Sacramento loves regional planning. Take an issue — say, transportation or land use or coordination of local government — and a group will sprout to chart a course.

When it comes to the California public pension system, one thing is crystal clear: it absolutely must and will change. The question is when and how. Practically every expert who has analyzed the state’s pension figures uses the word “unsustainable” to describe the system.

When Sacramento-based Breuner’s furniture store chain closed its in-house upholstery shop in 1971, the eight seamstresses and upholsterers were told that, if they opened their own shop, Breuner’s would send its work their way.

Steven Hansen, 32, is a senior regional manager at California-based biotechnology company Genentech Inc. He is a neighborhood representative for the Downtown Sacramento Partnership board of directors and was one of 15 city residents selected to serve on the Sacramento Redistricting Citizens Advisory Committee. Last November, Hansen announced his run to become Sacramento’s first openly gay council member in the newly aligned District 6.

When photographer Jill Carmel moved to Sacramento in 2008, she brought a bevy of cameras, a keen eye for composition and her dream of launching a niche business in a new city — a risky move, but passion trumped fear.

Justice delayed has become justice denied for the Capital Region’s business community.

It’s 2 p.m., and John Packowski must design an entire house from scratch by 5 o’clock.

As Sacramento’s Next Economy initiative tackles job growth, it is looking at a spectrum of untapped industries — as opposed to singling out individual industries — ripe for expansion. That strategy is the hallmark of two groups in the Seattle area.

Scott Silva got a job steering concrete-laden wheelbarrows at age 16 and started a local ready-mix company as a young man. He knew the concrete contracting business from the ground up.

In 2003, California’s workers’ compensation rates led the nation, setting off a debate about the cost of doing business here. Enter former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and his sweeping 2004 reforms to the system — everything from disability payments to medical care guidelines to return-to-work benefits got an overhaul.

Faucets on. Streets clear. Trash gone. Most city dwellers take for granted the infrastructure of daily life. And, except for monthly reminders supplied by bills, utility providers generally remain far from consumers’ minds.

Monica Gonzalez recently logged onto the Facebook page of Weave Inc., an organization that treats survivors of domestic and sexual abuse, to post a simple message about how the nonprofit helped her overcome a nightmarish ordeal.

Juliana Espinoza was a bashful teenager until last summer when she began a year-long internship at Junior Achievement of Sacramento.

A teenage boy walks through dangerous gang territory to reach the train that will take him from his low-income neighborhood to a private high school in Sacramento where almost no one knows his story.