Whither California after crises abate?
Someday, the COVID-19 pandemic will have subsided, probably when effective biologic treatments and vaccines emerge. Someday, California’s economy will begin recovery from the sudden and very painful recession that followed business shutdown and stay-at-home orders to fight the pandemic. Someday, too, the tumultuous reaction to a Minneapolis policeman’s brutal suffocation of George Floyd, a black […]
The Big Gamble at the State Capitol Casino
Sometimes following action on a bill in the California legislature feels like you are watching a high stakes poker game. This week such a hand was played in which the gambling house (think the ruling majority) risked $269 million hoping to cash in a much larger prize in a few months. But if the gamble […]
Newsom: Police And Firefighters Will Be Laid Off But We’ll Spend Millions To Enforce AB5
Gov. Gavin Newsom is leveraging the state’s $54.3 billion budget deficit. Give us what we want, he demands, or public safety programs will be cut. At the same time, he wants $20 million to enforce Assembly Bill 5, maybe the most damaging piece of legislation that ever became law in California. Appearing on CNN, Newsom […]
Paying Union Wages Kills Housing Affordability
Here’s a shocker for you: the building trades opposed a housing production bill this session. In fact, they opposed two production bills. Mind you, the association representing unionized subcontractors and their employees did this in the middle of a combined job drought and housing crisis – defying reality. AB 2580 (Eggman) and AB 3155 (Rivas) […]
The Protests: Our takes
Bill and Sherry debate the pace and reality of change demanded by protesters in the wake of the killing of George Floyd by police. They also discuss one of the most significant developments in American politics, the emergence of a strong new generation of African American women mayors. And they look at the controversy over […]
For Californians, It’s All about Covid-19 and the Economy
The latest Public Policy Institute of California poll clearly shows that Californians are focused on the health threat of Covid-19 and its obvious destructive effects on jobs and the economy. Likely voters ranked the Covid-19 issue as the most important issue facing the state at 35%; jobs and the economy was second at 25% and […]
Is Employer Liability Relief Possible in this Pandemic?
At both the federal and state levels, elected officials are considering proposals to relieve businesses of possible legal liability in response to the COVID-19 pandemic as it applies to their workplaces. California is unique because state law allows private litigants to enforce state labor laws and collect legal fees and expenses. Enacted in 2003, California’s […]
Newsom’s Tyranny of Numbers
As the California State Legislature enters the final two weeks of getting their 2020-21 budget to Governor Gavin Newsom for his signature, there is still some confusion as to the size of the financial hole Californians are current under. Is it $18 billion or $54.4 billion? And why the large disparity in numbers? California Governor […]
Is now the time to bring back affirmative action in California?
Depending on your viewpoint, now is either exactly the right time or precisely the wrong time to take up a proposed change to the state constitution that seems certain to reignite a heated debate about race and justice in California. At issue: a measure pending in the Legislature that seeks to reinstate affirmative action policies […]