This article appeared on CalMatters
BY EMILY HOEVEN
MAY 13, 2022
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Good morning, California. It’s Friday, May 13.
Due to skyrocketing inflation rates, California’s minimum wage for all employers will likely rise to $15.50 an hour starting Jan. 1, Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration said Thursday.
The announcement came during the administration’s preview of an $18.1 billion inflation relief package Newsom will likely discuss in more detail today, when he unveils a revised version of his January budget proposal — and it supercharges a debate already primed to intensify in a key election year.
Also Thursday, supporters of a proposed ballot measure to raise California’s minimum wage to $18 per hour announced having submitted more than 1 million signatures — far more than the about 623,000 required to land it on the November ballot.
While many labor unions cheered the announcement — “Increasing the minimum wage at this time of spiking prices is a just and urgently needed measure,” said David Huerta, president of SEIU California and SEIU-United Services Workers West — some small business owners said it could further impede California’s economic recovery.
Newsom’s proposed $18.1 billion relief package also includes:
Other Capitol updates you should know:
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The coronavirus bottom line: As of Monday, California had 8,687,626 confirmed cases (+0.4% from previous day) and 89,957 deaths (+0.1% from previous day), according to state data now updated just twice a week on Tuesdays and Fridays. CalMatters is also tracking coronavirus hospitalizations by county.
California has administered 75,088,046 vaccine doses, and 75.1% of eligible Californians are fully vaccinated.
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1. Mothers protest open-air drug markets
A record 107,000 Americans died from drug overdoses in 2021, according to new estimates from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — including approximately 11,700 Californians, a whopping 22% increase from the year before. The individual lives behind those stark numbers were highlighted Thursday at the state Capitol, when the group Mothers Against Drug Deaths called on Newsom to declare a state of emergency to crack down on the notorious open-air drug markets in places like San Francisco’s Tenderloin neighborhood. The group, which previously erected a billboard in Union Square decrying the city’s drug markets, are now putting up some in Sacramento with the slogan “Welcome to Camp Fentanyl: Open to kids everywhere” plastered across a photo of tent encampments lining a sidewalk.
2. Big environmental news
A slow environmental news day in California? No such thing. Let’s dive in:
3. Will CA accelerate student housing?
Speaking of the environment, college activists are pushing state lawmakers to pass a bill to fast-track UC, CSU and community college housing developments by getting rid of a secondary review currently required under California’s marquee environmental protection law, Ryan Loyola reports for CalMatters’ College Journalism Network. But one big question remains: Even if the bill passes, will it actually make a difference?
In other higher-education news, here’s a dispatch from Colleen Murphy, team lead for CalMatters’ College Journalism Network: Students on Wednesday filed a class-action lawsuit against Mills College, an all-women’s university in Oakland, arguing it misled them about a merger with Northeastern University. According to the lawsuit, the merger has forced some Mills students to either change majors or transfer, “resulting in delayed graduation dates and additional expenses.”
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Affordable housing production needs less stick and more carrot: To meet California’s dire housing needs, policymakers must put less emphasis on mandates and instead harness the power of incentives, argues Jason Ward, associate director of the RAND Center on Housing and Homelessness in Los Angeles.
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Joe Buscaino withdraws from L.A. mayor’s race, endorses Rick Caruso. // LAist
Opinion: Six ways Democrats need to start talking — and thinking — about crime. // San Francisco Chronicle
$10,000 reward for info on Sacramento gang shootout suspect. // Sacramento Bee
‘I hope nobody is bleeding out’: They called 911 in Oakland. They were told they’d have to wait. // San Francisco Chronicle
Sikh man sues California county over response to alleged hate crimes. // Sacramento Bee
San Jose police officer on leave over allegation he gave meth pipe in exchange for information. // Mercury News
Why S.F. might be about to prohibit police from making low-level traffic stops. // San Francisco Chronicle
Chesa Boudin recall: Who would replace the S.F. District Attorney if he’s recalled? // San Francisco Chronicle
VTA demolishes Building B where mass shooting began. // Mercury News
Homelessness: OC counts fewer on streets, in shelters than in 2019. // Orange County Register
State Supreme Court rejects a challenge by landlords to S.F. eviction protection law. // San Francisco Chronicle
Atherton to consider building townhomes to avoid California housing fines. Some residents would rather pay $100,000 a month in penalties. // San Francisco Chronicle
Four years among the San Francisco NIMBYS. // The Atlantic
How the California Public Utilities Commission undermines the Public Records Act. // San Francisco Public Press
Oil companies price gouging in California, Consumer Watchdog says. // ABC 10
California unlikely to fix massive wage-theft claim backlog anytime soon. // KQED
Foster Farms plant in Merced County asked Trump to help evade COVID rules. // Sacramento Bee
S.F. courts won’t be forced to lift COVID restrictions despite hundreds of backlogged criminal trials. // San Francisco Chronicle
L.A. County doctors to vote on strike authorization. // Daily News
Will California teachers be ready to teach ethnic studies? Some say training needed. // EdSource
Hayward superintendent picked to lead S.F. public schools. // San Francisco Standard
Wildfires, smoke, heat waves endanger West’s summer camps. // Bloomberg
See you Monday.
Tips, insight or feedback? Email emily@calmatters.org.
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