Sacramento news roundup: light rail, UC Davis lawsuit and ICE bills

Sacramento-area residents saw major developments Tuesday across transit, higher education and state politics. From light rail closures to a Title IX lawsuit and a wave of immigration enforcement bills, here’s what happened.

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• Sacramento Regional Transit’s Fruitridge station will undergo another two weeks of Blue Line construction starting the week of Oct. 5, with the 47th Avenue and Fruitridge stations inaccessible by light rail beginning Oct. 8 and work expected to wrap up Oct. 17. A shuttle will transport riders among the City College, 47th Avenue, Fruitridge and Florin stations during the closure, part of preparation work for the new S700 low-floor light rail vehicles designed to improve accessibility.

• Nineteen former members of UC Davis’ women’s varsity equestrian team filed a class action lawsuit Tuesday against the UC Board of Regents, alleging the school deprived female athletes of equal athletic financial aid for at least a decade in violation of Title IX. The suit seeks nearly $1.4 million in damages tied to the 2023-2024 and 2024-2025 school years and cites the school’s own reports showing it underpaid female student-athletes between $141,474 and $577,560 annually from 2017 to 2025, according to attorneys for the plaintiffs.

• Gov. Gavin Newsom signed 21 bills Tuesday aimed at strengthening state oversight of federal immigration enforcement, including a ban on law enforcement using electroshock gloves through 2030, a 25% tax on private detention facilities and limits on flash-bang grenade use during raids. The package also includes a narrower mask ban authored by Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, that bars state, local and federal officers from masking to hide their identities, after a federal judge struck down a broader version Newsom signed last year.