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Gov. Jerry Brown has signed legislation prohibiting California state government agencies from selling or display items displaying the Confederate flag. Brown’s office on Thursday announced signing AB2444. It was introduced by Democratic Assemblyman Isadore Hall of Compton after his mother saw replica Confederate cash sold at the Capitol gift shop. …

Gov. Jerry Brown has signed legislation creating a new loan program for undocumented students in California’s public universities. California has already taken several steps to make college more affordable for undocumented students, including extending in-state tuition to undocumented immigrants who graduate from California high schools and making them eligible to apply for Cal Grant scholarships. Brown signed the bill on Sunday without comment.

WATSONVILLE >> Forty cents might not seem like much, but multiply it by two or three kids and fork it over daily for school lunch and it begins to add up — especially for families struggling to get by in Santa Cruz County. That's why Pajaro Valley Unified School District officials have decided to stop charging families who are eligible for a discounted meal under the federal school lunch program.

Sen. Barbara Boxer called rumors that she planned to resign "bizarre" during a news conference in San Francisco's Ferry Building late this morning. Boxer, 73, said she has no plans to leave a job she loves while serving her fourth term in the U.S. Senate and will decide next year if she will run for re-election in 2016. Speaking to a crowd of reporters, the senator highlighted multiple regional, state, national and international issues she will address when Congress returns to session on Monday following a five-week recess. She noted that this is the 54th straight month the country has...

>Today, a federal judge ruled that California’s 10-day waiting period is unconstitutional. Gun owners Jeffrey Silvester and Brandon Combs, along with Calguns Foundation and the Second Amendment Fondation, challenged the law, saying that the 10-day waiting period adds additional costs and disruptions preventing them from exercising their constitutional Second Amendment rights (via Calguns Foundation): In the decision released this morning, Federal Eastern District of California Senior Judge Anthony W. Ishii, appointed to the bench by President Bill Clinton, found that “the 10-day waiting periods of Penal Code [sections 26815(a) and 27540(a)] violate the Second Amendment” as applied to members of certain...

Rick Blankenship was tired of an insatiable lawn he couldn’t keep green, no matter how he watered it, so he decided to tear it out. […] As California faces an historic drought, more residents are following in Blankenship’s footsteps and tearing out thirsty lawns to cut down on water use. Water agencies across the state have been encouraging the change by offering thousands of dollars in rebates to help homeowners make the switch to a drought-friendly landscape with better odds of surviving dry spells common to the local climate. The Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, which covers 19 million...

Health insurance companies in California may not refuse to cover the cost of abortions, state insurance officials have ruled in a reversal of policy stemming from the decision by two Catholic universities to drop elective abortions from their employee health plans. Although the federal Affordable Care Act does not compel employers to provide workers with health insurance that includes abortion coverage, the director of California’s Department of Managed Health Care said in a letter to seven insurance companies on Friday that the state Constitution and a 1975 state law prohibits them from selling group plans that exclude the procedure. The...

Students at the nation’s second largest school district will be shielded from prosecution and sent to administrators for low-level offenses as part of a sweeping reform to the way school police respond to bad behavior. Zoe Rawson of the Community Rights Campaign says students caught fighting or possessing alcohol or marijuana will receive interventions by a guidance counselor or school administrator, a shift that will prevent students, especially minorities, from becoming mired in the criminal justice system. …

“I don't know what the affluent families are doing,” Brown said. “They're not producing or something, because half the kids in schools are from low-income families.” At the conference, held in San Diego, Calif., in late June, Brown said California had addressed the fact that millions of children in the state’s school do not speak English. You have to do more to be able to create that opportunity and that pathway for those families that are not having that same skill of speaking English as others,” Brown said. “It’s pretty amazing,” Brown said. “I don't know what the affluent families...

It's going from worse to worst each week in California. Suffering in its third year of drought, more than 58 percent of the state is currently in "exceptional drought" stage, according to the latest U.S. Drought Monitor map. That marks a huge jump from just seven days ago, when about 36 percent of the state was categorized that way. Exceptional drought, the most extreme category, indicates widespread crop and pasture losses and shortages of water in reservoirs, streams and wells. If the state continues on this path, there may have to be thoughts about moving people out, said Lynn Wilson,...

