By Laura Friedman
There are few phrases in California politics that invoke as much passion as the words “high-speed rail.” The ambitious transportation infrastructure project seeking to move passengers from Los Angeles to San Francisco in two hours and 40 minutes, and ultimately connect San Diego to Sacramento, has become a centerpiece of public debate.
The two top California lawmakers that oversee the state's oil industry plan to call for hearings into a recent, massive oil spill in Kern County and revelations that officials at the agency that regulate oil wells held investments in the companies they were supposed to keep watch over.
SACRAMENTO — Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon (D-Lakewood) today announced assignments for the membership of Assembly leadership positions and standing committees for the 2019-2020 legislative session.
There’s a not-so-silent killer on our streets – one responsible for 265 traffic-related deaths in Los Angeles County in 2016 alone. In Glendale, where I previously served as Councilmember and Mayor prior to the Assembly, traffic-related injuries and fatalities rose 25% in 2016. However, Glendale is not alone in this alarming trend; cities and neighborhoods across my district and throughout the Los Angeles region have seen an uptick in the overall number of traffic collisions involving other vehicles, bicyclists, and pedestrians. The statistics are alarming, and yet for dec
To explain why she authored a bill to protect water in the Mojave Desert, Assemblywoman Laura Friedman goes back to her childhood. Growing up in Plantation, Florida, on the edge of the Everglades, the 50-year-old Glendale Democrat had a “front-row seat” to the destruction of the swamps, sloughs, and mangrove forests that spread across most of South Florida.
Local music education nonprofit Silverlake Conservatory of Music, which moved to Los Feliz from its former Sunset Junction location last October, was named “Nonprofit of the Year” by California State Assemblymember Laura Friedman late last month, just days after receiving an architecture award from the Los Angeles Business Council (LABC).
The battle over plans by a Los Angeles company to sell water pumped from aquifers underneath Mojave Desert conservation areas heated up again this week when state legislation was amended to require a new round of state reviews.
The legislation’s new language, by Assemblywoman Laura Friedman, D-Glendale, would stop major pumping until state land and wildlife officials determined that groundwater extractions would not harm wildlife or cultural resources.
The legislation is in response to the Cadiz desert water project that has been prioritized by the Trump administration.
A new bill in the state Legislature would require California to review the environmental impacts of a company's proposal to pump groundwater from beneath the Mojave Desert and sell it to Southern California cities — a controversial plan that was slowed down by President Obama, but which appears to have the backing of the Trump administration.
California legislators will consider a towering stack of bills addressing the state's rising housing costs, a testament, they say, to their recognition of an emergency.
"We have a housing crisis and we need to act now," said Assemblymember David Chiu, who chairs the Assembly's housing committee.
It's unclear how many of the 130 bills will make it through the session. Past leaders such as Toni Atkins, the last speaker of the Assembly, had made housing affordability a priority, but she was unable to get key pieces of legislation passed.