Call it whatever you want, but SideCar probably won’t be calling its new medical marijuana delivery service in California the “Uber” of pot delivery. In a bid to compete against its rivals in the ride-sharing business as well as take advantage of state marijuana laws, SideCar is launching its service in San Francisco to bring medicinal weed from dispensaries to patients. [More]
california
Google’s Self-Driving Cars Involved In Minor Accidents
By 5.11.15
Google, one of a handful of companies with permits to test self-driving vehicles in California, has 23 such cars roaming the streets there. But in just the few months since obtaining those permits, three of those Google vehicles have been involved in traffic accidents. [More]
ConocoPhillips, Phillips 66 Must Pay $11.5M To Settle Hazardous Waste Violations
By 5.8.15
Two Texas-based companies have been ordered to pay a total of $11.5 million to close the book on allegations that hundreds of their gas stations may have put local water supplies in California at risk.
[More]
California Says Alleged Recycling Scam Trucked In Bottles & Cans From Arizona For $14M In Illegal Refunds
By 5.8.15
It might just be a bunch of bottles and cans, but when you get enough recyclables together it can mean a hefty wad of cash. California authorities say a group involved in an alleged illegal recycling scheme was flush with $14 million in refunds after trucking roughly 250 million cans and bottles from out of state and redeeming them. [More]
Los Angeles Sues Wells Fargo Over Unfair Customer Account Conduct
By 5.5.15 — Updated: 9.30.16
The City of Los Angeles has filed a lawsuit against the largest bank based in the state, accusing Wells Fargo of a plethora of unfair practices including encouraging employees to open unauthorized consumer accounts and then charging those accounts phony fees. [More]
California Still Deciding Whether To Block Comcast Merger That Is No Longer Happening
By 5.4.15
Even though the $45 billion merger of Comcast and Time Warner Cable officially failed more than a week ago. One might assume that this collapse would have sufficed for the California state regulator who proposed blocking the deal in that state, but yet the merger approval process in California moves forward — even without a merger to approve. [More]
New Law Would Ban Companies From Penalizing Customers Who Write Negative Reviews
By 4.29.15
For the last couple of years, we’ve been telling you about ridiculous, so-called “non-disparagement” clauses that threaten customers with financial penalties for writing (or threatening to write, or even encouraging someone else to write) something negative online about a company. California has already outlawed these clauses, which tend to fail when challenged in court, but an attempt to enact legislation at the federal level has so far fallen short. But that’s not stopping some members of Congress from trying to ban this form of consumer bullying. [More]
Corinthian Colleges Completes Collapse, Closes Remaining Campuses Effective Immediately
By 4.26.15
Although it was nearly a year in the making, the largest collapse in U.S. higher education finally occurred Sunday, as embattled for-profit education chain Corinthian Colleges Inc. – the operator of Everest University, Heald College and WyoTech – announced it would close the remainder of its campuses effective Monday. [More]
Gift Card That Isn’t A Gift Card Can Ignore Consumer Laws
By 4.23.15
There are some disadvantages to using gift cards, but there are some laws that protect consumers who buy and use them. California has the strongest laws of this type: gift card holders can ask a retailer to cash in a gift card at any time, for example. Yet what happens when something that seems like a gift card isn’t, and it isn’t regulated the way that you expect–even in California? [More]
California Orders Corinthian Colleges To Stop Enrollment At WyoTech, Everest Campuses
By 4.22.15
The collapse of for-profit education chain Corinthian Colleges – operator of Everest University, Heald College and WyoTech – continued today after a California regulator issued an order requiring the company to cease enrolling new students at its Everest and WyoTech campuses in the state. [More]
Taco Bell’s Founder Originally Intended To Start A Burger Empire
By 4.20.15
If you drive to Downey, CA, you can find the oldest existing McDonald’s eatery and the currently vacant building that housed the first Taco Bell. And the tie between the two famous fast food names goes deeper than that. It was in the parking lot of the very first McDonald’s that the man who would eventually create the Taco Bell empire dreamt of a fast food empire stretching from coast to coast. [More]
Comcast Bringing Super-Fast Fiber Network To Silicon Valley & Other California Markets
By 4.17.15
Two weeks after Comcast announced that Atlanta would be the first market to get its new Gigabit Pro fiber service — which promises speeds of up to twice that of Google Fiber — the company is now saying it will bring the high-speed broadband to several markets in California where it already offers service. [More]
Walmart Raises Suspicions After Closing 5 Stores In Same Day For “Plumbing” Problems
By 4.16.15
There are thousands of Walmarts in the U.S., so the fact that five of them were temporarily shut down all on the same day, all for the same reason, and all for the same estimated amount of time, may be statistically insignificant. But some workers and city officials are raising questions about what’s actually behind these six-month shutterings. [More]
California Utilities Commissioner Calls For Rejection Of Time Warner Cable Deal
By 4.10.15
With Comcast set to take over Time Warner Cable’s millions of California customers, state regulators there have been scrutinizing the deal to see how it would affect consumers. Earlier this year, the state’s Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) suggested a number of conditions that would make the merger more acceptable, but today a CPUC commissioner publicly called for the state to block the marriage of Comcast and TWC, at least in California. [More]
California’s Denim Industry Trying To Get That Distressed Look Without Using Water During Drought
By 4.10.15
California is in the middle of a long drought right now, with state officials asking everyone to pitch in and do their best to conserve water. But that’s a bit tricky for the state’s denim industry, which produces about 75% of the “premium” jeans sold worldwide. Because getting that expensive, distressed vintage look is all about washing… and washing again, and again. With water, of course, which is in short supply. [More]
Google, Bing To Block Search Result Ads For Unlicensed Payday Lenders In California
By 4.8.15
Government officials in California found a few unlikely allies when it comes to ensuring online payday lenders aren’t illegally advertising their services to residents online: The nation’s top search engine providers. [More]
Should Lawyers Be Held Accountable When Clients Sue Just To Punish Whistleblowers?
By 4.2.15
Deep-pocketed companies have a long history of filing frivolous lawsuits with the sole intent of putting defendants through the expensive legal wringer. This sort of courtroom bullying is known as a Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation (SLAPP) and several states have Anti-SLAPP laws to deter this type of abuse. Plaintiffs that file these lawsuits can face penalties, but one question being considered by a California appeals court is whether plaintiffs’ lawyers should be held accountable for allowing their clients to behave badly. [More]
HMO Must Pay $28M For Delaying MRI That Could Have Saved Cancer Patient’s Leg
By 3.27.15
Back in 2009, a then 17-year-old woman in California visited a Kaiser Permanente office because she was experiencing strange back pain. In the months that followed, she and her mother say they repeatedly requested an MRI but Kaiser doctors would only tell her to lose weight or get acupuncture treatments. All the while, a cancerous tumor was growing that would eventually result in the surgical removal of her right leg, and parts of her pelvis and spine. Believing Kaiser could have caught the cancer earlier if it hadn’t delayed the MRI, a jury has awarded the patient $28 million in damages. [More]
