In today's newscast:
Bringing back bruins
The grizzly bear may be emblazoned on California’s state flag, but these bears haven’t roamed the Golden State in more than a century.
Now, some Democratic lawmakers want to consider reintroducing them.
Democratic State Sen. Laura Richardson, of Inglewood, has a bill that would task the California Department of Fish and Wildlife with creating a study to see if bringing grizzlies back to California is feasible.
California was home to as many as 10,000 grizzly bears before the Gold Rush. But settlers wiped out the population by the 1920s.
At least 40 groups, including tribes, environmentalists and animal welfare organizations, support the bill. They say reintroducing bears would improve the ecosystem and right an ecological wrong.
That’s a sharp contrast to the rural communities, ranchers and hunting groups that oppose the bill.
They say the predators we have—mountain lions, black bears, and wolves—are eating their livestock and wandering into their towns.
The measure provides no funding to carry out the study.
That reporting from our partner, CalMatters. Read the full story here.
Truth in Disclosure Act
The Senate Public Safety Committee has approved the Truth in Disclosure Act.
It would require companies doing business in California to check their records and disclose if they profited from slavery—including through loans, insurance policies, or using enslaved people as collateral.
Mona Tawatao, with the Equal Justice Society, spoke in support of the legislation.
"The Truth in Disclosure Act would require qualifying companies doing business in California to examine their history for those ill-gotten gains," she said, "and tell the truth about whether they profited from slavery so that the state can then share that truth with the public."
Insurance trade groups oppose the measure, saying it's duplicative since California has an older law requiring slave-era policy disclosures.
That reporting from our partner, CapRadio.