Speaker 1: Something's not right here. Crime is up all over the.
Speaker 2: State, homelessness and the city is out of control.
Speaker 3: The economy is six, axes are high.
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Speaker 3: Leaving California means fixing, and John Phillips is just the
Speaker 3: man to leave the charge. It's the Fix California Hour
Speaker 3: with John Phillips and Randy Way.
Speaker 4: And we continue at one oh five in the afternoon
Speaker 4: on The John Phillips Show, Mister Randy Weggs in Culver City.
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Speaker 4: Eight hundred two two two five two two two. Is
Speaker 4: the telephone number one eight hundred two two two five
Speaker 4: two two two.
Speaker 1: Well, I think it was.
Speaker 4: Last week we had Julie Watts from CBS News California
Speaker 4: Investigates on to talk about her multi part series on
Speaker 4: taxpayer dollars going to an organization that is very friendly
Speaker 4: with Gavin Newsom's wife to provide free diapers for California babies.
Speaker 4: Here with an update on that, mister Randy Wang.
Speaker 1: Julie Watts is continuing to dive deep into what has
Speaker 1: now been called Diapergate. By the way, we got such
Speaker 1: a huge response from that interview, we're gonna be rerunning
Speaker 1: that interview and the Susanie Crabtree interview from last week
Speaker 1: at the end of tomorrow's show. So if you did
Speaker 1: not get to see those interviews, we're gonna play them
Speaker 1: for you because we got a lot of requests. They
Speaker 1: were some of our best interviews we've had for the month.
Speaker 1: Is now we're doing these things on video. But here's
Speaker 1: the latest from the legendary Julie wattsper.
Speaker 5: This investigation began back in May as a simple fact check.
Speaker 5: That is what we Californians are actually paying for right now.
Speaker 5: That comes out to eighteen point five cents.
Speaker 1: Per diaper, has a lot of diapies.
Speaker 5: Back to the critics, math and backgrounded, Baby to Baby
Speaker 5: to Baby is a highly rated charity. Other than the
Speaker 5: state refusing to immediately release the contract, there was really
Speaker 5: only one red flag. This is what the state wants
Speaker 5: to send home with every new parent, four hundred diapers.
Speaker 5: But experts warn not to buy diapers in bulk for
Speaker 5: newborns because babies can quickly outgrow diapers in the.
Speaker 1: So whose idea was this? Gavin good question? Did Baby
Speaker 1: to Baby have an overstocked They overbought on size zero
Speaker 1: diapers and figured, hey, can we get the state to
Speaker 1: buy them first couple of months. Also, and I have
Speaker 1: to point this out every single time we do this story.
Speaker 1: Who was asking for this? Where was the need? There
Speaker 1: are a lot of hurdles to become a parrot in
Speaker 1: the state of California. It costs on average about three
Speaker 1: hundred thousand dollars to raise a child from birth to
Speaker 1: college in the state of California. Is four hundred diapers
Speaker 1: really going to push someone into the other direction?
Speaker 5: Good question, So stockpiling leads to waste. Turns out agency
Speaker 5: officials had the same concerns, which the records revealed when
Speaker 5: we finally got them after sixty six days.
Speaker 1: They slow rolled this contract over and over and over
Speaker 1: again until Julie found the numbers somewhere else and did
Speaker 1: a report on it, and they're like, no, no, no, here's
Speaker 1: the contract. There's nothing to see here. What are you
Speaker 1: talking about.
Speaker 4: Whenever they act weird about these, there's usually a reason why,
Speaker 4: And here we are now.
Speaker 5: The state warned baby to baby that sending new parents
Speaker 5: home with four hundred diapers quote might be overwhelming.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you think you even have room in the car
Speaker 1: for that.
Speaker 5: And echoed warnings that only offering newborn in size one
Speaker 5: diapers could lead to quote waste because maybe.
Speaker 1: So the state knows that this is a stupid idea,
Speaker 1: but we're going to pay the nonprofit to do it. Anyway.
Speaker 1: That's the state of California for you.
Speaker 5: It's quickly outgoing.
Speaker 1: I mean, this is by the way, it hearkens back
Speaker 1: to another thing that Julie Watts did a report from
Speaker 1: earlier this year on how the California State of California
Speaker 1: does all kinds of audits and nobody at the legislature
Speaker 1: or the Governor's office even reads them. There was an
Speaker 1: audit many years ago on how edd was prone for fraud,
Speaker 1: they didn't do anything about it. And John, how much
Speaker 1: did we lose in twenty twenty what thirty billion dollars?
Speaker 1: Estimates are around thirty billion dollars? Some of that went
Speaker 1: to Las Vegas steakhouses that now Baby.
Speaker 5: To Baby, pushing back arguing against offering the additional sizes
Speaker 5: and saying their boxes each about the size of a
Speaker 5: small carry on bag.
Speaker 4: What are you supposed to do with all of these diapers?
