Here are a few things I never got around to this week:

• Democratic Senators are asking for a real plan from Gov. Schwarzenegger about how to solve the prison crisis.  AB 900 passed a year ago with the promise of building thousands more beds to address prison overcrowding.  To date not one construction project has begun.  This is a complete shell game, and the courts are likely to act immediately in the face of such incompetence.  Just another reason why trying to build our way out of this problem was such a stupid idea.

• Not only did immigrant’s rights advocates rally in Los Angeles today, they were joined by businesses who want an end to workplace raids.  I actually believe in workplace enforcement to an extent, but business can be a powerful ally in reaching toward a comprehensive solution.  The crowd was smaller this year but I think there’s a more robust coalition for a breakthrough.  Voter mobilization is going to be the key.

• Others have mentioned the new poll numbers on taxes and schools, but I’ll say this – decades of anti-tax rhetoric has succeeded in dislodging the relationship between taxes and services.  People want education and other services to be funded but don’t want to pay for it.  The only way to restore that relationship is to… restore that relationship, by specifically explaining how America is worth paying for and turning the whole issue on its head.  Not a huge revelation, but thought I’d throw it out.

• Home prices continue to fall in LA and Orange County, and foreclosures continue to wreak havoc on the state’s homeowners, including Jose Canseco.

• I thought this was the most interesting study of the week:

It’s often said, “You are what you eat,” but new research suggests that where you eat may have a lot to do with it, as well.

In communities with an abundance of fast-food outlets and convenience stores, researchers have found, obesity and diabetes rates are much higher than in areas where fresh fruit and vegetable markets and full-service grocery stores are easily accessible.

“The implications are really dramatic,” said Harold Goldstein, a study author and executive director of the California Center for Public Health Advocacy, based in Davis. “We are living in a junk-food jungle, and not surprisingly, we are seeing rising rates of obesity and diabetes.”

Intuitive, and it’s a chicken-or-the-egg argument.  Convenience stores and fast-food outlets move to neighborhoods where people are more likely to only be able to afford convenience stores and fast food.  However, the researchers claim this holds across socioeconomic strata.  “Food environment” is something we have to think about.  Education would seem to be the key,

• Forgot to link George Skelton’s article on the potential for competing redistricting measures on the ballot.  My position on redistricting is well-known.  Skelton does segue into initiative reform, which is sorely needed.

Yesterday morning NPR ran this report on housing prices:

Economists say home prices are nowhere near hitting bottom. But even in regions that have taken a beating, some neighborhoods remain practically unscathed. And a pattern is emerging as to which neighborhoods those are.

The ones with short commutes are faring better than places with long drives into the city. Some analysts see a pause in what has long been inexorable – urban sprawl.

This is a predictable fact of soaring gas prices. Older city centers have more commute options, and usually shorter commutes period, meaning less gas consumption. This eliminates a key source of pressure on household incomes.

In fact, we can see a similar pattern here in California. The areas hardest hit by foreclosures are those places with the longest commutes – Stockton, Modesto, the SoCal Inland Empire. And when did the housing bubble begin to burst? Late 2006 and early 2007, as gas prices broke through the $3 barrier for good.

This view is bolstered by a new study and widget from the Center for Neighborhood Technology. It shows that once you factor in transportation costs, living in a city center is just as, if not more affordable, for a middle-class family than a suburb – at least in Seattle (a typical West Coast city with sky-high rents and home prices in the city center).

All of this reinforces the point I made last August in Redefining the California Dream, where I argued that the only way lower- and middle-income Californians will have economic security and be able to afford the cost of living is if we abandon the obsolete 20th century model of sprawl and embrace the 21st century model of elegant density.

It would help, of course, if folks like Zev Yaroslavsky would stop spending their time trying to prevent this necessary shift in living patterns. We need to bolster affordable housing policies, provide mass transit alternative, and zone for walkable communities if we are to avoid a situation where we merely exchange the inner city slum for a suburban slum.

Yes, it’s a new record!

Sinking home values and the collapse of flimsy mortgages sent a record number of California homes into the foreclosure process in the first three months of this year, a real estate information service reported today.

Default notices — the first stage of foreclosure — were sent to owners of 110,000 California homes from January to March, about 1% of the homes in the state, according to La Jolla-based DataQuick Information Systems. Default notices were up 143% from the same quarter a year ago.

Most California homeowners in default are now eventually forfeiting their properties to lenders. Only about 32% of those receiving default notices prevent foreclosure by refinancing or selling their property to pay off their mortgages, DataQuick reported. A year ago, 52% of those in default were able to avoid foreclosure.

If you read between the lines here, the implication is that around 70,000 families are in the process of losing their homes.  In the first quarter 47,000 additional families had their homes repossessed, which is a 400% year-over-year increase.

This is hundreds of thousands of people, and it’s getting to be a significant percentage of the state’s population.  And the federal government is dragging their feet looking for a solution.  And the state can do little beyond stopgap measures.

This is why the budget projections are ballooning.

