State Controller Betty T. Yee announced earlier this month an expansion of the eClaim feature for the state’s unclaimed property program. Property owners will now be eligible to submit their claims for property valued up to $5,000 using the controller’s streamlined paperless electronic claim process.

“The eClaim process is simple, efficient, and can be completed in a couple of minutes,” Yee said in a press release. “An increased threshold of $5,000 will allow many more Californians to claim lost or forgotten property online and quickly receive a check in the mail.”

Unclaimed Property: Your Money Held by the State

Under state law, when there’s been no activity on an account for three years, financial institutions are obliged to report this unclaimed property to the California Controller’s Office. In turn, the controller holds the funds until it is claimed by the owner. The most common types of unclaimed properties are bank accounts, stocks, bonds, uncashed checks, wages, life insurance benefits and safe deposit box contents.

Among the biggest problems facing the state’s unclaimed property program: a lack of public awareness about where people can find their old property. Most people don’t realize they’re owed money from a forgotten insurance settlement or an abandoned stock dividend.

However, for those owners aware of the program, obtaining the necessary paperwork to prove ownership can be costly and time-consuming. Many find the hassle of paperwork not worth a small dollar amount.

Unclaimed Property: eClaim created by Chiang

To address the paperwork hassle problem, in January 2014, then-Controller John Chiang created the eClaim feature to expedite the return process for properties valued at less than $500. Later that year, Chaing increased the value to $1,000. In total, more than 315,000 properties have been returned through the Controller’s eClaim feature.

The state currently holds more than $8 billion in unclaimed property that rightfully belongs to more than 32 million people and businesses. More than three-quarters of unclaimed properties are estimated to be eligible for the new expanded eClaim feature. Yee says that by increasing the threshold to $5,000, she’ll be able to return another $9.4 million per year.

Among those who could benefit from the eClaim feature is billionaire hedge fund manager turned environmental activist Tom Steyer. The former hedge fund manager has three unclaimed properties, each valued at less than $50, dating back to his time as founder of the San Francisco-based Farallon Capital Management.

LAO Report: State Can Do More

For decades, the state has made it difficult for owners to obtain their property. From 1990-2007, state law prohibited the Controller’s office from contacting approximately 80 percent of owners.

Earlier this year, the state Legislative Analyst’s Office released a report critical of the state’s unclaimed property system. The state could do a better job of finding owners, the report concluded, instead of passively waiting for the cash to be claimed.

It also argued that the state has a conflict of interest in managing the program.

“In particular, because property not reunited with owners becomes state General Fund revenue, the unclaimed property law creates an incentive for the state to reunite less property with owners,” the report found. “Now generating over $400 million in annual revenue, unclaimed property is the state General Fund’s fifth-largest revenue source. This has created tension between two opposing program identities — unclaimed property as a consumer protection program and as a source of General Fund revenue.”

Unclaimed Property: How to Search for Unclaimed Property

To find out if you have unclaimed property held by the state, go to www.claimit.ca.gov.

This week, the University of California issued a new open access policy that gives anyone in the world free access to scholarly articles authored by UC employees. That means clinical faculty, lecturers, staff researchers, postdoctoral scholars, graduate students and librarians at the system’s 10 campuses and numerous research labs will finally be allowed to share their work with the public.

“With the Presidential Open Access Policy’s inclusion of scholarly articles authored by a wide range of UC researchers, the University affirms its mission as a forward-looking public research institution in service to the people of California and to scholars around the world,” said Susan Carlson, the University of California’s vice-provost for academic personnel and programs.

UC Academic Senate paved way for open access

The latest UC decree builds on an open access policy previously-adopted by the UC Academic Senate, which represents more than 8,000 faculty members at all 10 UC campuses. In 2013, UC faculty members granted the public access to their research, but lacked the authority to require open access for work of non-faculty members.

“The Faculty of the University of California is committed to disseminating its research and scholarship as widely as possible,” states the Open Access Policy for the Academic Senate of the University of California, which was first passed in the summer of 2013. “In particular, as part of a public university system, the Faculty is dedicated to making its scholarship available to the people of California and the world.”

The new UC open access policy covers “all employees and students at the University of California campuses, the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, the Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources, the UC Medical Centers, the Office of the President, and all auxiliary University locations not already covered by the Academic Senate Open Access Policy.” As a result of the change, UC says that its open access publishing policies now “cover more authors than any other institutional OA policy to date.”

“Until now, tenure-track faculty have had the privilege of passing such policies to govern themselves, but at most universities, such faculty are a fraction of the people who do research and publish articles,” said UCLA professor Christopher Kelty, who chaired the Presidential Open Access Policy Task Force. “Extending the same rights to those who aren’t part of a faculty governance system is an important and difficult step – I’m thrilled we have accomplished it.”

Walled content of academic journals

Previously, research produced by university employees was commonly walled off from the public in academic journals that routinely charge high subscription fees to access material. The old model empowered publications, which could dictate terms and conditions to professors and researchers in desperate need to “publish or perish.”

Advocates for open access say that old policy stifled innovation and academic research.

“Students have already recognized that significant academic contributions come from all corners of our university,” said Meredith Niles, a recent Ph.D. graduate from UC Davis who was active in a graduate student association involved in crafting the new policy. “Now UC has taken the next step to affirm what graduate students have already demonstrated: a strong desire to make all scholarly research, regardless of its source, openly available to all members of society.”

