“Good morning, Sacramento! It’s a perfect day for a pig roast. Come out and join us,” hog farmer Perrin Clark tweeted on a long-awaited day in May.

There is a squad of clean air cops in Sacramento with a strong-arm approach that squashes the stereotype that environmentalists are wimps. These officials make up the enforcement branch of the California Air Resources Board, and they face off against truckers still fuming over
emission-control rules they fear will put them out of business.

Beutler Air Conditioning and Plumbing may be a poster-business for the rise and fall — and re-birth — of Sacramento’s economy. Rick Wylie, president of Beutler, says the 65-year-old Sacramento company was probably saved by its diversification, partially into green energy models.

Developers looking to build in the Capital Region are finding cash in emerging green-financing products.

If Rick Wylie were cast in a Chevy commercial, the director might pair him with a rugged pickup truck. It makes sense; Wylie worked his way up from sheet-metal apprentice to president of a construction company. In the real world, however, Wylie drives a Volt, pearl white with black trim.

The future of community growth in the Capital Region hinges on the fate of several habitat conservation plans slogging through the development pipeline.

Long into early spring, hiking the rocky trail to Loch Leven Lakes required little more than a good pair of boots.

Ronald Fong, 52, has served as president and CEO of the California Growers Association since 2008. The CGA is a nonprofit, statewide trade association representing more than 500 retail members operating 6,000 food stores and 200 supply companies in California and Nevada. 

There was a raucous debate on the political stage last year over whether California companies were giving up on the Golden State and moving to Texas.

Few San Joaquin success stories can rival that of Lodi grape growers, winemakers and tasting room hosts whose efforts have propelled an unheralded wine region to prominence.