I’ll fill you in on the protest soon.  It went very well.  But I’m fortunate enough to be able to go to Burbank at 4:00 on a Friday and protest.  Some of our other fellow Californians aren’t so lucky.  They’re busy trying to find a way to keep their homes and feed their families.  The LA Times has the latest job numbers, and they’re obscene.

California’s unemployment rate rose by a whopping half a percentage point in March, reaching 6.2% as a weakening economy shed jobs in the ailing construction and financial activities sectors. In all, 1.13 million were unemployed […]

California is doing worse than Pennsylvania and Ohio … the two Rust Belt states that have figured prominently in the presidential primary elections because of their lost manufacturing jobs.

If the governor’s budget-cutting plan moves forward and thousands of educators across the state lose their jobs, this will only get worse.  The worst, absolute worst numbers are in the Inland Empire, where construction is at a standstill and housing-related employment is melting away.

The rise in unemployment during March affected all of Southern California, with the worst effects in the Inland Empire. The rate in Riverside County — not seasonally adjusted — rose to 7.4% from 7.0%, while in San Bernardino County it rose to 6.7% from 6.3%.

7.4% isn’t approaching the 1980s just yet, but it’s getting pretty damn close.  And areas like the IE, which don’t have a sustaining support structure for the unemployed or the needy the way that, say, Los Angeles does, are particularly vulnerable.  We’re on the front lines of an economic meltdown that is rapidly expanding.

Good thing we have a bantaaastic governor who gets on the cover of Time magazine!  

Some links that I’ve picked up along the way:

• Assemblymember and former Banking Committee Chair Ted Lieu had a good piece yesterday on the foreclosure crisis and how continuing a laissez-faire attitude toward a deregulated lending industry is a recipe for even more disaster.  AB 1830 is the vehicle to crack down on irresponsible lenders and ban risky loans.

• Steve Wiegand writes about the circuitous route the Governor has taken this year, first toward fiscal austerity, then toward revenue enhancement, and everywhere in between.  Schwarzenegger is completely squeezed, knowing his legacy and reputation is on the  line and at his wit’s end over how to bridge the chasm between Republican intransigence and a way forward for California.

• The California Labor Fed has released its endorsements for legislative races.  Not a lot of surprises here, nor a lot of variance from the CDP endorsements, although Carole Migden and Bob Blumenfield didn’t see their endorsements vacated on the convention floor.  The Labor Fed can endorse multiple candidates in one race, which allows them to wiggle out of some of the more contested primaries (in AD-14 they actually had a TRIPLE endorsement).  The Labor Fed does bring member education, and in some cases money and volunteers, so it’s not a little thing.

• Wired’s Autopia looks at LA’s future in mobility.  In a word, I would call the report frustrating.  It’s basically going to take forever until the city truly has the transit system it deserves; right now, just 7% of the city uses mass transit.

• Mayor Villaraigosa takes a strong stand against ICE raids.

“I am concerned that ICE enforcement actions are creating an impression that this region is somehow less hospitable to these critical businesses than other regions,” Villaraigosa wrote in a March 27 letter to Michael Chertoff, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security […]

In his letter, Villaraigosa said ICE has targeted “established, responsible employers” in industries that have a “significant reliance on workforces that include undocumented immigrants.”

“In these industries, including most areas of manufacturing, even the most scrupulous and responsible employers have no choice but to rely on workers whose documentation, while facially valid, may raise questions about their lawful presence,” he wrote. He said ICE should spend its limited resources targeting employers who exploit wage and hour laws.

“At a time when we are facing an economic downturn and gang violence at epidemic levels, the federal government should focus its resources on deporting criminal gang members rather than targeting legitimate businesses,” said Matt Szabo, the mayor’s spokesman.

In general I agree with worksite rules enforcement, but the issue does seem to be out of proportion and balance.  It’s selective.

• This is a really interesting and refreshingly honest article by Brad Plumer on the SEIU/UHW situation.

The ongoing state budget deficit is but one aspect of the crisis facing public services in California. Local governments in particular are still very dependent on property taxes, and when those revenues decline, it affects libraries, local parks, roads, and puts added pressure on local schools.

Which is why this LA Times article is so worrying to see:

The tumbling housing market has prompted county tax officials around Southern California to begin reducing the assessed value of many houses, resulting in lower tax bills for homeowners but less-than-expected revenue for already cash-strapped governments.

The values of more than 41,000 homes have been reassessed downward so far in Los Angeles County, resulting in an average tax saving of $660. Other counties have barely begun the reassessment process but promise to get the job done before property tax bills are mailed in October….

In Los Angeles County, the assessment rolls include 2.3 million parcels and about 300,000 pieces of business equipment, boats and airplanes. The county receives about a third of property tax revenue, cities get a quarter, school districts take 20% and community redevelopment areas and special districts combined receive 20%.

The process by which reassessment takes place is somewhat complicated, but the overall point is that as property values decline, so too will revenues.

And this is going to be a long decline. The “bottom” may not be reached for another 4 years. And as this recession is likely to be long and deep, it suggests that government finances in California, on the state and local level, are going to be stressed for the next few years.

In such a situation the previous approach of “gut and run” – slash the state budget and hope a quick recovery prevents further damage to services – will accomplish little more than creating more suffering.