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EDD technology faces Senate scrutiny as unemployment rises (Sacramento Bee Capitol Worker Blog)
Mark's Media Clips - Tue, 03/24/2009 - 11:22pm
By Andrew McIntosh
Sacramento Bee Capitol Worker Blog
March 24, 2009
It's no April Fool's joke.
A Senate Web site is listing a joint Senate hearing for April 1 into how the Employment Development Department is using technology.
The hearing is to be led by the chairmen of the Senate Labor and Industrial Relations Committee and the Select Committee on Disaster and Emergency Response.
20-week extension for jobless benefits headed for a vote this week (Sacramento Bee)
Mark's Media Clips - Mon, 03/23/2009 - 9:35pm
By Jim Sanders
Sacramento Bee
March 23, 2009
Richard Cadena, jobless for months, has a four-letter word for any California lawmaker unsure whether to pass or defeat legislation to extend unemployment insurance benefits: pass.
"Anything is a blessing at this point in time," said Cadena, 47, a former auto painter.
Robert Williams, a 36-year-old custodian, said he has hunted for work since December and has submitted a thick stack of job applications.
"Probably 30," he said, anticipating the next question. "Nothing."
Mileage-tax proposal stirs debate (Contra Costa Times)
Mark's Media Clips - Sun, 03/22/2009 - 9:33pm
By Denis Cuff
Contra Costa Times
March 22, 2009
Concord motorist Weeda Mojadedi agrees the nation's bumpy, pocked roads and freeways need fixing, but she said she doubts that imposing a new tax based on miles driven rather than gas consumed is the way to pay for it.
"A mileage tax sounds too complicated. There are a lot of ifs," the office receptionist said during a recent stop at a service station. "If the problem is they don't have enough money for roads, why don't they raise the gas tax? Then again, I worry about government taking more money from us."
Threat of new state tax on wine returns (Santa Rosa Press Democrat)
Mark's Media Clips - Sun, 03/22/2009 - 9:20pm
Viticulture briefs
Santa Rosa Press Democrat
March 22, 2009
Just weeks after being dropped during state budget negotiations, the threat of a new state tax on wine has returned.
California legislators have introduced separate bills in recent weeks calling for 10-cent and 5-cent per drink taxes on alcohol.
Assembly Bill 1019 calls for a 10-cent per drink tax. It was introduced Feb. 27 by Assemblyman Jim Beall Jr., D-San Jose, who made it clear he's no wine lover.
Growing Troubles for Public Transportation (NewsHour with Jim Lehrer)
Mark's Media Clips - Mon, 03/09/2009 - 11:55pm
NewsHour with Jim Lehrer
PBS
March 9, 2009
GWEN IFILL: Next, growing troubles for public transportation compounded by the economic downturn.
New figures out today show Americans relied on public transit in greater numbers last year. The American Public Transportation Association reports that, as gas prices dropped, more than 10 billion trips were taken by bus and rail, the highest level in more than 50 years.
Can voters move beyond tribal politics? (Santa Rosa Press Democrat)
Mark's Media Clips - Sun, 03/01/2009 - 10:36pm
By Pete Golis
Santa Rosa Press Democrat
March 1, 2009
"If we continue to go down this path, we will devolve . . . into a collection of tribes." - Dan Walters, state political columnist.
SACRAMENTO
Constitutional Convention measure in the works (Contra Costa Times Political Blotter)
Mark's Media Clips - Tue, 02/24/2009 - 9:34pm
By Lisa Vorderbrueggen
Contra Costa Times Political Blotter
Tuesday, February 24th, 2009
After sitting through a daylong presentation put on by coalition of business leaders and government reform groups in Sacramento, it seems increasingly likely that voters will see on the ballot in 2010 two measures that would lead to the California Constitutional Convention since 1879.
Advocating for education (Contra Costa Times)
Mark's Media Clips - Tue, 02/24/2009 - 9:13pm
Staff Report
Contra Costa Times
02/24/2009
Advocating for education
Open primary debate reignites (Contra Costa Times)
Mark's Media Clips - Sun, 02/22/2009 - 8:50pm
Open primary debate reignites
By Lisa Vorderbrueggen
Contra Costa Times
February 22, 2009
IN THE PRE-DAWN hours of the budget fracas last week, a lone — and now lonely — state senator revived the open primary fight in California.
Sen. Abel Maldonado, a moderate Central Coast Republican, broke with his party and demanded the Legislature let voters decide the open primary question in return for his critical vote on the budget.
Maldonado ready to vote aye (Sacramento Bee Capitol Alert)
Mark's Media Clips - Fri, 02/20/2009 - 12:10am
By Kevin Yamamura
Sacramento Bee Capitol Alert
February 19, 2009
Sen. Abel Maldonado, R-Santa Maria, said he's ready to vote for the budget after scoring major concessions from legislative leaders as part of a plan to bridge a $40 billion deficit. The only remaining question is whether two-thirds of both houses will provide enough votes to give Maldonado what he wants.
