State Panel

The state panel charged with building California's 800-mile bullet train network pushed back Thursday against an academic analysis challenging the reliability of ridership and revenue estimates underpinning the massive project. The UC Berkeley-based Institute of Transportation Studies last week reported that patronage models for the $42-billion first phase were too flawed to accurately predict whether the trains would run severe deficits or generate large operating surpluses, as planners predict.

A truce has been forged in the decades-long fight over the forested land surrounding the world-famous Pebble Beach resort. The California Coastal Commission on Wednesday approved a plan by actor Clint Eastwood, golfer Arnold Palmer, former baseball Commissioner Peter Ueberroth and other Pebble Beach Co. owners that is billed as the last development ever at the gated complex of golf courses, mansions and hotels on the Monterey Peninsula. The decision largely puts to rest a contentious environmental battle over the company's plans to expand into its prime real estate holdings in the forest above the craggy bluffs and crashing surf.

Costa Mesa attorney Dana Reed has been nominated to the California Transportation Commission, the panel that helps decide statewide transportation policies and projects. Reed, 53, served as public representative on the Orange County Transportation Authority until 1993 and was an undersecretary of the state business, transportation and housing agency for former Gov. George Deukmejian.

Once again addressing the controversial issue of executive pay, a panel of the California State University Board of Trustees voted Tuesday to freeze state-funded pay for new campus presidents but allow individual college foundations to raise funds to boost those salaries. The nonprofit campus foundations would be able to augment taxpayer-funded pay for new executives up to 10% above that of their predecessor. The policy would be reviewed in 2014. Four members of the Special Committee on Presidential Selection and Compensation meeting in Long Beach voted for the change, with one member absent.

An Orange County judge has been accused by a state panel of routinely making offensive comments during court proceedings, including badgering defendants and, in one case, lecturing a lawyer on her drinking habits. Superior Court Judge Susanne S. Shaw made "intimidating, demeaning, undignified and discourteous" remarks that gave the appearance of bias, according to a report filed this week by the state Commission on Judicial Performance.

A state panel today could decide whether to contribute $1 million toward the public purchase of the Bolsa Chica wetlands. The State Coastal Conservancy, meeting in San Francisco, will discuss a tentative multi-agency plan that could result in state purchase of the ecologically sensitive wetlands next to Huntington Beach. That plan would bring together several state and federal agencies and the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach in an effort to buy the wetlands and help restore them.

A state panel agreed Thursday to pitch in $1 million to help buy 905 acres of wetlands from a developer to create a vast nature preserve near Huntington Beach. The State Coastal Conservancy, which approved the allocation, said the contribution brings to about $67 million the amount pledged to buy the wetlands in Bolsa Chica. The ultimate cost of the land--and whether a public purchase is feasible at all--probably will not be determined until later this year.

The Burbank City Council will ask the state Fair Political Practices Commission for an opinion on the potential conflict of interest presented by Margie Gee, who has refused to step down from the Burbank airport authority despite her participation in a lawsuit against the airport. The council Tuesday asked City Atty. Douglas C.

After holding its first public disciplinary hearing in history, the state Commission on Judicial Performance Monday unanimously recommended the ouster of a Central California judge for unethical conduct. In an unusual move, the watchdog panel suspended Kings County Municipal Judge Glenda Kraft Doan for failing to disclose personal connections with defendants who appeared before her.

Wary of the legal struggle over court-ordered improvements to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's bus system, the California Transportation Commission on Monday postponed until at least May any decision on building a light-rail line between Union Station and Pasadena.

SACRAMENTO - Reacting to public outrage over legislative perks, a state panel decided last year to cut lawmakers' monthly car allowance to $300, but a legal glitch has allowed some to get up to nine times that amount. The Citizens Compensation Commission, which is appointed by the governor, had hoped to save taxpayers money when it voted to set the $300 limit and take state-issued cars away from lawmakers. But the attorney general's office later determined that the panel did not have the authority to approve the allowance.

SACRAMENTO - Four out of five members of a divided California Public Utilities Commission are strongly criticizing a bill moving unopposed through the Legislature that would strip the agency of its last vestige of authority to regulate some basic telephone services. The members debated Thursday but did not vote to oppose legislation by the powerful chairman of the Senate Energy, Utilities and Telecommunications Committee at the behest of AT&T, Verizon Communications and a number of high-tech business groups.

SACRAMENTO — An industry-backed bill that would preempt state agencies from regulating Internet-enabled voice and data transmissions won unanimous approval from a state Senate committee in its first legislative hearing. Amid protests from consumer advocates, the bill's author, Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Pacoima), tried to downplay the significance of the measure, which proponents said would simply lock the state's current hands-off policy into law. Such a reiteration of existing practices would give Silicon Valley businesses "the certainty" to continue developing innovative, Internet-powered products and programs, Padilla argued at a hearing Tuesday of the Senate Energy, Utilities and Telecommunications Committee.

A Los Angeles County Superior Court commissioner who made "discourteous, undignified, gratuitous and denigrating remarks" during family law cases was publicly admonished Tuesday by a state agency overseeing judges' discipline. The Commission on Judicial Performance determined that Commissioner Alan H. Friedenthal should be "severely publicly admonished" for misconduct, including "humor at the expense of litigants," during five cases over which he presided from June 2007 to January 2009, according to an 18-page order made public Tuesday.

A state board charged with helping the unemployed find jobs and providing vocational training hasn't complied with state and federal laws and has failed to develop a required strategic workforce plan for California, according to the state auditor's office. The California Workforce Investment Board also missed half a dozen opportunities to receive at least $10.5 million in federal funding at a time when the state was suffering from extremely high unemployment during the recession of 2007-09, auditors said.

The Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum Commission came under fire from state officials Wednesday for a lack of transparency, then was forced to cancel its monthly meeting halfway into the session after officials acknowledged the venue had failed to publicly post the agenda as required by law. The cancellation came just hours after members of the California Science Center board, which owns the Coliseum land, chastised the stadium's top executive for...

A request by the city of Los Angeles to close down a portion of the Lopez Canyon Landfill above Lake View Terrace and begin dumping in a new part won approval Friday from a key committee of the state commission that overseas waste disposal. And the dump's neighbors won an unexpected victory as well: The city agreed to allow the dump's state license to expire in February, 1996, the same time that the dump's permit from the Planning Commission and City Council expires.

In a scathing critique that could further jeopardize political support for California's proposed $98.5-billion bullet train, a key independent review panel is recommending that state officials postpone borrowing billions of dollars to start building the first section of track this year. Gov. Jerry Brown has said he will ask the Legislature in the coming months to issue the first batch of $9 billion in voter-approved bonds for a high-speed rail network that backers say will create jobs, help the environment and transform the state's economy.

Reporting from Sacramento California Treasurer Bill Lockyer on Tuesday will ask a state panel that hands out sales tax exemptions to renewable energy manufacturers to suspend the program in the wake of the Solyndra scandal. Lockyer, who heads the panel, said he will ask fellow members of the California Alternative Energy and Advanced Transportation Financing Authority at a meeting to not approve any new applications for tax exemptions. The program is aimed at encouraging the purchase of equipment used to make solar panels and other energy-saving projects.