UC authors will continue to retain legal control over their work and will not be required to publish in open access journals. Instead, the new policy merely commits UC employees to submit a copy of their work to a free digital database maintained by the university. The new policy, which takes effect for scholarly articles published after October 19, 2015, also does not apply to books, textbooks or student theses.

According to UC officials, the system is responsible for 2 percent of the world’s total research publications.

UC slow to act on new technology

The University of California’s hasn’t always been quick to embrace new technology. Last year, the University of California initially banned reimbursements for travel expenses incurred with sharing services, such as Uber, Lyft and Airbnb. That led to a public outcry with some Democratic politicians calling for the UC system to modernize its travel policies.

“Sharing economy companies offer consumers more choices at often less cost than comparable services offered by traditional vendors,” Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, a member of the UC Board of Regents, wrote at the time. “Prohibiting UC employees from using services that cost less is simply bad for the university’s bottom line.”

Eventually, the UC system backed away from its ban. This year, Gov. Jerry Brown signed legislation authored by Asm. Ling Ling Chang that guarantees state workers’ ability to use sharing economy services on state business.

A bipartisan group of pension reform advocates, led by former San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed and former San Diego Councilman Carl DeMaio, recently filed a statewide initiative for the 2016 ballot that would give voters a direct say on pension benefits. Dubbed the “Voter Empowerment Act of 2016,” the initiative would amend the state constitution to require voter approval of any new defined benefit retirement plans and place a 50 percent cap on government subsidies of retirement benefits provided to government employees.

“California’s politicians have chosen tax hikes and draconian service cuts to divert taxpayer money for unsustainable and indefensible government pension payouts, which is exactly why we must empower voters with this initiative to get reform done,” DeMaio said in a press release announcing the measure.

Voter Empowerment Act of 2016

In recent years, pension reform measures at the local level have been repeatedly stymied by the courts. After San Jose voters overwhelmingly approved a pension reform plan authored by Reed, a judge overturned the measure for violating the “vested rights” of public employees.

Under what’s been called the “California rule,” public employees have a constitutional right “not only to the amount of public employees’ pensions that has been earned by past service, but also to employees’ right to keep earning a pension based on rules that are at least as generous for as long as they stay employed.”

Last year, Ventura County taxpayers gathered thousands of signatures for a pension reform measure to have the county opt-out of the current defined-benefit system and replace it with a new 401k style plan. However, Ventura County District Court Judge Kent Kellegrew ruled that voters couldn’t vote to leave a pension system created by the state.

“This court concludes that the initiative process cannot be used for such a process,” the Ventura County decision stated.

That decision spurred Reed and DeMaio’s measure, which explicitly grants voters the power to decide pensions.

“State and local politicians, government agencies, and courts have blocked common-sense efforts to address this financial crisis,” the measure states. “Consequently, the need to empower voters and clarify their rights with respect to compensation and retirement benefits for government employees is a matter of statewide concern.”

The four major provisions of the proposed state constitutional amendment, which would take effect in 2019, include:

1. Requiring voter approval of any defined benefit pensions for new government employees;
2. Requiring voter approval of any increase in pensions for existing government employees;
3. Prohibiting any taxpayer subsidy of government retirement benefits in excess of 50 percent of the cost – unless voters expressly approve a higher contribution;
4. Prohibiting  politicians and government agencies from delaying, impeding, or challenging any voter-approved state and local ballot measures regarding compensation and retirement benefits.

With those provisions, governments would default to 401k style plans that would not require voter approval.

Rising Pension Obligations

By engaging voters in the pension decision-making process, the group hopes to contain the state’s growing pension liability. Proponents of the “Voter Empowerment Act of 2016” point to independent numbers which show the state’s pension liabilities have increased 3,000 percent in a decade. Last November, then-State Controller John Chiang (now state treasurer) pegged the state’s total unfunded pension liability from 130 public pension systems at $198 billion, a dramatic increase from just $6.3 billion in 2003.

“The cost of public employee pension benefits continues to skyrocket across California, crowding out funding for important services such as police, fire, schools and road repairs,” Reed said.

Other local leaders that will help Reed and DeMaio collect 585,407 valid signatures include, former San Bernardino Mayor Pat Morris, Anaheim Mayor Tom Tait, former Vallejo Vice Mayor Stephanie Gomes, and Pacific Grove Mayor Bill Kampe.

Ballot title and summary obstacles

Before the measure can make the ballot, it must clear the ballot title and summary phase. Last year, while DeMaio was preoccupied with his campaign for Congress against Rep. Scott Peters, Reed unsuccessfully tried to qualify a similar statewide pension reform measure. However, that effort stalled during the qualification stage over a dispute with Attorney General Kamala Harris over wording for the title and summary.

In addition to clearing the title summary hurdle, the proposed constitutional amendment will face intense opposition from hundreds of thousands of public employees affected by the measure. The law would apply to all state and local government agencies, including special districts, counties, cities, school districts and both state university systems. Employees are prepared for a fight.

“It’s exactly what we expected,” Steve Maviglio, a prominent Democratic consultant said, according to CalPensions.com. “It’s fraught with flaws, potential major implications for both existing and future employees and will likely result in years of litigation.”

