InfrastructureDing, Dong, Redevelopment Is DeadMonday, February 6th, 2012 Feb. 6, 2012 The California Redevelopment Association's website this week was still up and running and featuring job postings for redevelopment jobs, although the site does report that the association's annual convention and expo has been canceled. It's just a matter of time before the news reach... Will Enviros Bend on CEQA Reform?Saturday, January 28th, 2012 Jan. 28, 2012 CEQA, the California Environmental Quality Act, has long been the third rail of politics here in theGoldenState. If a politician dare touch it, he or she is dead to the state’s powerful environmental lobby. Gov. Jerry Brown this week placed environmentalists in a quandary. He r... Delta Science Remains in QuestionFriday, January 6th, 2012JAN. 6, 2011 A federal judge opened up a can of whoop ass last fall on two government biologists, accusing them of mendacity in making their case for stricter environmental regulations in the Delta. This week, a report by a supposedly “independent panel of experts” cleared the pair of wron... Pelosi and Pickens Tap Natural GasThursday, December 22nd, 2011DEC. 22, 2011 Politics, the saying goes, makes strange bedfellows. Witness the curious alliance between House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, the San Francisco Democrat, and T. Boone Pickens, the oil and gas tycoon. Both Pelosi and Pickens are urging Congress to pass the New Alternative Transpor... Whose First Amendment Rights?Monday, November 7th, 2011 NOV. 7, 2011 The First Amendment is probably the most important right in America. And it is the most abused. Freedom of religion, assembly, speech, petition and press are all protected under the U.S. Constitution as well as the California Constitution. The right of the people “peaceably ... Rural Rebellion BrewingMonday, October 31st, 2011 OCT. 31, 2011 The nearly five-hour drive from the Sacramento area to Yreka, in Siskiyou County by the Oregon border, was a reminder not just of the immense size and beauty of California, but of the vast regional and cultural differences one finds within our 37 million-population state. Sacrame... Jobs Killed by Unendangered SpeciesFriday, October 28th, 2011 OCT. 28, 2011 It’s been 20 years since biologist Jonathan L. Atwood authored a study declaring the California gnatcatcher a distinct subspecies. Based on Atwood’s conclusion, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in 1993 listed the small blue-gray songbird as “threatened,” restricting lan... Steve Jobs: Free Market CapitalistFriday, October 7th, 2011 OCT. 7, 2011 The late Steve Jobs is remembered this week as a “visionary and creative genius,” as Apple Inc. eulogized him on its website; and as the Thomas Edison and Henry Ford of our time, as the New York Times described Apple’s co-founder in his obituary. Under Jobs, Apple proved the... California’s War on MotoristsSunday, September 25th, 2011 SEPT. 25, 2011 Laguna Niguel motorists should honk their horns in celebration. Their city council this week voted not to join the ranks of local governments throughout the state that have installed red light cameras on their streets. The primary function of “automated traffic enforcement sys... Solyndra Crash Hits Green BusinessesFriday, September 16th, 2011 SEPT. 16, 2011 Solyndra, the Fremont solar-panel manufacturer that went belly up last week, was the subject of a hearing Wednesday all the way in the nation’s Capitol. Lawmakers on the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee Committee on Oversight and Investigations wanted to get to the botto... |