Image by lortie. OPINION – Just a few miles from downtown Los Angeles, the Sterigenics sterilization facility in Vernon poses a silent threat to surrounding communities. The plant uses ethylene oxide (EtO), a toxic gas classified by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) as a known human carcinogen, to sterilize medical equipment. Yet, many residents are not aware of the dangers of what they’ve been breathing for years.
A groundwater monitoring well used for environmental groundwater sampling. Image by actualreece. OPINION – Across California, regulators maintain extensive records on contaminated bodies of water and hazardous remediation sites, especially in the Bay Area, Los Angeles Basin, and San Diego. Current policy allows polluted sites to be closed once they are deemed stable and pose minimal risk. But groundwater levels are climbing, and contamination that was once submerged is now at risk of being mobilized.
Legislation. Image by tumsasedgarsAs we head into the second year of the 2-year California Legislative Session, some legislators may want to re-introduce a bill that did not make it to the Governor’s Desk during this first year. Are there any applicable rules governing this question?
Image by Thapana Onphalai. A little less than a year after the California Legislature achieved near gender parity, uncertainty clouds the next chapter. Will the 2026 elections preserve the historic gains, or will the Capitol slide backward?
Cap and Trade image by WANAN YOSSINGKUMOPININ – California’s climate policies are impeded not by market volatility and unpredictability, but rather by indecision, the inability of the political establishment to decide what price we are able and willing to pay to mitigate climate change.
Image by SeventyFour.OPINION – Two recent federal lawsuits challenging an online safety law in Texas show that Big Tech doesn’t want to do its part to protect our kids. Far from being unconstitutional, Texas’s new law has charted the most privacy-protective and constitutionally sound approach to youth online safety that exists today.
Image by Andrzej Rostek. OPINION – Increasing costs for infrastructure development, regulatory and environmental compliance and climate resilience have made essential services such as water, energy and wastewater more expensive than ever.
Image by SandraMatic. OPINION – This week, 40,000 University of California workers will strike together across the state. All are members of AFSCME Local 3299, the people who clean patient rooms, prepare hospital meals, keep labs safe, move patients through care facilities, maintain campus infrastructure, and ensure students live and learn in functioning environments.
Image by AnnaStills. OPINION – When outside resources become scarce, individuals within social communities can work together to provide support for our own. It is easiest to help our folk if we have developed close relationships within our community.
Photo by AP.While both Gov. Gavin Newsom and his political nemesis President Donald Trump heavily use social media and podcasts to speak directly to voters, their communications teams also produce an avalanche of traditional press releases, advisories and briefings for the news media, an average of nearly seven pieces of written material every day of the year through Nov. 15 from the pair, according to a Capitol Weekly analysis.