Latest California Headlines

All the headlines from our California Topic Page, ordered by recency.

2018 Workers’ Comp-Related Bills Signed into Law in California

Oct 15 2018 // The Workers’ Compensation Insurance Rating Bureau of California in early October issued a summary of legislation signed into law by Gov. Jerry Brown.The Legislature recessed for the year on Aug. 31, and Brown had...

$4M Settlement for Police Explorers Molested in California

Oct 12 2018 // An attorney says victims molested by a Southern California police officer while participating in the department’s Police Explorer program have reached a $4 million settlement in a civil lawsuit. Anthony DeMarco says...

Walmart Paying $65M to Settle California Suit Over Seating For Cashiers

Oct 12 2018 // Walmart Inc. has agreed to pay $65 million to nearly 100,000 current and former cashiers in California who accused the retailer of violating state law by refusing to provide them with seating while they worked.Walmart...

Woes of California Wildfire Victims Include Cleanup Crews, Fraud

Oct 11 2018 // One year after a devastating series of wildfires ripped through Northern California wine country, destroying thousands of homes, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ first experience cleaning up after a wildfire has...

Charity First in California Names Paz-Cazares Business Underwriter

Oct 10 2018 // San Francisco, Calif.-based Charity First Insurance Services Inc. has named Margarita Paz-Cazares a new business underwriter. Paz-Cazares has more than 25 years of experience as a multiline commercial underwriter. She was...

Northern California’s Cascade Wildfire Tied to PG&E Equipment

Oct 9 2018 // PG&E Corp.-owned equipment caused the Cascade fire in Northern California last year, state investigators have determined.Sagging power lines were the ignition source of the blaze, the California Department of Forestry...

Registration Opens For 2019 Seismic Retrofit Grant Program in California

Oct 9 2018 // Registration opens today for the 2019 Earthquake Brace + Bolt program, which offers eligible homeowners grants of up to $3,000 for seismic retrofits to strengthen their older houses and make them more resistant to...

Alliant Names Guth Vice President in Southern California

Oct 9 2018 // Alliant Insurance Services Inc. has named Daniel J. Guth a vice president in Orange County, Calif. Guth will provide workers’ compensation, risk management, and property/casualty solutions to a diverse portfolio of...

Report: California Self-Insured Workers’ Comp Claim Frequency Rose Last Year

Oct 8 2018 // Workers’ compensation claim frequency reported by California’s private self-insured employers rose last year, the first increase in a decade, according to the California Workers’ Compensation...

Parents of Teen Who Drowned in Swim Class File Claim in California

Oct 8 2018 // The parents of a teenager who drowned during a high school swim class have filed a claim with his Northern California school district.The claim, generally a precursor to a lawsuit, alleges that a physical education teacher...

California Heads into its Peak Fire Season with State-Sized Burn Scar

Oct 8 2018 // California is poised to set an annual record it never wanted to break: the amount of earth scorched by wildfires.Blazes have already ripped through enough acres to blacken the entire state of Delaware, and what’s...

Summary of 2018 Workers’ Comp-Related Bills Signed into Law in California

Oct 4 2018 // The Workers’ Compensation Insurance Rating Bureau of California on Thursday issued a summary of legislation signed into law by Gov. Jerry Brown.The Legislature recessed for the year on Aug. 31, and Brown had until...

California Insurance Commissioner Wants Inventory Requirements Eased for 2018 Wildfire Survivors

Oct 4 2018 // California Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones wants insurers to assist wildfire survivors by voluntarily easing detailed personal property home inventory requirements and to follow the lead of other insurers providing at...

Murray and Murray in California Rebranding to Leavitt Coastal Valley

Oct 4 2018 // Santa Maria, Calif.-based Murray and Murray Insurance has rebranded to better reflect its affiliation with the Leavitt Group. The agency will now do business as Leavitt Coastal Valley. Dan Lillard remains the managing...

Remnants of Tropical Storm Causes Flooding, Traps Arizona Cars

Oct 4 2018 // Remnants of a tropical storm drenched parts of the desert Southwest this week, trapping some drivers on swamped streets of Phoenix, Ariz. as authorities prepared for possible flash flooding in the state, central Utah and...

California Catholic Bishops at Center of Sex Abuse Lawsuit

Oct 4 2018 // A man who says he was sexually abused decades ago by his parish priest said he is suing all Catholic bishops in California and the Archdiocese of Chicago, seeking to compel church officials to release records on clergy...

California Woman Paralyzed by Falling Tree Limb Will Get $14.5M

Oct 4 2018 // San Francisco supervisors have approved a $14.5 million settlement for a woman who was paralyzed from the waist down when she was struck by a heavy tree limb at a park two years ago.The San Francisco Chronicle reported the...

A U.S. Privacy Law Could Be Good for Google, but Bad for You

Oct 3 2018 // U.S. Congress is taking the first steps toward setting national rules governing how companies use consumers data – although one of its goals might be to prevent states from enacting stronger privacy protections of...

Lloyd’s U.S. Chief Says They’re Ready to Get into Canadian Cannabis Market

Oct 2 2018 // Lloyd’s is set to get into Canada’s cannabis market when recreational marijuana becomes legal there on Oct. 17, according to Hank Watkins, president of Lloyd’s America Inc.Watkins was speaking today at...

Insurtech Jumpstart Rolls out Parametric Earthquake Product for Californians

Oct 2 2018 // A firm that wants to make a name for itself as the first parametric insurtech in the U.S. for earthquakes has officially launched in California, over a year after its anticipated original launch date.Jumpstart Insurance...