Back in 2010, the California League of Conservation Voters put up a GreenGov 2010 supporting Jerry Brown.  It is still up: http://greengov2010.org/

Given Brown’s lack of performance on the issues of water and fracking, I wonder how happy CLCV is with their candidate now.  From my vantage, the most recent problems surround the Brown Administration’s being hell bent for leather to find one way or another to put a couple of tunnels under the Sacrament Delta.  That trades saving about a dozen homes for a 5 year disruption to the Sandhill Crane reserve and nesting grounds.  It still means that 19 homes will be lost.  

Brown’s lackey, Jerry Meral, wants to paint this as an improvement?  What does CLCV think?  I know the Restore the Delta position.  

George Skelton asks: Why do we have a LG?

by Brian Leubitz

In many states, the LG runs on a ticket with the governor. They are effectively a glorified aid, but all power runs through the governor. That is not the case in California, where LGs are independently elected. Getting elected to statewide office is not a trivial matter, but many are now wondering if the effort is worth it at all. Skelton summarizes the office:

California’s lieutenant governor is a voting member of the UC Board of Regents and state university trustees. That’s the job highlight.

He’s also ostensibly president of the state Senate – and can vote if there’s a 20-20 tie – but got booted off the chamber floor this year because there was nothing for him to do officially. He also chairs the state economic development commission, but it can’t vote because Brown hasn’t filled enough vacancies.

So lieutenant governor is pretty much a nothing job. … Newsom’s budget is down to less than $1 million. That’s enough for 3 1/2 employees.

Just dump the whole office. Why bother?

“I think it can have an important purpose,” Newsom responds. “It can be the eyes and ears for the governor on higher ed, economic development, delta water….”(George Skelton / LAT)

While Newsom is trying to strengthen the office, his bill to link the elections into one wasn’t even carried this year. Of course, the cost savings of such a measure will mean that eventually somebody will consider it, if only for purposes of grandstanding. But the question of whether we should have an office of the LG at all is a bigger question, that should be addressed.

One of these days we’ll really have that constitutional convention where we can really discuss how we can really reform our government in an holistic manner. And you could certainly draw up a number of proposals that make the LG more useful. Heck, in Texas, many consider the LG almost as powerful as the Governor. Bill Hobby and Bob Bullock became Texas legends from the LG spot. But, seeing as the convention idea kind of went nowhere just a few years back, maybe not any day soon. In the mean time, LG Newsom will continue to work to make his office relevant.

Photo credit: flickr user Franco Folini.

Legislature Agrees to Deal with Governor, Set to Pass Soon

by Brian Leubitz

It turns out representative democracy works. It really works! When you let the majority party do its job, they tend to get it done. It doesn’t hurt that the Governor is of the same party as well, of course. However, in the end, the Governor got most of what he wanted, this is primarily a budget with limited restorations of persistent funding. And he mostly got his way on school funding as well. From John Myers:

The proposal, which still must be put into actual bill form by week’s end, gives legislative Democrats from both houses a smattering of their priorities, from money for mental health programs to new dollars for career technical education and a new scholarship program aimed at college students from middle-class families.

For the governor, the budget includes most of what he wanted in a major education funding plan to earmark money for disadvantaged students.  The proposal tinkers with, but retains the structure, of the formulas first demanded by Brown in January — including extra cash for school districts with higher concentrations of poor and English learner students. (John Myers / News10)

There are still plenty of smaller details to work out, but the budget is looking like it will be passed on time for a third straight year. It is no coincidence that it has been three years since the majority vote ballot measure was passed.

On the other hand, this budget is far from all that could be desired from a progressive standpoint. There are big holes that should be filled sooner rather than later. We are still leaving some of our most vulnerable Californians without the services that they desperately need. We are still underfunding the supposedly co-equal judicial branch. We are still underfuning health care services.

The budget uses Brown’s more conservative estimates of revenue over the LAO’s estimates of $3B extra, but perhaps that caution could lead to a more sustainable future for state services.

