A scathing audit on school funding that found the state did not meet promises made six years ago to help English language learners, foster children and students from poor families sets up a 2020 test of the clout of the California Teachers Association and the California Federation of Teachers – and of the willingness of Gov. Gavin Newsom to take on the unions who were early backers of his successful 2018 candidacy. 

State Auditor Elaine Howle’s review focused on how school districts in San Diego, Oakland and Clovis had implemented the Local Control Funding Formula, which was adopted by the Legislature in 2013 at the behest of then-Gov. Jerry Brown. The governor and then-Senate President Darrell Steinberg, D-Sacramento, were among several leaders who said the LCFF would be a game changer by getting additional assets to struggling students.

But Howle found instead that billions in extra funds the formula directed to districts with high percentages of English learners, foster kids and poor families had been used for general needs – including raises for teachers. She concluded there was little or no evidence that the LCFF had boosted these students’ performance.

“In general, we determined that the state’s approach [to Local Control] has not ensured that funding is benefiting students as intended,” Howle wrote.

Howle’s finding confirmed all the major criticisms of the formula that have been raised by education reformers and by civil rights lawyers who have repeatedly sued Los Angeles Unified over its treatment of poor minority students. 

Bill to track school funding couldn’t even get a hearing

But these groups have never gotten far with Local Control changes. Last spring, Assemblywoman Shirley Weber, the San Diego Democrat who pushed for the audit, couldn’t even get Assembly Education Committee Chairman Patrick O’Donnell, D-Long Beach, to hold a hearing on her bill to require disclosure of how LCFF dollars are being used.

Howle’s audit gives Weber new evidence to push for tracking such spending, and she has said fixing Local Control is her top priority in 2020. But O’Donnell, a former teacher who is close to the CTA and CFT, is unlikely to drop his opposition to tracking the funding.

A key question is likely to be what the governor does. While Newsom won the early endorsements of the two teacher unions, he spent the 2018 campaign telling editorial boards and the Los Angeles and Silicon Valley billionaires who back education reform that he too wanted to fix Local Control to ensure it helped struggling students and had proper accountability protections.

But any attempt to get school districts to stop spending LCFF dollars on teacher compensation – and on rapidly growing teacher pension costs – will go directly against the CTA and the CFT. They already see available school funding as inadequate and are both pushing for billions of dollars in tax hikes in two measures expected to be on the ballot in November 2020. They also won changes that will make it more difficult for charter schools to be approved or renewed using the argument that charters were diverting funding from regular public schools at a time when those schools are desperately underfunded. They are unlikely to accept the notion that the audit must be acted on.

Meanwhile, Newsom has so far used his political capital to advance an education reform that teachers unions also may question. But the reform – using metrics to track the performance of students throughout their K-12 journey – isn’t nearly as contentious as the state forcing many school districts to reorient their Local Control spending and stop using it for raises and pension bills.

New reports show that six years after Gov. Jerry Brown and the Legislature approved a sweeping overhaul in how school funds were divvied up, the evidence is mixed that the overhaul is accomplishing its main goal: improving the academic performance of the 1.2 million English language learners in California public schools.

Under the law, known as the Local Control Funding Formula, schools with high percentages of English learners, foster children and poor families get additional funding that in 2013 was described as being specifically to help these students achieve proficiency in key subjects. Since then, about $30 billion in LCFF grants have been distributed.

But a 2015 decision by then-Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson to allow LCFF dollars to go for teacher raises and other general uses has led to critics such as Assemblywoman Shirley Weber, D-San Diego, arguing that struggling students aren’t getting the help they were promised in 2013. Earlier this year, Weber persuaded a legislative panel to have state Auditor Elaine Howle review how the grants are being spent and possibly examine their effectiveness.

Reformers see bad faith in how law was implemented

The pending audit is highly anticipated by education reform groups which have for years accused the state government of showing bad faith in implementing LCFF. 

