Entertainment conglomerate Anschutz Entertainment Group, a major political contributor, would be eligible for millions of dollars in state housing funds under a measure lawmakers approved early today as they moved toward adjournment for the year, the Los Angeles Times reports.

The controversial last-minute act at the urging of the company came at the end of a legislative session in which so little progress was made on major policy issues that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger used his executive authority Tuesday to call lawmakers back to work later this month.

They will return for special legislative sessions, which technically began Tuesday, on healthcare reform and water issues. Those key parts of the governor’s agenda remained unresolved as lawmakers prepared to end deliberations for the year.

But in the final hours of their regular session, lawmakers passed other measures, including the Anschutz bill. Approved over objections from advocates of affordable housing, it would make a company project near Staples Center in downtown Los Angeles eligible to compete for some of the $2.8 billion in bond money voters approved for such housing last year.

The bill, AB 1053 by Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez (D-Los Angeles), was among a handful of measures that changed substantially in recent days. Watchdog groups are highly critical of such bills — known as “jam jobs” — because they do not go through the normal vetting process of months of public hearings. The bill was amended in the Senate last week.

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