Newsom wants to ‘stabilize’ California’s insurance market. Here’s how it would work
The Chronicle's MEGAN FAN MUNCE: "Gov. Gavin Newsom has provided new details this week on his proposal to bolster California’s insurance market by speeding state approval for insurers’ rate increase requests.
The Department of Insurance is required to review all rate increases. Industry experts say the slow approval times are a key reason why many insurers have limited their business in the state, such as not writing new policies or dropping thousands of customers at a time. The pullbacks have pushed policymakers toward a hard choice: Let more of their constituents lose coverage, or create reforms that will allow insurance companies to raise rates faster."
READ MORE -- Newsom unveils plan that would hasten insurance-rate reviews — and increases -- CALMatters's LEVI SUMAGAYSAY
California lawmakers unveil budget rejecting Gavin Newsom spending cuts. Here’s their plan
Sacramento Bee's LINDSEY HOLDEN: "California lawmakers on Wednesday announced a joint budget plan that would restore some funds for homelessness and social safety net programs while cutting money from state prisons.
The spending proposal from Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas, D-Hollister, and Senate President Pro Tem Mike McGuire, D-Healdsburg, would address the state’s estimated $45 billion budget deficit, but it differs in significant ways from the one Gov. Gavin Newsom presented earlier in the month."
How did a shoplifting bill get through California’s liberal Assembly with most Democrats opposed?
CALMatters's RYAN SABALOW: "Assemblymember Ash Kalra did something exceptional last week.
He was the only legislator to vote “no” on a controversial piece of legislation while nearly half of the 80 members in the state Assembly – and a majority of the Democrats – did not vote."
State public works enforcement more than pays for itself (OP-ED)
Capitol Weekly's DINA MORSI: "A challenging state budget cycle and difficult choices about spending priorities have a way of focusing the mind on questions of return on investment for the taxpayers who ultimately foot the bills.
For everything that is on the proverbial chopping block in the wake of the Governor’s May budget revise, there are cases to be made, and hard conversations to be had. In other cases, where spending is pre-determined due to longer term federal or state policies, the question is really one of how best to maximize returns and position our state for longer term economic and fiscal health."
Jurors in Trump hush money trial end 1st day of deliberations after asking to rehear testimony
LAT's MICHAEL R., SISAK, JENNIFER PELTZ, ERIC TUCKER and MICHELLE L. PRICE: "The jury in Donald Trump’s hush money trial ended its first day of deliberations without a verdict Wednesday but asked to rehear potentially crucial testimony about the alleged hush money scheme at the heart of the history-making case.
The 12-person jury was sent home around 4 p.m. after about 4½ hours of deliberations. The process is to resume Thursday."
READ MORE -- Alito refuses to recuse himself from cases on Trump and Jan. 6 over flag controversy -- AP; Polls say a conviction could cost Trump a fifth of his support. Should we believe them? -- LAT's NOAH BIERMAN
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. files complaint over rules for CNN’s presidential debate next month
LAT's JONATHAN J. COOPER: "Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. filed an election complaint Wednesday alleging CNN is colluding with Democratic President Biden and presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump to exclude him from a debate the network is hosting next month.
Kennedy alleges that the requirements to participate in the June 27 debate were designed to ensure only Biden and Trump would qualify and that he is being held to a higher standard."
Why are California workers waiting so long on wage theft claims? A new audit has answers
CALMatters's JEANNE KUANG: "Severe understaffing, slow hiring, poor training and inefficient bureaucracy combine to slow California’s investigations of wage theft claims, the state auditor’s office concluded Wednesday.
The result, according to the audit of the state Labor Commissioner’s Office, is a backlog of 47,000 claims that take six times longer to resolve than the four months set in state law."
Will electric vehicle mandate be a roadblock to safe commutes for California farmworkers?
CALMatters's JEANNE KUANG: "It took years for CalVans to get its vehicles on the road legally.
The Central Valley transit agency, conceived after a 1999 crash that killed 13 farmworkers, leases strictly monitored vehicles to workers and employers to form vanpools."
Staying up late could be bad for your mental health, Stanford study finds
The Chronicle's CATHERINE HO: "Going to bed late, regardless of whether you’re a night owl or an early bird by nature, is linked to worse mental health, according to a new study by Stanford researchers.
Scientists had believed that aligning your sleep behavior to your sleep time preference — “evening people” going to sleep later, and “morning people” going to sleep earlier — was beneficial for mental health. This is known as aligning to your chronotype."
Kids sickened by training at nearby S.F. jail may have ingested decades-old chemical weapons
The Chronicle's MEGAN CASSIDY: "The law enforcement training exercise that unintentionally exposed San Bruno elementary school children to powerful riot-control agents last week may have included chemical weapons that expired decades ago.
A person familiar with the incident said that before the training at the San Francisco County Jail on Moreland Drive in San Bruno, officers from UC Berkeley and UCSF were invited to bring any chemical agents in the campus police forces’ inventory so they could be disposed of during the exercise."