Speaker 4: And we're the ones paying for it. If we're paying
Speaker 4: for that many diapers that newborns can't even use, they
Speaker 4: better fit Jerry Brown and Maxine Waters too.
Speaker 5: Hard to carry? Meanwhile, their competitors sided data.
Speaker 1: Did they give you a little dolly to carry them
Speaker 1: out to the car? Does now the hospital have to
Speaker 1: pay for a staffer not only to wheel you out,
Speaker 1: but also to wheel out all the boxes of diapers?
Speaker 1: Where does the hospital keep all the diapers that are
Speaker 1: going home with you. There's a lot of weird questions
Speaker 1: about this diaper deal.
Speaker 4: What are you supposed to do put the baby on
Speaker 4: the roof of your car when you load up your
Speaker 4: trunk in the back seat with diapers that you're not
Speaker 4: gonna use anyway.
Speaker 1: Like it's a piece of furniture.
Speaker 5: Showing that eighty three percent of families in need actually
Speaker 5: ask for diapers size four and above, several organizations urge.
Speaker 1: The state to yeah, those infant days, they don't need
Speaker 1: anything yet they don't need the diapers.
Speaker 4: Size four. That's pretty big, though, isn't it? Think how
Speaker 4: much breast milk are these kids drinking?
Speaker 1: This segment has already taken a dark turn.
Speaker 5: Amazon proposed letting families select sizes delivered to their door
Speaker 5: with returns, but Amazon is missing.
Speaker 1: From them, although we all know what the Amazon return
Speaker 1: process is. Like, why don't you want these diapers? Are
Speaker 1: you sure you don't want these diapers? Please tell us
Speaker 1: why you don't want these diapers? Oh, you want to
Speaker 1: talk to somebody, here's someone from Bangladesh. Tell them why
Speaker 1: you don't want these diapers.
Speaker 5: The state's comparison spreadsheet, which has no scores, no rankings.
Speaker 5: In fact, the closest thing to a score sheet is
Speaker 5: the agency's final recommendation listing Baby to Baby and one
Speaker 5: other nonprofit, which the state notes offered more diapers in
Speaker 5: more sizes and direct to consumer distribution, which Baby to
Speaker 5: Baby could not wait.
Speaker 1: Was the other organization a bank? It was diaper bank.
Speaker 4: Okay, I was about to say the only bank I
Speaker 4: think that would be associated with fertility would be a
Speaker 4: sperm bank.
Speaker 1: No, this is a diaper bank. It's a nonprofit that
Speaker 1: is donation based out of Oakland. They've been around for many, many,
Speaker 1: many years, and they have the infrastructure to actually give
Speaker 1: out the diapers to people. Baby to Baby does not
Speaker 1: have the distribution to do this, but now they have
Speaker 1: forty million dollars and they can figure that out. So
Speaker 1: the question is, again, Gavin Newsom's the one that at
Speaker 1: the press conference said this was a competitive bidding process.
Speaker 1: We now know it's not. And why was the organization
Speaker 1: with ties to Jennifer c. Bold Newsom chosen over the
Speaker 1: organization that could have done this more efficiently for cheaper.
Speaker 5: Still, the state selected Baby to Baby anyway, walking in
Speaker 5: a contract with four hundred diapers sent home with each
Speaker 5: baby in newborn and size.
Speaker 1: What if you have twins, you get eight hundred. What
Speaker 1: if you have triplets, What if you're octomom? How many
Speaker 1: diapers are they going to send you home with?
Speaker 5: And only no returns or exchanges?
Speaker 1: Okay, this is a scam. The nonprofit that's getting paid
Speaker 1: by the state to give out diapers to new parents
Speaker 1: won't let you return or exchange the diapers that you
Speaker 1: do not need because the kid already outgrew them, I'm guessing.
Speaker 1: So they can go back and say, well, now, Gavin,
Speaker 1: we need another forty million dollars for size two.
Speaker 4: All sales are final forty million.
Speaker 6: Now.
Speaker 5: The contract also specifies that the program's oversight committee is
Speaker 5: exempt from California public meetings law, and any talking points
Speaker 5: must be mutually approved by Baby to Baby and the state.
Speaker 1: Now, this is all attention that Gavin did not need.
Speaker 1: Who put him up to this? Because you don't get
Speaker 1: any There's no good press that actually came out of this.
Speaker 1: Nobody paid attention to that press conference outside of the
Speaker 1: bizarre framing of why we need this in the first place.
Speaker 1: What is Gavin getting out of this?
Speaker 4: Well, and the wife in particular, is attracting all kinds
Speaker 4: of negative attention. I'm sure when he picked her he thought, Okay,
Speaker 4: she's an actress, she's from a wealthy family. She'll produce
Speaker 4: good look in kids, she'll be nice arm candy, and
Speaker 4: she's not gonna bring me any negative headlines. And now
Speaker 4: look at it.