A California university says it is investigating religious discrimination allegations made by a prominent scientist and former employee who claims he was fired for his creationist beliefs. Mark Armitage, a scientist and evangelical Christian, claims he was fired from his job as a lab technician at California State University at Northridge because he published an academic paper which appeared to support his creationist views, according to a lawsuit filed last week. Armitage, who does not believe in evolution, was lauded by his colleagues and the science community after he discovered in 2012 the largest triceratops horn ever recovered from the...

MEXICO CITY – Gov. Jerry Brown suggested Monday that Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s ordering of National Guard troops to the U.S.-Mexico border to address the surge in border crossings is misguided, urging politicians instead to heed the “religious call … to welcome the stranger” in addressing the crisis. “This is a human problem, and it has been the religious call of all religions to welcome the stranger, and it’s in that spirit that I believe the clergy can call the United States, Mexico and all the players to perhaps a higher response than might otherwise happen,” Brown said on the...

A federal grand jury on Friday charged a California state senator with more felonies in addition to the eight counts he already faced in a sweeping organized crime and public corruption case centered in San Francisco’s Chinatown. […] Yee pleaded not guilty to the original eight charges. He will have to enter a plea Wednesday to the charges in the new indictment. The new accusations allege that San Francisco Democrat offered to help pass legislation making it harder for professional football players to obtain workers compensation in California, in exchange for campaign contributions from an unidentified NFL owner. The new...

San Francisco lawmakers narrowly agreed Tuesday to place a 2-cent-per-ounce tax on sugary drinks on the November ballot, a move that promises to turn the election into an expensive fight between the beverage industry and public health advocates. The city’s Board of Supervisors voted 6-4 to ask voters to approve the tax on sodas, sports drinks and other beverages sweetened with sugar and sold in the city. It would have to be approved by two-thirds of the electorate to take effect. City officials have estimated the measure would raise somewhere between $31 million and $52 million a year. The proceeds...

A Central California company has issued a voluntary nationwide recall of specific lots of its fresh peaches, plums, nectarines and pluots over concerns of possible listeria contamination. Wawona Packing says on its website that no illnesses have been reported and the recall is a precautionary measure. …

The former Georgetown University law student who gained national attention for being denied a chance to testify in Congress for health plan contraception coverage—and then was subjected to degrading comments by radio host Rush Limbaugh—is hoping to make public policy of her own. Sandra Fluke is running as a first-time candidate for a seat in California’s state Senate to represent some of the most affluent communities of Los Angeles County, a district that stretches from the Hollywood Hills to the Palos Verdes peninsula. In a district where Democrats outnumber Republicans 2-1, Fluke is campaigning on an agenda that includes subsidized...

At a time when election officials are struggling to convince more Americans to vote, advocates for the disabled say thousands of people with autism spectrum disorder, cerebral palsy and other intellectual or developmental disabilities have been systematically denied that basic right in the nation’s largest county. A Voting Rights Act complaint to be filed Thursday with the U.S. Justice Department goes to a politically delicate subject that states have grappled with over the years: Where is the line to disqualify someone from the voting booth because of a cognitive or developmental impairment? The complaint by the Disability and Abuse Project...

The terms “husband” and “wife” have been deleted from California’s marriage law under a bill signed into law Monday by Gov. Jerry Brown. The terms will be replaced with “spouse” to accommodate same-sex marriage, which became legal in the state last year after the Supreme Court struck down a voter-approved ban on it. SB1306, the bill signed Monday by Brown, takes effect Jan. 1 and reflects the legality of gay marriage after a decade of litigation. The law also removes limits on recognizing same-sex marriages performed out of state.

When American flag-waving protesters forced busloads of migrants to leave Murrieta earlier this week, the Southern California city became the latest flashpoint in an intensifying immigration debate that could heat up even more as patriotism surges on the Fourth of July. The city’s mayor has become a hero to those seeking stronger immigration policies with his criticism of the federal government’s efforts to handle the thousands of immigrants, many of them mothers and children, who have flooded the Texas border. Some of those immigrants were flown to California and were supposed to be processed at a Border Patrol facility in...

The crisis is sparking heated debate in Washington, where critics claim the Obama administration’s immigration policies are to blame, including the DREAM Act, which defers deportation for some children. Nearby residents who oppose the Escondido center said they’re concerned it will hurt property values, increase crime and cause other problems. But some also decried the idea of federal tax dollars being used for such purposes, especially in their city. “We want our City Council and the Planning Commission to push back to the federal government and adhere to the laws,” said Kitty Demry, who lives about a one-third of a...