joins us today to talk about

changes he is working on. mayor good to see you and again our condolences over what happened in the city. >> thank you kristin it's good to be with you. >> i know that you've gotten to work along with some city councilmembers after the mass shooting and i want to give people some perspective. that got our attention but more lives were lost to gun violence in your city in the past two weeks, correct? >> yes in just the 14 days since we've have had eight separate violent instances involving guns and we've lost lives and families have been devastated. >> and with that you've unveiled a plan along with the vice mayor and three councilmembers, with the support of da jeff rosen and it is something really unique. no other city or state in the u. s. has ever tried it so talk to us about this plan. >> there are a lot of aspects to the whole proposal but two in particular have not been tried in any city or state in the country, the first is

mandating insurance, that is on all gun owners just as all of us as drivers are required to have insurance that helps makes make us safer and compensate victims who are injured and it also incentivizes us to be safer drivers and to take care. so insurance could incentivize gun owners for example to get gun safes and trigger locks and other kinds of devices, and take gun safety classes and that is really important in a nation where we have 4.6 million children who live in a home where guns are loaded but kept unlocked. so interest is the first requirement and the second is around thieves. right now taxpayers are paying for the gun violence in addition to all victims and their families are feeling. in california taxpayers are paying $1.4 billion for police and emergency medical response and all of that is being borne by taxpayers. the second amendment may protect

the right of gunowners to own a gun but it doesn't require taxpayers to subsidize it. so this is about ensuring that we have a safer community and incentivize safety and we take the burden off of taxpayers and victims. >> okay let's look at the insurance part more closely. if your gun was used to take someone's life for example does this mean your insurance would pay for compensating the injured or the family of the dead? and is that not currently covered as part of any typical insurance plan? >> what insurance will cover is unintentional shootings. as a matter of law in california, most states, insurance won't cover intentional criminal acts but that is a large scope of harm. keep in mind 500 people are killed in unintentional shootings every year in this country, about 26,000 are harmed. a large percentage of those our children. so if we could have insurance companies involved in

incentivizing for example with premiums, that are reduced for gunowners who might take that gun safety class or have a gun in a safe at home, those are the kinds of measures that can make us all safer. >> let's talk about the fee to compensate taxpayers for the cost of policing and responding to gun related injuries or deaths. what do you say to folks who say, hey look, some gunowners may feel like my gun is just for me to go hunting so why should i pay for when somebody else's gun was used or collectively i guess when guns are used to commit crimes or take other people's lives, that's not my situation so why should i pay? >> because here in the real world my gun becomes someone else's gun. guns are stolen every single day, they are inadvertently picked up children every day because they are left in the home, there is a lot we need to do to make gun ownership safer. but what is clear is that taxpayers are paying the cost

for those who are not being safe. >> all right mayor i'm just going to share sadly that i did know many years ago someone who owned a gun and the gun was taken by somebody else to take their own life. i know he was devastated by it that his gun was used for such a thing and i know that will be covered under this situation. what about failure to comply, would there be consequences? >> yes. the understandable argument is crooks are not going to follow the rules and of course they're not, they won't get insurance or pay the fees but i consider that a feature and not a defect of the proposal. when an officer response for example to a domestic violence call and gets to a home and learns that they have a gun in the home, if that individual gun owner has not paid insurance or the fee, there is reasonable cause now for the officer to be able to seize the gun and that is something that can make us much safer because we know that guns in domestic violence in particular are a lethal mix. in fact the majority of mass

shootings in this country are actually the mastic violence related. >> sergio is watching us on facebook live and he is asking has there been feedback from insurance companies about the proposal? >> we had some early conversations about a year and a half ago and i don't expect them to be enthusiastic about it, the reality is it is relatively easy to get insurance for one's gun through a homeowner policy and can be done often with no cost at all or maybe very little cost to have a writer but most homeowner policies contain them. the reality is i don't think insurance companies are all that interested in getting involved with guns right now. what needs to happen is multiple states, multiple cities need to move together on this requirement and we are going to be the first. obviously we know we will be challenged in various ways and when other moves with us we can have the entire insurance industry getting engaged, the same way that we saw abs brakes

and airbags in the context of automobile driving, because pressure was applied by insurance companies that are looking to reduce the cost, the financial cost of injuries, harm and death in automobile collisions. we can similarly make gun ownership safer. >> mark has a question as well and it's really more of a comment, this is another way to tax people if you ask me. you know, i can tell what he thinks about this but it does raise an interesting question about equity because the same amount of money for the tax is not going the same way on individuals depending on their social economic circumstances. >> we expect that if we did not have a waiver for very low income residents we would probably have a second amendment issue. so there will be a waiver applied just as you would for example, for a waiver of court fees for those who can't afford access to a court. in either case though the gun owner must take responsibility