Defenders of the law have some data that back up claims it is working as intended. An EdSource analysis of the state’s Smarter Balanced test scores released earlier this month showed that schools with high numbers of LCFF students had seen a 9 percent increase in student English proficiency over the last five years. But the same analysis showed little change in the “achievement gap” between white and Asian students and those of Latino and African American descent. 

And a Public Policy Institute of California report released in August found that increased funding hadn’t changed a fundamental problem that makes progress difficult in struggling schools: They still had teachers who were considerably less experienced than those in wealthier communities. These schools are also far more likely to have teachers offering instruction in fields in which they had no training. The PPIC suggested there was evidence that these issues had gotten worse in recent years.

Because of strong teacher job-protection laws, veteran teachers have considerable latitude about where they work. Schools in wealthy communities that often get help from parental and community fundraisers have a huge edge over schools in poor communities where teachers often feel they have no choice but to bring in basic supplies for students from destitute families.

Civil rights lawyers again target LAUSD over spending

Meanwhile, in Los Angeles Unified, the state’s largest school district, a formal complaint has been filed by the Public Advocates civil rights law firm that alleges that much of the $1 billion-plus in LCFF money the district gets annually is being used in ways that are not properly documented as required by state law. The complaint includes numerous examples from district records of LCFF grants being spent in questionable ways.

In 2016, Public Advocates filed a similar complaint against L.A. Unified, which some district officials strongly disputed. But the next year, the district agreed to provide an additional $151 million to 50 schools with high concentrations of English learners, foster children and students from poor families.

For the second year in a row, a sweeping police reform measure that law-enforcement organizations said was motivated by antipathy toward peace officers has been embraced by the state Legislature.

Last year lawmakers passed Senate Bill 1421 by Sen. Nancy Skinner, D-Berkeley. It required police agencies to release information on officer discipline records – treating these records the same as many others that are routinely released to the public under government openness laws. California’s police disclosure rules previously had been among the strictest in the nation.

This year, Assembly Bill 392, by Assemblywoman Shirley Weber, D-San Diego, appears headed for passage after being approved 67-0 by the Assembly on Wednesday. It says officers may only use lethal force if it is “necessary” for public safety. Existing law says officers can use such force if they believe it is “reasonable” to ensure public safety. While provisions in Assembly Bill 392 were dropped to persuade law enforcement organizations to end their opposition and take a neutral stand – as they did last week – the ACLU says the bill will create among the strictest use-of-force standards of any state.

These organizations were lobbied by Gov. Gavin Newsom to accept Assembly Bill 392. After their decision to go neutral was announced, Newsom, Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon and Senate President Pro Tem Toni Atkins issued a joint statement endorsing Weber’s bill, seemingly guaranteeing its eventual approval.

The passage of the two reform measures would have been impossible to imagine earlier this century. Law enforcement unions had tight relationships with most elected Democrats, the same as with unions for teachers, nurses, service workers and government bureaucrats, providing them with heavy campaign contributions.

Gov. Gray Davis’ 2001 decision to give prison guards a five-year, 37 percent raise after its union helped him get elected in 1998 drew sharp blow-back from good-government advocates and newspaper editorial boards, especially after the 2003 revelation that Davis had badly underestimated the long-term cost of the labor deal. It was among the issues that helped lead to his unprecedented recall later that year.

2004 CHP scandal downplayed by state leaders

But the clout of law enforcement was again on display a year later. In 2004, the Sacramento Bee broke the story of a pervasive workers’ compensation scam in the upper reaches of the California Highway Patrol. The Bee found that 55 of the 65 senior CHP officers who had retired since 2000 had filed workers’ comp claims – with some citing injuries never reported while they were on the job. Their disability claims were routinely approved, sharply increasing their retirement benefits.

CHP Commissioner Dwight “Spike” Helmick agreed to retire after the “Chiefs Disease” scandal broke, then added to it by also claiming he was disabled because of vehicle accidents in the 1970s and 1980s. But neither the Legislature or Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger – who courted and won law enforcement support – agreed with calls to bring in an outside reformer to run the agency. Instead, Schwarzenegger chose Mike Brown, one of Helmick’s top aides.

