California’s utility charge saga began with misuse of budget process

A year ago, California’s three big investor-owned electric power utilities — Pacific Gas & Electric, Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric — proposed new fixed charges on their residential customers that would vary by income. Households making less than $69,000 a year would pay $20 to $34 a month, while those earning $69,000 … Read more

Gov. Newsom denies pushing for ‘bread’ exception in new fast food minimum wage law – Daily News

By ADAM BEAM SACRAMENTO  — California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration has denied a news report that he pushed for an exception to the state’s new fast-food minimum wage law that benefits a wealthy campaign donor. California’s minimum wage is $16 per hour. But starting April 1, most fast-food restaurants in the state must pay their … Read more

Gavin Newsom plans TV ad blasting abortion travel bans

Gov. Gavin Newsom said Sunday he plans to run an ad protesting travel bans that are making it tough for women in states restricting abortion to leave their home state for the procedure. “The conditions are much more pernicious than they even appear. These guys are not just restricting the rights, self-determination to bear a … Read more

Prop. 1 is best chance in decades to change mental health system

For nine years, I begged Alameda County agencies to give my intermittently homeless and schizophrenic ward the care she needed to stay alive and well. Last September, some 12 years after I became her legal guardian, she fatally overdosed on meth and fentanyl. The mental health system operating in California counties like mine could not save my … Read more

A good week for Rob Bonta, a bad week for Serranus Hastings

Rob Bonta California attorney general hasn’t said yet if he’ll run for governor in 2026, but he’s raised $2 million since July — more than the top four candidates: Tony Thurmond, Betty Yee, Toni Atkins and Eleni Kounalakis.       Serranus Hastings Judge rules the state did not violate the law when it removed … Read more

Labor deal in flux as Newsom revisits SB 525, the $25 minimum health wage – Daily News

By Don Thompson | KFF Health News Gov. Gavin Newsom is revisiting California’s phase-in of a nation-leading $25 minimum wage for health workers in the face of a projected $38 billion deficit, less than three months after he approved the measure. But renegotiating wages could threaten a delicate compromise between unions and the health industry. … Read more

Calif. family whose son was swept away in raging flood still searches

National Guard troops, sheriff’s office personnel and firefighters search for missing 5-year-old Kyle Doan Thursday, Jan. 12, 2023, near San Miguel, Calif.  AP It’s been a year of nonstops for the Doan family of Paso Robles. Nonstop disbelief. Nonstop searching. Nonstop second guessing. Nonstop grieving. And now a nonstop legal battle.   It’s been a year … Read more

Cursive writing returns to California classrooms in 2024

Sierra Rivera and her older sister, Dahlia, were thrilled at the idea of baking up a batch of their grandmother’s pumpkin cookies last month for Thanksgiving, but when their dad gave them the handwritten recipe, they froze. Letters of each word gracefully flowed from one to the next in a style familiar to those of … Read more

Exploring Dutch Flat, the Tahoe-area town that raised Gavin Newsom

When California Gov. Gavin Newsom named his son Dutch in 2016, it wasn’t because he had some unknown affinity for the Netherlands. Dutch Newsom, the governor’s youngest, was named for Dutch Flat, for Dutch Flat, California, a tiny Sierra Nevada town off Interstate 80 about an hour from Lake Tahoe. After his parents divorced and his father … Read more

Hundreds of Calif. Pizza Hut restaurants to lay off delivery drivers

More than 1,200 Pizza Hut delivery drivers in California are slated to be laid off in February. Brandon Bell/Getty Images Pizza Hut operators will lay off more than 1,200 delivery drivers at hundreds of franchises across California in February, the company confirmed.  San Ramon-based PacPizza and Southern California Pizza Co., which operate Pizza Hut restaurants … Read more