California Watch

State vacation payouts exceed caps, cost millions

Money and Politics

Managers have routinely allowed their employees to amass unused vacation time, enabling hundreds of workers to end their public-service careers with payouts topping $100,000.

How we estimated vacation, leave overages

State departments spend millions on unused vacation

GRAPHIC: Big checks for unused time

DUI checkpoint seizures raise cash, legal questions

Public Safety

Law enforcement agencies are more likely to seize cars from sober, unlicensed drivers than take drunks off the road at the state's sobriety checkpoints, investigation finds.

Reporter details how story came together

GRAPHIC: Southern California cities have highest impound rates

More women dying from pregnancy complications

Health and Welfare

Task force examines possible causes: C-sections, obesity, older mothers and fertility treatments.

CHART: Tracking maternal mortality rates

Q&A: Pregnancy-related deaths explained

AUDIO: Experts weigh in on maternal mortality rates

Stimulus program pours $54 million into Wine Train project

Money and Politics

An Alaska company landed a deal for one of California’s largest stimulus grants

MAP: The Road to Napa

SLIDESHOW: Inside the Wine Train

Recipients reap $18.5 billion in stimulus funds

Suulutaaq Inc.: In the company's own words

Money and Politics

State vacation payouts exceed caps, cost millions

Public Safety

DUI checkpoint seizures raise cash, legal questions

Health and Welfare

More women dying from pregnancy complications

Money and Politics

Stimulus program pours $54 million into Wine Train project

California WatchBlog

Money and Politics

Feds wouldn't tell Napa about Wine Train contractor

March 11, 2010, 12:04am | Lance Williams

California Watch wasn’t the only one trying to pry loose government documents on the Alaska Native Corporation that got a $54 million federal stimulus contract to relocate the tracks for the Napa Valley Wine Train.

It turns out that Napa County – the project’s co-sponsor – attempted to learn more about Suulutaaq Inc. last year via the federal Freedom of Information Act.

In a FOIA letter to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the lead...

Health and Welfare

Medicare cuts ties with drug plan that left patients in the lurch

March 11, 2010

Medicare officials announced this week that they are tearing up their contract with a New York-based company – with 4,100...

Higher Ed

Student fee deja vu for San Diego State University

March 11, 2010

San Diego State University, student fees

San Diego State University students voted this week on a fee increase to build a new student union, marking the third such vote since 2002,...

General Assignment

Thousands - mostly white men - apply to redraw district lines

March 11, 2010

Only a few brave Californians have expressed interest in being governor of a state that many believe is ungovernable.

Yet there has been no...

General Assignment

Report: Furloughs could add up to zero savings for state

March 11, 2010, 5:45am

California Watch vacation payouts state workers furloughs

That big savings that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger estimated taxpayers would get by furloughing state workers - wait for it - could amount to nothing at all. At the most, it's a short-term benefit to balance the books. Jon Ortiz and Phillip Reese at...

General Assignment

Chargers quarterback tops list of highest paid NFL players

March 11, 2010, 12:03am

What kind of money do professional athletes make? Check out USA Today's searchable pro-sports databases to find out. The 2009 numbers for the National Football League are in, and San Diego quarterback Phillip Rivers came in as the top earner at $25,...

K–12

Feds probe LAUSD's treatment of English language learners

March 10, 2010, 12:08am

The question has loomed large for years: Is the Los Angeles Unified School District neglecting its non-English-speaking students? A study last year by the Tomás Rivera Policy Institute at USC seemed to think it was possible. After tracking an...

Inside The Newsroom

California Watch site now features enhanced commenting

Saturday, February 27, 2010 - 5:58pm | Mark Katches

Almost immediately after launching our California Watch Web site in early January, we went to work on changes for our “Phase 2.”

The first results of that work relate to our commenting. And the changes just went live.

It is now dramatically easier to register on our site. That means instead of filling out a longer form, we now are requiring only a few simple steps before registered users can comment on our stories, blog posts and databases.

The flipside is...