tonight on kqed newsroom, newly minted district attorney brooke jenkins shares her plans for a safer san francisco. and assembly member phil tang tells us about the gun legislation he authored. we take a look at the wildfire threat in california and other top stories in the golden state. also, a close up view of those indelible, incredible images from the james webb space telescope is this week's something beautiful. coming to you from kqed headquarters in san francisco this friday, july 15, 2022.

hello and welcome to kqed newsroom. i am priya david clemens. it has been a little more than a month since the progressive district attorney was recalled from office. now, san francisco has a new district attorney. brooke begins. she is a prosecutor that worked for da putin. she became the lead spokesperson of the effort to recall her former boss. last week mayor london that read tapped her to take the job herself. da jenkins, welcome to the show. specks thank you. >> you are one week into this and you have spent the day putting your house in order. you are in the process of bringing new people in and you have fired more than a dozen people as well. what are you hoping to accomplish with the changes?

>> i want to bring in a new management team with prosecution experience. i announce three new members of the team that comprise about 50 years of prosecutorial experience and i think that will be critical moving forward with my promise to the public that accountability will be restored to the justice system in san francisco and that we will be the best advocates that we can. >> one is nancy tung who ran against district attorney boudin in the past. another worked alongside you and left under his time. so you are bringing in people opposed to the vision of what was. tell us about the firings that you are in the process of dealing with. >> i just want to make sure that i have a very strong management team that is dedicated to balancing reform and public safety and sometimes that takes some shifts, as it does in any new administration. but i am very optistic about

what is going to happen with the management team in the office and how we are going to begin restoring some law and order to san francisco. >> so, you were a prosser a prosecutor under chesa boudin. why did you quit? >> because i felt that the decisions being made were being made recklessly and without the public being taken into account. and issues of safety being prioritized as they should be. >> so, you are now in the hot seat. >> right. >> what are you going to do that is different? what is the number one thing that you think, to yourself, if i do noing else in my time in office, i only get this thing done. >> i think we have to go back to holding repeat offenders and repeat violent offenders accountable.

i think that has been lost in this system and that cost us many lives over the past two years. having repeat offenders go out and reoffend in lethal ways. so, i am committed to making sure that those who decide to live a life of crime and clinically commit crime in the city accountable. so, that is one of the main things that i want to accomplish. as well as balancing the need for reform. that is not going away. it is still a priority in our office >> so what are the reform measures that you think there is benefit in? that you agree with the former da. >> the establishment of the innocence commission. i think working to exonerate wrongfully convicted people is important. we hear story after story of people who spent decades in prison because evidence was lost.

>> one of e things that we saw during the recall was that, from the recall campaign, generally, was that police felt they should not make arrests or they should not bother because there was no accountability. do you agree that was happening? >> yes. i think morel amongst the san francisco police department had declined over the past two years. when they go out and risk their safety, sometimes putting in long hours to solve cases and they are seeing people return back to the street sometimes within hours and having those cases be dismissed, that can affect a persons easier eagerness to do their job. i am hoping that the restoration of accountability in the system ll motivate the police to understand that their work is valued in san francisco and they are an essential partner with respect to achieving public safety.

>> so would it be fair to say see if police arrest rates go up? >> i think a lot of it is how people feel. if people start to see more action on the part of the police and within the office of the da to hold offenders accountable, i think they should start feeling different. there will be data, of course, that they can look to to support see if we are doing everythin within our power to hold offenders accountable and promote public safety. but i hope that we can restore a feeling of safety as well. >> how do you measure that feeling? >> you know, can you walk outside and not be robbed? repeatedly? that is a part of what is happening. can we get the number of hate crimes to decline in this city? can we get people feeling like,

-- and i am hoping that we can see the numbers of those situations decline. >> by when? we have a few months until november en you are up again. do you expect that people should be able to see the effect of your work? >> myself and the attorneys in my office will work tirelessly to start seeing those effects immediately. im hoping that each and every day people see slow progress in that respect. >> it sounds like an i hope so. >> it is one day at a time and that is the best that we can do. go into court every day in make sure tht we are promoting accountability and we are using every power available to us to promote public safety and to deter criminal behavior.

