Daily Business Report: Tuesday, April 15, 2025
How badly will taxpayers be fleeced to prop up the 2028 Olympics?
By Susan Shelley | OC Register
The city of Santa Monica proudly claims the title of “birthplace of competitive beach volleyball” but will not host Olympic beach volleyball in 2028.
Nearly two years of negotiations between Santa Monica and the Los Angeles Organizing Committee for the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games, known as LA28, have just ended. The parties were unable to reach a “Venue City Games Agreement.”
Before you ask why, you should see what hosting Olympic events can do to a city budget.
Many cities have already seen it. In September 2017, the International Olympic Committee had to award the 2024 and 2028 Games to Paris and Los Angeles because they were the only two cities still bidding.
California’s schools chief has a $200,000 salary and a side gig
By Alexei Koseff | CalMatters
State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond has regularly taken side jobs running Bay Area nonprofits during his tenure as California’s elected schools chief, earning tens of thousands of dollars to supplement his income, financial disclosures show.
Thurmond has reported working part-time for four different nonprofits since he was elected superintendent of public instruction in 2018 — most recently as director of the Berkeley Food Pantry, for which he earned between $10,001 and $100,000 last year, according to his statement of economic interests.
The arrangement is not illegal under California law, but it is highly unusual for someone holding statewide elected office. Ten other people have served as statewide constitutional officers during Thurmond’s six years as superintendent of public instruction. None of them reported compensation from an outside job that they worked during their time in office, though several had considerable investments or other secondary income streams.
UC Berkeley Has Devolved Into a Cesspool of Anti-Semitism
By Evan Gahr | California Globe
It sounds like the University of California at Berkeley has devolved into a cesspool of anti-Semitism, where even the police cower in the face of Hamasnik hooliganism.
The school is already being sued for “inaction” over rampant Jew hatred on campus. And this week, the University was hit with a federal discrimination complaint over its indifference to the repeated assault and harassment of a Jewish student. With the acquiescence of a top University official, he was even blocked from walking freely on campus.
The complaint was filed with the Education Department Office for Civil Rights by the Los Angeles-based StandWithUs, an international, educational organization that supports Israel and fights ant-Semitism. The filing, which charges discrimination in violation of Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, says the Berkeley police department twice refused to apprehend the student’s masked assailants at pro-Hamas demonstrations because they feared inciting a riot.
