News

Oversight Hearing on Delta Stewardship Council and BDCP set for May 11

by Dan Bacher

The Assembly Water, Parks and Wildlife Committee will hold an oversight hearing on the Delta Stewardship Council and Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP) progress and updates on Tuesday May 11, in the State Capitol, Room 437, at 9:30 AM.

"At this hearing, we plan to get an update regarding the newly seated Delta Stewardship Council and its work on the Delta Plan, as well as follow up on questions related to the BDCP, including integration of the BDCP with the existing habitat conservation plan (HCP) and natural community conservation plan (NCCP) efforts in the Delta," said Tina Cannon Leahy, Principal Consultant for the Assembly Water, Parks and Wildlife Committee.

"Because our last Delta informational and oversight hearing included primarily state and federal agency representatives, this hearing will include an opportunity for BDCP stakeholders, Delta County representatives, and non-governmental entities that are not on the BDCP Steering Committee, to also participate," Cannon Leahy stated.

Delta and fish advocates have blasted the BDCP and Delta Stewardship Council for creating a clear path to the construction of the peripheral canal and new dams. The canal/tunnel being pushed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger would cost Californians $23 billion to $53.8 billion at a time when the state is an unprecedented budget crisis.

Twenty-one marine protected areas (MPAs) - dubbed "Marine Poaching Areas" by many game wardens because of the lack of enforcement staff to patrol new reserves - will take effect May 1, 2010 along California's north central coast.

Schwarzenegger's North Central MLPA Closures Begin May 1

by Dan Bacher

Twenty-one marine protected areas (MPAs) - dubbed "Marine Poaching Areas" by many game wardens because of the lack of enforcement staff to patrol the new reserves - will take effect May 1, 2010 along California's north central coast.

The regulations for the controversial marine reserves between Alder Creek near Point Arena in Mendocino County to Pigeon Point in San Mateo County were adopted by the California Fish and Game Commission in August 2009 and approved by the Office of Administrative Law in April 2010.

President Obama

The bottom line is this: given our energy needs, in order to sustain economic growth, produce jobs and keep our businesses competitive, we’re going to need to harness traditional sources of fuel. So today we're announcing the expansion of offshore oil and gas exploration

Click for more pics

Gulf: 5 times what they originally claimed

Supporters of AB 1594 are very disappointed that such a simple, straightforward bill, designed to stop Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's peripheral canal from being built without legislative oversight and a fiscal analysis, didn't receive a second motion from the Committee members.

Bill to Stop Peripheral Canal Killed In Committee

by Dan Bacher

A bill introduced by Assemblymember Alyson Huber to require a full legislative vote to approve any proposed peripheral canal around the California Delta was killed in its first policy hearing today for lack of a second motion to take a vote.

“Today, California lost the opportunity to ensure accountability and oversight of any proposed peripheral canal," said Huber. "The intention of AB 1594 was not to reopen the debate about last year’s water package, but to add a critical piece missing from the process - legislative oversight and a fiscal analysis of any conveyance proposal."

The bill, heard in Assembly Committee on Water, Parks and Wildlife, was supported by Senator Mark DeSaulnier (Co-Author) Assemblymember Wes Chesbro (Co-Author) Assemblymember Paul Fong (Co-Author), Assemblymember Ted Gaines (Co-Author), Assemblymember Tom Torlakson (Co-Author) and Assemblymember Mariko Yamada (Co-Author).

Link to pic

Interesting that whoever drove this, is also parked in a handicapped spot without a handicapped license plate. ... To be fair, maybe they have one of those things you stick on your review mirror, but it's kind of hard to see through the confederate flags in the back window

WaPo via boingboing

[T]he DMV agreed that the plate contains a coded message: The number 88 stands for the eighth letter of the alphabet, H, doubled to signify "Heil Hitler," said CAIR's Ibrahim Hooper. "CV" stands for "Confederate veteran" -- the plate was a special model embossed with a Confederate flag, which Virginia makes available for a $10 fee to card-carrying members of the Sons of Confederate Veterans. And 14 is code for imprisoned white supremacist David Lane's 14-word motto: "We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children."

