Dear Editor: I want to commend reporter Sigrid Bathen for her thorough and excellent reporting on an issue important to so many people: providing mental health care for our loved ones. Ms. Bathen’s two-part series shined a critical light on some counties’ resistance to adopting Laura’s Law to enhance outpatient services to those with severe mental health issues.
Candidates in the 7th Senate District: Orinda Mayor Steve Glazer and Assemblymember Susan Bonilla, D-Concord. (Photo illustration, separate images combined: Tim Foster, Capitol Weekly)Welcome to the 7th Senate District, where money and hardball politics came together in the primary election. The runoff likely will not be much different. Even in a state now accustomed to seven-digit spending in legislative campaigns, the 7th District showdown in May is likely to set records. And powerful interests that weighed in during the primary – organized labor, business interests, the dentists, the doctors and the fire fighters, for example – are all but certain to pony up again.
State Capitol, Sacramento. (Photo: David Monniaux)ELECTION 2014: Independent spending in California’s June 3 primary election has pushed above $23.2 million, with the political forces burning through about $250,000 a day. The largest single amounts from independent expenditure committees, or IEs, came from the California Teachers Association in the race for Superintendent of Public Instruction.