BOARD LEGISLATIVE COMMITTEE Friday, July 19, 2019 12:30 p.m. EBRPD – Administrative Headquarters 2950 Peralta Oaks Court Oakland, California 94605
The following agenda items are listed for Committee consideration. In accordance with the Board Operating Guidelines, no official action of the Board will be taken at this meeting; rather, the Committee’s purpose shall be to review the listed items and to consider developing recommendations to the Board of Directors.
A copy of the background materials concerning these agenda items, including any material that may have been submitted less than 72 hours before the meeting, is available for inspection on the District’s website (www. ebparks.org), the Headquarters reception desk, and at the meeting.
Public Comment on Agenda Items If you wish to testify on an item on the agenda, please complete a speaker’s form and submit it to the recording secretary. Your name will be called when the item is announced for discussion.
Accommodations and Access District facilities and meetings comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act. If special accommodations are needed for you to participate, please contact the Clerk of the Board at 510-544-2020 as soon as possible, but preferably at least three working days prior to the meeting.
AGENDA
TIME ITEM STATUS STAFF
12:30 I. STATE LEGISLATION / OTHER MATTERS A. NEW LEGISLATION R Doyle/Pfuehler 1. AB 38 (Wood D-Santa Rosa) - Fire Hardened Homes Revolving Loan and Rebate Fund 2. AB 1668 (Carrillo D-Los Angeles) – California Conservation Corps Education and Employment Reentry Program 3. SB 226 (Nielsen R-Gerber) - Watershed Restoration Grant Program 4. SB 268 (Wiener D-San Francisco) – Ballot Measure Tax Rate Information 5. SB 462 (Stern D-Canoga Park) – Community College Forest and Woodlands Restoration Workforce Curriculum 6. Other Matters
B. OTHER STATE MATTERS R Doyle/Pfuehler 1. Wildfire Prevention, Safe Drinking Water, Drought Preparation, and Flood Protection Bond Act of 2020 2. AB 1190 (Irwin D-Thousand Oaks) – Prohibition of Local Drone Bans Update
3. AB 1486 (Ting D-San Francisco) – Surplus Land for Housing Update 4. Other Matters
II. FEDERAL LEGISLATION / OTHER MATTERS R Doyle/Pfuehler A. NEW LEGISLATION 1. H.Con.Res. 49 (DeSaulnier D-CA) – Port Chicago 50 Exoneration 2. H.Res. 371 (Thompson D-CA) – Recognizing the 10th Anniversary of Outdoor Afro 3. H.R. 2358 (Kaptur D-OH) – 21st Century Civilian Conservation Corps 4. H.R. 3195 (Van Drew D-NJ) – Land and Water Conservation Fund Permanent Funding Act 5. S. 1098 (Cardin D-MD) – Transportation Alternatives Enhancements Act 6. S. 1263 (Cortez Masto D-NV) and H.R. 2435 (Smith R-NJ) – Accelerating Veterans Recovery Outdoors Act 7. S. 1746 (Schatz D-HI) – Explore America Act 8. Other Matters
B. OTHER FEDERAL MATTERS I Doyle/Pfuehler 1. S. 500 and H.R. 1225 (Portman R-OH and Bishop R-UT) Restore our Parks Act Update 2. Land and Water Conservation Fund Update 3. Other Matters
III. PARK AND PUBLIC INTEREST COMMUNITY I Pfuehler/Baldinger ENGAGEMENT PROJECT REPORT
IV. ARTICLES
V. OPEN FORUM PUBLIC COMMENT Individuals wishing to address the Committee on a topic not on the agenda may do so by completing a speaker’s form and submitting it to the recording secretary.
VI. BOARD COMMENTS
(R) Recommendation for Future Board Consideration Future Meetings: (I) Information January 18 July 19 (D) Discussion February – NO MTG August 16 March 15 September – NO MTG Legislative Committee Members April 19 October 18 Dennis Waespi (Chair); Ellen Corbett, Colin Coffey May 17 November – NO MTG Director Dee Rosario, Alternate June – NO MTG *December 13 Erich Pfuehler, Government Affairs Manager TO: Board Legislative Committee (Chair Dennis Waespi, Colin Coffey, Ellen Corbett, alt. Dee Rosario)
FROM: Robert E. Doyle, General Manager Erich Pfuehler, Government Affairs Manager
SUBJECT: Board Legislative Committee Meeting WHEN: Friday, July 19, 2019 12:30 PM Lunch will be served
WHERE: Board Room, Peralta Oaks ______
Items to be discussed:
I. STATE LEGISLATION / OTHER MATTERS A. NEW LEGISLATION 1. AB 38 (Wood D – Santa Rosa) – Fire Hardened Homes Revolving Loan and Rebate Fund This bill establishes the Fire Hardened Homes Revolving Loan and Rebate Fund (Fund) to provide financial assistance and rebates to building owners to help pay for costs associated with fire hardening. It also requires building owners to notify potential buyers about fire hardening improvements on the property. The Fund would be administered by the California Statewide Communities Development Authority. It also requires the Natural Resources Agency to review the regional capacity of each county that contains a very high fire hazard severity zone. The bill is supported by the California Fire Chiefs Association, California League of Conservation Voters, Sierra Club, The Nature Conservancy and a number of insurance groups. The Realtors oppose.
Staff recommendation: Support.
2. AB 1668 (Carrillo D – Los Angeles) – California Conservation Corps Education and Employment Reentry Program Assembly Member Carrillo’s legislation would require the Director of the California Conservation Corps to prioritize adding formerly incarcerated inmates to their crews. The Corps crews generally are between the ages of 18 and 25. The average age of a released inmate is 38. Integrating the two age groups could be a challenge.
Staff recommendation: Watch.
3. SB 226 (Nielsen R – Gerber) – Watershed Restoration Grant Program Senator Nielsen’s legislation requires the California Natural Resources Agency to develop and implement the Watershed Restoration Grant Program. It would provide grants for watershed restoration to improve water quality and/or water supply following a wildfire. This dedicated funding source defines a watershed to mean any river, watershed or river system tributary that has been affected by a wildfire. Funds are only available for areas where a wildfire occurred on or after January 1, 2017 and a state of emergency was declared by the Governor. The bill authorizes the grant program for five years, so potentially could apply to future fire
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emergencies. The bill is supported by the California State Association of Counties, Association of California Water Agencies and Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District.
Staff recommendation: Support.
4. SB 268 (Wiener D – San Francisco) – Ballot Measure Tax Rate Information Currently, if a ballot measure imposes or raises a tax, the tax rate needs to be identified in the ballot statement. Senator Wiener’s legislation would exempt a measure that imposes or increases a tax with more than one rate or authorizes the issuance of bonds. In its stead, it requires the statement include “see voter guide for information.” The tax rate can be identified in the voter guide. The bill is supported by the California Special Districts Association, California State Association of Counties and the State Building and Construction Trades Council. It is opposed by the California Taxpayers Association.
Staff recommendation: Support.
5. SB 462 (Stern D – Canoga Park) – Community College Forest and Woodlands Restoration Workforce Curriculum Senator Stern’s bill calls on the Chancellor of the California Community Colleges, to develop a forest and woodlands restoration workforce curriculum and vocational programs to be offered by community college districts commencing on or before July 31, 2021. According to the Senate Appropriations Committee, this bill, based on the cost of similar programs funded in recent years, could require $10 million in start-up funding. The model curriculum that would be created by this bill differs from existing fire science degree programs by focusing on restoration. Currently, there is no complete, explicit restoration workforce training program available in California. The bill is supported by the California Native Plant Society, Sierra Business Council and The Nature Conservancy.
Staff recommendation: Support.
6. Other Matters
B. OTHER STATE MATTERS 1. Wildfire Prevention, Safe Drinking Water, Drought Preparation and Flood Protection Bond Act of 2020 This is the $7.883 billion bond measure filed by Joe Caves. It allocates funding to the following: • $3.508 billion for wildfire prevention and community resilience from climate impacts. • $2.2 billion for safe drinking water, protecting water supply and water quality from climate risks. • $975 million for protecting fish and wildlife from climate risks. • $770 million for protecting coastal lands, bays and oceans from climate risks. • $230 million for climate resilience, workforce development and education, • $200 million for protecting agricultural land from climate risks. Given the high price tag for the bond itself and the expense of qualifying the measure for the ballot (estimated in the neighborhood of $4 million), it is unclear how serious an effort this is.
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2. AB 1190 (Irwin D – Thousand Oaks) – Prohibition of Local Drone Bans Update District staff and advocates have been working to amend this legislation to exempt Public Resources Code 5500 and 35100 (Santa Clara Open Space Authority), which would enable such open space agencies to ban the use of drones. It is a two-year bill, but District staff would like to have the Legislative Committee’s authority to oppose the bill if it is not amended.
3. AB 1486 (Ting D – San Francisco) – Surplus Land for Housing Update District staff remain concerned about the impacts of this legislation. It requires any local agency, when disposing of surplus land, to first offer it for sale or lease for the purpose of developing low- and moderate-income housing. It also requires each local agency, on or before December 31 of each year, to make an inventory of all lands it holds, owns or controls, including a description of each parcel found to be in excess of its needs. The California Special Districts Association is in strong opposition of this legislation. They assert this bill imposes onerous new requirements on the disposition of surplus land and does not take into consideration the unique needs of various local agencies and special districts. District staff would like to have the Legislative Committee’s authority to oppose the bill.
4. Other Matters
II. FEDERAL LEGISLATION / OTHER MATTERS A. NEW LEGISLATION 1. H.Con.Res. 49 (DeSaulnier D – CA) – Port Chicago 50 Exoneration Representative DeSaulnier reintroduced his resolution to express the sense that Congress: • Recognizes the service and sacrifice of those who served and perished at Port Chicago during World War II; • Forever exonerates the Port Chicago sailors of the charge of mutiny against the United States and any and all other charges brought against them in the aftermath of the July 17, 1944, explosion; • Upgrades the general and summary discharges issued to each of the Port Chicago sailors to honorable discharges; and • Directs the Secretary of the Navy to place a letter attesting to these actions in the file of each of the Port Chicago sailors and to notify any surviving family members of these actions. Representative DeSaulnier was able to include exoneration of the Port Chicago 50 as an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act, which passed the House by a close vote of 220-197. Given the close vote and need for agreement with the Senate, it is not certain the exoneration will remain in the final bill. The District should support the stand-alone resolution. The full Board considered a resolution for restorative justice for the U.S. Navy Sailors of Port Chicago at the June 7, 2016 meeting. Rep. DeSaulnier has reintroduced this bill in the 116th Congress. Supporting H.Con.Res. 49 is consistent with the Board’s previous position.
Staff recommendation: Support.
2. H.Res. 371 (Thompson D – CA) – Recognizing the 10th Anniversary of Outdoor Afro
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Outdoor Afro started as a blog about nature in 2009 and has grown into a cutting-edge nationwide network with volunteer leaders in 30 States. Leaders guide hundreds of outdoor events each year based on a simple mission to celebrate and inspire African-American connections to nature through recreational activities like camping, hiking, birding, fishing, gardening, skiing and more. In the past 10 years, Outdoor Afro has cultivated and trained more than 200 outdoor leaders, leading thousands of outdoor events and reaching well over 150,000 participants. Outdoor Afro is engaging millions of people through digital outreach by reaching 50,000 people per day. It is changing the narrative of who engages in the outdoors by posting thousands of photos and stories.
This resolution: • Supports the recognition of the 10th anniversary of Outdoor Afro; and • Commends the leadership of Outdoor Afro for changing the face of conservation by leading the way for inclusion in outdoor recreation and nature for all.
The resolution is also supported by Rep. Barbara Lee.
Staff recommendation: Support.
3. H.R. 2358 (Kaptur D – OH) – 21st Century Civilian Conservation Corps Representative Kaptur has reintroduced legislation to authorize the President to reestablish the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC). The CCC helps provide employment to unemployed and underemployed citizens for the performance of public work projects aimed at safeguarding natural resources, and developing new transportation and infrastructure. Examples of projects include trail construction, tree planting, stream restoration, park construction, wildfire prevention and invasive species removal. The District could be well positioned to participate in this program. The District has supported this Federal legislation in the past.
Staff Recommendation: Support.
4. H.R. 3195 (Van Drew D – NJ) – Land and Water Conservation Fund Permanent Funding Act Representative Van Drew’s bill would provide permanent, dedicated funding for the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF). While LWCF was permanently reauthorized when the Administration signed S. 47, the public lands package, on March 12, 2019, it left the annual commitment of funding up to the appropriations and budget process. That is the historical process which has only fully funded the LWCF once in 50 years. Rep. Van Drew’s bill would fund the LWCF at $900 million annually on a permanent basis. The District has long been a supporter of full funding for LWCF and previously took a support version on S. 1081, the Senate companion legislation.
Staff Recommendation: Support.
5. S. 1098 (Cardin D – MD) – Transportation Alternatives Enhancements Act Senator Cardin’s bill seeks to support and improve the Transportation Alternatives Program (TAP) run by the U.S. Department of Transportation. TAP is predicated on the idea that local governments should exercise authority over dedicated Federal transportation funding for local
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active transportation priorities – including bikeways and sidewalks which is infrastructure that reduces traffic congestion, provides children with safe routes to school and gives communities more affordable transportation options. Nationally, total authorization in FY 2019 for the transportation alternatives plan was $850 million. The legislation seeks to restore more local control which was reduced under the 2015 Fixing America’s Surface Transportation Act (FAST). FAST converted the TAP program into a set-aside in the Surface Transportation Block Grant Program and mandated state reporting on their transportation alternatives plans. The legislation also allows for Federal TAP funding to be used for recreational trails. This legislation could support the District’s overall trails program.
Staff Recommendation: Support.
6. S. 1263 (Cortez Masto D – NV) and H.R. 2435 (Smith R – NJ) – Accelerating Veterans Recovery Outdoors Act This legislation would require the Secretary of Veterans Affairs to establish the “Task Force on Outdoor Recreation for Veterans.” The Task Force is comprised of representatives from other Federal agencies. The Secretary of Veterans Affairs and the Secretary of the Interior shall serve as co-chairpersons of the Task Force. The Task Force will work to: • Identify opportunities to formalize coordination between the Department of Veterans Affairs, public land agencies and partner organizations regarding the use of public lands or other outdoor spaces for medical treatment and recreational therapy for veterans; • Identify barriers that exist to providing veterans with opportunities for medical treatment and therapy through the use of outdoor recreation on public lands or other outdoor spaces; and • Develop recommendations to better facilitate the use of public lands or other outdoor spaces for preventative care, medical treatment and therapy for veterans. The Task Force is to report their findings to Congress. Reps. Grijalva, Garamendi and Huffman support. While the direct impact is not substantial, the report could be utilized to help guide District policies with regard to veterans.
Staff recommendation: Support.
7. S. 1746 (Schatz D – HI) – Explore America Act Senator Schatz reintroduced this legislation to support the expansion of cultural heritage tourism by strengthening the Preserve America Grant Program. Changes to the program will help attract more visitors to American landscapes and cultural heritage sites in the National Park System, enhance existing programs, and increase collaboration between communities and the federal government. The Preserve America Program was established by Executive Order in 2003 to support state, tribal and local government efforts to preserve and enhance heritage tourism. The grant component of the Preserve America Program is a matching partnership between the Advisory Committee on Historic Preservation and the Department of the Interior that supports heritage tourism at the state and local levels.
The Explore America Act would amend the Preserve America Grant Program to: • Provide technical assistance. The bill directs the Departments of Commerce and Interior, and the Advisory Committee on Historic Preservation (ACHP), to provide technical assistance in lieu of monetary funds.
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• Focus on economic growth. It directs the Secretary of Commerce to coordinate with the Secretary of the Interior and the ACHP to evaluate how the program can increase job creation, boost economic growth and promote tourism. • Increase accountability. It establishes program metrics to measure effectiveness and report findings to Congress. • Prioritize community coordination. The bill directs collaboration with gateway communities (communities adjacent to National Parks) by providing financial and technical assistance, tourism development and promotion, visitor management services and access to federal resources. The bill was introduced with bi-partisan support. The District has supported Senator Schatz’s bill in the past as this type of legislation could help communities such as Richmond, Martinez, Concord and Danville which are gateways to units of the National Park Service (NPS).
Staff recommendation: Support
8. Other Matters
B. OTHER FEDERAL MATTERS 1. S. 500 and H.R. 1225 (Portman R – OH and Bishop R – UT) – Restore our Parks Act Update On June 26, the House Natural Resources Committee passed (by a vote of 36 to 2) the parks and public lands maintenance backlog bill (H.R. 1225). The bill would establish a $6.5 billion trust fund (from unallocated oil and gas revenues) for parks and public lands (Bureau of Land Management, Fish and Wildlife Service, Forest Service, Bureau of Indian Affairs) maintenance backlog. The total maintenance backlog is estimated at $19 billion. H.R. 1225 has 290 cosponsors. There are ongoing discussions about moving a package of lands bills (LWCF bill, parks maintenance bill, lands bills) on the House floor and the end of July or early September.
2. Land and Water Conservation Fund Update On June 25, the House of Representatives passed the Interior Appropriations Bill. The bill provides a 5% increase over last year. The bill provides $523.9 million for LWCF ($244 million Federal, $280 million state). Wildfire programs would receive $5.21 billion, which is $1.6 billion above the enacted level. The National Park Service would receive $3.39 billion, which is $168 million over last year.
3. Other Matters
III. PARK AND PUBLIC INTEREST COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT PROJECT REPORT Staff will provide a verbal update about the Park and Public Interest Community Engagement Project and corresponding survey.
IV. ARTICLES
V. OPEN FORUM PUBLIC COMMENT
VI. BOARD COMMENTS
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Governor, stop raiding state’s cap-and-trade funds By Fabian Núñez | Wednesday, July 10, 2019
When I was California Assembly speaker in 2006, I proudly negotiated with Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to lay down a marker in the fight against climate change by placing strict reductions on greenhouse gas emissions through Assembly Bill 32 . We knew we had to do something, especially after the United States pulled out of the Kyoto Protocol. AB 32 gave the California Air Resources Board the ability to create a system in which polluters had to pay if they were unable to directly reduce their emissions. This first-ever cap-and-trade system has become instrumental to California’s economy. Payments by polluters generate much-needed funds to clean up our environment and make California the leader in renewable energy that it is today. California has made great strides with investments from our cap-and-trade revenue, including massive efforts to get more electric vehicles on our roads and improving the environment of our poorest communities, all while reducing our greenhouse gas emissions at a historic rate. Unfortunately, some of this important progress may be threatened by diversions of cap-and-trade funds for investments that are barely related to the original intent of AB 32. The last thing our state and the planet can afford is for cap-and-trade funds to be turned into a slush fund for pet projects that do little or nothing to improve our environment. Over the years, we have seen standards weakened on the original cap-and-trade deal as it relates to what qualifies for appropriate spending of these dollars and there are now efforts underway to even further destabilize this critically important funding source. It is causing great alarm for those of us who fought so hard for this program. By allowing these funds to be used on unrelated projects we will never meet our greenhouse gas reduction goals or truly address the devastating impacts of climate change. Clean drinking water, highspeed rail and workforce training are critical to California’s future. But it is more appropriate to invest in these areas from the state’s general fund and not from the cap-andtrade revenue. I urge the Legislature and Gov. Gavin Newsom to not allow diversions to continue, and to be the environmental stewards they have been throughout their political careers. California has led the fight on climate change. We are now seeing much of the rest of the country follow. All of the top Democratic presidential candidates are making the fight against climate change a cornerstone of their campaigns. Our cap-and-trade system is our strongest tool in fixing this existential threat. We must not let it rust away in the toolbox. It is imperative that we not cheapen the world-class program we all worked so hard to create over a decade ago. Fabian Núñez is former California Assembly Speaker and co- author of AB 32, the California Global Warming Solutions Act. He wrote this commentary for CALmatters, a public interest journalism venture committed to explaining how California’s Capitol works and why it matters. The last thing our state and the planet can afford is for cap-and-trade funds to be turned into a slush fund for pet projects that do little or nothing to improve our environment.
Former Assembly Speaker Fabian Núñez says California cap-and-trade funds are being misused on high-speed rail. RICH PEDRONCELLI — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Local // Politics Kamala Harris is far from having California locked up Joe Garofoli May 25, 2019 Updated: May 25, 2019 10:49 a.m.
Sen. Kamala Harris has won three statewide elections, but polls show her running third in California behind rivals Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders.Photo: Santiago Mejia / The Chronicle They haven’t been scared off by Harris winning statewide elections three times, locking up endorsements from California’s top elected officials, racking up $13.2 million in campaign contributions, spending more on digital ads than nearly every other Democrat, and starring in one of the season’s most impressive spectacles — her January rally in Oakland before an estimated 20,000 people. Instead, they’re looking at polling that showed her running third in California among Democratic voters with 17%, behind former Vice President Joe Biden (26%) and independent Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders (18%). Nationally, after a burst of attention following the Oakland rally, she has settled in at around 8%.