Attorney General Bill Lockyer declined to prosecute the case, citing conflicts of interest because of his office’s close ties to the CHP. The case was assigned to Sacramento County District Attorney Jan Scully. But in 2007, she closed the investigation without bringing any charges. Scully said CHP officials and former officials were “unable or unwilling” to testify about the pension-spiking scheme. The story faded from the headlines.

But ties between lawmakers and police unions have weakened since then as the national outcry has grown over alleged police mistreatment of minorities, especially a series of fatal shootings of young African-American men in questionable circumstances. The California Democratic Party has also had an influx of newly elected progressive lawmakers who dislike the aggressive, confrontational policing style adopted by many departments after it was credited with reducing crime in New York City in the 1990s under Mayor Rudolph Giuliani.

Recent analyses of how Assembly Bill 392 overcame the obstacles that doomed a similar bill last year have focused on the March 2018 fatal shooting of Stephon Clark, an unarmed black father of two, in Sacramento.

The announcement two months ago that no officer would face charges for Clark’s death triggered an outcry so intense it became a national and international story that appeared to give Weber’s bill new momentum.

AB931 would limit the use of force to strictly a last resort, when officers have no other option to protect themselves or civilians.

Currently, police officers may use deadly force if their actions “are ‘objectively reasonable’ in light of the facts and circumstances confronting them.” This standard was established by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1989 in Graham v. Connor.

The bill was spurred by a spate of civilian deaths, particularly minorities, at the hands of police, with the killing of an unarmed Stephon Clark by Sacramento police officers in March in particular serving as the catalyst for legislative action.

“AB931 is about preventing unnecessary deaths by clarifying police use-of-force,” said Assemblywoman Shirley Weber, D-San Diego. “This bill is squarely in line with the best practices recognized by academics and best practices in the field.”

Additionally, Sen. Steve Bradford, D-Gardena, cited the need to protect communities of color.

The ACLU of California praised the development, tweeting, “We need the bill to address the policing crisis that has led to the deaths of far too many people.”

However, law enforcement groups, many of which have opposed the bill since its inception, will likely vigorously fight the bill’s passage. “We agree that more training can result in better outcomes, but there is a fundamental disagreement about raising the standards above what the Supreme Court has said,” one lobbyist for the California Police Chiefs Association told the Sacramento Bee.

AB931’s next test be the Assembly Appropriations Committee.

The clout of the California Teachers Association was on full display last week when a bill by Assemblywoman Shirley Weber, D-San Diego, to reform a tenure law that can give lifetime job protections to teachers 18 months into their careers was abruptly

Since her election in 2012, Weber, a former school board president and college professor, has prodded her fellow Democratic lawmakers to not accept the California education status quo. Weber wants to make tenure rules more rigorous and like those in other states, to ensure the Local Control Funding Formula actually does what it was promised to do and helps English-language learners, and to seek state standards that make it easy to gauge whether schools are helping struggling minority students.

But Weber’s push for significant reforms have either been killed in the Legislature or by Gov. Jerry Brown’s veto pen.

Her latest reform measure, Assembly Bill 1220, would have delayed tenure decisions until a teacher’s third year on the job, but would have allowed marginal teachers additional time to establish their worthiness for tenure in a fourth year, and, in limited circumstances, a fifth year. Weber’s bill included a provision intended to make districts put more of an emphasis on professional development of marginal teachers.

The measure won early approvals and initially appeared relatively uncontroversial, with only five Assembly members opposing it in a preliminary June 1 vote. Weber supporters saw the provisions emphasizing helping struggling teachers as a valuable way to reassure teachers unions that the bill wasn’t an exercise in teacher or union bashing.

But later in June, the Assembly Appropriations Committee shaved off the fourth and fifth year tenure consideration provisions – without consulting Weber. Then, on July 6, Assemblyman Tony Thurmond, D-Richmond, gutted and amended AB1164, a bill he had introduced about foster care policies, so it offered an alternative to Weber’s bill. Thurmond’s version would in some cases allow struggling teachers to win tenure consideration after a third year.

