So much of California’s land is off limits from development – and government rules impose high costs on builders who want to construct anything on the remaining, developable land. It’s not a surprise the state has many of the nation’s priciest markets, and current policies are likely to exacerbate the problem.
Published in 1961, Jacobs’ book exposed the flaws of that era’s urban-renewal programs. But she probably would never have imagined one of the more recent threats to old downtowns and to the oftentimes quirky small businesses that reside in historic buildings: disability lawsuits.
Brown offered few specifics for financing deferred transportation maintenance on Friday when he unveiled his $113 billion state spending plan, other than to say he’d bring a bipartisan group of lawmakers and stakeholders together.
School districts throughout San Diego County are seeing huge electricity bill increases that have soared as much as 40 percent in recent months, according to some officials.
In reality, once a Legislature creates a program and gives regulators broad new powers, it’s unlikely anything will rein it in. Maybe as the Legislature returns, someone can propose a law that requires a careful analysis of old laws. Then again, one can only guess the unintended consequences that would result from that idea.
A state-mandated schedule for replenishing California’s cash-strapped teachers’ retirement fund means school districts will see their pension contributions triple by 2021 and remain high for decades, according to budget forecasts released this month by several local districts.
Administrators say they’re at a loss for how they’ll come up with the cash, which for some districts could be tens of millions per year. The forecasts come just six months after a legislative deal was struck by Sacramento lawmakers to recover billions of dollars for the California State Teachers’ Retirement System, or CalSTRS.
But while San Jose and other cities will never literally reach a single employee who sits in the room mailing out pension checks, the trajectory is headed in that troubling direction. One city manager even quipped to a newspaper a few years ago that cities are becoming pension providers that offer a few public services on the side.
California’s unemployment rate for October was 7.3 percent, which remain unchanged from the previous month even as the state increased payroll jobs.
In a story reported widely in northern California last month, agents from the Department of Industrial Relations showed up unannounced at the tiny Westover Winery, in Castro Valley, and slapped its owners with more than $115,000 in fines and assessments for using volunteer workers.
It’s not just pro-business Texas anymore, or Utah or Nevada or Arizona. Now even New York, a state sometimes ranked as a worse place to do business than even California, is going after Golden State businesses and jobs.
In a blow to San Diego’s economy, Active Network will relocate to Dallas thanks in part to an $8.6 million check from the Texas Government.
Texas Gov. Rick Perry announced Thursday that the Active Network, which specializes in cloud-based software, will open a headquarters in downtown Dallas, and create 1,000 jobs at an average salary of $72,000 per year. This is the second San Diego company owned by Vista Equity to be lured to Texas this year. In February, Perry authorized $4.5 million to Websense to move its headquarters to Austin.
The defense contractor announced Thursday that over the next two years it will close its facility on Ruffin Road, which employs 530 people. The facility is the base for the company’s division that manufactures airline auxiliary power units.
Electricity bills are rising for small businesses as well as commercial and industrial utility customers, as San Diego Gas & Electric shifts the way it pays for low-income subsidies. Residential customers, meanwhile, will save.
Business owners who have fled California often say their decision to leave wasn’t just about tax rates, but about the punitive attitudes sometimes found among tax and regulatory authorities here. A new wrinkle in a high-profile, 22-year-old tax case gives fodder to those who make such claims.
California’s leaders often mock Texas and its Republican Gov. Rick Perry, who has been on an almost evangelical mission to lure California businesses eastward. Earlier this month, Perry visited Los Angeles, Orange County and the San Jose area. He’s been in TV ads pitching Texas to businesses and has boasted that in the last two years California companies created 14,000 jobs in the Lone Star State.