Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones says Anthem Blue Cross should be barred from the new health-care reform program that provides coverage to some small businesses, citing the company's past rate hikes.
From the LAT's Chad Terhune: "Thursday, Jones asked Covered California, the state agency implementing the federal healthcare law, to prevent Anthem Blue Cross from participating in a new market for employers with fewer than 50 workers."
"I have determined Anthem Blue Cross has had a practice of excessive or unjustified rate increases," Jones said."
"The state has already picked Anthem Blue Cross for its larger exchange for individuals that will sell policies next year to an estimated 5 million Californians who don't get health coverage through work."
Gov. Brown's environmental trifecta -- tapping cap-and-trade auction money, diverting Prop. 39 funds and apparently going along with hydraulic fracturing -- is raising the eyebrows of environmentalists.
From Capitol Weekly's Alex Matthews: "When Gov. Brown and legislative leaders announced their budget agreement at a press conference Tuesday, the tone was victorious: The budget was on time and balanced, and the Legislature had caved on a number of Brown’s more cautious fiscal proposals."
"But it was evident the governor still had something of a political Achilles’ heel – his environmental record."
"I want to believe that Jerry Brown is the same as Arnold Schwarzenegger and says, ‘Look there’s no conflict between the environment and the economy,’ Schwarzenegger made that clear, Jerry Brown hasn’t made it as clear,” said Bill Allayaud of the Environmental Working Group. “But perhaps part of his term is tempered by the fact that he inherited a terrible economy, so his prime directive was to get the state budget fixed and get the economy moving, and I don’t think anyone can say he’s done bad job on that.”
Willie Brown, the longest-serving speaker the Assembly ever had at a time when the speaker was the second-most powerful elected official in sate government, may get his name on partt of the $6.4 billion, newly built Bay Bridge.
From the Chronicle's Wyatt Buchanan: "Bay Area residents may have to get used to a new name for an iconic structure, or at least a part of the structure. How does the "Brown Bridge" - as in Willie Brown - sound?"
"A resolution introduced at the Capitol this week by Assemblyman Isadore Hall III, D-Compton (Los Angeles County), would name the western span of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge the "Willie L. Brown Jr. Bridge."
"That's right, only the western span of the bridge - the one connecting San Francisco to Yerba Buena Island - would be named for Brown. Left unnamed would be the new eastern span, which has been the subject of scrutiny over faulty bolts and other problems."
Speaking of the Bay Bridge, the contractor building the span will get a $20 million bonus if the bridge opens to the public on Sept. 3, as planned.
From the Contra Costa Times' Lisa Vorderbrueggen: "American Bridge/Fluor Enterprises and the three government agencies overseeing the construction agreed to the incentives in September 2010 as part of a plan to get the long overdue bridge back on track."
"The extra cash is small potatoes relative to the $1.43 billion overall contract with the consortium of international mega builders. And the state, not the contractors, will make the final call about when the bridge opens."
"Incentives or no incentives, the bridge will open when it is safe and not a day before," said bridge spokesman Andrew Gordon."
There had been talk about California using the national standards in the state's K-12 science curriculum, but it turns out the state already exceeds the national level.
From Cabinet Report's Tom Chorneau: "Plans in California to replace the state’s existing science curriculum standards with a new national set recently released for public review would be analogous to trading in a Cadillac for a Chevy, according to new analysis from the Fordham Institute."
"The new national science standards come as part of an effort being led by the Obama administration to get schools throughout the nation teaching common content goals."
"Hailed as one of the biggest advances in K-12 science curriculum in more than a decade, the Next Generation Science Standards were developed over the past two years by a consortium of states in a process similar to that which produced the common core standards in math and English language arts now being introduced into California schools."
And from our "Weeds" file comes word that goats from Wisconsin are heading to Iowa.
"Managers of a wetlands area near Davenport are turning to goats to rid the area of invasive plants."
"The Quad-City Times reports (http://bit.ly/14zBMiy ) facilitator Brian Ritter decided to give goats a try after failing at other efforts to remove invasive plants that crowd out native varieties in the Nahant Marsh area."
"Ritter says the 24 goats that arrived from Wisconsin in late May have made a huge difference."