War Is Making California Poor

Posted by robertgreenwald on April 21st, 2010

There’s a crisis on our hands in California. The cost of the war in Afghanistan is making basic goals, such as stable housing, decent work and education, nearly impossible to maintain.

Commission Delays Approval Of Limited Central Valley Salmon Season

by Dan Bacher

The California Fish and Game Commission today voted to delay the approval of a limited recreational salmon fishing season on Central Valley rivers until the next Commission meeting on May 5, but unanimously approved a recreational season on the Klamath River and the ocean salmon season adopted by the Pacific Fishery Management Council on April 15.

During the teleconference in Sacramento, Neil Manji, Department of Fish and Game (DFG) Fisheries Branch Chief, said the delay in adoption of regulations for the Central Valley rivers was necessary to simplify the regulations as much as possible and to incorporate the late fall run Chinook salmon season into the regulations.

The PFMC decided on April 15 to allow the harvest of 8200 fish in the Sacramento, American and Feather rivers in a limited season, based on a projection of 245,000 ocean abundance of Sacramento River Chinook this year by federal fishery scientists. The 8200 fish allocation includes 1,000 from the Feather, 1,000 from the American River, 3600 from the lower Sacramento below Knights Landing and 2600 from the upper Sacramento from Knights Landing to the Deschutes Road Bridge.

Huber Reintroduces Bill To Stop The Peripheral Canal

by Dan Bacher

Assemblymember Alyson Huber (D-El Dorado Hills) has reintroduced a bill, AB 1594, that would prevent construction of a peripheral canal around the California Delta without a full fiscal analysis and a vote of the legislature.

Huber's bill prohibits the construction of a peripheral canal - defined to include any facility or structure that conveys water directly from a diversion point in the Sacramento River to SWP or CVP pumping facilities south of the Delta - unless expressly authorized by the Legislature. It further requires the Legislative Analyst's Office to complete an economic feasibility analysis prior to the enactment of a statute authorizing the construction of a peripheral canal, according to Jane Wagner-Tyack, Policy Analyst for Restore the Delta.

The bill would also require that the construction and operation of a peripheral canal "not diminish or negatively affect the water supplies, water rights, or quality of water for water users within the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta watershed."

"Last November's water package completely omits legislative oversight, merely leaving it to the Delta Stewardship Council to decide whether the BDCP is consistent with the co-equal goals of water supply and ecosystem restoration for the Delta," said Wagner-Tyack.

California Court Okays Discrimination Against Section 8 Tenants

by Dean Preston of Tenants Together‚ Apr. 13‚ 2010

Remember Donald Sterling, the NBA team owner and Los Angeles mega-landlord who has been sued multiple times for outrageous housing discrimination, most recently by the U.S. Department of Justice? Sterling is back in the news this week, again for discrimination in his role as landlord. This time, however, Sterling convinced a California Court of Appeal that it was just fine for him to discriminate against a Section 8 tenant. At this point, anyone who still believes in the myth that judges are “liberal activists” needs to have his or her head examined.

CSU-Stanislaus Administrators Accused of Shredding Sarah Palin Documents They Claimed Did Not Exist

Did Sen. Leland Yee just evoke Watergate in his ongoing quest to discern how much California State University-Stanislaus will pay Sarah Palin for a forthcoming speech? You betcha.

When it was last month announced the former Republican vice-presidential candidate would appear at the Turlock college in June for its 50th anniversary, Yee queried how much she would be paid; Palin has earned six figures for past appearances.

The state senator's moves inspired two responses from the university. First, it claimed that its university foundation -- the privately funded auxiliary of the school officially hosting Palin -- was not subject to the California Public Records Act, and therefore didn't have to turn over any papers. But the university claimed that to be a moot point, because the school's compliance officer, Gina Leguria, informed Yee's office that "The University has no documents that are responsive to your request."

