According to this report from the Merc, the Commonwealth Club’s Silicon Valley chapter scored big in getting an appearance from none other than commish Bud Selig. Selig is scheduled to speak September 7 at the McEnery Convention Center, where he will speak on numerous topics including steroids and expansion. The most locally intriguing issues are, [...]

Yesterday, SB 4 passed easily in the State Assembly’s Appropriations Committee, 13-4. The three Bay Area Assembly members on the committee (Mark Leno, Johan Klehs, Joe Nation) all voted yes. Now, it should be on to a third reading and a vote in the Assembly. Afterwards, the heavily-amended bill has to go back to the [...]

CBS-5′s Hank Plante hosted a Charlie Rose-style roundtable including the mayors of the three big Bay Area cities: Jerry Brown, Ron Gonzales, and Gavin Newsom. The discussion covered a multitude of issues including crime, the Bay Bridge, gay marriage, and homelessness. Inevitably, Plante brought up the issue of competition among the three cities, and that [...]

The recent surge in the standings helped boost the A’s turnstile performance during the first week of the 12-game August homestand. As expected, attendance cooled somewhat with the weather and the arrival of the Baltimore Orioles and Kansas City Royals, but the average attendance for the homestand was still excellent, at 32,555 per game. To [...]

Two articles by the Trib’s Paul Rosynsky today. First off is a report with quotes from numerous property owners who may be willing to relocate if the price is right, but also hate eminent domain with a passion. Next is an article detailing a request from Lew Wolff to the City of Oakland, asking for [...]

The Chronicle has a new editorial that has the same tone as Thursday’s Tribune op-ed. I imagine Wolff must be a pretty good poker player, though I imagine he’s more likely to play hold-em, stud, or baseball than no-peekie. Then again, with so many Saturday evening games, perhaps he’s a fan of night baseball. Eric [...]

The CoCo Times’ Guy Ashley mentions an important nugget not previously reported from the 8/12′s JPA meeting: Though Wolff said the team is open to all possible alternative sites, the preferred one appears to involve a compact new A’s stadium in the Coliseum’s north parking lot, and a massive new parking facility on the south [...]

Prior to a vote in the Appropriations committee, SB 4 was amended again. This time, there’s a wholesale change in how the funding system works. The biggest change is the elimination of the California Public Performance Facilities Authority, the body that would have approved or rejected any stadium or venue projects that applied for funding [...]

Todays’ editorial from the Oakland Tribune shows optimism in the ballpark plan, but withholds judgment on it until more details come out. An important issue that is brought up in the piece is the High St/880 interchange. Will it have to be revamped to handle additional residential, commercial, and event-related traffic? Would the same have [...]

The ballpark site photo overview is now available. The file is slightly over 1 MB and is in PDF (Acrobat) form. A permanent link has been created in the sidebar as well. Here’s a sample photo: In tangentially related news, L.A.’s Staples Center (owned by Anschutz Entertainment Group) is getting $10 million in video and [...]