Updating . .
To block California soda taxes, companies paid for ‘Black Panther’ tickets, fancy dinners -- Dinners at an expensive restaurant in Maui — with ocean views. Tickets to professional sports games. A free screening of “Black Panther” at a Sacramento IMAX theater. And a $250,000 donation to a group that funds the governor’s travel. Samantha Young in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 4/7/19
Kimberly Sue Endicott, tourist in Uganda, rescued from kidnappers, authorities say -- Kimberly Sue Endicott, 56, an aesthetician from Costa Mesa, and her driver, Congolese national Jean-Paul Mirenge Remezo, were rescued by security services, the Ugandan government tweeted. No other details about their rescue were available. Their kidnappers had demanded a $500,000 ransom for their release. Hannah Fry and Carlos Lozano in the Los Angeles Times$ Marilyn Kalfus in the Orange County Register -- 4/7/19
Police officer wounded in a wild shootout with gunman in Manhattan Beach -- A Hawthorne police officer was wounded in a wild shootout with a gunman near a shopping center in Manhattan Beach early Sunday, authorities said. Police responded to reports of an active shooter near the corner of Rosecrans Avenue and Aviation Boulevard about 9:30 a.m., authorities said. Deborah Netburn in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 4/7/19
L.A. Times and other news outlets sue for 911 call records from Borderline shooting -- The Los Angeles Times, the Associated Press and the publisher of the Ventura County Star sued Ventura County on Friday, seeking the release of 911 call records from the Borderline shooting that left 12 people dead. The lawsuit alleges that the county has violated the state’s Public Records Act by denying requests for 911 calls, dispatch calls and body and dash camera audio or video. Brittny Mejia in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 4/7/19
With Republican Duncan Hunter’s future uncertain, Democrats rally around one candidate -- Rep. Duncan Hunter’s lingering legal issues and September trial set the stage for an unusual campaign season, with viable Republican alternative candidates in limbo and Democrats behind a familiar East County name. Charles T. Clark in the San Diego Union-Tribune$ -- 4/7/19
Firefighting aircraft ‘increasingly ineffective’ amid worsening wildfires -- Now, in the aftermath of the Camp fire, which killed 85 people and caused up to $13 billion in damage, some are calling Cal Fire’s use of air tankers “costly and increasingly ineffective.” They insist that fixed-wing air tankers are too vulnerable to the blinding smoke and high winds of extreme fire conditions. Joseph Serna and Kyle Kim in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 4/7/19
California coffers to swell when billion-dollar firms premiere on Wall Street -- California’s boom-and-bust budget could soon get a big boost as companies worth billions of dollars rush onto the public markets, bringing huge tax gains for their home state. Carolyn Said in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 4/7/19
The impossible challenge of tracking visa overstays -- Tracking the entry and exit of foreign travelers legally visiting the U.S. seems simple enough. In reality, it has proven an insurmountable challenge. The best tracking occurs at air and sea ports of entry, yet even those systems are not comprehensive. Kristina Davis in the San Diego Union-Tribune$ -- 4/7/19
85-year-old Wine Institute to move headquarters to Sacramento from San Francisco -- Sacramento’s proximity to lawmakers was the main reason behind the move, board of directors members told the San Francisco Chronicle, though the organization has been making policy arguments from San Francisco since 1934. Other reason to consolidate California offices in Sacramento: the rising cost of doing business in the Bay Area and visitors’ difficulty navigating San Francisco traffic to reach the current location in a Financial District skyscraper. Benjy Egel in the Sacramento Bee$ -- 4/7/19
Nipsey Hussle had a vision for South L.A. It all started with a trip to Eritrea -- At the age of 19, Nipsey Hussle took the money he earned hustling on the streets of South Los Angeles and bought a plane ticket to his father’s homeland — a tiny country in eastern Africa that fought a brutal war to secure its place in the world as Eritrea. Angel Jennings in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 4/7/19
County school districts struggle with the rising costs of special education -- Federal and state dollars for students with special needs aren’t rising with special ed enrollment, so districts are digging into general funds and reserves. Kristen Taketa, Deborah Sullivan Brennan in the San Diego Union-Tribune$ -- 4/7/19
Teen with autism turns a page in his ‘Ottobiography’ -- Otto Lana writes poetry, does distance swimming, and plans to study math and science after high school. Because he couldn’t talk, his first school put him in classes for students with low academic expectations. Deborah Sullivan Brennan in the San Diego Union-Tribune$ -- 4/7/19
Why Juul is thriving despite the crackdown on youth vaping -- For San Francisco vaping company Juul, the outcry from officials at all levels of government seems unrelenting: the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is cracking down on e-cigarette sales to minors, California lawmakers are weighing a bill to halt the sale of flavored tobacco like Juul pods, and, in the company’s own hometown, the city attorney is pushing to ban e-cigarettes altogether. Juul itself has yanked many of its most popular flavors off of store shelves. Catherine Ho in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 4/7/19
