tonight on kqed newsroom, deadly downpours have continued to flood california with more storms on the horizon. is this a result of climate change? we consider what all this wet stuff tells us about our shifting weather patterns. another major company laying off thousands of employees as governor newsom warns of a major deficit in this year's budget. plus we remember the life and times of a radical black bay area icon. in this week's, something beautiful. coming you from kqed

headquarters , this january 13, 2023. >> hello and welcome. this is kqed newsroom and i am priya david clemens. this has been a difficult time of evacuations and tragedies caused by the ongoing massive infall. across the state 19 people have died as a result of the storm. thousands of others have been evacuated to avoid potential flooding and landslides and hundreds of thousands more have lost electricity. meteorologist say we should expect at least another week of wet weather. joining me now to discuss the dangers and put this weather into context are kqed science reporter, danielle venton and san francisco chronicle newsroom reporter, gerry diaz. i know you have all been out in the field reporting on this weather , danielle you spend some time up at russian river. what was it like up there? >> this is an area that sees

floods. a lot of people are prepared. they have a game plan that they go to when flooding is expected. it is a big challenge for people who are unhoused or who úmay live in trailers or rvs in lower lying areas. i spoke with an organization who had sent outreach workers out for days before the storm trying to reach those who are unhoused, maybe living in encampments, riverbeds, creek beds. encouraging them to move to higher ground or come to shelters. i also visited an encampment of people living in rvs and trailers. there were about 50 people including about 20 kids. they had been there for about two weeks, really getting tired of it. i met this man, he had just moved to the area from the florida keys. he has twice lost all his possessions and hurricanes and then he comes here, sort of caught off guard

by how easily flooding can get bad in this area. he was hanging in there but going through a rough time. >> how hard to lose everything and come here and go through this again. gerry, what are you seeing as you have been out in the field over these last couple of weeks? >> out in the field we have been dealing with a lot of circumstances. flooding essentially covered soma and the mission. widespread flooding in other areas of the bay area including some of the on and off ramps. overall we have been seeing a lot of flooding in both the urban interface and around the urban corridor. also a lot of flooding in more remote areas. in the santa cruz mountains we have seen a lot of debris and a lot of damage on roads as these floodwaters have essentially just crept in to some of these inland valleys. we have seen a lot of damage out that way from the combination of both prolonged

flooding periods, and a lot of strong wind. out in sacramento just this past weekend we had some very intense wind on top of the flooding and that has caused more road closures in the area. all and all we have seen some pretty intense weather, damages do not only across the bay area but across the state. >> gerry, the meteorologist that the san francisco chronicle has hired, speaking to what we are all seeing in terms of changing weather patterns and how important that is in our lives. tell us what weare looking at in terms of the historical rainfall totals we are seeing. these are really records now? >> to put it into context, from the new year's eve storm to where we are now. we have seen that second wettest. in the last couple of weeks. with new year's eve producing the wettest day.

if you think about that we are talking about a time that goes all the way back to the 1840s. very historic in that context but also another perspective, we have not seen this type of rain in northern california since the great flood of 1862. that really tells us that this current extreme atmospheric river series as we call it, that is essentially brought us rainfall we have not seen in the region since the gold rush. what that tells us is we are going to be dealing with some long-term consequences from this, not only in terms of the flooding angle but the environmental side. a lot of these areas are just recovering from a lot of the fires we experience just a couple of years ago are now they are dealing with the rosen erosion and runoff. >> tells about the government response. has the state done enough to help people in these flood ravaged areas? is there more they can and want to do? another governor has declared a state of emergency.

