Fox and Hounds Daily Says Goodbye
With this article, we end publication of Fox and Hounds Daily. It has been a satisfying 12½ year run. When we opened in May 2008, our site was designed to offer an opportunity to those who wished to engage in public debate on many issues, especially in politics and business, but found it difficult to get placed in newspaper op-ed pages.
Co-publishers Tom Ross, Bryan Merica and I have kept F&H going over this time investing our own time, funding, and staff help. Last year at this time we considered closing the site, however with an election on the horizon we decided to keep F&H going through the election year. With the election come and gone, and with no sense of additional resources, we have decided to close the site down.
Fox and Hounds will live on, at least, with my articles collected in the California State Library.
On a personal note, I have spent over 40 years in California policy and politics. There have been some incredible high moments and some difficult low points. It pains me that politics too often is a blood sport, frequently demonizing the motives of opponents and using the legal system as a weapon in public discourse. At Fox & Hounds, we tried to adhere to the practice of giving all a voice in the debate, yet keep the commentaries civil and avoided personal attacks.
F&H offered the opportunity to publish different perspectives (even ones that criticized my writings!). We had success as indicated by the Washington Post twice citing Fox and Hounds Daily one of the best California political websites and many other positive affirmations and comments received over the years.
Tom, Bryan and I want to thank our many readers and writers for being part of our journey. The publishers of Fox and Hounds Daily believe that we added value to California and its people. We hope you agree.
California Employment Careens into 2016…Though the Handwringing Continues
The California economy careens into 2016. November state employment numbers will be released this Friday, and should follow the job gain trends of the past few years.
In the most recent job numbers through October 2015, California had gained over 2.1 million payroll jobs since February 2010, 463,000 payroll jobs in the year from October 2014 through October 2015, and 41,200 in the month from September to October. The chart above (click to enlarge) prepared earlier this year by Mr. Brandon Hooker of the Employment Development Department (EDD), provides a good overview of the job losses and job gains for California since July 2007. Our state unemployment also has steadily declined over the past six years, down to 5.8% in October. (more…)
Thumbs Down on Neighborhood Integrity Initiative
By now, you may have heard of a new anti-growth effort, the Neighborhood Integrity Initiative, being promoted by a group called the Coalition to Preserve L.A. The initiative would impose harsh restrictions on projects that require major changes to city planning rules – including putting a moratorium of up to 24 months on development projects that cannot be built without votes from elected officials to increase density. It would make it difficult to change the L.A. General Plan for individual real estate projects. It would place City employees directly in charge of preparation of environmental review of major projects. It would require the City Planning Commission to update the City’s community plans to be consistent with the City’s General Plan – even though these initiative supporters often fight any effort to update the community plans.
Let me say the obvious – that the goal of the initiative proponents is to stop any significant development within the City of Los Angeles. They claim that their initiative “will preserve the character of neighborhoods throughout the City of Los Angeles and improve the overall quality of life for city residents.” In actuality, it will worsen the quality of life for city residents – as there will be fewer jobs, higher housing prices, and more congestion. (more…)
California’s Ever-Expanding High School Football Season Is Risky
How many state champions does California need?
There’s a new answer to this question: 13. That’s how many state football champions California will crown this weekend during five state bowl games at Sacramento State’s Hornet Stadium and eight other games around the state. And that’s a big increase from the five state champions we had in 2014—and 13 more than California had before the state’s governing body for high school sports, CIF (the California Interscholastic Federation), started holding state bowl games a decade ago.
Even in the largest football-crazy state of this football-crazy country, that’s an awful lot of football. Indeed, California’s ever-expanding high school football season now starts the last week of August and extends into the winter holiday break. And it’s worth noting that some of the teams seeking state titles this weekend will be playing their 16th games of the season—the same number of games that the pros in the National Football League play each year. (more…)
Democratic Dreams; Republican Opportunity
There are at least three reasons for California Democrats to be proud of themselves this week.
First- guess what? Turns out California has a GREAT business climate, after all! All this doom and gloom about environmental regulations and business taxes is for naught. What’s Joel Kotkin even talking about?
Second- in Paris, our leaders are spreading our ecotopian values around the world to fight climate change! Our state is leading on reducing emissions while still maintaining a top-notch economy and a sky-high GDP. People need only emulate us.
Third- a bill in Congress that would’ve fought The Drought with funding for desalination and storage capacity projects has been killed for the year, precluding those troglodyte build-stuff Republicans from further despoiling our state’s environment! (more…)
Black Bart Nominee: Symbol of New Politics in CA—Steve Glazer
California politics are changing and there is no greater symbol of that change than state Senator Steve Glazer.
Glazer represents a new division in state politics. With the Republican Party losing influence, the majority Democratic Party is beginning to splinter into different factions. This situation has been driven by California’s move to the top-two primary system. Glazer was involved in probably the most high profile example of a top-two intraparty clash when he captured his senate seat in a special election last May topping Assemblywoman Susan Bonilla.
Glazer was backed by the business community looking to find business friendly Democrats. That strategy has intensified with word that many in the business community want the Republican Party to stand away from its support of Republican Assembly leader Kristin Olsen as she considers taking on Democratic Senator Cathleen Galgiani, whom many in the business community feel they can work with. (more…)
There’s Still No Evidence That CEQA Litigation is Impeding California’s Climate Goals
A report published by the law firm Holland and Knight is getting a lot of media attention with its claim that the California Environmental Quality Act actually harms the environment by making it harder for the state to meet its climate goals. I recently criticized this report, demonstrating that its data don’t support its claims. Last week, Sacramento lobbyist and former California Senate leader Don Perata published a post on Fox and Hounds Daily, responding to me. Mr. Perata’s response misses the mark. He doesn’t refute any of my points, but instead misrepresents my views.
Holland and Knight found that most CEQA litigation challenges “infill” projects, and concluded that this means CEQA disproportionately harms environmentally-friendly development. But the law firm did that by defining “infill” to include literally every project located within the geographic boundaries of any municipality, as well as certain other projects. I pointed out the obvious: the fact that most CEQA litigation is about projects within the boundaries of cities (many of which are actually suburbs and sprawling communities) is unsurprising, and simply has nothing to do with whether CEQA harms environmentally-friendly development. For example, Chandler Ranch, a new development in the suburban city of Rolling Hills Estates that includes 114 single-family luxury homes plus a new golf course and clubhouse for the Rolling Hills Country Club, is “infill” under this definition. (more…)