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Seniors join ‘new’ homeless
I’m gettin’ up there in years myself — 60 in June. So I’m sympathetic. The latest crisis to hit California is that its massively high cost of living is pushing seniors out onto the streets. Social Security checks, small pensions
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CHP’s probe of CalFire yielded leads — unlike DA’s probe of CHP
The reports that suggest the California Highway Patrol did a solid job in handling the investigation of a prostitution scandal at CalFire’s training acadmy in Ione have a rich subtext. CHP gathered enough strong evidence that 16 CalFire employees were
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Retirement will be painful for most
In an excellent column in the U-T San Diego, Dan McSwain paints a grim retirement picture for almost everybody: For most Americans, it’s tempting to live in denial or outright fantasyland when it comes to paying for retirement. That’s because
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Harsh impact of CalSTRS bailout begins to emerge
The deal struck in spring 2014 to bail out the underfunded California State Teachers’ Retirement System will lead school districts, the state and teachers to increase their annual contributions to CalSTRS from $5.9 billion in 2014 to at least $10.9
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Pension reformer Chuck Reed will fight on
San Jose is in the center of the world’s economic pulse, Silicon Valley. By all rights, its city treasury ought to be overflowing with digital wealth. Instead it has flirted with bankruptcy because of its burgeoning pension problem — a problem
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CA initiative reform: Lawmakers ignore the elephant in the room
The San Francisco Chronicle recently reported on initiative reforms that take effect today. After more than a century in California’s political spotlight, the state’s initiative process will be getting a major revise next year. Even more surprising, both Democrats and
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Mary Nichols the ‘rock star’ bureaucrat
America is supposed to be a democracy ruled by “We, the people.” Actually it’s rule by bureaucracy. The vast bureaus of federal, state and local governments run our lives, and there’s not much that can be done about it until
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Thieves rip $800,000 in computers from San Jose State
Can’t blame this one on Kim Jong Un of North Korea. Thieves ripped off $800,000 of computer equipment from San Jose State. The Contra Costa Times reported: Without a central warehouse or reliable system for keeping track of the valuables
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Humorous new attack on Prop. 13
Lenny Bruce was funnier But Lenny Goldberg is pretty funny, too. Because he’s wasted 40 years attacking Proposition 13, the landmark 1978 property-tax limitation initiative. The Times just ran a puff piece on him. There’s no hint that, in a state
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CA gas tax jumps 10 cents in Jan.
New year. New tax on gas. It’s AB 32, the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 finally gouging drivers at the pump. Although industry spokesmen have said the new gas tax could be as much as 70 cents a gallon, it
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