In The News
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Schwarzenegger’s budget could expose state to risk, analyst says
January 12th, 2007
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's proposed budget relies on rosy revenue projections and could expose California to serious financial risk, the state's nonpartisan legislative analyst's office said Friday.
"The budget contains a significant number of downside risks and is based on a number of optimistic assumptions," said Legislative Analyst Elizabeth Hill, in her first review of the $143.4 billion spending plan the governor released Wednesday.
"Its key proposals also raise serious policy and legal issues. Adverse outcomes in just a few of these areas could easily eliminate most or all of the proposed reserve."
Gov. calls on state to borrow and build more
January 10th, 2007
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger called for another multibillion-dollar wave of borrowing Tuesday for new reservoirs, courthouses, classrooms and prison beds — core public resources that, he said, are strained by California's growing population.
In his annual State of the State speech, the governor laid out a plan for $43.3 billion in bonds over the next three years to pay for a round of public construction that would surpass what voters approved in the November election.
If Schwarzenegger can persuade lawmakers to bring his proposal to the ballot — no easy feat, given widespread worries about state finances — voters would be asked to approve the new borrowing in the 2008 and 2010 elections.
A plan with something for everyone to love, hate
January 10th, 2007
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's expansive plan to reform the state's health insurance system seems to contain a carrot and a stick for everyone.
The proposal would give most of California's 6.5 million residents without insurance access to some form of health coverage, but the price might be high for some.
For example, hospitals and doctors would receive more money for taking care of poor patients, but they would have to pay new fees to the state. Insurers would get more business, but they wouldn't be able to turn away high-risk customers with pre-existing illnesses.
“There's something for everybody to love in this proposal, and there's something for everyone to hate,” said Ann Kuhns, Blue Cross of California's vice president for state affairs.
Can California afford Schwarzenegger’s record borrowing plan?
January 9th, 2007
Even as California voters approved a record bond package last year, critics questioned whether it was just too big and would come back to haunt the state's finances.
Whether the $42.7 billion in borrowing for roads, schools, levees, parks and affordable housing would thrust California too far in debt was one of the leading arguments against the bonds.
Now double it.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Tuesday proposed yet another massive borrowing plan, this one $43.3 billion for prisons, courts, schools, colleges and water storage. Can California afford a combined $86 billion in bond debt, especially when it continues to grapple with multibillion dollar annual deficits?
Big-box grocery ban is headed for the ballot box in Long Beach
January 8th, 2007
The battle over banning grocery sales at big box stores in Long Beach will now be fought at the polls and could cost the state's fifth-largest city hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The Long Beach City Council voted in September to ban grocery sales at stores larger than 100,000 square feet, including Wal-Mart, even though the discount retailer had no plans for a so-called Supercenter in the city.
In November a group calling itself Long Beach Consumers for Choice, largely funded by the Greater Long Beach Area Chamber of Commerce and Wal-Mart, presented a referendum petition signed by 33,391 registered voters that favored repealing the ban.
The petition was later certified, leaving the council three options: to kill the ban, place the issue on the June 2008 ballot or hold a special election on the issue.
Gov. to seek cuts in aid to families on welfare
January 8th, 2007
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger will propose a major rollback of the state's welfare system this week, including a cutoff of aid to tens of thousands of children whose parents do not meet minimum work requirements or are in the country illegally, administration officials said Sunday.
The proposed $465-million reduction in California's welfare budget came two days after the governor promised that his second term would feature "post-partisan" cooperation.
State Supreme Court to hear gay marriage challenge
December 20th, 2006
The California Supreme Court unanimously agreed Wednesday to decide whether the state's ban on same-sex marriage violates a constitutional ban on discrimination.
The justices' move sets aside a lower court's decision in October that upheld state laws banning gays and lesbians from marrying one another. The outcome is not likely until late next year.
Massachusetts is the only state that authorizes same-sex marriage.
The justices are reviewing an October decision by the San Francisco-based 1st District Court of Appeal, which ruled 2-1 that California marriage laws do not discriminate because gays and lesbians get most all the rights of marriage the state confers to heterosexual married couples.
Health care plan recipe for disaster
December 20th, 2006
STATE Senate President Don Perata has a plan to provide all uninsured working Californians with health insurance at an estimated cost of $5 billion to $7 billion without a tax increase. OK?
The Perata plan would force businesses that do not provide health insurance and their employees, through a payroll deduction, to pay into a state agency that would attempt to negotiate for "affordable" coverage. When paying taxes, workers would have to show proof of medical insurance.
This is just plain wrong on so many levels. Let me count the ways.
A plan that is estimated to cost $5 billion to $7 billion will, if past government program estimates are any guide, cost a lot more than first advertised. One only has to look at the Bush prescription benefit plan as a reminder.
Dymally regrets using ‘racist’ label
December 20th, 2006
Five days after he called a fellow lawmaker "the most racist legislator I have encountered in over 40 years," Assemblyman Mervyn Dymally (D-Compton) expressed remorse.
