1. Proposition 6, a Republican-led effort to eliminate California’s new gas tax, is leading comfortably in the latest poll, 58 percent to 29 percent, reports the San Diego Union-Tribune, which commissioned the Survey USA poll. Opponents of Prop. 6 note that, if it passes, it will kill hundreds of transit projects around the state.
2. The kidney dialysis industry has raised a stunning $99 million to defeat Proposition 8, which seeks to regulate dialysis clinics in California, reports Chris Nichols of Capital Public Radio. Prop. 8 “would cap what clinics can spend on overhead and administrative costs, versus actual care.”
3. Hundreds of sea lions off the California coast have been stricken with a deadly bacterial infection — the second-largest outbreak “since state officials began keeping track of the infectious disease in 1970,” reports Peter Fimrite of the San Francisco Chronicle$. Some scientists believe that the outbreak of leptospirosis bacterial infections could be related to warming ocean waters.
4. California regulators have fined PG&E $5 million for two gas leaks in Northern California in 2016 and 2017, reports Melia Russell of the San Francisco Chronicle$. The California Public Utilities Commission “issued a $4.05 million citation to PG&E stemming from a 2016 incident in Deer Park” a $1 million fine for a leak in Yuba City last year.
5. ICYMI: Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf and three nonprofits announced a $9 million, privately financed pilot program earlier this week that is designed to help prevent people from becoming homeless, reports Gwendolyn Wu of the San Francisco Chronicle$. The funding through nonprofits, East Bay Community Law Center, Catholic Charities of the East Bay and Bay Area Community Services, comes from a grant by Kaiser Permanente and a large anonymous donation to the San Francisco Foundation.
6. And recreational cannabis is now legal in Canada, Bloomberg reports.
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