The full initiative is available here.

This week, State Controller Betty T. Yee announced that her office would investigate the financial practices of the 12-square mile municipality, which has come under fire for awarding $326 million in taxpayer-funded contracts to businesses owned by a former mayor and his family.

“Our initial review shows significant discrepancies between the financial transaction reports submitted to my office and the city’s audited financial statements,” Controller Yee said in a press release. “As the state’s chief fiscal officer, I have the duty to bring my office’s expertise to bear to identify potential misuse of taxpayer dollars.”

The audit will begin with a review of local, state and federal programs administered by the city dating back to 2012. Yee’s office alerted city officials that it reserves the right to broaden its investigation at a later date.

$326 million paid to former mayor’s businesses

Earlier this year, an outside, limited-scope audit conducted by KPMG found that, over the past two decades, the city had awarded $326 million in government contracts to former mayor David Perez and his family. The city, which has just 99 registered voters, generates $140 million in annual revenue. Much of the city’s revenue comes from taxes paid by roughly two thousand businesses that have set up shop in Industry to avoid the high taxes and regulatory burdens of surrounding cities. 

According to the San Gabriel Valley Tribune, which first obtained a copy of the KPMG audit, the City of Industry paid one company $133,000 a month for street sweeping and parking lot maintenance — a rate that is six times higher than the city’s current contract. In one case, the company, which is partially owned by the former mayor, billed taxpayers “the equivalent to six street sweepers running for a total of 216 hours in one week.”

In addition to outrageous billing, the audit revealed that the city paid out $7 million arising from a sexual harassment lawsuit and water fine by Zerep Management Corporation, the company owned by the former mayor and his family members.

“This is crony capitalism at its worst,” Douglas Johnson of the Rose Institute of State and Local Government, told the San Gabriel Valley Tribune. “This isn’t why cities exist. They exist to provide service and structure, not for the benefit of one family conglomerate.”

City of Industry’s checkered past

Corruption at the City of Industry has been an open secret for years. In 2009, the Los Angeles Times detailed the by then self-dealing Mayor Perez.

“Everyone who does business in the city of Industry is required to sign up with Mayor David Perez’s company,” read the opening sentence of a 2009 investigation by Los Angeles Times reporter Rich Connell. “For years, a firm partly owned by the mayor has held an exclusive, multimillion-dollar franchise to pick up trash from the warehouses, manufacturing plants and other commercial enterprises packed into this oddly configured, avidly pro-business San Gabriel Valley city.” 

Perez and his family have maintained control over the city, which rarely holds elections and instead hands off City Council seats to one of the 400 residents. The city currently has just 99 registered voters. In previous years, residents have claimed “to live in churches, houses that can’t be found.”

“If this were the old Soviet Union we were talking about – or current-day Russia, for that matter – we would understand that we’re not really dealing with a democracy here,” the local newspaper editorialized in 2012. “It’s an oligarchy, a clique of family and friends with enormous sums of money at stake.”

In 2009, the Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office opened an investigation into claims that elected city officials had filed fraudulent voter registration forms and were residing outside of the city. However, that investigation concluded without charges being filed. 

“I can’t say that we absolutely were sure that all the city officials really lived where they said they lived, but I know we didn’t seek criminal charges,” Dave Demerjian, the then-head of the D.A.’s Public Integrity Division, told the San Gabriel Valley Tribune’s Ben Baeder.

Antonovich, Solis demand answers

This time, the scandal appears to have reached a critical mass of support to finally force the City of Industry to clean up its act. On Tuesday, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors, led by Supervisors Hilda Solis and Michael Antonovich, stepped into the fray by demanding a grand jury investigation.

“The recent audit of expenditures by the City of Industry revealed millions of dollars in questionable payments to the former mayor and his family members,” the L.A. County Board of Supervisors stated in its draft motion. “Given the magnitude of the audit findings, a Grand Jury investigation into possible corruption and back-room deals is warranted.”

The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office launched an investigation into the matter last Friday, according to the Pasadena Star-News.

The scandal in Industry is only the latest in a long line of Southern California municipal corruption cases. In 2010, the tiny city of Bell was caught paying city employees excessive salaries. Earlier this year, a former employee at the city of Pasadena was arrested as part of a 60-count indictment for embezzling $6 million in taxpayer funds.

Drivers who’ve had their licenses suspended could soon get a reprieve.

State Sen. Bob Hertzberg, D-Van Nuys, has introduced legislation that would reduce outstanding penalties and fines for drivers with a suspended license. In addition to reducing penalties, Senate Bill 405 would provide a method for drivers with a suspended license from a nonviolent offense to regain their driving privileges.

Hertzberg says that legislation is needed to help low-income residents who are caught in a Catch-22: They can’t pay their fines because they are unable to find or keep a job without a driver’s license.

“We are criminalizing the poor and dramatically impacting their lives with punishments that far exceed their crimes by slamming them with excessive fines,” Hertzberg said in a recent press release. “Then we take away their ability to get to work.”

Exponential growth of traffic fines

In recent years, state and local governments have added supplemental charges and raised fines for traffic offenses.

“What used to be a $100 violation now costs nearly $500, and jumps to over $800 if a person misses the initial deadline to pay,” the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area, which is co-sponsoring Hertzberg’s legislation, noted in a recent report. “As the fees have gone up, and with the economic crisis, fewer people can afford to pay their tickets.”

