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- Written by: Lake County News Reports
Beginning Jan. 1, nine new laws — sponsored by Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara and the California Department of Insurance — went into effect, with the goal of delivering stronger consumer protections for all Californians.
These new laws establish a wildfire safety grant program, expand insurance discounts, speed up claim payouts for wildfire survivors, extend non-renewal protections to businesses, strengthen the financial stability of the FAIR Plan, and modernize outdated insurance laws to improve transparency and accountability.
“The recent wildfires in Southern California exposed deep weaknesses in a 30-year-old framework of insurance regulation and enforcement. These new laws are part of a broader solution to put consumers in command by giving them more options, more transparency, and faster recoveries on their own terms,” said Commissioner Lara. “Protecting consumers is my top priority. I am grateful for the continued partnerships with the Governor and state legislators who helped champion these important measures.”
The following laws will go into effect on Jan. 1, unless otherwise noted.
Wildfire safety
• The California Safe Homes Act (AB 888), authored by Assembly Member Lisa Calderon, protects homes and access to insurance by establishing a new grant program within the Department of Insurance to assist qualifying residents in obtaining new or replacement fire-safe roofs and implementing fire-safe mitigation measures within five feet of their homes — known as “Zone Zero.” This program will cover part or all the costs and will be included in community-wide safety initiatives.
These mitigation measures are among the most impactful yet costly, and homeowners have consistently communicated their desire to undertake this work but lack the financial means. The California Safe Homes Act will help provide financial assistance for these essential projects.
• The California Wildfire Public Model Act (SB 429), authored by Sen Dave Cortese, enhances community safety and education by allowing the Department of Insurance to issue grants for establishing the nation’s first publicly available wildfire loss catastrophe model. The public model will facilitate assessments of wildfire risk, educate the public, and ensure greater transparency so communities and homeowners can plan effectively. This new law builds on recommendations from the Cal Poly Humboldt-led Public Wildfire Model Strategy Group.
• The Insurance and Wildfire Safety Act (AB 1), authored by Assembly Member Damon Connolly, enhances insurance discounts by requiring the Department of Insurance to regularly review its groundbreaking Safer from Wildfires regulations, ensuring this law reflects advancements in science, safety, and mitigation. This regular review will ensure that these regulations meet the needs of consumers and the industry, providing maximum benefits to homeowners and essential support to communities most vulnerable to wildfires.
Consumer protection
• Eliminate “The List” Act (SB 495), authored by Sen. Ben Allen, requires insurance companies to pay 60 percent of contents coverage limits, capped at $350,000, to wildfire survivors who experience a total loss without needing to submit a detailed inventory list. It also grants consumers at least 100 days to provide proof of loss to their insurance company following a declared state of emergency. Furthermore, the new law will establish specific data collection authority to help the Department of Insurance understand long-term trends in risk management and the integration of information related to climate-driven risks that significantly impact insurance availability.
• The Business Insurance Protection Act (SB 547), jointly authored by Senators Sasha Renée Pérez and Susan Rubio, builds on the Wildfire Safety and Recovery Act of 2018 (SB 824, authored by then-Senator Lara), which has protected millions of homeowners by prohibiting non-renewals of residential property insurance for one year. This new law extends this existing protection by broadening the insurance moratorium to now include commercial policies, covering businesses, homeowners’ associations, condominiums, affordable housing units and nonprofits, among other covered entities.
• The FAIR Plan Stability Act (AB 226), jointly authored by Assembly Members Lisa Calderon and David Alvarez, enhances consumer safeguards by allowing the FAIR Plan, if authorized by the Insurance Commissioner, to access catastrophic bonds through the California Infrastructure and Economic Development Bank and enter into a line of credit or loan agreements with one or more lenders. This new law provides additional financial support for the state’s insurer of last resort, ensuring timely payment of consumer claims in the event of a major disaster.
• Annual Insurance Omnibus (AB 487), authored by the Assembly Insurance Committee, clarifies existing law, removes outdated code sections, and establishes new laws developed in collaboration with the Department of Insurance and stakeholders. It benefits the Department and Californians by improving clarity, efficiency, and fairness in regulation.
