College savings accounts are being set up by the state with a little added in. Low-income families are getting the accounts with deposits of up to $1,500 per child as part of the CalKIDS program, administered by ScholarShare Investment Board. The program is for college advances for kids in low-income families, from first to 12th grade. Children are automatically enrolled. The amount a child gets is based on a Local Control Funding Formula. All Calif. newborn children will also get a boost no matter the family’s income. Those accounts start with $100. The state is putting up over $1.9 billion toward the accounts.
Sutter Health is getting some bad press as thousands of healthcare workers and nurses say they messed up their pay. A spokesperson for Sutter says they had put in a new human-resources and payroll system recently, which was complex. But at the same time says, most of their more than 50,000 employees got their checks as expected, but there were some data issues from their old system, so some of their employees did not get paid the way they should. She says they’re working diligently to fix the issues as soon as possible. Employees called out the company saying, in some cases, they lost thousands of dollars, in the meantime. Their unions say they immediately reported the errors, but they were not made good on.
The company that operates the Skunk Train, Mendocino Railway, is suing to use more railroad tracks. The company filed a federal lawsuit in Eureka against the City of Fort Bragg and the California Coastal Commission so they can more easily operate the railroad. The President of the Railway company says they want to expand but there are road bocks in their way. He says state and local agencies should not be allowed to disregard federal law by using state powers to get in the way of transporting passengers and freight. The company is trying to get the power to extend the railroad 13 miles north of Willits, which is where the Great Redwood Trail is being built.
It’s a big thumbs up in Clearlake for a new women’s clinic. The Clearlake Planning Commission all voted yes to allow the anti-abortion group, the Pregnancy Counseling Center of Ukiah, calling itself, Mendo Lake Women’s Clinic, to set up in town. They’ll be inside a building that used to be an eye clinic. The planning commission’s staff writes the clinic is a nonprofit, and its original clinic is located in Ukiah. The company is also known as the Center for Life Choices, which will fund the new clinic. The chair of the board says their mission is to stop the need for abortions by effectively serving pregnant, at-risk women by transforming their fear into confidence.
After both cities okayed the agreement, Clearlake Police will start to service Lakeport as well. Because of staffing shortages in Lakeport, the chief asked for help from his counterpart in Clearlake. After an agreement was drafted and both cities signed off, the work begins today. Lake Co News also reports the contract will allow Lakeport Police officers to work in Clearlake as well, if they’re ever in the same boat. The city of Lakeport is paying for the help. Lakeport police have had a mutual working relationship for years with Clearlake, and the agency says they have practically all of the same policies, procedures and training. To start, Clearlake Police will work a few shifts/week temporarily.
The Governor says he’s been working on ways to increase the water supply in the state as we continue to deal with hotter temperatures and lower humidity. Newsom has announced “California’s Water Supply Strategy, Adapting to a Hotter, Drier Future”. It comes after the previous announcement of $8 billion in investments the state’s already made to help store, recycle, desalt and conserve water to outpace climate change. The plan to reportedly bring the state enough water for over 8.4 million households by 2040.
In what’s being called a “catastrophic failure”, tens of thousands of fish have died at the UC Davis Center for Aquatic Biology and Aquaculture. The University says 21,000 fish were exposed to chlorine, and they’re investigating. But it’s an outside, independent review, so they can see where their systems failed, and what potential risks there are at similar facilities. The 5-acre facility is home to various aquatic biology programs, with more than a dozen species being studied at any given time. While this happened, they were studying environmental stressors on fish species including green and white sturgeon and the endangered Chinook salmon.
The Governor’s Office of Emergency Services is working on current fires they say, but also still completing recovery operations from fires last year. The agency announced over 99 percent of the private properties who had enrolled in the state’s Consolidated Debris Removal Program have been cleared of wildfire debris. There are some homes that don’t use the state program, instead opting to use private companies. Cal OES reported as of Wednesday of this week crews had pulled out metal, concrete, ash and contaminated soil from 1,773 of the 1,775 private properties enrolled in program. There was over 430,000 tons of wildfire debris cleared away across the state. And 67,000 tons of metal and concrete were recycled for new construction.
As the latest Legislative session is about done, there’s been a flurry of hearings. Some of the bills headed to the Governor’s desk, could become law or be veto’d. Some of the last minute proposals being considered include one of the Governor’s for new courts for the homeless so they can get mental health or substance abuse treatment. Another to limit using solitary confinement in jails and prisons, allow for the composting of human remains and increase family leave payments for lower-wage workers, though it wouldn’t take effect until 2024. Some that died before moving on include, one by Republican lawmakers to cap the co-pay on insulin, another to approve procedures and drug prescriptions without getting insurance company permission first and another that could have allowed prosecutors to go after social media companies for knowingly addicting children.