Those higher fees have corresponded with an increase in the number of drivers with suspended licenses due to non-payment of penalties. The civil rights group estimates that 4.2 million Californians have had their licenses revoked because of non-payment of fines since 2006.

Even responsible drivers, who coordinate a payment plan with the court, are unable to regain their license “until every cent of a fee is paid,” according to the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights.

Hertzberg’s office argues that some fines are compounded by simple mistakes, such as address changes. In one case, “a $25 ticket for failing to notify the DMV of an address change ended up owning $2,900 to the state,” according to CBS Los Angeles.

Governor’s Traffic Amnesty program

Hertzberg’s proposal would work in conjunction with Gov. Jerry Brown’s plan for a Traffic Amnesty program in the 2015-16 state budget. Currently, the state has $10 billion in uncollected court-ordered debts.

Advocates for poor and working class Californians say that an amnesty program is helpful, but only part of the solution. After all, it’s usually necessary to have a license in order to hold a job. One study in New Jersey found that 42 percent of drivers lost their jobs once their license was suspended.

“Suspended licenses can trap working poor in an impossible situation: unable to reinstate their licenses without gainful employment and unable to access employment without a license, keeping people in cycles of poverty that are difficult to overcome,” a State Senate committee analysis explains of the bill. “Employers are affected by having to internalize the cost to replace workers and face the challenge of finding qualified workers with valid driver licenses.”

Under SB 405, drivers with licenses suspended before January 1, 2013, would be allowed to participate in the governor’s amnesty program. Drivers would also see their fines lowered based on a sliding scale based on income levels. The new fees would be based as follows:

• 20 percent of fine or bail for people with an income that is less than 150 percent of the federal poverty level
• 50 percent of fine or bail for people with an income that is between 150 and 200 percent of the federal poverty level
• 80 percent of fine or bail for people with an income that is greater than 200 percent of the federal poverty level

Broad base of support

The measure has a broad base of support, including the the Association of Deputy District Attorneys, Drug Policy Alliance, Personal Insurance Federation of California and Legal Services for Prisoners with Children.

“The state needs to tread cautiously in this field lest it remove any incentive for offenders to pay their fine, or, even worse, follow traffic laws in the first place,  the Sacramento Bee wrote in its editorial supporting the bill. “But the kind of measured response Hertzberg is proposing in Senate Bill 405 seems to strike the right balance between expecting personal responsibility while still exercising some compassion and common sense. If this results in more drivers having a license and more fines being paid to local governments, the law would be a victory for motorists and taxpayers alike.”

Last week, the Senate Public Safety Committee agreed, passing SB 405 on to the Committee on Appropriations.

“This is a limited amnesty,” State Senator Joel Anderson, R-Alpine, said in support of the bill during the hearing. “Why do we have to be such money-grubbing legislators?”

Anderson urged Hertzberg to further and focus on more people because “many of these folks are just one step out of poverty.”

Graphic: A Journey through Traffic Court

This month, two state legislative panels blocked efforts by Central Valley Republican lawmakers to guarantee the property rights of those caught in the path of the the $68 billion transportation project. State Senator Andy Vidak of Hanford and Asm. Jim Patterson of Fresno are concerned that the California High Speed Rail Authority could use eminent domain to seize land for a project that may never be built.

“I’ve heard from dozens and dozens of property owners – many are farmers, small businesses and homeowners – that they are victims of these flash appraisals and pressure tactics,” said Sen. Vidak, who has been one of the state’s leading high-speed rail critics. “Many of these folks have land, businesses and homes that have been in the same family for several generations.”

Eminent domain requires fair-market compensation

For centuries, governments have used the power of eminent domain to compel property owners to sell their property for large public works projects. In theory, the Fifth Amendment guarantees the rights of property owners to receive just compensation for any property that is seized for public use.

“The U.S. Supreme Court has defined fair market value as the most probable price that a willing but unpressured buyer, fully knowledgeable of both the property’s good and bad attributes, would pay,” Cornell University Law School explains in its Fifth Amendment primer.

However, in practice, government agencies with their unlimited resources and army of lawyers can tip the scales in favor of a lower price.

Lawmakers say “no” to independent audit

In the Central Valley, residents are concerned that the state’s high-speed rail agency, which has already blown its budget estimates, could use “flash appraisals” and other hardball tactics to take property for less than the fair market value.

To make sure that everything’s on the up-and-up, Vidak requested that the state’s independent auditor investigate the California High-Speed Rail Authority’s property acquisition process. Among the questions Vidak wanted answered:

• Has the Authority’s contractors issued any property acquisition offers that the property or business owners were not involved in for the appraisal of their property or business?
• What policies and procedures has the Authority given to its contractors in order to obtain property necessary for the completion of the High-Speed Rail project?

After hearing testimony from the High-Speed Rail Authority, the Joint Legislative Audit Committee rejected Vidak’s audit request on a party-line vote.

“There seems to be a misperception that the High-Speed Rail Authority has unique authorities or abilities with regard to right of way that are separate from other state agencies,” California High-Speed Rail Authority CEO Jeff Morales told state lawmakers. “That’s just not the case.”

A flabbergasted Vidak expressed his dismay at his colleagues.

