Book review: Recovering institutional memory
Assemblyman Willard M. Huyck served two terms in the Legislature shortly after the end of the Second World War. Though little-remembered today, Mr. Huyck is still alive – the only surviving member of the 1940s-era Legislature, a living link to the reigns of Governor Earl Warren and lobbyist Artie Samish. Also in the 1940s, as […]
The cost of California’s public pensions is breaking the bank. Here’s one reason this problem is so hard to fix
More than 20 times in the last 15 years, political leaders looking to control California’s fast-growing public pension costs have tried to put reform initiatives before the voters. None of the proposals has made it onto the ballot. Often, advocates could not raise enough money for signature gathering, advertising and other costs of an initiative […]
The Other California: A Flyover State Within a State
California may never secede, or divide into different states, but it has effectively split into entities that could not be more different. On one side is the much-celebrated, post-industrial, coastal California, beneficiary of both the Tech Boom 2.0 and a relentlessly inflating property market. The other California, located in the state’s interior, is still tied […]
Courts Jump on Revenue Raising Bandwagon
Tax and revenue increases are piling up on Californians–passed by voters, approved by legislators, and now the courts are getting into the act. On the same day that the legislature passed the $52 billion gas tax, California’s Third District Court of Appeal on a 2 to 1 vote upheld a lower court ruling that businesses paying […]
Business Owners, Grassroots Supporters and Lawmakers Stand Together to Stop Shakedown Lawsuits
They would have preferred staying home to tend to their stores, shops and services. But they had to be there to stand up for their economic livelihood and to protect the jobs of their loyal employees. More than 150 small business owners and supporters gathered for a boisterous rally April 4 on the lawns of […]
Dissecting San Jose Unified
Normally, California school districts don’t face financial stress when state revenues are robust. Usually that stress arises only when state revenues shrink as a result of declining stock markets. But schools in California are experiencing stress right now despite record revenues from a long bull market and a tax increase. One illustration is the San Jose Unified […]
Will Democrats get Another Supermajority Vote that could Raise Gas Prices?
The power of the California Democratic party’s ‘supermajority’ was mightily tested Thursday, with the nail-biting passage of a $52 billion transportation package, that will add 12 cents to the price of gasoline. What does that bode for the other big lift coming up in the legislature, the reauthorization of the the state’s landmark climate change […]
Ugly Lawmaking on Display for All to See
Laws are like sausages, it is better not to see them being made. Otto von Bismarck Californians saw the how gas tax sausage was made last night. Hopefully, they enjoyed the show because they will be paying for it to the tune of over $5 billion a year. Promises were made to a number of […]
The Pointless Prop 54
Prop 54 didn’t last long. The bill was approved last year overwhelming, with all right thinking Californians, good government types and newspaper editorialists backing it as a necessary reform. Only a few of us dead-enders – we were accused of being against mom and apple pie – dared speaking against it. Prop 54 was going […]