and apply for the waiver and if they don't have the form showing that they paid the fee or that they have a waiver in their gun could be subject to seizure. >> and you are having this conversation in the broader context of a federal judge having recently overturned california's assault weapon ban that has been in place for over 30 years. do you think that will lead to a surge in such weapons and the proliferation of them are what do you think is the reality of that? >> the good news i think is that there is a stay on the effect of the order until it gets to the ninth circuit, that's my understanding but we are leading the effort in supporting an appeal on that very ruling. there is no question that most californians no better than the federal judge the difference between a swiss army knife and an assault weapon. this is really, this is the kind of ruling i think that makes us incredibly frustrated with jurisprudence coming out

and scrambling this issue. we need to push ahead with common sense gun solutions and common sense gun regulation, the regulation that has been around this country as long as guns have been. the gun regulation is every bit as american as gun ownership, we just need sensible regulation. >> mayor one last question, when will vta service resume do you think? >> that's a great question and i don't have a good answer for you. i was in conversation with general managers just a few days ago, the general manager is doing all she can to manage a very difficult situation with a workforce that is grieving and to be blunt, literally we lost nine people who really performed critical work on that light rail line. and we are going to have difficulty actually replacing the people who did that work. to just be able to keep the system running. so it is important for us to

move forward safely and we are going to continue to provide bus service however we can and we will continue to look for creative solutions. >> we certainly understand mayor and i know commuters understand as well and we grieve with you during this process. but i just wanted to see if there was an update. thank you for your time today, we really appreciate it. >> good to be with you. coming up next the topic of conversation a lot of people are having now, when do you return to the office full-time? should you? this convers

returning back to the

office has become a topic of conversation for a lot of employers and employees but can companies reach a happy medium or will we go back to business as usual? joining us now is darren murph ahead of remote learning at get lab, good afternoon and thanks for joining us. >> absolutely, thank you for having me. >> you've always been an advocate for working remotely as an option. we heard through our reporting that google and apple are trying to get employees back. apple supposedly wants full- time in person by fallen google three days in person but some employees are pushing back. against coming back to the office. is any of this surprise you? >> no, it's not surprising at all. knowledge workers that have shown over the past 18 months that they've been able to be creative and get their jobs done, layer on top of that they've realized that the recaptured commute time is better spent engaging with their family and community. so institutional power is not easily relinquished but neither are individual freedoms so the

friction you feel greatest transfer of workplace power that many of us have seen in our lifetimes. >> okay but if it's been shown productivity wise there was no loss with a lot of these engineers and other office workers working from home, then why would a company not say this is great because you know, they could potentially save a lot of money because maybe they can hire some folks working from home in iowa instead of paying them bay area salaries. so why would a company not go for this win-win so to speak unless they don't view it as a win-win in case, in which case you have to explain. >> some companies are leaning into this as an opportunity but legacy habits are hard to break and many of these companies have long-term leases or really sizable investments in real estate and many of the leaders are not equipped to manage remote teams. i think it's a combination of, what are we using this building for if we don't have people in

it and also are we really going to make the investment in the tools and upscaling to make sure that our workforce is prepared to work in a more flexible future? >> okay. i want to point out, this is very interesting to me that there is also that what we are used to setting up this friction because millions got used to working from home and in fact a questionnaire out by blind found that more than half of workers prefer to be at home over a $30,000 raise. so that tells you where priorities are and we are going to get this clash but legally can companies require that employees come back? they can't can they? >> you are subject to the legalities of whatever you signed up for in your employment agreement but now we have a global permission slip to ask ourselves, does this really have to be done the way it's always been done? in many cases you have the employee up against the employer and that's the friction you are feeling. >> okay, look, just because you can ask doesn't mean you're

going to get it. legally employers can require that you work in house right? and legally can they refuse to come back? under what circumstances maybe? >> i think for a lot of folks it's going to come down to, is this new culture one that i want to be part of? i expect you will see a huge shifting of sand, a lot of top talent will flee companies that force them to return to the office. you have to remember these people now have more opportunities than they have ever had before. covid has made a lot of companies remote fluent so what used to be a rare opportunity to work in a high-tech industry in a place that was comfortable for you is now much more commonplace. >> all right but what about the argument that some companies put out, and i definitely see legitimacy in this, that when you put people together in the office and happens. you start talking and the ideas come about and the chemistry leads to better products, do you not see that at your own company? >> absolutely.