“I won’t say the result of the hearing was a ‘whitewash’ or ‘cover-up’ for the Authority, but clearly this reasonable request should have been given high priority, not rejected,” he said following the vote.

Assembly Committee rejects Patterson’s property rights proposal

In the lower house, Asm. Jim Patterson, a fellow Central Valley Republican lawmaker, didn’t fare any better with his proposal to place restrictions on when the rail authority can seize property.

Assembly Bill 1138, the Protection from Eminent Domain Act, would prohibit the rail authority from beginning the eminent domain process until all the necessary funding and environmental approvals for the project have been secured.

Central Valley property owners that have held land for multiple generations supported the measure as a way to guarantee that their historic land rights remain intact – if the project is unsuccessful. According to the Sacramento Business Journal, the state has acquired just 209 of the 1,100 parcels needed for the first construction segment from Madera to Bakersfield – with 54 eminent domain lawsuits pending against the state.

“The reality is — this project does not have the funds in line necessary, and it is a grave injustice to the people whose property is being taken,” Patterson said at a press conference earlier this month. “We join with our Central Valley neighbors who are concerned that their property will be taken by the state for a project that doesn’t have a clear funding source and could be abandoned altogether, leaving these hardworking families with nothing.”

Yet, the Assembly Transportation Committee ignored those concerns and defeated Assembly Bill 1138 on a party-line 5-10 vote, with all Republicans in favor.

With ongoing questions about ridership estimates and travel times, the project’s viability remains very much in doubt. CalWatchdog.com’s Chris Reed has pointed out that the chorus of high-speed rail critics is growing – with even liberal journalists questioning the project.

“We are rapidly exiting the realm of rose-colored glasses and entering the realm of pure fantasy here,” Kevin Drum, a writer for Mother Jones magazine, wrote last year. “If liberals keep pushing this project forward in the face of plain evidence that its official justifications are brazenly preposterous, conservatives are going to be able to pound us year after year for wasting taxpayer money while we retreat to ever more ridiculous and self-serving defenses that make us laughingstocks in the public eye.”

Today, the Assembly Utilities and Commerce Committee is scheduled to consider legislation by Asm. Adrin Nazarian, D-Sherman Oaks, that, some say, is intended to put ride-sharing companies out of business and force Californians back under the thumb of the taxi cab cartel.

Assembly Bill 24 would force transportation network companies, more commonly known as ride-sharing companies, to register with the Public Utilities Commission, display an identifying decal on all ride-share vehicles, and go through extensive bureaucratic red-tape for all their drivers.

“Nazarian’s bill is a blatantly anti-competitive example of regulatory capture at its very worst that will only serve to pile on bureaucratic redundancy and red tape while choking innovation,” argues CALinnovates, a tech group that lobbies in Sacramento and Washington, D.C.

Nazarian seeks end to “high-tech hitchhiking”

Nazarian makes no secret of his intention to run the ride-sharing industry out of California. His latest bill was introduced on December 1 – one month before last year’s compromise measure became law.

“Ridesharing is simply high-tech hitchhiking,” Nazarian said in a March press release announcing his latest proposal for new ride-sharing regulations. “Consumers are being blindly picked-up by complete strangers and entrusting them with their safety.”

Of course, Nazarian’s statements about naive consumers are hyperbole. Last year, he voted for Assembly Bill 2293, which forced ride-sharing companies to abide by new statewide regulations. That law requires companies to carry at least $1 million in commercial-grade insurance and set new minimum levels of additional insurance to be carried by drivers.

The bill also ordered the state’s Public Utilities Commission and Department of Insurance to produce a study on transportation network companies before December 31, 2017 – to see how well the new law is working.

But, before there’s any data on the new law, Nazarian is seeking to add more requirements to the books.

AB24 violates 2014 ride-sharing compromise

Nazarian’s latest proposal would make your next ride home more expensive by forcing ride-sharing companies to put all their drivers through a Department of Motor Vehicle Employer Pull Notice, a Department of Justice Fingerprint Background Check, and random drug and alcohol testing.

Critics of this year’s proposal say that Nazarian is resurrecting bad bills that were previously sponsored by their competitors, the taxi cab industry.

“If the vast majority of AB24 looks familiar; that’s because it is,” Alex M. Leupp, the West Coast public policy lead for Uber, wrote in his opposition letter. “Last year, the state Legislature twice rejected nearly identical bills, AB612 (Nazarian), and AB2068 (Nazarian).”

Both of those bills were sponsored by the Taxicab Paratransit Association of California, a trade group that represents the taxi cab industry. Rather than embrace government-controlled monopolies, business groups believe the state should support innovative technologies.

“The California Legislature should embrace companies like Uber, Lyft, and Sidecar, who are not only changing the future of transportation, but are driving economic growth and job creation in cities all around the State,” said Robert Callahan, the state executive director for the Internet Association. “A primary reason for the wide-scale adoption of ridesharing by consumers is the enhanced safety experience.”

Serious safety concerns with taxis

Consumer safety, Nazarian says, is exactly why more government mandates are needed.

“As a public servant, I want to ensure your driver gets you home safely through the enactment of common sense safety measures,” he said. “Who would be against making sure your driver is not a convicted felon or a reckless driver?”

