ICE agents have reportedly claimed to be police officers to gain consent to enter a person’s home – a tactic that is viewed as unethical, but within the powers granted to the officers. Civil rights groups supported Kalra’s bill, looking to stymie the Trump administration’s promise to use any and all available tools to deport undocumented immigrants who have committed crimes. Many groups fear Trump will expand deportations to include all undocumented immigrants, their families and relatives.   read more

There appear to be two kinds of motorists in California: those who hate motorcyclists who dart between lanes … and motorcyclists. Now the state has a manual, produced by the California Highway Patrol, which settles once and for all the rules of the road for “motorcyclists who are competent enough riders to lane split.”   read more

A six-month-old study making the rounds of media outlets lately is turning stomachs and generating an unhealthy amount of head scratching. Can it be true that plastic bag bans, passed by more than 40 cities and counties since 2007, are responsible for significant increases in E. coli? That’s the conclusion of “Grocery Bag Bans and Foodborne Illness,” a report that has received less-than-glowing reviews from environmentalists and plastic bag ban advocates.   read more

Californians have plenty of reasons to dislike utility companies besides having to write them checks every month: nuclear power plants that don’t work; gas lines that explode; rates that only go up, environmental insensitivity, impediments to alternative energy; monopolistic behavior. The list goes on. If Ben Davis, Jr. has his way, voters will have a chance to change all that.   read more

In pursuit of increased math proficiency, the state Board of Education has dumped a 15-year-old requirement that students take Algebra 1 in the eighth grade. The state joins all the other states in adopting a standard included in what’s known as the Common Core Curriculum. State legislation passed last year pretty much ordained that Algebra 1 would become an option, rather than a requirement, after years of controversy.   read more

After testing of a massive state payroll computer system “exposed a system riddled with grave weaknesses,” the State Controller’s Office (SCO) fired the contractor, SAP Public Services, and asked for $50 million back. The 21st Century Project has cost the state $254 million since 2005 and isn’t close to working.   read more

Around 2,000 taxpayers, who thought they had received a great small-business state tax break the past four years, are finding out the break was a mirage and the bill for back taxes is real. The state Franchise Tax Board (FTB) wants $120 million from small-business owners and investors who took advantage of a 20-year-old law to claim a 50% break on the taxable gain on the sale of their stock.   read more

If it weren’t a religious institution, the Archdiocese of Los Angeles might be in a heap of legal trouble for taking $115 million from a cemetery maintenance account to pay clergy sex abuse settlements. But according to the Los Angeles Times, which broke the story, it’s probably legal for the Catholic Church to take money contributed by families for perpetual care—a 15% fee on burial bills at church cemeteries—and use it to defer expenses from the ongoing scandal.   read more

In a political landscape saturated with pitched battles over balancing budgets, offshore tax havens have managed to maintain advantages for corporations and wealthy individuals that cost California and the nation billions of dollars each year. The California Public Interest Research Group’s Education Fund (CALPIRG) calculated that offshore tax havens diverted $39.8 billion from state coffers across the nation in 2011, led by California’s loss of $7.1 billion.   read more

Around 30% of water deliveries in the state come from the ground—more during droughts—and more than one in five of these 3,037 community water systems that serve 21 million people are providing water that was contaminated before treatment, according to a new report from the State Water Resources Control Board.   read more

Last month California Attorney General Kamala Harris sued ConocoPhillips and its spinoff, Phillips 66, for failing to properly inspect and maintain 560 underground gasoline storage tanks. This month, it’s BP’s turn. The attorney general is seeking unspecified civil penalties for the various alleged violations and asked the court for injunctive relief; i.e. the state wants BP and ARCO to start complying with the California Health and Safety Code.   read more

California joined the federal government, 15 other states and the District of Columbia this week in suing Standard & Poor’s credit rating agency for its role in the housing debacle and financial collapse that began in earnest five years ago. California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) and the California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS) were both large investors in mortgage-backed securities and other financial instruments rated by S&P.   read more

California Senator Barbara Boxer and Massachusetts Representative Ed Markey have written a letter to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) asking that it investigate new information from a leaked report which indicates plant operator Edison and manufacturer Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) early on identified problems in replacement steam generators but did nothing about them.   read more

The California Department of Education (CDE) has ordered eight school districts to repay nearly $170 million to student meal programs they grabbed to cover their own budget shortfalls over a period of years. In what may be only a “hint” of “ongoing abuse,” a state Senate investigation found that money meant to pay for free and reduced-price meals—often the only decent food low-income students receive—was diverted or spent in a fashion that undercuts the programs.   read more

A report from the state Legislative Analyst’s Office said that California lost the Medicaid reimbursement money for a couple of reasons. The court-appointed receiver overseeing the prisons had failed to sign an agreement with every affected county (Medicaid funs come through counties), and the Department of Health Care Services (DHCS) has been unable to process two-thirds of the inmate claims because of software problems.   read more

Dissenters in the California Supreme Court’s 4-3 decision Monday on credit card privacy characterized the ruling as permission for retailers to “collect unlimited personal information concerning their credit-card-using customers and sell that information.”   read more

On Tuesday, the Los Angeles Times wrote that the Los Angeles Catholic Archdiocese was considering launching a campaign to raise $200 million for its coffers, depleted by a $660 million settlement in 2007 with hundreds of alleged priest abuse victims, and legal costs for its ongoing priest abuse scandal.   read more