Speaker 5: There is no profit included in this deal, but it
Speaker 5: does include funding for twelve taxpayer funded Baby to Baby
Speaker 5: staff positions.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so that is Yeah, of course there's no profit.
Speaker 1: It's a nonprofit. But now the state is subsidizing twelve
Speaker 1: jobs at this nonprofit to fulfill a service that nobody
Speaker 1: was asking for. This is as California as it gets.
Speaker 1: I'm surprised it's only twelve but not more.
Speaker 5: Warehousing, shipping, and eight to nine cents per diaper, though
Speaker 5: we don't know how much Baby to Baby is actually
Speaker 5: paying for each of those diapers manufactured in Mexico.
Speaker 1: Oh boy, they're not even California manufactured diapers. A wait
Speaker 1: a second, what if it's the diapers in Mexico, not
Speaker 1: the lettuce in Mexico that contains cyclosporiasis.
Speaker 5: And the record showed that Baby to Baby declined to
Speaker 5: name its manufacturer during the RFI process. Now we ask
Speaker 5: the state if they do now know who is manufacturing
Speaker 5: Baby to Babies diapers. We have not heard back that say.
Speaker 1: This sounds as crooked as Gavin News some weird deal
Speaker 1: to supply masks from China from electric car manufacturer byd
Speaker 1: ED This.
Speaker 4: Is the one we know about. How many deals like
Speaker 4: this are going on that we haven't heard about yet.
Speaker 1: Well, that's what Diipergate is truly about. What she found
Speaker 1: out was so many different of these massive contracts. We're
Speaker 1: not through a competitive bidding process, which makes you wonder
Speaker 1: why and who exactly is getting the deal and who
Speaker 1: are they connected to.
Speaker 5: One of many questions that we've asked the state that
Speaker 5: we're waiting for answers on, and we'll keep you updated
Speaker 5: when or if we get answers for CBS California Investigates,
Speaker 5: I'm Julie Watts.
Speaker 1: And like I said, we're going to be replaying John's
Speaker 1: interview with Julie Watts from last week tomorrow at two
Speaker 1: thirty because the stuff that she has uncovered. She is
Speaker 1: one of the best reporters in the state of California,
Speaker 1: and if you didn't get a chance to hear it,
Speaker 1: you need to hear all the things that she has
Speaker 1: uncovered in this weird diaper deal from Gavin Newsom.
Speaker 4: Dirty dealings going on in Sacramento. Now that isn't the
Speaker 4: only thing going on in Sacramento right now, Randy. There's
Speaker 4: also a fight over AI campaign ads that's also heating
Speaker 4: up in the state capitol.
Speaker 1: Just give me a second here, because now I have
Speaker 1: to switch to today's stuff, and then I have to
Speaker 1: add this, and then I have to go over here. Yes,
Speaker 1: Adam Schiff, the Senator from California, thinks that AI ads
Speaker 1: are bads from mar Here's ABC ten.
Speaker 7: We have election season heating up. Campaign ads are, of
Speaker 7: course everywhere. Good evening, Thank you so much for joining
Speaker 7: us on to the point. I'm Alex bell. As AI
Speaker 7: becomes more sophisticated, one California lawmaker wants to limit how
Speaker 7: it can be used to influence voters.
Speaker 1: ABC do know what this is about.
Speaker 4: This is about Spencer Pratt generating a ton of interest
Speaker 4: and shaming Karen Bass and shaming the California Democratic Party
Speaker 4: for how they've run Los Angeles and how they've run
Speaker 4: the state of California and becoming an even bigger celebrity
Speaker 4: than he already was because of it. They don't want
Speaker 4: future candidates to be able to do the same thing.
Speaker 1: Well, especially when that guy that was doing those videos
Speaker 1: for free, Spencer Pratt, just got hired by Steve Hilton.
Speaker 1: What's interesting, though, is when we originally started talking about
Speaker 1: AI and campaign ads, everyone's big fear was deep figs.
Speaker 1: Like everyone's seen that video that was from like four
Speaker 1: or five years ago where it had Barack Obama saying
Speaker 1: things that he would not say, and it was really
Speaker 1: hard to tell that it wasn't him. The AI campaign
Speaker 1: ads that we're talking about now, it's very obvious that
Speaker 1: they're not real. No, it's cartoons. Mostly nobody thinks Steve
Speaker 1: Hilton is really fighting a robot, nobody thinks that Spencer
Speaker 1: Pratt is really Batman. And while some people might think
Speaker 1: that Karen Bass is the joker, but that's on you.
Speaker 7: And is here to break it down for us tonight.
Speaker 8: Well, Alex Democratic US Senator Adam Shiff is the main
Speaker 8: author behind the AI ads act.
Speaker 1: By the way, we're not going to feature it, but
Speaker 1: if you go on Twitter, the guy who created all
Speaker 1: these things, Charles Kerrn, in response to Adam Schiff writing
Speaker 1: this bill. He made a video of Shifty Shift and
Speaker 1: Rokanna in bed together. We might have to play that.