The bill was knocked by reformers as unnecessarily complex and inferior to Weber’s. But the clout of its prime supporter – the CTA – led Weber last week to withdraw her bill for now in hopes it would have better chances in 2018.

Thurmond then withdrew his bill, suggesting it was only introduced as a way to block Weber and her proposal. Both are members of the California Legislative Black Caucus.

CTA expected to back lawmaker who thwarted bill

The EdSource website connected the maneuvering to Thurmond’s plan to run for state superintendent of public instruction in 2018 when incumbent Tom Torlakson is termed out. That’s because the CTA has already sent signals it will endorse Thurmond, who has established his pro-teacher union bona fides with such measures as proposing that teachers be given subsidized housing.

The CTA’s strong and early support of Torlakson was key to the low-profile Bay Area state lawmaker winning the superintendent’s job in 2010 after finishing second in the primary, and to his narrow 2014 win over fellow Democrat Marshall Tuck, a Los Angeles charter school advocate with backing from school reform groups.

Tuck has already announced he will seek the job again in 2018.

A new government-run retirement program: On Thursday, Gov. Brown signed Senate Bill 1234, which gives legislative approval to the state’s continuing efforts to create a new government-run retirement program for private-sector employees. Once it is up and running, private employers (with five or more employees) will be required to offer this program, whereby 3 percent of each employees’ earnings will be deducted and invested by a state-selected investment group – possibly, the California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS).

Employees can opt out. The details are not yet certain, but the goal is to invest the money in a low-risk investment tied to the Treasury bond. Supporters say the law protects taxpayers from incurring more than minimal costs, but critics insist the program could grow and change in ensuing years – and that there’s no way of creating a massive new government program without imposing risks on the state budget.

The idea, which is being pitched in other states too, grew out of union activism. Several years ago, when publicity over unfunded public-pension liabilities began creating pressure for pension reform, union allies wanted to come up with a “positive” rebuttal to all those news stories about six-figure pensions and pension-spiking gimmicks. This idea is designed help private workers.

Putting limits on ‘policing for profit’: One of the most controversial policing strategies in recent years has been “civil asset forfeiture.” Born out of the nation’s drug war in the 1980s, forfeiture was designed to help police agencies crack down on drug kingpins by allowing departments to grab the cash, cars and properties gained through their illegal activities. But like many government programs, asset forfeiture morphed into something its creators never envisioned.

Two of the men who helped create the program in the U.S. Department of Justice, John Yoder and Brad Cates, wrote an op-ed in The Washington Post in 2014 pointing to the corruption engendered by this process: “Law enforcement agents and prosecutors began using seized cash and property to fund their operations, supplanting general tax revenue, and this led to the most extreme abuses: law enforcement efforts based upon what cash and property they could seize to fund themselves, rather than on an even-handed effort to enforce the law.”

Basically, police agencies came to depend on the revenue and they distorted their law-enforcement priorities based on the chance to grab more cash. There’s no due process here, given that police agencies file suit against the property itself, alleging it was involved in a drug crime. No conviction is necessary. California had previously passed reforms that mostly required a conviction, but police agencies got around that by partnering with the feds (and operating under looser federal standards) and then splitting the seized property.

Senate Bill 443 was killed last year after lobbying efforts by police chiefs and other law-enforcement agencies. But a fairly recent amendment – allowing cops to still take large amounts of cash without a conviction, but limiting smaller amounts of cash and property takings – eliminated most opposition from law enforcement. The new law is meaningful, and one of the more substantive compromises to take place in Sacramento this year.

Giving the terminally ill the right to try: One of the more significant “freedom” battles this year was over the so-called “right to try” – i.e., the ability of terminally ill patients to try experimental drug treatments that have yet to gain final approval from the Food and Drug Administration. Similar measures have been approved by 31 other states.

