Free Republic

The tech billionaires behind a project to build a utopian new city in California's Bay Area have released the first artistic renderings of their ambitious plans. Previously known only as 'Flannery Associates,' the group rebranded as 'California Forever' and released the plans in a publicity blitz on Thursday night, following months of silence and speculation. Led by former Goldman Sachs trader Jan Sramek, the group's backers include Silicon Valley heavyweights such as LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, Andreessen Horowitz investor Marc Andreessen, and Steve Jobs' widow Laurene Powell Jobs. California Forever is now the largest landowner in Solano County, which is...

Travis Air Force Base and surrounding land in Solano County, Calif. Image: Google Maps Since 2017, a shadowy Silicon Valley company has bought up 52,000 acres of farmland around Travis Air Force Base in Solano County, Calif., totaling about $800 million.Flannery Associates is a company run by Jan Sramek, a 36-year-old former Goldman Sachs trader. Beyond that, nothing much is known of the company except that some of the most famous names in Silicon Valley have invested in a project being promoted by Flannery. Some backers include Marc Andreessen, Powell Jobs, Michael Moritz of Sequoia Capital, LinkedIn co-founder Reid...

A billionaire venture capitalist and partner at Sequoia Capital has blasted San Francisco’s seedy, drug-addled downtown — lambasting the city’s Democrat leadership that “bans plastic straws but permits plastic needles.” “It’s a strange city that bans plastic straws but permits plastic needles. Yet that’s San Francisco today,” Michael Moritz, 68, seethed in a fiery op-ed published in the Financial Times on Wednesday. “Between 2020 and 2022, 1,985 people here have died from drug overdoses compared to 1,143 from Covid-19,” he added. The former journalist-turned-investor said rampant and unchecked drug use has turned the City by the Bay into a “zombie”...

A billionaire venture capitalist and partner at Sequoia Capital has blasted San Francisco’s seedy, drug-addled downtown — lambasting the city’s Democrat leadership for leaving them “zombie zones.” “It’s a strange city that bans plastic straws but permits plastic needles. Yet that’s San Francisco today,” Michael Moritz, 68, seethed in a fiery op-ed published in the Financial Times on Wednesday. “Between 2020 and 2022, 1,985 people here have died from drug overdoses compared to 1,143 from Covid-19,” he added. The former journalist-turned-investor said rampant and unchecked drug use has turned the City by the Bay into a “zombie” land. “Fentanyl, the...