Students at Encinal High School walked out of their classrooms today in response to proposed budget cuts. Last night the school board held a tense meeting that went well into the wee hours of the morning, voting to increase class sizes by cutting advanced placement classes, most high school sports, music in the elementary schools, and counselors in the middle schools, reports NBC 11. Students walked out today, marching straight over to the school......

We've got some follow-up news on Blotter items covered previously! In response to allegations by deceased Stanford engineering grad student May Zhou's father earlier this week that his daughter's death was a homicide and not self-inflicted, the Santa Rosa police released additional information from their investigation. Namely, they said they have videotape and receipts of her buying four bottles of sleeping pills from local drugstores in two days, and they have an email she sent......

Well, just to follow up on yesterday's day of violence, we can't find anything about the late-afternoon incident on Ellis Street that a couple of you guys saw, but there was another shooting around 11:50 p.m. in Visitacion Valley. That one was fatal. (The Examiner also has a list of other recent daytime shootings in SF, if you're interested.) Phew, let's get to the less life-endangering stuff. Politicians! Matt Gonzalez's 2003 mayoral campaign team was......

--Michael Moore loves Gavin Newsom. --SFMike reports back on yesterday's Newsom rally. So does Beyond Chron and the Examiner. --Grizzly bears get a new home at the zoo. --Meet the new SF school board superintendant. --A provocative name for a gay party on June 1 draws complaints. --BART doesn't have the money to increase service times after all. (Update! They're going to do it anyways!) Meanwhile, lower gas prices can't last. Picture by SFist......

--Ha! The guy to your right ran for mayor of Barcelona, and doesn't he look like Matt Gonzalez? By copatbark from the SFist Flickr stream. --John Edwards was in town at Google. So was Hillary Clinton. --Yau-Man's back at work and gives the lowdown on the Survivor season to the UC Berkeley web newsletter. --Oh no, Ed Jew! Bevan Dufty's not living in his district right now either! (it's all okay, though, at least for......

Lotta activity on Capp Street lately: not only was a man caught beating and trying to strangle a woman around 15th and Capp, but a few weeks earlier, the SFFD found a pot farm on fire two blocks down, in the same building as the Space 180/Locus Arts gallery (where Kim-Shree Maufas and Jane Kim had their school board election party.) And in other clusters of crime news -- not only did Berkeley chalk up......

-In a poll, local residents say their biggest pet peeve is traffic. -San Francisco school board wants to go small. ...

--They've arrested the guy who said he attacked Elie Wiesel. Gleegate attackers still at large. --Will you be underwater when global warming comes? --The only family members at James Kim's well-attended public memorial were wife Kati Kim (with their two children) and James's sister Eva. --Gavin Newsom's approval numbers are still in the 70% range, but someone's been trying to break into his house. --There's more human bones in the Santa Cruz mountains. --An......

So the blog LA Observed ran a caption contest for the picture you see at your left, of Paris Hilton with their mayor-about-town Antonio Villaraigosa. They got the usual level of "that's hot" Paris references and obscure "I'd like to join YOUR LA school board" inside-politics commentary, but, entertainingly enough, look who else got invited to the Villaraigosa-Hilton party! Here's two of the winning captions: --Wait until Gavin Newsom sees this picture. and --So, um,......

-Republicans whine that Pelosi isn't being very nice to them. That sound you hear is the playing of the world's smallest violin. ...

Good news! San Francisco school board vice president Norman Yee is recovering nicely after being hit by a car the day after Christmas. The accident shattered his spine and crushed an artery in his neck. Turns out Norman Yee is an avid salsa dancer, and was crossing Bryant and 4th that Tuesday with the light in his favor to get to a local club (maybe the Glas Kat?). Yee doesn't remember much about the accident,......

San Francisco school board president Norman Yee remains in intensive care after being hit by a car on 4th and Bryant the day after Christmas. However, he's in stable condition after undergoing two spinal surgeries, and in a statement (.pdf) released by the school district, he says he intends to stay on the board and resume attending meetings as soon as he's physically able. According to the police report, Yee was hit in the crosswalk......

While most of the 2006 elections are over, there's still a bit of a contention coming from, where else, Florida. In the Sarasota congressional race, a recount was held and 18,000 under votes were discovered. That meant those people voted for everything else but not for congress. This drew alarm bells from people because the percentage of under votes was higher than anywhere else. And, you'd have to figure that the one race people would vote on would be for congress instead of the school board or bond measures or a Sarasota style Question Time. Voters also complained that the machines garbled everything up and they never got a chance to vote. ...

An event will be held today in yet another effort to Free Josh Wolf. Wolf, of course, is the video blogger/journalist being held in jail for contempt of court for not releasing the hottest video out there that doesn't involve a celebrity having sex with somebody else. And thank God for that but we'd love to see the alleged video of Britney and K-Fed playing chess. ...

Because we've started the column "Who's Attacking Newsom Now!", we figure it's only right to start the counterpoint column next: Who's Defending Newsom Now!. So who's Mayor McDreamy got on his side? (beside these young ladies in the picture above, that is!): --Ken Garcia!: The Examiner columnist looks for the silver lining (.pdf, page 5) on the gloomy month that Newsom's been having. Ed Jew'll vote with Gavin on the Board of Supervisors (even......