>> so this is not just their radical. that you have had family interactions with the law and you had a personal experience that had to pivot into this work. >> yes. i was raised by my mother who is african-american and i grew up hearing my grandmother talk about losing her brother who died while in segregation. watching family members be told that they fit the description and held up for that. it was very personal to me to try to be within law enforcement to be a diverse representation from within. i practice corporate law for a number of years until i get pregnant with a son. my husband and i were very excited nine and i went into premature labor and our son passed away shortly after his

birth. his name was justice. i knew after he died i needed to find a sense of purpose and úi thought, finding justice for those in the criminal justice system would give me purpose. >> i am glad to hear that and i look forward to the work that you will be doing. i asked district attorney chesa boudin this question. it do you have a song or a power ballad that is keeping you going? >> it is the song grinding all my life. it will be a grind to get the city back to where it needs to be better i am committed to working tirelessly to doing so. >> it district attorney brooke jenkins, thank you . there have been more than 300 mass shootings in e united states. including tragedies in texas, buffalo, new york and the state capital of sacramento. the california governor and the legislature reacted swiftly.

the state already boosts some of both some of the strictest gun control laws but if you knew one been signed into law this last week. >> nearly every industry is held to account except one and that is the gun industry. the gun lobby spent millions and millions of dollars buying out politicians to shield themselves from any liability. kids, families and communities deserve to live without the worry of gun violence. >> the assembly member joins us now in studio. thank you, for being here. tell us about the new law you úauthored and what it will do? >> we are so proud to get this passed. we have been following this very closely and we have been working on it for about a year.

basically what it says is that the gun industry should be held accountable for their actions. just like every other industry is. whether you were in the auto industry or a toy manufacturer. if you are any kind of company in this country you have to be accountable to consumers. we are asking people to do the same thing with the gun industry. >> isn't there a federal protection for gun manufacturers? and will the new law will really stand up in the courts? >> it allows states to look at this particular issue. and that gave the gun industry a shield and we notice that states could definitely say that consumers could hold the industry accountable if they were negligent.

the national rifle association has a few things to say. i want to redo a section of the letter. they say they seek to frustrate gunowners by empowering toward attorneys and publicly motivated attorneys to drive firearm ammunition and accessories, wholesalers, and dealers out of business with frivolous litigation. how do you respond to the concern about business owners and if they will be unfairly targeted with frivolous lawsuits? >> i would respond by saying, we have a parent testifying at every hearing. her son was in a shooting at a jewish day care in the 90s and they started to sue the gun maker. as the case made its way through the court system they were optimistic. well when -- got passed, this case was dismissed.

this industry needs to be held accountable for the death and crnage put on the city streets. every industry is responsible for what happens. >> so, frivolous lawsuits. do you think they are not frivolous? go ahead and bag, bug and pester the gun manufacturers? >> well, you do have to be the victim of gun violence to sue. i don't see a lot of frivolous lawsuits but again, the lawsuits would have to be attached to shootings. i don't think that any of us feel that shootings on our streetsare frivolous. >> let's talk about the safety standards in california and where we are right now. i am curious about this because of what might be coming next. the giffords law center looks at

concerns of gun violence and it says that california is the safest state to be in. they are 25% less likely to die from a mass shooting than people in any other state in america. what is next in california? are we done with legislation around the gun industry? úor is >> it's too bad the gun lobby does not focus on what we are trying to focus on. i think they would be happy with more guns on our streets and what we see is the more guns in the hands, the worst things happen. there was that shooting two blocks from the capital. we do believe that california is safer but it is still not safe enough. if we have to worry about if it is safe tosend children to school, we really have not made our streets safe enough. >> i want to turn to another topic now. an issue you have been active on. last month the governor signed sb 54 and that put some of the

strong strongest limits on single use plastics. what are your thoughts on back? >> that bill was a work in progress for a number of years and it was because a ballot measure was coming down the pike that the industry finally said, we either get a ballot measure or we will get legislation that we can work on. i am really proud of senator allen d all of the work that the advocates did to get this groundbreaking legislation. it takes a bite out of single use plastics. we use way too many every day. we all think they are recyclable but they are not. what we want to do is see a reduction in single use plastics. but we also want to recycle thermoformed. we want to get those recycled. we need to reduce the use of

single use plastics but the ones in the waste stream, we need to figure out how to recycle those. >> okay. anything else you are working on that you would like to share x >> you know we talked about tolls and jaywalking. we want to make sure that streets are safety fe for that one of your reporters did, we took on legislation to make it easier for people to pay their tolls. >> assembly member phil ting, thank you, for being with us today. the first six months of the year have been the driest in california history. setting us up for another wildfire season. crews have been fighting a fire in yosemite that is threatening agent sequoia trees. joining us to discuss this are kqed climate editor, kevin

stark. kqed politics and government reporter , guy marzorati. and, grace toohey , los angeles times breaking news reporter. kevin, what is the latest in yosemite with this fire rex and what else she would be thinng about with wildfires? >> in california, if we have good news, let's take it. the washburn fire in yosemite is going to continue to burn but they say the giant sequoias will likely survive. they are probably going to benefit from this fire. more broadly in california, we have mega fires because a history of fire suppression around the state has loaded our forests with wood to burn. in yosemite, they have done a really good job of mitigation and doing controlled burns and for sending. fire scientists say that this is a model for the rest of the

state. our forests are overloaded and there is a lot of extra wood. this is a terrible drought and so all of that wood is dried out and it is baking in heat waves exacerbated by climate change. every summer in california it is 3 degrees hotter annually than it used to be so, when we have a dry year like this, it is setting the table for a big fire. >> obviously we look at climate change is something that is exacerbating the climate issue. when it comes to california we are a leader in reducing the carbon foot print and governor newsom has said by 2035, no more gas powered vehicles will be sold in california. i want to bring grace in here because she has been reporting on some california cities which are choosing to not construct any more gas stations.

