Covering Coronavirus and the New Normal

With the global coronavirus outbreak bearing down on us, the Public Press is committed to serving the community with relevant, timely and accurate information about public health and the response by local institutions.

We pledge to remain nimble in our news coverage and provide clarity about important developments where needed.

We’re focused on following storylines we have tackled for a long time — vulnerable populations including the homeless, the housing insecure, youth and those reliant on public health services — and safety information of direct utility to the general public.

We realize it will be a long time before many people feel comfortable attending public in-person events. We are postponing most of the half-dozen gatherings we were planning for the coming months, and are exploring hosting virtual public meetings and online forums. Stay tuned for details.

Meanwhile, we’ve been busy this week breaking or matching important stories on deadline:

San Francisco schools are shutting down for several weeks to prevent community spread.
The Department of Public Works is still seizing homeless people’s property on the streets.
San Francisco’s public defender is calling on police to scale back enforcement activities to reduce person-to-person contacts during arrests and in jail.
Nurses expressed dismay at poor communication by hospital leaders.
San Francisco State University and other schools are scrambling to sort out closure policies that leave some students stranded without housing.
Our team at KSFP continues to broadcast updates on terrestrial radio on 102.5 FM, streaming online and through the daily news program “Civic,” also available as a podcast. Subscribe for the latest updates.

For a decade, the Public Press has produced award-winning accountability and solutions journalism for San Francisco and the Bay Area. We are ad-free, and need your help to pay for our coverage of public health and long-term investigative reporting projects.

Please make a donation today to help us provide more in-depth and timely coverage of the COVID-19 crisis — and report what local leaders and the general public can do to keep our community safe.

Thank you so much,