In California: Another suit to open schools? And a bill to reopen Disneyland

I'm Julie Makinen, California Editor for the USA Today Network, bringing you Thursday's headlines. In California brings you top Golden State stories and commentary from across the USA TODAY Network and beyond. Get it free, straight to your inbox.

Another suit to reopen schools?

First San Francisco, now maybe L.A. Los Angeles Councilman Joe Buscaino announced Thursday that he plans to ask the city to go to court to force campuses in the Los Angeles Unified School District, the nation's second-largest, to reopen for in-person learning.

According to the L.A. Times, Buscaino said he plans to submit a resolution next week, for consideration by the full council, that would direct the city attorney to file a lawsuit modeled on one announced this week by San Francisco officials, who have started litigation against San Francisco Unified. 

San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera, who filed the legal action Wednesday, said he decided to take the school board and superintendent to court for failing to do their jobs by not having a specific plan to get students back into classrooms.

San Francisco school district officials have called the allegations frivolous, petty and embarrassing, the San Francisco Chronicle reported. “This isn’t helpful when we’re all in this together,” Superintendent Vincent Matthews said. “To turn on those of us trying to solve this is not helpful whatsoever.”

Other interesting COVID-related reads:

• Daily COVID-19 deaths in L.A. have finally peaked, the L.A. Times reported.
• Second-dose vaccine efforts in Ventura County are being hampered by shortages, the Ventura County Star reports.
• Two L.A. families turned a McMansion into the ultimate pandemic pod. They took the plunge and rented a 5,000-square-foot, five-bedroom, six-bathroom house in Orange County sight unseen. Here's how it's been going, according to the L.A. Times
• Struggling to keep that mask on? Here are some tips from the pros for making it less awful, via the Redding Record Searchlight. 

California legislators introduce bill to hasten Disneyland's reopening

California Assemblywomen Sharon Quirk Silva, D-Buena Park, and Suzette Valladares, R-Santa Clarita, introduced a bipartisan bill aimed at hastening the reopening of Disneyland, which has been shuttered since March, and other California theme parks. The bill proposes to move larger theme parks, including Disneyland, to California's orange tier, which is one of the benchmark levels for reopening amid the COVID-19 pandemic. 

The bill goes against Gov. Gavin Newsom's Blueprint for a Safer Economy, which doesn't allow larger theme parks to reopen until the county in which each park is located reaches the yellow tier.  In the orange, or moderate, tier, there must be fewer than four new daily COVID-19 cases per 100,000 people and a less than 5% rate of positive tests over seven days. In the yellow, or minimal, tier, there must be fewer than one daily new case per 100,000 people and a less than 2% rate of positive tests over seven days.

Under the guidance, only "smaller parks can open with modifications" in counties in the orange tier, and "capacity must be limited to 25% or 500 people, whichever is less." Smaller parks can hold 15,000 or fewer visitors.

Most of the state – including Orange County, where Disneyland is, and Los Angeles County, where Universal Studios is – remains in the purple tier, the highest, which means the parks have a long way to go until they can reopen.

More bad news on EDD

Speaking of Disneyland. ... She didn’t know it at the time, but last September was when everything started to unravel for Julie Hansen, a furloughed Disneyland candy maker. It was late in the month when she saw a string of suspicious charges totaling $12,222 on her state-issued Bank of America unemployment debit card. First, the money was credited back to her account. Then it disappeared again, setting in motion a chain of events that left her and her son homeless.

Behind the scenes, California’s Employment Development Department and longtime debit card contractor Bank of America were scrambling to rein in rampant fraud. They froze some 350,000 unemployment accounts around the time Hansen’s card was cut off. 

The catch: while Hansen and other out-of-work Californians were left in financial purgatory unable to access unemployment money, a Great Recession-era contract ensured that the state and the bank kept raking in millions of dollars in merchant fees whenever debit cards still in circulation were swiped, CalMatters found. In September, the EDD made $5.2 million on a debit card revenue-sharing agreement with Bank of America — a sizable chunk of the $22.5 million the state raked in from March to October, according to public records requested by CalMatters.

But the state may have some money for you.

California Controller Betty Yee celebrated the first National Unclaimed Property Day on Feb. 1 by urging folks to search the state’s online database of forgotten funds, where more than $10.2 billion waits to be reunited with its rightful owners, the Press-Enterprise reported. That’s up nearly $1 billion since 2019, even though $258 million in unclaimed property has been returned in the past fiscal year.

You'd be surprised who wound up on the list. Gavin Newsom can claim $90 in unclaimed cashier’s checks. For President Biden, there’s $250 from Times Mirror — the company that once published the Los Angeles Times and was consumed by Tribune Co. in 2000. And for Donald Trump, there’s still $3,000 from Bank of America. Go figure.

Bite-sized news, from avalanches to a shorter rainy season 

• California's congressional delegation voted largely along party lines in the vote to strip controversial Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene from her committee posts, the San Francisco Chronicle reported. See who was the lone crossover vote. 
• A backcountry skier from Oregon died in a small avalanche near Etna Summit Wednesday afternoon despite the best efforts of a fellow skier who was able to unbury himself, locate 36-year-old Brook Golling under six feet of snow, and perform CPR for more than an hour before acknowledging it was futile.
• California's rainy season is starting a month later now than it did in 1960, a new study shows. That means more fires, according to the Mercury News.

In California is a roundup of news from across USA Today network newsrooms. Also contributing:  The Mercury News, the Press-Enterprise, Los Angeles Times, San Francisco Chronicle and CalMatters, We'll be back in your inbox tomorrow with the latest headlines.