Health care
• Increasing Consumer Protections in Student Health Insurance (AB 594), authored by Assembly Member José Luis Solache, allows students who are no longer enrolled at a university to withdraw from their health insurance coverage and cease paying premiums, makes changes regarding notices that must be given to schools and students when an insurer wants to increase its rates, and institutes a penalty if insurers fail to timely file their rate changes with the Department of Insurance. This new law will go into effect on July 1, 2026.
• Infertility Treatment Health Care Coverage (SB 729), authored by Sen. Caroline Menjivar, requires insurance coverage for fertility and infertility care under disability insurance policies and large group health plans. This protects Californians’ access to in-vitro fertilization (IVF), and updates the definition of infertility to be inclusive of LGBTQ+ family planning experiences, despite any federal action to limit this coverage. This law applies to large and small group health care service plan contracts and disability insurance policies issued, amended, or renewed on or after the bill’s implementation dates. As signed by the Governor in 2024, SB 729 was to take effect on July 1, 2025, but an enacted California State Budget trailer bill delayed implementation to Jan. 1, 2026. For CalPERS, the mandate begins on July 1, 2027.
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- Written by: NASA Hubble Mission Team, Goddard Space Flight Center
Astronomers using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope have imaged the largest protoplanetary disk ever observed circling a young star.
For the first time in visible light, Hubble has revealed the disk is unexpectedly chaotic and turbulent, with wisps of material stretching much farther above and below the disk than astronomers have seen in any similar system. Strangely, more extended filaments are only visible on one side of the disk.
The findings, which were published Tuesday in The Astrophysical Journal, mark a new milestone for Hubble and shed light on how planets may form in extreme environments, as NASA’s missions lead humanity’s exploration of the universe and our place in it.
Located roughly 1,000 light-years from Earth, IRAS 23077+6707, nicknamed “Dracula’s Chivito,” spans nearly 400 billion miles — 40 times the diameter of our solar system to the outer edge of the Kuiper Belt of cometary bodies.
The disk obscures the young star within it, which scientists believe may be either a hot, massive star, or a pair of stars. And the enormous disk is not only the largest known planet-forming disk; it’s also shaping up to be one of the most unusual.
“The level of detail we’re seeing is rare in protoplanetary disk imaging, and these new Hubble images show that planet nurseries can be much more active and chaotic than we expected,” said lead author Kristina Monsch of the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian, or CfA. “We’re seeing this disk nearly edge-on and its wispy upper layers and asymmetric features are especially striking. Both Hubble and NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope have glimpsed similar structures in other disks, but IRAS 23077+6707 provides us with an exceptional perspective — allowing us to trace its substructures in visible light at an unprecedented level of detail. This makes the system a unique, new laboratory for studying planet formation and the environments where it happens.”
The nickname “Dracula’s Chivito” playfully reflects the heritage of its researchers — one from Transylvania and another from Uruguay, where the national dish is a sandwich called a chivito. The edge-on disk resembles a hamburger, with a dark central lane flanked by glowing top and bottom layers of dust and gas.
Puzzling asymmetry
The impressive height of these features wasn’t the only thing that captured the attention of scientists. The new images revealed that vertically imposing filament-like features appear on just one side of the disk, while the other side appears to have a sharp edge and no visible filaments. This peculiar, lopsided structure suggests that dynamic processes, like the recent infall of dust and gas, or interactions with its surroundings, are shaping the disk.
“We were stunned to see how asymmetric this disk is,” said co-investigator Joshua Bennett Lovell, also an astronomer at the CfA. “Hubble has given us a front row seat to the chaotic processes that are shaping disks as they build new planets — processes that we don’t yet fully understand but can now study in a whole new way.”
All planetary systems form from disks of gas and dust encircling young stars. Over time, the gas accretes onto the star, and planets emerge from the remaining material. IRAS 23077+6707 may represent a scaled-up version of our early solar system, with a disk mass estimated at 10 to 30 times that of Jupiter — ample material for forming multiple gas giants. This, plus the new findings, makes it an exceptional case for studying the birth of planetary systems.
