Cal State pledges to freeze tuition in response to governor's budget plan
From EdSource's LARRY GORDON: "The chancellor of the 23-campus California State University system pledged Tuesday not to raise tuition next year, a response to the recent generous higher education funding proposal from Gov. Gavin Newsom."
"Chancellor Timothy P. White’s announcement means that tuition will be frozen for a second year in a row at $5,742 annually for full-time undergraduates who are California residents. Those undergraduates taking six or fewer credits still would pay $3,330."
“You heard me correctly: tuition is off the table,” White told the CSU board of trustees meeting in Long Beach. When he received modest applause at first for that, he jokingly responded: “That’s all? Oh my. It must be early in the morning.”
READ MORE related to Education: Cal State, buoyed by Newsom’s generous budget proposal, to boost enrollment -- TERESA WATANABE, LAT; What's in the deal to end the LAUSD teachers' strike? A look at the details -- LAT's SONALI KOHLI; In teachers’ strike settlement, public support for education was the best news -- LAT's STEVE LOPEZ; Stockton Unified Agrees To Address Discriminatory Discipline Practices Following State DOJ Investigation -- RICH IBARRA, Capitol Public Radio; LA teachers strike may be over, but in Sacramento, the debate has just begun -- RICARDO CANO, CALmatters; Stockton schools settle California discrimination claims -- AP
Former California lawmaker registers as a lobbyist after #MeToo investigation
Sacramento Bee's SOPHIA BOLLAG: "A month after the state Assembly told him he had likely violated its sexual misconduct policy, former Assemblyman Sebastian Ridley-Thomas moved to return to the Capitol by registering as a lobbyist."
"Paperwork filed on the state’s online lobbying database last week shows Ridley-Thomas, a Democrat who represented Los Angeles, registered as a lobbyist with his firm Millennial Advisors, drawing criticism from anti-sexual harassment activists at the Capitol."
"The database shows he registered the same week the state Assembly released documents showing an investigator found he likely made an unwanted sexual advance toward an Assembly employee. The investigator also found Ridley-Thomas likely made another staffer uncomfortable by winking at her and holding her hand, the documents show. "
Newsom made these 10 promises on the campaign trail. Let's see if he can keep them
Sacramento Bee's ALEXEI KOSEFF: "Gov.-elect Gavin Newsom made promises on these 10 topics while campaigning for California’s highest office. Click or tap each promise to expand."
How close are we to Doomsday? Jerry Brown will soon tell us
Sacramento Bee's ANDREW SHEELER: "After eight years as California’s governor, Jerry Brown has a new job: Tracking the apocalypse."
"On Thursday, the former four-term governor will announce whether the minute hand of the Doomsday Clock — a measurement of humanity’s proximity to total annihilation — has moved."
"Brown will do so in his capacity as executive chairman of the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, a nonprofit organization founded by Manhattan Project scientists in the aftermath of nuclear proliferation."
L.A. may charge drivers by the mile, adding freeway tolls to cut congestion
LAURA NELSON in the Union-Tribune: "For years, Southern California lawmakers have tried to steer clear of decisions that make driving more expensive or miserable, afraid of angering one of their largest groups of constituents."
"But now, transportation officials say, congestion has grown so bad in Los Angeles County that politicians have no choice but to contemplate charging motorists more to drive — a strategy that has stirred controversy but helped cities in other parts of the world tame their own traffic."
"The Metropolitan Transportation Authority is pushing to study how what’s commonly referred to as congestion pricing could work in L.A., including converting carpool lanes to toll lanes, taxing drivers based on the number of miles they travel, or charging a fee to enter certain neighborhoods and business districts."
PG&E says bankruptcy could take three years as shareholders fight filing
From LILY JAMALI and MARISA LAGOS, KQED: "A week after announcing that the company will file for bankruptcy protection at month's end, Pacific Gas and Electric officials said they have secured financing to continue safe operations while the Chapter 11 case proceeds."
"In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, PG&E wrote that it entered into an agreement with four major banks to provide $5.5 billion in "debtor-in-possession," or DIP loans."
"PG&E expects that the DIP Facilities will provide it with sufficient liquidity to fund its ongoing operations, including its ability to provide safe service to customers during the Chapter 11 cases," the filing states, adding that the company expects the Chapter 11 proceedings to take two years, but that the loans could be extended to a third year."