We stole this column idea from Stephen Colbert -- but goodness, a lot of people are attacking Newsom these days, aren't they? Here's today's list! (The Guardian's keeping a list too.) Ross Mirkarimi!: Ross says that Gavin has been "hoisted by his own petard," in response to mayoral minder Peter Ragone's statements that Mirkarimi is only pushing the foot patrol issue so he (Ross) can run for mayor against Newsom. Ross said the Newsom......

We're back from our two-day vacation from the site with your Day Around The Bay, as SFist Jon continues to struggle with his DSL. --Children meet cows. --After a mysterious price rise last week that was unsupported by the economic fundamentals, gas prices have now dropped again. Did something happen last week? --The club Mingles in Jack London Square is closing down permanently after the death of a pregnant woman in a shooting last......

-Berkeley joins in on the Stadium fun. -Dems already start in with in-fighting: Pelosi backs John Murtha over Steny Hoyer. What kind of name is Steny anyways? ...

SFPD not surprised that a member was off doing kiddy sex junkets in Asia as they sort of knew it for years. -Caltrain board approves plan for Wi-FI on Caltrains. Thousands of commuters jump for joy. ...

Everyone goes through phases where they think: am I nuts to think that I can afford to live in this city any longer? You spend so much for these teeny-weeny houses, the public schools are so tough to navigate, wouldn't it be nice to have a yard? But then you look at how nice the view is, and how awesome the people are, and how great our neighborhoods are, and you either think, how could......

More art tonight! Feeling hungry? Check out Détourned Menu: Food in the Form of Activism at The Lab(2948 16th Street @ Capp) from 6-9pm. Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi continues his predecessor, Matt Gonzales' tradition of art shows in his office. Tonight, photos by Amy Auerbach and Ethel Mays! (City Hall Room 282) - 5-8pm. Saturday Writers With Drinks, two hours of trauma and nihilistic epiphany (and drinks), returns to the Make Out Room (3225 22nd.......

Our new favorite trivial pursuit is police radio codes and according to APCO (that's the Association of Public-Safety Communication Officials), 10-16 means "domestic trouble." So, to avoid any domestic trouble, we're heading on over to ATA (992 Valencia @ 21st) to check out the Free Form Film Festival program OUT2, a series of "outsider" shorts about the holidays. High kitsch factor alert! The screening will be followed by a performance by Sabreteeth, who will hyphenatedly......

-Three fires raged in Rockridge last night and police think it's all due to arson. What the hell is going on in Oakland these days? -Former HP head honcho, CEO Carly Fiorina, can't understand why she was fired and replaced by a bunch of people who just got indicted. We would imagine that would kind of hurt, but we're also pretty sure all the millions she got as a buy out would probably ease some of that pain. ...

Next up in our SF school board candidates interview series -- Mr. Omar Khalif! Omar's got a MySpace page, and he's a Scorpio. Khalif's also been endorsed by Gavin Newsom, and is running on a platform promoting neighborhood schools in the Bayview-Hunters Point, and charter schools. Introduce yourself, and tell us what you currently do. For the last seven years, I have been an independent contractor with the City and County of San Francisco Juvenile......

We here in the Bay Area may not agree on many things, but the one thing we do agree on is that MUNI sucks. Hell, even the Mayor realized this as he went all Grampa Simpson on us and whined about it. Whether it's litter or bad drivers or super-crowded busses, the week was nothing but one big huge MUNI kvetch. ...

And the second in our school board interviews -- Kim Knox! Knox is currently a member of the local SF Green Party County Council, and blogs with Robert Haaland and Sasha Magee at Left in SF. Just to remind you guys, everyone gets the same questions and we run the answers unedited! The floor is yours, Kim! Introduce yourself, and tell us what you currently do. My name is Kim Knox, an education and environmental......

Did you know there's fifteen people running for three seats on the school board this election cycle? That's almost like a District 5 election! How will you figure out who to vote for (besides just blindly voting the Bay Guardian ticket, that is)? Never fear -- SFist has bravely gone out and contacted all the candidates, and, much like we did for District 6, we've sent them all the same interview questions and will run......

--We missed this yesterday, but it's still awesome. Who's put security cameras in Chris Daly's office? --Your SF school board candidates. --More bus-only lanes on Geary, please. --$1 billion for Facebook? --The Albion Hotel in the Mission by Katz's Bagels gets sued. --Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams may go to jail. --A poignant profile of the homeless Asian man shot to death in San Mateo earlier this month. --The man who wrote Celluloid San Francisco......

--Chemo the cancer dog was returned! As was Dixie, the other stolen dog of a sick child. --Intel: Layoffs inside. --HP catches a board member leaking information to the press. --Free wifi throughout the Valley. --You may as well just buy a billboard with your name and Social Security name on it if you bank at Wells Fargo. --There might not be as much fighting on the school board this year. --Willie Brown loses it......

You know, we're kind of getting into the week-long series that the Chron's doing on the San Francisco school system. It's a comprehensive look at all the various factors affecting the perception of our local schools: segregation controversies; why people flee to the East Bay once their kids hit school age; how the school system is actually doing much better than everyone thinks it is; and how the lottery actually works. Tomorrow they're discussing private......