Trucks on the 210 Freeway keep crashing onto the Gold Line. A fix could get expensive -- In April of last year, a traffic collision in the middle of the night sent a FedEx truck crashing across the 210 Freeway in Pasadena and onto the tracks of the Metro Gold Line, which is separated from the roadway by a squat concrete barrier. Laura J. Nelson in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 4/7/19
San Francisco getting new red-light cameras, but it’s been a stop-and-go process -- If you ran a red light at one of San Francisco’s 20 camera-monitored intersections in the past four months, you got a pass. That’s because the aging traffic cameras were turned off while a new system was waiting to be installed. Phil Matier in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 4/7/19
Citations soar for homeless on American River Parkway after ruling halts bans on camping -- Marietta Watson wonders why being homeless is cause for a ticket. She reached into her small purse and pulled out the pink citation slip with the offense “CART ON PKWY” that she received from an American River Parkway ranger last week. It is exhausting enough being homeless, she said. This was like salt in the wound. Alexandra Yoon-Hendricks in the Sacramento Bee$ -- 4/7/19
As more people go without a lawyer, courts offer self-help services. Advice from the judge? No way -- The divorced couple appearing before Judge Helen E. Zukin was fighting over visitation. The man said he had kicked his heroin addiction and wanted to spend time with his children, whom he hadn’t seen in three years. His ex was against it, saying she did not trust that he was clean, and that he had let his children down before. Maura Dolan in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 4/7/19
Bretón: #UFWToo. Union head Teresa Romero wants us to remember the farmworkers -- She’s the first woman to lead the fabled United Farm Workers union, which was established nearly 60 years ago by César Chávez, perhaps the best known Mexican American in U.S. history. Teresa Romero is also the granddaughter of a Zapotec woman whose indigenous lineage predates the Spanish conquest of the nation of Mexico. Marcos Bretón in the Sacramento Bee$ -- 4/7/19
Joe Biden accuser Lucy Flores went from gangs and jail to law school and elected office -- Lucy Flores has seldom been shy about saying what she felt needed to be said. David Montero in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 4/7/19
McManus: Stop thinking of Bernie Sanders as a gadfly. He’s the front-runner -- In case you missed it, Bernie Sanders is now, for all practical purposes, the front-runner in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination. The Vermont socialist pulled in $18 million in the first three months of 2019, most of it from small donors. His nearest rival, Kamala Harris, collected $12 million, with others far behind. Doyle McManus in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 4/7/19
California Policy & Politics This Morning
Nipsey Hussle memorial service planned for Thursday at Staples Center in downtown L.A. -- A public memorial service for slain rapper Nipsey Hussle is tentatively set for Thursday at Los Angeles’ Staples Center, a source familiar with the plans said Saturday. The service is being planned as a ticketed event with non-transferable tickets, the source said. No other details were available. Dakota Smith in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 4/7/19
CHP officer killed, 2 injured in crash that closes 15 Freeway in Riverside County -- The crash occurred about 4:30 p.m. north of Nichols Road, according to the CHP and the Riverside County Fire Department. As of 8 p.m., all southbound lanes between Nichols Road and Indian Truck Trail remained closed, according to Caltrans. Carlos Lozano in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 4/7/19
Maggots, mice fall into California prison dining hall -- Maggots and mice have fallen onto inmates’ dining tables at a California state prison where holes in the roof also allow rain and bird droppings to seep through and streak the walls, according to an inmate lawsuit that charges the state isn’t moving fast enough to repair deteriorating prisons. Don Thompson Associated Press -- 4/7/19
At Santa Anita, at Least for One Day, the Racing Goes Off Safely -- As the alarming run of thoroughbred fatalities at Santa Anita Park continued last weekend, various parties associated with the venerable track began voicing a shared prayerful wish: Can we somehow get through Saturday without another one? Mike Tierney in the New York Times$ -- 4/7/19
Walters: Managerial miscues plague the state -- Politics being what they are, officeholders habitually pitch new services and projects to their constituents, seeking favorable images that will carry them through their next election. Dan Walters Calmatters -- 4/7/19
Economy, Employers, Jobs, Unions, Pensions
Writers and agents agree to one-week extension in talks to avert showdown -- Hollywood’s version of a family feud has reached a tipping point as writers prepared to fire their agents en masse following an extraordinary standoff that could disrupt TV and film production. David Ng in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 4/7/19
