Top Stories
They're Not “Poor,” but 31% of California Households Can't Afford Basic Needs
Researchers for “Struggling to Get By: The Real Cost Measure in California 2015” calculate that 3.2 million California households (31%) lack sufficient income to cover the basic costs of living. That’s even higher than the 23.4% Supplemental Poverty Measure for California used by the U.S. Census Bureau to measure additional cost-of-living factors. read more
Hunt for Exide Lead Contamination Widens; Cleanup Cost Estimates Grow
Additional testing could cost $150 million, sources told the San Gabriel Valley Tribune, which is significant since the bankrupt Exide agreed in March to keep the shuttered plant closed and pay $38.6 million to clean up the site. Exide also paid $9 million for the residential cleanup. “We are looking to put a funding stream in place to get started. Then we will recover the cost and pay ourselves back as we go,” DTSC Director Barbara Lee said. read more
State Joins Drought-Shaming Community Call to Action with SaveWater Portal
Now, Californians can direct their anxiety and anger over water shortages against their neighbors with the push of a button, while pondering, in passing, the policies and protagonists that are perhaps more relevant. Someone is to blame for the 25% water cutback we must endure; why not take it out on the douchebag across the street whose sprinklers are dampening the sidewalk on the wrong day of the week. read more
Thousands of Inmates Still Fighting Fires Despite Early Release of Low-Level Felons
Last year, lawyers from the state Attorney General’s office argued to the courts that an earlier court-ordered revamp of parole standards to reduce prison overcrowding would hurt the fire program and didn’t want to do it. The program rewarded low-level felons with 2-for-1 credits for days-served for working. Prison spokesman Bill Cessa said, “We currently have a sufficient number of inmates." read more
ExxonMobil Fined for Blast at Torrance Refinery; Ready to Fire It Back Up
Clyde Trombettas, with the state Department of Industrial Relations (DIR), told the Torrance Daily Breeze, “It’s pretty rare for a compliance officer to issue one willful citation, let alone six willful citations. An employer has to be pretty egregious for us to do something like that. It’s trying to send a message that we need to take these things seriously.” read more
Downtown San Jose Loses the Guadalupe River to Drought
At least eight miles of the 14-mile urban river, including a stretch running through the heart of downtown San Jose on its way to the bay, are dry. That has been the case for a couple of months. That’s a shame. The 250-acre River Park and Garden was recently developed along the Guadalupe’s banks and its website still recommends that visitors “take a rest at one of the seven Sister City seating areas to simply watch the river flow.” read more
State Sued for Not Releasing School Records on English Learners
Key data on long-term English learners is not posted online and, according to civil rights groups, is being denied to the public.Parents of English learners participate in the process of allocating school funds through District English Language Advisory Councils, but that’s a little hard to do without all the data. "Without it, parents and community members are unable to evaluate which English programs work and which ones are failing.” read more
LAPD Has Had “Stingray on Steroids” Surveillance Equipment for a Decade
Like Stingray, the device mimics cellphone towers to connect and monitor mobile devices. But dirtbox can monitor multiple signals at a time, breaking encryption as it goes, sweeping up data in a dragnet whose scale is unknown beyond its users. Devices like dirtbox were first developed for the military and intelligence agencies. read more
Environmentalists Unhappy over Secret Gehry Redesign of L.A. River
Friends of the Los Angeles River denounced the secret talks with famed architect Frank Gehry to help design a new master plan for developing the entire river. Founder Lewis MacAdams thought the Garcetti administration was being a tad too controlling and told the Times, “Last time there was a single idea for the L.A. River it involved 3 million barrels of concrete.” read more
L.A. Agrees to Let Ontario Have Its Airport Back
Ontario sued Los Angeles, LAWA and the L.A. Board of Airport Commissioners in June 2013, claiming the airport was losing business to LAX because legal agreements were being violated. Passenger numbers dropped from 7.2 million to 4.9 million at Ontario during the first three years after the economic crash of 2007. It was down to 3.9 million in 2013. read more
Federal Judge Cites California Law in Blocking Warrantless Cellphone Tracking
Judge Koh, in San Jose, ruled that the government would have to show probable cause and get a warrant to receive 60 days of cell site location information (CSLI). She said the easier standard for acquiring a permit, merely stating specific and articulable facts, did not protect the 4th Amendment right against warrantless searches. read more
U.S. Appellate Court Almost Sorry for Letting Feds Skate on San Bruno Blast
Despite “very troubling allegations” about federal regulators’ oversight of pipeline safety, or lack thereof, the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals said San Francisco cannot blame them for the 2010 San Bruno blast that killed eight people and leveled a neighborhood. The court said, “We have no authority to compel agency action merely because the agency is not doing something we think it should do,” read more
Environmentalists Sue to Block State’s Rosy Fracking Report
The Center for Biological Diversity filed a complaint Thursday asking the Sacramento County Superior Court to kill the EIR’s certification and stop the state from handing out well-stimulation permits based on it. “We had a promise from the Legislature that we’d have a real scientific review and a real report, and they’d make a decision based on science, and that didn’t happen,” the Center’s Climate Law Institute Director Kassie Siegel told ThinkProgress. read more
Water Agencies Don't (Want to) Know How Much Their Pipes Leak
The state does not require water agencies to report leaks and, consequently, not a lot do. The survey found that six out of 10 retailers combined leaks with unbilled or unauthorized water use in accounting for missing water. The four retailers that do measure leaks separately reported numbers three times better than the world champion of leak stoppers: Israel. read more
The Kids Are Not Alright in California
Based on data from 2013, the latest available, the report ranked the state 14th in Health, 38th in Education and 42nd in Family and Community to go with its 49th place in Economic Well-Being. California is no stranger to income inequality, but it does have the eighth-largest economy on the planet. How can so many kids be in financially-strapped homes? The answer starts with the cost of that housing. read more
If the State Ever OKs Recreational Pot, It Has a Blue Ribbon Report to Guide It
The authors want the state to pursue a highly-regulated marketplace built to reduce, if not eliminate, the competing illegal pot industry without actually trying too hard to produce and deliver its own product. The report warns against “lowering the price of marijuana for recreational users, creating and promoting the largest industry possible or raising the maximum amount of tax revenue.” read more