Yet, if safety is his top concern, Nazarian may want to turn his attention to taxi cabs. Los Angeles taxi drivers have been cited more than 10,000 times in the past five years, according to a review of citation data from the city of Los Angeles. In some cases, taxi drivers were caught drinking on the job, aiding in prostitution and driving without a license.

Unlike popular ride-sharing companies that allow passengers to rate their drivers, the information supplied by the city of Los Angeles redacted all driver information from the citation database.

Meanwhile, Uber is ready to respond at a moment’s notice to complaints against more than 70,000 drivers in California.

“Uber has resources available 24/7 to respond to any allegations from riders or drivers, and can within minutes suspend access to the TNC platform in real time while it performs a thorough investigation with the rider, driver, trip data and third party resources,” Leupp, a representative of Uber, wrote to lawmakers.

On the safety front, Uber and Lyft have also received high-profile support from advocacy groups that see ride-sharing as a way to reduce the number of drunk drivers. As CalWatchdog.com reported last year, Mothers Against Drunk Driving opposed efforts to regulate ride-sharing.

“MADD supports new ridesharing platforms like Uber, Lyft and Sidecar as well as traditional taxi services that are enabling more options to provide safe rides in communities across the country,” J.T. Griffin, MADD’s chief government affairs officer, wrote in an open letter to state lawmakers.

The Assembly Utilities and Commerce Committee is scheduled to debate the bill at 3 p.m. You can listen live here.

On Tuesday, the committee is scheduled to consider a proposal by Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez, D-San Diego, that would provide greater labor protections for professional cheerleaders. Assembly Bill 202, which scored a 5-2 win in the Assembly Committee on Labor and Employment earlier this month, would protect cheerleaders of professional sports teams from workplace abuses by classifying them as employees, not independent contractors.

Specifically, the bill would amend the Labor Code to state that “a cheerleader who is utilized by a California-based professional sports team directly or through a labor contractor during its exhibitions, events, or games, shall be deemed to be an employee.”

Gonzalez: Treat cheerleaders fairly

Gonzalez says that professional cheerleaders are being exploited by multi-billion-dollar professional sports franchises.

“AB202 simply demands that any professional sports team – or their chosen contractor – treat the women on the field with the same dignity and respect that we treat the guy selling beer,” said Gonzalez, who was a cheerleader in high school and college. “NFL teams and their billionaire owners have used professional cheerleaders as part of the game day experience for decades.”

She added, “They have capitalized on their talents without providing even the most basic workplace protections like a minimum wage.”

Gonzalez’s legislation, which has the support of the California Employment Lawyers Association, California Labor Federation and Consumer Attorneys of California, comes on the heals of high-profile lawsuits by professional football cheerleaders that allege widespread workplace violations. The allegations include claims that the Cincinnatti Bengals, Buffalo Bills, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Oakland Raiders and New York Jets failed to pay overtime or even the minimum wage.

Cheerleaders claim NFL teams broke labor laws

Caitlin Yates, one of the former NFL cheerleaders that has filed a lawsuit for labor violations, testified earlier this month before the Assembly Committee on Labor and Employment about her experiences with the Oakland Raiders.

“When I first started working as a Raiderette, I was just happy to make the squad and support my team,” Yates said. “However, over time I realized that the way I was being treated was unfair.”

Yates claimed that cheerleaders were sexually harassed, forced to pay out-of-pocket for job-related expenses and work with injuries.

“There are some teams out there who don’t treat their cheerleaders as employees or pay their cheerleaders a fair wage,” she told lawmakers. “We are professionals who deserved to be paid fairly no matter what team we play for.”

The issue has been a black eye for the National Football League, which has acted quickly to settle lawsuits and avoid similarly embarrassing testimony. Last September, two former Raiderette cheerleaders reached a $1.25-million settlement over accusations of “failing to pay minimum wage, withholding wages for months and refusing to reimburse cheerleaders for their business expenses,” according to the Los Angeles Times. Earlier this year, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers paid out $825,000 to settle allegations that one cheerleader was paid just $2 per hour over two seasons.

Independent contractor vs. employees

For all of its sex appeal, much of the debate about Gonzalez’s legislation centers on the highly-technical differences in employment law between an independent contractor and employee. Some companies seek to designate their workers as independent contractors to avoid payroll taxes or other workplace requirements that are mandated on employees.

A 2006 study by the United States Government Accountability Office found that “misclassification of workers as independent contractors … cost the United States government $2.72 billion in revenue from Social Security, unemployment and income taxes in 2006 alone.”

“When companies misclassify workers as independent contractors instead of as employees, these workers do not receive worker protections, including minimum wages, overtime pay, and health and vacation benefits, to which they would otherwise be entitled,” a legislative analysis of AB202 contends. “Because employers do not pay unemployment taxes for independent contractors, workers who are misclassified cannot obtain unemployment benefits if they lose their jobs.”

That explains why professional sports teams would want to treat cheerleaders as independent contractors. But, do they meet the standard?

“Under common-law rules, anyone who performs services for you is your employee if you can control what will be done and how it will be done,” the IRS explains on its information page detailing the differences between employees and independent contractors. “This is so even when you give the employee freedom of action. What matters is that you have the right to control the details of how the services are performed.”

