California motorists in a traffic jam. (Photo: Shutterstock)OPINION: Just as the state’s Renewable Portfolio Standard requires electric utilities to phase in a specific amount of clean energy in our electricity mix, the LCFS mandates that the oil industry phase in cleaner fuels to tackle the state’s biggest source of greenhouse gas emissions: the fuel that runs our cars, trucks, and buses.
A powerplant at sunset. (Photo: David Crockett)California is in the midst of multiple regulatory efforts to reduce methane emissions from natural gas and oil operations throughout the state. It’s a key opportunity to make a real dent in the state’s climate impact since methane, the primary component of natural gas, packs over 84 times the warming potential of carbon dioxide in the first 20 years after it is released unburned.
Demonstrators seeking more funding for health care coverage gathered recently at the state Capitol. Inside, the Senate voted to expand coverage to undocumented choldren. (Photo: Alvin Chen, Capitol Weekly)The state Senate today approved legislation that would make California the first state in the nation to extend health coverage to children who are in the country illegally and seek federal authorization to sell private insurance to those in the country illegally. The bill, now headed to the Assembly, would allow children under 19 from low-income families to qualify for state-funded Medi-Cal, regardless of their legal status.
On the outskirts of San Bernardino. (Photo: Steve Heap)A San Bernardino plan to exit bankruptcy follows the path of the Vallejo and Stockton exit plans, cutting bond debt and retiree health care but not pensions. Then it veers off in a new direction: contracting for fire, waste management and other services. The contract services are expected to reduce city pension costs. Other pension savings come from a sharp increase in employee payments toward pensions and from a payment of only 1 percent on a $50 million bond issued in 2005 to cover pensions costs.
California motorists in a traffic jam. (Photo: Shutterstock)As a physician – especially a physician living in Los Angeles – I am deeply concerned about the effects of air pollution on lung health. Southern California is home to some of the most entrenched air pollution in our nation and it affects the millions of our residents living with asthma, heart and lung disease and other chronic health conditions.
A powerplant at sunset. (Photo: David Crockett)Last week’s executive order on climate change from Gov. Jerry Brown offers a valuable opportunity to reflect on what Pacific Coast climate leadership is helping us achieve. As someone whose career has spanned both economic and environmental interests, I have a unique vantage point on why reducing carbon emissions is a win-win for both business and the environment.
OPINION: As a surgeon, I weigh in on political issues whenever they impact me and my patients, and when I think I can shed additional light on the matter. That was the case this year when I became a vocal opponent of Proposition 45, which would have given the state’s Insurance Commissioner unprecedented new powers over health care decisions.
The rapidly growing cost of state worker retiree health care, a more generous benefit than received by active state workers, soon could be taking a bigger bite out of the state general fund than pensions. As if trading places, a new forecast expects the annual general fund payment for state worker retiree health care, now $500 million less than the payment for pensions, to be $500 million more than the pension payment in six years.
CalPERS' headquarters in Sacramento. (Photo: Coolcaesar/en.wikipedia)A new study shows CalPERS members are living longer. It’s the first step in a review of workforce changes and investment polices that could lead to higher contribution rates for employers and possibly employees. (Photo: coolcaesar, en.wikipedia)
California’s core environmental protection law, a 43-year-old statute frequently denounced by developers and business interests as a tangle of red tape, is on a Capitol hit list once again.
But the political dynamic this year is unusual: Those pushing hard for change are Democrats, including Gov. Brown, the Senate and Assembly leaders and a