READ MORE related to Energy & Environment: Erin Brockovich says PG&E is 'runaway monopoly,' calls for oversight after wildfires -- Sacramento Bee's MICHAEL MCGOUGH; Los Angeles Department of Water and Power agrees to relinquish Owens Valley commercial property -- LA Times's LOUIS SAHAGUN
Governor seeks to transform youth prisons
DON THOMPSON, AP: "Gov. Gavin Newsom proposed Tuesday to change the way California’s juvenile prisons are overseen, eventually closing facilities to cut what he called the “ludicrous” cost. "
“If we’re going to get serious about changing the trajectory of the lives of these young children, I think we need to do it through a different lens and not the traditional corrections lens,” Newsom said at one of the state’s four remaining juvenile detention centers. "
"The Democratic governor is asking state lawmakers to put youth prisons under California’s Health and Human Services Agency. Youthful offenders currently are overseen by the same agency that runs adult prisons."
Kamala Harris grabs for the brass ring
From DAN WALTERS, CALmatters: "President Kamala Harris?"
"She thinks so, anyway. After just 1 1/2 terms as California’s attorney general and two years as a U.S. senator, Harris this week declared her candidacy for the White House. She joins a Democratic field that grows larger every day and could eventually reach two or three dozen – all trumpeting their implacable disdain for President Donald Trump."
"The American people deserve to have somebody who is going to fight for them, who is going to see them, who will hear them, who will care about them, who will be concerned about their experience and will put them in front of self-interest,” Harris said as she made her announcement Monday on ABC’s “Good Morning America.”
Gun show operators file lawsuit against board that oversees state-owned Del Mar Fairgrounds
From the U-T's PHIL DIEHL: "The family-owned company that operates the Crossroads of the West gun show filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday against the Del Mar Fairgrounds, challenging its suspension of the weekend event that has been held there for more than 30 years."
"The 22nd District Agricultural Association board of directors, which oversees activities at the state-owned fairgrounds, voted to stop the shows after December until staff members develop a policy that could ban the sale and possession of firearms on the property. Any decision in the case is likely to take years and have far-reaching effects."
"Gun-show owners Russell and Ann Sallie Nordyke filed suit against Alameda County after it banned weapons from the public fairgrounds there in 1999. That case went on for more than 12 years and cost millions of dollars in legal fees before a settlement reached through mediation allowed guns if they were secured to exhibit tables with wire cables."
Uninsured rate under Trump surges to highedst level since Obamacare began
LA Times's NOAM N LEVEY: "The percentage of American adults without health insurance surged upward in 2018, reaching levels not recorded since before President Trump took office, according to a new national survey that revealed widespread coverage losses over the last two years."
"At the end of 2018, 13.7% of U.S. adults were uninsured, up from 10.9% at the end of 2016, when President Obama was completing his second term."
"The new number represents the highest uninsured rate since the beginning of 2014, when the Affordable Care Act began providing billions of dollars in aid to help low- and middle-income Americans get covered, according to the survey by Gallup."
Impact of SCOTUS decision on transgender troops
AP's JESSICA GRESKO: "A sharply divided Supreme Court is allowing the Trump administration to go ahead with its plan to restrict military service by transgender men and women while court challenges continue."
"The high court split 5-4 on Tuesday in issuing orders allowing the plan to take effect for now, with the court's five conservatives greenlighting it and its four liberal members saying they wouldn't have."
"Some questions and answers about what the high court did:"
AP sources: Trump, others agitated by Giuliani's performance
AP's JONATHAN LEMIRE/ERIC TUCKER: "Rudy Giuliani’s latest media blitz, which was filled with a dizzying array of misstatements and hurried clarifications, agitated President Donald Trump and some of his allies, who have raised the possibility that the outspoken presidential lawyer be at least temporarily sidelined from televised interviews."
"Trump was frustrated with Giuliani, according to three White House officials and Republicans close to the White House who were not authorized to speak publicly about private conversations. The president told advisers that he felt his lawyer had obscured what he believed was a public relations victory: the special counsel’s rare public statement disputing portions of a BuzzFeed News story that Trump instructed his former attorney, Michael Cohen, to lie before Congress."
"The president told confidants that Giuliani had “changed the headlines” for the worse and raised the possibility that Giuliani do fewer cable hits, at least for a while, according to the officials and Republicans."
READ MORE related to POTUS: Trump plans SOTU address next week, despite Pelosi request to delay -- LA Times's ELI STOKOLS
