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

A number of large-scale industrial companies left a toxic footprint that is still being cleaned up. The Los Angeles Times said they produced two of the worst chemical dumps in the nation. But it wasn’t until this year that the EPA stuck air samplers in homes of the community surrounding the Del Amo Superfund and Montrose Chemical Superfund sites to see what residents were breathing.   read more

The University of California payroll/benefits system of the future is two years overdue and at least $45 million over budget. “You have a project that is out of control, poorly planned and lacks basic governance,” Michael Krigsman, an IT industry analyst, told the Sacramento Bee. The “critical” UCPath is meant to replace a 35-year-old system with a “single payroll, benefits, HR and academic personnel solution for all UC employees.” Last week, its rollout was pushed back to September.   read more

More than 60 people have filed a new civil lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court making essentially the same grotesque claims as a lawsuit settled last year for $80.5 million, but covering a different time frame and people who didn’t participate in the first suit. The suits allege that owners systematically smashed concrete casings protecting coffins with backhoes and despoiled graves while reconfiguring the grounds to accommodate more paying customers.   read more

The screwed-up rollout of the Los Angeles Department of Power and Water’s (DWP) new computer billing system in September 2013 caused a world of hurt for residential customers, who suffered incorrect bills, delayed bills and threats of disconnection. Lawsuits are pending. Commercial customers were affected, too, but in a different way. The DWP said 10% of its 400,000 commercial users didn’t get billed.   read more

A report (pdf) from County Auditor-Controller John Naimo found that “numerous” department personnel, particularly captains, were sharing questions and answers for the training exam and other civil service tests. The report did not assign a motive to the generous sharing of materials and information, but noted that 15% of the department’s 701 trainee hires between 2007 and 2014 had a relative working there.   read more

California gained 20 new billionaires in the past year, according to Forbes’ annual tally, bringing the state's total to 131. Researchers studied how California migration trends were affected by tax cuts in 1996 and a millionaire’s tax in 2005. “This pattern does not indicate that the recent tax changes were of major concern to top-income earners,” the report said.   read more

It is safe to say that Californians celebrated the beginning of the fourth year of drought by trying to save their lawns and the last vestiges of civilization, like water in restaurants. But a new study from Stanford University reinforces other recent scientific reports that rising heat, not lower precipitation, is what’s slow-cooking the state’s goose.   read more

The NRDC wants the EPA to review the main ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup, a commonly used herbicide that has wiped out the milkweed plant in many parts of the country. Monarch butterflies rely on the milkweed for their survival. The NRDC says the “distinctive butterfly” is “in peril,” and faces the risk of completely dying off. “The remaining population is so small that a single severe weather event could eradicate it,” the group wrote.   read more

Last week, Hyperloop Transportation Technologies (HTT) announced it had secured the land to build a slower, five-mile version of the 760-mph L.A.-to-S.F. transportation system envisioned by Silicon Valley billlionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk in 2013—along the edge of Quay Hays’ 9-year-old yet-to-be-realized community vision centered on renewable energy and organic farming.   read more

Eight other wells were shut down last year after media reports highlighted the broader problem of unregulated drilling, and heightened oversight mandated by the state’s first fracking legislation, Senate Bill 4, began to kick in. Poisoning aquifers also became a concern after three years of drought exacerbated California’s chronic water shortage problems. Drilling wastewater can contain arsenic, benzene, heavy metals and radioactive material.   read more

A new study published in the New England Journal of Medicine found for the first that respiratory function in Southern California kids 11 to 15 years old improved over the past 17 years as government regulations at state and federal levels dramatically reduced pollution in the region. The benefits were felt equally by boys and girls and across racial and ethnic backgrounds.   read more

A phalanx of local and federal agencies participated in raids this week at 37 “maternity hotels” in Southern California, gathering evidence but not arresting people. Wealthy Chinese are reportedly paying $15,000 to $50,000 to operators of "maternity hotels" who arrange for the pregnant women to attain U.S. citizenship for their children by delivering them here.   read more

A third of the 9,000 prisoners serving three-strikes sentences were eligible for release and, as of a month ago, about 2,100 got out. If you didn’t read about the rampage they went on, it’s because they didn’t. Some of them did, indeed, commit crimes anew and 4.7% were returned to lockup within 18 months, according to the New York Times, compared to a 45% rate for all other prisoners released during that period.   read more

The California Supreme Court unanimously invalidated the portion of the 2006 Jessica’s Law that applied a 2,000-foot restriction on sex offenders living near any school or children’s park. The law “bears no rational relationship to advancing the state’s legitimate goal of protecting children from sexual predators and has violated their basic constitutional right to be free of unreasonable, arbitrary, and oppressive action,” Justice Marvin R. Baxter wrote for the court.   read more

Measure O would have allowed Bakersfield-based E&B Natural Resources Management to drill 34 oil wells on 1.3 acres in the city’s maintenance yard, which is surrounded by businesses, residences and a greenbelt, and is just blocks from the beach. Now, the city, which has an operating budget of $40 million, has to pay the oil company $17.5 million to go away.   read more

Last week, the California Environmental Protection Agency (CalEPA) cited the department for 19 “deficiencies” that included failing to properly inspect hundreds of facilities. The department checks gas stations, chemical factories, laboratories and other facilities that have hazardous materials around.“ Their program has fallen apart,” CalEPA’s Jim Bohon told the Los Angeles Times.   read more