Legislators are preparing to dramatically rewrite regulatory laws to ensure stronger oversight of poor performing private career colleges.
Katy Murphy reports for Mercury News: “Inspection backlogs and lagging investigation times -- the bureau took 502 days to complete a probe into an alleged sham flight school and didn't flag it as a priority -- have allowed abuses to persist and unlicensed schools to operate illegally, the audit concluded.”
"It has consistently failed to meet its responsibility to protect the public's interests," reads the title of the audit report on the state's Bureau for Private Postsecondary Education.”
Some prominent members of the GOP are now backing California's clean tech innovator Tesla Motors.
David R. Baker reports for S.F. Gate: “In recent weeks, Tesla has won support from such figures as Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, Texas Gov. Rick Perry and Fox News commentator Bill O'Reilly.”
"Everybody on the planet should be rooting for Tesla," O'Reilly said on his March 31 show. "I mean everybody, even the traditional car companies that will have to compete.”
Federal transportation authorities are revisiting safety rules after a deadly bus crash in Northern California claimed 10 lives.
Fentil Nirappil reports for the Associated Press: “The truck driver veered across the Interstate 5 median, sideswiped a sedan and collided with the bus, leaving no tire marks to suggest he had applied his brakes. Dozens of injured students escaped through windows before the vehicles exploded into towering flames and billowing smoke in Orland, 100 miles north of Sacramento.”
“The sedan driver told investigators the truck was in flames before the crash, but the National Transportation Safety Board said Sunday investigators found no physical evidence of a pre-impact fire or other witnesses to confirm that account.”
Well drilling is in high demand in the Central Valley.
Scott Smith reports for the Associated Press: “With California in a third dry year, well drilling is booming across the nation's most productive agricultural region, and some drilling companies are booked for months or a year. In some counties, requests for permits to dig new wells have soared, more than doubling over this time last year.”
State lawmakers are pushing to make a life-saving overdose antidote easier to purchase.
Melody Gutierrez reports for S.F. Gate: “Once only found in emergency rooms and a handful of community overdose prevention programs, naloxone is finding its way into more medicine cabinets as lawmakers, medical professionals and advocates push for increasing access to the life-saving drug.”
“A bill making its way through the Legislature would dramatically boost the drug's availability by allowing it to be sold without a prescription at pharmacies across the state.”
California’s Chamber of Commerce has 26 so-called “job killer” bills it hopes nix from the Legislature’s agenda.
Marc Lifsher reports for the L.A. Times: "Of course, what is a job killer to the chamber may be something entirely different to labor unions, environmentalists and other traditional business community adversaries.”
Owners of the Orange County Register are expanding with a new daily newspaper focused on Los Angeles.
Mary Ann Milbourn reports for the O.C. Register: “The Los Angeles Register will be available at 5,500 retail locations throughout Los Angeles County, including grocery and convenience stores and on news racks. The paper will cost $1.50 weekdays and $2 on weekends. Home delivery is expected to begin in May.”
Young techies in San Francisco want to let the public virtually walk in the shoes of the city’s homeless.
Kevin Fagan reports for S.F. Gate: “The idea is to increase compassion for the down-and-out by letting the housed see what the un-housed go through every day as they scrabble for food, shelter and relief from the tedium of street life.”
“To do this, team members are doing what so many innovators of their generation are doing - bending technology to their needs.”