Here's your daily briefing...
May revise out today: With California’s financial picture for the current year coming into better focus, Governor Jerry Brown is expected to release a revised budget today. The capital’s cognoscenti predict Brown will proceed as he usual: recapping the boom and bust tendencies of the state’s economy and warning fellow Democrats against profligate spending.
Tinkering with Cap and Trade: Lawmakers and lobbyists are looking for ways to alter California’s global-warming-fighting Cap and Trade rules as the program nears its 2020 sunset. There’s little doubt the program will be renewed, though the rules could get some significant revisions.
Failure Had Many Fathers: There was not one glaring cause for the near disaster at Oroville Dam in February, but many possible contributing factors according to an initial report by a team of experts. A final report is not due until next fall.
Narc Guilty: A Yuba County Sheriff’s Deputy and leader of a multi-agency anti-narcotics task force was himself convicted on multiple drug and firearm charges following a two-day trial in Pennsylvania. Christopher Mark Heath was arrested in December of 2015 while transporting nearly 250 pounds of marijuana to York County Pennsylvania. Heath faces additional charges in Butte County.
And on the California Report: Republican Congressman Kevin McCarthy of California leapt to the defense of President Donald Trump’s decision to fire of FBI Director James Comey, accusing Comey of politicizing the Bureau…More on the Governor’s ‘May Revise’ --- that’s the annual document revising next year’s initial budget plan released in January…Campaign finance researchers say that ‘big soda’ was really ‘pouring-it-on’ the legislature’s Latino Caucus last year, sweetening the war chests of lawmakers in hopes of draining support for a tax on sugary drinks.