Problems Reported in Bridge Safety Tests; 65,000 Bay Area Immigrants Could Benefit From New Policy; Secret Meeting on A's South Bay Move

A special team within Caltrans has uncovered problems with safety testing far broader than previously known. After reviewing records for roadways and bridges, the engineering team has uncovered doctored data and other suspicious tests, including work done on the new eastern span of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge. The engineers started examining test results in December to learn how much trouble a single rogue technician caused California. They found problems that extend beyond that former employee and call into question testing of the new Bay Bridge and three other key Bay Area spans.

As the Obama administration readies for a rush of applications from young illegal immigrants seeking work permits, a new study predicts one of the largest contingents will come from the Bay Area, perhaps more than from all of Arizona. And while the majority of the applicants here and across the country were born in Mexico, the Bay Area also has a large number of Asian immigrant youths who are likely to benefit from the new policy.

One of the first "benefits" from Oakland's big $500 million development deal for the city's old Army base will be five giant billboards along the new Cypress connector. Depending on the outcome of negotiations with the Port of Oakland, another four will be added along Interstate 880 as well.

The San Francisco Arts Commission is increasing oversight of its civic art collection, estimated to contain more than 4,000 works of art valued at about $90 million. A full-time staff member will be added to the two-person civic collection and public art team, and another will be hired to conduct an 18-month inventory of public artwork. The commission has been criticized for not keeping a full inventory of its extensive art collection, most recently from a report by the San Francisco County Civil Grand Jury released last month.

Rooftop solar power is growing like crazy in California. But there's a big problem: About 44 percent of California residents are renters, not homeowners. That means that nearly half the residents of the state can't purchase solar-generated electricity even if they want to. Now the solar industry, utilities, environmentalists, financiers and legislative staffers in Sacramento are hashing out an innovative but controversial Senate bill that would allow people to join forces and collectively "buy" solar power from a shared facility.

California managed care regulators are ordering a doctors' group to stop letting business administrators make decisions about granting requested medical care. The order targets Accountable Health Care IPA, where regulators say the chief executive's son and another manager made calls on patient care that, by law, should be made by a doctor.

Just days after The City’s top cop revived calls for nonlethal weapons for police, a man in his 20s was shot by an officer Saturday in Potrero Hill. The man was reportedly involved in some kind of dispute at a residence before the run-in with cops. He was taken to San Francisco General Hospital and is expected to survive.

Amid reports of some nonprofits mismanaging charitable donations, the state Legislature is considering a bill that would increase the authority of the state attorney general’s office to crack down on organizations that violate the law.

Even as Major League Baseball remains mum -- after 40 months -- about the prospect of an Oakland A's move to the South Bay, its high-level committee reviewing the A's future quietly met last week with leaders in both San Jose and the East Bay.

Charnjit Singh gave a blank stare as he closed his flip phone Sunday afternoon...The person on the other line in Wisconsin confirmed that his cousin, a priest at a temple there, was dead...As details of the deadly rampage unfolded nationwide, the Hayward priest, 49, was taking personal calls from friends and family in Oak Creek, a suburb of Milwaukee. He relayed eyewitness reports of people locking themselves in bathrooms and the kitchen at the temple to shield themselves from gunfire.