California Senate Republicans Oust Leader -- Budget Pushed Further Into Question (San Francisco Sentinel)
Mark's Media Clips - Wed, 02/18/2009 - 10:33pm
By Kevin Yamamura and Jim Sanders
San Francisco Sentinel
February 18, 2009
Senate Republicans ousted their leader early this morning as other lawmakers continued searching for one more GOP vote in the upper house to break the state’s budget deadlock.
In a contentious meeting that lasted through the midnight hour, Senate Republicans removed Sen. Dave Cogdill as leader and replaced him with Sen. Dennis Hollingsworth, who opposes the budget deal Cogdill negotiated for his caucus because it contains new taxes.
Pilot who landed jet in Hudson honored by Schwarzenegger (Associated Press)
Mark's Media Clips - Wed, 02/18/2009 - 12:36am
By Steve Lawrence
Associated Press Writer
02/17/2009
Click here to see a photo of Mark with the Sullenbergers during the ceremony.
SACRAMENTO—Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger says the US Airways pilot who safely landed his plane in the Hudson River last month is a "great international hero, a national hero and a California hero."
Celebration Honoring Captain Chesley Sullenberger
Mark's Media Clips - Tue, 02/17/2009 - 9:11pm
Click here to watch a video of the Capitol ceremony.
DEL ROGERS: Thank you, everyone, for waiting so patiently while everyone got ready because, as I told you earlier, they were in the gathering room, gathering up, getting it started.
The reason that we’re here, we’re going to celebrate one of California’s great heroes. Let me tell you just a little bit about it, in case you don’t know—he’s coming.
CROWD:
Sully, Sully, Sully . . .
DEL ROGERS:
Spending cap may not fit in June (Contra Costa Times)
Mark's Media Clips - Sat, 02/14/2009 - 12:21am
By Steven Harmon
MediaNews Sacramento Bureau
02/13/2009
SACRAMENTO — A spending cap, one of the linchpins to what could be a $41 billion budget agreement that lawmakers will be voting on today, has been touted as key to reining in the soaring costs of state government.
Republican leaders in the Legislature insisted on enforced spending limits in exchange for having to ask a handful of their caucus members to vote for $14.4 billion in tax increases on sales, vehicles, gasoline and personal income.
Calls to alter how California government works (San Francisco Chronicle)
Mark's Media Clips - Mon, 02/02/2009 - 9:26pm
John Wildermuth
San Francisco Chronicle
February 2, 2009
With the state drowning in red ink and the Legislature facing a seemingly endless gridlock, political reformers and business officials want to call a state constitutional convention to redraw the way government works in California.
"Our premise is that California is broken," said Jim Wunderman, a leader of the effort and president of the Bay Area Council, which represents key businesses in the region. "That part is no longer debatable. The question now is 'How do we fix it?' "
Bay Area lawmakers keeping busy (Contra Costa Times)
Mark's Media Clips - Sun, 02/01/2009 - 10:53am
By Steven Harmon
MediaNews Sacramento Bureau
2/01/2009
SACRAMENTO — On a recent night at her Capitol office, Assemblywoman Joan Buchanan, D-Alamo, spent until 2 a.m. answering 150 e-mails from constituents worried about the state's fiscal crisis. That was after she'd hand-signed 500 letters she'd written about the budget.
Assemblyman Sandre Swanson, D-Alameda, has been meeting regularly with labor groups, who are angered over possible rollbacks to worker's rights.
After school programs help fight childhood obesity and hunger with healthy eating and exercise (Contra Costa Times)
Mark's Media Clips - Fri, 01/30/2009 - 7:53am
By Theresa Harrington
Contra Costa Times
1/30/2009
BAY POINT — Fourteen-year-old Andy Balcazar eats healthy foods and stays physically active because he doesn't want to get diabetes, which runs in his family.
The Riverview Middle School eighth-grader is one of dozens of teens participating in a Mt. Diablo school district after-school program that gets them outdoors to play sports and also gives them opportunities to grow, cook and eat nutritious meals such as squash soup with whole-grain bread.
Republicans considering the unthinkable: taxes (Contra Costa Times)
Mark's Media Clips - Thu, 01/22/2009 - 7:33pm
By Steven Harmon
MediaNews Sacramento Bureau
1/22/2009
SACRAMENTO — Republicans are rethinking the unthinkable: saying yes, though begrudgingly so, to taxes.
It would be a hard break from dogma and would require their members to back down from pledges they've steadfastly upheld for years to avoid tax increases at all costs. But as state lawmakers stare into an abyss that is a $42 billion 18-month budget deficit, previous ideological markers appear to be softening.