The IRS identifies three areas for determining whether the individuals providing services are employees or independent contractors. Those questions are: behavioral, whether the employee has control over the work; financial, who controls the business aspects of the work relationship; and the type of relationship, whether the work performed is a key aspect of the business.

According to the Internal Revenue Service, “You are not an independent contractor if you perform services that can be controlled by an employer – what will be done and how it will be done.”

If the claims in some of the lawsuits are accurate, some NFL teams clearly exercised controlled of what and how cheerleaders performed their jobs.

“If a Raiderettes cheerleader forgets to bring the right pom-poms to practice, she’s fined $10,” Mother Jones summarized of the claims in one lawsuit. “The same thing happens if she wears the wrong workout gear to a rehearsal, she forgets to bring a yoga mat to practice, or her boots aren’t cleaned and polished for game day.”

Last week, the California Chamber of Commerce, known simply as CalChamber, announced a preliminary draft of its “job killer” bills, an annual list of proposed legislation that will hurt the state’s business community and economic competitiveness.

This year’s list includes 16 bills that, the chamber says, will make it harder to do business in California by increasing labor costs, litigation costs, health care costs and taxes. Notably excluded from the chamber’s list is a $10 billion sales tax on services that is being proposed by State Senator Bob Hertzberg, D-Van Nuys.

“Although we will be opposing a number of bills throughout this year, the ‘job killer’ list represents the worst of the worst,” said Allan Zaremberg, president and CEO of the California Chamber of Commerce. “These proposals will unnecessarily increase costs on California employers that will likely lead to a loss of jobs.”

“Job Killer” Bills: 93 percent defeated since 1997

Although organized labor and environmental groups provide major financial and grassroots support to legislative Democrats, they’ve largely been unsuccessful in passing bills branded “job killers” by CalChamber.

Since 1997, the not-for-profit business advocacy group has identified 631 bills as “job killers,” of which only 46 have made their way into becoming state law. That’s a 93 percent success rate for the organization that represents 13,000 members, including Fortune 500 companies such as Microsoft and Walt Disney.

The chamber’s success has remained constant under both Republican and Democratic governors. During the past decade, 357 bills have been dubbed job killers with just 14 becoming law. It’s also scored major legislative victories while Democrats maintained a super-majority in both houses of the legislature.

Gov. Jerry Brown delivers for CalChamber

And the chamber’s best years have come with Jerry Brown in the governor’s mansion.

“Over the past four years, the Chamber has marked 129 bills as job killers. Only 8 of these measures have been signed into law,” points out Joel Fox, publisher of Fox and Hounds Daily, the state’s leading business blog.

Fox also credits the chamber’s success at defeating “job killer” bills with the state’s improving economic climate. California’s unemployment rate has dropped from 8 percent in February 2014 to 6.7 percent in February 2015. According to the state’s Employment Development Department, California added nearly a half-million jobs, a year-over-year increase of 3.1 percent.

Although California’s unemployment rate is higher than the national average of 5.5 percent, the state has been the country’s most improved economy. In February, the Golden State added 29,400 jobs, the nation’s best over-the-month increase, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

“If many of the defeated bills passed,” Fox asks, “would California’s job creation number be so strong?”

“Part of the credit for this success goes to the California Chamber of Commerce’s effort to rally against bills that would hinder job creation and hurt the economy,” he said.

So, what’s included in this year’s list of “job killer” bills?

2015 “Job Killer” Bills

AB357 (David Chiu, D-San Francisco): Requires retailers and restaurants to give employees at least two-weeks’ notice for their work schedule.

SB3 (Mark Leno, D-San Francisco): Increases the minimum wage by $3.00 over the next two and a half years and imposes future automatic increases tied to inflation.

SB406 (Sen. Hannah-Beth Jackson, D-Santa Barbara): Eliminates the small business exemption from the state’s family and medical leave law.

SB350 (Kevin de León, D-Los Angeles): Forces the state by 2030 to reduce petroleum use by 50 percent, increase the current Renewable Portfolio Standard to 50 percent and increase energy efficiency in buildings by 50 percent.

SB684 (Sen. Loni Hancock, D-Berkeley): Raises taxes on publicly-held corporations and financial institutions.

ACA 4 (Jim Frazier, D-Oakley): Lowers the vote threshold from two-thirds to 55 percent for new local tax measures.

SCA 5 (Hancock): Lowers the vote threshold from two-thirds to 55 percent for new local tax measures.

AB356 (Das Williams, D-Santa Barbara): Imposes new regulations and water monitoring restrictions on oil and gas drilling projects.

AB1490 (Anthony Rendon, D-Lakewood): Imposes a de facto ban on oil fracking and oil well stimulation activities by halting any activity after a nearby earthquake of a magnitude 2.0 or higher.

SB32 (Fran Pavley, D-Agoura Hills): Raises California’s greenhouse gas emissions limits to 80 percent below the 1990 level by 2050 and gives the State Air Resources Board authority to set interim standards for 2030 and 2040.

SB546 (Leno): Requires health insurance companies to comply with new regulations before increasing their premiums.

AB359 (Lorena Gonzalez, D-San Diego): Bans grocery stores from laying off workers during a transfer in store ownership.

SB576 (Leno): Prevents mobile applications from collecting or sharing a user’s location data without consent.

AB244 (Susan Talamantes Eggman, D-Stockton): Makes changes to the state’s foreclosure rules with respect to successor in interest.

