San Francisco Is Launching an Office to Watch Over Food Delivery Robots

An agency to regulate food delivery robots is launching in San Francisco

Funding to establish San Francisco’s Office of Emerging Technologies, which will oversee tech dropped by private companies on the “the public right-of-way,” got the green light from the city’s Board of Supervisors Budget and Finance Committee Wednesday, the SF Examiner reports. The office, which will cost SF $250,000 per year and employ three people, was proposed by Supervisor Norman Yee after autonomous delivery robot companies surprised SF by unleashing the devices on city streets. “When I tried to ban delivery robots I was seen as anti-tech or solving for something that wasn’t a problem,” Yee tells the Ex. “A few weeks later...there were hundreds of scooters that were dumped on our sidewalks, suddenly everyone understood what I was talking about.”

Sonoma County restaurateurs are facing financial hardships due to PG&E’s shutoffs

The Sonoma County tourism bureau tells KQED that area restaurants each lose about $4,700 per day when PG&E turns off the power during wildfire risk periods, and most businesses’ insurance policies don’t cover losses sustained during the voluntary shut-offs. “We are usually set up for winter and we have a cushion,” Backyard in Forestville owner Daniel Kedan says. “But dealing with this — three years in a row with floods, fires and power outages — that’s beyond gone.”

On December 3, restaurants around the world will trade and remix recipes for one night

138 restaurants across 38 countries participate in the Grand Gelinaz shuffle, a December 3 event in which chefs will “create eight new, spontaneously rethought & totally remodeled dishes” based on recipes received from other participating venues. Local restaurants engaged in the stunt include Mister Jiu’s, Maum, SingleThread, Nightbird, Cala, and, Coi. Tickets are available now, and are likely to sell out quickly.

Restaurants probably won’t be serving local Dungeness crab until at least mid-December

On Wednesday, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife announced that commercial Dungeness crab fishing season — which had already been pushed back to November 22 — will probably be delayed until December 15 for the waters south of the Mendocino-Sonoma county line. The Chron reports that surveyors are still seeing a lot of whales off the coast of Half Moon Bay and Point Reyes, so to avoid entangling the great beasts in crab fishing nets, the season will likely be paused until the humpback (etc) herds move on.

White Pony Express says it’s “rescued” 9.4 million pounds of food in the Bay Area

Seven-year-old nonprofit White Pony Express tells The East Bay Times that since its launch in the area, it’s reclaimed about 6,000 pounds of food per day from restaurants, distributors, and grocers that would otherwise throw the food away. It delivers the goods to agencies like Loaves and Fishes and Shelter Inc., and has started distributing produce, fresh meat, and dairy products to students and families at select Contra Costa County schools.