The stakes are high at the California agency that regulates gambling in California, the Gambling Control Commission. It has suffered through turmoil, culminating Sunday with the departure of its chairman.
The U-T's Greg Moran tells the tale: "The chairman of the state gambling regulatory commission announced Thursday he is retiring, the second key regulator this month to step aside at an agency that has been shadowed by conflicts of interest this year."
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"Richard J. Lopes said he would retire from state service as of Sunday and would leave his $138,000 per year post as chairman of the California Gambling Control Commission..."
"His retirement comes just two weeks after Tina Littleton, who served as the executive director for the commission, announced that she would resign from that position at the end of the month, although continuing to work at the commission in a lower-level management job."
Sepaking of gambling, Assemblyman Rocky Chavez, a former career Marine Corps officer, is a Republican seeking a U.S. Senate seat. He's got his work cut out for him.
From the LAT's Michael Finnegan: "Chavez, 64, sees himself as just the kind of Republican who can win, a Latino whose politics are not too conservative for California, particularly on immigration. And his service in the Marines, Chavez says, makes him uniquely qualified to handle national security matters.
"I had a great career," Chavez, a retired colonel, said as he drove his pickup truck across Camp Pendleton one recent morning...
Chavez left the Marines in 2001 and still lives with his wife, Mary, in an Oceanside tract house overlooking Camp Pendleton. From the backyard, he watches Marines fire shells across the dry hillsides.
Despite Mungo Jerry's advice, it's not a good idea to drink and drive, and the state Senate agrees: The upper house has hired a pair of designated drivers to make sure lawamkers who drink make it home okay.
The Bee's Alex Koseff and Jim Miller have the story: "One man who turned down the job told The Sacramento Bee that Senate officials approached him earlier this year about working from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m. or 7 a.m. to drive senators home upon request."
He said he was told the shifts would come only when lawmakers were in Sacramento – generally Monday through Wednesday nights when the Legislature is in session, between January and early or mid-September. The purpose, he was told, would be to give rides “just if they were drinking too much. Just pick them up and take them home.” One legislative chief of staff confirmed that the service is intended to prevent drunken driving by legislators."
Surprise, surprise: The nation's largets public pension fund -- that's CalPERS -- is looking at a steady round of rate increases over time in order to stay flush and cover investment losses.
From Calpensions' Ed Mendel: "CalPERS is considering small increases in employer and employee rates over decades to reduce the risk of big investment losses, a policy that also would lower an earnings forecast critics say is too optimistic."
"The proposal is a response to the “maturing” of a CalPERS system that soon will have more retirees than active workers. From two active workers for each retiree in 2002, the ratio fell to 1.45 to one by 2012 and is expected to be 0.8 to 0.6 to one in the next decades."
"As a result, investment losses will trigger bigger California Public Employees Retirement System employer rate increases. It’s a kind of “leveraging” effect as the investment fund becomes increasingly larger than the payroll on which rates are based."
Summer is approaching and that means the latest, special effects-filled Hollywood blockbuster is awaiting our consideration. This time it's "San Andreas," -- a cinematic take on a superquake that hits California.
From LAT politics scribe Cathleen Decker: "Rick Wilson, the California Geological Survey's senior engineering geologist, issued a droll movie review noting that the more dramatic depictions — a giant chasm, those cratering skyscrapers, a breathtakingly large tsunami aiming at the state's most famous bridge — were not exactly realistic."
"Unless a huge asteroid hits off the coast, there is no chance of a tsunami higher than the Golden Gate Bridge," Wilson said.
"They were hoping that the movie might inspire some real-life preparation. And they knew it wouldn't happen."
And frinally, from our Love Affair With The Car file, comes the story of a monument to vehicles along a Great Plains road. Our apologies to Stonehenge.
"Along a lonely stretch of highway in Alliance, Nebraska sits a mysterious monument to America's rich history of putting the pedal to the metal: Carhenge...."
"Paying homage to Stonehenge, Carhenge has been fascinating people since its installation in the '80s. Dreamed up by Jim Reinders as a memorial to his father, Carhenge consists of a circle of cars with a heel stone, slaughter stone, and two station stones within the circle. In fact, it's a near perfect match to its counterpart across a pond, thanks to Reinder's extensive studies of Stonehenge while living in England."
"While it's certainly the centerpiece, the druidic tribute isn't the only strange thing on the property. There's also a "Car Art Preserve" populated with plenty of art projects created with vehicle bits and pieces, and even a little graveyard dedicated to three foreign cars buried on the grounds. A full vehicle serves as their makeshift gravestone, reading: "Here lie three bones of foreign cars. They served our purpose while Detroit slept. Now Detroit is awake and America's great!"
