In this perspective piece, producer Mel Baker recounts some of his memories of the movement that resulted in the creation of the AIDS quilt, which has now returned to the Bay Area. He says the callous eight-minute-long killing of George Floyd at the hands of a Minneapolis Police officer in the midst of a pandemic, which has been the catalyst for a worldwide demand for police accountability and long denied racial justice, seems to have a certain rhyme with the callous disregard for an epidemic that was initially killing despised minorities and spurred the LGBTQ community and its allies to action.

The United States Postal Service is running out of money — the agency requested $75 billion in emergency funding in April, saying it would be out of money by September. Legislators had planned to give the postal service $25 billion in the CARES Act. But the Trump administration blocked the funding. Local members of the American Postal Workers Union staged a car caravan Tuesday to raise awareness of the impending financial calamity for the agency. They said they hoped to remind supporters to call on their Senators to allocate $25 billion in a new stimulus package to the Postal Service. They also rejected the notion that the agency should be reshaped to turn a profit, and emphasized the role of the service in the November elections, in which Californians will vote by mail.

Thousands have been protesting police brutality and racism in cities across the world, since a Minneapolis officer killed George Floyd in late May. Last Friday, marches and other demonstrations were planned throughout the day in San Francisco and around the Bay Area to mark Juneteenth, a day that commemorates the ending of slavery in the U.S. San Francisco Public Press reporter Brian Howey talked with demonstrators about how they were reflecting on the day and their feelings about the sustained momentum of these recent protests.

As San Francisco marks the 50th Anniversary of the first LGBTQ rights march, the program “Out in the Bay” is returning to the air on KSFP, a radio station created by the San Francisco Public Press. “Out in the Bay” returns after a four-year hiatus. Mel Baker, producer and contributor for “Civic,” spoke with “Out in the Bay” founding producer and host Eric Jansen and producer Truc Nguyen about the show and the parallels between the LGBTQ rights movement and the broader fight for civil rights.

As San Francisco improves its ability to mitigate the spread and treat the effects of the novel coronavirus, the city is also grappling with the fallout of its economic shutdown. Dr. Grant Colfax, director of the city’s Department of Public Health, said at a virtual press conference on Tuesday that the city has rapidly expanded its testing and contact tracing capacity and improved its supplies of personal protective equipment. Listen to the full press conference audio here.

Hi listeners — we just wanted to let you know why you won't be seeing many new episodes this week. But keep an eye out for one special interview with the producers of Out in the Bay!

A few days after a new city-approved tent encampment, known as a “safe sleeping village,” opened at Everett Middle School, "Civic" talked with District 8 Supervisor Rafael Mandelman and some people at nearby encampments to get their perspectives on the site, which will be in operation for just six weeks.

The uprising sparked by the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer has turned a national spotlight on the idea of defunding police, and locally, Mayor London Breed and Supervisor Shamann Walton have announced they are developing a proposal for something in that vein. “Civic” spoke with people demonstrating about whether the idea of defunding the police department appealed to them, how drastically they would reduce funding, and what they would like to see money reinvested in.

Omorede “Rico” Hamilton, a street violence intervention program coordinator and community organizer, has been addressing crowds of hundreds at recent protests against police brutality and racism at San Francisco’s City Hall. In this interview, Hamilton expands on some of his remarks made at one demonstration and makes a case for addressing some of the damage done by racism with reparations.