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California’s county tax assessors are reporting sharp increases in valuations that will generate billions of new dollars for local governments and schools, according to the California Taxpayers Association.

. . . use of the chargers is included in the price of a Tesla, and advertised as being “free for life.” While many of its rivals spend big money on advertising, Tesla has invested millions of dollars in charging stations meant to be an extra incentive for buyers to consider its pricey electric car.

After years of neglect, state officials estimate it will cost $59 billion to fix the now-crumbling roads and freeways that Gov. Edmund G. “Pat” Brown championed more than five decades ago. And it’s up to his son, Gov. Jerry Brown, to find the money.

The purpose of the new rules was briefly outlined last week by the accounting board chairman, David Vaudt . . . “Previously, what happened under current standards is that the pension and OPEB liabilities appeared in the footnotes of the financial statement, and regretfully that didn’t get the attention of the policymakers, the mayors and councils, the governors and the legislators,” Vaudt said.

The purpose of the new rules was briefly outlined last week by the accounting board chairman, David Vaudt . . . “Previously, what happened under current standards is that the pension and OPEB liabilities appeared in the footnotes of the financial statement, and regretfully that didn’t get the attention of the policymakers, the mayors and councils, the governors and the legislators,” Vaudt said.

The budget’s enactment comes a week before the July 1 start of the next fiscal year. But Brown and the Democratic-controlled Legislature still have significant work to do outside the budget process. Brown called a special session last week to address funding shortfalls in health care, roads and infrastructure.

A CNBC analysis of tax data and figures provided by two major national moving companies shows that states with the highest per-capita taxes, for the most part, are also seeing the biggest net migration out of those states.

The answer lies largely in the rapid expansion of the Medi-Cal program, which will soon provide health care to nearly 1 in 3 Californians. At the same time, the federal government has disallowed a creative financing scheme the state was using to maximize federal money for the program.

To bring the pavement condition and essential components such as storm drains, gutters, sidewalks and curbs of local streets and roads to a level of Best Management Practices (BMP), there needs to be an additional investment of $8.22 billion dollars annually over the next ten years.

For months, groups representing labor, contractors, local governments, transportation interests and others worked on legislation to revamp the state’s roads and ease the movement of freight at the state’s ports. The bill, which would use the $1 billion collected annually in truck weight fees for road work, awaits action on the Senate floor. The measure may be converted to a special session bill and serve as the centerpiece of the legislative session.

Although California motorists pay the second highest fuel taxes in the nation, we sit near the bottom in maintenance spending per mile of roadway and, therefore, at or near the bottom in congestion and pavement conditions.

Gov. Jerry Brown apparently has liberated himself from the self-imposed pledge to ask voters to approve new state taxes.

Prompted by complaints like Hill’s, the California state auditor last year began evaluating how the state oversees much of its health program for low-income residents. The resulting audit released Tuesday found that provider directories were riddled with errors and that the state Department of Health Care Services hadn’t properly regulated plans to guarantee patients adequate access to doctors.

“That stunning number is stark evidence of California’s ever-widening economic divide.

California has nearly twice as many enrollees as the next largest state, New York, and 17.2 percent of all Medicaid enrollment in the nation.”

In announcing the agreement, Brown said the deal preserves his General Fund revenue forecast and overall spending levels, a major concession by legislative leaders to the fourth-term governor. Total general fund spending of $115.4 billion was only $61 million more than Brown originally proposed, not the $749 million more legislative Democrats wanted.