if ($dept='CA') is an assignment, not a comparisson. In addition you should use 'eq' for a texual comparison (== for numeric). So:
if ($dept eq 'CA')
is the way to go.
HOWEVER, you have an imbedded 'if' inside a print staement, which is the reason for the syntax error. I suggest you break it up into two print statements.

In reply to Re^4: Perl CGI and SQL statements by cdarke
in thread Perl CGI and SQL statements by kjg

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