The Goldwater Institute, a Phoenix-based free-market think tank, has been championing these measures across the country. As Goldwater explains: “The FDA … often stands between the patients and the treatments that may alleviate their symptoms or provide a cure. To access these treatments, patients must either go through a lengthy FDA exemption process or wait for the treatments to receive FDA approval, which can take a decade or more and cost hundreds of millions of dollars.”

The California law, Assembly Bill 1668, passed overwhelmingly. According to the official bill analysis, it authorizes drug manufacturers to make investigational treatment available “to a patient with a serious or immediately life-threatening disease, when that patient has considered all other treatment options currently approved by the FDA, has been unable to participate in a relevant clinical trial, and for whom the investigational drug has been recommended by the patient’s primary physician and a consulting physician.”

Allowing felons to vote: One of the more controversial new laws, Assembly Bill 2466 by Assemblywoman Shirley Weber, D-San Diego, allows felons who are serving their sentence in county jails to vote. The measure was opposed by law-enforcement groups, but Weber argued it would stop discrimination in voting and make it less likely that prisoners would commit new offenses.

“Civic participation can be a critical component of re-entry and has been linked to reduced recidivism,” Weber said, according to a Los Angeles Times report. “For me, this bill is not about second chances, but about maintaining the integrity of elections,” said Sen. Pat Bates, R-Laguna Niguel, in a statement. “Close elections, especially at the local level, could now turn on a handful of ballots cast by people in jail. This new law is bad for democracy and will further erode trust in government.”

Putting self-driving cars on the road: Autonomous vehicle technology has been advancing rapidly, and California is, not surprisingly, ground zero for the development of this important new technology. Gov. Brown signed a bill Thursday “that for the first time allows testing on public roads of self-driving vehicles with no steering wheels, brake pedals or accelerators,” according to a San Jose Mercury News article. “A human driver as backup is not required, but the vehicles will be limited to speeds of less than 35 mph.”

Assembly Bill 1592 itself is rather modest. It provides two spots for such testing – in a San Ramon business park and at the former Concord Naval Weapons Station. And Friday, the California Department of Motor Vehicles released new regulations that are far friendlier toward self-driving cars than the DMV’s previous regulations. So while the new law itself isn’t particularly significant, the state’s new legislative and regulatory approach certainly is. If that approach continues, we’ll be seeing rapid expansion of autonomous vehicles here.

Greenlighting granny flats: The governor’s signing of Senate Bill 1069 shows increasing bipartisan understanding of the state’s skyrocketing home prices. The bill would relax standards for creating ADUs (accessory dwelling units), better known as granny flats.

“Eliminating barriers to ADU construction is a common-sense, cost-effective approach that will permit homeowners to share empty rooms in their homes and property, add incomes to meet family budgets, and make good use of the property in the Bay Area and across California while easing the housing crisis,” according to the bill analysis’ summary of the author’s arguments. The bill embraces a regulatory approach that could be tried with other types of housing.

Steven Greenhut is Western region director for the R Street Institute. He is based in Sacramento. Write to him at sgreenhut@rstreet.org.

No Child Left Behind, championed by President George W. Bush and Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Massachusetts, was enacted in 2002. It included a long list of mandates that states had to follow to receive federal funding. But it quickly became a lightning rod because of its heavy emphasis on testing. It was also criticized for setting unrealistic goals.

Last year, the House and Senate moved to pass a new federal framework that included far fewer requirements. But accountability advocates did manage to win a provision that they believe will force states to step in and improve poorly functioning schools. It mandates that states must intervene with schools which repeatedly fail to graduate two-thirds of students, fall in the bottom 5 percent of academic achievement or have chronic problems with low scores for ethnic groups.

U.S. Department of Education officials charged with drafting rules for this provision want states to adopt simple metrics based mostly on test scores that provide one number for each school, making it easier to assess academic performance.

California State Superintendent of Public Schools Tom Torlakson

But Gov. Jerry Brown, state Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson (pictured) and state Board of Education President Michael Kirst have for years disapproved of the single-score rating. This view — and the aggressive lobbying of the California Teachers Association and the California Federation of Teachers — led to the scrapping of the Academic Performance Index that had previously provided snapshot looks at school performance.

