They're baaack: Just when you thought the anti-vaccination folks had packed up and left, there's a new wrinkle -- now they want to recall the author of the legislation.
From the Bee's Jeremy White: "Thwarted in the Legislature, opponents of California’s vaccine mandate law have turned to the ballot box with a recall aimed at Senate Bill 277’s champion."
"A campaign to recall Sen. Richard Pan, D-Sacramento, the pediatrician who carried the bill requiring full vaccinations for schoolchildren, has been cleared to advance to the signature-gathering phase. Proponents have until Dec. 31 to collect 35,926 verified signatures from the 436,318 registered voters in his district."
"Crafted in response to a measles outbreak that began in Disneyland, SB 277 spurred a furious backlash from parents assailing a loss of child-rearing autonomy and insisting that vaccines are unsafe. As they lined up at hearings to testify against the bill, many vowed to make lawmakers pay at election time."
Another stadium, another town, another team, another exemption to California's environmental laws. This time, it's San Diego.
From the U-T's David Garrick: "San Diego’s pitch to the NFL on Tuesday about a new Chargers stadium included assurances from state Assembly speaker Toni Atkins that she would help expedite any environmental lawsuits filed against the city."
"San Diego’s negotiators, who met with NFL officials for three hours at the U.S. Grant Hotel, also presented designs for a stadium in Mission Valley, a proposed financing plan and the city’s recent progress on environmental analysis."
"Mayor Kevin Faulconer said the meeting went well and that he was encouraged by the reaction from NFL officials, including executive vice president Eric Grubman, who is overseeing potential franchise relocations to Los Angeles."
As the drought intensifies, so does the fight over the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, the core of the state's water system. A key player in the dispute is a wealthy rice farmer, who hopes to block the Brown admninistration's Delta tunnel projects.
From Timm Herdt in the Ventura County Star: "In the history of California, wealthy interest groups have used some brazenly cynical tactics to try to fool voters into passing initiatives that would pad their bank accounts. But none of them has been as recklessly cynical as rice farmer Dean Cortopassi."
"Cortopassi seeks to protect his nearly unfettered right to Delta water by paralyzing California’s ability to build infrastructure or to rebuild critical facilities after a natural disaster. He already has laid out $3 million to qualify an initiative for the November 2016 ballot that would do exactly those things."
"His transparent goal is to preclude construction of the California Water Fix, the proposal by Gov. Jerry Brown to build two tunnels north of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to prevent further degradation of the Delta ecosystem while also ensuring reliable delivery of the imported water upon which two-thirds of Californians rely."
From rice to wine: A compromise was reached over that ban on new vineyards in the Malibu area after grape growers launched protests.
The LAT's Abby Sewell tells the tale: "Ater hearing from grape growers upset by a drought-inspired ban against new or expanded vineyards in the north Santa Monica Mountains, Los Angeles County supervisors compromised Tuesday, voting to extend the ban four months instead of 10 and letting existing permit applications proceed."
"The proposed 10-month extension was prompted by an influx of vineyard applications over the last year and concerns about water use and the environmental effects from such a potential rapid expansion of grape-growing operations."
"Last year, the supervisors approved a land-use plan for an 81-square-mile coastal portion of the Santa Monica Mountains that will ban new vineyards in that area. The more recent ban covers a 32-square-mile area north of the coastal zone."
L.A. is in the running to host the 2024 Olympics, and the city must decide by mid-September whether it wants to take the plunge. Boston had been the intended host, but pulled out because of the heavy load on public funds. So what will LA do?
From the LAT's Peter Jamison: "Wth Los Angeles' hopes of hosting the 2024 Summer Games unexpectedly revived, Mayor Eric Garcetti must soon decide whether he is willing to accept the sort of financial risks that his counterpart in Boston — the U.S. Olympic Committee's first choice of host city — balked at this week."
"Olympic officials insist that a host city pledge to cover cost overruns or revenue shortfalls associated with the Games. Boston Mayor Martin Walsh expressed second thoughts about providing such a guarantee shortly before his city withdrew Monday..."
"Before Boston's selection in January, representatives from all four finalist cities — Boston, L.A., San Francisco and Washington — had signaled their willingness to cover cost overruns. But Walsh's dramatic reversal is likely to make such a commitment a central issue for any city that hopes to take Boston's place."
And from our "Happy Family" file comes word that the adult daughter of Oklahoma Gov. Mary Mallin is moving the trailer in which she has been living since April off the grounds of the governor's mansion. Oklahomans are upset that the young woman is living on public property.
"One resident summarized the public’s concerns: “That is state property! Who is paying her bills? Oklahoma taxpayers?”
"The governor addressed the furor on Tuesday, stating that her daughter’s trailer was not abusing state resources. “She would be using that electricity if she lived in the house, or if she got a drink of water out of the faucet, or if she flushed the toilet in the house,” Gov. Fallin told KFOR, an Oklahoma City television station..."
“We’re just like any family, any American family, any Oklahoma family,” Gov. Fallin said. “If I’m 80, if she comes to me and says, ‘Hey mom, I need a temporary place to stay, I’m going to let her stay with me.”
Go, mama ....
