Politics, Government and Business in Southern California's Inland Empire
11:29 AM PDT on Wednesday, August 11, 2010
The Press-Enterprise
San Bernardino-based Stater Bros. Holdings Inc. reported net income of $6 million in the fiscal quarter ending June 27, a decrease compared with a $15.1 million profit a year ago, according to a statement from the company.
Joe Nelson, Staff Writer
Created: 08/10/2010 05:06:04 PM PDT
San Bernardino County supervisors on Tuesday decided to appeal a judge’s decision ordering the county to pay more than $51,000 in attorney’s fees to a local public attorney’s union it sued.
In a 3-1 vote, with Supervisor Neil Derry dissenting and Chairman Gary Ovitt absent, the board agreed to appeal the July 27 decision by Superior Court Judge Michael S. Mink in favor of the San Bernardino County Public Attorney’s Association, the union representing county prosecutors and deputy public defenders.
News of SEC inquiry spooks investors
Rebecca U. Cho, Staff Writer
Created: 08/10/2010 05:33:11 PM PDT
The stock price for Ontario-based CVB Financial Corp. sank 22 percent Tuesday, a day after the company disclosed it was being investigated by the Securities and Exchange Commission investigation.
The SEC subpoenaed the institution July 26for information regarding its lending practices, CVB Financial said Monday in its regulatory filings.
Prosecutors will begin presenting their evidence
Mike Cruz, Staff Writer
Created: 08/10/2010 08:33:00 PM PDT
Prosecutors are expected to begin presenting evidence Thursday at a hearing for former San Bernardino County Assessor Bill Postmus and co-defendant Gregory Eyler in connection with the Assessor’s Office corruption scandal.
Postmus, 39, and Eyler, 34, appeared Tuesday before Judge Michael Dest, who set the case for a preliminary hearing two days later in San Bernardino Superior Court.
Lewis
August 10, 2010 5:32 PM
FROM STAFF REPORTS
WASHINGTON • Congressional Republicans bristled over a $26 billion bailout to state governments to offset state costs for education and Medicaid.
Congress has already sent nearly $75 billion in “stimulus” dollars to help states with education. That was supposed to be a one-time, temporary bailout, House Appropriations Ranking Republican Rep. Jerry Lewis said in a press release. The new legislation marks the third year in a row that the federal government has propped up programs that should be the responsibility of state and local governments, and would perpetuate the cycle of unstable and unbalanced state budgets, Lewis said.
Editor’s Note: Democrat economists in the mix?
Carla Marinucci, Chronicle Political Writer
San Francisco Chronicle
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
Meg Whitman’s plan to boost California’s economy by cutting taxes and government regulations touched off debate Tuesday between liberal economists, who called it “deeply flawed” and potentially damaging to the state’s economy, and conservatives who praised it as a “well-planned road map” to recovery.
Public discussion of the Republican’s proposal – outlined in a 48-page policy book distributed to 500,000 Californians as part of her campaign for governor – came in response to a report by a team of leading academics who said the plan is based on “faulty economic theories and on studies that are fundamentally unsound.”
PolitiCal
On politics in the Golden State
August 10, 2010 | 11:24 pm
Republican gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman and her Democratic rival, Jerry Brown, traded barbs Tuesday over Brown’s expanded investigation into the Bell salary scandal.
In an interview that aired on Fox 11 (KTTV), Whitman reiterated claims she makes in a new radio ad, accusing Brown, the state attorney general, of presiding over his own Bell-style salary scandal when he was mayor of Oakland.
The desert town of Indio learned a painful lesson from its now-retired city manager.
BySteve Lopez
August 11, 2010
I was never particularly good at math, but as I looked through the contract of former Indio City Manager Glenn Southard, I knew his $300,000-plus salary was not the best part of his deal.
Southard didn’t start at that salary. He was hired in 2005 for $240,000 after a long stretch working for the city of Claremont. But raises seem to come more quickly for some city executives than for the rest of us, even as local services and workforces are being whacked. In 2007, Southard negotiated a new contract for $300,000, plus a nice little bonus.
PolitiCal
On politics in the Golden State
August 10, 2010 | 2:11 pm
President Obama said he will sign a $26-billion aid package for cash-poor states passed by the House of Representatives Tuesday — a bill that could be worth more than $2.4 billion for California.
Leaders of Cigna, Humana, UnitedHealth, WellPoint and Aetna received nearly $200 million in compensation in 2009, according to a report, while the companies sought rate increases as high as 39%.
By Noam N. Levey, Los Angeles Times
August 11, 2010
Reporting from Washington —
The top executives at the nation’s five largest for-profit health insurance companies pulled in nearly $200 million in compensation last year — while their businesses prepared to hit ratepayers with double-digit premium increases, according to a new analysis conducted by healthcare activists.
The leaders of Cigna Corp., Humana Inc., UnitedHealth Group and WellPoint Inc. each in effect received raises in 2009, the report concluded, based on an analysis of company reports filed with the Security and Exchange Commission.
Two months after launching a probe of the mayor’s acceptance of free tickets, one of the panel’s members warns that the commission might actually be about to weaken, rather than strengthen, gift laws for elected officials.
By David Zahniser, Los Angeles Times
August 11, 2010
The Los Angeles City Ethics Commission failed Tuesday to approve a plan to tighten rules regulating free tickets received by elected officials, with one member warning that the panel is on the verge of weakening, not strengthening, its own gift laws.
Two months after the agency’s enforcement team opened an investigation into Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s practice of accepting free tickets to major sports and cultural events, commissioners found themselves at odds over a proposal to bar high-level officials from receiving any gift from companies with business pending before them.
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