News

That effort, resisted by environmentalists and powerful labor unions, sputtered out two years ago. Since then, Brown and Democratic lawmakers have instead struck deals giving special consideration to certain projects rather than confront the political difficulties of overhauling the law. . . Because the arrangements are tied to the budget, they are not subject to the lengthy public review process required of most proposals in the Capitol.

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.

Fed officials sharply downgraded their economic forecast for this year. They projected the economy would grow between 1.8% and 2% this year, well below the range of 2.3% to 2.7% in its last forecast in March.

You’re not alone if you can’t afford your health insurance obligations, whether you’re struggling to pay your monthly premium or facing thousands of dollars in out-of-pocket costs.

Brown approved a streamlined environmental review for the 8150 Sunset Blvd. project in Hollywood in April 2014 and the same expedited process for the Warriors project in Mission Bay three months ago.

Los Angeles County Supervisor Sheila Kuehl said Monday that she intends to propose a minimum wage increase for county workers and businesses in unincorporated areas that mirrors the plan recently approved by the city of Los Angeles.

But for some partisans on each side of the debate, that historic moment has been tainted by labor leaders’ last-minute push for an exemption for unionized workplaces. The request for a union waiver — proposed and then abruptly shelved — drew national attention, much of it negative, to the county Federation of Labor and its recently installed top executive, Rusty Hicks.

The Fed’s finding: “Currently, a little over a million workers are paid the federal minimum wage, and most of them are not employed full-time.” In addition, “A little less than a million workers are paid less than the federal minimum wage, a large majority of whom are employed full-time.”

But the loophole is a problem with a relatively small number of properties. And the alleged fix would hammer tens of thousands of property owners who play by the rules and don’t game the system – and who employ millions of Californians.

A Pepperdine University study found that a split roll property tax could result in the loss of up to 396,345 jobs in California over the first five years and increase property taxes for businesses anywhere between $6 billion and $10 billion per year.

Much of the media and many politicians blame the San Joaquin Valley’s water shortage on drought, but that is merely an aggravating factor. From my experience representing California’s agricultural heartland, I know that our water crisis is not an unfortunate natural occurrence; it is the intended result of a long-term campaign waged by radical environmentalists who resorted to political pressure as well as profuse lawsuits.

The total climbed to more than $11.4 billion last year, according to the California Workers’ Compensation Institute, which is up $4.5 billion from the industry 10-year low in 2009, but still $4.7 billion less than 2004’s historic high of $16.1 billion 11 years ago.

In fact, according to a new calculation out this week, the price gap in May between the California and U.S. averages was a whopping $1.03, the biggest in at least 15 years. The cost “premium” ranged from 80 cents in the Sacramento region to $1.19 in Los Angeles.