Thousands of Californians potentially exposed to measles by sick traveler
The Chronicle's AIDIN VAZIRI: "A traveler with measles flew from Munich to Los Angeles and then to the Yosemite area, potentially exposing thousands of people along the way to the highly infectious disease, according to health officials.
The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health confirmed the case on Monday, bringing the number of documented measles cases in California in 2024 to nine."
Planned Parenthood sought a building permit. Then a California city changed zoning rules
CALMatters's DEBORAH BRENNAN: "The war over abortion is raging in statehouses around the country, but in California, a bastion of reproductive rights, the fight has shifted to local battlegrounds.
In the Inland Empire region, Planned Parenthood is suing the city of Fontana, alleging its officials are illegally blocking its plans for a new clinic."
Lifeguard who took down Pride flags at beach sues L.A. County over religious discrimination
LAT's REBECCA ELLIS: "A longtime Los Angeles County lifeguard stationed in Pacific Palisades near a stretch beloved by gay beachgoers is suing the county for requiring him to work feet away from a Pride flag last summer and punishing him for taking three of the flags down.
The lawsuit, filed in federal court May 24 a week before this year’s Pride month kicks off, brings the county’s sparkling coastline squarely into the nation’s culture wars."
Two ultrapopular S.F. hiking trails will soon close for summer renovation project
The Chronicle's SAM WHITING: "Two hiking trails to the Twin Peaks lookout over San Francisco — one of the city’s top outdoor attractions — will close for renovation in mid-June, just as the summer tourism season gets under way in earnest, officials announced Wednesday.
Both the trail at Noe Peak and the switchback trail just south of it will be closed for several months, according to the city Recreation and Park Department. Both trails are within the area marked as Twin Peaks Open Space and are part of a decadelong transformation called the Twin Peaks Access, Roadway, and Pedestrian Walkway Improvement Project."
This downtown S.F. neighborhood is having a moment, with new shops and housing on the way
The Chronicle's JK DINEEN: "It’s been a hell of a month for the East Cut, the downtown San Francisco neighborhood that has sprung up over the last dozen years around the Salesforce Transit Center.
First, on May 8, the city announced five “vacant-to-vibrant” pop-ups would be moving into the neighborhood, including an Italian deli, ice cream parlor and a boba shop. Then, on May 20, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi breezed into town to celebrate the commitment of $3.4 billion in federal funding that will help pay for the downtown rail extension, which would bring Caltrain and 10 other transit systems into the downtown."
Lawsuit alleges deputy gang ‘shot-caller’ boasted about gruesome death of fleeing suspect
LAT's KERI BLAKINGER: "Six years ago, a plumber found the decomposing body of Raymundo Rivera inside a pillar at a Winco supermarket in Lancaster. At the time, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department officials said the 35-year-old appeared to have fled during a traffic stop and may have “gotten inside there and gotten down to try and hide from the deputies and then couldn’t get out.”
But according to a lawsuit filed Wednesday in L.A. Superior Court, former Deputy Aaron Tanner later boasted that he and other deputies had chased Rivera — and that they knew he’d fallen into the pillar. Instead of trying to save him, the suit says, “the deputies left him there to die, and made false reports that they lost track of the suspect in the pursuit.”"
Scott Peterson strikes out as judge denies nearly all requests for new DNA testing
BANG*Mercury News's JULIA PRODIS SULEK: "Convicted murderer Scott Peterson’s attempt to prove someone else killed his wife, Laci, and their unborn son failed overwhelmingly Wednesday when a judge denied all but one request to retest DNA samples from old pieces of evidence.
Although his new defense lawyers from the Los Angeles Innocence Project will be allowed to retest a piece of duct tape stuck to Laci’s pants when her body was found washed up along San Francisco Bay in 2003, they won’t be able to retest a stained mattress from a burned-out van found two miles from her Modesto home. They hoped it would show Laci was kidnapped and killed that morning of Christmas Eve in 2002, then thrown into San Francisco Bay to frame her husband, who said he was fishing there the day she disappeared."
Convicted Massachusetts ‘bad breath rapist’ found in East Bay after 17 years on the run
The Chronicle's NORA MISHANEC: "A wanted Massachusetts man known as the “Bad Breath Rapist” was arrested at a multimillion-dollar home in Contra Costa County on Tuesday nearly two decades after his conviction and subsequent escape, police announced.
In 2007, a jury found Tuen Lee guilty of raping a co-worker in 2005, but he fled Massachusetts before he could be sentenced, the Massachusetts State Police said in a statement Wednesday. He was identified at the time by DNA evidence and his “horrible” breath, officials said."
How bad are Sacramento-area roads? They’re some of the deadliest for pedestrians in the US
Sacramento Bee's ARIANE LANGE: "The capital region is one of the deadliest areas for pedestrians in the country, a new report has found.
During a five-year period, 377 pedestrians died, landing the Sacramento-Roseville-Folsom metropolitan area the 20th spot on the Smart Growth America’s 2024 list of the most dangerous places for people on foot."