humans are relational, communal beings so the goal should not be to create a company were no one ever sees each other but what many companies don't realize is you can have an intentional in person strategy and still get people together on occasion. we do this, we get the entire company together for one week a year for culture bonding and rapport building. so you don't have to have someone in the office every single day to get this but organizations will have to be more intentional about those in person moments. >> okay. now you mentioned earlier and i was interested in exploring this more, you said companies may have to make infrastructure improvements, technology improvements to upscale this like everybody working either hybrid or from home. what things are you talking about because i thought oh, you just zoom and it works. what are we talking about that i'm not thinking of? >> you certainly can zoom and it just works and many of us are experiencing zoom fatigue

because the virtual office, although it is passable to work in that way, you artfully taking advantage. consider if it were physical infrastructure and if you were growing your team you might have to invest in a new building with new technological advancements to power your team. the virtual version of this is implement in collaboration tools like get lab to make sure people can collaborate in one digital space and to make sure that people know how to use the tools that you are equipping them with. for many, the office was a crutch for communication so if you are fundamentally changing that and you no longer have it as a part of your workflow, learning and development teams have a great opportunity to upscale their base. >> all right we have about 30 seconds but i want to ask for your prediction with regard to this conflict shaping up between apple, google and their employees on this issue, what do you think it will all go? >> i think a lot of legacy organizations will probably dig their heels in but i think other organizations will see this as an opportunity to

acquire talent that they may not have had access to before. and i do think you'll be able to see glassdoor reviews for example, the litmus test of the companies that supported remote work versus merely allowed it or force people back in. >> great info but i had to chuckle when you mentioned apple and google as legacy organizations, being in the field of tv i still think of them as newbies but thank you so much, i appreciate your time, take care. >> thank you. coming up next we take you on a live tour of the san

welcome back, the san mateo county fair is underway. it started on the fifth after being canceled last year due to the pandemic. the old favorites are back there are some big changes. joining us now is the manager justin aquino. great to see you.

>> great to see you as well and thank you for having me. >> we are at their come there at the fairgrounds and this is great, how is it going? are you doing capacity limits and are you selling out? >> that is correct, we are at a capacity at 35% each and every day adhering to state guidelines for san mateo county. >> i know you guys are pretty much the only ones because santa clara and marin county fairs were canceled again this year like last year. then alameda pushed it to the fall so i'm wondering how are you managing? so show us what's happening and the precautions you put in place? >> certainly and we are very excited. we are proud of san mateo county, where we come from and where we are now. san mateo county was the first county to go into red tier, and we were the second county to go into the yellow tear and now

are hosting the county fair. over 80% of san mateo residents have received their vaccine and thinking about what we've done is a county being able here to open our fair, and have a carnival? our carnival is back and we have less rides due to the pandemic but there is greater space. there's more space than we've ever had and a lot of that has to do with trying to keep up with sanitation and disinfection of all the rides. so employees of the carnival company are disinfecting and sanitizing the rides and there is also a closure between 4 pm to 4:30 pm where they willed do deeper sanitation and disinfection of all the rides. so that's one of the things that is different from past years. >> so on the rides our folks social distancing? for example if it's a roller coaster is it like one family

per car? talk about distancing on the rides or the eating areas? >> yes, let's head over there right now. as part of state guidelines, each eating area has to be 6 feet apart and we also need designated eating areas. so we are going to head to the food court and show you how these food areas look. usually fairgoers are traditionally able to walk around and eat or drink whatever they like, but according to state guidelines we want to ensure that they are able to go to a designated food area to eat. so right around here is one of those food areas, it is a designated food area and it covers all the concession stands in this area. so you have all these different tables that are 6 feet apart and after usage each table gets sanitized as well. i know it's hard for us as residents and individuals wanting to go to a public setting to wait before something gets cleaned up, we just want to get that table immediately. but i want to remind the public

that until that table is sanitized and disinfected, that is something we are doing that we haven't done before. >> i can still get my funnel cake right? i can still get my corndog? i just need to sit in a designated area 6 feet apart from other people. how about, can you talk about the fan favorites like the piggy races or the farming for h , what is happening there and what's not happening? >> they are all back. we have formic age, we have four -- we don't have petting zoo, but this is all to comply with current guidelines by the state and through san mateo county health. >> and what about the concerts? >> that's fun. this year we had to do all our concerts outdoors and in the past the concerts have been in an indoor venue.

but capacity would have been 2000 people in this time we would only have a capacity of 330 people within this concert area, and right now you are hearing journey revisited, a tribute band on a sound check. here they are right now. >> oh don't stop believing, this is awesome. >> san mateo county continued to believe that we could host a county fair and here we are now. >>

thank you so much for joining us on this interactive show getting answers, today's we

talked with the san jose mayor about the gun liability insurance proposal, getting employees back to the office and tonight, several developing stories as we come on the air. president biden landing in the uk just a short time ago, making news already. addressing american troops. what he said about our allies. the united states is back. and what he said about vladimir putin, with his upcoming face-to-face meeting. after the russia-based cyber attacks in the u.s., affecting gas prices and the u.s. meat supply. cecilia vega traveling with the president in england. the coronavirus in the u.s. will we meet that fourth of july goal? a reality check right here tonight. and dr. jha with us on the concerning delta variant first seen in india. now the dominant strain in the uk. it's being seen here in the u.s. already. what americans need to know. and the doctor on the big difference, how effective the vaccines are against this variant after one dose