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The boat left Redondo Beach's King Harbor early Friday morning under conditions so perfect, I couldn't think of one good reason to ever go back to the office.

The overnight fog had lifted, with only a thin layer lingering over the Palos Verdes Peninsula. A small swell rolled gently under the boat, gulls sailed through the salt air, harbor seals frolicked and common dolphins used our wake as a playground.

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - In the decades since a 1969 oil spill near Santa Barbara tarred sea-life and gave rise to the U.S. environmental movement, politicians and environmental activists have built up ample ways to make it difficult but not impossible for the Trump administration to renew drilling off California's coast.

The Interior Department said Thursday it plans to open most federal waters off the United States to oil leases.

Hours after President Donald Trump’s administration unveiled plans to massively expand offshore drilling, California lawmakers announced they’ll re-introduce legislation to block the federal government from doing so ― at least near their shores.

The Trump Administration is proposing a major expansion of offshore oil leasing nationwide, including off the California Coast.

It would be the first West Coast oil lease sale since the 1980s, but that doesn’t mean it’s a done deal. State and local officials could easily throw a wrench in the plans.

On Sunday, show-business women will wear black onto the Golden Globes red carpet in a display of post-Harvey-Weinstein solidarity.

Good for them, and skip the snark about superficial celebrity causes. If ever a cohort had a point about their working conditions, it’s the exploited, objectified and occasionally assaulted women of California’s signature cultural export.

A bill by a Los Angeles-area state senator would protect homeowners against losing their insurance after wildfires like the ones that tormented California in 2017.

That’s just one example of how issues commanding local state lawmakers’ attention in the new year seem to be ripped from the headlines, including the disastrous fires, the Aliso Canyon gas leak, worrisome crime trends and, inescapably, sexual harassment scandals.

California environmental groups and Democratic Party leaders blasted the Trump administration’s proposal Thursday to reopen areas off the state’s coastline to new offshore oil drilling lease sales for the first time since 1984.

Amid the recent wave of sexual harassment allegations in Hollywood, two California lawmakers introduced a bill that would require hotel employers to provide “panic buttons” to staff so they can summon help in potentially dangerous situations involving hotel guests.

A California bill was introduced on Wednesday, January 3, 2018, that requires hotels to provide hotel room cleaners with panic buttons, according to US media reports. 

CNBC reports that if the bill is passed, California will be the first to have a statewide law mandating hotels to have the panic button.

Two California state lawmakers Wednesday introduced a bill that would require hotels to provide housekeepers with a "panic button" to prevent violent assaults and sexual harassment.

Assemblyman Al Muratsuchi, D-Torrance, jointly introduced the so-called hotel maid "panic button" bill with Assemblyman Bill Quirk, D-Hayward. If it gets passed, it would make California the first in the nation to have a statewide law requiring hotels to provide employees working alone in guest rooms with a panic button.