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“I don’t know why she’s not caught fire. But she hasn’t,” said Tim Malloy, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Poll. “I think everybody is sampling and taking a look at everybody. But for now, she’s a regional candidate. A California candidate.” White House hopefuls know they can win delegates in California’s March 3 primary even if Harris does well, because this isn’t a winner-take-all state. More than half of California’s 495 voting delegates are allotted by congressional district, so candidates can pick off a few delegates if they win at least 15% of the vote in a district or statewide. But the biggest reason so many Democrats will be in San Francisco next weekend is the lesson learned from recent presidential campaign history: Anything could happen. “Clearly, nobody is scared of doing anything in this race — that’s why we have 2,000 candidates,” said Melissa Michelson, a professor of political science at Menlo College. “It’s more of a reflection on the lessons of 2016: Nobody knows what will happen, especially in a big field,” Michelson said. “Four years ago, we were talking about Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio.” Joining Harris at the party’s convention will be more than half the announced Democratic field: Sens. Cory Booker of New Jersey, Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Sanders; Pete Buttigieg, mayor of South Bend, Ind.; Reps. Eric Swalwell of Dublin and Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii; former Reps. Beto O’Rourke of Texas and John Delaney of Maryland; former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper and current Washington Gov. Jay Inslee; and former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julián Castro. One big name not expected to be here is Biden. But that’s more of a front-runner’s decision not to get lost in the scrum. Many of the candidates who will be here are hovering in the low single digits in the polls. This is their chance to remind the national media that they exist, tap into the country’s nation’s largest trove of Democratic donors, and rally volunteers to do the yeoman’s organizing work before the primary. “We’re campaigning in every state,” said Mike Hopkins, a spokesman for Delaney, one of the 1 percenters in the polls. “Sen. Harris is certainly one of the senators from this state, but she’s got to earn their vote like everyone else. I think all Democrats should remember the lessons we learned in 2016 about expectations.” Lisa Tucker, chief strategist for Swalwell, said she doesn’t think it’s a reflection on Harris that so many rivals will be here. “It’s California. It’s the largest state. It’s delegate-rich,” Tucker said. “With so many candidates, we all have plans on how we can win something. Nobody is ceding any state to anyone.” Many of the candidates plan to pop into town to speak to the full convention, address party caucuses that focus on labor, environmental and other issues, perhaps attend a fundraiser and then head off to other early primary states. At least seven — Booker, Castro, Gillibrand, Harris, O’Rourke, Sanders and Warren — plan to appear at a MoveOn forum Saturday in San Francisco. Warren plans to hold a town hall meeting at 7:30 p.m. Friday at Laney College in Oakland, and Sanders has scheduled a rally for 5 p.m. Saturday at Arena Green East in San Jose. For Sanders, an independent who is unlikely to have much help from the Democratic Party, such rallies are designed to help recruit the volunteer army he’ll need to compete in the primary. Sanders has spent four years building a formidable grassroots force in California, where he won 45% of the vote and 206 delegates in the 2016 primary.
Complete convention coverage At least 14 Democratic presidential candidates are coming to the Bay Area for the state party’s San Francisco convention Friday through Sunday. Check SFChronicle.com for complete coverage of the candidates and “It’s All Political” podcasts, and go to http://bit.ly/2wjAlc9 to receive special editions of the Political Punch newsletter.
Since the launch of his 2020 run, 384,000 Californians have taken some kind of action for Sanders, his campaign says — donating money, volunteering or hosting or attending an event. “We’re continuing to build a volunteer force unlike any other candidate,” said campaign manager Faiz Shakir. “You have to to do that in order to win. California is too big. You could spend a billion dollars on TV and it wouldn’t be enough. ” Nevertheless, Shakir said, “it will be an uphill fight against establishment candidates like Biden and Harris.” Harris will bring many home-field advantages to the convention and the primary. On Friday, she will attend a fundraiser in San Francisco hosted by billionaires Ann and Gordon Getty and attended by Gov. Gavin Newsom, who has endorsed her. It’s a sign of Harris’ familiarity with the state’s deepest pockets. Of the $13.2 million she raised through March, $4.3 million came from California, according to federal campaign reports. That was before Biden got into the race. The No. 2 Democratic fundraiser in California was Booker, at $1.2 million, followed by Sanders with $785,000. President Trump raised $1.4 million. Unlike most of the other candidates, Harris won’t have to spend her precious few minutes in her convention speech introducing herself to party insiders. They’ve known her since she first ran for San Francisco district attorney in 2003 and backed her through her statewide wins for attorney general and the Senate. Instead, she will focus on the economic plans she has proposed: a $6,000 tax break for low- and middle-income earners; a system to fine companies that pay women less than men for comparable work; and a $13,500 annual pay hike for teachers. Harris will point out how these proposals would put money in people’s pockets now — unlike other candidates’ soak-the-rich proposals that could take years to help. Harris won’t take anything for granted, spokesman Ian Sams said. “Her native status will be helpful,” Sams said, “but we are under no illusions that anything is locked up.”
Joe Garofoli is The San Francisco Chronicle’s senior political writer. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @joegarofoli
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Local // Politics Rep. Jackie Speier draws power from experience in her politics Tal Kopan | May 26, 2019 | Updated: May 26, 2019 12:52 p.m.
Rep. Jackie Speier, D-San Mateo, revealed her own abortion and sexual assault to protect the rights of women and others. Photo: Jana Asenbrennerova / Special to The Chronicle 2018
WASHINGTON — For Rep. Jackie Speier, much of politics is personal.
It’s not necessarily by design. The San Mateo Democrat has often drawn on her own wrenching, even tragic experiences to protect the rights of women and marginalized populations. Those have included the very public Jonestown massacre, as well as private abuse that she has revealed only in adulthood.
In many ways, Speier was a vanguard of the #MeToo movement before it had a name, having spent years going back to the California Legislature fighting sexual harassment, violence against women and sexual assault in the military.
The latest example of Speier being unafraid to draw from her own experiences came last week, when she revealed her own second-trimester abortion in protest of several states’ recent passage of measures that all but ban abortions.
It was “a painful procedure that became necessary after the fetus I was carrying moved from my uterus to my vagina,” Speier said in a tweet. “I am not ashamed. Neither should anyone else be. Those who treat women like chattel should be ashamed.” Speier believes it’s important to speak out in her position to show that she and women like her did nothing wrong in exercising their legal rights — and she would encourage any other member of Congress who would be comfortable to do the same.
“Twenty-five percent of the women in this country have had abortions, under what have to have been traumatic times and experiences,” Speier said. “There’s over 100 women in the House, and in all likelihood there’s maybe as many as 25 that have had abortions. It’s always a painful and complicated experience, it’s not anything anyone wants to do, but it’s a right that we have and it’s not going to be taken away.”
Speier recently spoke with The Chronicle’s “It’s All Political” podcast to discuss her efforts to advocate for women and why the issue matters so much to her. She said she wasn’t able to identify the source of her drive to protect others until she wrote her autobiography, “Undaunted,” which came out last year, and revealed that she had been sexually abused by her grandfather.
“I never really came to grips with it” until then, Speier said. “I was trying to understand: Why do I have such a passion for these issues? Why? Why is it they create this outrage in me?”
Speier said she “was really good at compartmentalizing” the abuse but realized in writing her memoir that it was at the root of much of her work to help the vulnerable, “to protect others from what I had endured.”
Podcast Hear Rep. Jackie Speier, D-San Mateo, on “It’s All Political”: www.sfchronicle.com/political
But the congresswoman wasn’t sure at first whether to include it. “There was a point when I was writing the book that I wasn’t even going to put it in,” Speier said. “And I thought, you know, that’s the problem. We don’t talk about these issues. We don’t talk about, you know, the sexual abuse that happens to family members. And so, it goes on and we don’t, we don’t heal from it.”
Beyond the abortion story and her grandfather’s abuse, Speier has also spoken about how she experienced a sexual assault as a political staffer herself. She has also drawn from her survival of the Jonestown massacre as a staffer for Peninsula Rep. Leo Ryan. Speier was shot five times on the airstrip in Guyana where Ryan and four others were killed in November 1978 and waited there for 22 hours before she was rescued — fearing the whole time that gunmen with Jim Jones’ Peoples Temple would return to kill her and the other survivors.
“It was the basis of my carrying legislation in the state Legislature on assault weapon bans and being chastised because I hadn’t shot an assault weapon,” Speier said. “I turned it on my colleague, who was chastising me on the Assembly floor, by saying, ‘You know what, let me ask you a question. Have you ever been shot by an assault weapon?’
“It was very effective in getting him to shut up and sit down.”
She went from Ryan’s office to being a San Mateo County supervisor, state assemblywoman and state senator, and in 2008 was elected to Congress.
Speier said she “could hold my own” in a male-dominated political sphere, but that staffers who lacked her power — a single mother, for example, living paycheck to paycheck — might not be able to resist a supervisor’s sexual advances. She carried a measure in Sacramento that mandated sexual harassment training in the Legislature and repeated the effort in getting a series of sexual harassment reforms passed in Congress last year. She said she also stood up for women in other ways, including once when she “embarrassed” then-Assembly Speaker Willie Brown, now a Chronicle columnist.
“He would do his end-of-the-year bash, and there was always a poster — in one year it was a woman’s calf in a high heel and black stocking on it, and it was just another example of objectifying a woman,” Speier said. “So I signed it. Lots of staff women signed it. We took the poster down to his office and I said, ‘You know, don’t do this anymore.’ ... He was mortified, as he should have been.”
While Speier said she doesn’t believe in “legislating anecdotally,” she sees value in having members of Congress who bring their life stories to bear.
“I think we do bring our personal experiences to our work,” Speier said. “It does help us form opinions on issues. And that’s why I think it’s so important for us to also walk in people’s shoes, so we can have a better sense of what it is we’re dealing with.”
Now that Democrats are in control of the House, Speier has her sights set on decades-old unfinished business: the Equal Rights Amendment.
The amendment to ban discrimination on the basis of sex was passed by Congress in 1972, but only 35 states voted to ratify it by the deadline that lawmakers included in the bill preamble — three short of the total needed to attach it to the Constitution. States have continued to ratify it, and the count stands at 37, including California. Speier hopes Congress will pass a bill that has been introduced to extend the deadline, which would enable the ERA to become part of the Constitution if a 38th state ratifies.
Although there are laws protecting women from discrimination based on gender, a constitutional amendment would make those protections much stronger.
As Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, now deceased, had said, “There’s nothing in the Constitution that prohibits discrimination based on sex,” Speier said. “Every time I say that, I almost have a shiver that goes down my back. How can we be in the 21st century, with all of the advances ostensibly that have been made, and still be looking at a Constitution ... that doesn’t have a prohibition against sex discrimination?”
Although the bill extending the deadline could pass the Democratic-controlled House, it would be a long shot in the GOP-run Senate. But Speier believes the pressure could be too great for Republicans to ignore.
“Women are a key factor in the 2020 presidential election,” Speier said. “I think 2018 underscored very clearly that women make a difference.”
Tal Kopan is The San Francisco Chronicle’s Washington correspondent. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @talkopan
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Science
SF Bay’s problems fester as regulator neglects responsibility, investigation finds Peter Fimrite | May 27, 2019 | Updated: May 27, 2019 4 a.m.
An abandoned tugboat is seen in a cove near the shoreline of Rodeo, Calif. Tuesday, May 21, 2019. An abandoned tugboat is seen in a cove near the shoreline of Rodeo, Calif. Tuesday, May 21, 2019.Photo: Jessica Christian, The Chronicle
An investigation into the Bay Conservation and Development Commission found mismanagement and disorganization so rampant that the once-celebrated watchdog agency allegedly neglected its primary responsibility — to protect San Francisco Bay.
A state audit of the regulatory agency known as the BCDC describes slow and inefficient enforcement, a huge backlog of cases and an inability to perform key duties. It blames those problems on leadership failures, staffing shortages and inadequate funding. The commission “has neglected its responsibility to protect the San Francisco Bay,” the 94-page audit states. “This audit is a major wake-up call,” said Assemblyman Kevin Mullin, D-San Mateo, who with several other legislators requested the audit last year. “The findings are serious in nature and ought to be taken seriously by the commissioners and the senior staff.”
But the message from the investigation depends on one’s point of view. Waterfront businesses say it is confirmation the organization has targeted them unfairly with wallet-busting fines, while conservationists see it as a call for stricter enforcement of environmental and other rules.
The state auditor paints a troubling picture of the 27-member commission, which was established in 1965 by the McAteer-Petris Act to regulate development, prevent the filling of wetlands, fight pollution and ensure public access to San Francisco Bay.
The audit outlines a pattern of foot-dragging, including a backlog of 230 enforcement cases. The commissioners opened an average of 14 more cases than they closed every year from 2012 to 2017, according to the audit. Seven cases reviewed by auditors remained open an average of 7½ years, the report said.
All the while, problems in the bay festered, the auditors said.
An abandoned tugboat sits near the shoreline of Rodeo. An audit of San Francisco Bay’s watchdog agency finds mismanagement and disorganization. Photo: Jessica Christian / The Chronicle
There are, for example, 200 boats anchored illegally off Sausalito, many of them dilapidated, sinking or beached and spewing pollutants into ecologically sensitive Richardson Bay. The boats, some occupied by scofflaws known as “anchor-outs,” remain even though the BCDC has been the lead agency in a cleanup campaign for about two decades.
The auditors also criticized commission staff for closing a case involving a decaying tugboat that has been sitting illegally for years in the mud off Rodeo and for failing since 1987 to protect Suisun Marsh, a migratory bird habitat south of Fairfield. They said the commission failed to properly oversee local marsh restoration plans and never conducted five-year program reviews required by the Suisun Marsh Preservation Act.
Commission officials agreed only that they need more money to do a better job. In a lengthy response to the audit, BCDC officials denied most of the allegations, particularly the claim that its 48 employees neglected their responsibilities.
“BCDC plans to use this report to advocate for more resources to allow us to make critical improvements and do more enforcement better,” wrote Lawrence Goldzband, the executive director, who acknowledged only that his organization could do a better job protecting the bay if it had more money and personnel.
The nation’s first coastal zone protection agency has an annual budget of $10.4 million that comes from state funds, grants, environmental cleanup allocations, permit fees and fines.
The audit, however, said administrators failed to provide commissioners with adequate guidance, paid staff with money that was meant for restoration work and displayed “inconsistencies” in how much violators had to pay in fines.
Mullin joined state Sen. Jerry Hill, D-San Mateo, and his Assembly colleagues Marc Berman, D-Palo Alto, and Marie Waldron, R-Escondido (San Diego County), in calling for the audit. Their interest was piqued in December 2017 when a judge overturned a $3.6 million fine imposed on an East Bay man who had been accused of violating the Suisun Marsh Preservation Act.
John Sweeney, the owner of Point Buckler, a 39-acre island in the Suisun Marsh, racked up $2 million in legal fees after the BCDC and the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board tried to stop him from establishing a duck hunting club and kite-surfing center on his property.
Solano County Superior Court Judge Harry Kinnicutt found that the two state agencies had acted with “an appearance of vindictiveness” and that the penalties were “retribution” for a related lawsuit that Sweeney filed.
Mullin said the regulatory attack against Sweeney was disturbingly similar to the case against Mark Sanders, the founder and president of Westpoint Harbor marina in Redwood City, whom the BCDC socked with $500,000 in fines for 37 violations, which Sanders said had nothing to do with the bay environment.
Sanders also spent $2 million over seven years fighting what he called a “shakedown” of petty allegations that he locked bathrooms without permission, didn’t have adequate signs directing people to public parking, planted trees without permits and blocked public access. The charges were eventually dropped as part of a settlement that required Sanders to make $75,000 donations each to the California Coastal Conservancy and the Marine Science Institute.
“I really am an environmentalist, and one of the things we get accolades for is our environmental work as a marina,” said Sanders, whose business was named by the Marine Science Institute as North America’s Large Marina of the Year for 2018. “It kills me that here is this agency with this wonderful mission that has gone so far off the rails.”
More than 5,000 people signed a petition started by a group called Friends of Westpoint Harbor asking state legislators to order the audit.
Although the criticism has been widespread, not everybody believes the problem with the BCDC is that it is too tough on shoreline businesses.
Sejal Choksi-Chugh, executive director of San Francisco Baykeeper, said her organization alerted the commission to many polluters, only to learn the violators received token punishment. But, she said, the commission has recently gotten tougher on violators, resulting in backlash.
“I think that the violators were lulled into a false sense of complacency, and they started whining and complaining when the rules got enforced,” said Choksi-Chugh. “Honestly, the state Legislature needs to step up and identify that BCDC needs more funding to do their job.”
Mullin and other lawmakers plan to meet in the next few months with the auditor, BCDC representatives and other stakeholders to discuss possible legislation and, it is hoped, speed the enforcement process.
“Collectively, we need to have this commission on a strong footing because the challenges we face are immense,” Mullin said. “This is about protecting the greatest natural resource we have, the San Francisco Bay.”
Peter Fimrite is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @pfimrite
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Opinion // Editorials Editorial: A good deal on police use of force in California Chronicle Editorial Board May 24, 2019
Sgt. Steven Pomatto (left) holds a gun while simulating a scenario during a demonstration to the media on how police officers are trained to use force in San Francisco, Calif., on Monday, Sept. 11, 2017. Major law enforcement lobbying groups have dropped their opposition to a bill in Sacramento setting new use of force standards for police. Photo: Gabrielle Lurie / The Chronicle
It’s been a long and winding road for reform on police use of force.
But last Thursday’s breakthrough compromise on AB392, a crucial-but-contentious state bill to strengthen standards for when police officers are permitted to use deadly force, suggests an end may be in sight.
Authored by Assemblywoman Shirley Weber, D-San Diego, and supported by civil rights groups, including the American Civil Liberties Union, AB392 is designed to reduce the number of police shootings.
More people are killed by police in California than in any other state in the union.
For the past several years, activists and community groups have mobilized to reform the rules around officer-involved shootings. Persistent protests about unarmed men and women killed by police — including the cases of Sacramento’s Stephon Clark in 2018 and San Francisco’s Mario Woods in 2015 — pushed state lawmakers and law enforcement organizations to scrutinize police practices on use of force. After weeks of negotiation and painstaking amendments, AB392 now permits officers to use deadly force only if it’s “necessary” to defend themselves or others against the imminent threat of death or serious bodily injury. Previously, AB392 specified that officers could only open fire when they had “no reasonable alternative.”
The amended measure also drops a previous requirement for officers to try de-escalation strategies before using deadly force. In another amendment, officers who use “objectively reasonable force” will maintain their right to self-defense. These changes were enough to convince law enforcement groups to drop their opposition to the bill.
“AB392 now reflects the shared experiences, perspectives and expertise from everyone at the table, from families and communities to the officers who have sworn to serve and protect them,” Ron Lawrence, president of the California Police Chiefs Association, said in a statement.
But does it still reflect real reform?
The ACLU thinks so.
“This maintains the core of what we’ve been trying to do since last year, which is that officers can only use deadly force when it is absolutely necessary,” said ACLU lobbyist Lizzie Buchen. “It’ll make a significant impact on how officers are trained and how they’re held accountable.”
In addition to requiring officers to use other techniques besides force “if feasible,” Buchen singled out a provision allowing the courts to consider officers’ actions before a deadly incident — not just the moment of force.
“The courts will be able to assess whether officers tried to de-escalate the situation or took steps to provoke it,” Buchen said. “Very few states have this kind of provision. AB392 will give California one of the strongest laws in the nation.” Gov. Gavin Newsom, Senate President Pro Tem Toni Atkins, D-San Diego, and Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon, D- Paramount (Los Angeles County) are also on board with the compromise.
It’s rare to see a negotiation as successful as this one. While it may still prove necessary to change the use of force standard if unintended consequences occur, AB392 represents a positive solution to a contentious problem. Legislature, pass this bill.
This commentary is from The Chronicle’s editorial board. We invite you to express your views in a letter to the editor. Please submit your letter via our online form: SFChronicle.com/letters.
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
What causes wildfires? A look at 10 of the deadliest and most destructive wildfires in California history shows that power lines, fireworks and other elements of human civilization are often to blame. By Kimberly Veklerov | May 31, 2019
People cause the vast majority of California wildfires, whether it’s an arsonist lighting up a hillside or a driver’s tractor releasing a spark that turns into an inferno. Networks of power lines built into wildland are also behind some of the worst blazes. Yet, in many cases, the cause simply can’t be determined. As fire season ramps up, state officials are warning that heavier-than-usual rain and snow in recent months have knocked down trees and led to an overgrowth of grass and shrubs that will soon dry out and become ready-made fuel for 2019 wildfires.
California Fire Map: Wildfire Tracker for Northern, Central and Southern California
A fire’s cause typically doesn’t affect how it grows or moves, said Battalion Chief Amy Head, a spokeswoman for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. Wind, humidity and vegetation are the primary factors that drive fire behavior. Still, finding out what happened at the outset is critical. “It’s important for us to know the causes to hopefully prevent more of those fires in the future, and also to determine who’s possibly responsible,” Head said.
Photo: Gabrielle Lurie / The Chronicle
The Camp Fire burning in 2018. State investigators found that PG& equipment sparked the deadly fire. State legislators are now voting on an overhaul of the way California deals with wildfires sparked by ... more To discover the origin and cause of a fire, investigators use the scientific method: collect evidence, test and refute hypotheses, and analyze data. Evidence could range from someone seeing a suspect vehicle’s license plate to a dead squirrel under a power line, said Dan White, chief of the fire prevention and law enforcement division for Cal Fire. “We interview witnesses, look at burn patterns and burn indicators to find a general origin area, then a specific origin area,” he said. “Every fire investigation starts as a criminal investigation until determined otherwise.” By the end of a probe, Cal Fire assigns blame to one of a dozen causes: arson, debris burning, electrical, equipment, campfire, lightning, playing with fire, railroad, smoking, vehicle, miscellaneous or undetermined.