what does that mean for us? >> the state has seen many big disasters in the last decade or so. it fairly is a robust response, governor newsom requested president biden to declare an emergency. that was granted. which has been extended to about half of the counties in the state of california. that assistance comes in multiple waves from direct assistance, staffing, financial assistance will be available. will it be enough? these are really bad storms. it won't take away the damage or make people feel entirely whole again but the state is doing what it can, at the moment. i have not seen too many complaints that it has not been enough. the state and federal government are alsocooperating on a flat operation center. which is getting the best forecasting they can, and offering practical help such as

getting sandbags. >> this is not over yet . we are looking at several more days of rain. gerry, what are you seeing for hot spot that you are worried about coming up? i hear about monterey turning into an island? >> we have seen a lot of more of those issues. from the flood waters in the mountains but also in the sierra which is another mountain range. a lot of that runoff is now flooding into the salinas river so we are dealing with a situation where highway 1 and highway 68 will arteries for the monterey peninsula are at risk for flooding. the latest forecast tells us a lot of the flooding could reach moderate levels by this weekend. that raises a concern as to whether or not we will keep those roadways open for residents to come in and out of the region. we also have landslide damage along the big surf coast which

is blocking the southern end of highway 1. this is something we have not seen since the 90s when we had a similar instance when the salinas river over spilled and now in this repeat scenario. we are getting close to reaching that moderate rivers each for the salinas river. >> i have been around long enough that i have seen lots of rain come to the bay area in the past. we have seen flooding happened before and when we look at those historic models we see this is not the largest amount of rain that has ever fallen. however, these weather patterns are different than what we are used to in recent history. immediately what comes to mind úfor many people is this is a direct result of human caused climate change. daniel, is that what we are seeing here? >> we are seeing storms that are in line with what we have historically seen. but also climate changes also

making these extreme whiplash events where we go from very, very dry times two very intense wet periods. we can expect to see more of this whiplash effect in the future and you need to start preparing for that. >> the differences , it is all happening in a shorter period of time than having rain over many, many months. we are getting these short intense storms? >> climate change can make this whiplash more intense and more frequent. >> what does that mean in terms of the drought we have been in? when we are getting all this water coming down, it seems like there has been some good news. many reservoirs are being replenished and we are seeing our snowpack that is at a much higher level than it was last year. we are seeing some good news in terms of the drought? >> absolutely. all of this rainfall is helpful in terms of water supply in our drought. but it is i mean we are necessarily out of the woods yet. we still need to have a conservation mind-set.

>> gerry if you can talk to us specifically, as a meteorologist about this route and what it means and why we aren't out of it yet. >> to danielle's point abou the drought monitor. we have seen some improvement. we have gone from exceptioal drought to tell us that at the very least we are entering a stage where the drought conditions are improving. we aren't out of the woods because we have such a deficit. we need so much rain to account for this past few years of drought. to danielle's point we are in a situation where we have these extreme y conditions that go on for a couple of years. the fall of 2019 up to the rought of 2022 now where very exceptional lack of rain essentially. the atmospheric first is what we call it. the lack of rain over a period of time and to go from that to this whiplash of extreme rainfall over a short span of

time. the best way to describe it is we are in a warming climate. the atmosphere is able to hold much more water. the warmer the air, the re water it can hold. unfortunately in a warming world people see instances where you think about in terms of a cup of water, as the water builds in the atmosphere if the cup is larger it will take a longer period of time before it eventually spills over. now that we are seeing that play out here with the extreme rainfall events after prolonged drought conditions. >> just a follow-up, this rainfall may help with the surface waters, snowpack, what is in our reservoirs, unless we can slow that water and let it sink into the ground it will not help us recharge our groundwater as much as we would like to see in california has relied on its groundwater resources enormously. >> we hear sometimes this is what we are seeing is a new rmal. what does that mean? is is now the new static

pattern we should expect going forward in years to come? >> there is never no new normal that we will enter. we are entering a new abnormal. climate change will be inherently unpredictable. >> what does that mean gerry, weather pattern modeling? are we going to be able to predict what is to come? >> i will speak a little bit on the challenge we have been having with these extreme weather events. this past storm we forecasted about 2 to 3 inche for san francisco and i was already on the treme end of our forecast. we ended up with 5.5 inches by the end of that afternoon on new year's eve. this past weekend we are forecasting gusts of about 50 to 60 miles an hour and we saw areas exceed 70 miles per hour. we are dealing with a changing climate where the way to calibrate our weather models has to be put into consideration. not only are we dealing with these extremes, we are dealing with models struggling to capture that and it is not just for weather events.

