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Wary Palm Springs guards its cheap, plentiful water

The California narrative about water is generally a tidy tale about the arid south scrambling to come up with water from the relatively wet north. But plenty of other angles deserve mention, starting with the fact that the state’s best-known

CA budget deal reached, legislators to vote Monday

Josephine Djuhana June 13, 2015

On Thursday, the California Senate Committee on Budget and Fiscal Review released an overview of the budget adopted by the Conference Committee on June 9. The Conference Committee is composed of both Senate and Assembly members, tasked with negotiating multiple

House obstructs funding for CA high-speed rail, rail authority

Josephine Djuhana June 11, 2015

On Tuesday, the U.S. House of Representatives voted to pass H.R. 2577, which blocks federal funding for the California high-speed rail and the California High-Speed Rail Authority. H.R. 2577 is the House appropriations bill determining financial support for all federally-funded

Vaccine bill passes Assembly health committee

Josephine Djuhana June 10, 2015

On Tuesday, the California Assembly Committee on Health passed Senate Bill 277, the controversial mandatory vaccination bill. The bill was passed on a 12-6 vote, with one vote not recorded. According to a summary from the health committee, SB277: “Eliminates

S.F. Supervisors pass laws requiring health warnings on soda ads

Josephine Djuhana June 10, 2015

On Tuesday, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors unanimously voted to pass legislation that would require posted advertisements for sodas and other beverages to include health warnings. Additional legislation bans the use of city funds to purchase sodas and sugar-sweetened

NFIB opposes four Sacramento bills

CalWatchdog Staff June 10, 2015

Here’s the analysis of four pieces of legislation in the California State Assembly and Senate by the National Federation of Independent Business California. The NFIB opposes all four bills. These bills were introduced by Democratic legislators. Assembly Bill 464: Transaction and use taxes: maximum combined

LAUSD may kill reform to avoid graduation-rate plunge

Chris Reed June 9, 2015

Even amid scandals over its iPads-for-all program and battles over leadership, the Los Angeles Unified School District has been able to cite some good news on the academic front in recent times. In April, district officials trumpeted the release of

Climbing gas prices lower consumer sentiment

Josephine Djuhana June 9, 2015

Chapman University’s Anderson Center for Economic Research recently released California consumer sentiment survey results, demonstrating that although continued job growth and lowered unemployment rates are helping boost consumer sentiment, higher gas prices have done the opposite. According to a report on fuel

Banned guns not the ones used in crimes

Steve Miller June 8, 2015

In the wake of firearms madness on both sides of the issue comes a batch of material obtained via public records request from guns.com, a news website that editorially tilts toward the support of gun rights. The site found that

Bullet-train agency chided for deceptive claim

Chris Reed June 8, 2015

The California High-Speed Rail Authority’s first business plan warned that the project would struggle to attract outside investors without some sort of revenue or ridership guarantee. That led the Legislative Analyst’s Office to repeatedly warn such guarantees would be illegal