Either Vote or Disincorporate
Consider two problems, together. California has too many local governments – not just hundreds of municipalities but thousands of various special districts. Far too many
Joe Mathews
April 10, 2015
Author: Joe Mathews
Connecting California Columnist and Editor, Zócalo Public Square, Fellow at the Center for Social Cohesion at Arizona State University and co-author of California Crackup: How Reform Broke the Golden State and How We Can Fix It (UC Press, 2010)
California Needs More Old People
Florida Gov. Rick Scott is traveling to California this weekend with designs on stealing away some of our state’s businesses. So why don’t we return
Joe Mathews
April 9, 2015
Is the Drought Making Us Dumb?
Is the drought making Californians dumb? Hard to say. It definitely affects our sense of time and history. Gov. Brown’s water executive order last week
Joe Mathews
April 7, 2015
Could A New Pro Football Stadium Help California Beat Its Drought?
That’s the ambitious goal of the latest stadium proposal to appear in Los Angeles. The project—details of which are only now becoming public—would provide more
Joe Mathews
April 1, 2015
Let’s Toast China’s President, California’s Savior
Dear President Xi Jinping, This is a thank you note from California. Thank you, first off, for sustaining our neighborhoods through these last difficult years.
Joe Mathews
March 26, 2015
Prop 30 Plus
Reading and listening to (and hearing some background talk) about what sort of tax plan the state’s leaders might offer voters next year, two things
Joe Mathews
March 25, 2015
Harris Should Not Circulate The “Sodomite Suppression Act” to Voters
Does an attorney general of California have a duty to approve for circulation any ballot initiative she receives? The legal consensus is that Attorney General
Joe Mathews
March 23, 2015
The Only Thing Worse Than Scandals Are California’s Attempts to Stop Them
Did we win in Bell? There is no greater symbol of local California corruption than Bell, a city of 35,000 people, 2 ½ square miles,
Joe Mathews
March 19, 2015
Rooting for the Court to Uphold Redistricting Commission
I’m not a fan of the redistricting commission. I don’t hate it either. I think of it more as a waste. So much time and
Joe Mathews
March 16, 2015