grace, tell us a little bit about what you are learning. >> california is trying to move towards this future that is less reliant on fossil fuels and gas burning vehicles. some cities have decided it does not make sense to keep building new gas station so, the proposals do not change existing gas stations but it was petaluma who did this for the first time last year and officials have said, they did not realize they were starting a movement in climate policy but, that is exactly would happen. we hadfour other cities follow suit and it has been interesting to see that policy move across the state in the nation. los angeles is considering a similar proposal where they would not construct any new gas stations in the city. it will be interesting to see how that plays out in los angeles.

it is a little different from some other areas but, we have also heard there will be the oil and gas level lobby. it will be interesting to see how this movement continues to take off. >> thank you, so jik much. it is interesting to see the change. guy, i want to bring you into the conversation and talk about inflation, the economy. in a way they are related. gas prices have been rising and rising. we have seen a little bit of relief that we are definitely dealing with inflation costs like we have not seen in a long time. 9% consumer price index. i don't feel like i have heard much from the governor lately. where do we stand? >> i think in a lot of ways,

governor newsom is pivoting away from the economic issues in the election year and turn things towards the culture area. the economic siation for democrats is not good. we have inflation in real wages just plummeting. and there is not a lot of good news to share. even the things that he is pushing, but the stimulus checks, they will not make a measurable difference. and a lot of democrats feel like national leaders are not pushing back hard enough against the rollout of civil rights. and governor newsom is leaning into that. >> so why is he in dc this week? >> the main reason is to accept an award around education policy and to put himself on the national platform when it comes to the culture were conversation. when did the nation first learned about gavin newsom?

it was when he was pushing for the expansion of marriage rights. also, with senator chris murphy , he has led the push for gun control bills in washington. governor newsom, he signed a bunch of gun control bills right before he left. we really want to touch on public health. gray sky you have been talking with people in la about monkeypox. we know that covid-19 has been a concern and it continues to be. the ba.5 variant is very contagious. but, public health officials are pleading for more monkeypox vaines and say they do not have enough. >> yes.

definitely. unfortunately it is another concern that we have to think about. public health officials are saying, this is not a massive public health concern but it is something to keep in the back of your mind. we have 250 confirmed cases in california right now so compared to covid-19, it is much less but it is spreading among men who have sex with other men. focusing on those communities and trying to make sure that they are getting the access to vaccines and the public health response that they need. what has been interesting is i have been talking with a few men that got monkeypox and they are under quarantine and trying to deal with symptoms or if you have recovered. their main concern is, it is really hard to get a vaccine, no matter where you are. the government has admitted that they are struggling to get the vaccines and so they are not trickling down to the states

and counties that give them out. and these e mostly communities that are historically disenfranchised that are affected. >> what's a snapshot of what you have been seeing kevin? >> there are about 80 cases in san francisco and the bay. there are treatments for this, if you can get it. we had reporters out in the field all week and in the east bay there were lines around the corner at some clinics. in san francisco, san francisco general hospital, they ran out of the vaccine. we have city officials pushing the biden administration for more doses. th is a song and dance we have heard before. the demand is high and the supply is low. manufacturers are supposed to be making more. kevin stark, our science editor , thank you.

guy marzorati, our politics and government reporter and grace toohey from the la times, thank you. you may not have known that we have a special california úc telescope. it was partly assembled in southern california and many californian engineers worked on the project for years. this week something beautiful focuses on this remarkable piece of technology that taps into the collective human spirit of invention, exploration, and wonder.

♪ ♪ that last image, with all of those galaxies, nasa tells us that represents a tiny >> of the entire universe. and that just blows my mind. and that is the end of the show tonight. you can find kqed newsroom

online at kqed.org/newsroom and you can meet me on social media. we will see you back here next friday night. have a great weekend.

♪ geoff: good evening. i'm geoff bennett. tonight on "pbs news weekend"... climate crisis -- parts of europe are battling to control huge wildfires blamed on soaring temperatures. maria: i am doing very badly, very stressed and very badly. we are ally stressed. it's a shame how the fields are burning. geoff: then... crypto crash -- we look at cy's downturn and who isl ang the rden. life after roe -- with federal abortion rights overturned, we look at the long-term economic costs of abortion bans. those stories and the day's headlines on tonight's "pbs news weekend." ♪