Where is the Money Going?
Edison Wants $7.6 Billion from Mitsubishi for San Onofre
Mitsubishi manufactured the vibrating steam generators and hundreds of tubes that leaked a small amount of radioactive steam shortly after installation. For its part, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries claims the most it could owe is $137 million and said in a statement, “The allegations and demands made by those parties disregard the history of the contract negotiations and performance and are factually incorrect, legally unsound, and inappropriate.” read more
California (and Just About Every State) Gets an “F” in Health Care Transparency
“You will find little progress since last year and, in some cases, regression,” the authors of the report warned in the intro. Availability of information on a website is one-third of a state’s grade. The other two-thirds involve a complex review of laws and regulations that states pass facilitating and compelling transparency of health pricing information. The report also analyzes how effectively the laws are applied. read more
Uber Lobbying in California Tops Walmart and Big Banks
Uber has paid lobbyists 10 times more in 2015 than the limousine industry and four times more than the taxi industry. The company spent 10 times more money ($474,182) on lobbying in the state capital during three months in the summer of 2014 than it spent in any prior three-month period. Lawmakers were considering how to make the company do proper background checks and carry enough insurance. read more
Judge Swats Away Challenge to City Funding for New Sacramento Arena
“Because the City agreed to contribute ‘assets’ beyond its capital contribution, Plaintiffs infer a nefarious, backroom deal to subsidize the investor group’s purchase of the team, separate from the Arena,” the judge wrote. If not nefarious, the deal was at least complicated and admittedly played out behind the scenes by powerful financial and political interests. read more
Santa Barbara Reanimates Desalination Plant Closed for 23 Years
On Tuesday, the council agreed to spend another $55 million to bring the plant back online by 2016. The facility could provide around 30% of the city’s water needs. Operation of the plant will add $10-$20 to utility bills each month, but council members expressed a willingness to pay that even if giant El Niño storm systems bring heavy, sustained rain to the area, as many climatologists cautiously predict. read more
Gas Prices up a Buck; Oil Refiners’ Gross Profits Double
The California Energy Commission (CEC) keeps track of this sort of thing and according to them, refiners averaged gross profits of 49.3 cents per gallon from 1999-2014. So far this year, the average is 88.8 cents. The commission calculated that on July 6, when retail prices averaged $3.432, the refiner’s take was $1.166. read more
Despite Court Setback, State Announces First Fine Against Senior Water Rights Holders
Byron-Bethany Irrigation District in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta area was informed Monday it would have to pay $1.5 million for diverting water for two weeks after being told to stop. The district provides water to 160 farms and the planned community of Mountain House (pop. 15,000), a decade-old exburb 60 miles outside of San Francisco. read more
Appellate Court Rejects Favorite School District No-Bid Contract Ploy
School districts don’t call them no-bid contracts—those are illegal—but the way they misuse state-approved “lease lease-back” deals involving billions of dollars allows contractors to work on projects without bidding, the court said. In the case of Fresno Unified School District (FUSD), the court agreed with an attorney who called it a “sham and subterfuge.” read more
Powerless State Regulator Badmouths Price-Gouging Aetna for 21% Rate Hike
It's the fourth time in a year that state officials have said mean things to Aetna about price hikes, but none of it means anything. Last November, 59% of the voting public refused to grant the insurance commissioner the power to do more than rail about high health insurance rates, when they soundly defeated Proposition 45. read more
State Audit Finds “Serious and Pervasive Deficiencies” in SoCal City
The audit covered two years, 2011-12 and 2012-13, and found that 72 of the city’s 79 accounting controls were inadequate. That sounds kind of dry and bookkeeperish. But the upshot is the city did things that make budgeting a challenge. For instance, they counted $9.3 million in property taxes in 2011-12 when the real number was $23.3 million and they reported $9.2 million in sales tax when the real number was $13.2 million. read more
Uber Faces $7.3-Million Fine and Suspension in California for Not Sharing Info
The company was required to tell the PUC stuff like how many UberX users sought and received rides (by zip code), how much the rides cost and whether there were any accidents. The PUC wanted a spreadsheet listing the work hours for every driver and a list of who committed any company violations or were suspended. The Uber subsidiary in charge of delivering that information, Raiser-CA, did not provide what the commission wanted. read more
San Francisco Affordable Housing Looks Worse Using the New Math
“What is causing the overall balance number to be lower is the loss of rent-controlled units,” Don Falk, chief executive officer of the nonprofit developer Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corp., told the San Francisco Examiner. San Francisco has lost nearly as many affordable housing units as it has built since 2005. They established 6,559 units while developers took 5,470 off the market. read more
Gasoline Prices Surge in California, Retreat in Rest of the Country
Gasoline prices have been edging up for days in the state and are expected to soar 50 cents a gallon in Southern California this week. Bay Area prices could rise 30 cents. GasBuddy.com attributes the spike to “a convergence of fuel supply problems.” A lawsuit filed by Persian Gulf Inc. alleges, "For years Californians have seen tremendous spikes in gasoline prices, seemingly untethered to normal market forces of supply and demand.” read more
SoCal Cash-for-Grass Program Ends Because It's Too Popular
Demand increased exponentially after Brown announced 25% mandatory cuts statewide in April and called for 50 million square feet of lawn to be ripped out. That would save 2 billion gallons of water a year. The program was expanded by $350 million the next month and was projected to triple the turf removal called for by Brown. The money went fast. read more
Insurers Say Hepatitis C Drugs Could Cost State Government $5.1 Billion
They are really good drugs, with high cure-rates for a debilitating and deadly infection that an estimated 750,000 Californians have. It is said one the drugs, Sovaldi, can cure more than 90% of patients with the most common type of hepatitis C. Price estimates for months-long treatments have ranged from $65,000 to $189,000. read more
Santa Cruz County Slashes Business with Five Big Felonious Banks
The board voted to “not do new business for a period of five years with Citigroup, JP Morgan Chase, Barclays, Royal Bank of Scotland and UBS as specified, and further direct that the County unwind existing relationships with these five banks to the greatest extent feasible.” That means the county won’t buy the banks’ commercial paper or investment services, and will withdraw whatever funds it can from them. read more