Crosscurrents

Today, we’re in the Sierra Peaks to hear how snowmelt may contribute tiny bits of plastic to Bay Area drinking water. Then, the backstory behind a seasonal San Francisco show.

The Bay Area gets much of it's drinking water from the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Back in 2023, we saw record snow fall in the Sierras. And that was followed by record snow melt. And with that melt came… microplastics.  At the time, reporter Joshua Sirotiak went up to the mountains to find out what researchers are looking for in our drinking water.

While the Bay Area doesn’t see much snow, one place you CAN find some right now is.. Southeast San Francisco! An annual tradition is taking place these days in a transformed arena off Geneva Street. In a space once reserved for livestock and cowboys, the streets of Victorian England come alive. It’s the Great Dickens Christmas Fair at the Cow Palace!

Every week, locals are showing up outside San Francisco’s immigration courthouse to protest. Today, how some neighbors have come together to try and stop deportations. Then, we’ll hear from people who provided vital care during the AIDS epidemic in San Francisco.

It seems like every day we see another headline about an ICE mass deportation. While legal advocates are doing everything in their power to support immigrants, some locals have taken matters into their hands. One group in San Francisco is providing support for people attending immigration court.

December is HIV/AIDS Awareness Month. So we’re going to go back in time to 1988. It was the height of the AIDS crisis. Marcy Fraser and Michelle Francis worked together in hospice care in San Francisco. In this StoryCorps episode from 2015, they look back on the moment their friendship was cemented for life.  Then, Karen Van Dine was a prayer counselor in a healing circle at a gay ministry in the...

Today, a new episode of Sidewalk Stories about how it's getting harder to live in a vehicle in the Bay Area. Plus, signing up for summer camp, monarch migrations, and a poem.

We’re quickly approaching the Winter Solstice. But today, we wanted to bring you a little slice of summer. Camp Mather, San Francisco’s oldest summer camp, opens its 2026 lottery registration today ! In 2024, KALW’s Molly Blair Salyer went away to camp, to capture a moment of Camp Mather’s 100th summer.

Every year, the western monarch butterfly migrates from the coast between Santa Cruz and San Diego to spend the summer along rivers in Oregon, Washington and Idaho. Then, in winter, they do the whole thing again, in reverse. When one musician heard about the plight of the monarchs, he decided to take a radical step to help them along their journey… by taking the trip with them. This morning we bri...

In this segment of Sidewalk Stories, we hear from people who live in RVs as Bay Area cities are increasingly cracking down on vehicle homes. 

Today we hear about how residents are preparing to pass a tougher version of the naturalization civics test. Then, a grandmother writes a children’s book with her grandson, and he has an idea for the main characters. Plus, preserving memories when family comes together.

For lawful residents yearning to become naturalized citizenships, learning U.S. history and civics is one of the barriers to passing a ten question exam and it just got harder. 

Here’s Al Robles reading an excerpt from his poem, “Cold Mountain in Chinatown,” which he performed at the Poetry Center at San Francisco State on November 10th, 1976. 

Author Stephanie Wildman’s children's books have centered around three characters Flor, Roberto and Luis who are adventurous siblings. But her latest book Story Power is different- she  co-wrote it with her nine-year-old grandson Simon Wildman Chung.

Thanksgiving week makes us feel… Different things. About history, about family, about memory... Back in 2018 reporter Margaret Katcher brought a recorder to her holiday table. But when she turned it on, she found herself wondering about her impulse to document the moment…

Today, we’ll get an update on housing, and more, from District 3 City supervisor Danny Sauter. Then, a woman in prison wrestles with what to do, after hearing her brother has been shot. And, acclaimed Oakland author Caro de Robertis is the keeper of an oral history collection of personal stories from trans and gender nonconforming elders of color.

A a story from Uncuffed and the California Institution for Women about a woman in prison who hears that her brother has been shot and wrestles with what to do.

Caro De Robertis is an author based in Oakland, and a creative writing professor at San Francisco State. They’re mostly known for their magical works of fiction. But for their most recent project, they wanted to focus on the true stories of queer elders of color. The book is “So Many Stars: An Oral History of Trans, Nonbinary, Genderqueer, and Two-Spirit People of Color.” 

Today, an excerpt from the award winning episode of The Stoop, ‘This ain't Texas, it's Africa.’ 

The work of disability advocacy just lost one of its strongest voices. Today, we remember Alice Wong. Then, we’ll hear a story about navigating the pain and stigma of losing loved ones to suicide.

San Francisco disability justice activist, writer, and MacArthur ‘Genius’ Grant recipient, Alice Wong, died last week at the age of 51. We honor her and her lasting impact with this tribute. 

In this story, we hear from Palo Alto loss survivors as they navigate the complicated emotions around a loved one’s death and what it means for them to keep going.

A “tree army” from the 1930s helped build today’s Tilden and other East Bay regional parks. The program’s impact can still be felt today. Then, a story about how a friend can help you see, and change, yourself. It's a new story from California Institution for Women. Plus, a poem!

In this third episode of The Public Works series, reporter Sheryl Kaskowitz makes some surprising discoveries about the history of the East Bay Regional Park District. In the 1930s, the federal government’s Civilian Conservation Corps left its mark on the landscape, and their work continues in a different form today.

A story from Uncuffed producer Daphnye Luster at the California Institution for Women about how a friend can help you see yourself and change yourself.