News

‘Pesticide drift’ affecting California health and safety

A helicopter sprays a field in the Salinas Valley. (Photo: Dwight Smith, via Shutterstock)

Angela Mancuso had just dropped off her kids at Glenwood Elementary School when she started to smell something “funky.” She was driving back to her home just a mile away in Stockton and decided to roll down her window for some fresh air. She noticed too late that a helicopter applying pesticide to a nearby walnut grove that Tuesday morning in September 2016 kept flying back and forth across the road, spraying continuously.

News

Newsom recall unlikely — but simmering

Gov. Newsom at a 2019 briefing in Sacramento. (Photo: Associated Press)

A perfect storm of events is giving Gov. Gavin Newsom political headaches, and he is yet again the subject of a recall movement that claims to have already collected more than 800,000 signatures. It marks the sixth attempt by various Republicans to oust Newsom – the other five fizzled. Few veteran political observers give this one any chance of success, either, although California politics is full of surprises.

News

Poll: Kids will be worse off than parents; rich-poor gap grows

A check-cashing outlet in Los Angeles, often used by low-income families. (Photo: image_vulture, via Shutterstock)

A solid majority of Californians say children growing up in the state today will be worse off financially than their parents, while more than two-thirds say the gap between rich and poor is widening. In the past year, more than four in ten households with annual incomes below $40,000 had work hours or pay reduced, and an equal share had to cut back on food.

News

California tax revenue ‘windfall’ now uncertain

The state Capitol in Sacramento, the seat of California government. (Photo: Always Wanderlust, via Shutterstock)

That $26 billion dollar “windfall” that California lawmakers learned about last month may not withstand a second round of economy-squelching lockdowns, and the risk of losing what little leverage they have is a top concern for state budget writers.

News

Pandemic: Some leaders’ behavior sends mixed messages

Beachgoers in April at Huntington Beach, despite stay-at-home orders. (Photo: Matt Gush, via Shutterstock)

California, like the rest of the nation, is seeing a dramatic rise in COVID infections and deaths — and Los Angeles County has some of the most dire statistics. Health officials reported more than 7,500 new cases in the county on Tuesday, shattering the old record, set last week.

News

Governor plans stricter COVID-19 response*

Illustration of California flag and the pandemic. (Image: bekulnis)

Gov. Gavin Newsom is expected to announce a tougher response to a surge in coronavirus infections that includes a three-week cutback on nonessential services and renewed stay-at-home restrictions affecting most Californians.

News

Californians who are in the running for Biden cabinet

Image by gguy, via Shutterstock

California stands to gain additional clout in Washington when Joe Biden is inaugurated as the nation’s 46th president on Jan. 21st. We already have Californians in powerful Washington positions, of course — including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco, who was just reelected easily to her post, and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy of Bakersfield.

News

Historic accord reached on Klamath river dam removal

A stretch of the Klamath River in far northern California near the Oregon line. (Photo: Victoria Ditkovsky, via Shutterstock)

The governors of California and Oregon, leaders of the Yurok and Karuk Tribes, PacificCorps and billionaire investor Warren Buffet announced a landmark, $450 million agreement Tuesday to remove four dams on the Klamath river to restore dwindling salmon populations.

News

As anxieties rise, Californians buy hundreds of thousands more guns

Background checks for gun purchases rose sharply starting in March and have remained high. (Graphic: Phillip Reese for California Healthline.

Handgun sales in California have risen to unprecedented levels during the COVID-19 pandemic, and experts say first-time buyers are driving the trend. The FBI conducted 462,000 background checks related to handgun purchases in California from March through September, an increase of 209,000, or 83%, from the same period last year. That’s more than in any other seven-month period on record.

News

Mental health courts cut costs, inmates, but lack oversight, data

Sacramento County Superior Court Judge Lawrence Brown. (Photo: Steinberg Institute)

San Francisco attorney Jennifer Johnson views her life and legal trajectory as “life before and life after” a devastating 2016 homicide case that forever changed her view of how the courts treat defendants who are mentally ill. The case in San Francisco Superior Court involved an 85-year-old defendant, Don Rebello, who suffered from severe dementia.  Suddenly and for no apparent reason, he stabbed and killed his beloved friend and longtime roommate, Erik Kleins, 83 – two of three elderly men who had long shared a San Francisco home.

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