According to Cal Fire data from 2013 to 2017, the most recent five-year period available, the cause of about a quarter of all fires was found to be “undetermined.” Usually when a cause is undetermined, either firefighting activities have disrupted the origin area or investigators have winnowed down the possibilities but remain unsure between a few of them, White said. The second-most common cause of California wildfires falls under “miscellaneous,” which includes fireworks, explosives, glass refraction, shootings and “those oddball things that don’t completely fit in another” category, White said. On one occasion, the cause of a fire he investigated turned out to be a horseshoe hitting a rock. Cal Fire also tracks when every fire starts. In any given year, fires tend to follow a time-of-day bell curve, reaching an apex around 3 p.m. Blazes late at night or early in the morning are less common than those in the afternoon. Here are the causes behind 10 of the largest, deadliest and most destructive wildfires in state history. A couple of the worst ones — the Mendocino Complex and the Woolsey Fire in Southern California — remain under investigation.
The PG&E transmission tower that sparked the Camp Fire, in Pulga, Calif., Feb. 28, 2019. | Max Whittaker / The New York Times
Camp Fire, November 2018
County: Butte Acres burned: 153,336 Structures destroyed: 18,804 Deaths: 86 Cause: Electrical transmission lines
Power equipment owned and operated by Pacific Gas & Electric Co. caused the deadliest and most destructive wildfire in state history near the town of Pulga, according to Cal Fire’s investigation.
The probe identified a second ignition site in the town of Concow, where vegetation fell onto PG&E distribution lines. The fire that started in Pulga consumed the second one.
Cal Fire forwarded its findings to Butte County District Attorney Mike Ramsey, who could file criminal charges.
Smoke shrouds burnt trees along Whiskeytown Lake in the aftermath of the Carr Fire west of Redding on Monday, July 30, 2018. | Scott Strazzante / The Chronicle
Carr Fire, July 2018
Counties: Shasta and Trinity Acres burned: 229,651 Structures destroyed: 1,614 Deaths: 8 Cause: Human
A tire on a trailer belonging to an older couple went flat and dragged on the pavement, sending sparks into parched grass near Whiskeytown Lake, investigators said.
The Thomas Fire threatens homes as it burns along the 101 Freeway on Dec. 5, 2017, in Ventura. | Jae C. Hong / Associated Press
Thomas Fire, December 2017
Counties: Ventura and Santa Barbara Acres burned: 281,893 Structures destroyed: 1,063 Deaths: 2 Cause: Power lines
Energized power lines in Santa Paula (Ventura County) — operated by Southern California Edison — came into contact with each other, authorities said. The connection released molten aluminum particles onto surrounding dry vegetation and sparked the fire, arson investigator Christine Saqui, of the Ventura County Fire Department, wrote in her report.
An inspection team walks on the charred property below power lines on Bennett Lane in Calistoga following the Tubbs Fire on Friday, Nov. 10, 2017. | Paul Chinn / The Chronicle
Tubbs Fire, October 2017
Counties: Napa and Sonoma Acres burned: 36,807 Structures destroyed: 5,636 Deaths: 22 Cause: Electrical
Lead investigator John Martinez, a battalion chief with Cal Fire, and his team of experts found that a privately owned conductor or electrical equipment at a Calistoga residence caused the fire. They reached the conclusion through an arduous process of elimination.
The charred remains of a shed in Cobb, California, on Tuesday, Sept. 15, 2015. | Connor Radnovich / The Chronicle
Valley Fire, September 2015
Counties: Lake, Napa and Sonoma Acres burned: 76,067 Structures destroyed: 1,955 Deaths: 4 Cause: Electrical
Investigators found that homeowner John Pinch installed a circuit to power a hot tub outside his Cobb (Lake County) residence. The circuit connection didn’t follow electrical code standards and a breaker tripped.
“The temperature at the electrical connection was at least 1,981 degrees Fahrenheit as the copper wire was melted,” James Engel, a Cal Fire deputy chief, wrote in the investigative report. “The wire connection was in contact with dry grass and lead litter, which ignited.”
Prosecutors declined to file charges.
Firefighters douse hot spots along highway 120 near Groveland, Calif. on Wednesday August 28, 2013, during the Rim Fire in the Stanislaus National Forest. | Michael Macor / The Chronicle 2013
Rim Fire, August 2013
County: Tuolumne Acres burned: 257,314 Structures destroyed: 112 Deaths: 0 Cause: Human
An illegal campfire in the Stanislaus National Forest burned out of control, investigators said. Bow hunter Keith Matthew Emerald was indicted, but federal prosecutors dropped the charges, citing two key witnesses’ deaths.
Firefighters douse a hot spot at a destroyed house in the Rancho Bernardo area of San Diego following the Witch Fire on Oct. 25, 2007. | Chris Carlson / Associated Press
Witch Fire, October 2007
County: San Diego Acres burned: 197,990 Structures destroyed: 1,650 Deaths: 2 Cause: Power lines
Power lines operated by San Diego Gas and Electric came into contact with each other in the wind and arced, releasing hot particles onto vegetation. The company agreed to pay the state more than $14 million to settle accusations that it was responsible for the Witch Fire and other 2007 blazes in the area.
Kern County firefighters check on hot spots, Aug. 22, 2007, during the Zaca Fire in the Los Padres National Forest. | Casey Christie / The Bakersfield Californian / Associated Press
Zaca Fire, July 2007
County: Santa Barbara Acres burned: 240,207 Structures destroyed: 1 Deaths: 0 Cause: Human
Workers at La Laguna Ranch were using grinding equipment to repair a metal pipe, which emitted sparks. The corporate owners of the ranch, without admitting guilt, agreed to a $17 million settlement.
A firefighter watches the Cedar Fire move past a home on the outskirts of Julian, Calif., Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2003. | Paul H. Nilson / Imperial Valley Press / Associated Press
Cedar Fire, October 2003
County: San Diego Acres burned: 273,246 Structures destroyed: 2,820 Deaths: 15 Cause: Human
Sergio Martinez, a West Covina man on a deer-hunting trip, started the fire when he became separated from his companion. Dehydrated and worried he might die, he lit the fire to signal for help. He was convicted of arson and sentenced to six months in a work-furlough program and 960 hours of community service.
A firefighter puts out the smoldering embers October 21, 1991, after a six-alarm fire tore through the Oakland Hills neighborhood. | Brant Ward / The Chronicle 1991
Tunnel Fire, October 1991
County: Alameda Acres burned: 1,600 Structures destroyed: 2,900 Deaths: 25 Cause: Rekindle
A grass fire that started the day before rekindled to cause the major Oakland Hills firestorm. Several arson fires had occurred in the hills before and after the Tunnel Fire, including at least one on the same day, but no link was made to any of those incidents.
Kimberly Veklerov is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @kveklerov
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Local // Politics Ro Khanna’s quest to marry Silicon Valley capitalism with progressive populism
Tal Kopan | May 30, 2019 | Updated: May 31, 2019 7:48 p.m.
Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Fremont, is a fixture on cable news because of his ease on social media. He’s a free thinker to his supporters, an opportunist to his critics. Photo: Tom Williams / CQ-Roll Call Inc.
WASHINGTON — Rep. Ro Khanna calls representing Silicon Valley the “first line” of his identity. It’s a statement that rings profoundly true — for better or worse.
The Fremont Democrat’s success has largely come from his ability to fit in with the culture of the tech world. His ability to appeal to some of tech’s wealthiest political donors helped propel his election to Congress over an eight-term Democratic incumbent.
But the same traits that help him connect with the valley are at the root of skepticism he faces as he gains prominence nationally and leans into an independent streak that puts him at odds with some Democratic colleagues. His closeness with the epicenter of American wealth has also raised eyebrows as Khanna takes a progressive line, including joining the presidential campaign of a self-described democratic socialist who laments the “proliferation of millionaires and billionaires” in an unequal society and has embraced calls to break up Facebook.
Much like the titans of Silicon Valley, Khanna is unapologetically ambitious and says his goal is changing the world. His confidence pushes him to take on big challenges — even when trying to weave together seemingly mutually exclusive ideas.
At 42, the second-term congressman’s ease on social media and in front of a camera has made him a fixture on cable news. That quick rise has earned him many national profile pieces, and his decision to co-chair independent Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders’ campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination has only increased the intrigue.
To his supporters, Khanna is a free thinker who pursues his ideals whether they’re popular or not. To his critics, he’s an opportunist, one who shopped for congressional seats and did whatever he could to win, then adapted his politics to what could help him rise.
Like the tech titans of Silicon Valley, Khanna is unapologetically ambitious and says his goal is changing the world. Photo: Bill Clark / CQ-Roll Call Inc. 2017
Khanna calls himself a “pro-growth progressive” or a “progressive capitalist.” It’s how he reconciles a worldview that combines semi-socialist elements gaining popularity on the left with centrist endorsement of the promise of Silicon Valley’s entrepreneurship.
He’s backed Medicare for All, the Green New Deal and a $15-an-hour minimum wage, but pushes back on calls to break up big tech in favor of a more “nuanced” approach. His pet project on dealing with income inequality isn’t boosting taxes for the rich — it’s traveling to struggling Rust Belt communities in Trump country with venture capitalists from the valley, pushing them to invest. He has also made an antiwar foreign policy and human rights advocacy a centerpiece of his work, sponsoring legislation to cut off U.S. support for a Saudi-led campaign in Yemen that has caused famine and widespread civilian deaths. The bill passed Congress with bipartisan support, but President Trump vetoed it.
In Khanna’s view, independence is rarely punished and usually rewarded. As a Yale law student, he organized a protest of the school’s law journal, challenging its editing test as a barrier to entry. Then he didn’t join.
“People said, ‘Oh, you’re going to end your legal career,’ and, of course, it made absolutely no difference,” Khanna said.
Rep. Ro Khanna
Age: 42
Birthplace: Philadelphia
Education: University of Chicago bachelor’s degree in economics, 1998; Yale University law degree, 2001
Government career: Deputy assistant secretary, U.S. Commerce Department, 2009-11; House of Representatives, 2016-present
Family: Married to Ritu Ahuja Khanna, formerly in marketing for Italian jewelry firm Bulgari. Two children, ages 6 months and 2 years.
He got the same reaction in 2004 when, as a 27-year-old with no experience in elective office, he ran against longtime Rep. Tom Lantos to protest the San Mateo Democrat’s vote in favor of the Iraq War. And again when he ran against Rep. Mike Honda, D-San Jose, unsuccessfully in 2014 and successfully in 2016.
“People said, ‘You can’t run against a Holocaust survivor — you’re going to end your career,’ and if anything, Lantos became a mentor,” Khanna said. “When I ran against Honda, people said, ‘You can’t do that — you’re going to end your career,’ and they were wrong.”
Being bold is never a career-ending move, “as long as you’re civil and try not to make it personal,” Khanna said. “If anything, people respect you more.”
Khanna grew up in Philadelphia, the birthplace of what he calls “the American scriptures” written by the nation’s founders. The child of middle-class Indian immigrants, Khanna says he was heavily influenced by the local monuments to American democracy. He was also shaped by the experiences of his grandfather, an activist with Gandhi’s independence movement in India who was jailed for several years for his work.
Khanna was a top student at the University of Chicago, graduating with a degree in economics. Even then, he would speak of his grandfather, “march to the beat of his own drum” and talk about changing the world, said college and law school friend Renato Mariotti, a former federal prosecutor.
“He’s always been an ambitious person who wanted to make some big impact,” Mariotti said. “I always presumed that he either had something to do with public service or some other grand path.” Khanna then moved to Silicon Valley. He saw it as a “microcosm” of America and noted the well-established Indian American community — complete with cricket leagues. Khanna worked in intellectual property law and made his challenge to Lantos.
Khanna listens as Michael Cohen, former attorney for President Trump, testifies in the House Oversight and Reform Committee on Feb. 27. Photo: Bill Clark / CQ-Roll Call Inc.
He was walloped, but he impressed powerful Bay Area Democrats including Reps. Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco and Anna Eshoo of Palo Alto. Five years later, they helped him get an appointment in President Barack Obama’s Commerce Department, promoting the U.S. in international trade.
Christine Pelosi, daughter of Nancy Pelosi and chair of the California Democratic Party’s Women’s Caucus, said Khanna helped his cause by promoting the party’s interests even after he lost.
“He had a lot of smarts, lot of talent, very good communications skills, a lot of discipline, and he did a lot of networking,” Pelosi said. “He was more than just a volunteer who called people up and asked for checks. He asked for ideas.”
Eshoo said Khanna was “crushed” emotionally after his loss. She told him it was just a beginning.
Khanna, who calls Eshoo a “true mentor,” recalls that her advice was, “Don’t go away. Stay involved, stay engaged.”
When Al Gore won the Nobel Peace Prize for his environmental advocacy, she said, “See, this is why you have to play things out,” Khanna said. “Even though he lost the presidency, he didn’t give up on public service. And then he arguably achieved something equally significant.”
Khanna speaks during a panel discussion during the National Security Action Forum at the Capitol Hilton Hotel on May 10 in Washington, D.C. Khanna calls himself a “pro-growth progressive” or a “progressive capitalist.” Photo: Calla Kessler / Special to The Chronicle
Khanna did run again, challenging Honda in 2014. Backed financially by tech titans, he emphasized his ability to speak to and for Silicon Valley, and lost narrowly. In 2016, he campaigned on more policy than just tech and, aided by an ethics investigation of Honda, won by more than 20 points.
Through 2018, he was still attracting centrist and solidly Republican donors, including D.C. lobbyist Wayne Berman, who is closely tied to President Trump. But his political profile has been strongly progressive, and he’s vice chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus.
At the same time, Khanna’s pet cause has taken him to economically distressed places in Kentucky, West Virginia, Michigan, Ohio, Iowa, North Carolina and South Carolina. Khanna partners with local lawmakers to bring venture capitalists and Silicon Valley representatives to meet with local businesses and universities to form partnerships.
Rep. Dan Kildee, D-Mich., hosted Khanna last year in Flint, Mich., where problems with lead-contaminated water became infamous in 2014.
“There was a moment when Flint was in the spotlight all the time, and we knew that the recovery effort was going to be more than just the government itself stepping up,” Kildee said. “We need private investment. ... I think it’s more a statement of his values that he understood we really needed help.”
Khanna (left) leaves the National Security Action Forum after speaking on a panel at the Capitol Hilton Hotel on May 10 in Washington, D.C. In his view, independence is rarely punished and usually rewarded. Photo: Calla Kessler / Special to The Chronicle
Ohio Democratic Rep. Tim Ryan, who helped organize some of the tours, said Khanna has a unique ability to blend progressivism with the benefits of capital investments.
“He’s so progressive, but he totally gets the new economy,” Ryan said. “There’s very few people in the Congress that really understand both.”
But Khanna’s balancing act of the left and center has others rolling their eyes — though none will go on the record. His critics see a politician with his finger in the wind, believing he ran to Honda’s right in 2014 and, when it became more expedient, tacked left.
Khanna even “dual-endorsed,” as he puts it, in a 2018 primary race involving a colleague in the House Democratic leadership. Khanna first backed former New York Rep. Joe Crowley, then endorsed Crowley’s now-famous challenger, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, saying he had learned more about her and found her compelling.
Rep. Jared Huffman of San Rafael says he has a good relationship with his fellow Bay Area Democrat. But he knows of colleagues perturbed by Khanna’s willingness to help candidates affiliated with the Justice Democrats, a group aligned with Ocasio-Cortez that is targeting incumbents for primary challenges from the left.
“I think it remains kind of an open question for some members: Is he going to be a colleague that we can work with and trust, or is he out to get me?” Huffman said. “We’ve got some colleagues that are pretty skeptical and nervous about him.”
Much like the young disruptors who built Silicon Valley, Khanna speaks the language of risk. He considers the fights he has gotten into “justified.” Khanna took on Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., in a Twitter thread, accusing the House Energy and Commerce Committee chairman of holding up Khanna’s bills because he supported Ocasio-Cortez’s Green New Deal. Pallone’s office did not respond to requests for comment.
Khanna also defends endorsing a primary challenger to an anti- abortion Illinois colleague, Democratic Rep. Dan Lipinski. And he’s battling with Illinois Rep. Cheri Bustos, who runs the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, over her move to punish political firms that work with primary challengers to incumbents.
But Khanna says he’s also willing to admit a mistake — like when he endorsed the primary opponent of Rep. William Lacy Clay, D-Mo., without realizing who she was running against.
Clay said he accepted Khanna’s apology. Being willing to own up to a judgment error, he said, “tells you about a person’s humanity and their compassion, and he possesses both of those qualities.”
“I try to be very civil,” Khanna said. “I try to avoid excessive rhetoric, even when criticizing the president. ... And I don’t like personalizing things.”
Khanna acknowledges that his 2014 race against Honda could have given observers the impression he was more moderate, but says he believes he course-corrected and campaigned as an authentic progressive in 2016.
“Mike Honda and I were competing for independent Republican votes, and you know, there were probably mailers, one or two mailers sent that I regretted sending even two weeks after the campaign,” Khanna said, chalking it up to “tactical mistakes” rather than an expression of his values.
Lisa Ferino, a progressive with Indivisible South Bay, said Khanna is “an incredibly mixed bag for a lot of people,” though she knows activists who fall on both sides. She wishes Khanna would be more aggressive in attacking Trump and supporting impeachment and would be clearer about what his work with Sanders entails.
“If he does go all in for Bernie ... I don’t think he’s made it clear to his constituents why that’s something that’s so important for him to do right now,” Ferino said.
Khanna’s affiliation with Sanders has some of his Silicon Valley tech benefactors scratching their heads, though he says no donors have pulled their support. Many backed Hillary Clinton and have lingering hard feelings over Sanders’ race against her in 2016. Others are apprehensive about Sanders’ criticism of wealth and capitalism.
“I think that’s taken some people by surprise — (there’s a) difference of both substance and style” between the two men, said Carl Guardino, CEO of the business-oriented Silicon Valley Leadership Group.
“Congressman Khanna is very warm,” Guardino said. “Even when there are areas of disagreement, he listens and learns and tries to truly hear people out, and Sen. Sanders’ style is much more aggressive and dogmatic.”
Khanna said his role with Sanders is largely to be a surrogate on the campaign trail. He has pledged not to attack other Democratic candidates.
Christine Pelosi said she believes Khanna could be a bridge-builder between Sanders and the party as the primary campaign plays out. He may have to be, she said.
“That will be his biggest test yet ... but he’s up to the challenge,” she said. While his affiliation with Sanders has some suspecting he’s interested in higher office, Khanna said he’s staying put unless the job gets tiresome. He calls representing Silicon Valley “one of the 10 most important jobs in American politics,” and compares it to representing Athens at the peak of ancient Greece.
“It’s not for a lack of ambition that I’m shy about doing something else,” Khanna said.
He welcomes the suggestion of some close to Silicon Valley donors that they supported him because they recognized something of themselves in him.
“They were forced out of companies or fired because they didn’t look the part to be a CEO. They had too different-sounding a name, they didn’t have broad shoulders or a square jaw,” Khanna said. “I had the same story as a lot of entrepreneurs, where they go all in on something and they’re willing to go into debt and have that kind of all-consuming passion on a dream.”
In fact, Khanna said one of the “highest compliments” he ever received was from center-right New York Times columnist David Brooks, who called him a political entrepreneur.
“If people said, ‘You know, Ro Khanna ... was a real policy entrepreneur, political entrepreneur, who was willing to question orthodoxies, willing to take on challenges, but advanced ideas that really improved the public debate,’ I think that would be a success,” Khanna said. “Then I want a few concrete achievements. Things that I could say have really impacted the nation or the world.”
Tal Kopan is The San Francisco Chronicle’s Washington correspondent. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @talkopan
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
The generation gap and the imminent GOP apocalypse
By David Brooks | Wednesday, July 10, 2019
In the 20th century, young and old people primarily voted similarly. More recently the defining political gaps have been the gender gap (women preferring Democrats) and the education gap. But now the generation gap is back, with a vengeance.
It’s evident in the way Democrats are sorting themselves in their early primary preferences. A Democratic voter’s race, sex or education level doesn’t predict which candidate he or she is leaning toward, but age does.
In one early New Hampshire poll, Joe Biden won 39% of the vote of those over 55, but just 22% of those under 35, trailing Bernie Sanders. And in an early Iowa poll, Biden won 41% of the oldster vote, but just 17% of the young adult vote, placing third, behind Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.
As Ronald Brownstein pointed out in The Atlantic, older Democrats prefer a more moderate candidate who they think can win. Younger Democrats prefer a more progressive candidate who they think can bring systemic change.
The generation gap is even more powerful among Republicans. To put it bluntly, young adults hate them.
In 2018, voters under 30 supported Democratic House candidates over Republican ones by an astounding 67% to 32%. A 2018 Pew survey found 59% of millennial voters identify as Democrats or lean Democratic; only 32% identify as Republicans or lean Republican.
