Jackie Speier

Children as old as 6 will have to be restrained in child seats when they travel with their parents or guardians on California roadways if a bill headed for the governor's desk becomes law. Under current law, parents or guardians can be fined $100 if they fail to transport children who are under age 4 or who weigh less than 40 pounds in special car seats. But state Sen.

A bill that would require Californians to give consent before their private financial information is sold, swapped or otherwise shared with third-party businesses was passed by the Senate on Monday and sent to a cloudy future in the Assembly. But the bill's author, Sen.

The state Assembly has a chance today to prove to Californians that its members have nothing to hide. Assemblywoman Jackie Speier of Burlingame will try to resurrect her modest but compelling bill that would require all candidates for statewide office to electronically file campaign finance statements--which report contributions and expenses--on the state of California's home page on the computer Internet so they can be viewed free by the voting public.

Assemblywoman Gwen Moore (D-Los Angeles) announced Wednesday tentative plans to seek election next year as California's secretary of state. Moore, 52, has represented the 47th Assembly District since 1979. She is chairwoman of the Assembly Utilities and Commerce Committee. Moore said that as secretary of state she would focus on bringing the state election process into "the information age."

When Gov. Pete Wilson vetoed a bill last October that would have allowed victims of job harassment to collect cash damages, less than a week had passed since Prof. Anita Hill captured national attention with her account of sexual harassment. A lot of women--and men--who believed that the U.S. Senate did not take seriously Hill's charges against now-Justice Clarence Thomas were already mad; Wilson's veto made them even madder.

An Assembly committee narrowly approved a hotly disputed bill Wednesday to outlaw job discrimination against homosexuals similar to legislation vetoed last year by Gov. Pete Wilson. The governor's rejection caused thousands of gays and lesbians to take to the streets of Los Angeles, San Francisco and Sacramento, accusing Wilson of bowing to political pressure.

A bill requiring the written approval of donors before human eggs and other reproductive materials can be harvested and transferred to others sailed through the state Senate on Tuesday. The legislation, approved on a 36-0 vote, was introduced by state Assemblywoman Jackie Speier (D-Burlingame) in response to the human egg-swapping scandal at UC Irvine, where three doctors have been accused by former patients of taking eggs and embryos without consent and implanting them in other patients.