And yet, at a Sacramento press conference this morning, a pair of CSU-Stanislaus students claim they discovered university officials on April 9 -- a furlough Friday -- shredding the very documents the school claimed it did not have, and disposing of them in a dumpster.

In an interview with Dan Wiessner of the Tarrytown-Sleepy Hollow Patch, an unnamed Riverkeeper official "shrugged off" criticisms by environmentalists and fishermen that the Hudson Riverkeeper is greenwashing Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's abysmal environmental record by honoring him for his "environmental advocacy" at the "Fishermen's Ball" in New York City on April 14.

“The governor’s work speaks for itself. He’s recognized across the world for his work in combating global climate change,” the official said.

The Riverkeeper is honoring Schwarzenegger in spite of the fact that he is the worst Governor for fish and the environment in California history. Schwarzenegger has presided over the unprecedented collapse of Central Valley salmon, Delta smelt, longfin smelt, green sturgeon, threadfin shad, Sacramento splittail and striped bass populations. He has continually attacked the biological opinions protecting salmon and Delta smelt while campaigning for a peripheral canal and new dams that is likely to result in the extinction of many of these species in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, the largest estuary on the West Coast of the Americas.

Judge Wanger Affirms Flows to Protect Central Valley Salmon

by Dan Bacher

Environmentalists, fishermen and the Winnemem Wintu Tribe scored a legal victory on March 31 when a federal judge affirmed restrictions on Delta pumping to protect imperiled Central Valley salmon populations.

In a rebuke to junior water rights holders, Judge Oliver Wanger of the Eastern District of California refused to grant the Westlands Water District and its co-plaintiffs a temporary restraining order on the biological opinion of the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS). The opinion includes seasonal water flows required to protect Sacramento River endangered spring-run Chinook salmon and Central Valley steelhead in the California Delta, according to the Planning and Conservation League (PCL).

Despite claims to contrary from the plaintiffs, the Judge found that the NMFS opinion, expressed in written comments to the Delta Flow Criteria Proceeding as the absolute "…minimum flows necessary to avoid jeopardy," was based on the best available science and takes the human impacts of seasonal flow regimes into account.

After you read the article below, read these related posts to understand why it matters to you: Why are Financial Terrorists (JP Morgan Chase and Morgan Stanley...etc.) getting away with attacking America?
And this: Munis and The Next Crash by Susie Madrak
Then there's this: Did Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase 'Naked Short Sell' California Bonds? Which Could Lead to a Greek Style Collapse?
And this: SMUD Sues Financial Terrorists - Bank of America, UBS, and JPMorgan Over Derivatives

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JPMorgan, Lehman, UBS Named in Bid-Rigging Conspiracy

March 26 (Bloomberg) -- JPMorgan Chase & Co., Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and UBS AG were among more than a dozen Wall Street firms involved in a conspiracy to pay below-market interest rates to U.S. state and local governments on investments, according to documents filed in a U.S. Justice Department criminal antitrust case.

[...]

None of the firms or individuals named on the list has been charged with wrongdoing. The court records mark the first time these companies have been identified as co-conspirators. They provide the broadest look yet at alleged collusion in the $2.8 trillion municipal securities market that the government says delivered profits to Wall Street at taxpayers’ expense

I don't know if there's a description for doing this with bonds, but, it sure looks as though what they did was a sort 'naked short sell.' Watch the video for a description and example of how it works

What they did, was play off the state of California's budget woes to sell derivatives (bets) to their other clients that California was a credit risk (I wonder if any obstructionist Republican legislators invested in those derivatives?). They took brokerage fees (millions of dollars?) from the state of California on the one hand and sold the state short on the other; the banks didn't own the bonds, or borrow them, but they made $12.4 Million from a deal that just happened (wink, wink) to fall through last Oct.. More below ...

CIA Afghanistan