Speaker 1: I don't know if we can. Okay, I've already getten
Speaker 1: some notes from management that I can't put politicians inside
Speaker 1: the images that I create for the show. So I
Speaker 1: don't know if we can or we should. You get
Speaker 1: to remember, this show has the staffing level of a
Speaker 1: startup with the bureaucracy of a big conglomeration, So we're
Speaker 1: just going to have to deal with it.
Speaker 8: This comes after Republican candidate for governor's Steve Hilton released
Speaker 8: an AI generated ad that ship ark.
Speaker 1: Now, I think we can play the clip that's featured
Speaker 1: in the newscast, but I can't wait to get a
Speaker 1: note after this.
Speaker 8: Show is problematic and fraudulent. He hopes his bill can
Speaker 8: put a stop to this, but experts say changing the
Speaker 8: rules around political ads will be an uphill battle. In
Speaker 8: a recent ad from Republican, no.
Speaker 4: I think that's really Steve Hilton, Oh yeah, Hilton fighting
Speaker 4: the robot that happened.
Speaker 8: Editorial candidate Steve Hilton. It shows him as a fighter
Speaker 8: against what he calls the machine featured in the AI
Speaker 8: generated ad our images of Governor Gavin Newsom, former VP
Speaker 8: Kamala Harris, and Democratic gubernatorial candidate Javier Basera.
Speaker 9: It's already a violation of the law to defraud people.
Speaker 1: That is not AI. That is actually what Adam Schiff
Speaker 1: looks like with a little too much cheek makeup.
Speaker 4: Well after he got called pencilneck. I think that really
Speaker 4: got in his head.
Speaker 9: Pull and political advertisements. I've reintroduced legislation, the AI Ads Act.
Speaker 8: This bill, if.
Speaker 1: Passed, AAA, you're going to get sued.
Speaker 8: Us, would expand the existing federal election law and prohibit
Speaker 8: the use of AI to falsely impersonate candidates, campaigns, or
Speaker 8: political organizations.
Speaker 1: And by the way, you want to talk about where
Speaker 1: you have free reign to say all kinds of misleading information.
Speaker 1: That's what political ads are all about.
Speaker 4: And by the way, while he's out saving democracy, this
Speaker 4: is the same sun of a bitch that tried to
Speaker 4: get me kicked off Twitter.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I forgot about that one.
Speaker 2: Wash your hands often and always before eating and after toileting.
Speaker 8: The bill would apply to anyone or group who produces
Speaker 8: these ads. To be clear, this would not ban the
Speaker 8: usage of AI in campaign ads.
Speaker 9: All of these ads total fakes meant to misrepresent to
Speaker 9: voters the positions of real people, real candidate incumbents.
Speaker 8: But author and journalist Al Tompkins says it'll be difficult
Speaker 8: to pass this bill as the rules and regulations around
Speaker 8: campaign ads are heavily protected.
Speaker 10: The courts have always given the widest possible birth to
Speaker 10: free speech when it comes to politics, So the courts
Speaker 10: federally have been very reluctant to restrain speech political speech.
Speaker 10: But in the age of artificial intelligence, states have stepped
Speaker 10: in to do the work that generally would have been
Speaker 10: left to Congress.
Speaker 8: In twenty nineteen, Governor Gavin Newsom signed a bill that
Speaker 8: would crack down on deep fakes and elections. And in
Speaker 8: twenty twenty.
Speaker 1: Five, and that's not what this is. This is in
Speaker 1: making it look like you might actually get fooled by something.
Speaker 1: The videos that are going viral are very obviously not real.
Speaker 4: No, what they're trying to do is man parody. They
Speaker 4: don't want to be made fun of, they do not
Speaker 4: like it, they can't handle it, so they want to
Speaker 4: make it illegal.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of thin skins, and Sacramento or.
Speaker 8: Signed three additional bills seeing deceptive AI generated election related content.
Speaker 8: But even with these new laws, Tompkins says, it's still
Speaker 8: up to the voter to be educated when consuming political ads.
Speaker 10: So we've been able to alter the way that people
Speaker 10: sound in recordings on video and film for decades. So
Speaker 10: there's nothing new about that. What's new is it's easier
Speaker 10: and even more convincing now. But it's not new that
Speaker 10: politicians lie about each other. That's not new.
Speaker 8: In a statement, Steve Hilton says in part, Adam Schiff
Speaker 8: is another creature of the same corrupt machine and wants
Speaker 8: to silence criticism. He adds, that's not democracy. Abs Ten
Speaker 8: did request an interview with Senator Schiff, but Alex he declined.
Speaker 7: All right, Jenny, thank you.
Speaker 1: There you go. Adam Schiff wants to go after AI
Speaker 1: campaign ads.
Speaker 4: Maybe he had to sharpen his neck and get a
Speaker 4: new eraser. If you'd like to email the show, you
Speaker 4: can do so at Johnny don't like show at gmail
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Speaker 1: So if you haven't watched this week's episode where we
Speaker 1: talk about Kamala Harris and her potential presidential run, watch
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Speaker 1: All right. We know that.