Instead, the state Board of Education earlier this month unanimously adopted a system that rates schools on several factors, including math and English test scores; graduation, suspension and absenteeism rates; and effectiveness of English-learner courses. Kirst and Torlakson wrote a letter to a U.S. Department of Education officials urging that California’s multi-metric standard be accepted.

State evaluation ripped as confusing, unhelpful

But the proposal has come under fire within California. While it was being finalized, the state evaluation system was blasted in a Los Angeles Times editorial as being confusing and unhelpful. The Legislature was also skeptical. At the behest of Assemblywoman Shirley Weber, D-San Diego, the Assembly and Senate passed a bill with almost no dissent that had a similar variety of metrics for schools — but also a bottom-line, single score on academic performance, as the U.S. Department of Education wants.

Last weekend, Gov. Brown vetoed the bill — AB2548 — saying the standards developed by the state Board of Education were superior.

This sets up a confrontation with the Obama administration in the short term and with the administration of Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump after Jan. 20, 2017.

Brown, Torlakson and Kirst may be hoping for a more sympathetic ear from Clinton. A high-profile education reformer earlier in her career, in recent years she has echoed teacher unions’ criticism of assigning so much importance to results of standardized tests.

Heightening the stakes in the criminal justice debate roiling the country at large, Gov. Jerry Brown could soon greenlight a law that would allow some state felons to vote from jail.

California has wound up in the middle of the pack on state laws around criminals and voting rights. “Two states, Maine and Vermont, allow felons to vote while behind bars,” KTVU noted, while “14 states restore voting rights automatically when a person is released from prison. 4 states, including California, restore voting rights after completion of parole.” The new rule, if Brown were to sign AB2466, carves out an exception for felons shifted out of state prisons due to realignment.

Constitutional claims

For that reason, advocates of the bill have characterized it as more of a formality than an overhaul of the state’s criminal law. In 2011, the Criminal Justice Realignment Act “created new sentencing categories for low-level, nonviolent offenders to remedy unconstitutionally overcrowded state prisons,” the NAACP’s Janai Nelson noted in the Los Angeles Times. “Instead of time in state prison, minor felony convictions now result in a term in the county jail followed by release under what’s known as mandatory or community supervision.” Given the opportunity to rule on how that changed status squares with voting laws, “Alameda County Superior Court already has held that people subject to this new form of mandatory or community supervision are not ‘on parole’ and therefore retain their right to vote,” Nelson added, claiming AB2466 would simply “codify that ruling” and eliminate any “ambiguity in how a felony conviction affects voter eligibility” in California. 

But critics have countered that the parole language is not as relevant to a proper interpretation of standing law as other elements of voters’ 1976 addition to the state constitution. “The Legislature shall prohibit improper practices that affect elections and shall provide for the disqualification of electors while mentally incompetent or imprisoned or on parole for the conviction of a felony,” that language ran in full. Although supporters of AB2466 “contend that the word ‘imprisoned’ in the California Constitution refers to a state prison, but not a county jail,” the looser interpretation AB2466 embraces “would create an odd circumstance in which inmates out of prison on parole are prohibited from voting, but felons behind bars in county jails could vote” — a view held by the state Sheriffs’ Association, as legislative director Cory Salzillo suggested to the Daily Signal. Given the low level of the judiciary ruling used as a baseline by AB2466, that could invite further litigation that would effectively freeze or scuttle the legislation before it is implemented. 

Signaling and consequences

For the bill’s supporters, that risk appeared to be one worth taking. “I wrote AB2466 because I want to send a message to the nation that California will not stand for discrimination in voting,” Assemblywoman Shirley Weber, D-San Diego, said in a statement, indicating a preference to pass legislation now and consider later whether it squares legitimately with the state Constitution. Weber has also advanced a bill that would add a five year period of eligibility for nonviolent felons petitioning a sentencing reduction in the wake of Proposition 47, which changed their crimes to misdemeanors. “But issues surrounding Proposition 47 generate significant controversy” as well, the Los Angeles Times recently observed. “The California Police Chiefs Assn. has blamed the initiative for a recent increase in property crimes across the state.”