Business funded poll has some otherwise predictable results

by Brian Leubitz

The business roundtable is pretty much exactly what you would think it is: a business, right-leaning group that wants lower taxes and job growth.  So, it is no surprise that in their recent poll, almost 79% of Californians think taxes are too high. Now, there are a lot of ways to ask that question, and the results are somewhat confusing considering a strong majority voted for Prop 30 to raise taxes.

But some of the other data is more useful, including some evidence of support for the Governor’s education agenda:

* 54.5%, including 68.3% of Latinos support the governor’s proposed education funding plan to allocate additional money to school districts with higher populations of high-needs students;

* 56.4% support the Governor’s current budget proposal to send an additional $2.9 billion to California schools, including $1 billion in one-time funding to help schools implement recently adopted academic standards. (CBRT)

Now, I think this poll is best viewed in a larger context of other data, and that will come soon enough. However, for now, the Governor appears to be on the right track.

By Gary Cohn

John Thomas and Hans Burkhardt have a lot in common. For more than 17 years each man had a good paying union job, with health and pension benefits, near San Francisco Bay. Thomas worked as a warehouseman for VWR International, a medical supply company with a warehouse in Brisbane, south of Candlestick Park. Burkhardt also worked as a warehouseman, for BlueLinx, a building products company with a facility across the bay in Newark.

The similarities don’t end there. Both Thomas and Burkhardt are now collecting unemployment, having lost their $22-an-hour jobs after their employers moved to take advantage of California’s enterprise zone plan, a controversial state program that is supposed to create jobs.

The enterprise program, established in 1984, provides $700 million in tax breaks for companies that set up business or move to one of 40 zones within the state. It is operated by the state but administered by local governments. The program gives companies tax credits of up to $37,440 per person hired in one of the zones, which are intended to create jobs and spark investment in economically distressed areas. Yet interviews and public documents reviewed by Frying Pan News reveal that some of these zones are located in relatively well-off areas, including San Francisco’s Financial District and the city’s hipster-packed SoMa neighborhood, which is home to many software and technology firms. In Southern California, enterprise zone areas encompass parts of Hollywood and the corporate center of downtown Los Angeles.

The program has been under fire for years from critics who say that it simply rewards employers for moving jobs from one location to another — and who echo the charge that several of the so-called enterprise zones aren’t really in economically distressed regions.  According to sources with knowledge of the program, other businesses that have applied for enterprise zone credits include two strip clubs, Gold Club Centerfolds and Déjà vu Showgirls.

The two gentlemen’s clubs are located in Rancho Cordova, a largely middle-class suburb just east of the state’s capitol, Sacramento. Gold Club Centerfolds advertises itself as “Sacramento’s All Nude Adult Entertainment,” while Déjà vu Showgirls, which is part of a national chain of clubs, offers “1000’s of Beautiful Girls and 3 Ugly Ones.” It isn’t known whether the applications were approved because, like so much of the program, the names of recipients aren’t public information. (The two clubs have not responded to requests for comment; neither have VWR or BlueLinx.)

In fact, because the program falls under the purview of tax codes, much of its day to day workings, including the names of businesses that receive the enterprise zone tax credits, aren’t publicly available. Overall, 61 percent of enterprise zone tax credits were claimed by corporations with more than $1 billion in assets. People familiar with the program say that recipients include huge retailers such as Walmart. The total amount of enterprise tax credits received by Walmart is one of those facts cloaked in the program’s tax secrecy.

Numerous studies have raised questions about the value of the enterprise zone program. The nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California concluded in 2009 that enterprise zones had no effect on job creation.

“On average, enterprise zones have no statistically significant effect on either business creation or employment growth rates,” the study said. “The absence of evidence of a beneficial effect of California’s enterprise zones on job and business creation clearly calls into question whether the state should continue to grant enterprise zone tax incentives.”

Other critics say that the worst thing about the program is the human toll it takes on workers. Both John Thomas and Hans Burkhardt were willing to move with their companies, but under the provisions of the enterprise zone program the companies cannot take their current workers and still claim the tax credits.

“They should have taken people with them who wanted to go,” says Burkhardt. “I would have gone.”  The union jobs that Burkhardt and Thomas and their fellow workers had at the BlueLinx and VWR locations paid, on average, about $20 an hour, plus benefits. They were replaced with non-union positions that paid about one-half of that, with non-existent or substantially reduced benefits.

