Business Plan

Several Los Angeles leaders backed a revised business plan released Monday by the agency overseeing California's ambitious high-speed rail effort, saying it lowers costs and speeds construction while bringing jobs and world-class transit to the region. By embracing a "blended" approach, the plan shaves $30 billion off the cost by using some tracks that now carry regional passenger lines rather than building new ones exclusively for the bullet train. "High-speed rail is the natural extension of the transportation network we are building in Southern California," said L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa.

California's small-business owners worry about the economy, regulatory burdens and taxes, but they're also concerned about the deteriorating quality of public education and crumbling roads and other public works. Those are the findings of an annual survey of 1,067 small-business executives just released by Small Business California, an advocacy group. Employers -- just over half of them with 19 workers or less -- have trouble finding capable staff and then have trouble navigating clogged freeways, said Scott Hauge, a San Francisco insurance broker who is Small Business California's founder and president.

It strikes me that anyone who'd want to be the next mayor of Los Angeles ought to have his head examined, so Dr. Lopez has decided to begin seeing patients. Think about it. Services have withered, streets look like they've been chewed up by IEDs, budget shortfalls could become catastrophic, and the City Council always has an assortment of second-stringers who can't be counted on to lead or get out of the way. What kind of twisted person would want to wake up to that every day?

The gig: Jackie Sorkin, the self-appointed "Candy Queen," founded the event-planning business the Hollywood Candy Girls in 2009. Working alongside a cadre of young women (and one Eye Candy Boy), she's designed hundreds of sweets-centric parties for the likes of Kim Kardashian, Katy Perry and the only celebrity to ever leave her starstruck, Oprah Winfrey. Although Sorkin is tight-lipped about numbers, she said her profit has grown each year. "People think this is all magic," said Sorkin, 32. "They forget that it's a business and you have to work really, really hard.

Ads, sand don't mix Re "Beach cities look for cash in the sand," Jan. 16 I object to Los Angeles County officials trying to sell advertising on our coastline to the highest bidders. The beaches of California are for the hardworking people of the state to enjoy; they are not a blank canvas for excessive, in-your-face advertising on every conceivable surface. This reminds me of the billboard companies that have, with the blessings of our public officials, made our landscape, roads and skylines one huge video advertisement What a sick situation.

Show everyone how special you think your iPhone 4S is — have it gold-plated. For a little more than $1,500, you can have an iPhone gold plated by Laban Roomes, an entrepreneur looking to expand his England business into the U.S. Roomes plans to make his American debut in south Florida next month. "Florida is kind of like my second home," he said, adding that he has family in Fort Lauderdale. Roomes is the founder and owner of Goldgenie, a business that began by gold-plating car emblems and has grown to plate phones, computer mice, flowers, game consoles and iPads.

Gov. Jerry Brown said Thursday that he will formally request that the Legislature approve billions of dollars to start construction of the California bullet train next year and will work hard to persuade skeptical lawmakers that the project is critical to the state's future. In his first extended remarks on the $98.5-billion project since a controversial business plan was unveiled last week, Brown said that the state will have a broad need for the system in the long term and that it represents a significantly cheaper alternative to additional highway and commercial aviation investments.

California's bullet train will cost an estimated $98.5 billion to build over the next 22 years, a price nearly double any previous projection and one likely to trigger political sticker shock, according to a business plan scheduled to be unveiled Tuesday. In a key change, the state has decided to stretch out the construction schedule by 13 years, completing the Southern California-to-Bay Area high speed rail in 2033 rather than 2020. The delay allows inflation to drive up the price over the additional years of construction.

Investors may not be willing to back the state's bullet train project until after it begins operating, the California High-Speed Rail Authority said in a letter to key legislators, an acknowledgment that again raises serious questions about how the $43-billion construction cost will be paid over the next decade. The letter gives a preview of the authority's upcoming business plan, a critical document that is supposed to address long-standing concerns that it lacks a credible blueprint for building and operating the system.

With California's bullet train project facing new opposition in the Central Valley, including from the operator of the nation's largest farm, J.G. Boswell Co., the state agency in charge of the project has announced a two-week delay in the release of a key business plan. The extra time was sought by two members of the California High Speed Rail Authority board who were recently appointed by Gov. Jerry Brown and have begun a comprehensive review of the bullet train plan. The questions they are asking go to the heart of the pending business plan, including why the project is starting construction in the center of the state instead of in Los Angeles and San Francisco.