Speaker 4: Energy is very, very very expensive in the state of
Speaker 4: California and Randy in northern California. It could be getting
Speaker 4: more expensive very soon.
Speaker 1: And this is about as PG and E as it gets.
Speaker 1: PG and E that got six approved rate hikes last year.
Speaker 1: Wants to hike their rates again, and not for wildfire prevention,
Speaker 1: not for upgrading their infrastructure, simply to give more money
Speaker 1: to their shareholders.
Speaker 4: I'm sure the rate payers will be very happy to
Speaker 4: hear about that.
Speaker 1: For more, here's a report from NBC in the Bay.
Speaker 11: PG and E is raising eyebrows tonight asking for a
Speaker 11: rate increase on natural gas to fund a twenty six
Speaker 11: million dollar shareholder reward.
Speaker 1: You know, at this point, it's probably a good idea
Speaker 1: to invest in PG and E because California wants to
Speaker 1: make sure this company will never lose.
Speaker 4: I did that once before, when they were on the
Speaker 4: ropes and Gavin had to step in and help them.
Speaker 4: I said, there's no way Gavin's not going to step
Speaker 4: in and help them. So I bought a bunch of
Speaker 4: stock and it went up.
Speaker 2: PG claims it.
Speaker 1: I mean, hell, when they burned down a whole town,
Speaker 1: what do they give the victims? PG and E stock
Speaker 1: instead of cash?
Speaker 11: Great payers money by keeping costs down, and shareholders should
Speaker 11: be rewarded for that. As NBC beayer is Trudy Hernandez
Speaker 11: tells us that's not sitting well with customers.
Speaker 12: The PG and E rates keep going up, and social
Speaker 12: security does in.
Speaker 2: Sixty seven year old Janis Mercado and her friend, and
Speaker 2: it does go up every year, but by like five bucks. Yeah,
Speaker 2: Miss Henry had plenty to say today. After learning PG
Speaker 2: and E wants to raise their natural gas rates, we
Speaker 2: caught up with them at their senior nitty club and antioch,
Speaker 2: one of the few activities they say they can afford.
Speaker 1: They're going to have to cut back on yarn because
Speaker 1: of you, PG and E.
Speaker 4: Well, she's going to have to put together a thicker
Speaker 4: blanket because she's not going to be able to afford
Speaker 4: to turn the heat on.
Speaker 1: This winner.
Speaker 6: PG and E needs to drop the rates instead of
Speaker 6: raising the rates.
Speaker 1: These rates only go in one direction, ma'am.
Speaker 6: Need to give back to the consumers instead of the
Speaker 6: big pocket people that already have plenty of money.
Speaker 12: We all have to count off pennies. That's why we're
Speaker 12: here at the Senior center for some social activity that
Speaker 12: doesn't cost a fortune.
Speaker 2: PG and E has notified customers it's requesting a rate
Speaker 2: hike to fund a twenty six point six million dollars
Speaker 2: shareholder reward.
Speaker 1: They're not even trying to lie and say that this
Speaker 1: is for wildfire prevention. No, this is just because we
Speaker 1: want more money.
Speaker 4: Well, a lot of people talk about the Getty family
Speaker 4: as being the family that allowed Gavin news Him to
Speaker 4: have a police career, and they were his big benefactors,
Speaker 4: and that's true, but PG and E was right there
Speaker 4: along with them. Without PG and E, there's no Gavin Newsom.
Speaker 4: So there's nothing that PG and E wants that Newsom
Speaker 4: is not going to give them.
Speaker 1: Well, and you go back to Gavin's biggest blunder during
Speaker 1: the COVID days, that dinner at the French Laundry in
Speaker 1: Yontville where he said he was celebrating his best friend's
Speaker 1: fiftieth birthday. Wasn't his best friend, It was his lobbyist friend.
Speaker 1: And who was he? The lobbyist for Netflix and p
Speaker 1: G and E. Just after Gavin Newsom orchestrated their bailout.
Speaker 2: They say they saved consumers one hundred and seventy million
Speaker 2: dollars by purchasing the lowest gas prices possible.
Speaker 1: Sure, yeah, they're doing us a favor. Remember what happened
Speaker 1: And this was true with PG and E San Diego
Speaker 1: Gas and Electric and so Cal Edison when the war
Speaker 1: started in Ukraine a few years ago. They decided that
Speaker 1: they can make a bunch of money by selling all
Speaker 1: of their natural gas to Europe and then buying new
Speaker 1: gas on the spot market and selling it to Californians
Speaker 1: at triple the price. How could we forget? People were
Speaker 1: calling into the show telling us that their one hundred
Speaker 1: dollars bill turned into five hundred and they could not
Speaker 1: afford it. And these companies care no, They're making tons
Speaker 1: of money left and right. And you might ask, where's
Speaker 1: the regulators here? Where's the California Public Utilities Commission? Well,
Speaker 1: the people that Gavin appoints to the California Public Utilities
Speaker 1: Commission are all former people that worked at PG and
Speaker 1: E and so cal Edison November of Cowmany members of
Speaker 1: the legislature are former executives at PG and E. Well,
Speaker 1: Lisa Calderon is.
