How You Helped Us Cover More Corners of California

Editor’s note: Starting next week, California Today will have a new look. It will still arrive in your inbox every weekday morning and feature a curated collection of New York Times articles about the state, but it will no longer include a staff-written introduction each day. For more details, please read Monday’s newsletter.

It goes without saying that California is enormous. The third-largest state in the country by area, it stretches for nearly 800 miles from its northern to its southern border. It also has the biggest population of any state, the largest variety of plants and animals, and a seemingly endless number of communities and places to explore.

When I started writing California Today in August 2021, I had stepped foot in probably just 20 of California’s 58 counties, despite living in the state for nearly three decades. I decided that I wanted to spotlight lesser-known places by reporting from all 58 counties in my time on the newsletter. But having lived only in Los Angeles and now the Bay Area, I needed your help.

In my first week on the job, Joan Voight invited me to her house in the wine country town of Healdsburg to see firsthand the city’s creative drought fix. On a dry, 95 degree afternoon in Sonoma County, we squeezed through the tall stalks of her family’s thriving backyard vegetable garden, which had been fed by treated wastewater.

I was invigorated to be doing field reporting again after more than a year of pandemic restrictions, but also to have a journalism job where my connection to readers was so potent. When so much of news reporting centers on tragedy, it felt particularly meaningful to meet real people and walk around communities in good times, not only during the hardest weeks of their lives.

So a few months later, when I wanted to write about San Diego, I invited you all to tell me what to cover. That resulted in some of my favorite stories in this job.

Bruce Higgins recommended visiting Chicano Park, a stretch of land under freeway overpasses that came about as part of the Latino struggle for civil rights. The park also has a stunning collection of outdoor murals, one of the largest in the United States.

Also in San Diego, Jill Spitzer asked me to come watch her senior women’s basketball team. On the sidelines in a Y.M.C.A. gym, I witnessed women in their 70s, 80s and 90s dribble, shoot and score. They were an impressive, tight-knit and charming group. One of the oldest players, then 92, told me she had gone skydiving for 90th birthday: “There was a man strapped to my back. How bad could it be?”

From then on, I came to rely on your questions and suggestions to guide me through California. And I’m forever grateful.

This year alone, based on your recommendations, I’ve visited the lone volcano in the otherwise flat Central Valley, a desolate cabin in the Sierra Nevada foothills where Mark Twain kick-started his career, and one of the oldest Chinese temples in North America.

As of today, I’ve reported for The Times from 50 counties in California, and will continue to try to reach my target as I move into a new assignment as a Times national correspondent based in San Francisco. If you have tips for what to cover in Humboldt, Siskiyou, Del Norte, Mariposa, Mono, Trinity, Modoc or Alpine Counties, email me at [email protected]. I would love your help.

The rest of the news

• Coronavirus levels in California wastewater have reached a “very high” level, according to wastewater data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Southern California

• Lee Baca, the former Los Angeles County sheriff who was reported missing from his San Marino home over the weekend, was found safe at a restaurant in El Monte early Monday, The Los Angeles Times reports.

• Fires in Southern California over the weekend burned a combined 30,000 acres and forced more than 1,000 evacuations.

• Winston, the second-oldest living gorilla in a U.S. zoo, died at 52 at San Diego Zoo Safari Park, The San Diego Union-Tribune reports.

Central California

• There have been nearly 60 mass layoffs or closures announced so far this year across the central San Joaquin Valley, The Fresno Bee reports.

Northern California

• Officials in San Francisco’s Chinatown argue that the potential addition of a bike lane could lead to traffic and safety issues, The San Francisco Examiner reports.

And before you go, some good news

Readers of Travel + Leisure voted on their Top 100 hotels across the world. California had the most locations in the United States that made the cut.

Ranking at No. 8, the Pendry Newport Beach opened just last fall. Other notable favorites included the Mission Pacific Beach Resort in Oceanside, which came in at No. 11, and Villa Mara in Carmel-By-The-Sea, which was ranked No. 37.

Thanks for reading. I’ll be back tomorrow. — Soumya

P.S. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword.

Halina Bennet and Briana Scalia contributed to California Today. You can reach the team at [email protected].

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