Silicon Valley Leadership Group names former Feinstein aide as CEO

Silicon Valley Leadership Group, the region’s major business group, has named Ahmad Thomas as its new CEO.

Thomas, a former Barclays executive and aide to Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., replaces longtime CEO Carl Guardino. Thomas starts Aug. 10.

“Our community has always had serious issues to tackle, but with unprecedented economic challenges brought on by a once-in-a-lifetime global pandemic and reckoning with systemic racism, we need to lead with industry-wide initiatives that drive both the national dialogue and bring about real, measurable change,” Thomas said in a statement.

Thomas said in an online press conference that he is focused on inclusion and diversity, including boosting opportunities for Black and brown job candidates, particularly at the executive level. Another priority is investment in public infrastructure. The Leadership Group has focused on measures to boost transit and affordable housing. Thomas also called for “immediate impact” to help mitigate the devastation caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

The group has 360 business members, including the region’s biggest tech companies including Apple, Facebook and Google, as well as companies like Microsoft which are significant employers in the area.

Kim Polese, chair of investment firm CrowdSmart and a member of the search committee, said at the press conference that Thomas’s vision for the future of the group made him stand out among candidates. She said it was also “meaningful and important” that Thomas is African American as businesses grapple with racial disparities, particularly in executive ranks.

“Ahmad showed a keen understanding of complex subjects, insight that has only grown over the years,” Feinstein said in a statement. “Ahmad’s practical understanding of how businesses interact with the community will be invaluable as he carries on the work of Carl Guardino, who made transportation, housing and career development cornerstone issues for the SVLG.”

While serving in Feinstein’s office, Thomas was a liaison between California and the Treasury Department during the 2008 financial crisis, according to the Bond Buyer newspaper. He joined Barclays in 2010 and co-led California municipal coverage.

Thomas lives in Menlo Park with his wife, Dr. Reena Thomas, a neurologist at Stanford Hospital, and their two sons.

https://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/Silicon-Valley-Leadership-Group-names-former-15429868.php

California needs to shut down again to contain coronavirus, Bay Area lawmaker warns

A Bay Area lawmaker is calling on Gov. Gavin Newsom to put most of California under a second shelter-in-place order, arguing that the state’s management of the coronavirus pandemic is spiraling out of control.

State Sen. Steve Glazer, D-Orinda, put forth a proposal Thursday that would require every county to keep residents at home again, except for essential trips, until the rate of positive tests over 14 days drops below 2% in both the county and its neighbors. As of Wednesday, the statewide positive test rate for the previous week was 7.6%.

Newsom announced the state’s largest single-day increase Wednesday of new confirmed coronavirus cases, 12,807, and California has surpassed New York for the most total cases of any state, though on a per-capita basis it is still far from the worst hot spot in the country.

“It’s clear that we have lost control of the coronavirus fight, and you don’t have to look very far to see it in the numbers,” Glazer said at a news conference Thursday. “This crisis is on the verge of spiraling out of control.”

It is not immediately clear how many of California’s 58 counties would have to shut down again under Glazer’s plan, but it would probably be the vast majority. Nearly two dozen counties exceed the state’s target threshold of 8% for positive tests, although the spread of the virus remains low in some rural areas. Modoc County, for example, has yet to report a single case.

Glazer said the more incremental steps Newsom has taken over the past month, including requiring Californians to wear face coverings in public and closing some businesses such as bars and indoor restaurants, have not contained a surging caseload. He said the governor should shift strategies to try to eradicate the virus completely, rather than simply managing its spread.

A former aide to Gov. Jerry Brown, Glazer was elected to the Legislature in 2015 from a district consisting largely of suburban cities in central and eastern Contra Costa County and southern Alameda County. He has been criticized in the past by liberal activists for being too business-oriented. But he said Thursday that the harsh economic effects of another stay-at-home order were necessary to get the coronavirus under control and avoid the continuing lurch between opening and closing that has defined the state’s response so far.

“Public health and the economy are handcuffed together. We can’t have one without the other,” Glazer said. “We have to do this right, because that’s the only way to bring our economy back.”

California was the first state to impose a stay-at-home order on March 19, a move experts have credited with slowing the initial outbreak. But under growing political pressure as the economy folded, Newsom began loosening restrictions in early May and allowed many counties to move at their own faster pace.

Glazer, who has been outspoken about concerns that the state was reopening too quickly, criticized Newsom on Thursday for ending his original shutdown before the state had contained the coronavirus. He said that to this day, California does not have adequate testing and contact tracing capacity to manage a safe resumption of public life.

“When we did begin to open up, none of the major indicators were declining,” he said. “It was clear the only place to go was up, and that’s what happened.”

https://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/article/California-needs-to-shut-down-again-to-contain-15429454.php