January 18, 2011, 12:05 AM
Salaries for top posts in Gov. Jerry Brown’s office are down by about 11 percent from the pay scale set by former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, records show. And, as Brown promises to impose big cuts in state government, there are fewer jobs in the governor’s office. Brown has...
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January 14, 2011, 12:05 AM
In the halls of local governments, most of the talk surrounding Gov. Jerry Brown's state/local realignment strategy this week has centered on the proposed demise of redevelopment agencies – a prospect that has rankled some local officials, who worry that such cuts could stymie local...
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January 13, 2011, 12:05 AM
To help close a $25.4 billion budget shortfall, Gov. Jerry Brown has proposed reallocating $1 billion in reserves from Proposition 10, which uses tobacco taxes to fund "First 5" childhood development programs, to Medi-Cal. But that's money First 5 says it does not have. Voters...
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January 12, 2011, 12:06 AM
Just how big is a $500 million cut to the University of California system? Gov. Jerry Brown this week unveiled a budget that included drastic reductions for the state's public colleges and universities. The plan calls for [PDF] a $500 million cut to the UC, a $500 million cut to the...
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January 11, 2011, 12:05 AM
It might seem hard to swallow given Gov. Jerry Brown's dour budget pronouncements yesterday, but if the experts are to be believed, there's a case to be made that things here in California could be a whole lot worse. Let's start with the typical tale of woe: California's $25-...
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January 11, 2011, 12:05 AM
Gov. Jerry Brown wants to change a long-criticized method of funding community colleges based on the number of students in attendance on a single day near the beginning of the semester. It is only one of several proposals relating to community colleges in his budget, including calling...
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January 10, 2011, 3:18 PM
Gov. Jerry Brown is counting on fewer Medi-Cal users seeing the doctor, visiting the emergency room or spending the night in the hospital - by charging those low-income patients a co-pay of as much as $100. In other words, what's bad for the patient, might be good for the state budget....
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January 10, 2011, 12:05 AM
As Gov. Jerry Brown opens yet another austere budget season today, open government advocates are launching an offensive to ensure the public's right to be looped in on local government meetings won't become an inadvertent casualty of future budget cuts. State Sen. Leland Yee, D-San...
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January 6, 2011, 12:05 AM
In one of his first appointments, Gov. Jerry Brown has chosen Bill Honig, a once nationally acclaimed education leader who was effectively frozen out of the reform movement in the state for nearly 20 years, to serve on the State Board of Education. Before the era of term limits, Honig...
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January 4, 2011, 12:06 AM
Tom Torlakson, the new state superintendent of public instruction, chose to be inaugurated in the gymnasium at Mount Diablo High School in Concord where he used to teach – a school district that like many others around the state, faces a perilous financial future. Torlakson once taught...
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January 4, 2011, 12:06 AM
Newly inaugurated Gov. Jerry Brown will propose shifting low-level offenders from state prisons to county jails as one of many budget cuts to shrink California’s $28 billion deficit, according to the Sacramento Bee. But this solution also poses a number of problems. First among them:...
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January 3, 2011, 12:06 AM
It was the worst of times. In this tale of two governors, the state's precarious financial condition is about all that unites Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Gov.-elect Jerry Brown, set to be inaugurated today in Sacramento. When Schwarzenegger came into office, he faced budget...
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December 22, 2010, 12:05 AM
The first attempt to use a controversial "parent trigger" law to convert a regular public school into a charter school has raised at least one key question: Just how public should the petition drive to gather the parent signatures needed to trigger the change be? On Dec. 7 a...
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December 21, 2010, 12:05 AM
Michael Kirst, a Stanford emeritus professor and a confidant of Jerry Brown for more than thirty years, is the leading candidate to become president of the State Board of Education, according to education sources. It would be the same position Kirst occupied 35 years ago during the first Brown...
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December 16, 2010, 12:05 AM
The California attorney general’s office announced a multimillion-dollar settlement with satellite TV provider DirecTV yesterday. The El Segundo-based company will pay more than $13 million to 49 states and the District of Columbia for "misleading sales and marketing practices," the...
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