this past heat wave, the large heat dome that formed over california. it was manny's many deviations from the norm. the calibrations needed to be calculated because it was so much hotter. we ended up at 116 degrees in fairfield. that begs the question, how will we adjust our technology in the adjusting climate. >> the new abnormal as you said, danielle. okay, danielle venton with kqed and gerry diaz with the san francisco chronicle. thank you both for being here. >> thank you. let's turn to the financial outlook. we ended last year with a series of layoffs at several big technology companies and this week showed us the pain is not over yet. another 18,000 tech workers lost her job at places like amazon and salesforce in the first few weeks of january.

more layoffs on the way according to industry analyst. there will be cuts to government services as well as the pullback hits the state budget. joining me now is the san francisco bureau chief from marketwatch, danielle venton and marketwatch senior reporter, levi sumagaysay. thank you both for being here. >> thank you for having us. >> tellus about these layoffs. how is it being felt in california? >> the layoffs are happening at big global companies to focus on text companies. amazon has a presence here so hundreds of people so far have lost their jobs in california that work for amazon, but also salesforce which is the biggest employer in san francisco. they are laying off thousands of people and those cuts began this week. they will be effective in march and more to come. ceo said they are going to be

cutting in the coming weeks and mpanies like cisco and meta are also cutting thousands of people but only hundred have shown up in the filings with the state appellate on you. they, i think this first quarter is going to be when we feel it. when me see the positions being cut and when the businesses that rely on these text companies, other businesses that rely on these tech companies will start to feel the pain. >> there are also some ways that mpanies are also discouraging workers perhaps ? from coming back and staying in those positions. disney, for example implementing a return to work, four days a week policy. >> many of the text companies úhave already done that. they have three date work week policies. apple has that. google. i believe apple is tuesday and thursday and your deceit one

other day. disney is late to that but going further with four days a week. i think we are seeing as more and more throughout the economy and companies outside of tech. because these companies have spent millions if not billions on these giant palaces down in the south bay to that they were actually ahead of the curve. we are seeing that ripple through some the other companies as well. a lot of that is to force them to either come back or leave. if you can force people out at this point, you don't have to lay them off. you can oid layoffs. i think a lot of managers and top execs are saying let's put the screws to them a bit and see who leaves and we can get around it that way. >> it seems like we are hearing interesting news on the national picture and terms of inflation rates. that it is finally slowing. if this trend holds, what does that mean for purchasing power over this coming year, interest rate over the coming years? >> and has declined but it is still more than 6% since last

year. we are still seeing pretty strong inflation. i don't know if the fed will pull back maybe they signaled a bit. inthe 70s we have this high inflation and the government pulled back and we had a really bad economy. there will be some people fighting to keep going and that will be really where to watch. it will certainly hurt low earners. that is what we are seeing through this. while the tech workers who get laid off are probably going to find a job pretty quickly at another tech. the people who get laid off at our low earners will have a lot more trouble finding a job maybe and they are seeing the higher prices that aren't expected to stop. we are seeing fall off. >> for text, at least here in the bay area. most jobs are filled, right? we are pretty good at having full employment. >> the unemployment rate is under 5% i believe. it'll be interesting to see in the next few months like jeremy

said, the tech workers who are getting laid off may have some cushion. they may be able to find a job really quickly. the lower wage earners who also help make these tech companies run, some of them are losing their jobs. twitter, janitors have lost their jobs. >> bus drivers , during covid as well. something that was hard. >> it'll be rough but i do think there are a lot of people out there and a lot of openings. we haven't seen a drop off in job postings. there are still jobs out there, we will see how that goes further on and if there are more layoffs. i still think google will lay off people at some point. we saw this week reports of a couple of their subsidiaries writing off people. they have been adding throughout and some of these other places have announced

cuts. i wouldn't be surprised to see some kind of cut from google and there are already rumors of at least 10,000 jobs being cut there. i think as long as he still have some one looking, that could balance out. >> i think one interesting upside for low earning workers is this trend toward bosses forcing their white-collar employees back to work. that will mean that more buildings will have to be cleaned and so that might be some sort of upside. >> right, but it could be last year the state was able to help many californians by providing a surplus payment to help with inflation. the rising prices. this year that looks pretty unlikely. jeremy when you are on last time, you warned us that yes, there is a great budget surplus,