The most important statistic in American politics right now is this: Pew found 57% of millennials call themselves liberal. Only 12% call themselves conservative. Surveys find Generation Z voters (those born after 1996) are even more liberal than millennials.
It’s hard to look at that data and not see long-term disaster for Republicans. Some believe generations get more conservative as they age, but that’s not what evidence shows. Today’s generation gap isn’t temporary — it’s based on concrete, lived experience that’s never going away.
Millennials and Gen Z voters live with difference daily. Only 16% of the Silent Generation is minority, but 44% of the millennial generation is. In California, Texas, Florida, Arizona and New Jersey, it’s over 50%. In about 20 years, America will be a majority- minority country.
Young voters approve of these trends: 79% of millennials think immigration is good for America and 61% think racial diversity is.
They have an ethos around dealing with difference. They’re much more sympathetic to anyone identifying as transgender, much more likely to say racial discrimination is the main barrier to black progress and much less likely to say the U.S. is the world’s greatest nation.
Today’s Republican Party seems against this ethos — against immigration, diversity, pluralism. Conservative thought seems to be getting less relevant to the America that’s emerging.
The burning question for conservatives should be: What can we say to young adults about the diverse world they’re living in? Instead, conservative intellectuals seem hellbent on taking their 12% share among the young and turning it to 3.
There is a conservative way to embrace pluralism and diversity. It’s to note that there’s a deep strain of pessimism in progressive multiculturalism: blacks and whites will never really understand each other; racism is endemic; the American project is fatally flawed; American structures are so oppressive, the only option is to burn them down.
A better multiculturalism would be optimistic: We can communicate across difference; the American creed is the right recipe for a thick and respectful pluralism; American structures are basically sound and can be realistically reformed.
So far that’s not visible. My mentor William F. Buckley vowed to stand athwart history yelling “Stop!” Today’s Republicans don’t even seem to see the train that’s running them over. David Brooks is a New York Times columnist.
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Local // Politics Former Rep. Ellen Tauscher recalled as dedicated public servant and good friend John Wildermuth | June 6, 2019 | Updated: June 6, 2019 8:01 p.m.
Rep. Mark DeSaulnier leaves the stage after speaking during the memorial service for former Rep. Ellen Tauscher on Thursday at the Lesher Center for the Arts on in Walnut Creek. Photo: Lea Suzuki / The Chronicle
The East Bay said goodbye to former Democratic Rep. Ellen Tauscher on Thursday, with friends, family and colleagues from California and Washington remembering her as a model for public service.
“She knew how to be firm, she knew how to be friendly and she knew how to be both at the same time,” said University of California President Janet Napolitano, a former homeland security secretary and a friend of Tauscher’s since their days together in Washington.
Several hundred people were at the Lesher Center for the Arts in Walnut Creek for an upbeat, 90-minute remembrance of Tauscher, who died April 29 at the age of 67. Born and raised in New Jersey, Tauscher was a stockbroker and investment banker at a time when women were rare on Wall Street. After moving to the Bay Area, she won a seat in Congress in 1996 and spent 13 years representing parts of Contra Costa, Alameda and Solano counties.
In 2009, she resigned from Congress to become undersecretary of state for arms control and international security affairs, where she worked on nuclear arms reduction talks with Russia.
Tauscher “put more than a couple of cracks in the glass ceiling for women,” said Judge Angela Bradstreet of San Francisco Superior Court, a longtime friend.
Tauscher was remembered in a letter from Gov. Gavin Newsom as “a public servant to the core” and someone who “was never afraid to break with party or tradition” when her conscience demanded it. But it was the former congresswoman’s personal side that most of the speakers recalled.
Tauscher “was my mom’s closest friend,” said Katherine Feinstein, standing in for her mother, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, who was in Washington.
Tauscher and the senator frequently dined together in Washington restaurants, bemoaning the lack of California vintages on the wine lists, Katherine Feinstein said.
“They talked about everything ... and executed shopping expeditions,” she said. “She was also the only person, including me, who could get my mother to go to the movies.”
Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who was Tauscher’s boss during her diplomatic service, said in a video tribute that the former congresswoman was “someone who took her responsibility seriously, but not herself. ... When she entered a room, everyone was always uplifted and energized by her positive spirit.”
Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell of Dublin was an intern in Tauscher’s Washington office and recalled how she was the model of the new Congress.
A congresswoman with a young child — daughter Katherine, who was 5 years old when Tauscher was first elected — wasn’t something that was seen back in the 1990s, he said.
Tauscher recognized that in the 2009 speech when she told Congress that she was resigning to take the State Department post.
Her daughter had been raised in Congress and had moved on to college, Tauscher said in the speech, which was shown at the end of the remembrance.
“You should be as happy as I am, since you helped raise her,” she told her congressional colleagues.
Tauscher’s last visit to Washington was Jan. 3, when she stood on the floor of the House as Speaker Nancy Pelosi was sworn in.
She stood there “with the most diverse and woman-filled class (of new representatives) in the history of the United States,” and she was at least partially responsible for it, said Democratic Rep. Mark DeSaulnier, who now holds Tauscher’s East Bay congressional seat.
That day wasn’t the last time Tauscher was involved in politics, DeSaulnier recalled.
“I got texts from the ICU in Walnut Creek, making suggestions about what I should be doing,” he said. As a self-described “effective moderate,” Tauscher was always willing to work with anyone.
“A 20-year-old who saw who she was hanging out with wouldn’t know if she was a Democrat or Republican,” Swalwell said. “She was only interested in getting things done.”
The day was filled with more laughter than tears, as people recalled what her friends and family termed “Tauscherisms”: turns of phrase that stuck with the people who heard them.
She would say she “felt like a little black dress in a lint storm,” remembered one friend. Talking to Swalwell when he was first elected to Congress, she told him that if he ever had to check for votes on a bill, “only count on the ones who say they are against you.”
When a political newspaper wanted to talk to her about why she had changed her hair color to brown, she was furious that people were more interested in her hair than her legislation.
“She finally told them that, ‘I have a blond personality with brunette responsibilities,’” said Katie Merrill, who ran Tauscher’s first campaign for Congress and served as her chief of staff.
And then there was her admonition to “know when to leave the party,” which is something she followed, Swalwell said.
Tauscher could have stayed in Congress as long as she wanted, but she had things she wanted to get done in the State Department, he said. And when she accomplished what she wanted, she left.
In the years after she left government, Tauscher stayed involved, serving as a UC regent and running a political action committee that helped Democrats flip seven Republican-held California congressional seats in 2018.
Throughout her time in public life, she followed the rule she gave the people who worked for her, said Merrill, her longtime political aide:
“Put your loved ones and your conscience first.”
John Wildermuth is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: [email protected]. Twitter: @jfwildermuth
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White House is prepared to relax mileage standards
By Juliet Eilperin and Brady Dennis | Saturday, June 8, 2019
The Washington Post
WASHINGTON » A last-minute push by automakers appears unlikely to sway the Trump admin-istration from abandoning Barack Obama’s signature climate policy to improve mileage standards for cars and light trucks, two government officials said Friday.
The administration’s plan to freeze federal fuel-efficiency requirements for six years and end California’s authority to set its own standards has injected uncertainty into the auto market and raised the prospect of a drawn-out legal fight between federal officials and the nation’s biggest state.
The Environmental Protection Agency and the Transportation Department are poised to finalize a proposal this summer that would set federal car standards at roughly 37 mpg, rather than raising them to nearly 51 mpg for 2025 models. The rule would also revoke California’s existing waiver to set its own rules under the Clean Air Act, a practice the federal government has sanctioned for decades.
On Thursday, 17 U.S. and foreign firms sent a letter to both the president and California Gov. Gavin Newsom, urging them to “resurrect” talks to avoid harming the industry and American consumers. They warn that only a nationally agreed upon set of rules would avert “an extended period of litigation and instabil-ity, which could prove as untenable as the current program.”
But White House officials rebuffed the automakers’ request Thursday, saying there was no prospect of further negotiation with the California Air Resources Board. The two government officials, who were briefed on the discussions, spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe internal deliberations.
“As we acknowledged earlier this year, CARB failed to put forward a productive alternative, and we are moving forward to finalize a rule with the goal of promoting safer, cleaner, and more affordable vehicles,” White House spokesman Judd Deere said in an email.
Administration officials say that the nation needs to readjust the emissions targets because consumers prefer bigger and less fuel-efficient vehicles than regulators initially envisioned and that keeping them in place will spur Americans to drive older, less safe vehicles.
In 2009, the Obama admin-istration reached an agreement with automakers and officials in California to establish the firstever carbon standards for the vehicles. Limiting cars’ carbon output and improving fuel efficiency reduces the amount of carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere.
In February, CARB officials said that the administration had broken off communications before Christmas and had neither responded to the state’s proposals or offered one of its own. An aide to California Attorney General Xavier Becerra said that the state was still committed to defending the standards that California, automakers and the federal government agreed to back in 2009.
Trump officials have often framed their deregulatory agenda as an effort to create more certainty for U.S. businesses and to hand more power back to individual states instead of the federal government.
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Opinion // Editorials Editorial: California’s resistance to the Trump administration continues with latest budget deal Chronicle Editorial Board | June 10, 2019 | Updated: June 10, 2019 4:35 p.m.
California Governor Gavin Newsom releases details of his revised state budget for fiscal 2019-2020 during a press conference at the State Capitol on Thursday. May 09, 2019, in Sacramento, Ca. Photo: Michael Macor, Special To The Chronicle
Gov. Gavin Newsom and the Democratic leadership of the state Legislature have come to an agreement about the next year’s budget, and the contrast between California and the Trump administration could not be clearer.
While horror stories continue to trickle out of the migrant camps President Trump has erected along our nation’s southern border, California will become the first state in the union to pay for some undocumented immigrants to have full health care benefits.
Sacramento’s agreement will extend Medi-Cal, the state’s health care program for low-income adults, to low- income undocumented immigrants between the ages of 19 and 25. Approximately 90,000 people will receive coverage, at an estimated cost of $98 million annually. As dramatic as this is, many in Sacramento wanted to go further. Newsom rightly resisted a proposal to open Medi-Cal to all undocumented adults living in California. The price tag for such largesse could have been as great as $3.4 billion.
While President Trump and congressional Republicans remain mum on their promised plans for improving the Affordable Care Act, California is also leading the way on expanding health care access for legal residents.
With this budget agreement, the state will become the first in the country to subsidize health insurance premiums for middle-income families. Families of four making as much as six times the federal poverty level — that’s more than $150,000 a year — will be eligible for about $100 a month.
To pay for the change, California’s bringing back a much-contested element of the Affordable Care Act: the individual mandate penalty. President Trump eliminated the federal mandate as part of the 2017 tax cuts.
By restoring the mandate, California is declaring its determination to press forward on expanding individual access to health care — regardless of what’s happening in Washington. The two health care decisions are also a big win for Newsom, who proposed both of them.
Not all of this year’s most important budget compromises were forged in reaction to the Trump administration.
Lawmakers rejected Newsom’s proposal to raise fees on water customers and agricultural interests to fund badly needed improvements to the state’s water infrastructure. Some 1 million Californians don’t have dependable access to safe drinking water, and millions more rely on water providers who have failed state standards in recent years.
Both Newsom and former Gov. Jerry Brown sought to remedy this shameful situation with water fees. Both have now found themselves stymied by fee-fearful lawmakers.
State lawmakers’ solution — they’re going to raid the state’s cap-and-trade auction fund for up to $130 million a year — is convenient but irresponsible.
The cap-and-trade program is meant to fund programs that reduce long-term greenhouse gas emissions. Water infrastructure is a separate priority, and it deserves a separate revenue mechanism.
Finally, Sacramento expects to end the fiscal year with more than $20 billion in the state’s reserve fund. It’s a whopping number, but it should be a sobering one. As state Sen. Holly Mitchell, D-Los Angeles, noted, California is only now paying off its last debts from the recession of 2008-09.
The boom times never last forever. Sacramento must remain fiscally disciplined and continue preparations for far harder budget times right now.
This commentary is from The Chronicle’s editorial board. We invite you to express your views in a letter to the editor. Please submit your letter via our online form: SFChronicle.com/letters.
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Local // Phil Matier
Oakland council taking its time, wants answers about A’s ballpark and financing Phil Matier | June 12, 2019 | Updated: June 12, 2019 11:31 a.m.
A rendering of the proposed new Oakland A's Coliseum at Howard Terminal. Photo: Bjarke Ingels Group
With hearings set to begin today, the Oakland City Council appears to be in no rush to approve the Oakland A’s ambitious plan for a waterfront ballpark development at Howard Terminal.
“We have a lot of questions,” Oakland City Councilman Noel Gallo said.
“We are not going to be rushed. It is going to be done on our timeline, not the A’s timeline,” Councilman Dan Kalb added.
“We need more information,” Councilwoman Nikki Fortunato Bas said. The A’s are hoping to have final approval for the Howard Terminal deal by the end of next year, with the goal of opening it by 2023.
The team has already won a tentative nod from the Oakland Port Commission and is working with state lawmakers on a pair of bills — one written by Assemblyman Rob Bonta to streamline the permitting process and a second bill by Sen. Nancy Skinner to allow the creation of a new tax district to help cover millions of dollars in infrastructure costs.
And while the mega-development — it includes housing, offices, retail and park space — has the support of Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf, and several polls show it appears to be popular with voters, final approval of the project and its infrastructure and financing plan will be up to the City Council.
And so far, the council members, who are keenly aware that they’ll have to answer to the voters for any financing deal and development, say they have been given little information to go on so far.
“One of the biggest questions people have is transportation,” Kalb said. “How are people going to get to and from the ballpark? We’ve all heard about the plan for an overhead gondola from downtown. That’s an interesting idea, but we need to see a much more comprehensive plan.”
Another big question is who will pay for the roads, walkways, sewer lines and other support structures needed for the privately financed development to pencil out.
So far the team has been tight-lipped.
“We are working with the city on the infrastructure plan,” team spokeswoman Catherine Aker said.
The A’s have yet to submit an infrastructure cost estimate. However, council members said privately they are expecting an “ask” of about $200 million — that’s roughly the amount of infrastructure help the city offered the Raiders in its ill-fated effort to strike a deal on a new football stadium back in 2017.
“It is reasonable to assume that the city would consider doing the same for the Athletics at Howard Terminal,” Mayor Schaaf said in an April 19 letter to Oakland A’s President Dave Kaval.
But Schaaf drew the line at current city tax dollars for the project. Instead, she and the A’s are supporting a bill authored by state Sen. Skinner to set up a special tax district around the stadium to help cover the costs with new money generated by the 34,000-seat ballpark, the 3,000 units of housing, a 400-room hotel, and the retail and office space included in the project.
“This bill can provide tax increment solutions for other projects in Oakland, creating a lasting benefit beyond the ballpark” such as work on sea level rise resiliency, the expansion of bay trails along the waterfront and street repairs in the area, Aker said.
But again, the council wants to see the details before giving the nod.
“I’m not for or against the Howard Terminal project, but I want to know how much public money would be spent inside the development, and how much public money would be for infrastructure adjacent to the development,” Kalb said.
“We don’t want to give anyone the impression that we are supporting something we have not discussed,” Fortunato Bas said. And council President Rebecca Kaplan said she wants “to remove any language implying that a decision has already been made about a ballpark.”
In another twist, council members are also grousing about the A’s purchase of the county’s half share of the 130-acre current Coliseum site across town.
If they were going to stay at the Coliseum, I would have understood their desire to buy it, but if they are going to Howard Terminal and they still want the Coliseum site, that strikes me as a bit greedy,” Kalb said of the A’s.
Oakland had hoped to gain control of the county’s half interest on the East Oakland site for itself, making it the sole owner.
“They just went around us,” Councilman Larry Reid said.
And word is the council is exploring options, possibly to block the sale.
Not exactly the best way to start negotiations.
The first hearing on the state bills is scheduled for a special City Council meeting Wednesday at 3 p.m.
“It’s going to get interesting,” Gallo said.
San Francisco Chronicle columnist Phillip Matier appears Sundays and Wednesdays. Matier can be seen on the KPIX-TV morning and evening news. He can also be heard on KCBS radio Monday through Friday at 7:50 a.m. and 5:50 p.m. Got a tip? Call 415-777-8815, or email [email protected]. Twitter: @philmatier
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Trump’s wildfire plan eases environmental law to speed forest thinning in California By Emily Cadei June 12, 2019 03:02 PM, Updated June 12, 2019 08:44 PM
WASHINGTON
The Trump administration is proposing new regulations it argues could help prevent wildfires — but could also open up more federal land to logging and mineral exploration.
The U.S. Forest Service released proposed regulatory changes Wednesday that would exempt several new types of forest management projects from the typical review process under the National Environmental Policy Act or NEPA.
The changes are part of an ongoing push by the Trump administration to speed forest management projects — things like clearing brush, removing dead trees and thinning smaller trees from overgrown forests. Over half of California’s forests are on federal land. Due to a combination of factors, they are now choked with dead trees and brush, which have made them dangerously prone to the kind of catastrophic wildfires the state has endured over the past two years. Scientists warn California is at risk of a similarly dangerous fire season in 2019. “We are committed to doing the work to protect people and infrastructure from catastrophic wildfire,” Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue said in a statement. “With millions of acres in need of treatment, years of costly analysis and delays are not an acceptable solution – especially when data and experience show us we can get this work done with strong environmental protection standards as well as protect communities, livelihoods and resources.” The Forest Service is an agency within the Department of Agriculture.
The Forest Service is proposing to exempt certain forest restoration projects, road and trail management, administrative and recreation site management, and special use authorizations from environmental impact reviews.
Examples of the types of projects that would qualify, according to the Forest Service proposal: clearing roadside brush; repair and maintenance of recreation sites; clearing forests for utility or telecommunications equipment; and thinning and brush control work to reduce fire hazards.
Other potentially exempted projects would be more controversial, such as authorizing short-term mineral or energy exploration and commercial timber harvests, which would be limited to areas less than 4,200 acres.
The Forest Service notes in its proposal notes that “the agency has a backlog of more than 5,000 applications for new special use permits and renewals of existing special use permits that are awaiting environmental analysis and decision.” Meanwhile, “Over 80 million acres of National Forest System (NFS) land are in need of restoration to reduce the risk of wildfire, insect epidemics, and forest diseases.”
“Increasing the efficiency of environmental analysis would enable the agency to do more to increase the health and productivity of our national forests and grasslands,” it argues.
Republican Rep. Tom McClintock, who represents a large chunk of Sierra Nevada forest, cheered the move. “The Forest Service’s proposed revisions to its NEPA regulations are a breath of fresh air,” McClintock said in a statement. “In the Tahoe Basin in my district, we have seen the kind of categorical exclusions that the revisions expand cut hundreds of pages of paperwork, and turn years of delay into projects that could be enacted in months.”
Some forestry experts were also open to the proposal. “We have guarded optimism that this type of ‘streamlining’ could be used to increase the pace and scale of ecologically appropriate projects,” said Ed Smith, an ecologist with The Nature Conservancy who works in the Sierra Nevada mountains. “But of course there is always a risk that it could be abused,” Smith cautioned.
Other environmental advocates warned that exempting these types of projects from the standard environmental review would limit the public’s ability to weigh in on their merits, before the work begins.
“The Trump administration is trying to stifle the public’s voice and hide environmental damage to public lands,” said Ted Zukoski, a senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Logging companies could bulldoze hundreds of miles of new roads and chainsaw miles of national forests while ignoring the damage to wildlife and waterways. All of this would happen without involving nearby communities or forest visitors.”
The move by the Trump administration comes after other efforts to loosen forest management regulations fell flat in Congress last year.
Lawmakers passed the Farm Bill in December without any of environmental exemptions for logging projects that the president and leading cabinet secretaries had sought Shortly afterward, Trump signed an executive order calling for more active forest management on federal land, including expanding logging, as part of a plan to reduce wildfire risks. The president has continued to blame California for the rising toll of wildfires in the state, suggesting more aggressive forest management would solve the problem.
“Billions of dollars are sent to the State of California for Forest fires that, with proper Forest Management, would never happen,” Trump tweeted in January. “Unless they get their act together, which is unlikely, I have ordered FEMA to send no more money. It is a disgraceful situation in lives & money!”
Update: Story updated to include Rep. Tom McClintock’s reaction to the proposal.
Emily Cadei works out of the McClatchy Washington bureau, where she covers national politics and policy for McClatchy’s California readers. A native of Sacramento, she has spent more than a decade in D.C. reporting on U.S. elections, Congress and foreign affairs for publications including Newsweek, Congressional Quarterly and Roll Call.
Read more here: https://www.sacbee.com/news/state/california/fires/article231482868.html#storylink=cpy
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Local // Politics Where Gov. Gavin Newsom wins and loses in newly passed California budget
Alexei Koseff | June 14, 2019 | Updated: June 14, 2019 12:12 p.m.
Gov. Gavin Newsom made several gains when the Legislature passed his budget, but many key initiatives remain in limbo.Photo: Rich Pedroncelli / Associated Press
SACRAMENTO — The budget proposal that Gov. Gavin Newsom introduced in January gave California’s new leader his first major opportunity to stake out how he would accomplish the ambitious agenda he touted on the campaign trail.