“In theory, IRAS 23077+6707 could host a vast planetary system,” said Monsch. “While planet formation may differ in such massive environments, the underlying processes are likely similar. Right now, we have more questions than answers, but these new images are a starting point for understanding how planets form over time and in different environments.”
The Hubble Space Telescope has been operating for over three decades and continues to make ground-breaking discoveries that shape our fundamental understanding of the universe. Hubble is a project of international cooperation between NASA and the European Space Agency, or ESA. NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, manages the telescope and mission operations. Lockheed Martin Space, based in Denver, also supports mission operations at Goddard. The Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, which is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, conducts Hubble science operations for NASA.
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- Written by: Elizabeth Larson
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — The National Weather Service has issued a flood watch and wind advisory for Lake County through the weekend due to incoming storms.
The flood watch is in effect from 4 p.m. Friday through 10 p.m. Sunday, while the wind advisory lasts from 1 p.m. Friday through 4 p.m. Saturday.
Forecasters said there will be rain and mountain snow, along with gusting winds and the potential for thunderstorms across Northern California through Monday.
The forecast calls for south winds of up to 25 miles per hour and gusting winds up to 60 miles per hour in northern Lake County.
Rainfall totals through Monday could reach nearly 3 inches, according to the forecast.
After Monday, chances of rainfall are expected to lessen but to continue through Thursday.
Daytime temperatures through the weekend will hover in the low 50s, dropping into the high 40s at the start of the week.
Nighttime conditions into next week will be in the high 40s, dropping into the high 30s.
The rainy conditions over the past week have given Clear Lake a boost.
The United States Geological Survey’s gauge on Clear Lake shows that since the day after Christmas, the lake’s depth rose from 4.27 feet Rumsey, the special measure for the lake, up to 5.11 feet Rumsey by early Friday morning.
On Jan. 2, 2025, Clear Lake’s level was at 5.90, according to USGS historical records.
Email Elizabeth Larson at
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- Written by: Levi Sumagaysay, CalMatters
This story was originally published by CalMatters. Sign up for their newsletters.
Some homeowners in areas of California with high wildfire risk could eventually get money for new roofs or to build fire-resistant zones around their properties under a new state law that goes into effect today.
The Safe Homes grant program is designed to help low- and middle-income homeowners with fire mitigation. People who qualify could use grants to create 5-foot ember-resistant zones around properties, also known as Zone Zero, as required by law in some areas. The program will also contribute toward costs for fire-safe roofs.
The state’s Insurance Department, which is responsible for implementing the program, is working out the details around eligibility, the amount of and the distribution of grants. It is now developing an application portal that it hopes to have ready by March, said Michael Soller, spokesperson for the department.
The insurance department will be handling all the details of the grants, said Mike Dayton, chief of staff of Assemblymember Lisa Calderon, the Los Angeles-area Democrat and chair of the Assembly Insurance Committee who wrote the law, and has so far secured $3 million in the state budget to get the program started.
Soller said homeowners who have policies with admitted insurance carriers or the last-resort FAIR Plan and who live in high-risk areas will have to meet income limits set by the state housing department to be eligible for the grants, whose amounts have not been determined. Communities, cities and counties with mitigation projects could also apply for grants.
He also said the insurance department plans to advocate for additional and ongoing funding for the program.
Another source of funding could be the federal government, including the Federal Emergency Management Agency, Soller said. But Gov. Gavin Newsom recently tried to meet with FEMA to talk about disaster aid related to the Los Angeles County fires and was unsuccessful.
Also, two Californians in Congress have proposed legislation that would establish a federal grant program and tax credits for mitigation. U.S. Reps. Mike Thompson, a Napa Democrat, and Doug LaMalfa, an Oroville Republican, have introduced their bill for the past two sessions, but it has not made it to a floor vote.
The California Board of Forestry and Fire Protection recently extended the finalization of rules regarding Zone Zero buffers around properties to the first half of next year. The rules are expected to take effect for existing homes in 2029.
This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.
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