And as part of that, I was going to track 311 encampment resolutions to see how well the city itself is responding to its own order to no longer confiscate those tents, to make sure that homeless people are protected from COVID-19 ... which really protects all of us, because if you have a homeless population that has contracted COVID like wildfires, that affects every one of us.

And that takes time. It takes time to go through every 311 resolution. And that's not something that you can get in a press release. It's not something you make one phone call to figure out. That's something that takes time.

The Broader Impact of Losing Local Reporters

When reporters are diminished, when there are fewer of us, the only way that the few remaining reporters are able to get the information that they need to put a story out there is through press conferences and statements from officials.

That is very one-dimensional. At the end of the day, if you're not going out into the community, if you're not talking to the people who were there, then you don't have a story about people — about what people are going through.

I have a plan to go and ride Muni in San Francisco and talk to the people who still have to work, the people who can't work from home and who can't protect themselves from COVID and who have to go out there — either because they're an essential worker or because they need the money and can't afford to take the time off to protect themselves and their families.

And that kind of reporting, when you're out there talking to people, is what's going to get lost as we lose more reporters and more time.

How He’s Handling This Personally

I might have spent about two or three hours laying on my couch, staring at the ceiling yesterday. That may have happened. I guess the news shocked me so much. I guess it just kind of startled me so much.