Many of those plans overlapped with the priorities of the Legislature, and they are reflected in the final $215 billion budget deal reached over the weekend. Lawmakers passed the budget Thursday, sending it to Newsom for his signature. The Senate vote was 29-11, and the Assembly approved it 60-15. But several key Newsom initiatives were rejected or still await action in budget follow-up bills that the Legislature will consider in coming weeks. Those differences underline challenges the governor will face to achieve signature campaign promises such as creating a universal health care system and building 3.5 million homes by 2025.
Health care: On his first day in office, Newsom announced a sweeping plan to reduce the cost of health care in California and increase access. Two significant proposals that he included made it into the budget: California's Budget
• California will become the first state to expand eligibility for its health program for the poor to undocumented young adults ages 19 to 25. Those 18 and younger were already eligible for the program, Medi-Cal. The expansion will cost $98 million next year. Newsom rejected calls from Senate Democrats to open the program to undocumented seniors as well, which would have cost another $63 million.
• The state will require residents to carry health insurance, replacing the individual mandate that congressional Republicans and President Trump eliminated in the 2017 federal tax overhaul. Adults in California who do not buy insurance will have to pay an annual penalty on their state taxes of $695 or 2.5% of their household income, whichever is greater. Revenue from the penalty will be used to increase insurance subsidies for individuals and families making up to six times the federal poverty level. The budget also sets aside an additional $450 million over three years to reduce insurance costs further for middle-income people.
After a push by lawmakers, the state will seek to renew its tax on health insurance providers, which brings more than a billion dollars per year into the general fund and draws matching federal dollars for Medi-Cal. The current tax, which the Legislature passed in 2016, expires at the end of the month. Newsom left the proposal out of his budget plan, arguing that the Trump administration would deny the tax, which requires federal approval.
Reflecting the political tensions over adopting a government-run universal health care system, the Assembly has resisted Newsom’s bid to remake a commission that is studying how to change health care in California. The commission was established last year after the Assembly shelved a high-profile bill to develop a single-payer system for the state. Newsom, who campaigned on single-payer health care, wanted to refocus the commission on evaluating options for transitioning to the public model. The issue was deferred from the budget.
Housing: Seeking to spur residential construction and get more homeless people off the streets, Newsom proposed a multibillion-dollar housing and homelessness package.
Most of that money made it into the budget, including $250 million to help local governments plan to reach their state-mandated housing goals; $500 million for infrastructure projects, such as sewer hookups and sidewalks, that support new affordable housing developments; and $1 billion to expand tax credits and loans for building low- and mixed-income housing. The budget also includes $650 million for cities and counties to combat homelessness, and $120 million for programs that offer supportive housing and other coordinated services for homeless people.
But lawmakers are likely to reject Newsom’s bid to withhold transportation funding from communities that do not hit their housing targets. That policy would have to be adopted through a follow-up bill but is deeply unpopular.
Education: The budget takes the first step toward Newsom’s campaign goal of offering universal preschool by adding 10,000 state-funded slots for 4-year-olds from low-income families. It also increases funding for subsidized child care for low-income families with money from the sales tax on marijuana. The state will spend $300 million, half of what Newsom sought, to help school districts build out their facilities so they can offer full-day kindergarten.
Newsom took aim at charter school enrollment with a proposal to ban the schools from requesting students’ academic records before they are admitted and encouraging students with poor grades or learning disabilities to transfer elsewhere. Teachers unions, a strong ally of Newsom’s, dislike charter schools because most do not employ unionized instructors and they compete with school districts for funding. The language is included in a follow-up bill on education spending that is pending in the Legislature.
Community college students will get a second year of free tuition, as Newsom promised on the campaign trail, while the budget funds thousands of additional spots for state residents in the University of California and California State University systems. The state will create two scholarship programs that Newsom proposed: extra financial aid for parents attending college, and state-seeded college savings accounts for children from low-income families.
Clean water: Newsom revived a proposal to impose a fee on water users and polluters that would help communities without access to safe and affordable drinking water, a problem that affects more than a million Californians. The idea fell short in previous years and lawmakers rejected it again, fearing retribution from voters. Instead, the state will divert up to $130 million annually from its cap-and-trade auctions — money meant to support programs that reduce greenhouse gas emissions — to a clean water fund.
911 system: Seeking to update its emergency communications, the state would restructure how the system is funded: A surcharge on landlines would be replaced by a monthly tax on any device capable of dialing 911, including cell phones. The Department of Finance estimates the fee would start at 34 cents per month per device. The Legislature rebuffed the proposal when former Gov. Jerry Brown tried to do it last year, but Newsom brought it back in his budget plan. It must be approved by a two-thirds vote in a follow-up bill this month.
Earned income tax credit: Newsom has thus far been unable to get the Legislature on board with his plan to realign some sections of California’s tax code with the 2017 federal overhaul, which would raise about a billion dollars to expand the state’s tax credit for the working poor. As with the clean-water fee, some lawmakers fear the political fallout of raising taxes. Newsom agreed in the budget deal to keep negotiating over the plan, which the Legislature could approve by a two-thirds vote in a follow-up bill.
Paid family leave: Expanding paid parental leave — from six weeks for each parent of a newborn or newly adopted child to six months per baby — was a centerpiece of Newsom’s early agenda. The budget gets the state part of the way there by giving each parent, or a close family member, two additional weeks to bond with an infant, bringing the total to four months per baby. The expansion also covers leave to care for a seriously ill family member.
To address concerns that poor Californians can’t take advantage of the program because it pays only some of their salary during time off, lawmakers raised the wage replacement rate to 90% for low-income workers.
Government: Newsom got his Office of Digital Innovation, to redesign government services, and hundreds of millions of dollars he requested to reduce wait times and address other workload issues at the Department of Motor Vehicles. The budget also includes a redesigned substance-abuse treatment program that Newsom proposed for California prisons, where drug overdoses are climbing. Lawmakers largely went along with the governor’s $15 billion plan to pay off the state’s budget debts, pay down some of its unfunded retirement benefits and build up reserves, such as the rainy-day fund, in anticipation of an inevitable economic downturn.
Alexei Koseff is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @akoseff
Alexei Koseff
Follow Alexei on: https://www.facebook.com/SFChronicle/akoseff
Alexei Koseff is a state Capitol reporter for The San Francisco Chronicle, covering Gov. Gavin Newsom and California government from Sacramento. He previously spent five years in the Capitol bureau of The Sacramento Bee, reporting on everything from international recruiting by the University of California to a ride service for state senators too drunk to drive. Alexei is a Bay Area native and attended Stanford University. He speaks fluent Spanish.
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
By Peter Hegarty | [email protected] | Bay Area News Group PUBLISHED: June 13, 2019 at 12:35 pm | UPDATED: June 14, 2019 at 9:52 pm Longtime Alameda County Supervisor Scott Haggerty says he won’t seek another term Scott Haggerty will not try to keep his seat when his term ends
Alameda County Supervisor Scott Haggerty gives a speech during the unveiling of the Marissa Hunt Agricultural Educational Center at the Alameda County Fairgrounds in Pleasanton, Calif., on Thursday, March 7, 2019. The 8,000 square foot facility is named after ten-year-old Marissa Hunt, a Pleasanton 4-H member who was killed in a car accident in 2004. The community youth barn provides enough space to house approximately 80 animals as well as a classroom, an animal wash rack, outdoor paddocks, and a livestock scale. The facility is available for all Alameda County FFA and 4-H Club members who raise animals for the Junior Livestock Show, held annually at the Alameda County Fair.(Doug Duran/Bay Area News Group)
LIVERMORE — Alameda County Supervisor Scott Haggerty, known for his often brusque, off-the-cuff remarks, announced Thursday he will not seek re-election to the seat he has held without challenge for almost a quarter century. Already, the jockeying to replace him has begun, even though his term doesn’t expire until the end of next year. Within hours of Haggerty’s tweet about his decision, termed-out state Sen. Bob Wieckowski announced he plans to run for the seat.
“It’s been my privilege to serve Alameda County & the Bay Area region over the last 23 years. Its been an incredible run,” Haggerty posted Thursday on Twitter. “I can’t adequately express in words my gratitude to all who have supported me through the years. Still so much to do in the next 18 months!”
Haggerty was first elected in 1996 to replace the retiring Ed Campbell. He has not faced any contestants in subsequent elections for District 1, which includes the cities of Livermore, Dublin, most of Fremont and the unincorporated areas of eastern Alameda County.
Haggerty said his age — he’s 61 — played into his decision not to seek re-election, noting that if he ran again and won he would be 67 when the next term ends.
“This job takes a toll on you,” Haggerty said in an interview. “I need to make some lifestyle changes. I want to get healthy.” He declined to elaborate about his health.
He said he has been mulling over not seeking another term for several months.
The announcement from Fremont City Councilman Vinnie Bacon in February that he planned to campaign for the supervisor’s seat played into his decision to announce now, Haggerty said.
“I thought it best to get out of the race and leave a level playing field for any candidates,” he said.
As a supervisor, Haggerty has served on a host of boards and commissions, including the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, the Bay Area Air Quality Management District, the San Joaquin Regional Rail Commission and the Livermore Amador Valley Transit Authority.
He also serves on the Oakland Alameda County Coliseum Authority, where in April he helped negotiate a deal in which supervisors agreed to sell the county’s ownership share of the complex to the Oakland A’s for $85 million — an action that supporters say will help keep the team in Oakland.
As a supervisor, Haggerty pushed to get BART’s Warm Springs extension completed, secured funding to expand Axis Community Health, which offers medical services in the Tri-Valley, and spearheaded the creation of East Bay Community Energy, the local electricity supplier in Alameda County.
“I am really proud of all that I have accomplished,” he said. “But it’s not as if I am going to be resting on my laurels for the next 18 months. There’s still plenty to do.”
As a supervisor, Haggerty has taken stands on contentious issues that put him at odds with some public speakers during raucous board meetings. Though known as the most conservative member of the board, he has backed progressive causes, such as the recent decision to fly the gay pride flag at the county building.
He also has gone against the grain, such as voting in 2013 to oppose a resolution discouraging county cooperation with Secure Communities, a federal deportation program that critics say unfairly targets undocumented immigrants.
And in February, he supported only tweaking Urban Shield, the police training exercise that came under fire for allegedly militarizing law enforcement, not the broader changes that were eventually adopted. Until Bacon announced he was running, Haggerty had not faced an electoral opponent for nearly two decades.
On Thursday, Wieckowski gave some of his reasons for seeking Haggerty’s seat.
“I want to continue on the supervisor’s work to create a more efficient transportation network to better connect people, housing, and jobs and invest in programs that will take on homelessness and serve children, youth, and families,” Wieckowski said in a press release.
Bacon told this news organization when he announced his campaign that he wants to win over voters with a platform focused on limiting what he called overdevelopment, which has caused traffic congestion and school overcrowding.
Along with Haggerty, the other supervisors on the five-member Alameda County board are Richard Valle, Wilma Chan, Nate Miley and Keith Carson.
Haggerty, who was raised in Fremont, lives in Livermore.
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Opinion: State parks vision must look beyond expansion Why California should first focus on maintenance, access for all residentsks
By Michael Mantell | PUBLISHED: June 14, 2019 at 6:10 am | UPDATED: June 14, 2019 at 6:37 am
DAVENPORT, CA – APRIL 30: California golden poppies bloom along the Skyline to Sea Trail in Big Basin Redwoods State Park as it approaches Waddell Beach, Tuesday, April 30, 2019, near Davenport, Calif. (Karl Mondon/Bay Area News Group)
Almost two decades ago, I founded Resources Legacy Fund to help Silicon Valley funders protect a quarter million acres of ecologically valuable land in California. We went on to leverage that initial investment to double the original conservation target.
We’ve been proud to do our part in growing the map of California’s protected areas and in expanding public funding for this. In the end, however, protecting and enhancing the environment, including parks, is fundamentally about creating benefits, access, and greater opportunities for healthier lives for all citizens.
The charge to grow the parks’ statewide acreage, a priority identified in a recent editorial in the Mercury News, is not the only or even most important priority. Our work over the past few years tells us that mandate is overdue for a 21st century update that reflects the needs of today’s parks users. That’s why in 2015, the California Department of Parks and Recreation concluded a deliberate, thoughtful, and public Parks Forward process to examine the department’s practices and find ways to improve its operations, chiefly in how it serves parks visitors for today and tomorrow. The result was a set of recommendations that serve as a road map to fundamentally transform the department and our parks.
Current State Parks leadership has already taken the department a long way down that road, making some difficult but profound and necessary changes along the way.
For starters, the department has introduced a new budgeting system that ensures greater accountability and restores public trust in how it manages its funds.
It has also reformed hiring practices in the department, eliminating law enforcement requirements for the parks’ superintendents. This shift, which upset many in the old guard, will allow State Parks to build a deep bench of talented leaders with the diverse expertise needed to serve today’s Californians.
Most importantly, State Parks has made remarkable progress in shaking up an antiquated and arguably elitist conservation perspective that at times seems oblivious to change. Current State Parks leadership has sent a clear signal that while expanding the parks system is important, it cannot come at the expense of dealing with more pressing issues. In fact, the Parks Forward commission made an explicit and deliberate choice in not including land acquisition as a priority in its report. Instead, it recommends the department to redirect its attention to historically underfunded areas, deferred maintenance, and outreach to local communities to ensure California State Parks truly serve all Californians.
The department is well on track to reach the 2025 vision outlined in the report: A system that puts every urban Californian within a safe, half-mile walk of a well-maintained park that provides relevant and meaningful recreational opportunities. State Parks is funding the expansion of safe neighborhood parks, restoring existing facilities, and bringing low-cost places to stay overnight along the coast, among other ways to enhance community access. It deserves every opportunity to see this vision through.
Michael Mantell is president of the Resources Legacy Fund.
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Despite Dem control, progressive plans don’t pan out
By Ben Christopher and Laurel Rosenhall
CALmatters
An unprecedented haul of tax dollars generated by a roaring economy. A governor who campaigned on a big- ticket policy agenda of longtime leftist favorites, including universal child care and state-funded health care for all. A Legislature so thoroughly packed with Democrats it gives rise to a new term — “gigamajority.”
Californians could be forgiven for expecting it all to add up to liberal bonanza, a gusher of policies that the Democratic Party’s base has been clamoring to enact for decades.
But as the new super-blue Legislature sends Gov. Gavin Newsom his first state budget and the Capitol passes the halfway point for making new laws this year, the progressive policies that are advancing amount to less of a torrent than a trickle. California may look pretty far to the left from a national perspective, but statewise, lawmakers have killed or downsized major items on the progressive wish list. They rejected bills to rein in charter school growth, curb oil production, expand data privacy rights and regulate e-cigarettes.
They drastically scaled back ambitious agendas to protect renters and limit soda consumption. Though they approved some big progressive goals — giving workers more paid time off to care for a new baby, boosting government funding for health care and child care — those policies have
Gov. Gavin Newsom campaigned as a progressive, but lawmakers have killed or scaled back major items on the progressive wish list.
JUSTIN SULLIVAN — GETTY IMAGES
been whittled down from their original versions, making them more incremental than revolutionary.
If voters expected last year’s blue wave to upend policymaking- as-usual in Sacramento, it seems, at least for now, that the old rules still apply. Why? Moderating forces are at work: swingdistrict Democrats remain tax- wary, lobbying and campaign money still wield a lot of influence, and virtually no one wants to burn through the state’s $21 billion budget surplus or its nearly $16 billion rainy day fund.
“There was a lot of talk that with a super majority and a very progressive governor, things were going to go crazy. But when you’re sitting in that spot and looking at what’s going on, you have to hold the line,” said Dana Williamson, a Democratic political consultant who worked closely with former Gov. Jerry Brown.
“It’s also not as easy as everyone thinks to get a two-thirds vote, even when you have a super majority.”
Democrats now hold about 75% of the Legislature’s seats, and most bills need only a simple majority to pass. But some measures — notably, any tax increases — must be approved by two-thirds of both houses. Legislative leaders have historically been strategic about using the super majority, saving it only for high-priority votes.
Even then, getting to two-thirds usually involves a lot of negotiation and heartburn because swingdistrict Democrats are leery of casting votes that their constituents could see as too liberal.
“All Democrats aren’t created equal,” said Holly Mitchell, a Los Angeles Democrat and chair of the powerful Senate budget committee. “We all celebrated having a super majority in both houses. But we have to recognize that some of those areas where we were able to elect Democrats ... are probably more purple than blue.”
Democratic leaders — spooked by last year’s successful recall of northern Orange County Democratic Sen. Josh Newman after he voted to increase the gas tax — have shelved almost all of this year’s proposals to raise taxes.
That nixed some progressive hopes to increase education funding by taxing oil, health programs by taxing soda, v iolenceprevention by taxing guns, and environmental cleanup by taxing water.
Instead, lawmakers and Newsom have agreed to clean up toxic drinking water by siphoning some money designated for projects to combat climate change. That frustrated environmentalists, who say a progressive legislature and governor should not raid funding for climate programs but instead find another way to pay for water cleanup — even if it means voting for a new tax.
“What’s the point of having a super majority if you don’t do the hard and scary thing?” said Mary Creasman of the California League of Conservation Voters.
Of course, moderation is in the eye of the beholder.
“Governor Newsom proposed one of the most bighearted and progressive budgets in memory and did so in a responsible way that builds historic reserves and saves more funding for a rainy day than at any point in our history,” wrote Nathan Click, a spokesman for the governor. “And in his first 6 months in office, the Governor has helped thrust the state to the forefront of the fight for justice and the national conversation — from taking on Big Pharma to putting a moratorium on the death penalty to fast-tracking humanitarian and legal aid for asylum seekers and refugees.”
And on the national spectrum, California is still regarded by many as a leftist outlier. Its plan to become the first state to offer health insurance to low-income undocumented immigrants under age 26 has been lambasted on the right, with Fox News personality Laura Ingraham calling California a “sucker state.”
The governor’s most recent budget proposal puts the annual cost at $98 million. But that plan is a scaled-down version of a Senate proposal that would have covered undocumented senior citizens as well, with an added yearly cost of $1 1 5 million. And it’s a far cry from the governor’s campaign vow to push California toward a single-payer health care system, with an estimated price tag in the hundreds of billions.
“The hope from this blue wave — more Democrats, more progressive action — that remains to be seen,” said Stephanie Roberson, a lobbyist with the California Nurses Association, which advocates for a statefunded universal health care program and endorsed Newsom last year, spending more than $735,000 to help elect him. Earlier this year she said she expected a single- payer bill, but nothing was ever introduced.
“There are a lot of issues that you would assume would have passed, so yeah, there are some surprises,” she said. “What we should be doing with these super majorities is using them to our advantage to pass really good reform. Hasn’t been exercised yet.”
Anthony Wright of Health Access California, a nonprofit health advocacy group, applauded the governor’s “first steps” on expanding health care: issuing an executive order to begin creating a way for the state to buy prescription drugs in bulk, including in his budget a mandate that all Californians buy health insurance, and sending a request for a waiver from the Trump administration to redirect federal funds to a future singlepayer program.
“We’re not going to get to full universal coverage in one year,” Wright said. “But he hasn’t laid out what his next steps are.”
While California is in the grip of a severe housing crisis, lawmakers rejected several pro-tenant bills, such as one that would have given them more protection from evictions. The lone survivor: a weakened anti-rent- gouging bill that caps annual rent increases at roughly 9%, exempts landlords who own fewer than 10 homes and would expire after three years.
Contrast that with New York, where Democratic lawmakers last week announced an agreement on a package of bills to not only strengthen rent control in New York City but allow it to extend statewide, a move that The New York Times said left big landlords “in shock.”
California progressives have scored a few notable wins. Newsom used his executive power to stop all executions while he’s in office. The Assembly passed a bill to limit when police can justifiably kill and another to cap interest rates on “predatory” loans targeted at low-income consumers. The budget includes a sales tax exemption for diapers and tampons.
But even those wins come with asterisks.
Prosecutors are still seeking the death penalty in some murder cases because only voters can repeal California’s capital punishment law.
The original version of the police reform measure — proposed by a broad coalition of civil rights groups — didn’t seem to have enough votes to pass.
Instead, lawmakers passed a version that reflects a compromise with law enforcement, causing Black Lives Matter to remove its support. The American Civil Liberties Union remains a key supporter, and the group spent heavily lobbying the statehouse — nearly $1.2 million in the first three months of the year.
Meanwhile, the bill to prohibit triple-digit interest rates on some consumer loans faces an uphill climb in the Senate, where it will go before its first committee this week. And those who dug into the details of the governor’s budget found it was often less than it seemed: His cancellation of the menstrual product tax, for example, would expire in two years.
When a Newsom aide told a panel of lawmakers that a future decision to extend the tax break for longer would depend on the state’s economic condition at that time, Democratic Assemblywoman Cristina Garcia shot back: “Our uteruses shouldn’t be used to balance our budget down the road.”
The relatively restrained pace of change has come as a pleasant surprise to many political moderates and business interests. Of the 31 bills stamped with the California Chamber of Commerce’s “job killer” label — a moniker for the policies it lobbies most strongly against — lawmakers have quashed all but five.
Chamber President Allan Zaremberg attributes his organization’s high success rate in a Democraticdominated Legislature to a combination of “good lobbying and their bad ideas.”