AB465 (Roger Hernández, D-Baldwin Park): Prevents workers and employers from reaching agreements that include any waiver of labor protections as a condition of employment.

SB203 (Bill Monning, D-Carmel): Singles out sodas and some sugar-added drinks for health warning labels, but excludes other unhealthy beverages.

In an effort to better understand the challenges posed by high-speed rail, a delegation of three state Senators spent the Legislature’s spring break in Japan to investigate the first and, arguably, best high-speed rail system in the world.

Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de Leon, D-Los Angeles, Senate GOP leader Bob Huff, R-Diamond Bar and Sen. Hannah-Beth Jackson, D-Santa Barbara, began the four-day trip with a briefing from the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo before moving on to Osaka, Kobe and Kyoto. The delegation also received a tour of the country’s High Speed Rail Operation Center and discussed transportation, seismic safety, clean energy, environment and climate change with various Japanese officials, including Issei Kitagawa, the country’s transportation and tourism minister.

Here at CalWatchdog.com, we don’t think a few state Senators should have all the fun. That’s why we packed our bags and headed to Tokyo to research Japan’s world-class rail system for ourselves.

Japan: World leader in high-speed rail

What makes the Japanese experts on high-speed rail? For starters, it’s the birthplace of high-speed rail. Since its opening in 1964, the Shinkansen has transported an estimated 5.6 billion passengers throughout the third largest economy in the world. The phrase “bullet train” comes from the Japanese translation of “dangan ressha,” which was used to describe Japan’s first high-speed rail system.

“Japan’s high-speed rail system is one of the best if not the best in the world,” Huff explained following the trip. “It has a safety record unparalleled in a seismically active country with a lot of similarities to California.”

Safety, especially as it related to earthquakes, is perhaps the most important takeaway for California. Japan boasts an impressive safety record – with no major injuries in 50 years. During the tragic 8.9 magnitude earthquake in 2011, trains were sent an automatic shut-off command from a control center in Kinkazan. That warning gave 33 trains enough time to safely stop.

Japanese bullet trains, which travel up to 200 miles per hour, are prepared for other natural disasters. When a bullet train in Northern Japan derailed during a 2013 blizzard, none of the 130 passengers and crew on board were injured.

Huff: Rail works with high-density populations

While California can incorporate Japan’s safety protocols into its design and construction, the state will have a harder time matching ridership, in part, due to vastly different transit habits and urban growth patterns.

“The biggest difference is they have a high density population that has not evolved around a ‘car culture’ as we have here,” Huff explained. “Only half of Japan’s population own a car, and all of the associated costs of ownership – parking, gas and everything else – are prohibitively expensive. Taken together that creates the raw ingredients for a successful high-speed rail system.”

As Slate’s Eric Holthaus points out, air travel is ingrained in American travel, with rail barely a blip. “In 2012, Americans traveled nearly 3 trillion passenger-miles by car, 580 billion by air, and more than 300 billion by bus,” Holthaus wrote in January. “Passenger rail was barely even comparable—just 7 billion passenger-miles.”

Supporters of high-speed rail say that U.S. passengers don’t embrace rail because it’s currently too slow. Throughout the world, transportation experts have cited a 3-hour rule for travel– passengers prefer rail for journeys under three hours. In his review of high-speed rail research, Chris Nash of the Institute for Transport Studies at University of Leeds concluded, “Targeting air markets where rail journey times can be brought close to or below 3 hours therefore does make sense.”

California likely to break 3-hour rule

Japan’s well-designed system easily meets that three hour rule, allowing passengers to fly through security and arrive at the station just minutes before departure. A trip from Nagoya to Kyoto, which would have been a two-hour journey by car, took under 40 minutes on high-speed rail. And the rush hour commute to Nagoya station was so bad that it took longer to reach the station than the trip itself.

That’s why Japanese airlines are steadily losing ground to the bullet train. “Six out of 10 travelers on the Tokyo-Hiroshima line used to fly the route, but now the ratio has reversed in favor of the bullet train,” Nikkei Asian Review observed in 2013.

California’s high-speed rail system faces the opposite problem, where airlines can transfer passengers from Los Angeles to San Francisco in under 90 minutes. The state’s planned route has also extended the travel time and will likely break the important 3-hour travel rule.

Last year, Louis Thompson, chairman of the High-Speed Rail Peer Review, testified before a state Senate committee that California’s system would not meet the anticipated trip times of two hours and 40 minutes, according to the Los Angeles Times.

Japanese high-speed rail encourages growth

Fewer riders translates into concerns about profitability. To make Japan’s high-speed rail system more profitable, rail companies own the surrounding land and are encouraged to develop.

The Economist noted that Japan’s system “thrives because of a planning system that encourages the building of commercial developments and housing alongside the railway route. JR East owns the land around the railways and lets it out; nearly a third of its revenue comes from shopping malls, blocks of offices, flats and the like.”

Given California’s environmental laws and anti-development mentality, it’s hard to envision the state embracing new major development projects.

For Huff, the trip left lingering doubts about California’s current high-speed rail plan.

“My takeaway for California is that if Governor Brown intends to continue pushing for a high-speed rail system he might be better served by starting in the big cities and building systems that will help connect people immediately, and then expand later,” he said.