“I’ve been up here four years, and this is the most abused program I’ve seen,” says state Senator Jerry Hill, (D-San Mateo), whose district includes Brisbane, where VWR had its warehouse.

“This [the enterprise zone program] is not creating jobs at all,” Hill says. “This is a big-industry, big-business tax grab.” The move by VWR, owned by private equity firm Madison Dearborn Partners, cost Brisbane about $2.1 million a year in tax revenue while saving the company more than $1.5 million annually through the enterprise zone program, according to Hill’s office.

Hill has introduced Senate Bill 434 to reform the program by specifying that employers must create net new jobs to claim the hiring credit and that the jobs pay at least $16 an hour. The legislation also calls for the creation of a public database of companies that get the tax breaks and the number of jobs they created. The bill was approved by the state Senate Appropriations Committee this week, and is expected to go to the full Senate later this year.

Governor Jerry Brown has previously tried unsuccessfully to get rid of the enterprise zone program, claiming that it doesn’t create new jobs and unfairly benefits companies moving from one location to another. Last week he proposed that the zones be replaced by a sales tax credit for firms that buy manufacturing or biotech equipment.  Like his proposal to eliminate the program, Brown’s new initiative is likely to be opposed by legislators whose districts include enterprise zones.

Craig Johnson, president of the California Association of Enterprise Zones, vehemently defends the current program.

“The program does work and it has been successful,” he says in an interview. “It does create jobs. In 2012, the enterprise zone program was responsible for 25,000 new jobs in California and responsible for the retention of 115,000 jobs. By every metric used to evaluate a program like this, it has been very successful.”

Former workers at BlueLinx and VWR, who were represented by Teamsters Local 853, hold a different opinion.

“I’ve been angry. I’ve been upset. It’s not good for the state,” says Thomas, who was among about 75 warehouseman and drivers who lost their jobs when VWR moved its Brisbane facility to Visalia, located 235 miles away in the San Joaquin Valley. “People like me, if we lose our jobs the people of the state of California have to pick up the tab on unemployment.”

Even though he has worked only part-time jobs since then and is currently on unemployment, Thomas feels fortunate that he still has health insurance coverage through his wife’s job.

Burkhardt recalls that, early on, BlueLinx told its workers that they could move with it to a new location. Later, an employee found through an Internet search that the company was actually moving to Stockton, and that workers would not be allowed to transfer with the company.

Doug Bloch, Teamsters political director for the Central Valley and Northern California, says that the situation involving VWR and BlueLinx epitomizes all that is wrong with the enterprise zone program.

“Our union is all for programs that create jobs in economically distressed areas,” Bloch says. “This program doesn’t create jobs.”

The situation involving the layoffs of existing workers when VWR and BlueLinx moved to enterprise zones, he says, “was really perverse. Their tax dollars were given to their employers to replace their jobs.”

“I lost my job and a lot of people got devastated.” says Thomas, now 62. “They pirated jobs from the people at Brisbane and moved to Visalia – and [the company] got paid for it.”

Burkhardt, 58, who has been out work since BlueLinx closed its Newark warehouse, agrees. “You’re taking some people off unemployment and putting some on unemployment.”

(Gary Cohn writes for Frying Pan News.)

LAO thinks more cash is coming than  Gov. Brown

by Brian Leubitz

In his negotiations with the Legislature, perhaps Gov. Brown would prefer to bargain over less money and pocket any extra revenues that fall into the general fund over the course of the fiscal year. But alas, the LAO thinks that the bigger sum should be in discussion:

Legislative Analyst Mac Taylor projected state revenues Friday that are $3.2 billion higher than those projected by Gov. Jerry Brown this week in his revised budget proposal.

The difference translates into $400 million for the current fiscal year and $2.8 billion for the year that begins in July. The projection sets up a potential battle between Brown and fellow Democrats in the Legislature. who want to spend more than he proposes.

