The California Stem Cell Report, a one-man operation run by writer from his sailboat off the coast of Mexico, has a good scoop today, about a member of the committee who oversees the state’s $3 billion stem-cell initiative, the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM).

Turns out that John Reed, who is also president of the Burnham Institute in La Jolla, wrote a letter back in August that protested the agency’s decision not to award a $638,000 grant to the Burnham. The decision apparently came down partly to the eligibility of the PI on the grant application, such as whether he was a fulltime faculty member at Burnham and worked in his own lab on the Burnham campus. CIRM’s response is here.

Still, rough days at CIRM don’t seem to be slowing interest any; Nature Reports Stem Cells’s Monya Baker had a piece recently (subscription required) on how industry is trying to get a piece of some of the grant money.