but next year it will probably be a different picture and this week that prediction came true. governance and let us know that the state budget is not only smaller than it was last year, but it is also $22 billion in the red. tell us a little bit about what happened here and how it turned so fast. >> 2021 was an outlier economically. but one of the ways it was the biggest outlier is that it was a record year for -- you remember the company called snowflake had one of the biggest ipos and we had all this money coming in and it wasn't from the companies themselves but from the people. it was from the tech workers who got the ipo and had all this extra cash. people buying houses with their snowflake money. all these companies and everything fell off in 2022. the market completely shut down in 2022 so all that money got shut down. yes, we took that nearly hundred billion dollars surplus in 2022 and get it back out.

the governor decided to give it to californians as he was facing a recall and actually did it before he went up for re- election. so now we are in a deficit and we could have kept 20 billion of that hundred billion and we could have planned a little more for this type of situation where all last year as those ipos went happening people were saying, including myself we are not going to have the money ne year. >> we do have reserves in the state and governor newsom has said , we are in a very volatile moment he says we are not touching the reserves right now. we'll wait and see how the economy unfolds. levi , give us an idea of what is getting cut and where we will feel it. >> i think one place you mentioned was in the investment into the electric vehicle infrastructure. which, i think will affect us & because ere are a couple of deadlines coming up in a couple of years. where manufacturers are supposed

to transition into not selling gas fueled cars. if there is going to be an influx of electric vehicles, we need the infrastructure for that. that is one place and i think also, there is going to be some cutting and spending on transportation which will be interesting. transit has suffered in the past couple of years as we know because of the pandemic. so, as more cuts happen, that will hit low income workers who need buses and trains to get around. >> let's talk about the largest consumer tech show. jeremy you are just there last week. tell us what was new and exciting and what we should be watching for any year ahead. >> artificial intelligence and

machine learning are the buzzwords. we seen some of that. some people were chanting a lot about it and where i struggle to see is actually how this will affect people's lives. ai is improving a lot of services we already know. but to a level that'll actually make an economic impact, you don't really see it yet. when we brought up the iphone yorty had apps. now we have all the ways to do things with ai and machine learning we ven't seen what a killer app is yet. i believe it will be autonomous driving but that is still years away. autonomous driving, is still years away at this point. we are starting to see some robotech stuff here in california and some more advanced driver system come into cars ke mercedes. they're hoping to have a hands off automated driving system in place. we are seeing advances

there, but you are going to buy a car that will be a robo taxi for you. the future is still years away, actually any. >> a new law in california this year. >> they are supposed to basically, it is a truth in advertising law. tesla has self driving technology that it calls one autopilot and two full self driving. the california law says you have to be truthful about what your car can do. that is pretty much in that's tesla because it is full self driving capability that some of his customers pay a lot of money for, is not full self driving. >> the dmv is also looking at that. >> i know there is some laws

about transparency. people can take a look at that on the kqed website. i appreciate your time. jeremy owens, levi sumagaysay with marketwatch. thank you for coming in. angela davis is an outspoken social activist and bay area icon. in the 1970s she became known as a prominent face of the black power movement nationwide. during that time she was also embroiled in a highway file high profile murder case. she was acquitted. later in life she had a -- and exhibit at the oakland museum of california. featuring davis' sometimes polarizing impact and influence. ♪ ♪ ♪ number ♪ ♪

♪ ♪ ♪ >> what a treasure trove of documents and images.

that is the end of our show for tonight. you can email us or always find us online or on twitter and you can reach me on social media. thank you for joining us. you will have a great weekend. try to stay dry.

>> tonight on pbs news weekend, by now, pay later. what you need to know about the interest-free payment plans that are exploding in popularity. then, research into the connection between air pollution and degenerative brain diseases. and, my conversation with martin luther king iii on his father's legacy and the meaning of martin luther king jr. day. >> every year i'm asked the question, have we achieved the dream that your dad envisioned? and my answer, unfortunately, every year is we didn't achieve it last year. but every january, we have an opportunity to start anew.