Inside Government
Back to homepageAB32 vs. jobs
The nonpartisan — and, in my experience, professional and objective — Legislative Analyst confirms that AB32 will kill jobs. AB32 is the 2006 bill that’s supposed to cut greenhouse gases by 20% by 2020. It’s called the “Global Warming Solutions
Read MoreLegislators Allow Another Enviro "Ransom"
When the word “mitigate” is used repeatedly in a legislative hearing, and written extensively into the summary of the proposed bill, special interest must be wrangling money from business, claiming to try to “limit damages.” Specifically, environmentalists win another big
Read MoreVoyeurism bill shut down
March 9, 2010 By KATY GRIMES Fulfilling a request by the Riverside County District Attorney, Assembly member Kevin Jeffries, R-Lake Elsinore, introduced legislation last month requiring any person convicted of inappropriate sexual filming offenses to register as a sex offender.
Read MoreBrown scandal resurfacing?
Mar. 9, 2010 Sacramento Bee columnist Dan Walters has been covering California politics since 1975. No one writing about our beloved state government has more experience or authority. But Walters did a curious thing in his March 3 column, titled
Read MoreThe Ballad of John Nunez
Once upon a time — okay, in 1996 — there was a Garvey school board member named John Nunez. He apparently didn’t really get along with another school board member named Robert Miranda, because one day Nunez told a couple
Read MoreFeel like cussing
March 7, 2010 California’s union-dominated, Democratic-controlled Legislature is temperamentally incapable of fixing the state’s structural budget deficit, given that such a fix would require reduced government spending and the granting of fewer benefits to the state’s class of government workers.
Read MoreCertainty Shmertainty
Just to recap a bit for those following at home: the state is currently running a $20 billion or so budget deficit. What to do about it has paralyzed Sacramento for, well, years, virtually guaranteeing that it will get worse. Notice
Read MoreLegislators Consider Merits of Williamson Act
Mar. 3, 2010 By KATY GRIMES For more than 45 years, California farmers, ranchers and land owners have voluntarily participated in the Williamson Act, which restricted the use of their land to agriculture but gave property tax breaks for the
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Calls For Senator's Resignation
What a sad and awkward day it is when newspapers call for the resignation of a Senator, and it’s not even surrounding a sex scandal or serious political mishap. Two newspapers in Senator Patricia Wiggins’ district have called for her
Read MorePublic Versus Private: Different Sets of Rules
Mar. 2, 2010 The recent stories of state workers abusing vacation policies and comp-time serves as another reminder that there are two sets of rules and laws in California — one for private sector employers and one for the state
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