(The Center Square) – During the past seven days in California, Sen. Anna Caballero, D-Merced County, announced implementation of her successful 2025 bill, Senate Bill 72, that modernizes the Golden State’s water plan.
Her bill directs the state’s Department of Water Resources to build the infrastructure to support the capacity to hold an additional nine billion acre-feet of water by 2040, according to the text of the bill. The effort to push for additional water, and the infrastructure to hold it, is in response to the worsening effects of climate change and its effects on California’s water, Caballero said at a press conference on March 10 at San Luis Reservoir in Merced County.
Caballero added she expects the state will need to pass a bond to pay for the water infrastructure.
“Frankly, we don’t know what the cost will be to meet that goal,” Caballero said, answering a question from The Center Square at the end of the press conference. “It’s speculative to say it’s a certain amount. Will it be expensive? Yes.”
On Tuesday, Republican Assemblywoman Leticia Castillo, R-Corona, announced a bill that would restrict the use of bathrooms, locker rooms, showers, dressing rooms and other intimate spaces by biological sex. The bill was inspired by the experiences of women who have encountered transgender individuals who were born male in women’s locker rooms and other private places, Castillo said at a press conference.
“For me, this bill starts with a very simple principle: protecting women and protecting womanhood in spaces where privacy and dignity matter the most,” Castillo said. “Restrooms, locker rooms and changing areas are places where women and girls are often vulnerable. Sometimes they are undressed, sometimes with their children and expecting the most basic level of privacy.”
Members of the California’s Progressive Caucus, which consists of 37 Democratic lawmakers, also unveiled their 2026 legislative priorities on Tuesday, which include bills on health care, artificial intelligence, child care, cost of living and ending the state’s biggest corporate tax break.
“As California faces difficult budget years, many of us are working on progressive revenue solutions that make sure the cost of programs that people rely on are not shifted onto working people and taxpayers,” Assemblymember Sade Elhawary, D-Los Angeles, told reporters in Sacramento.
Just weeks after Democratic lawmakers introduced a series of bills that aim to help communities across the state prepare for and recover from wildfires, Republican lawmakers also rolled out a package of bills that advance similar goals. The Republican package includes state-funded grants to help homeowners in wildfire zones harden their homes against wildfires, stabilize the insurance market and allocate additional funds to Cal Fire to help fight wildfires.
“As California continues to face escalating wildfire threats, especially in our rural communities and our wildland-urban interface communities, it’s critical that we prioritize prevention, resilience and financial relief for hard-working families and property owners,” Sen. Marie Alvarado-Gil, R-Modesto, said during a press conference introducing the Republican-led legislation.
On Wednesday, lawmakers and victims’ rights advocates rallied outside the main office of the California Board of Parole Hearings in downtown Sacramento before a scheduled parole hearing for a convicted child molester, Gregory Lee Vogelsang, 57. Vogelsang was convicted of several counts of child molestation in the 1990s and sentenced to 355 years in prison, but after serving 20 years in prison, became eligible for parole under California’s elderly parole laws. Those laws allow those who are at least 50 years old to qualify for parole if they have served 20 years in prison.
“To my shock and disgust, I realized that despite the fact that he was sentenced to multiple life terms, this parole board thought it was appropriate to let a pedophile who readily acknowledges that he’s still sexually attracted to children out of prison,” Anne Marie Schubert, a former Sacramento County district attorney and current president and CEO of the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, told reporters.
