The two-year legislative session ends Wednesday at midnight, giving Gov. Gavin Newsom and state lawmakers just three days to hammer out agreements on complex, controversial bills and budget items encompassing everything from nuclear power to abortion to youth vaccination. According to veteran Sacramento lobbyist Chris Micheli, legislators still need to determine the fate of about […]
Emily Hoeven, CalMatters
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What’s Behind Newsom’s Safe Injection Sites Veto?
Read between the lines of Gov. Gavin Newsom’s Monday veto of a controversial bill that would have allowed San Francisco, Oakland and Los Angeles to launch trial supervised drug injection sites in a bid to curb California’s epidemic of fatal overdoses, and you might catch a glimpse of the political tightrope he’s walking. Although the […]
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Buckle Up for a Busy Month in Sacramento
Welcome to the final countdown. Today, state lawmakers will reconvene in Sacramento after a month-long summer recess — during which some traveled abroad on trips funded by special interest groups that lobby them on various issues — for the final, frenzied month of the legislative session. Legislators face an Aug. 31 deadline to determine the […]
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California Plans to Update School Mask Rules
California appears to be on the brink of what could be one of its most dramatic shifts in COVID policy since the pandemic began nearly two years ago: changing school masking rules. State health officials announced Monday that they are working with “education, public health and community leaders to update masking requirements at schools to […]
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Newsom Stops Short of Single-Payer Healthcare
Don’t ask Gov. Gavin Newsom about Democratic lawmakers’ proposal to create a state-funded single-payer health care system — he hasn’t read it. “I have not had the opportunity to review that plan, and no one has presented it to me,” Newsom said Monday while unveiling his record-high $286.4 billion budget proposal — which includes an […]
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California’s State Auditor: ‘Speak the Truth to Power’
Gov. Gavin Newsom will soon get to make yet another appointment with far-reaching implications: Who should lead the independent agency tasked with evaluating the performance of his own administration? Elaine Howle — who has led the California State Auditor’s office for 21 years — announced last month that she plans to retire at the end […]
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Port Backlogs Sum up California’s COVID Crisis
The extent to which California’s — and the country and world’s — challenges are interconnected was exemplified by President Joe Biden’s Wednesday announcement that the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach will move toward 24/7 operations to help unsnarl massive supply chain backlogs. Still, Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg said Sunday during a CNN […]
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770 New Laws Coming to California
You’d be forgiven for not knowing Gov. Gavin Newsom vetoed the largest expansion of California’s college financial aid system in a generation — he did so during the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Francisco Giants’ first playoff game Friday night. Hours later, it was all over: Newsom signed his final bills on Saturday, a day […]
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Newsom is Running Out of Time to Sign Bills
T-minus three days. That’s how much time Gov. Gavin Newsom has left to decide the fate of the remaining bills on his desk — and as the deadline draws nearer, the buildup for big-ticket and contentious proposals is getting more intense. The direct impact of Newsom’s decisions was particularly apparent Wednesday, when he signed a […]
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EDD Fiasco Takes a Surprising Turn
Just how dysfunctional is California’s unemployment department? Apparently so dysfunctional that Bank of America, which since 2010 has had an exclusive contract with the state to deliver unemployment benefits through prepaid debit cards, wants to end the contract — even though the Employment Development Department just renewed it for another two years. The news, first […]
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California Mask Mandate Likely to End Soon
If you’re looking for a sign that California is approaching the end of the pandemic, here it is: The state may soon ease workplace rules that require employees to wear face masks and physically distance from each other. Next week, California’s workplace safety agency is set to consider proposed changes to its emergency coronavirus standards […]