Author: admin

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    The BID for Westwood and the Hotel Blending

    Byadmin

    No, not the kind of bid you see at auctions.  BID stands for Business Improvement District. Under state law, businesses (property owners) in particular areas can form a BID and assess themselves for upgrading their neighborhoods. In theory, the upgrading improves the business climate and property values. There are many BIDs in the LA area. Westwood at one time had a BID but it disappeared some years ago in a financial scandal. However, a new one has formed and is reporting progress.  Still, if you walk up Westwood Boulevard towards the campus, you see many empty stores for lease. There…

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    No Meds for Riverside

    Byadmin

    UC-Riverside keeps trying to get state funding to open a med school.  But not successfully, so far: From the Press-Enterprise (excerpt):The latest Capitol attempt to secure state funding for UC Riverside’s school of medicine is all but dead after a key Senate committee blocked a bill to allocate $15 million from an expected legal settlement…Full story at:http://www.pe.com/local-news/politics/jim-miller-headlines/20120816-uc-riverside-med-school-funding-bill-stalls.ece

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    They may not play nice

    Byadmin

    Competition from rival tax measures on the ballot may sink the governor’s Prop 30 which the Regents have endorsed.  In particular, there is concern about Prop 38 – the Munger tax for schools.  Excerpt today from an LA Times blog: …Sens. Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer sent a letter to the head of the California State PTA, the sponsor of Proposition 38, imploring them to stop what they call “personal attacks against Gov. Jerry Brown” that they fear could sink the governor’s tax measure, Proposition 30. Proposition 38, which has been financed by wealthy Pasadena attorney Molly Munger, seeks to…

  • Verify the Feds

    Byadmin

    We have been providing some hints about avoiding email fraud/spam being sent to UCLA folks.  Here is some more general info courtesy of your friendly feds: Every day, the federal government uses social media services like Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube to communicate and provide easy access to government benefits and services. But unlike most government websites, which are hosted on a .mil or a .gov domain, social media sites are hosted on commercial domains. Without the .gov or the .mil, it can be difficult to determine which social media accounts are official government sources of information and which are impersonators….

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    Prop 30 Campaign Officially Starts

    Byadmin

    Governor Brown kicked off the official campaign for his tax initiative – Prop 30 – which, as readers of this blog will know – was endorsed by the Regents. Early polling has shown a bare majority of voters favor it (and the other two tax initiatives on the November ballot are polling poorly).  It is unclear how much funding the opposition to Prop 30 will be able to raise for a negative campaign.  However, Prop 38 – the “Munger tax” initiative which is focused on schools – does have money behind it and its campaign will push the argument that…

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    Follow Up on Close-Loophole-for-Tuition-Cut Bill

    Byadmin

    Yesterday, we noted the passage in the state assembly of a bill that closed a corporate tax loophole and used the money for higher ed tuition cuts.  The bill required a 2/3 vote and squeezed by with one independent vote (a former Republican who quit the party) and one from a renegade Republican – Brian Nestande – who deviated from the party line. The renegade – depending on which story you read – either stepped down from chairing the Republican caucus in the assembly or was forced out. The stepped-down version is athttp://www.sacbee.com/2012/08/15/4726584/california-republican-leader-gives.html The forced-out version is athttp://www.camajorityreport.com/index.php?module=articles&func=display&ptid=9&aid=4877 It probably…

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    UCLA’s Tech Spinoffs

    Byadmin

    The LA Business Journal has a section this week on tech-type firms that have been spun off by UCLA.  Well, not exclusively UCLA; Caltech and USC are also part of the story.  An excerpt from the UCLA portion: UCLA: Enabling Campus Entrepreneurs UCLA spun out 19 startups during its 2011 fiscal year, making it the leader among the University of California campuses in technology transfer. About 90 startups have come out of the campus in the last five years. Some of the startups to come out of UCLA in the past several years show the wide range of the school’s…

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    UC Submits Legal Brief on Affirmative Action to US Supreme Court

    Byadmin

    There is currently a challenge to the University of Texas’ affirmative action plan before the U.S. Supreme Court. Various interested parties have submitted friend-of-the-court briefs in support of the U of Texas program. Inside Higher Ed today carries a lengthy article on the case. California voters enacted Prop 209 in 1996 which barred affirmative action in student admissions, so it might seem that UC has no interest in the Texas case.  (In 1995, before voters enacted Prop 209, the Regents had enacted a similar ban.  That ban was removed after Prop 209 made it redundant.)  However, UC has submitted a…

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    And in the State Senate?

    Byadmin

    From the Sacramento Bee‘s Capitol Alert blog last night: By a razor-thin margin, the California Assembly passed legislation today to raise a billion dollars annually for middle-class college scholarships by altering tax law for numerous out–of-state corporations. The measure, Assembly Bill 1500, passed 54-24, the bare-minimum two-thirds vote needed for tax or fee increases. Democrats supported the measure, as did Republicans Brian Nestande of Palm Desertand Independent Nathan Fletcher of San Diego Assembly Speaker John A. Perez proposed the bill as a companion to his separate legislation, Assembly Bill 1501, which would spend the billion dollars raised to assist college and university students whose families earn less than $150,000 per year……