Contributed

California law has tried for almost 50 years to protect people with mental illness from forced treatment, and for just as long, critics have said that the state is leaving mentally ill people without treatment, abandoning them to die on the streets.

Some years ago, I visited some old lefty friends, who both just happened to have MBAs. A periodic recession was happening then and we started talking about macro-economics. Being lefties, they advocated cutting the work week to four days in order to make room for more jobs and thus lowering the rate of unemployment. Being an evil curmudgeon, I asked them if they would gladly accept a 20% cut in their own incomes in order for this to happen.

The Republican Party will hold a presidential candidate debate at the Ronald Reagan library Wednesday. It’s a bad fit. The GOP’s modern idol is exactly the opposite of Reagan in personality and character. For upbeat Reagan, America was a “shining city on the hill.” For whining Donald Trump, it’s a waste bin for venom and lies.

State lawmakers approved legislation late Wednesday that would bar mandatory evictions or exclusion for California tenants and their families based on criminal histories or brushes with law enforcement. Assembly Bill 1418 combats local policies known as “crime-free housing” that can require landlords to evict tenants for arrests or prohibit landlords from renting to those with prior convictions.

The board of supervisors today approved the last funding agreement needed to expand a two and a half mile sewer project along Van Buren Boulevard in the county’s unincorporated Woodcrest area, adjacent to the City of Riverside.