Top Stories
State Tracks Hospital “Adverse Events” but Doesn’t Publish Them
NBC found that 63% of the broadly-defined adverse events (3,959)in a four-year period were Stage 3 or 4 decubitus ulcers—better known as bedsores. But second on the list with 986 events was “retention of a foreign object in a patient.” That’s 2.7 accidents a day that leave something behind. NBC also tallied 140 surgeries performed on wrong body parts, 114 instances of “death or serious disability associated with a medication error” and 107 sexual assaults on patients, read more
AT&T Agrees to Pay “Chump Change” for Nine Years of Hazardous Waste Dumping
California took its first enforcement action against a giant telecom for doing that when it penalized AT&T $23.8 million for nine years of illegal dumping by its 235 state facilities. The company admitted no wrongdoing but will pay the civil penalty and $28 million over five years for “enhanced environmental compliance measures.” “Enhanced” compliance does not include actually cleaning up any of the mess, which is scattered up and down the state. read more
PUC Fines PG&E $1 Million for Inappropriate E-Mail Exchanges—with PUC
PUC critics and PG&E both derided last week’s e-mail decision, albeit for opposite reasons. Critics said the decision did little, if nothing, to address the overly cozy relationship between the regulator and the utility, which they say led to shoddy practices and the San Bruno blast. PG&E said “sanctions were unwarranted” and the PUC may have overstepped its legal authority. read more
UC Regents Square Off with State Lawmakers, Approve 5-Year, 28% Tuition Hike
The university receives about $460 million less today than it did in 2008, before the recession. Dianne Klein, a spokeswoman for President Janet Napolitano, said the university could avoid the first year’s tuition hike if the state gave it another $100 million. Governor Brown has suggested that, instead of asking for more money, UC should reduce expenses by handing out three-year undergraduate degrees, expand online classes and realign its campuses to specialize more. read more
Covered California Survey Finds Nearly Half of Blue Shield/Anthem MDs Are MIA
A couple of surveys by the California Department of Managed Health Care (DMHC) found what patients have been complaining about for more than a year, journalists have been writing about and advocacy groups have been suing over. Insurance companies are not accurately telling customers and potential customers what doctors and hospitals are available to them. read more
Lawsuit Seeks to Block Expulsion of 1 Million from Medi-Cal Rolls
The lawsuit seeks a temporary injunction to stop California from dropping people from Medi-Cal until a better system can be put in place to ensure that beneficiaries have been properly informed. DHCS official Rene Mollow told Kaiser Health News the agency knows the form is in need of improvement, but for now, “We do have remedies in place where people can come back into coverage” after they lose their insurance. read more
Yet Another Truce Declared over Owens Dry Lake
Who knew that decades of acrimony between the city of Los Angeles and Owens Valley might have been avoided by just plowing ditches in the Owens (Dry) Lake? The overseer of Owens Valley air quality and L.A. settled yet another lawsuit over the city’s legal commitment to contain the dust left behind after it sucked all the water out of the lake in the early part of the last century. They are hopeful, again, that this solution will end the fighting. read more
Federal Court Blocks State from Appealing Concealed-Gun Permit Rollback
The three-judge panel ruled Attorney General Kamala Harris was too late to join the appeal and the case lacked a constitutional issue involving a state statute. Judge Sidney Thomas, the lone dissenter, said the ruling conflicts with the court’s precedents and “deprived one of the parties most affected by the panel’s decision the opportunity to even present an argument on an important constitutional question affecting millions of people.” read more
L.A. City Planners Reject Council Request for Fracking Ordinance
Eight months ago, the Los Angeles City Council unanimously directed its Department of City Planning to develop an ordinance to prohibit oil and gas well stimulation techniques, such as hydraulic fracturing (fracking), within city limits. Last week, the planners said they couldn’t do it. The report to the council detailing why the requested ordinance would not be forthcoming noted that the City of Compton passed such an ordinance and got sued by the Western States Petroleum Association. read more
State Plan Could Force Organic Farmers to Use Pesticides
The EIR argues that the nation’s largest organic farming industry wouldn’t be economically harmed by having to use pesticides because they could simply sell their product in the conventional food market. “Organic certification would not be lost, and the use of chemicals would not be expected to result in the conversion of farmland to non-agricultural use. Therefore, no impact would occur.” read more
State Report Questions the Value of GPS Monitoring under Jessica’s Law
The California Office of the Inspector General (OIG) issued a report last week that said, although parole agents anecdotally report that GPS is a valuable tool, “There exists little objective evidence to determine to what extent, if any, GPS tracking is a crime deterrent. . . . While it may be tempting to think of CDCR’s use of GPS technology as a crime–prevention tool, it is more accurate to categorize it as a monitoring tool.” read more
10 Take-Aways from Tuesday's Election
California is still the bluest of blue states, with Democrats winning all the elections for statewide office and firmly controlling the Senate and Assembly. But no state is easily defined or color-coded and California is no exception. The following 10 electoral outcomes at the local level help reveal a fuller, more nuanced portrait of the Golden State. read more
PG&E Profits More than Quadruple Despite Scandals and Lawsuits
How did the utility do it during a tumultuous period that included a ton of bad publicity and billion-dollar payout after a defective pipeline exploded, leveling a neighborhood and killing eight people in San Bruno? The Oakland Tribune gave credit to a rate increase granted by the PUC and lower-than-expected charges for its mandated pipeline repair work. read more
Crummy L.A. Schools Computer System Now Messing up Transcripts for College
L.A. Unified board member Steve Zimmer told KPCC he and other officials don’t know how widespread the problem is. He said the problems included missing data from classes taken at community colleges and summer school. LAUSD has made November 1 the deadline to straighten out the mess. California State University and the University of California want applications filed by November 30, but many schools require applications in October and early November. read more
Lawsuit Derails Oil Shipments by Train for the First Time in California
The suit sought a full review under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). The air quality district asked for the permit back after Earthjustice filed a lawsuit last month on behalf of the Sierra Club. The suit claimed that the district failed to consider the potential risk to public health and safety posed by shipping the crude in outdated tanker cars along aging rails to within seven miles of the state capital
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Federal Judge Rejects New S.F. Law Meant to Curb Evictions
Judge Breyer acknowledged “the severity of the housing crisis” but said the law would prevent some landlords from changing the use of their property, which he deemed a “per se taking” by the government of private property without just compensation. He said landlords were being made “to pay for a broad public problem not of their making.” read more