Sacramento killed two bipartisan lobbying transparency bills without a hearing, while a new Assembly bill could expose journalists who report on government-funded immigration nonprofits to $4,000-per-violation fines—with no press exemption. These aren't isolated failures: recent months have also surfaced a rigged curriculum review in San Francisco, $465 affordable housing units that were promised but never funded, and a tropical disease outbreak that courts kept cities from cleaning up for over a year. The throughline is a government that resists scrutiny, avoids accountability, and leaves the public to find out after the fact.
Two bipartisan bills would have shown you who's lobbying your lawmakers. Sacramento killed them both.
AB 2624 just cleared committee. It could allow taxpayer-funded immigration NGOs to sue the journalists investigating them.
The board voted 6-1 to commit to a curriculum validated by a rigged process. But litigation is incoming.
The Mission spent eight years in working groups designing housing that SFMTA admitted was only ever a future possibility — never a funded commitment. Then the city cut 365 units and called it a compromise.
Leptospirosis, common in underdeveloped countries, spread through Berkeley's Harrison encampment—and courts continued to prevent cleanup efforts.
Waymo cleared every safety bar and got exiled to the Rental Car Center. Meanwhile, Uber and Lyft keep 800,000 monthly trips.
California's EDD lost $20 billion to fraud and still owes $21 billion on its federal pandemic loan — and that's only the tip of the iceberg.
Now they want a new tax, and can't find the invoice for the "equity" report they commissioned to argue enforcing fares was pointless
Los Angeles emptied a building that was already housing people. Four years and $625,000 per unit later, it still houses nobody.
SF's 540-page city charter is the longest in the country, and it was built to protect insiders. Lurie is finally tearing it apart.