Sen. Elaine Alquist, D-Santa Clara, is jumping into a fight between the 49ers football team and education leaders in her Bay Area community by writing a bill that would allocate $30 million in disputed redevelopment funds toward building a new NFL stadium.
Alquist's bill is fallout from Gov. Jerry Brown's decision last year to dissolve redevelopment agencies.
Santa Clara's redevelopment agency had planned to give $30 million to the $1.2 billion effort to build a new stadium for the San Francisco 49ers.
A county oversight committee created after the redevelopment agency folded decided last month not to use the money for the stadium but instead give it to schools.
"All of the redevelopment agency's agreements to provide this important funding predate the law that dissolved the redevelopment program," Alquist said in a statement.
Oversight committee members told the San Jose Mercury News they have authority to use the $30 million for local schools. The paper quoted oversight board member Bobbie Plough, who is also superintendent of Santa Clara Unified School District, saying, "We need that money to balance our budget."
– Laurel Rosenhall
BY THE NUMBERS
California's unemployment rate – now 10.7 percent – is the nation's third-highest, but the state ranks second-worst in a broader measure of employment distress by the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics that includes "marginally attached workers" and those employed only part time for economic reasons. By that measure, 20.3 percent of the workforce was distressed – second only to Nevada's 22.1 percent.
– Dan Walters
>WORTH REPEATING
"The job I've said to people I would like is I would like to be governor of the state of California."
LOS ANGELES MAYOR ANTONIO VILLARAIGOSA, responding to a Yahoo News question about whether he'd like to be president
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