Angry Business Voices Ask: “Who’s the Boss?”
Feeling the affects regulations impose on business, angry business leaders attending the California Business and Industrial Alliance (CABIA) inaugural meeting in Los Angeles last week had a simple question: “Who’s the boss?” Is the employer still in charge or has government taken over the boss’s role? One employer said the minimum wage increase put through by […]
Connect the World? The Bay Area Can’t Even Connect Its Trains
The northern terminus of SMART, the new passenger-rail system officially opening this weekend in the North Bay, is the Sonoma County Airport Station in Santa Rosa. But after my 8-year-old son and I disembarked from an Alaska Airlines flight, we learned that the airport is more than a mile away from the train. We didn’t […]
California Population Lags Behind Projections
Halfway through the new decade, California, widely seen as an irresistible force for the young and ambitious, is underperforming the state’s own demographic projections. Since 2010 the state’s population grew 5.3 percent from the 2010 census figure, 12 percent below the 6.1 percent increase projected by the California State Department of Finance. The population increased […]
Three Weeks and 966 Bills to Go
Based upon a rough count, there are 436 pending measures on the Assembly and Senate Floors (292 on Senate Floor and 144 on Assembly Floor) as of this Monday’s floor session (August 28). In addition, there are about 511 pending measures in the Senate and Assembly Appropriations Committees (347 in Senate and 164 in Assembly). […]
Budget Trailer Bill Mischief
The California state budget was passed and signed two months ago but the legislature is still passing trailer bills attached to the budget with small money tweaks and major policy changes. It’s doubtful when voters passed Proposition 25 in 2010 that changed the rules on how the budget is approved they intended the legislature to […]
Busting the Myth That Proposition 13 Eviscerated Local Revenue
The year 1978 might seem almost like ancient history – a distant memory for most voters, and unimaginable for a growing class of lawmakers who were not yet born then. With the passage of time, folklore prevails and myths sometimes come to overshadow facts. It is in this light that opponents of Proposition 13 have […]
We Should Get to Vote in More than One Place
In the constant and fruitless search for fraud in American elections, one focus has been on the question of whether some Americans are voting in more than one place. President Trump’s new federal commission on election integrity has already seized on examples of people who are registered to vote in more than one state. It’s […]
Deputy District Attorneys Applaud Supreme Court’s Prop 66 Ruling
We are pleased with the Courts decision to uphold the will of the voters. Prop. 66 preserves the death penalty for the most heinous criminals by enacting critically needed reforms to the system. The court recognized that Californians not only voted to keep the death penalty but also to reform the appellate court system and […]
New California Republicans
San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer called for a “New California Republican Party” during his speech at the Commonwealth Club last week. He said, “It’s time to offer California a GOP with broad appeal again – because a vibrant, competitive Republican Party is good for our state.” Meanwhile, Assembly Minority leader Chad Mayes, holding off a […]