Crosscurrents

We are broadcasting live for KALW's December membership campaign. Today, we revisit the Valkyries first season and talk about some of our favorite music of the year. 

Today, we're doing things a little differently... For KALW's December Membership Campaign we're bringing you a special LIVE episode of Crosscurrents! And we're joined by our reporter, Wren Farrell.

Today, we visit a special space where conservatives and liberals connected. The Anderson Valley Grange Hall. Then, how a collection of posters in San Francisco's Mission district captures over four decades of community organizing.

Grange halls have been around for more than 150 years — the Grange began as a fraternal organization for farmers. Many rural towns still rely on Grange halls as community centers. In the Anderson Valley, many people credit this place for bringing together groups of people that were once really divided.

Located a block away from the 24th street BART station, the Mission Grafica print studio and archive has empowered public art in the Bay Area since 1982.KALW is now hosting a gallery of some of their prints at our space in downtown San Francisco at 220 Montgommery, it is called ‘Mission Grafica: The Public's Voice.'The posters on display offer a living timeline of how artists have aligned beauty with justice in the face of power and change.

What happens in kids' brains… when they're improvising? Today, we learn how brains work in childhood, and how that's linked to creativity. Then, a woman in prison discovers her inner beauty. And, a new series captures San Francisco at the height of the AIDS epidemic. We hear a conversation with the host of “When We All Get To Heaven.” 

A lot of adults feel they've lost touch with the ability to get messy… and also just mess up. Scientists call that childlike, everyday experimentation, “prosaic creativity.” And it's more accessible—even as adults—than many tend to think.

Now, it's a new story from Uncuffed, our podcast that empowers people in prison to tell their own stories. This one comes to us from the California Institution for Women. This is a piece that was scheduled to air a few weeks ago, but it was only after our show was broadcast that we realized we had aired the wrong story. So today we bring this piece from Uncuffed producer Haena Worthing.When she was first incarcerated, in the county jail, she realized she would no longer have access to most of what she called "pretty girl things” -  like makeup and nail polish. But her experience with incarceration changed how she thinks about beauty. 

All month, KALW's Queer Power Hour will be airing a special series called ‘When We All Get To Heaven.' With archival tape it tells the story of one of the first gay-positive churches, the Metropolitan Community Church of San Francisco during the height of the AIDS crisis in the 80s and 90s.The series brings to life a community facing personal, social, and political trials, including the deaths of hundreds of its members. It's hosted by Lynne Gerber. Here's Lynne speaking with Crosscurrents host, Hana Baba.

A round-up of what's happening in transportation news around the Bay Area for a segment called “Getting Around the Bay.”

Sometimes your chosen family isn't your biological family. And sometimes we choose houses of worship other than our own because they feel safer for us. Today, we meet a woman who's leading her church to be a refuge — not just for Christians, but for all people.

Today, an update on Bay Area bike paths and walkways. We bring you the latest on ‘Getting around the Bay' from our transit reporter. Then, an adopted son needs to decide which family to call home. And, how an Oakland pastor turns the tables on homophobia in the Church.

When Uncuffed producer Fonuamana Fuahala unexpectedly meets his biological family, he's confronted with one of the most difficult decisions of his life.

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 Castro. Her personal and professional relationships were steeped in the love and loss that came out of the tragic circumstances of the AIDS epidemic. Karen shared this history with the non-profit My Life, My Stories in 2018. 

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 bring you an excerpt from Reporter Lusen Mendel's story, that they produced in April.

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.

This is Lorenz Mazon Dumuk reading his poem, “Everyday I become an Egg.” 

Today, we're bringing you an excerpt from The Stoop episode, ‘Bury Me Whole." It recently won The Northern California chapter of Society of Professional Journalists for Long Form Storytelling. It's the story of one woman's incredible loss, and her struggle deciding whether or not to donate her son's organs. And it's a conversation about Black communities and the stigma around organ donation. 

San Francisco has to build more housing… but where will it happen? And how? A panel of experts weighs in on the ongoing debate. Then, back in March, a Russian bathhouse in San Francisco went public with a controversial policy. It's an award winning story about trans inclusion… and exclusion.

KALW recently hosted a Town Hall conversation about proposed changes to San Francisco's zoning plans. It took place at our live event space in Downtown San Francisco, and was cohosted by KALW Executive Producer Ben Trefny and SF Public Press Executive Director Lila LaHood.