Employers are now barred from asking for passwords to employees’ social media accounts. By eliminating fear of arrest for minor drug law violations, the Good Samaritan Overdose Prevention law encourages people to call 911 for help with victims of drug overdose. If someone at the scene possesses small amounts of drugs or paraphernalia, they will not be liable for arrest or prosecution. Concurrently, a new driving law says that DUI drivers can no longer choose between blood test and urine tests to determine blood drug content—blood tests are now the only option. California was lauded this year for being the first state to pass a law preventing therapy that would purportedly change minors’ sexual orientation (also know as “ex-gay” therapies or gay conversion), but the law has been delayed pending a federal appeals trial. On the flipside, Gov. Brown signed quite a few bills in 2012 that apply to veterans, but one is particularly notable: AB 1505 reinstates California veterans benefits for those who were discharged due solely to sexual orientation. The bill will guarantee a lifetime of healthcare and disability compensation for unfairly discharged LGBT vets.
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Freedom Walker For years, the people of Bil’in, a Palestinian community, have held weekly demonstrations against the building of an Israeli-helmed “separation wall” through the community’s agricultural lands. Iyad Burnat, a Palestinian farmer and nonviolent peace activist, has been a leader in the movement to protest such settlements on Palestinian land. He’s currently on a three-month speaking tour of the United States, telling stories of Palestine and discussing strategies for nonviolent popular resistance, and arrives in Marin on Jan. 8. “Since the 1936 intifada against British occupation, we have been working peacefully for freedom. We don’t know the meaning of ‘freedom.’ We know it’s the most beautiful thing in the world, but we don’t know how it feels,” Burnat told a crowd in Columbus, Ohio, this past December. Hear Iyad Burnat tell his story—along with a showing of 5 Broken Cameras, a documentary by Emad Burnat, the speaker’s brother—on Tuesday, Jan. 8, at the First Presbyterian Church. 72 Kensington Road, San Anselmo. 7pm. Donations accepted. 415.456.3713.
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they were legally purchased. If the driver cannot prove that the purchase was lawful, the supplies can be impounded. The law applies to unpaved roads through private timberland of 50,000 acres as well as any roads in the jurisdiction of the U.S. Forest Service, the Bureau of Land Management, the Department of Forestry and the Department of Parks and Recreation.
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Price of Pot Illegal pot farms take a severe environmental toll on the North Coast, according to an extensive Dec. 24 report in the Los Angeles Times. Growers have clear-cut trees, siphoned hundreds of gallons of water from nearby creeks and streams, poisoned wild animals with a powerful rodenticide called Carbofuran and polluted watersheds with potting soil and fertilizers. The problem has gotten so extreme that scientists have begun to blame unregulated marijuana “supergrows” for a breakout of cyanobacteria in North Coast rivers, a toxic blue-green algae that has been responsible for the deaths of water creatures and dogs.—Leilani Clark
The Bohemian started as The Paper in 1978.
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