Both Brown and Taylor urge fiscal restraint, however, because revenue projections are largely dependent upon economic factors ranging from employment to housing prices. Both also agree that the bulk of the money will go to schools under state law.(SacBee)

Taylor is generally in favor of taking the cautious approach, so that’s no surprise. But acknowledging the extra cash will surely mean that the fight is more intense from legislators that are looking to restore funding for some of the state’s programs. Social services, the judiciary, higher education and other interests are competing with the Prop 98 K-14 funding guarantee, and the fight will be typically intense. This LAO report will only add intensity.

Abel Maldonado Wildly Misses Mark in His Criticism of the Prison Realignment Policy

by Brian Leubitz

By any estimation, Governor Brown is in a tough spot politically and managerially with the issues surrounding the prisons. As Attorney General, he fought the federal courts on capacity and healthcare standards. As Governor,  he’s been forced to actually implement the reduction of population by those judges. And he’s been fighting it all the way.

But, in realignment, he probably struck on the path of least resistance to state prison population. It allows a significant reduction in population without actually setting all of the prisoners free. But that’s not what Abel Maldonado sees.

Maldonado, flanked by Fontana Mayor Acquanetta Warren and Erin Runnion, whose daughter Samantha was kidnapped and murdered in a high-publicized 2002 crime, argued in favor of an as-yet-unwritten ballot measure that would repeal A.B. 109, the law creating the state’s realignment policy, which Maldonado referred to as “early release.”

“The legislature and more importantly, the governor, won’t fix early release,” said Maldonado, a former lieutenant governor and legislator who represented communities in Santa Barbara County.(Daily Bulletin)

Abel Maldonado simply sees it as “early release” and plans on running some sort of initiative to address the issue. How it will address the issue while maintaining compliance with the federal rulings is anybody’s guess. It’s hard to see the ToughOnCrime act to be anything other than posturing for the 2014 race for governor. And he’s searching for Willie Horton. Desperately. Calitics diarist smoker1 pointed that out last week.

This week, Abel Maldonado held a news conference announcing a statewide effort to repeal the realignment program.  Proof of the dangers of realignment: the heinous murder of Mary Beth Blaskey.  Jerome Anthony Rogers has been arrested and charged with the murder.  Rogers, 57, has a lengthy criminal record, but was last in prison in 2003.  

Got it?  The last time he was in prison was 2003 and Maldonado is using this case as an example of how realignment is failing.  Realignment came last year, not 10 years ago. Why would Maldonado use a case that has nothing to do with realignment to promote an effort to repeal realignment?  Because there is no such case within the realignment universe.

The thing about the California prison system is that there is a lot of shades of gray. Way more than 50, it turns out. There are some hardened criminals, some murderers, some rapists and the like, that will probably never be rehabilitated to the point that we’ll want them on the streets. However, the total number in that category are a minuscule portion of an enormous system. The recidivism rate in our system was hovering around 70% for a while, dipping down to 65% in 2012. But considering that the national level is below 45%, there is still a ways to go.

But much of that increased rate is about parole violations. Increasing parole flexibility and working with former prisoners to increase the percentage of better outcomes could go a long way to reducing some of that recidivism.  Some of that has already been happening in a few counties, but there is a lot more work to be done.

Realignment itself laid a heavy burden on counties, and this is where the changes haven’t really been as successful as we would like. They were supposed to get reimbursed for much of that burden, and while they will see additional revenues from the state to pay for the increased expenditures, it seems unlikely that they will ever be made truly whole.  However, Brown knows what he’s doing. Counties should be held more directly responsible for the prison population. Allowing prosecutors to simply lock away a criminal and forget about them has a perverse effect on the extreme overcapacity at state prisons.

The entire law enforcement community has begun a process of working to improve efficiency. As prisons have passed higher education spending, this is a conversation long overdue. But these changes can’t come overnight. But we can’t allow our prison budget to overwhelm the general fund, and we can’t build our way out of the prison crisis. We need to reduce the prison population, and that is done through hard work, funding education, including Brown’s effort to increase resources for disadvantaged students, and reducing the population of reoffenders.

Maldonado wants to simply revert back to the failed ToughOnCrime policies because that just might be an issue that scares voters. It’s simplistic and cynical.