Jerry and Meg Rely on Arnold’s Budget Ideas
Jerry Brown and Meg Whitman have the same problem when it comes to offering solutions to California’s budget crisis:
His name is Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Whatever you think of the current governor, Schwarzenegger made many, many attempts to deal with the state’s budget problems. In fact, the governor has tried so many different tactics that he succeeded – not in balancing the budget but in showing that there’s really no way to balance the budget under the current budget system.
Funding the Yes on 27 Campaign. Or is that the Intention?
The campaign to bring congress under the independent redistricting commission (Yes on Prop 20), and at the same time defeat the effort to do away with the redistricting commission all together (No on Prop 27), has taken a look at the efforts of Congressman Howard Berman to get legislators to fund Prop 27 and has suggested the money raised to pass 27 will eventually end up being used to defeat Prop 20.
Here’s the deal: Berman is encouraging legislators to donate to a campaign to pass Proposition 27, which will get rid of the independent redistricting commission the people set up by passing Proposition 11 a couple of years ago. The commission takes over the power once jealously guarded by legislators to draw legislative districts. Legislators would prefer to create their own safe legislative districts than see independent commissioners drawing the lines.
However, Proposition 11 did not apply to redistricting congressional districts. Proposition 20 was put on the ballot so that congressional redistricting would become part of the new commission’s portfolio.
California’s 60 Finalists for Redistricting Commission a Diverse Group
Just minutes ago, California’s Applicant Review Panel completed
its work selecting its pool of 60 finalists for California’s first-ever
Citizens Redistricting Commission. The pool, consisting of 20
Democratic applicants, 20 Republicans, and 20 "others," now advance to the Legislative Strikes phase of the selection process.
The 60 finalists are a diverse group. In
the battle of educational institutions, the UC system beat out the Cal
State system 33 to 13. Ivy Leagues schools have 9 finalists, USC has 6,
Standford has 5 and our sister institution Claremont Graduate
University has two. (Some applicants graduated from more than one
college or university, and are thus counted more than once).
In terms of income, one applicant reported earning less than $35,000
last year, 9 earned between $35,000 and $75,000, 20 earned between
$75,000 and $125,000, 22 earned between $125,000 and $250,000, and 8
earned more than $250,000.
Did Your Tax Dollars Line The Pockets Of Bell’s Leaders?
A
document sent to PublicCEO.com reveals that the city of Bell received
nearly $1 million of federal money in the fiscal year ended June 30,
2009 alone (see attached document).
A
bulk of the federal money received by Bell was from the CDBG program
which is intended to provide assistance for low-income housing, among
other things.
Did
the City use this money to help provide low income housing or did it
instead use the money to pad its highly paid administrators salaries?