Abel Maldonado in the Senate has just agreed to vote yes on the deal drawn up by the Governor and top legislators. Although no one is reporting exact details yet, from what we are hearing it looks like a bad deal for Californians. Fortunately voters will have a chance to vote on three parts of it in June and could knock the whole thing down.

This week Napa County began a process of examining what to do about the enormous deficits in pensions due to the meltdown of the stock market. Pension and actuarial expert John Bartel presented an actuarial analysis on Tuesday to the Board of Supervisors to begin this process.