"Assembly Speaker
Fabian Nuņez said Tuesday that his caucus
cannot support a $68 billion package of general obligation bonds that is a linchpin of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's 10-year "strategic growth plan,'" reports Jim Sanders in the Bee.
"Nuņez said Democrats worry that debt-service payments on a larger package could cut into funds needed for public education."
"'
We know exactly what it is that we want out of this infrastructure bond - and we know it's not $68 billion,' said Nuņez, who led Assembly Democrats in a three-day Monterey retreat last week to set priorities."
"'We can't live with $68 billion,' he said. 'We could live with $25 (billion or) $30 billion.'"
"
Despite wanting to reduce the bond package, Nunez said, Democrats want to add projects that would increase affordable housing, parks, public transit, light rail and earthquake retrofitting of nonprofit hospitals."
The Assembly Democrats plan probably does not include the peripheral canal or its progeny, but the governor's plan just might. Steve Geissinger writes in the Oakland Tribune "The governor's Strategic Growth Plan does not specifically propose a new Peripheral Canal, but administration officials said that as part of the effort, they are eyeing the ailing Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta and a
combination of remedies that include a smaller canal to divert river water around the east side of the region.
"'We've determined that the current path we're on (in the Delta) is not sustainable, and the economy of the state of California is at stake,' said
Lester Snow, director of the state Department of Water Resources. "
Nuņez also "called Tuesday for a
radical overhaul of how the state handles its highest-risk sex offenders, proposing that they be forced to undergo therapy before they can win release," report Sam Stanton and Mareva Brown in the Bee.
Nuņez shared his thoughts while having breakfast with the Bee, and following a series of reports by the Bee that sex offenders were not following court-ordered treatment.
"'I'm glad the speaker's found religion,' said Assemblyman
Todd Spitzer, R-Orange, who accused Nuņez of personally killing his own efforts to increase the public information available on the Web about sex offenders."
(But do they have provisions for
cases like this?)
Nuņez also said yesterday that
this is the year for assisted suicide.
"Santa Clara County health chief
Robert Sillen,
named Tuesday to take control of California prison health care, will have extraordinary powers to tackle a problem state officials have been unable to solve: the overhaul of a system that has been described as so abysmal that prisoners are dying for lack of care," report Barbara Feder Ostrov and Brandon Bailey in the Merc News.
"Answering only to the [
Thelton Henderson, the] federal judge who appointed him, Sillen will be able to hire and fire state employees, build clinics, buy medical equipment and negotiate union contracts."
"The judge's action, which he termed a 'drastic but necessary step,' removes nearly all health care powers from the chief of California's Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation,
Roderick Q. Hickman. Henderson also ordered state officials to set up an initial $750,000 operations fund that will be under Sillen's control."
Dan Walters takes a look at how candidates are
using their public offices to position themselves for this year's election. "The oddest thing about this flurry of campaigning masquerading as official action is the quietude surrounding state Treasurer Phil Angelides these days. Angelides is the leading Democratic candidate for governor and has never been shy about using his office as a political platform, especially in becoming Schwarzenegger's critic-in-chief.
But Angelides as treasurer has been fairly quiet for the past few weeks, ever since he issued a sharp critique of Schwarzenegger's infrastructure scheme. One wonders what he has up his sleeve."
Well, for starters, he has withdrawn papers to
officially run for governor. ""I'm a very lucky man," a bespectacled Angelides told a few dozen sign-carrying supporters massed outside the Sacramento County elections office. "As I enter this race today, I do it not only with a great love for my family, but a great love for this state, for the people who work hard each and every day to try to make California the best place to live on earth."
Wow, that's just so beautiful. In fact, we're a little verklempt.
Talk amongst yourselves. Topic for discussion. The Democratic gubernatorial primary is neither Democratic nor gubernatorial nor a primary. Discuss.
From our Stupid Legislator Tricks files, Lloyd Levine has introduced his bill to crack down on energy-hogging appliances. It's not the bill itself that made us groan, but the ridiculous title:
The California Vampire Slayer Act of 2006. Please hold while we drive a stake through our own heart.
Levine is not trying to make many friends at LA's Dept. of Water and Power, in the meantime.
The Times' Mark Lifsher explains. Levine "is pushing a bill that would authorize regulators to hit the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power and other municipal utilities with millions of dollars in charges if they fail to meet energy efficiency targets.
Assemblyman Lloyd Levine said Tuesday that his bill, AB 2020, would assess charges of as much as 3 cents per kilowatt hour to cover the cost of investments needed to meet energy efficiency standards similar to those now applied to investor-owned utilities such as Southern California Edison.
Meanwhile, a federal judge
ordered the Department of Corrections to be gentle when executing an inmate next week, after hearing evidence that six of the past 13 executions have had complications. "Agreeing that lethal injection may cause excessive pain, a federal judge told state corrections officials Tuesday to change the way they administer the fatal dose, or face a delay in death row inmate
Michael Morales' Feb. 21 execution," writes Louis Sahagun in the Times.
"U.S. District Judge
Jeremy Fogel said in a 15-page ruling that San Quentin State Prison officials may either administer fatal levels of sedatives exclusively or have an anesthesiologist present to ensure that Morales is unconscious before they deliver the standard mix of sedatives, paralytic agents and heart-stopping chemicals."
"'This is a historic decision,' said
Natasha Minsker, director of death penalty policy for the American Civil Liberties Union in Northern California. 'This is the first time a federal judge has concluded that there is substantial evidence that people may be suffering pain during the lethal injection process.'"
Speaking of lethal injection, we close with some
bad news for more than 100 cats at Avenal State Prison who are facing the ultimate punishment for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. "Administrators at Avenal State Prison said they will have to kill more than 100 cats that have sneaked in and reproduced inside the facility.
The felines have become a health nuisance for the prison. The state has cited the prison for unsafe working conditions because of cat urine and feces.
