CALMATTERS

• Housing advocates still waiting for state-ordered stair report
  February 10, 2026
  California’s fire safety regulators were asked to study whether mid-rise apartments can go with a single staircase. They’re more than a month late.
• Hospitals’ opaque pricing is crushing California’s small businesses
  February 10, 2026
  Hospitals often charge California’s small businesses more than Medicare for the same treatments and tack on hidden “facilities fees.”
• Overtime pay and night vision binoculars: UC San Diego is among agencies helping patrol border
  February 10, 2026
  Local police forces get money every year from the Department of Homeland Security to assist with border patrol operations. This includes the UC San Diego Police Department, which helps monitor for smuggling along the coastline.
• Troubled LA Mayor Karen Bass faces a re-election challenge from the city’s left wing
  February 10, 2026
  City Councilwoman Nithya Raman declared her candidacy with a few hours to spare. A left leaning progressive, she'd previously endorsed Bass.
• California dirt bikers battled against desert preservation, spawning anti-environmental wars
  February 9, 2026
  Today’s anti-environmentalists follow tracks laid by the ‘Phantom Duck’ and the Barstow-to-Vegas Race, where thousands of bikers sped across open desert.
• La EPA promociona esfuerzos bipartidistas para limpiar el río Tijuana
  February 9, 2026
  El administrador de la EPA, Lee Zeldin, se reunió con líderes locales y del Congreso en San Diego para promocionar el progreso de Estados Unidos y México en la limpieza del contaminado río Tijuana.
• California gasta millones en base a datos de este rastreador de polución. ¿Quién se beneficia de su última actualización?
  February 9, 2026
  California está actualizando CalEnviroScreen, el sistema de seguimiento de la contaminación que ayuda a determinar qué comunidades reciben subvenciones ambientales. Los activistas afirman que el estado debería mejorar la herramienta y usarla con mayor frecuencia […]
• CA’s illegal pot farms pollute public forests and watersheds
  February 9, 2026
  Illegal cannabis farms hidden inside California forests harm nearby wildlife, ecosystems and watersheds. But with little being done at the federal and state levels to clean up these sites fast enough, ecologists are sounding the […]
• ‘Little death bombs’: Illegal cannabis farms poison California’s forests. Who’s cleaning them up?
  February 9, 2026
  Even after legalization, illicit cannabis grows continue to pollute California’s public lands. And the contamination, new research shows, lingers.
• Will California lawmakers break their promise to child sexual abuse survivors?
  February 9, 2026
  In 2019, the Legislature and Gov. Newsom closed a loophole that allowed schools to avoid liability for child sexual abuse. Now the law is under threat.