In a final wrinkle fueling concern around the vote-from-jail law, impacted felons would face a logical but potentially problematic geographic restriction on their vote. “Under AB2466, these inmates would vote in the district where they are incarcerated,” noted state Sen. Patricia Bates, R-Laguna Niguel, in the Orange County Register. “For example, an inmate whose home residence is in San Clemente would be able to vote for local races affecting Santa Ana, since that is where Orange County’s Central Jail is located.” 

A bill sponsored by Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de Leon, D-Los Angeles, would have added three members to the South Coast Air Quality Management Board, which regulates air quality in Los Angeles, Riverside, San Bernardino and Orange counties.

And while that probably seems as dull as watching paint dry to nearly everyone who just read it, the measure had major implications for Republicans, local governments, business interests, environmentalists and residents of the broad district that has some of the most toxic air in the nation.

De Leon introduced the board-packing plan shortly after Republicans engineered a takeover of the board, swinging the focus from environmentalists to business interests. In December, the board disregarded SCAQMD staff recommendations and instead adopted rules on refineries backed by the oil industry, and in March it ousted the the longtime director who had been seen as anti-business.  

Representatives to the board are local city council members and county supervisors, appointed locally. De Leon’s bill would have added three seats to the 13-member board, appointed by the the Senate Rules Committee (which de Leon chairs), the Assembly speaker and the governor.

During floor debate, proponents argued that the measure was about adding diversity to the almost all-white board that had no Latinos, which defies the demographics of the heavily-Latino region. 

“Needless to say, I’m disappointed,” de Leon told CalWatchdog on Thursday. “Any time people of color are excluded from decision-making processes directly tied to their health and wellbeing, fundamental change is needed. This is a textbook example of institutional racism.”

De Leon added that Los Angeles County Supervisor Mike Antonovich, a Republican who also sits on the SCAQMD board, is termed-out and will soon be replaced by “someone far more progressive on the matter,” likely shifting the balance of power back to the environmentalists. 

However, of the current board’s ethnic composition, and the persistent lack of diversity, belies the fact that it’s largely been in Democratic, or environmentalist, control for years. De Leon did not say whether he’d reintroduce similar measures in the future.

Local control

Many opponents of the measure argued that the bill was a power grab by state policy makers at the expense of local control. And the large bloc of Democrats who either voted no or abstained suggest that the matter is not purely partisan.

“State versus local, that’s what this is about,” said Mike Madrid, a GOP strategist who helped devise the SDAQMD takeover. “It happened to be Republicans, but it was a state/local fight.”

But it was still a big win for Republicans, who are steadily slipping in their share of voter registration throughout the state, face the very real possibility of a Democratic supermajority in the Legislature next year and are not considered a consistent threat in any statewide election. For Republicans, local offices are where they can have a policy impact.

And despite several major policy victories for environmentalists, the defeat of the de Leon measure is a big win for the advocates of economic development. 

John Husing, the chief economist of the Inland Empire Economic Partnership, has been studying Southern California’s economy since 1964. His research suggests a correlation between the rise of poverty and the rise of environmental regulations in the state. Husing argues that while the policies have had a positive impact on air quality in the region, the policies are imbalanced in relation to business development and subsequently drive poverty, which affects health. 

“The whole air-quality, green initiative is having detrimental effect on moving people out of poverty and into the middle class,” Husing said of the SCAQMD region and the neighboring central valley.

Environment v. economy

Environmentalists have often said that any job loss associated with these air-quality policies would be offset by job creation in green sectors. However, Husing says statistics say that isn’t true, at least not in areas with high unemployment, like many communities in the SCAQMD.

Citing data from the California Employment Development Department and the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Husing said from 2010 to 2016 the U.S. added 836,000 manufacturing jobs, compared to California which added 42,500 — a mere 5.1 percent. While the growth rate is on pace with with the national average, it lags by over 50 percent behind the state’s share of gross state product.

