California Policy & Politics This Morning  

California police report almost no racial profiling -- California’s first-in-the-nation attempt to track racial profiling complaints against police produced numbers so unrealistically small that the board overseeing the tally wants departments to make changes to encourage more people to come forward. The panel’s most recent report found 17 percent of California’s law enforcement agencies reported not a single complaint in 2017. Don Thompson Associated Press -- 3/11/19

California has become a battleground for the protection of consumer privacy rules -- A landmark California law signed last year to enact the strongest privacy rules in the country and regulate the online marketplace of personal data is caught in a tug of war between industry lobbyists who want to weaken it and consumer groups that say it doesn’t go far enough. Jazmine Ulloa in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 3/11/19

Housing, global warming to dominate state’s 2019 agenda -- Changes like apartments in neighborhoods that don’t want density, fast-tracking environmental reviews for new developments and tenant protections to curb homelessness. Other changes likely will include more people using public transit, more zero-emission cars on the road and electric appliances replacing gas cooktops and furnaces. Jeff Collins in the Orange County Register -- 3/11/19

The future of Orange County politics starts Tuesday -- On the one hand, a win by one of the big-name Republicans on the ballot could assure the party faithful that the GOP brand isn’t as shaky, locally, as last November’s election suggested. On the other, a win by the one big-name Democrat could signal that the so-called “blue wave” of 2018 — in which Democrats took every federal office in a county once synonymous with Republican politics — wasn’t a blip. Jordan Graham in the Orange County Register -- 3/11/19

Skelton: High taxes be damned, the rich keep moving to California -- Are rich people fleeing California to escape astronomical state income taxes? That’s the word. But it’s fake news. In fact, more wealthy people are moving to California than leaving, research indicates. It’s the poor and middle class who are departing. George Skelton in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 3/11/19

Walters: Both abortion factions try to silence opponents -- Abortion is a divisive moral and political issue that generates ceaseless heated debate, as it should. However, it also entices those who feel passionately about it, one way or the other, to use politics to shut down the other side. Dan Walters Calmatters -- 3/11/19

Oakland City Councilwoman Lynette Gibson McElhaney’s son fatally shot -- Victor McElhaney, an Oakland native, was a student at the University of Southern California. The avid drummer and jazz musician had recently transferred to the university from a community college. McElhaney, 21, apparently was the victim of an attempted robbery off campus. Kimberly Veklerov and Dominic Fracassa in the San Francisco Chronicle$ George Kelly, Marisa Kendall, David DeBolt in the San Jose Mercury$ Laura Newberry in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 3/11/19

Promises broken? City’s handling of protesters called a ‘breach of faith’ -- Two days before Sacramento County District Attorney Anne Marie Schubert announced she wouldn’t file criminal charges against the police officers who fatally shot Stephon Clark, Chief Daniel Hahn sat at a table with the Rev. Mary Westfall, a pastor with the Presbytery of Sacramento. Benjy Egel and Theresa Clift in the Sacramento Bee$ -- 3/11/19

Housing  

‘It’s great having people here when I come home’: Behind the rise of co-living -- The home, run by the 2-year-old San Francisco company Bungalow, embodies a trend that’s spreading rapidly across pricey cities in the Bay Area and beyond: co-living, in which unrelated people share spaces and split costs. Carolyn Said in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 3/11/19

Education 

William J. Johnston, superintendent who led LAUSD for 10 turbulent years, dies at 92 -- William J. Johnston took the helm of the Los Angeles school district in 1971 — in the wake of a five-week teachers’ strike and not long after Latino students had marched out of their Eastside schools, even as black leaders were in court demanding integration. Howard Blume in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 3/11/19

Palomar College president's $1 million office cost sparks dispute -- A nearly $1 million project to build an office suite for the president of Palomar College has prompted some faculty members to complain that the facility is too expensive and wasn’t properly approved. Deborah Sullivan Brennan in the San Diego Union-Tribune$ -- 3/11/19

Many California schools have police but no counselors, ACLU report finds -- Nearly 400,000 K-12 students in California attend a school that has a police officer but not a counselor, according to a new nationwide report by the ACLU on the presence of police and mental health services in schools. David Washburn EdSource -- 3/11/19

Cannabis 

California’s marijuana industry needs an intervention to avoid an ‘extinction event’ -- An estimated 10,000 marijuana growers could lose their licenses in the coming months if California lawmakers fail to pass a bill designed to grant them an extension, according to Sen. Mike McGuire, D-Healdsburg, who has sponsored Senate Bill 67. Andrew Sheeler in the Sacramento Bee$ -- 3/11/19

Also . . . 