Speaker 2: One two to October of twenty three. While most of
Speaker 2: the same goes to consumers, they believe shareholders.
Speaker 1: And wasn't it one of your legislators, Chad Mays, who
Speaker 1: is not even in PG and e's area, that helped
Speaker 1: orchestrate that bailout to.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and then he went to work for the firm
Speaker 4: that represents pg and.
Speaker 2: E deserve to be rewarded. In a statement, pg and
Speaker 2: E says, under CPUC rules, customers retain the majority of
Speaker 2: those savings, while shareholders may receive a performance based incentive
Speaker 2: when procurement costs are lower than the established market benchmarks.
Speaker 1: These companies are guaranteed a specific rate of return, and
Speaker 1: they are guaranteed rate hikes and all kinds of things.
Speaker 1: It was one of the only things that was positive
Speaker 1: about Tom Steyer's incredibly annoying campaign for governor. We're to
Speaker 1: big ass crisis. He was the only one going after
Speaker 1: these monopolies and their behavior, which has been reprehensible.
Speaker 11: PGEN because they think they did well in keeping it
Speaker 11: not too high.
Speaker 1: Now they want to reward just for doing their job.
Speaker 1: Pgn E is the only company that could say with
Speaker 1: a straight face, no, we deserve more money because we've
Speaker 1: kept your rates real cheap.
Speaker 4: Good luck with that, and their job is to keep
Speaker 4: rates as low as possible.
Speaker 2: Mark Tony, the executive director of the Utility Reform Network,
Speaker 2: calls the request outrageous and unfair.
Speaker 1: If they want their shareholders to be rewarded when they underspend,
Speaker 1: then their shareholders should be held accountable.
Speaker 4: Hey, that's the name of our podcast. A new one
Speaker 4: dropped earlier this week.
Speaker 1: It's the most meaningless word in the English language.
Speaker 11: When they overspend, and that's not what PGN is asking for.
Speaker 2: PGNE says, if approved bills will go up about forty
Speaker 2: one cents a month, Janice and Jen say, when you're
Speaker 2: scraping to get back.
Speaker 1: Wait, they're both named Janis. I wonder if everyone in
Speaker 1: that senior center is named Janis, even the men. M
Speaker 1: Maybe that's just, you know, part of your life. If
Speaker 1: you're name Janis, at some point you're going to be
Speaker 1: into crocheng.
Speaker 2: Hi. Every penny counts.
Speaker 12: Why don't we get the reward we've been paying the bills. Hello,
Speaker 12: you know, give it back to the people that are
Speaker 12: paying the bills.
Speaker 1: It's hard, okay, Just noting that the majority of these
Speaker 1: women in a Bay area senior center all sound like
Speaker 1: they're from New York.
Speaker 4: Yeah, not one of them sounds like they're from here for.
Speaker 12: US seniors to make up bills.
Speaker 2: California Public Utilities Commission isn't expected to make a decision
Speaker 2: on pg and e's shareholder reward request until sometime next year.
Speaker 2: Jody Hernandez, NBC Bay Area News.
Speaker 1: So there you go, Pacific Gas and Electric once again
Speaker 1: and wants more of your money. And they're not even
Speaker 1: pretending that they're going to do anything good with it.
Speaker 1: They just want more of your money. Okay.
Speaker 4: So they want to be rewarded for what they regard
Speaker 4: as being good stewards of their company for mini moons.
Speaker 1: Correct, yes, okay.
Speaker 4: This is the same company that was held criminally responsible
Speaker 4: for the fire in Paradise, burning the entire town down
Speaker 4: and all the people who were there. It wasn't that
Speaker 4: they were found to be civilly responsible, although they were,
Speaker 4: but criminally responsible as well. They were charged by a
Speaker 4: local district attorney in northern California criminally for that fire.
Speaker 4: No one ended up going to prison, but they were
Speaker 4: convicted in that trial. And now they want to pat
Speaker 4: themselves on the back for being such a good California company.
Speaker 1: And if you want any proof that Gavin Newsom does
Speaker 1: nothing but hold water for this crooked, corrupt company. Every
Speaker 1: single time he is at a wildfire press conference, he
Speaker 1: was at a conference with cal Fire last week, he
Speaker 1: will inevitably bring up Paradise, Grizzly Flats, Greenville, and will
Speaker 1: blame all of those on climate change, not on who
Speaker 1: started all three of those fires, faulty, none paid attention
Speaker 1: to equipment from Pacific Gas and Electric. He constantly wants
Speaker 1: you to think that PGENE had nothing to do with
Speaker 1: those fires.