Tech boom driving reinvention of historic San Francisco structures for office space -- Putting new wine into old bottles has been going on in San Francisco for years. But now the tech boom is in full swing in repurposing several historic structures as office space. Carl Nolte in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 4/7/19
Southwest Hawaii air service caused a 17% fare drop from California -- If you are a fan of Hawaii, you may be saying mahalo for the Southwest Effect. Hugo Martin in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 4/7/19
In San Francisco, Making a Living From Your Billionaire Neighbor’s Trash -- A military veteran who fell into homelessness and now lives in government subsidized housing, Mr. Orta is a full-time trash picker, part of an underground economy in San Francisco of people who work the sidewalks in front of multimillion-dollar homes, rummaging for things they can sell. Thomas Fuller in the New York Times$ -- 4/7/19
Wildfire
Cleaning up Woolsey fire debris remains a work in progress -- The blaze led to deaths of three people, consumed 97,000 acres of land and destroyed 1,500 structures. And in all of its destruction, it produced large volumes of trash — tons of disaster-related debris needed to be removed from former homes and other structures. Olga Grigoryants in the Los Angeles Daily News$ -- 4/7/19
Education
Teach For America — except for California -- Backed by powerful teachers unions, Democrats are pushing to ban Teach For America from California amid a wave of teacher’s strikes and a heated debate over charter schools in the nation’s most populous state. MacKenzie Mays Politico -- 4/7/19
This Sacramento-area high school’s football field won’t open on time — thanks to some birds -- Rio Americano High School might want to change its mascot from the Raiders to the nesting birds. That’s because a pair of killdeers, a type of small shore plover, have taken up residence with their four eggs in the end zone of a new track and field at the San Juan Unified high school in the Wilhaggin section of Arden Arcade. Mila Jasper in the Sacramento Bee$ -- 4/7/19
Immigration / Border
Identifying potentially thousands more separated families could take up to 2 years -- The federal government is asking for up to two years to identify potentially thousands more migrant children who were separated from their parents at the border, according to a plan filed in San Diego federal court late Friday. Kristina Davis in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 4/7/19
Environment
Burning Man begs festival-goers to help stop BLM from 'outright killing' the event -- Burning Man organizers are pleading with festival-goers to write to the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and urge them to reconsider a number of new requirements for the festival. Eric Ting in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 4/7/19
Also . . .
Ly Tong, ex-fighter pilot known as the ‘Vietnamese James Bond’, dies at 74 -- Ly Tong, the former fighter pilot known as the “Vietnamese James Bond” for his daring stunts — including hijacking a plane to drop 50,000 political leaflets over his homeland, calling on citizens to overthrow the communist government — died Friday night in San Diego. He was 74. Anh Do in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 4/7/19
Hiltzik: Chinese immigrants helped build California, but they’ve been written out of its history -- In 2014, the U.S. Labor Department formally inducted the Chinese workers who helped build the transcontinental railroad into its Hall of Honor, giving them a place in American labor history alongside union leaders such as Eugene V. Debs and A. Philip Randolph and champions of worker dignity such as Mother Jones and Cesar Chavez. What was remarkable about that moment was that it took the nation 145 years to recognize Chinese immigrants’ role in building the nation. Michael Hiltzik in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 4/7/19
POTUS 45
Trump Lawyer Asserts President’s Right to Keep Tax Returns Private -- President Trump’s personal lawyer on Friday asserted Mr. Trump’s right as a citizen to keep his tax returns private and told the Treasury Department not to hand the returns over to House Democrats, foreshadowing what has the potential to be a far-reaching legal fight that could reach the Supreme Court. Nicholas Fandos and Maggie Haberman in the New York Times$ -- 4/7/19
As Trump struggles to curb unauthorized immigration, his rhetoric gets tougher, but quick solutions are elusive -- More than halfway through President Trump’s first term, unauthorized immigration has surged to the highest levels in a decade, leaving him searching for quick-fix solutions and his administration roiling with internal tensions over how to address a problem the president promised to solve. David Nakamura and Seung Min Kim in the Washington Post$ -- 4/7/19
Beltway
2020 Democrats grapple with immigration message as border crossings surge -- Democrats credit their 2018 midterm success to focusing on pocketbook issues and avoiding engaging with President Trump on immigration. They may not have that luxury in 2020. Tal Kopan in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 4/7/19
-- Saturday Updates