Sunday Streets turns Valencia into 1.5-mile-long block party -- Elisse Azofeifa watched her 2-year-old daughter, Avery, gingerly pick up a jump rope as if it were a live snake and then toddle over to a bucket filled with confetti, flinging the vibrant pieces of tissue paper into the air. Carolyn Said in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 3/11/19

POTUS 45  

Trump’s massive reelection campaign has 2016 themes — and a 2020 infrastructure -- President Trump and his advisers are launching a behemoth 2020 campaign operation combining his raw populist message from 2016 with a massive data-gathering and get-out-the-vote push aimed at dwarfing any previous presidential reelection effort, according to campaign advisers, White House aides, Republican officials and others briefed on the emerging strategy. Toluse Olorunnipa and Josh Dawsey in the Washington Post$ -- 3/11/19

Trump to demand $8.6 billion in new wall funding, setting up fresh battle with Congress -- President Trump on Monday will request at least $8.6 billion more in funding to build additional sections of a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, setting up a fresh battle with Congress less than one month after he declared a national emergency. Damian Paletta and Erica Werner in the Washington Post$ -- 3/11/19

GOP bracing for Trump to veto Congress’s rejection of his emergency declaration -- Republican leaders expect President Trump to veto a measure attempting to overturn his declaration of a national emergency to enable construction of a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, after the Senate votes on it this week. Karoun Demirjian in the Washington Post$ -- 3/11/19

Beltway 

GOP meddles in Democratic nomination with takedown of O'Rourke -- The Club for Growth sees the ex-Texas congressman as a serious threat to Donald Trump, and they're treating him accordingly. Alex Isenstadt Politico -- 3/11/19

 

-- Sunday Updates 

For these California fire survivors, hope grows amid the ashes of Paradise -- Months after California’s most devastating wildfire killed 85 people and leveled the town of Paradise, many former residents find the thought of returning here unbearable. But others, whose homes escaped destruction, have come back to a life of surreal contrasts. Laura Newberry in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 3/10/19

SFO traffic suffers from Uber and Lyft, so it entices riders to meet car in garage -- Uber and Lyft made a whopping 10 million pickups and drop-offs at San Francisco International Airport last year, clogging the curbside spaces so badly that the airport started offering a $3 discount to ride-hail customers willing to walk across the street and meet their drivers at an adjacent garage. Phil Matier in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 3/10/19

Local marijuana industry wants looser dispensary rules, on-site 'consumption lounges' -- Leaders of San Diego’s marijuana industry are lobbying city officials to allow more dispensaries to open, lengthen their hours of operation and permit on-site use of the drug in “consumption lounges.” They say city regulations are outdated and unnecessarily restrictive, contending San Diego needs an expanded legal marijuana industry to combat the local black market for the drug. David Garrick in the San Diego Union-Tribune$ -- 3/10/19

Family sues San Diego Unified alleging two brothers were beaten, bullied and district had father arrested -- A family suing the San Diego Unified School District claims that Lincoln High School officials failed to protect two brothers from being bullied and beaten at school, one to the point of unconsciousness and a concussion. The lawsuit, which covers 2017 and 2018, also claims the boys’ father was arrested and jailed after he complained about their treatment. Kristen Taketa in the San Diego Union-Tribune$ -- 3/10/19

Startup offers loans to H-1B visa holders, DACA recipients -- Rohit Mittal knew he’d need financial help to pursue a master’s degree at Columbia University. But as an Indian national, he couldn’t apply for a U.S. student loan. Instead, his father took out a loan in Delhi and put up their home up as collateral. Leonardo Castañeda in the San Jose Mercury$ -- 3/10/19

The U.S. tracked border activists, journalists and attorneys. Is it legal? -- What U.S. Customs and Border Protection is calling a valid duty to gather cross-border intelligence and investigate criminal activity is being labeled as harassment by those who have been targeted. Kristina Davis in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 3/10/19

Do California politicians’ yearbooks harbor secrets? Nah. But dorkiness? -- After Virginia’s governor fumbled last month to explain the disgraceful racist photos on his college yearbook page, it raised the question: Could our own politicians’ yearbooks harbor secrets too? John Woolfolk, Dylan Bouscher, Casey Tolan and David DeBolt in the San Jose Mercury$ -- 3/10/19

Bay Area police try out controversial AI software that tells them where to patrol -- Even the head of a Santa Cruz tech company that sells software to Bay Area police departments admits that using an algorithm to tell cops where and when to patrol raises a host of complicated issues. Ethan Baron in the San Jose Mercury$ -- 3/10/19

In budget, Trump to ask Congress for $8.6 billion for border wall -- President Donald Trump on Monday will ask the U.S. Congress for an additional $8.6 billion to help pay for his promised wall on the U.S-Mexico border to combat illegal immigration and drug trafficking, officials familiar with his 2020 budget request told Reuters. Roberta Rampton Reuters -- 3/10/19