Speaker 4: I would love to know what the people who burned
Speaker 4: to live think about this, but as it so happens,
Speaker 4: we can't get comment from them because they're no longer
Speaker 4: here thanks to pg and E.
Speaker 1: Should we try to get Tyler henry On as a guest?
Speaker 4: We could, but if we can't do AI, I don't
Speaker 4: think we can do that either.
Speaker 1: How we doing on the likes, Randy, Let's check out
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Speaker 1: a couple of minutes in between a break at your job.
Speaker 1: We're currently at two hundred and thirty four likes for
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Speaker 1: all right.
Speaker 4: Yesterday we told you about a development in West Hollywood,
Speaker 4: an abandoned development that was taken over by coyotes, and today, Randy,
Speaker 4: we have an update on that story.
Speaker 1: And the update if you have small pets, we'll piss
Speaker 1: you off as much as it pisses me off. People
Speaker 1: keep feeding the coyotes idiots. For more, here is CBS
Speaker 1: in Los Angeles.
Speaker 13: The city of West Hollywood telling a local developer to
Speaker 13: fit the problem. Well, that's after a pack of coyotes
Speaker 13: made their home in an empty condo complex under consideration.
Speaker 1: Really, this empty condo complex has been sitting here abandoned
Speaker 1: for two years. I thought we're in a housing crisis.
Speaker 4: Okay, so on that point, A friend of mine who
Speaker 4: knows about this texted me after the show and gave
Speaker 4: me an explanation as to what likely happened there and
Speaker 4: what is likely producing buildings that are abandoned like that
Speaker 4: all over southern California.
Speaker 1: Here is what he had to say.
Speaker 4: One of the big reasons why a lot of these
Speaker 4: projects become abandoned is because in a city like West Hollywood,
Speaker 4: for instance, they have so much pushback from the NIMBI
Speaker 4: crowd about the development. The city puts so many extra
Speaker 4: requirements on it that it takes years and years and
Speaker 4: years to get permits and approvals, so that by the
Speaker 4: time that they have those, costs for the project have
Speaker 4: changed and they have to go do the financing, and
Speaker 4: sometimes it doesn't work out, or sometimes earlier permits expire
Speaker 4: and they have to start that over because the other
Speaker 4: part of this process takes so long. When the city
Speaker 4: makes them jump through all of these hoops, nothing can
Speaker 4: happen quickly, and that kills projects that have already broken ground.
Speaker 4: He then went on to say the pandemic and the
Speaker 4: subsequent inflation screwed a lot of that stuff up. Anything
Speaker 4: that was approved right before the pandemic. They got the
Speaker 4: financing based on the costs at that time, but then
Speaker 4: everything was delayed through the pandemic and the cost of
Speaker 4: everything went up by like twenty percent, So then they
Speaker 4: don't have enough money to actually start the project, and
Speaker 4: then they have to go redo everything on top of
Speaker 4: the hurdles that the city puts on them.
Speaker 1: So, in other words, the bureaucracy is real. Yep shangy soothsayer.
Speaker 13: Cbsla's Nicole Comstock is live in West Hollywood with concerns
Speaker 13: from residents and the city's demands.
Speaker 14: Nicole that's right, ladies, and tonight, a wildlife rescuer told
Speaker 14: me realistically, it could take a couple of weeks for
Speaker 14: an expert to come out here start monitoring these coyotes.
Speaker 1: Come up with you a couple of weeks, so that
Speaker 1: means how many cats are they going to eat before?
Speaker 1: Between now and then, they can't have any more urgency
Speaker 1: than that, Well, this is California.
Speaker 14: Plan and then carefully kick them out. Perhaps they were
Speaker 14: shining away from the limelight today, but we finally spotted
Speaker 14: the coyotes of the now infamous Coyote Condos.
Speaker 1: Right around Coyote Condos, Tager Towers, LA has so many landmarks.
Speaker 14: Sunset honkering down in the middle of the unfinished building.
Speaker 14: It delighted their many admirers.
Speaker 1: These people are so stupid. Seriously, I feel like, and
Speaker 1: I've been to other cities in Los Angeles and West
Speaker 1: Hollywood count I feel like I live with the dumbest people
Speaker 1: on the planet. It's like the New Walk of Fame.
Speaker 14: Heck, even the dogs wanted to look.
Speaker 2: I also haven't seen any of them today, and I
Speaker 2: see them every day.
Speaker 14: What a relief for neighbor Cindy Sorely she's been worried
Speaker 14: about them since last night.
Speaker 1: Not worried about them eating pets. Now, we're just worried
Speaker 1: about the wild animals.
Speaker 2: She says.
Speaker 14: Someone drove to the construction site and dumped raw meat
Speaker 14: over the fence.
Speaker 1: Oh god, a bunch of chicken drumsticks. Seriously, do not
Speaker 1: feed the coyotes.