Good lobbying is expensive. The Chamber is among the biggest spenders on lobbying in Sacramento — nearly $720,000 in the year’s first quarter. The Chamber joined major tech firms in lobbying against two bills that would have expanded consumer protection under a landmark data privacy measure California passed in 2018.
Lawmakers quietly shelved both of them. The oil industry — a political boogie man for many progressives and Sacramento’s most lavish lobbying spender — is so far faring pretty well in the Democratic- controlled statehouse.
Lawmakers have killed nearly half the bills the Western States Petroleum Association lobbied on this year. That includes a bill to increase reuse of treated wastewater by restricting how much can be released into the ocean, and a proposal to prohibit new oil and gas operations within 2,500 feet of homes, schools, playgrounds and health care facilities.
Industry lobbying helped kill several bills meant to promote public health by limiting vaping and soda consumption. Soda companies more than tripled their spending on lobbying in Sacramento during the first three months of the year.
They persuaded lawmakers to jettison four of five measures backed by doctors, dentists and public health advocates that sought to limit how much sugar Californians drink.
Lawmakers also snuffed out bills meant to curb teen use of e-cigarettes by banning the sale of products with enticing flavors.
The California Association of Realtors, which typically opposes restrictions on property owners, spent more than $400,000 on lobbying and nearly $1 million (more than any other group) on campaign spending this year so far. That could help explain why all but one of the state’s high-profile prorenter bills have died.
The effect of all that money may be put to the test this week as the Senate takes up a bill at the center of one of the year’s biggest battles between organized labor and business interests. The Assembly has passed the proposal, which would force gig-economy companies such as Uber and Ly f t to treat their contractors as employees, guaranteeing them minimum wage and other basic worker protections.
One big test of Newsom’s progressive agenda remains: whether he’ll be able to increase payments to low- income Californians by changing the state tax code.
He has proposed increasing the Earned Income Tax Credit — an anti-poverty program that has historically garnered bipartisan praise — by bringing California’s tax code in line with changes Republicans enacted to the federal code in 2017, such as placing new limits on the losses, workplace- related expenses and interest payments that businesses have traditionally used to lower their tax bills.
The governor’s office estimates that nixing those deductions would raise an extra $1.7 billion from wealthier Californians and businesses and redirect it to poor people.
“That sounds like the kind of thing you would expect to pass in a Legislature dominated by Democratic politics,” said Chris Hoene, president of the California Budget and Policy Center, who supports the governor’s proposal.
But Assembly Democrats — fearful of potential political attacks — have yet to come on board. Senate leader Toni Atkins of San Diego said Democrats in her chamber support Newsom’s proposal.
But looking more broadly at negotiations among the governor and both legislative leaders, Atkins observed what may become the motto of 2019: “All three of us are sort of moderating each other.” CALmatters.org is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media venture explaining California policies and politics.
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Budget impasse threatens shutdown, deep cuts and default
By Erica Werner and Seung Min Kim
The Washington Post | Sunday, June 16, 2019
WASHINGTON » Senate Republicans and President Donald Trump’s administration are struggling to reach agreement on a path forward on critical budget and spending issues, threatening not only another government shutdown and deep spending cuts but a federal default that could hit the economy hard.
GOP leaders have spent months cajoling Trump in favor of a bipartisan budget deal that would fund the government and raise the limit on federal borrowing this fall, but their efforts have yet to produce a deal. And the uncertain path forward was underscored last week at the Capitol when a budget meeting between key Senate Republicans, including Majority Leader Mitch Mc-Connell, R-Ky., and senior White House officials left out Democrats, whose votes will be imperative to avoid a shutdown and an economy-shaking breach of the federal debt limit.
“We’re negotiating with ourselves right now,” said Senate Appropriations Chairman Richard Shelby, R-Ala. “The president, the administration, has some views, maybe, that are a little different sometimes than the Senate Republicans have. So we’re trying to see if we can be together as best we can.”
The GOP dysfunction — coupled with a new House Democratic majority with its own priorities — puts the sides much further apart than they were at this time in last year’s budget process, which ended in a record-long government funding lapse. At the time, Republicans controlled both chambers of Congress, but negotiations stalled over funding Trump’s immigration priorities.
Trump and Congress face a trio of difficult budget issues. Congress must pass, and Trump must sign, funding legislation by Oct. 1 to avoid a new shutdown. They need to raise the federal debt limit around the same time, according to the latest estimates. Failure to do so would force the government to make difficult decisions about what obligations to pay, and could be considered a default by investors, shaking markets and an economy already showing some signs of alarm.
And by year’s end, they also need to agree on how to lift austere budget caps that otherwise will snap into place and slash $125 billion from domestic and military programs.
Senate Republicans and the administration thus far have not agreed on how to proceed on any of the issues, making it all but impossible for them to enter into substantive negotiations with Democrats. That’s left the Capitol in a state of suspension over what the coming months will hold.
“True to form they seem to be intent on waiting until the absolute last minute to address all these issues that we’ve known about,” said Maya MacGuinea s, president of the nonpartisan, nonprofit Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. “Basically everything they could do wrong, they are doing wrong.” Tensions between key Senate Republicans and White House acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney have been on glaring display for months, and GOP lawmakers and aides partially blame that frayed relationship for the halting pace of talks. Mulvaney was a member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus before he joined the administration, first as White House budget director before becoming acting chief of staff, and he has advocated dramatic spending cuts opposed by lawmakers of both parties.
Mulvaney has been slow to come around to the need for a bipartisan budget deal that would raise domestic and military spending caps even after McConnell met privately with Trump last month and got the president’s blessing to proceed with such a deal, according to a senior GOP Senate aide who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe private conversations.
“The problem with Mulvaney is sometimes he forgets he’s a staffer now, so he’s looking to execute on his own vision instead of the president’s, and that slows down the process,” the aide said.
A Mulvaney spokesman did not respond to a request for comment on his relationship with Senate Republicans. But an administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity to describe internal thinking, said that Trump had urged McConnell to get a good deal but had not offered a blanket agreement for a budget deal that would raise domestic spending indiscriminately higher.
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Rebecca Kaplan’s reckless Oakland city budget plan
Sunday, June 16, 2019
It’s amateur hour at the Oakland City Council.
Two weeks ago, council President Rebecca Kaplan proposed an irresponsible twoyear budget plan that threatened to upend years of slow but steady fiscal progress.
Now she and three newly elected council colleagues are back with a new version that claims $87 million in new revenues and proposes to add roughly that amount in new spending.
Kaplan filed her latest version with the city clerk late Thursday for discussion at Tuesday’s special City Council meeting. No action should be taken until the council and city residents receive a detailed, impartial analysis from City Administrator Sabrina Landreth.
And the council should flatly reject Kaplan’s proposed use of the budget process to essentially undermine city negotiators, giving away money to workers while two of the larger city labor unions are currently in negotiations.
Under the city’s budget process, Mayor Libby Schaaf offered up her two-year proposal in May. Her $1.5 billion plan for the upcoming 2019-20 fiscal year represents a 7.2% increase over the current year.
But it’s the eight-member City Council that has the final say, with Schaaf having a vote only in case of a tie. Rather than suggest small tweaks to the mayor’s plan, as has been common in past years, Kaplan proposes upending it with a long list of amendments designed to appease special interests, especially the city’s labor unions.
To make her plan pencil out, Kaplan, in her first proposal, ignored the city’s fiscal experts and made her own — wildly optimistic — revenue forecasts, inflating projected income over the next two years.
It was reckless financial planning, especially at a time when the city and the nation are overdue for an economic downturn.
Kaplan’s budget “adds more than $100 million in non-existent revenues that are simply not substantiated by data or evidence to validate their existence,” Landreth wrote in a scathing analysis.
Landreth, known as a fiscal expert and straight-shooter, warned that the first Kaplan plan would have left the city with a $59 million deficit over the next two years, a deficit that would lead to layoffs, hiring freezes and service reductions. The plan “would also reverse the tremendous progress that this city has made over the past decade to gain solid financial footing and address irresponsible spending decisions made by prior administrations that brought Oakland to the brink of financial catastrophe during the last recession.”
Those damning words coming from a professional city administrator constituted a dressing-down the likes of which neither we nor some City Hall veterans could recall seeing before. But Kaplan deserved it. Kaplan, in her latest proposal, abandoned her $17 million inflation of income projections over the next two years from the city’s real estate transfer tax. It made no sense at a time when the overheated housing market is showing signs of cooling, or at least leveling off.
But she still clings to her irresponsible proposal to set aside an additional $12.2 million for employee raises, above what the mayor already included in her budget.
Kaplan and her political allies claim the city underestimates future income. Actually, the staff does a fairly good job. Besides, with a recession overdue, it’s smart to budget conservatively.
If extra revenues materialize, they should be used to pay down the city’s enormous $2.7 billion debt for underfunded employee pension and retiree health plans.
Kaplan apparently feels emboldened by last year’s election, which gave her and her labor-backed allies majority control of the City Council. Now that they have the power, the question is whether they can use it wisely.
The answer so far seems to be no.
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
On the matter of impeaching Trump, Speaker Pelosi has to pick her poison
Sunday, June 16, 2019
By Eugene Robinson
WASHINGTON » House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Thursday she believes President Trump “has been involved in a criminal cover-up.” Too bad she’s not in a position to do something about it.
Oh wait, she is. If she believes Trump has committed crimes, violated his oath of office, is trampling the Constitution, she can have the House begin a formal impeachment inquiry. But she won’t.
When Pelosi says that most House Democrats don’t favor launching an impeachment inquiry, she’s telling the truth — but not the whole truth. She’s the respected and unchallenged leader of her caucus. If she changed her mind, many other minds would quickly follow.
Pelosi clearly believes impeachment is a political trap, and she may be right. But doing nothing looks increasingly like a political trap, too. The speaker must pick her poison. In politics, observation suggests, it’s generally better to play offense than defense. And in life, conscience demands, it’s always best to do what’s right.
The danger in doing nothing is that Congress allows Trump to hold himself above the law. Trump’s attorneys formally made that argument last week in a court filing that seeks to bar the House Committee on Oversight and Reform from investigating whether Trump committed tax fraud. But Trump’s “Sun King” view of the presidency has long been obvious. He ignores legal and constitutional norms and acts as if his presidential powers are unlimited.
This isn’t “what the American people voted for,” Republicans argue. Many Trump voters wanted a disrupter. But they didn’t want to weaken our democracy by giving the president the unchecked powers of a banana- republic strongman.
Congress has a sworn duty to uphold the Constitution, which says everyone, including the president, is subject to the law.
Many gnashed teeth over Trump’s declaration, in an interview broadcast Wednesday, that hypothetically he’d accept help from a foreign government in his upcoming reelection campaign. Democrats and Republicans alike declared they’d never do such a horrible thing. But Trump explicitly solicited and welcomed help from Vladimir Putin’s Russia in the 2016 election. If such foreign meddling is so shocking, why doesn’t the established fact of its occurrence merit official action?
Pelosi says special counsel Robert Mueller provided ample evidence that Trump obstructed justice. She says Trump is stonewalling Congress by refusing to hand over documents and blocking witness testimony that House committees need to perform their constitutional duties of oversight and investigation. She says Trump has abused his emergency powers in unconstitutional attempts to circumvent Congress and usurp its power of the purse.
In essence, she says Trump has committed impeachable offenses — but she won’t open an impeachment inquiry.
Instead, the speaker is presenting a quasi reality-TV version of Mueller’s report. Trump, a master of reality TV, is denying Pelosi the necessary actors and script. How does it help Pelosi for her committees to spend months fighting in the courts for scraps? Why hold a hearing with Richard Nixon’s White House counsel, John Dean, as a witness when you need Trump’s onetime White House counsel, Don McGahn?
Pelosi says she believes Trump is trying to bait her into impeachment. He is likely trying to bluff her out of it. He dreads the stigma of impeachment — and the greater power it gives Congress to compel testimony and documents.
Pelosi is famous for sticking to a plan, so this may fall on deaf ears. She and her caucus will hear from their base, though. And the demands of history may overwhelm even the most carefully plotted strategies. Eugene Robinson is a Washington Post columnist.
Pelosi clearly believes impeachment is a political trap, and she may be right. But doing nothing looks increasingly like a political trap, too.
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Sunday, June 16, 2019 Dems must focus on sure winner in 2020, not flock to the left
By George F. Will
WASHINGTON » “It is a great advantage to a president,” said our 30th, “and a major source of safety to the country, for him to know he is not a great man.” Or, Calvin Coolidge would say today, a great woman. While today’s incumbent advertises himself as an “extremely stable genius” and those who would replace him promise national transformation, attention should be paid to the granular details of presidential politics, which suggest that a politics of modesty might produce voting changes where they matter, and at least 270 electoral votes for a Democrat.
If the near future resembles the immediate past, which it often does, the Democratic nominee in 2020 will be, as the Republican nominee was in 2016, the person favored by the party faction for whom government is more a practical than an ideological concern. For Republicans in 2016, the faction — non-college whites — felt itself a casualty of an economic dynamism that most benefited people who admire this faction least.
In 2020, the decisive Democratic faction in the nomination contest is apt to be, as it was in 2016, African Americans, whose appraisal of government is particularly practical: How will it handle health care, employment, schools? For them, packing the Supreme Court, impeaching the president, abolishing the Electoral College and other gesture-promises probably are distractions.
African Americans were at least 20% of the vote in 15 of the 2016 primaries, and in all the primaries combined 76% voted for Hillary Clinton. This helped edge out Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, who narrowly defeated Clinton among white voters in the primaries, according to the National Journal’s Josh Kraushaar and a 2016 Pew survey that found just 27% of African American Democrats identify as liberal, and a plurality describe themselves as moderate. How important is ensuring robust African American turnout for Democrats? If in 2004 John Kerry had received as many black votes in Ohio as Barack Obama was to receive in 2008, Kerry would have been president.
Furthermore, in the 110day sprint between the end of the Democratic nominating convention in Milwaukee and Election Day, the earliest voting — which may change — begins Sept. 18 in Minnesota and at least one-fifth of 2020 voters will probably cast their ballots before Election Day. The decisive voters might be those who crave not transformation but restoration — the recovery of respectable national governance.
So, the Democratic Party, the world’s oldest party, which for the first time in its history has won the popular vote in six of seven presidential elections, should be keenly focused on how to subtract states from Donald Trump’s 2016 roster, and to do so by carrying more than the 487 counties (out of 3,142) that Clinton carried. Democrats might try to decipher the almost 41-point swing in northeast Iowa’s inscrutable Howard County, the only U.S. county that voted in a landslide for Obama over Mitt Romney (by 20.9 points) in 2012 and four years later in a landslide for Trump over Clinton (by 20.1 points). Democrats must make amends with the 402 other counties that voted for Trump after voting for Obama at least once. This will require the Democrats’ progressive lions to lay down with the Democrats’ moderate lambs, a spectacle as biblical as it is inimical to progressives’ pride about their wokeness. They might, however, be encouraged to be more politically ecumenical by remembering this: In 2016, Clinton won cumulatively a million more votes than Obama did in 2012 in New York, Massachusetts and California, but won 1 million fewer than he received everywhere else.
Everything, however, depends on Democrats jettisoning, before they allow it to influence their selection of a candidate, their self-flattering explanation of 2016. As William Voegeli, senior editor of the Claremont Review of Books, has written: “Ascribing the 2016 election to your opponents’ bigotry makes clear that the problem wasn’t that Democrats didn’t do enough to deserve people’s votes, but that the people weren’t good enough to deserve Democrats’ governance. … Sooner rather than later, even Democrats will learn that denigrating people until they vote for you lacks a certain strategic plausibility.” Sooner than the Milwaukee convention? George Will is a Washington Post columnist.
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Friday, June 14, 2019
By Ali Tadayon [email protected]
OAKLAND » Oakland’s City Council gave its blessing Wednesday to two pieces of state legislation that would allow the A’s to cut through red tape and move forward with their plan to build a 35,000seat ballpark by 2023.
Council members stressed, however, that they are not ready to give the green light to the project itself.
The City Council voted unanimously at a special meeting Wednesday to support SB 293 from Senator Nancy Skinner, D-Berkeley, and AB 1191 from Assemblyman Rob Bonta D-Oakland. Councilwoman Lynette Gibson McElhaney was absent from the meeting.
SB 293, which passed the Senate and has gone to the Assembly, would allow the city and county to create a special tax district to finance the infrastructure around the ballpark. AB 1191, which passed the Assembly and has gone to the Senate, simplifies the permitting process for the site.
The meeting was packed with A’s fans who mostly spoke about the benefits of keeping the baseball team in Oakland, as well as longshoremen and port business representatives who reiterated their concerns that building the ballpark at Howard Terminal could interfere with port oper-
The Oakland A’s released renderings of their proposed new ballpark at Howard Terminal.
COURTESY OF BJARKE INGELS GROUP
ations. Little was spoken about the bills themselves during the public comment portion of the meeting.
The A’s plan to construct the ballpark by 2023, as well as triangular buildings around it that would house apartments, condos or hotels.
The Port of Oakland’s board of commissioners last month approved an exclusive negotiating term sheet that would give the Athletics four years to obtain land use permits, conduct an environmental review and do other preparatory work needed to eventually lease the 50-acre Howard Terminal.
Contact Ali Tadayon at 408-8595289.
Howard Terminal and downtown Oakland are seen on March 13. The site is being considered for the A’s new ballpark and for housing on the northern side near Schnitzer Steel.
JANE TYSKA — STAFF ARCHIVES
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Friday, June 14, 2019 Legislature approves $214.8B budget By Sophia Bollag and Hannah Wiley
Sacramento Bee
California lawmakers passed a $214.8 billion budget deal Thursday, with new spending on schools, homelessness and health care for undocumented immigrants.
The budget relies on a surplus to add billions to the state’s reserves funds, which will bring the state’s total so- called rainy day fund to $19 billion. It puts hundreds of millions of dollars into other reserves, too, including ones for schools and social services.
Lawmakers are still hashing out final details of some aspects of the budget through so-called trailer bills, which can be passed after the main budget bill. But the bill passed Thursday will provide the major framework for state spending in the next fiscal year, which starts July 1.
“The budget deal will maintain the state’s ongoing commitment to fiscal prudence,” said Sen. Holly Mitchell, D-Los Angeles, who leads the committee that oversees the final budget deal. “This budget is bold and responsible.”
Republicans criticized some of the spending tucked into the budget for individual projects, including dog parks and playgrounds.
“This budget has more pork in it than any other budget that I’ve seen in my time in the Legislature,” said Assemblyman Jay Obernolte, R-Hesperia, noting that many of those expenditures were added over the weekend. “Those earmarks have no business being in the budget at that late date.”
Now that lawmakers have passed it, Gov. Gavin Newsom has 12 days to sign or veto the bill. He can also nix parts of the budget through line-item vetoes.
Here’s a look at some of the aspects of the budget bill passed Thursday:
Education
The budget has about $101 billion for K-12 education, spending largely based on a formula in state law that dictates how much California must spend on public schools.
It has hundreds of millions of dollars to ease pension pressure on schools and it allocates more money for special education programs.
Schools will also receive $125
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
By Rachel Becker | Published: June 17, 2019 Why fighting for clean water with climate change money worries some California lawmakers
California's political leaders agreed to fund safe drinking water with money set aside for fighting climate change – pitting environmental cause against environmental cause. | Photo by Steve Johnson via Flickr
Combat climate change, or clean up California’s water? Those alarmed by the Legislature’s decision to dip into a greenhouse gas fund to pay for clean drinking water may need to get used to it: constitutional restrictions on spending that money are set to expire in 2021.
At issue is the decision to address one environmental crisis—the lack of clean water for one million Californians—with money set aside for fighting another: climate change. It’s a move that pits those committed to curbing greenhouse gases against environmental allies over $1.4 billion dollars of polluters’ money, even as the state boasts a $20.6 billion surplus. Environmentalists who worked for years to find money for clean water are celebrating the decision as a victory despite the message for climate change goals. Sen. Bill Monning, a Carmel Democrat who has pushed for safe drinking water funding in the past, called it the right thing to do on the Senate floor on Thursday.
“We will make history today by making good on that promise of addressing the human right of every Californian for access to clean, safe drinking water,” he said.
Sen. Bob Wieckowski, a Democrat from Fremont, didn’t dispute the need for clean water funding. But he voiced concerns over its source: income from cap and trade, a program that requires major greenhouse gas producers to reduce their emissions or buy credits to compensate. The money from selling those credits goes into a piggy bank called the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, which is supposed to pay for efforts to do exactly that: reduce greenhouse gases.
Those efforts have included high-speed rail, reducing emissions from transportation, clean air programs, and promoting housing density—efforts that, at least arguably, could be related to greenhouse gas pollution. The fund also has been used for tasks less clearly connected, like a $500 million dollar loan to the general fund and paying for a tax break for manufacturers.
Adding water to the mix dilutes the fund’s emphasis on climate change prevention, making it more of an environmental catchall fund. It’s a controversial shift in political direction for a finite pot of money.
“It’s morally reprehensible that there are more than a million Californians that don’t have clean water,” Kathryn Phillips, director of the Sierra Club, told CALmatters. But, she said, “We think it would have made more sense to take the money out of the general fund. That way you could continue to use cap-and-trade funds to reduce air pollution and greenhouse gas pollution.”
