This is a web edition of GBH Daily, a weekday newsletter bringing you local stories you can trust so you can stay informed without feeling overwhelmed.

Sign up here!

☀️Sunny with highs in the 70s. Sunset is at 7:44 p.m.

It’ll be a sunny weekend with highs in the 80s and 90s, and we’re officially entering the second half of August. So our Morning Edition colleagues asked Marc Hurwitz, who writes the Boston Restaurant Talk Blog, where to find some lesser-known spots to eat by the water. He pulled through with some fabulous suggestions: The Tipsy Seagull in Fall River for tiki drinks, bar pizza at Towne Tavern & Treehouse in Pembroke, and Fred’s Franks in Wakefield, where you can find shnurbles — a combination of a sausage and a hot dog in a big bun.

“There are a lot of modern types of inventive, upscale places on the water where you can sit outside and a lot of those are very popular, especially in Boston,” Hurwitz said. “But the old-school places are still a big draw and there’s still a lot of them within an hour and a half of Boston that I like.” Check out his list here.

Four Things to Know

1. The majority of health care workers in Massachusetts got a flu shot last year but, among them, vaccination rates for both flu and COVID are falling.

“Overall, there has been a decrease in flu and COVID vaccination uptake among health care providers in Massachusetts, which is similar to the trends that are reported nationally,” Massachusetts Department of Public Health epidemiologist Fareesa Hasan said.

2. After a person who swam in a Falmouth beach last week tested positive for the potentially fatal vibrio vulnificus bacteria, infectious disease experts say they’re keeping an eye on things. They suggest that people who are immunocompromised or have open wounds avoid swimming in the ocean and eating raw seafood. These bacteria are rare here, but appear to be becoming more common as our coastal waters warm.

“Especially if you have one of these predisposing conditions like liver disease or are immunocompromised, and particularly if you have open sores or wounds, you’d want to be more cautious,” said Doctor Daniel Kuritzkes, who leads the Division of Infectious Diseases at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. “But the typical person who’s healthy, whose skin is intact, has really no reason to be concerned.”

3. It’s official: the NBA has approved the Boston Celtics’ sale to Massachusetts-born private equity businessman Bill Chisholm, who now lives in California.

Under this deal, the Celtics are valued at $6.1 billion — the highest price in history for an American sports team.

4. Meet Giulio Caperchi, who runs a small pasta company in Boston and grows fresh produce that he gives away to people experiencing hunger. 

Hunger, he said, “should not be an issue in a part of the world where there is an abundance of food and an abundance of funds. No scarcity in food. No scarcity in funds. There is a scarcity of will, and perhaps a scarcity of democracy.”

Inside one of the most understaffed immigration courts in the country

Recently, attorney Stephen Born is seeing more of his clients’ appointments in Chelmsford Immigration Court delayed and rescheduled. Some of the cases his clients have waited years — even a decade — for, NPR’s Ximena Bustillo reports.

“The court is not functioning,” Born said. “The little light at the end of the tunnel for these people who have been following the American dream and playing by all the rules is increasingly being snuffed.”

The system has had backlogs for years. But in recent months, some judges have been let go from their jobs and cases seem to be piling up — 3.7 million pending cases at the end of July. President Donald Trump’s administration has laid off immigration judges and increased detainments of immigrants. Chelmsford’s immigration court now has seven judges listed on its website, far fewer than the 21 slots the system has for that location.

“Under this Administration, the total pending caseload of immigration court cases has fallen by more than 391,000,” Executive Office for Immigration Review spokesperson Kathryn Mattingly told Bustillo. “EOIR will continue to use all of its resources to adjudicate immigration cases fairly, expeditiously and uniformly consistent with due process.”

One thing you should know about immigration courts: they are not like other courts. For one, they’re not run by the judicial branch as other federal courts are, but by the executive, under the Department of Justice. And going to immigration court does not mean someone is accused of committing a crime or violating immigration law. Some people apply for certain legal statuses and go to court for an immigration judge to decide whether they should be approved. So delays leave immigrants in limbo, waiting for legal status that may or may not be granted.

“People know not everybody is going to win,” said Stephanie Marzouk, a Boston immigration attorney. “But at least they’ll have a chance to have their case heard before a judge who is going to treat them fairly and get some sort of reasoned decision out of it.”

Read Ximena Bustillo’s entire dispatch — including interviews with former immigration court judges who have lost their jobs. 

Dig deeper: 

-Fired Massachusetts immigration judge worries about long-term impact of lost staff

-Immigrants and advocates prepare for Trump’s impact to court system