Republicans Present No-Tax Budget Roadmap
This morning the Assembly Republicans presented a budget roadmap that contained no new taxes, funds education at its current level and requires government to help balance the budget by reducing state employee costs.
The six-point plan was formally presented to Assembly Speaker John Perez in a letter from Minority Leader Connie Conway. You can read the letter here. You can read more from Conway in her Flash Report column here.
A take on the plan from Kevin Yamamura of the Sacramento Bee is here. He points out that some features of the plan would require voter approval to move special funds to the general fund that voters rejected in the past.
High-Speed Rail Still Has Place in California
You want to kill a project like high-speed rail? Just let
the Green Eyeshade Brigade start working on it.
On Tuesday, Mac Taylor and his Legislative Analyst’s Office put out a report that treated
the 15-year-old effort to tie the state together with a 200-plus mph train as
something nasty that needed to be wiped off his shoe.
You might remember that plan. It’s the one that 6.6 million
California voters agreed to support with $9 billion in state bond money when
they passed Prop. 1A back in 2008.
It’s also the one that has collected around $3.5 billion in
federal funds even as President Obama has announced a six-year, $53 million
plan to expand high-speed rail, including $8 billion in next year’s budget.
Education Committee Puts Union Interests First – Students Last
Education reform legislation I authored was voted down in the Senate Education Committee yesterday following an outburst of opposition from union interests that were bent on protecting the status quo. SB 355 would have allowed school districts in California to base layoffs on teacher performance rather than just teacher seniority. The measure is part of a broader, nationwide wave of school reform that will allow school districts to foster and retain quality teachers.
With our schools struggling to increase their education quality, I’m disappointed the Senate education committee chose the status quo related to which teachers we let go. Half of our state’s schools are experiencing declining enrollment. Regardless of this year’s difficult budget, layoffs are being made. The defeat of SB 355 means incompetent teachers are still given preference to better teachers because of the quality blind approach we currently use.
Union members with the California Teachers’ Association showed up in force during the committee hearing to oppose my reform efforts, and at the same time, defend the “Last in, First Out” (LIFO) hiring policy. This policy ensures that, no matter how proficient many teachers are, no matter how hard they work, no matter how well they teach, they will receive layoff notices solely based on the date they were hired.
Main Street Menace of the Week: Assembly Bill 10 (Alejo)
While the legislature is in session, the National
Federation of Independent Business/California will be profiling anti-small
business bills and the adverse effect they would have on California’s job
creators. This is the third column of
the 2011 series.
Anyone even remotely tuned in knows that the cost of doing
business in California is high, much higher than the rest of the nation.
California consistently ranks as one of the least business-friendly states in
America, and consequently is losing businesses, big and small, to states that
boast relocation incentives and pro-business regulations.
In order to make up for high taxes and a burdensome
regulatory process, California legislators have decided to… increase the cost
of labor. Huh?
Nigeria teaches us a lesson in democracy
We Americans can learn something about democracy from the people of Nigeria, where I recently joined a few hundred international observers to witness that nation’s presidential election. It was an extraordinarily moving experience to watch democracy being born, and a reminder of what we enjoy as Americans but increasingly take for granted.
Unlike Nigeria’s election in 2007, which was so violent and corrupt that observers called it “the worst they had ever seen anywhere in the world,” observers reported that this year’s presidential election was fair, transparent and mostly peaceful. For the Nigerians I talked to on election day, this was important for the world to know.