Nipsey Hussle ‘was a protector.’ His parents and girlfriend Lauren London speak out -- In the days since rapper and community activist Nipsey Hussle was gunned down outside of his clothing store Sunday, his loved ones have taken comfort in each other, huddling, as they have for years, at Hussle’s grandmother’s house in South L.A. Angel Jennings in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 4/6/19
As Trump presses immigration crackdown, Santa Clara reconsiders sanctuary policy -- The slaying of a San Jose woman in her home, allegedly by an undocumented immigrant with prior arrests, has become a test of Santa Clara County’s sanctuary policy, throwing into question how far local leaders should go with such measures — and at what cost. Tatiana Sanchez in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 4/6/19
Last major San Francisco Transbay tower, affordable housing at risk of delays -- A Transbay district tower that would fund more than 300 affordable housing units at no cost to the city could be held up for years, a potential victim of San Francisco’s cap on the approval of new office space and the flood of big South of Market projects lining up for permits. J.K. Dineen and Roland Li in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 4/6/19
Some wealthy parents cut deals, others fight on in college admissions scandal -- In a busy week in the college admissions scandal, some accused parents have decided to cooperate with prosecutors. One couple that balked, however, has been indicted with an added charge of money laundering, indicating the government is ready to wield more charges as leverage. Matthew Ormseth in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 4/6/19
With talent scarce, some firms offer ‘returnships’ to sidelined professionals -- But with the unemployment rate near record lows in the Bay Area — it’s 2.5 percent or below in San Francisco, San Mateo and Marin counties — some employers are reaching out to people who have exited the labor market to care for kids or other family members. Kathleen Pender in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 4/6/19
Williams-Sonoma ‘prepared for the worst’ as China trade war continues -- The San Francisco home-goods company is one of several firms moving manufacturing operations out of China in anticipation of tariff hikes. Shwanika Narayan in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 4/6/19
Lopez: Inglewood is gentrifying fast, but this girls’ softball team faces bleak conditions -- Several hundred yards away from the site where billions of dollars are being plowed into a new stadium for the Rams and Chargers, athletic field conditions are bad and getting worse at Morningside High School in Inglewood. Steve Lopez in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 4/6/19
DA clears four San Jose cops in fatal Christmas Day shooting of woman mistaken for suspect -- Four San Jose police officers who shot and killed a woman in a car on Christmas morning, after mistaking her for a suspect in an earlier shooting, will not face criminal charges, according to a report released Friday by the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office. Robert Salonga in the San Jose Mercury$ -- 4/6/19
Arsonist targets two Victorian house fires, blocks apart, in midtown Sacramento -- Two homes under renovation in midtown Sacramento, blocks away from each other, were set ablaze three hours apart early Saturday in what authorities believe was arson. Molly Sullivan in the Sacramento Bee$ -- 4/6/19
Glendale puts its natural gas plant back on the table — while LA, others back away from fossil fuels -- Just two months after Los Angeles announced it would not repower three natural gas-fired electric plants and instead move toward renewable energy, the city of Glendale is reigniting old plans for refurbishing its electricity plant using fossil fuels. Steve Scauzillo in the Los Angeles Daily News$ -- 4/6/19
Piles of cash, nearly $2 million in bitcoin seized in Sacramento darknet drug crackdown -- Federal officials in Sacramento announced a new round of indictments Friday aimed at disrupting the sale of opioids nationwide through marketplaces set up on the darknet, a portion of the internet that uses encryption to shield users from law enforcement. Sam Stanton in the Sacramento Bee$ -- 4/6/19
Willie Brown: It may be time to kiss Joe Biden goodbye -- It’s make-it-or-break-it time for Joe Biden’s presidential bid, and he hasn’t even formally entered the race. “Uncle Joe,” as the 76-year-old former vice president is called, finds himself accused of physical contact with women who didn’t welcome it. Willie Brown in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 4/6/19
Abcarian: Trump’s threat roils Calexico, where a border closure could spell disaster -- A giant inflatable baby Trump floated over the crowd of protesters who gathered Friday morning here at the Mexican border, next to the new outlet mall that was supposed to bring salvation to this economically depressed city. Robin Abcarian in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 4/6/19
2020 Democrats grapple with immigration message as border crossings surge -- Aside from condemning President Trump’s immigration policies, Democrats and especially those running for president have largely avoided presenting their own border security policies to voters. Tal Kopan in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 4/6/19