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

If FBI background checks are any gauge, Californians went on a holiday shopping spree in November, showing an intention to buy more guns than any other month this year and edging toward an annual record of more than 1 million purchases.   read more

Two judges from the U.S. District Court’s Eastern District of California delivered diametrically opposed rulings on California’s newly-passed law banning gay-conversion therapy for underage youths, setting up a showdown in the appellate courts. The law, signed by Governor Jerry Brown in October, prohibits mental health providers from using “sexual orientation change efforts” on minors. Those who do are engaging in unprofessional conduct and are subject to discipline by state licensing boards.   read more

The Navy is developing an underwater drone shaped like a torpedo that can do many of the same tasks performed by dolphins. Once available, the drones can be built in much less time that it takes to train mammals, about seven years. By 2017, many of the Navy’s 80 dolphins will be reassigned to other jobs. Sea lion jobs are safe for now.   read more

A large house in the San Bernardino County city of Chino Hills, allegedly home to a series of pregnant Asian women enjoying a brief stay, has attracted the scrutiny of neighbors and local authorities. It is suspected that the home is part of low-key industry that caters to foreign women who want to give birth in the United States to obtain U.S. citizenship for their child.   read more

Wildlife advocates voiced extreme displeasure and disbelief when game wardens from the state Department of Fish and Game shot to death two 25- to 30-pound cubs believed to be about 9 months old near downtown Half Moon Bay over the weekend.   read more

California Attorney General Kamala Harris assured local law enforcement officials Tuesday that they would be on firm legal ground if they did not comply with the federal Secure Communities program that encourages cooperation in the deportation of illegal immigrants.   read more

Governor Jerry Brown wants more oil drilling—he fired two top officials when they slowed the state permit process—and now he’s got it. The state Department of Conservation increased the number of exemptions to the landmark California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) six-fold, to 19, in the months following Brown’s firing of the acting department director and the head of its Division of Gas, Oil, and Geothermal Resources (DOGGR) last November.   read more

San Bernardino City Attorney James Penman had some words of advice at a community meeting last week for residents concerned about what effect the city’s bankruptcy might have on their day-to-day lives: “Go home, lock your doors and load your guns.”   read more

Born out of the Watts Riots in 1972, Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center in South Central Los Angeles was the premier medical facility in the low-income neighborhood until its closure in 2007 amid tales of medical mistakes, mismanagement and dangerous health conditions. A target date for a replacement facility was moved to 2012 and has now been pushed to 2014.   read more

Five years ago, independent researchers at Morgan Quinto Press rated San Jose the nation’s safest city among those with a population over 500,000. Now, with a month to go in 2012 the city is about to top a two-decade high for homicides: 43. Eight murders in 11 days in August were a major contributor. Homicides reached 41 in 2011, nearly double the year before.   read more

An atmospheric river, unheard of in the meteorological world before 1998, is carrying water in a narrow conveyor belt of vapor from the equator, up to 8,000 feet above Earth, and dumping it on Northern California in a series of storms. Between 15 and 20 inches of rain had fallen as of Monday and at least another 5 inches was expected within days.   read more

The Poway Unified School District in Southern California became the poster child for oversized spending earlier in the year when it was revealed that it had borrowed $105 million over 40 years using capital investment bonds (CABs), obligating it to pay back around $1 billion down the road. Now, the Los Angeles Times says that 200 districts, one fifth all school systems in the state, have used CABs to borrow $2.8 billion since 2007.   read more

Los Angeles opened its first toll lanes for business November 10 and has already mailed 12,297 tickets to drivers hurtling in the freeway fast lane past clogged downtown traffic without the requisite transponder to identify them as legal. Fortunately for the scofflaws, they are only being charged for their time in the toll lines, and their expenses only amounted to $18,358.   read more

Charities don’t always raise money directly. Sometimes they use professional charitable fundraisers who take a portion of the solicitations for fees or other overhead expenses. Sometimes those fundraisers don’t take anything and sometimes they take a lot.   read more

The California Supreme Court dealt a potential blow to cities trying to ease their financial burdens by privatizing services and firing municipal workers when it refused to hear a Costa Mesa appeal of a lower-court ruling that killed its jobs plan. The earlier appellate decision effectively prohibits most cities from privatization except for certain “specialized services” such as legal or financial functions.   read more

The U.S. Department of the Interior ended a century-old practice of oyster farming in Drakes Bay when agency Secretary Ken Salazar ordered the eviction of a company that accounts for 40% of California’s oyster production. The Drakes Bay Oyster Company, which sought a 10-year extension of its expiring 40-year lease during a long-running dispute, was given 90 days to end its operations in the 2,700-acre estuary at Point Reyes in Marin County.   read more