In a four-paragraph statement to Assembly Speaker Fabian Nuñez (D-Los Angeles), Dymally, an African American, said, "I have been around long enough to know that you do not mix your personal feelings with public policy. I deeply regret my statement about Assemblyman Hector De La Torre, and it is my hope that this is now behind us."
Dymally called De La Torre, a Democrat from South Gate, a racist after Nuñez asked De La Torre to investigate the practice by Dymally's office of giving official-looking "Assembly commissioner" badges to campaign donors and other supporters. De La Torre heads the Assembly Rules Committee.
Earlier this month one of Dymally's supporters, Pirikana Johnson, 27, of Compton was charged by the Redondo Beach city attorney with impersonating a state official. Johnson allegedly twice flashed at police a badge issued by Dymally's office.
Dymally’s epithet an honor
December 20th, 2006
The official stationery of the U.S. House of Representatives has yellowed with age, but the angry words of the letter still leap from the page.
Then-Congressman Mervyn Dymally sent the missive to this columnist in 1992 in response to a column about those retiring from California political office that year, listing Dymally among those who wouldn't "be found in the political hall of fame."
"I would have thought that time would have tempered your bigotry," Dymally wrote. "But I am told that hatefulness is a sickness, so you are to be forgiven.
"Fortunately, the black media do not share your racist views. The fact that I have been decorated by two countries in Africa and honored in Asia are proof that the Third World recognizes my contribution to build a better life for the underprivileged.
Penalty waivers allow the military, a major polluter, to skirt hefty fines
December 20th, 2006
When Navy officials announced in mid-November that they inadvertently piped 14.2 million gallons of sewage into a tributary of San Diego Bay, water-quality regulators were aghast.
The two-year violation, caused by a piping error involving barracks on the San Diego Naval Base at 32nd Street, amounted to one of the largest sewage spills in San Diego County's recent history.
If the accident happened on civilian property, the perpetrators would have to worry about something besides bad publicity – a hefty fine, perhaps topping $1 million. Such penalties are widely viewed as major deterrents to pollution.
But not the Department of Defense, a large landholder in San Diego County and one of the nation's worst polluters. Thanks to an age-old legal theory and inaction by Congress, the military and other federal agencies can sidestep fines for violating the Clean Water Act of 1972.
County tackling emissions
December 20th, 2006
Sacramento County officials will announce plans today to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in county operations by joining a Chicago exchange whose members buy and sell emissions-reduction credits.
The effort targets the energy consumed running the county's 3,300 vehicles and 70 buildings. It would not apply to businesses and residences in the county.
If approved by the Board of Supervisors, Sacramento County would be the second county in the United States to join the growing number of companies, institutions and municipalities that have voluntarily joined the Chicago exchange.
Pocket change to change the world
December 19th, 2006
The fight against global warming has created its own odd market, one in which companies sell their ability to remove greenhouse gases from the air.
Some of these companies plant trees to absorb carbon dioxide. Others create systems to capture methane produced by dairy cows. Some build windmills to generate electricity that otherwise would come from power plants burning coal or natural gas.
Their buyers? Companies or individuals who want to offset the amount of carbon dioxide they pump into the atmosphere as part of their everyday lives.
While similar markets exist overseas, it's a relatively new phenomenon in the United States. Here, the market still doesn't have many participants and is noticeably short on rules. As public concern over climate change rises, however, the market is expected to grow.
That market got one of its biggest boosts last week when Pacific Gas and Electric Co. jumped in.
Pot is called biggest cash crop
December 18th, 2006
For years, activists in the marijuana legalization movement have claimed that cannabis is America's biggest cash crop. Now they're citing government statistics to prove it.
A report released today by a marijuana public policy analyst contends that the market value of pot produced in the U.S. exceeds $35 billion — far more than the crop value of such heartland staples as corn, soybeans and hay, which are the top three legal cash crops.
California is responsible for more than a third of the cannabis harvest, with an estimated production of $13.8 billion that exceeds the value of the state's grapes, vegetables and hay combined — and marijuana is the top cash crop in a dozen states, the report states.
The report estimates that marijuana production has increased tenfold in the past quarter century despite an exhaustive anti-drug effort by law enforcement.
Three anti-smoking bills headed to Legislature
December 18th, 2006
A month after voters rejected a ballot initiative to raise tobacco taxes, California lawmakers are proposing new laws that would affect how much it costs Californians to light up and where they are allowed to puff.
At least three smoking-related bills have been introduced in the Legislature so far. One bill that could attract attention during the so-called year of health care would raise cigarette taxes by $1.90 a pack to generate almost $2 billion for children's health care and smoking-cessation programs.
"We can do more to stop smoking, to save lives and end suffering,'' said Sen. Tom Torlakson, the Concord Democrat who proposes to raise the tobacco tax with SB 24. "We can do more to save billions that are going down the drain in health care costs.''
Similar efforts have been mounted in the past -- and have fallen short -- and all three proposals next year are likely to attract intense lobbying, predicted San Jose State University political scientist Larry Gerston. The tobacco industry aggressively protects its interests, he noted, and some Democratic and Republican lawmakers have libertarian leanings and instinctively reject so-called "nanny government.''
