No. 1 Read: A 'Deep Dive' Into the Sweeping Changes Made in California's $12 Billion Stem Cell Program

Capitol Weekly's Twitter item on its most
read story of 2020

Capitol Weekly, the respected online news service devoted to state government and politics, this week reported that its most-read story of the year is an article headlined "Proposition 14: There’s much, much more than meets the eye."

The piece was written by yours truly and dealt with the successful ballot initiative that saved the state stem cell agency from financial oblivion with a $5.5 billion infusion of borrowed money. 

The 17,000-word measure, however, also involved a sweeping expansion of the scope of the agency and made a host of consequential changes. The freelance piece began: 

"Proposition 14, the fall ballot measure to save California’s stem cell agency from financial extinction, contains much, much more than the $5.5 billion that it is seeking from the state’s voters.

"Added to the agency’s charter would be research involving mental health, 'therapy delivery,' personalized medicine and 'aging as a pathology.' That is not to mention a greater emphasis on supporting 'vital research opportunities' that are not stem cell-related.

"The measure would enlarge the board from 29 to 35 members. Even at 29, the board has been much criticized for its large size, which creates more possibilities for conflicts of interest, a long-standing issue for the agency.

"Proposition 14 would ban royalties generated by state-backed stem cell inventions from being used for such things as prisons and schools, isolating the funds from tinkering by lawmakers."

The Aug. 31 article was drawn from my new book, "California's Great Stem Cell Experiment: Inside a $3 Billion Search for Stem Cell Cures."  The book is a product of 15 years of coverage of the stem cell agency and posting of more than 5,000 items on its activities on the California Stem Cell Report.

Other stories in Capitol Weekly's top ten, most-read articles include the governor's plans for a stricter Covid lockdown, the tough sell facing California ballot measures and Capitol Weekly's list of the state's 100, top unelected political power players.

Capitol Weekly has been around for decades, originally as a print publication. It is now part of Open California, a nonprofit that helps to fill a gap left by diminishing coverage of state issues by the mainstream media. 

On its website, Open California says, 

"Our mission is to inform, enlighten and educate Californians about public policy and state governance, and to provide a platform for engagement with public officials, advocates and political interests.  To meet this goal, Open California publishes continuing, in-depth, nonpartisan coverage of current policy and political issues, and hosts regular forums for public discussion of policy and California politics."

Checking in on Skimpy Media Coverage of the $3 Billion California Stem Cell Program

The Capitol Weekly website, a must read for state policy makers and legislators, published an article yesterday involving California's stem cell agency. The article began like this,

"A small firm in Menlo Park is probably the only company in the nation that is named after the number of a particular human protein. It is a small number too, only 47. But it has large implications for California’s financially strapped state stem cell agency."

The piece pulled together the events of last week involving the purchase of Forty Seven, Inc., a grantee of the stem cell agency, by Gilead Sciences, Inc., for $4.9 billion. It was the lead story on Capitol Weekly for much of yesterday.

The political and governmental news website is a case where California stem cell news reaches an important audience not normally attuned to what emanates from the stem cell agency's headquarters in Oakland.  

While regular readers of the California Stem Cell Report are familiar with many aspects of the Forty Seven deal and its significance, that is not necessarily the case with the readers of Capitol Weekly. They consist of "elected officials and staff, political professionals, activists, academics and regular state employees," according to its web site. Capitol Weekly is also something of an institution and has been publishing, first in print and then online, since the 1980s.  

As our readers are aware, news coverage of the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) in the mainstream media is virtually non-existent, which poses a challenge for the agency as it hopes for voter approval of a proposed ballot measure next fall to give it an additional $5.5 billion. 

Mainstream coverage of the agency and the ballot measure will step up next fall, but the news media has severe financial and staffing limitations. Most of their efforts will go to cover the presidential race and matters that have more perceived, immediate impact on California. 

Capitol Weekly has a special niche that reaches influential folks and opinion leaders in the state Capitol. The California Stem Cell Report has an arrangement with Capitol Weekly in which it often picks up items from this site after they are published here. This writer also sometimes writes a piece for Capitol Weekly that is tailored to its audience, which does not necessarily want or need as much detail as many of the readers of the California Stem Cell Report. Yesterday's story on Capitol Weekly is one example. 

The media environment is tough right now for coverage of science-oriented stories or small state agencies, with the exception of such things as the coronavirus. But it is a reality that confronts the campaign on behalf of the $5.5 billion initiative to keep CIRM alive.