EAST COUNTY ROUNDUP: LOCAL AND STATEWIDE NEWS

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September 3, 2014 (San Diego's East County)--East County Roundup highlights top stories of interest to East County and San Diego’s inland regions, published in other media. This week’s top “Roundup” headlines include:

LOCAL

STATE

For excerpts and links to full stories, click “read more” and scroll down.

 

LOCAL

Putting the "Public" back into the CPUC (SD Reader, Don Bauder)

State senator Jerry Hill, a Democrat of San Mateo, has introduced a bill that would require the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) to conform to state open-meeting laws. The roots of this proposed bill are in San Diego.

Turning water shortage into wine (UT San Diego)

Drought pushes San Diego farmers to try vineyards, organic crops.

Carlos Mercado ordered to stand trial for deaths of Ilona Flint, Salvatore and Gianni Belvedere (10 News)

A trial has been ordered for a man accused in the shooting deaths of two brothers and a woman who was engaged to one of them -- a crime that came to light when two of the victims were found mortally wounded in a parked car at a Mission Valley mall last Christmas Eve.

Juan Vargas's dinner with Azano (UT San Diego)

Congressman says company was on Mexican moneyman’s mind.

In La Mesa, free speech is a new cross to bear in mind O(UT San Diego)

Racially charged postings of police dispatcher protected by the First Amendment? 

 

STATE

Tax relief bill for county fire victims passes Legislature (Times of San Diego)

An Assembly bill that offers tax relief for San Diegans recovering from this year’s fires was unanimously approved by the state Legislature on Friday and sent to Gov. Jerry Brown for approval.

Desperately dry California tries to curb private water drilling (New York Times)

California’s vicious, prolonged drought, which has radically curtailed most natural surface water supplies, is making farmers look deeper and deeper underground to slake their thirst …But in a drought as long and severe as the current one, over-reliance on groundwater means that land sinks, old wells go dry, and saltwater invades coastal aquifers. Aquifers are natural savings accounts, a place to go when the streams run dry. Exhaust them, and the $45 billion annual agricultural economy will take a severe hit, while small towns run dry.

Historic California groundwater regulations head for Jerry Brown (Sacramento Bee)

California could soon become the last state in the West to regulate water pulled from beneath the earth, with the Legislature on Friday advancing an unprecedented groundwater-management strategy.

Feds to resume leasing for fracking in California (Sacramento Bee)

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management will resume issuing oil and gas leases next year for federal lands in California after a new study found limited environmental impacts from fracking and other enhanced drilling techniques, the agency said Thursday.

California passes 'yes-means-yes' campus sexual assault bill (Reuters)

Californian lawmakers passed a law on Thursday requiring universities to adopt "affirmative consent" language in their definitions of consensual sex, part of a nationwide drive to curb sexual assault on U.S. campuses.

Arrest rate in California Senate highest of all state’s largest cities (Sacramento Bee)

Three of the members of the California State Senate have been arrested this year, more than double the statewide arrest rate…


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