Wieckowski warned the Senate before the budget vote on Thursday that the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund shouldn’t be tapped for every worthy cause. “To finance worthy, and non-carbon reducing programs, would move us farther, not closer, to the ambitious greenhouse gas reduction goals we have set for 2030.”
Across the room—and across the aisle—Sen. Jeff Stone, a Riverside County Republican, agreed. “We could have very easily funded this through our budget surplus,” he said.
Contaminated drinking water: “a moral disgrace”
State political leaders looking to compromise thought otherwise. Gov. Gavin Newsom threw down the gauntlet during his state of the state, calling drinking water contamination “a moral disgrace and a medical emergency.” He called for sustained funding to ensure all Californians have access to clean water.
But Newsom initially proposed creating the funding from fees on water users, animal farms, dairies, and fertilizer companies, a plan that was criticized as a new tax and met with resistance. The Assembly floated its own collection of charges and fees for water providers and polluters. The Senate instead opted for an ongoing flow of $150 million from the general fund, the state’s discretionary account. Ultimately, all three dropped their proposals in favor of the cap-and-trade piggy bank.
The compromise is a package of safe drinking water funding that includes $100 million from cap-and-trade and another $30 million from the general fund for this budget year. Going forward, 5 percent or $130 million of cap and trade revenues will continue to pay for safe and affordable drinking water every year through 2030. If there isn’t enough in the cap-and-trade purse, then the general fund will fill in the rest.
“We made the best of a negotiation across three parties,” Senate President Pro Tem Toni Atkins said on the Senate floor. “We did what we had to do—somewhat reluctantly—in order to get it done.” The move, however, is legally murky. Right now, cap-and-trade revenues are only supposed to pay for efforts that “reasonably relate to the reduction of [greenhouse gas] emissions,” according to an opinion by the Legislative Counsel. H.D. Palmer, deputy director for external affairs at the California Department of Finance, told CALmatters the funding helps advance the state’s climate resiliency goals and support disadvantaged communities. “Climate change adversely impacts water availability and can affect drinking water quality,” he said in an email. “Rising temperatures will impact precipitation amounts and result in less reliable water supplies.”
Still, it can be hard to say what really constitutes a reasonable relationship. “Everybody has an incentive to describe their project as being related to greenhouse gas reduction,” says Danny Cullenward, policy director at climate change think-tank Near Zero and member of the Independent Emissions Market Advisory Committee. But when it comes to evaluating their effects, he said, “There’s not a lot of rigor, and no independent review.”
He points to the 25 percent yearly allocation for the controversial high-speed rail project, which, once completed, will need to be cheap enough to draw people away from emissions-intensive air travel. “There are a lot of contingencies that have to come true for that to be a major climate reduction,” Cullenward said.
Some of those legal restrictions on fund use end in 2021, according to the Legislative Counsel’s opinion, when the cap-and-trade extension kicks in. At that point, “The handcuffs are off the Legislature in terms of how the Legislature can use these funds,” said Cara Horowitz, co-executive director of UCLA Law’s Emmett Institute on Climate Change and the Environment. “The Legislature may very well decide to continue prioritizing projects that reduce greenhouse gases and promote climate resilience after 2021, but it won’t be obligated to do so,” Horowitz said.
That lack of obligation worries lawmakers like Wiekowski and Assemblywoman Cristina Garcia, a Bell Gardens Democrat. “At least with the safe drinking water there’s still an environmental justice component, which has constantly been my argument about thinking locally, but acting globally,” she said.
Yet she’s concerned the move could set up the fund for future plunder. “What’s going to happen if we have a downturn in the economy and we’re desperate for money—are we going to have money grabs for anything else from this pot? Because we’ve opened that door,” she said.
That precedent becomes more critical as the money in the greenhouse gas fund ebbs and flows. Observers expect the fund to grow over the next decade as industry relies more heavily on credits to meet more stringent climate goals. That expectation changes over time. Longer term, the hope is that industry and fossil fuel companies will need to buy fewer credits as they clean up their emissions. That means this tap of environmental funding eventually could run dry.
“We have generations of man-made disasters that we need to clean up, and we know how expensive that is,” Garcia said. “People keep telling me, ‘Why are you so worried? You have enough money right now.’ I know that, but I know that down the road, there’s not going to be enough money—and I want to have that discussion now.”
Phoebe Seaton, co-executive director of Leadership Counsel for Justice and Accountability, which helped lead the push for safe drinking water with the Community Water Center and Clean Water Action, thinks that water quality belongs in that conversation. “I think everybody would cut up the pie a little differently, and everybody has opinions over what’s the most bang for your buck,” she said. If the fund were to prioritize climate resilience, greenhouse gas reductions, adaptation, and environmental justice, she said, “It would absolutely include safe drinking water and drinking water resilience.”
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
California bill would reduce ballot measure transparency
By Dan Walters | Wednesday, June 19, 2019
Given their druthers, many government officials would prefer to do their business — our business, actually — behind closed doors and provide sanitized, self-serving versions of their actions after the fact.
Journalists and governmental watchdogs struggle constantly to overcome the tendency toward secrecy and obfuscation, sometimes winning and often losing.
Two years ago, in a rare display of support for transparency in governmental finance, the Legislature and then- Gov. Jerry Brown required local governments and school districts to tell voters how proposed bond and tax issues would affect constituents’ tax bills.
That’s common sense and good government, but local officials complained that the new law, Assembly Bill 195, would be too difficult to implement.
More likely, however, they feared that including an estimate of tax consequences in the brief ballot summary would crowd out their pitches for passage and that telling voters that their tax bills would increase might discourage them from approving the measures.
Last year, the disdain of local officials for the law manifested itself in a budget “trailer bill” that would suspend the transparency law for two years — thereby exempting hundreds of 2018 bond and tax measures.
The author of AB 195, Assemblyman Jay Obernolte, a Big Bear Lake Republican, said the trailer bill was drafted by the Legislature’s Democratic leadership without his knowledge.
For whatever reason, the exemption bill was not taken to a floor vote. Therefore, Obernolte’s disclosure law remained in effect for local tax and bond measures in 2018.
Local officials still don’t like the law and have waged a low-profile drive in the Legislature to get it repealed or watered down and, not surprisingly, a new bill has popped up to fulfill their hopes.
Last week, Sen. Scott Wiener, a San Francisco Democrat, did a “gut-and-amend” maneuver on one of his bills, Senate Bill 268. The measure, which had dealt with welfare benefits and already had passed the Senate, was stripped of its contents and a new bill was inserted.
It would allow local officials to remove the required information about tax consequences from the ballot summary that voters read before casting their votes and place it, instead, in the voter pamphlet or another separate statement, where it would get much less attention.
Moreover, the bill declares, “Failure to comply with this chapter shall not affect the validity of any bond issue following the sale and delivery of the bonds,” which basically lets local officials entirely off the hook. SB 268 is just what local officialdom wants — a new law that purports to give voters vital information about tax and bond measures but ensures that the data will be buried in official paperwork and that failure to provide it won’t be penalized.
A Wiener spokesman, however, said the senator’s motive is “to make it clear what they (voters) are voting on,” asserting that the 75word limit on ballot summaries isn’t enough space to adequately explain tax consequences of ballot measures and thus voters might reject taxes and bonds they otherwise would support. “A 75-word limit confuses voters,” he said.
That rationale parrots what local officials have been saying. One might suspect that Wiener is carrying the bill to placate those officials because they had been angered by his authorship of a highly controversial housing bill. That measure, Senate Bill 50, would have overridden local zoning laws to authorize high-density housing near public transit services but was buried in an avalanche of local government opposition.
Dan Walters is a CALmatters columnist.
State Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, gutted SB 268, which had already passed the Senate, and a new bill was inserted allowing required tax and bond measure details to be removed from the ballot summary and buried elsewhere.
BAY AREA NEWS GROUP FILE PHOTO
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Offshore drilling likely ‘dead in the water’
House blocks funding for Trump’s oil plan off Pacific, Atlantic coasts
By Paul Rogers | Tuesday, June 25, 2019 [email protected]
When President Donald Trump boldly announced that he was going to expand oil drilling off coastlines across the United States, including California’s, he drew cheers from the oil industry and dread from environmentalists and coastal tourism leaders.
Two years later, his plans for new drilling are hitting a potentially fatal setback: Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats who now control the House of Representatives. On Thursday, in an obscure but key vote, the House voted to adopt several amendments to the Department of Interior budget for next year that ban the agency from spending any money to pursue new offshore oil and gas drilling in federal waters off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts.
Without funding, the Trump administration cannot hold public hearings, perform the legal work, complete required studies and oversee lease sales to oil companies.
“Congress is saying you can’t have the money to drill here,” said veteran coastal activist Richard Charter of Bodega Bay, a senior fellow with the Ocean Foundation. “I think Trump’s offshore drilling plan is dead in the water for now.”
The move mirrors a tactic that Democrats, led by former Rep. Leon Panetta of Monterey, successfully used every year starting in 1 9 8 2 to block former President Ron-
A fin whale surfaces near offshore oil rigs off the Southern California coast near Long Beach.
DAVID MCNEW — GETTY IMAGES
ald Reagan and his Interior secretary, James Watt, from leasing federal waters off the Big Sur, San Mateo and Sonoma coasts to oil companies for new drilling.
It affects the Interior Department budget for the upcoming fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1, and would need to be renewed a year from now.
The White House and Department of Interior did not respond Monday to a request for comment.
Environmental groups cheered.
“This decisive action by the House of Representatives to block funding to advance offshore drilling activities supports healthy communities, oceans, national parks, climate and marine life,” the Sierra Club, the Natural Resources Defense Council and other conservation groups said in a joint statement. “We cannot allow the oil and gas industry to boost its profits while our environment and coastal economies suffer the consequences of devastating oil spills.”
The votes were somewhat bipartisan. Overall, 25 Republicans, mostly from coastal districts on the East Coast, voted with Democrats.
The House amendments were attached to two spending bills. One would fund the Department of Interior and the Environmental Protection Agency (HR 3052), and the other would fund the departments of Commerce, Justice and other related agencies (HR 3055).
Three Democrats, Rep. Frank Pallone of New Jersey, Rep. Salud Carbajal of Santa Barbara and Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz of Florida, added language to the Interior and EPA budget bills to bar the use of federal funds for offshore drilling off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, and Florida’s Atlantic and Gulf coasts respectively.
Two other amendments that the House also passed block the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and NOA A , the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, from using funds to allow seismic air gun blasting, a tool used by oil companies to find oil and gas.
Another amendment by Rep. Jared Huffman of Marin County blocks NOA A from weakening states’ review of offshore drilling in federal waters.
The House is expected to hold a final vote on the spending bills this week. They go then to the Senate, which is controlled by Republicans.
The Senate is not considered likely to block the House actions, however, because several Republicans representing coastal states, such as Florida, Georgia and the Carolina s, where business leaders and GOP governors have come out against new drilling, quietly oppose it.
The zero-funding strategy is the latest move in Washington’s tug-of-war over offshore drilling.
In January 2018, the Trump administration proposed the largest expansion of offshore oil and gas drilling in U.S. history, releasing a plan to allow new drilling off the coasts of Northern, Central and Southern California, along with most of the East Coast.
Then-U.S. Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke called it “a new path for energy dominance in America.” Lease sales to oil companies were to begin in 2020 off Southern California, and 2021 off Northern and Central California, the administration said. The announcement overturned a fiveyear plan that the Obama administration had put in place banning new drilling off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts.
Offshore drilling is banned in state waters out to 3 miles in California, under a law signed by former Gov. Pete Wilson, a Republican, in the 1990s. The Trump plan would have allowed it in federal waters, from 3 to 200 miles offshore.
This April, however, after Republicans in Florida told Trump officials that his drilling plans could cost him the critical state in the 2020 election, Interior Secretary David Bernhardt told the Wall Street Journal that the plan was being “sidelined indefinitely” while his agency worked through legal challenges to it. Environmentalists called Thursday’s vote insurance.
“Given all of Bernhardt’s connections to industry,” Charter said, “I don’t think Congress wants to trust him with the entire coast.”
Contact Paul Rogers at 408- 920- 5045.
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Report cites ‘lasting damage’
By Peter Hegarty | Tuesday, June 25, 2019 [email protected]
ALAMEDA » A scathing grand jury report issued Monday takes two City Council members to task, finding that they tried to use their political influence to get a union-backed candidate hired as fire chief.
However, the Alameda County civil grand jury determined it would not take steps to get Jim Oddie and Malia Vella removed from office because of the high threshold that would be needed to effectively usurp the will of voters.
The report found that Oddie and Vella violated the Alameda city charter by improperly attempting to influence former City Manager Jill Keimach as she was picking a fire chief.
The elected officials cost the city more than a million dollars in investigation and legal fees, eroded morale among city employees and “damaged public trust in government at a time when such trust is so important,” the grand jury said.
The grand jury did not name Oddie and Vella, though it was clearly referencing them based on previous reports by this news organization and others.
“The grand jury’s investigation revealed a pattern of conduct by two council members that, taken together, amounted to inappropriate interference in the fire chief hiring process and resulted in lasting damage to the city,” the grand jury said in its 201819 final report.
The Alameda city charter puts all
Oddie
Vella
hiring decisions for key personnel in the hands of the city manager. Council interference is prohibited and can be grounds for removal from office.
The grand jury said the conduct of Oddie and Vella did not rise to filing an “accusation,” a legal charge that would start the process to remove them from office for willful or corrupt misconduct.
Vella and Oddie reportedly wanted Keimach to pick Domenick Weaver — the candidate favored by the firefighters union — as head of the $33 million fire department.
Instead, Keimach tapped Edmond Rodriguez, then chief of the Salinas Fire Department, saying he was more qualified.
“I am pleased that the grand jury has concluded its deliberations and happy that the jury determined that no further ‘accusation’ proceedings are warranted,” Oddie said in an email on Monday. “As the Alameda City Council will be formally responding to the grand jury’s report in the coming weeks, it is premature and inappropriate for me to provide any additional comments at this time. I look forward to putting this behind us and continuing to focus on the important work of serving the Alameda community.”
Vella did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Keimach was so concerned about the pressure she was under while searching for a fire chief that she secretly audio recorded a 55-minute meeting with Oddie and Vella in August 2017, the grand jury said.
“While the council members were careful not to make any direct threats, their message was clear,” according to the jury, which listened to the recording. “They supported the labor- backed candidate and pressed the city manager on that point. They appeared to be doing the labor leader’s bidding, although they claimed the meeting was their idea.”
In a October 2017 letter to the council, sent the day before announcing that Rodriguez was her pick for chief, Keimach said she was subjected to “unseemly” and “intense and unrelenting” pressure to go with the candidate that the union wanted hired.
Keimach also said her job evaluation was continually postponed, a delay that she said made it appear as if a positive evaluation hinged on who she would end up selecting as fire chief.
Keimach’s letter did not name Vella or Oddie.
In May 2018, Keimach quit her job under a $900,000-plus settlement with the city after it emerged she had recorded the council members. She was initially placed on paid administrative leave as a result of the fallout from her allegations.
The Alameda County District Attorney’s Office cleared Keimach of wrongdoing in recording the tape.
Along with Keimach, four other top officials left city employment within about a year following what the grand jury called the “fiasco” surrounding the fire chief’s hiring. Among them were Janet Kern, the city attorney, and Jennifer Ott, an assistant city manager.
A consultant brought in by the city to help with Keimach’s performance review also quit before completing the work, the grand jury said. “It is quite telling that an outside consultant with years of city management experience terminated his contract with the city, foregoing full payment for his future services, because he did not want to participate in an unethical misuse of the performance review process,” the grand jury report said.
The grand jury report noted Oddie sent a letter to Keimach lobbying for the union-favored candidate on city letterhead and signed it in an official capacity as a councilman, describing it as “a direct and very public violation” of the city charter.
The grand jury also criticized Oddie and Vella for taking part in a closed session council meeting, where the council reviewed and edited a report from an independent investigator brought in by the city following Keimach’s accusations before the report became public.
Among the recommendations from the grand jury are that the Alameda City Council adopt a policy stating that council members who knowingly violate ethical codes cannot seek reimbursement for related legal fees.
The grand jury also called for the creation of a handbook outlining a code of conduct for council members.
As part of its investigation, the grand jury heard testimony from current and former city of Alameda staff, elected officials and statewide governance experts.
It also reviewed city council agendas, minutes and meeting videos, as well as emails and other documents.
Contact Peter Hegarty at 510-748-1654.
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
What can we expect from Harris in tonight’s debate?
‘I expect she’ll distinguish herself,’ a former opponent says
By Casey Tolan [email protected]
It’s 250 days until California’s presidential primary, and things are heating up. We’re taking a look back at Sen. Kamala Harris’ past debate performances in advance of her turn in the spotlight tonight. Also, there are new developments in the race for political tech, and Joe Biden finally comes to the Bay Area.
Harris is about to face the highest-stakes debate stage of her life tonight as she goes up against nine other Democratic presidential contenders, including former Vice President Joe Biden and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders. Will her performance give her a boost in the polls? What should viewers expect? We looked back at more than five hours of her radio and television debates during her campaigns for San Francisco district attorney, California attorney general and U.S. Senate over the last 16 years.
The takeaways: Harris is almost universally cool and collected, staying unruffled even in the face of some tough attacks. Offense is the best defense, as she often responds to criticism with broadsides against her rivals. She’s effective at pivoting away from uncomfortable topics, dodging questions that don’t play to her strengths. And while she’s
Sen. Kamala Harris and nine other Democratic presidential hopefuls take part in a debate at 6 tonight in Miami.
TONY CENICOLA — THE NEW YORK TIMES
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Local // Bay Area & State SF judge says Bay Area bridge toll measure was legally approved by voters Rachel Swan | June 15, 2019 | Updated: June 15, 2019 9:32 p.m.
Regional Measure 3, to raise bridge tolls to generate funds for mass transit improvements, was approved by voters in 2018.Photo: Paul Chinn / The Chronicle 2018
• For the second time this year, a San Francisco judge has ruled that the Bay Area’s new Regional Measure 3 bridge tolls were legally approved by voters.
But that doesn’t mean the attempts to quash the new fees are over. Alamo resident Randall Whitney has 60 days to file an appeal and revive his lawsuit against the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, which submitted last year’s ballot measure to incrementally raise tolls by $3.
The measure seeks to generate $4.5 billion for mass transit and infrastructure improvements that will ease congestion on roads and freeways. It won by a 55 percent margin, creating a financial reservoir for projects such as BART’s extension through downtown San Jose and a robust ferry network. Whitney called it a “special tax disguised as a bridge toll,” and said that under the state Constitution it should have gotten two-thirds approval from voters to take effect.
The Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association made similar arguments when it sued to kill Regional Measure 3. A judge tossed out that case in April, but the association still has a window to appeal.
San Francisco Superior Court Judge Ethan Schulman knocked down the second lawsuit in an order last week, which sided with the MTC and said the toll increases are fair. Though Whitney wasn’t immediately available for comment, MTC spokesman John Goodwin said he’d already “communicated that they intend to appeal this ruling.”
So, the money for dozens of transportation projects throughout the nine counties is still in escrow.
That could stall funding to agencies such as BART, which sought Measure 3 money for new railcars. Whether it will actually delay projects remains uncertain, Goodwin said.
Despite that element of doubt, some organizations that supported the ballot measure were ready to declare victory after the ruling was published.
“We’re very encouraged the court rejected this flawed lawsuit,” said Rufus Jeffris, spokesman for the Bay Area Council, an association of businesses and CEOs. It led the ballot measure campaign in partnership with Silicon Valley Leadership Group, whose president and CEO, Carl Guardino, derided the two lawsuits as “nuisances for weary, hardworking commuters in our region.”
The ruling drew equally strong reactions from the ballot measure’s critics.
“It’s preposterous,” said David Schonbrunn, head of the Transportation Solutions Defense and Education Fund, an environmental group that opposed Measure 3. He considers the MTC, the Silicon Valley Leadership Group and the Bay Area Council to be members of an ineffective “transportation establishment” that’s “enmeshed the Bay Area in dysfunctional planning.”
Schonbrunn and other watchdogs recently filed a complaint with the Fair Political Practices Commission saying the MTC and other agencies illegally used public resources to promote the ballot measure.
Rachel Swan is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @rachelswan
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Independent voters may be irrelevant in primary unless they get proper ballot
By Ben Christopher | Monday, July 1, 2019
CALmatters
Presidential challengers hoping to glide to victory through California’s newly relevant primary, a headsup: Your electoral fate may hinge on persuading enough left-leaning millennials to send postcards over the holiday season.
Welcome to the quirkfilled world of California election law. Here, voters without a registered political party can participate in the Democratic Party’s “open” presidential primary — but only if they ask for the right ballot.
Those who vote the oldfashioned way, in person at the polls, can simply request their presidential ballot of choice on the spot. But for those who vote by mail (now a majority of the state’s electorate), that request takes a remarkably analog form: a postcard signed and sent to the county registrar of voters.
If voters skip that step, the section of their ballot reserved for presidential candidates will be blank.
“Very few independent voters know that they have to do something to get the presidential ballot,” said Paul Mitchell of Political Data Inc., which analyzes electoral data for campaigns. He predicts the status quo could disenfranchise a million would-be presidential voters in California.