Husing said that the sluggish growth of manufacturing jobs in the state is attributed to three factors: Companies leaving, companies growing beyond the state’s borders and out-of-state companies refusing to grow in the state.

“Whose affected by that? It’s not the companies,” Husing said. “They’re doing fine some place else. It’s workers whose jobs are never created. … So you’re basically cutting off routes to the middle class for those workers.”

The vote

The measure failed just before the stroke of midnight on Wednesday, 30-36. And while it is seen as a victory for Republicans, the measure was largely defeated by the 14 assemblymembers, all Democrats, who didn’t vote.

Those who didn’t vote were Luis Alejo of Watsonville, Joaquin Arambula of Fresno, Kansen Chu of San Jose, Jim Frazier of Oakley, Rich Gordon of Menlo Park, Adam Gray of Merced (who was not present), Kevin Mullin of South San Francisco and Shirley Weber of San Diego. The six who didn’t vote and live in the region were Ian Calderon of Whittier, Eduardo Garcia of Coachella, Mike Gipson of Carson, Roger Hernandez of West Covina, Chris Holden of Pasadena and Patrick O’Donnell of Long Beach.

And while the tributes range in length and tone — one legislator joked (?) about his romantic feelings for Assemblywoman Nora Campos — none were as awkward as the one for termed-out Roger Hernández, who was recently placed under a restraining order from his now-ex-wife and was subsequently stripped of his committee assignments.

Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez, D-San Diego, was the first of around a half dozen Democrats to pay kind words to the West Covina Democrat, whom she had known since election night 2000.

Gonzalez spoke of Hernández’s focus on immigrant communities and low-wage workers.

“This body will miss your work,” Gonzalez said.

Remember when he stole a member’s mic?

Gonzalez opened her remarks with a joke about Hernández’s relationship with Assemblyman Matthew Harper, R-Huntington Beach. Last July, Hernández had security remove Harper’s microphone at a committee hearing on increasing the minimum wage after repeatedly talking over Harper and calling a vote to end debate. Videos suggested that even the clerk and deputies seemed confused by Hernández’s requests.

“Seargents have already turned off Mr. Harper’s microphone, so we’re going to do OK,” Gonzalez said.

Harper declined to speak on Wednesday when jokingly asked.

“Thank you for your wisdom, Mr. Harper,” said Assemblyman Kevin Mullin, D-South San Francisco, who was presiding.

Proud

Assemblywoman Shirley Weber had the most awkward exchange with Hernández, however, when she said she was “proud” to see how he’d handled himself over the past year.

In April, Hernández was placed under a temporary restraining order from his then-wife, Susan Rubio, after allegations of domestic violence surfaced during divorce proceedings.

Rubio alleged Hernández assaulted her 20 times over a three-year period, detailing eight alleged incidents in court that included being choked with a belt, being beat with a broom while on the ground and being threatened with a knife after having been accused of an affair.

Hernández has not been charged with a crime but was placed under a three-year restraining order earlier this summer. Hernández has denied the allegations, and even compared Rubio to former Olympic ice skater Tonya Harding, who hired a thug to whack the knee of another skater, Nancy Kerrigan.

It’s not the first time Hernández was in trouble. In 2012, an ex-girlfriend accused him of domestic violence, although charges were never filed. That same year, Hernández was arrested for drunk driving in a state vehicle, but was acquitted by a jury on one charge, while the jury was hung on another. And in 2015, allegations of political money laundering against Hernández were dropped by the Fair Political Practices Commission after two key witnesses were unable to testify — one had serious medical issues while the other passed away.

“You’ve taken a lot this year,” Weber said. “You’ve taken a lot over the years. And I’m always so proud to see you stand.”

Weber added that she thought of Hernández as courageous on tough issues, a man of “tremendous love and respect” and reiterated her appreciation for his toughness during his personal turmoil. Hernández recently dropped a bid for Congress amid the allegations.

“Many of us struggle with all the issues of life and we crumble as a result of it, but you did not,” Weber said.