Fifth & Mission

California school districts have been grappling with a teacher shortage since before the pandemic, but in cities like Oakland and San Francisco it's become normal to start the school year with vacant classroom positions. Chronicle education reporter Jill Tucker tells host Laura Wenus how Bay Area school districts are filling the gaps and how the state is trying to entice people into teaching. | Unlimited Chronicle access: sfchronicle.com/podGot a tip, comment, question? Email us: fifth@sfchronicle.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Wildfires have devastated giant sequoias, the world’s largest trees. Now national park officials want to restore the iconic California species by replanting them, but the plan is facing pushback. Reporter Kurtis Alexander joins host Cecilia Lei to discuss scientists' concerns and why debates like this will only become more common as we confront the devastation wreaked by climate change. | Unlimited Chronicle access: sfchronicle.com/podGot a tip, comment, question? Email us: fifth@sfchronicle.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Women's sports are increasingly popular, and even late-night matches during the Women’s World Cup have drawn big crowds in the Bay Area. But when the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team, which was knocked out of the tournament over the weekend, isn’t playing, it's a constant struggle to find public places to catch games. Sports reporter Marisa Ingemi tells host Laura Wenus why and how a local entrepreneur has started a group called Women's Sports Takeover to make watching easier for fans longing for community. | Unlimited Chronicle access: sfchronicle.com/podGot a tip, comment, question? Email us: fifth@sfchronicle.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Elected last year on promises to reform the criminal justice system from the inside, Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price is now the latest progressive Bay Area prosecutor to face a recall campaign. Reporter Rachel Swan joins host Cecilia Lei to explain the effort to oust Price from office. Then data reporter Susie Neilson takes a closer look at Oakland crime figures as residents try to make sense of an ongoing surge in violence. | Unlimited Chronicle access: sfchronicle.com/podGot a tip, comment, question? Email us: fifth@sfchronicle.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Since 2016, California has allowed certain terminally ill people to choose assisted death through a physician-prescribed cocktail of lethal medications. Columnist Nuala Bishari recently helped her partner’s mother take that path, and joins host Cecilia Lei to share what she learned about bodily autonomy from that experience, and why it’s so hard to talk about death. | Unlimited Chronicle access: sfchronicle.com/podGot a tip, comment, question? Email us: fifth@sfchronicle.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

With public safety top of mind for San Francisco voters, Mayor London Breed has been hammering the topic hard, calling for a stricter approach to drug crimes and touting her administration's efforts to hire more police officers. Will it convince residents dissatisfied with her leadership to give her another term? Reporter JD Morris joins host Cecilia Lei to give an early look at Breed’s political prospects as the 2024 election approaches. | Unlimited Chronicle access: sfchronicle.com/podGot a tip, comment, question? Email us: fifth@sfchronicle.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

City leaders are calling on private and public universities to consider opening up a campus in San Francisco's downtown. They imagine that classrooms or dorms could fill office buildings left empty by remote work, and that students might spend their money at local businesses and breathe life into the city's economic core. SFNext reporter Noah Arroyo joins host Laura Wenus to explain how this could work and what it would take to bring a downtown campus closer to reality. | Unlimited Chronicle access: sfchronicle.com/podGot a tip, comment, question? Email us: fifth@sfchronicle.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Since April, city workers have been constructing new bike lanes along the Mission District's busy and dangerous Valencia Street. The twist: They run down the middle of the road. The hope is that giving cyclists their own space will reduce collisions, but a confusing rollout has stirred up controversy. Theater critic and seasoned cyclist Lily Janiak joins host Laura Wenus to discuss the new lanes and what else it might take to make city streets an inviting place for drivers and cyclists alike. | Unlimited Chronicle access: sfchronicle.com/podGot a tip, comment, question? Email us: fifth@sfchronicle.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It’s here! Swifties are converging on Santa Clara for two shows of Swift's Era's Tour. Whether you’re collecting friendship bracelets to trade or you're utterly clueless, Chronicle music critic Aidin Vaziri and the newsroom’s resident Swifties tell host Cecilia Lei about tour highlights and why the generation-spanning pop star “just keeps getting bigger and bigger.” | Unlimited Chronicle access: sfchronicle.com/podGot a tip, comment, question? Email us: fifth@sfchronicle.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Since he left the Democratic Party, former presidential candidate Andrew Yang has been recruiting candidates and raising money for his new Forward Party. Instead of running a presidential campaign, Yang tells It’s All Political on Fifth & Mission host Joe Garofoli, the Forward Party is focused on local offices where entrenched party representatives have no incentive to serve their constituents. | Unlimited Chronicle access: sfchronicle.com/podGot a tip, comment, question? Email us: fifth@sfchronicle.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices