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Ending water wars could spark tax wars
Phil Isenberg wants to end California’s water wars. The member of the Delta Stewardship Council and its past chair wants to connect the cost of water more closely to its users. According to a report by the California Economic Summit, he
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SB1188 could expand product litigation
“California has consistently had one of the worst lawsuit climates in the nation, currently ranked at 47th for lawsuit fairness,” concluded the Institute for Legal Reform’s 2012 Lawsuit Climate Report. “The courts in Los Angeles rank as the country’s second
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Do Californians want to raise oil taxes?
Are Californians ready for another tax increase? That’s what California hedge-fund manager Tom Steyer sought to find out in his “People’s Poll” on whether voters would support an added oil extraction tax in California. The tax would be 9.9 percent on
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Prop. 26 wins San Diego water war
Remember Proposition 26, the Stop Hidden Taxes Initiative, passed by 52.5 percent of California’s voters in 2010? Probably no one who voted at that time had any idea Prop. 26 would help resolve — at least for now — the 68-year
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Skepticism rises over need to reduce CO2 levels
It’s not even Halloween, but this sounds scary. The San Francisco Chronicle headline warned, “High Carbon Dioxide Levels Set a Record.” CO2 is a greenhouse gas of the type that AB32, the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, is designed
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Legislative committee OKs $2 billion oil tax
The Senate Education Committee last week approved a $2 billion tax hike on California’s oil industry that critics say would drive up energy costs and push businesses out of state. Proponents of Senate Bill 1017 tout the additional revenue it
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Ivanpah morphs into gas-solar hybrid
This is Part 2 of a two-part series on the Ivanpah solar plant. Part 1 is here. As its name implies, the Ivanpah Concentrated Solar Thermal Power Plant in the Mojave Desert is supposed to provide renewable energy from the rays of the
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Ivanpah solar power shifts pollution to the desert
This is Part 1 of a two-part series on Ivanpah solar power. It’s supposed to be the latest thing in solar power. Gov. Jerry Brown and other state politicians tout the new Ivanpah Concentrated Solar Thermal Power Plant in the Mojave
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Experts question legality of cap-and-trade for high-speed rail
Editor’s Note: This is Part 3 of a series looking in depth at the latest hearing in the state Senate on California’s high-speed rail blueprint. Part 1 is here. Part 2 is here. California’s high-speed rail project has problems in
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San Ramon sued over ‘pension’ tax
Is it legal for a city to make new residents pay hundreds of dollars extra in property taxes for essentially the same city facilities and services that current residents receive? That question is at the heart of a lawsuit
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