Stories you shouldn’t miss for Dec. 19, 2017:
1. The median home price in the Bay Area soared to $910,350 in November, a 12.5 percent increase over the previous year, reports Richard Scheinin of the Mercury News$, citing a new analysis by the California Association of Realtors. The median home price in Alameda County jumped to $880,000, a 10 percent increase over 2016. And it rose 8 percent in Contra Costa County to $615,000. The Bay Area “continues to reflect dire market conditions of tight supply and low affordability,” the report said.
2. The GOP-controlled Congress is poised to seriously damage Obamacare as part of its tax overhaul plan, a move that threatens to greatly increase healthcare costs for most Americans, The New York Times$ reports. The Republican tax package, which both houses of Congress are expected to pass this week, eliminates the individual mandate in the Affordable Care Act, a provision that requires people to purchase health insurance. Analysts say the elimination of the provision likely will lead to healthy young people not buying insurance, thereby raising rates for everyone else.
3. A former 18-year Navy pilot said he spotted what appeared to be alien space ship off the coast of California in 2004, and his story is part of a revelation that the Pentagon operated a secret program to track UFOs starting in 2007, the Washington Post$ reports. ‘“It was a real object, it exists, and I saw it,’” former Cmdr. David Fravor told the Post. “Asked what he believes it was, 13 years later, he was unequivocal. ‘Something not from the Earth,’ he said.”
4. An off-duty Richmond police officer shot up a San Francisco hotel over the weekend and was acting erratically and “talking about spirits,” the East Bay Times$ reports, citing 911 dispatch recordings. No one was injured in the shooting, and Sgt. Phillip Sanchez was placed on administrative leave after being booked on felony criminal charges.
5. Despite marketing claims that brain games, diet, drugs, exercise, and vitamins can delay or prevent the onset of Alzheimer’s disease, a new comprehensive study concludes that nothing can prevent cognitive decline later in life, reports Lisa Krieger of the Mercury News$, citing research U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research & Quality and published in the Annals of Internal Medicine.
6. And plans for a major new shoreline park with beaches, meadows, and expansive views of the bay near the foot of the Bay Bridge are moving forward, reports Denis Cuff of the East Bay Times$. The 170-acre park will cost an estimated $170 million and will completed in several years.
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