Speaker 2: Some guy just came over and dumped like sixty chicken legs.
Speaker 1: Maybe he got them from Boyle Heights.
Speaker 4: I don't know, got chicken legs?
Speaker 2: She says.
Speaker 14: She saw one of the coyotes dragging a drumstick away
Speaker 14: and then the seem to disappear for the whole day one.
Speaker 4: A second, Well, they didn't need to hunt that day.
Speaker 4: I wonder if he's trying to poison them.
Speaker 1: That's what she thinks. But no, that's not what happened.
Speaker 1: It's just a bunch of idiots.
Speaker 9: At almost like, oh no, did someone try to poison them?
Speaker 1: You know, that went through my head.
Speaker 14: The City of West Hollywood says their main photos.
Speaker 1: By the way, that is a real tactic that in
Speaker 1: Texas people try to use to knock down the wild
Speaker 1: boar population. That is a literal pest to communities that
Speaker 1: can tear up yards and houses and everything else they
Speaker 1: try to poison them.
Speaker 14: Is on securing a prompt humane wildlife assessment and response.
Speaker 14: They've been in contact with the property owners representative and
Speaker 14: say they expect them to promptly address what can only
Speaker 14: be called a wild living arrangement.
Speaker 15: Realistically to probably think about maybe like maybe a week
Speaker 15: in order to devise a plan. How are they going
Speaker 15: to do it? Are you going to exclude them via
Speaker 15: the building via defense?
Speaker 14: Mary Cummins of Animal Advocates is a state license wildlife rescuer.
Speaker 14: She says trapping the coyotes won't work because they're too
Speaker 14: smart to go into box traps.
Speaker 1: I don't know. I've seen a lot of looney tunes.
Speaker 4: Wiley was pretty dumb, constantly kept running off cliffs.
Speaker 14: The best plan of action, she says, would be to
Speaker 14: haze or scare the alpha male and alpha female out
Speaker 14: of the condos when they're all together around eight pm.
Speaker 15: So if you were to, I mean delicately carefully haze
Speaker 15: out the parents, the juveniles would follow them up.
Speaker 14: And then they would probably just find a different spot
Speaker 14: in the neighborhood.
Speaker 15: They're already living in the city. They live in the city.
Speaker 14: She says, to deter them from denning here again, where
Speaker 14: they unfortunately.
Speaker 1: So instead of being in the abandoned condo, we want
Speaker 1: them in the neighborhood where they can hebe even closer
Speaker 1: to people's pets.
Speaker 14: Habituated to getting big bowls of water and French fries.
Speaker 14: The owner should probably bard up.
Speaker 1: You know how the coyotes would leave if people stop
Speaker 1: feeding them and giving them water.
Speaker 4: I don't think the neighborhood wants them to leave, though,
Speaker 4: I think the neighborhood thinks it's cool that they're there.
Speaker 1: I gotta get out. I've got to get out. Even
Speaker 1: for California, Southern Californians, specifically La County, are the stupidest
Speaker 1: people on the planet.
Speaker 14: The bottom levels of the condos because coyotes can easily
Speaker 14: climb over and crawl under fences.
Speaker 2: They have to monitor if the babies are ready.
Speaker 14: Some neighbors are worried about the three coyote pups living
Speaker 14: here being sent off into the city, but Cummen says
Speaker 14: there's no need to.
Speaker 15: This is the time of year when the parents start
Speaker 15: teaching them how to hunt.
Speaker 1: Great, so they'll go after everyone's small dogs and then
Speaker 1: we'll celebrate them because the kids learn how to hunt.
Speaker 1: These are wild animals in their pests, and anyone that
Speaker 1: treats them any differently as a freaking moron.
Speaker 15: Now.
Speaker 14: Cummins also suggest using trail cameras inside the building to
Speaker 14: detroy what parts of the building the coyotes are actually
Speaker 14: staying in and to figure out if their plan is
Speaker 14: ultimately successful. We'll send it back to you in the studio, all.
Speaker 13: Right, thanks to Cole.
Speaker 1: Do you know how long the story would be if
Speaker 1: it took place in Texas? Some coyotes took over a
Speaker 1: condo someone shot them. Story over.
Speaker 4: Wouldn't even make the news at eleven.
Speaker 1: It really wouldn't.
Speaker 4: No, the people are the problem here because those coyotes
Speaker 4: are never going to leave.
Speaker 1: They're wild animals and they're being taught right now that hey,
Speaker 1: I should stay here. These people will feed me. And
Speaker 1: if they don't feed me after they already fed me,
Speaker 1: maybe I should go to their house and eat their dog.
Speaker 1: That's what they're telling is right now, and they'll probably
Speaker 1: end up doing both.
Speaker 4: Yep, all right, We've got one more hour coming up
Speaker 4: on The John Phillips Show. If you're watching us live
Speaker 4: at Johnny don't like dot com Click that like button.
Speaker 1: What are we at right now, Randy, we are. Let's
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