A federal court turned down Gov. Brown's latest attempt to ease prison overcrowding, but gave him a month of breathing space to reduce the state's inmate population -- the latest in a series of legal setbacks for the governor.
From the Chronicle's Bob Egelko: "California wants a three-year extension of a federal court’s Dec. 31 deadline to reduce its prison population by nearly 10,000 to ease overcrowding and improve health care. On Tuesday, the court granted a four-week extension and told state officials to start negotiating with lawyers for the inmates."
"Gov. Jerry Brown’s administration has been fighting the three-judge panel’s order to lower the inmate population to 137.5 percent of the prisons’ designed capacity by the end of this year. The U.S. Supreme Court upheld that order in 2011, but Brown has asked the high court to take another look, arguing that he’s already eliminated the overcrowding problem with his “realignment” program of sentencing low-level felons to county jail instead of prison."
"If he’s turned down by the courts, Brown plans to transfer about 9,600 inmates to private prisons, some of them outside California, and leased jail cells in the state, at a first-year cost of $315 million."
Down in LA, officials have come up with their own plan to deal with jail overcrowding: Bye-bye LA, hello Bakersfield.
From KPCC's Rina Palta: "In a deal meant to relieve Los Angeles County's strained jails, the L.A. County Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday to send hundreds of inmates to a facility near Bakersfield."
"Under the agreement, the Taft Community Correctional Facility, operated by the City of Taft, will house 512 L.A. inmates for about $61 per day each, which is less than the county spends on inmates in county jails. The five-year contract is expected to cost the county up to $75 million."
"Supervisors have been debating the agreement for over a year, and even as the contract passed, two supervisors, Mark Ridley-Thomas and Zev Yaroslavsky, said they were not ready to approve the deal and abstained from voting."
Meanwhile, John McAfee, whose improbable bio reads like something out of Eric Ambler, is poised to make a return to the Land of the Geeks.
From the Mercury-News' Dan Nakaso: "Anti-virus software pioneer John McAfee, who buried himself in the sand to hide from police in Belize, faked a heart attack in a Guatemalan detention center and admits playing the "crazy card," says he's now ready for his next adventure: a return to Silicon Valley."
"At age 67, McAfee is promising to launch a new cybersecurity company that will make the Internet safer for everyone."
"My new technology is going to provide a new type of Internet, a decentralized, floating and moving Internet that is impossible to hack, impossible to penetrate and vastly superior in terms of its facility and neutrality. It solves all of our security concerns," McAfee said in an interview with this newspaper."
Gov. Jerry Brown, who prides himself on being nearly as cheap as Jack Benny, tells California State University trustees that money is tight and to lower their expectations.
From the LA Daily News' Josh Dulaney: " Gov. Jerry Brown delivered a simple message to California State University trustees on Tuesday during a discussion on funding the system next year."
“I can’t squeeze blood out of a turnip, can’t get water out of a stone,” said Brown, after a presentation on a preliminary support budget proposal that aims at gaining at least $100 million more than what the governor expects to give CSU for fiscal 2014-15."
"Robert Turnage, assistant vice chancellor for CSU, ran down a list of big ticket categories that total about $250 million in support funding next year, an amount that far exceeds Brown’s expectation of $142.5 million."
Trouble-plagued Stockton, a bankrupt city looking for a way out, intends to disclose its exit strategy on Friday.
From Reuters' Jim Christie: "The bankrupt city of Stockton, California, will present a draft plan on Friday to adjust its debt while it keeps negotiating with bondholders, a lawyer for the city told Reuters on Tuesday."
"Stockton's city council will review the draft next week and a final version could be filed with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Sacramento on or shortly after Oct. 4, marking a milestone in the city's efforts to put its finances in order, attorney Marc Levinson said."
"Levinson later told U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Christopher Klein during a hearing on Stockton's Chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy case that it was not clear whether agreements with bondholders would be part of the plan. But Levinson added he was hopeful ongoing confidential talks with Stockton's capital markets creditors will lead to agreements with them."
And from our "We Love Fall" file comes 24 things about autumn that are really cool. Enjoy....