As political independents and absentee voters make up an increasing share of the California electorate — one disproportionately made up of non-white and young voters — that could leave a large, perhaps determinative, portion of the electorate confused and left out of the process.
Pending legislation by Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez, D-San Diego, won’t necessarily make the process easier, but it aims to at least ensure that voters get plenty of advance notice.
Her bill AB 681 would require county election officials to send three notifications to registered voters reminding them which party they’re registered with — and if they’re registered with no party preference but want to vote in a party’s presidential primary, that they’ll need to request that party’s ballot. (Assuming their party of choice al-
lows them to.) Currently, county officials are required to send only one notification, a postcard asking independent voters if they want a “crossover” ballot. Given the timing of California’s March 3 primary, that reminder is likely to hit most voters’ mailboxes in November or December — squeezed between all the holiday cards, catalogs and bills. With Democrats a supermajority in the Legislature, the bill is now in the Senate after sailing through the Assembly, despite almost every Republican voting no. No one argued against the idea, but GOP legislators were unconvinced that the price tag for the extra postcards — pegged in the low tens of millions of dollars — was a worthy state expense, not to mention that it might pump up participation among those less likely to vote conservative on the rest of the ballot. The League of Women Voters expressed support, noting that “voter confusion suppresses turnout, feeds a false narrative of unfairness or fraud, and destabilizes the electoral system.”
Along with the Democrats, the American Independent, Green, Libertarian and Peace and Freedom parties have traditionally allowed nonaffiliated voters to participate in their presidential primaries.
But for more than a decade, the Republican Party has been more exclusive: It has allowed only registered Republicans to cast ballots in its presidential contest. Independents who want to vote either for or against President Donald Trump in the 2020 primary will likely need to change their party affiliation to Republican. (The parties will make a formal decision about how to conduct their primaries later this year.) The particular voting bloc that California omits by default from its presidential primary could be crucial this year.
No party preference voters (that’s election-speak for political independents) now make up the second-largest political affiliation in the state, behind Democrats. They’re also by far the fastest- growing group. That’s especially true since last year when the state began automatically registering Californians to vote when they applied for a driver’s license — with no party as the default choice.
At the same time, an expanding majority of California voters now vote by mail.
Combined, there are nearly 3.6 million independent permanent “absentee ballot” voters in the state, or roughly 18% of all registered voters, according to Political Data Inc.
In 2016, Mitchell conducted a survey that found 88% percent of this type of voter saying they intended to participate in the presidential primary, with the vast majority saying they intended to vote in the Democratic race. But a majority did not know that they had to specifically request a ballot to do so. Sure enough, in a followup poll after Election Day, he found that 45% of surveyed independent voters who cast their ballots by mail said they wanted to vote in the Democratic primary but were unable to do so.
Santa Cruz County Clerk Gail Pellerin saw the fallout firsthand.
She heard from plenty of confused and angry voters on Election Day when many voters opened their mail-in ballots for the first time, only to discover that they hadn’t been given an option to vote in the most eagerly watched contest of all.
She was also sued. A voter registered with the far-right American Independent Party (but who, like many American Independents in the state, mistakenly believed she was a nonaffiliated voter) requested a Democratic ballot at her polling station on Election Day and was denied.
“She sued and the judge ruled in her favor and allowed us to go ahead and count her vote for a party candidate, so that was cool,” said Pellerin. “I always tell people they can sue me, and she actually took me up on it.”
Pellerin said now that California allows sameday voter registration, litigation would no longer be necessary in that situation, since an erroneously registered American Independent will be able to switch affiliation to a lowercase “i” for independent on the spot. But those voting by mail at the last minute will have a tougher time.
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Local // Bay Area & State At 30, the San Francisco Bay Trail continues to grow Michael Cabanatuan July 4, 2019 Updated: July 4, 2019 7:30 p.m.
Spectacular views of the bay and San Francisco will be a feature of a new segment of the Bay Trail between the Albany Bulb and the foot of Gilman Street.Photo: Michael Short / Special to The Chronicle
Horse racing may be between seasons at Golden Gate Fields in Albany, but there’s plenty of action just west of the grandstand on a bluff with a stunning view of the Golden Gate Bridge and San Francisco Bay.
Bicyclists and pedestrians will have access to that view by the end of the year when it becomes the newest stretch of the San Francisco Bay Trail, a path that one day will circle and cross the bay over 500 connected miles. The trail — with 356 miles completed so far — celebrates its 30th anniversary this month.
All nine Bay Area counties and 47 cities are included in plans for the trail and all have agreed to help it encircle the bay. The purpose of the trail is to bring Bay Area residents closer to the bay while creating recreational opportunities as well as corridors for those who commute on foot or bike, said Laura Thompson, who manages the Bay Trail project for the Metropolitan Transportation Commission and the Association of Bay Area Governments. “An important part of the Bay Trail is that it’s for everyone, for people of all ages and abilities all around the bay,” she said. “It takes people through a number of environments and lets people enjoy it in their own way.”
In Albany, construction crews have carved a shelf in the cliff near Fleming Point and are pouring concrete along a roughly mile-long extension that fills a gap in the Bay Trail. The new path connects a small beach near the Albany Bulb and the foot of Gilman Street in Berkeley across 4.8 acres donated by Golden Gate Fields in 2016. The $8 million project is expected to open in December.
Intrepid trail users can already close the gap, but it requires braving the Golden Gate Fields parking lots and battling traffic, rough pavement and steep grades. The experience isn’t relaxing, pleasant or family friendly.
“That will be no longer,” Thompson said. “We will have a dedicated trail for cyclists and pedestrians. There are going to be spectacular views. When you’re out there, you can see all across the bay, downtown San Francisco, Mount Tam.”
A sign marks a section of the Bay Trail. The grandstand of Golden Gate Fields horse-racing track is visible in the background. Photo: Michael Short / Special to The Chronicle
While the Albany project is just 1/500th of the Bay Trail, it’s a good example of how the trail has been assembled over the past three decades — and the challenges it faces as it presses forward.
“It illustrates how the Bay Trail comes together piece by piece,” Thompson said.
The idea to piece together a trail around the bay was born at a lunch between then-Assemblyman Bill Lockyer, of Hayward, and the editor of the now-defunct Hayward Review in 1986. After Lockyer complained about a story critical of some legislation he authored, he floated the trail idea. In 1987, Lockyer, backed by the entire Bay Area legislative delegation, got legislation passed creating the Bay Trail. In 1989, the official map for the 500-mile trail, which also includes paths across seven toll bridges and various spurs to nearby parks and places of interest, was completed.
The longtime East Bay lawmaker counts the Bay Trail among his greatest accomplishments.
“There’s been a lot of progress,” said Lockyer, now an attorney at an Orange County law firm. “It’s been sort of incrementally completed. Some counties have been extraordinary and there are some places that are difficult to complete. But they keep working at it and that’s good.”
The Bay Trail has taken shape in piecemeal fashion — a mile here, 6 miles there — at various locations around bay. Among the longest stretches are 25-mile trails in Santa Clara County from East Palo Alto to San Jose and in San Mateo County between Millbrae and San Carlos.
An East Bay stretch connects 17 miles though San Leandro and Hayward. Richmond — the Bay Area city with the most shoreline — has 35 miles of Bay Trail, not all contiguous.
A recently completed piece in Pinole, where a curving concrete bridge swoops over wetlands and railroad tracks from a shoreline park to a nearby bluff, is among the most dramatic stretches — and was one of the most technically difficult to complete.
“It was an engineering answer to a complex landscape,” Thompson said. “It was not so easy as laying asphalt in some areas.”
Regardless of its location, the Bay Trail is popular. On weekends and sunny afternoons, many stretches are crowded with joggers, bicyclists and dog walkers. Weekdays bring fewer visitors but they enjoy the solitude — and the views.
“I use it all the time,” said Dmitrius Rodriguez, a 20-year-old Contra Costa College student and barista from San Pablo, who grew up in Hayward. “You can get a little workout in, do some people-watching and look at the bay without going far.”
Rodriguez was hiking through the Golden Gate Fields parking lot, breaking in his backpacking gear — and himself — for a summer trek in Yosemite National Park. After a test at Contra Costa College, he drove to Point Richmond, started hiking and planned to go to Emeryville.
“It’s pretty awesome,” he said as watched construction crews working on the new stretch of trail. “I’m glad they’re putting money into something like this that people like and will use.”
He’s used sections of the Bay Trail all his life, mostly in Hayward and now in the upper East Bay, but said he had no idea it covered more than 350 miles.
A worker with the Gordon N. Ball road construction company uses a tractor to grade a portion of the Bay Trail near Golden Gate Fields racetrack in Albany. Photo: Michael Short / Special to The Chronicle
Some trail users admit they’re only familiar with the stretches close to their homes and weren’t aware the trail may someday circle the bay. But that doesn’t stop them from appreciating the path, which is generally paved and at least 8 feet wide, often with dirt or gravel paths alongside. Benches, drinking fountains and restrooms appear intermittently.
“It’s beautiful up here,” said Judith Holten-Mendez 78, a retired dance teacher from Richmond, as she walked her blind dog along the trail on grassy bluffs in Pinole. “I said to myself, ‘Why are you walking the dog in the neighborhood? Get out and see the beauty that God created.’”
Since they retired from Safeway five years ago, Rebecca Ritchie, 60, and Tony Peovich, 62, walk the trail regularly at both Point Isabel in Richmond and in Pinole.
“We love it,” she said. “We never had time to do it before. Now we’re taking advantage of it.”
It is difficult to place a price tag on the Bay Trail, Thompson said, since different segments are built by different entities and nobody kept track in the early days, “but it is in the realm of hundreds of millions of dollars,” she said.
The money to build the trail comes mostly from local parks and recreation taxes, state bond measures and grants, regional transportation measures and some federal transportation funding. Developers building along the bay are often required to install part of the trail, and some property owners donate land.
Planners believe it will cost another $1.4 billion to complete the trail, but when it will be done is a tougher question to answer. With less than a third of the trail left to build, Thompson said, “You’d think we could say we’re in the homestretch. But a lot of what’s left is more difficult.” That includes the least-developed stretch of the trail along the northern edge of the bay paralleling Highway 37. Other crucial stretches include the San Francisco shoreline near the former Hunters Point shipyard and parts of western Contra Costa County along San Pablo Bay, said Thompson and Sean Dougan, trails development program manager for the East Bay Regional Parks District, which has built 40 miles of the Bay Trail in its parks and has 47 miles to go.
Thompson said the Bay Trail should be “substantially completed” in the next decade. Planners and trail backers intend to keep the momentum.
“We have to do it sooner,” said Dougan, “because it gets more and more expensive the longer we wait.”
Michael Cabanatuan is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @ctuan
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
The Democratic candidates are not on a winning track
By Victor Davis Hanson | Friday, July 5, 2019
Presidential candidates from both parties usually sound hardcore in the primaries to appeal to their progressive or conservative bases. But for the general election, the nominees move to the center to pick off swing voters and centrist independents.
Voters put up with the scripted tactic as long as a candidate had not gone too extreme in the primaries and endorsed positions too far out of the mainstream.
A good example of this successful ploy was Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign. In the primary against Hillary Clinton, Obama ran to her left. But he was still careful not to get caught on the record going too far left. That way, he was still able to tack to the center against John McCain in the general election.
Yet the current crop of wouldbe Democratic nominees has forgotten the old script entirely. Nearly all of them are currently running so hard to the left that the successful nominee will never be able to appear moderate.
Bernie Sanders leads the charge for abolishing all student debt. Kamala Harris wants reparations for slavery. Joe Biden talks of jailing health insurance executives if they falsely advertise.
The entire field seems to agree that it should not be a criminal offense to enter the U.S. illegally.
Not a single Democratic candidate has expressed reservations about abortions, and a number of them have fought proposed restrictions on partial-birth abortions.
Elizabeth Warren has said guns are a national health emergency and would not rule out the possibility of federal gun confiscation.
Yet none of these positions currently wins 51% of public support, according to polls.
What are the Democratic frontrunners thinking? Maybe the candidates assume that the present Democratic Party is so radical and so steeped in identity politics that everyone must run to the left of all other rivals, even if insincerely so. Then, once nominated, the survivor can back off from his or her earlier radicalism, move to the center in the general election and hope that voters prefer a centrist hypocrite to an unapologetic radical.
A second theory is that we are watching a sort of progressive feeding frenzy. In their echo chamber, they have no idea that they are talking radical nonsense.
A third possibility is that the Democratic candidates believe the polling on these issues is wrong.
There is a fourth hypothesis. It may be that the Democratic Party would rather lose in a fashion it considers noble than win insincerely. Maybe the goal for Democratic candidates is to advance the hardleft cause, even if Democrats suspect it will mean that their nominee will lose to Donald Trump in the November 2020 election.
Such blind idealism is not unprecedented in American electoral history. Republican nominee Barry Goldwater knew early on that his hard-right positions would likely mean a big loss to Democratic incumbent President Lyndon Johnson in 1964, but perhaps Goldwater hoped to lay the foundation of a new conservative movement.
George McGovern, the 1972 Democratic nominee, may have suspected that he would be demolished by incumbent Richard Nixon. But the hard-left McGovern nonetheless sought to preach a new sort of progressivism rarely embraced by Democrats.
Goldwater and McGovern lost in landslides.
If all of these explanations seem far out, it’s only because the current Democratic candidates sound far out — as if they either don’t know how to win in 2020 or don’t care to win at all.
Victor Davis Hanson is a syndicated columnist.
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Opinion // Editorials Editorial: Fate of SF citizen initiatives far from settled
Chronicle Editorial Board July 8, 2019 Updated: July 8, 2019 8:58 a.m.
City Attorney Dennis Herrera said two San Francisco measures needed just a simple majority to pass, and a court agreed. Photo: Liz Hafalia / The Chronicle
This is no way to resolve an election in which more than 61% percent of San Franciscans made their intention clear, with neither doubt about the accuracy of the count nor any other allegations of irregularities. The only question was whether the threshold was passage should be a simple majority or two-thirds vote.
That question moved a significant step toward an answer Friday when a Superior Court judge agreed with City Attorney Dennis Herrera’s office that two tax measures from last year required only a simple majority. November’s Proposition C, taxing the city’s largest businesses to raise $300 million a year for housing and services for the homeless, received 61.3% of the vote; June’s Proposition C, taxing commercial landlords to raise $146 million a year for child care programs, received just under 51% of the vote. The delegation of the outcome to the courts was regrettable but inevitable because of the ambiguity about whether initiatives resulting from citizen petitions are subject to the same threshold as those put on the ballot by elected officials. Two constitutional amendments passed by state voters decades ago (Propositions 13 and 218) had set a two-thirds standard for tax increases.
The state Supreme Court has not directly addressed this issue. But its 2017 ruling on an Upland (San Bernardino County) cannabis-tax measure that citizen initiatives can be decided in a primary election — instead of a general election, as required of government-sponsored measures — was interpreted by Herrera as a green light for citizen initiatives to pass with a simple majority.
This dispute goes beyond San Francisco. Across the bay, 62.4% of Oakland voters last year supported Measure AA, a $198 parcel tax increase to raise $30 million a year for pre-K through college readiness programs. Unlike Herrera, Oakland City Attorney Barbara Parker had interpreted state law as requiring a two-thirds vote for passage — which underscores the lack of clarity in state law. The Oakland City Council nevertheless certified Measure AA’s passage, but voted 5-2 to hold off collecting the tax until the court challenge is settled.
San Francisco is collecting those taxes, though not spending the money until they get a final go-ahead from the courts. That could take years, with business and anti-tax groups promising to appeal Friday’s ruling.
The status quo is unfair all around. For individual voters considering the merits of a new tax, the threshold for passage might not make any difference on what they decide. It makes a huge difference, however, to the approach of a campaign. The two-thirds barrier is daunting even in the most progressive of cities. It requires a greater infusion of money for voter education — and more intensive collaboration with potential opponents.
Indeed, one of our criticisms of Prop. C, for all our concern about the homelessness crisis, was the deficiency of accountability on the $300 million surge in spending and the absence of input from all relevant interests in the ballot measure. If faced with a two-thirds threshold, the advocates of Prop. C might have gone to greater lengths to address those issues.
But fair is fair. The Prop. C campaign was assured by the city attorney’s office before the election that it needed a simple majority to prevail. It did. It would be eminently unfair for the courts to invalidate that result after the vote, especially with all the ambiguity in the law.
It seems likely that either side that loses the court case will go back to California voters to make state law crystal clear. The unfortunate reality is that campaigns in the meantime are certain to face two battles, one at the ballot box and the other in courts.
This commentary is from The Chronicle’s editorial board. We invite you to express your views in a letter to the editor. Please submit your letter via our online form: SFChronicle.com/letters.
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Swalwell drops out; Steyer back in?
‘WE WANTED TO BE HONEST WITH OURSELVES AND OUR SUPPORTERS’
Megadonor expected to resurrect bid for 2020 presidential race
By Casey Tolan | Tuesday, July 9, 2019 [email protected]
Eric Swalwell dropped out of the presidential race Monday after his long-shot bid failed to gain traction among voters.
The East Bay congressman will run for reelection for a fifth term, he said at a news conference at his Dublin campaign headquarters, attributing his decision to leave the presidential contest to anemic fundraising and poll numbers.
“We wanted to be honest with ourselves and our supporters,” Swalwell said. “If there was a viable chance, I wouldn’t be standing here today.”
Swalwell could almost immediately be replaced in the presidential race by another Democrat from the Bay Area. San Francisco megadonor and former hedge fund chief Tom Steyer has told political allies he’s reconsidering his decision not to run for president and could announce he’s in the race as soon as today, according to multiple media reports Sunday night.
Swalwell, 38, jumped into the race in April and hoped that his message of generational change could make him a contender. He staked out unique positions on issues such as gun control, calling for the federal government to ban and buy back all assault weapons in the U.S.
But while he got in one memorable line in last month’s debate — using front-runner Joe Biden’s past words against him in calling for the former vice president to “pass the torch” to a new generation — Swalwell acknowledged that his campaign failed to gain momentum. He hasn’t received even 1% in any polls approved by the Democratic National Committee in more than a month. It seemed likely he would miss the second debate in late July, with Montana Gov. Steve Bullock apparently getting enough support in polls to beat him for the 20th spot on the debate stage. In addition, Swalwell’s first campaign fundraising report is due next week, and he said Monday it would show him raising only about $850,000, far behind the race’s top candidates and less than even some congressional hopefuls.
Swalwell insisted he held no regrets from his threemonth- old White House bid and said his campaign had pushed the top candidates to take stronger stances on gun control issues. “I moved the needle on the debate stage on an issue I’m very passionate about,” he said. Still, he could face a fight to keep his East Bay seat. Hayward City Councilwoman Aisha Wahab, a favorite of local progressives and one of the first Afghan American elected officials in the U.S., has already announced a bid for the congressional district, earning several endorsements from local and state elected officials. Wahab has said she would “re-evaluate” her campaign if Swalwell chose to run for reelection. Swalwell said Monday that the two hadn’t spoken.
“Decisions.. Decisions..” Wahab tweeted Monday.
One of her backers, BART board member Lateefah Simon, said she planned to “keep her word” and support Wahab against Swalwell if the two faced off, even as she called him an “awesome” representative.
“Women of color shouldn’t be scared to dip our toes into these highly contested races, even if we believe there’s a strong incumbent,” Simon said Monday morning. “That’s what democracy is for.”
Swalwell’s decision was hardly unexpected. Last week, he skipped a New Hampshire campaign swing, raising eyebrows among Democrats about his staying power in the race. Joe Perry, an organizer with the local Epping, New Hampshire, Democratic Party, said a Swalwell staffer had called him to cancel a July 3 meetand- greet event just hours before it was scheduled to begin — after spending multiple weeks getting it on the books.
“I was distressed to say the least,” Perry said. “I assumed at that point he was dropping out of the race.”
Swalwell also was scheduled to appear at several other events on July 3 and 4, including walking in multiple parades around the state. “They didn’t really give me any explanation other than he wanted to spend the Fourth of July with his family,” said Carlos Cardona, the chair of the Laconia, New Hampshire, Democratic Party, with whom Swalwell had been expected to walk.
Swalwell is the first presidential candidate to drop out since the 2020 race truly kicked off, and he could be the first of a wave of contenders to make their exits over the next few weeks. The debate qualification requirements will scale up drastically for the September forums, likely shutting at least half of the more than two dozen candidates out of the spotlight.
Meanwhile, Steyer could be the last Democrat to jump in. The San Francisco billionaire, who has spent millions of dollars on a campaign urging Congress to impeach President Donald Trump, said in January that he was skipping the presidential race. Now, as two dozen other Democrats are duking it out, he has changed his mind, sources told The Atlantic.
It would be a tough climb for Steyer to get the number of donors and poll support necessary to get into the presidential debates. But if he invests his considerable fortune into a campaign, he could make an impact and force the other candidates to take a stand on his key issues such as impeachment and fighting climate change.
The fact that huge longshots such as Swalwell and Steyer are taking a swing at the White House is a testament to how wide open the 2020 race is.
“For a lot of these folks, their odds are long but they may figure this is their best shot in their life,” said Jack Pitney, a politics professor at Claremont McKenna College and a former Republican operative. “It’s better to take the shot and fail than spend the rest of your life wondering about what might have been.” Staff writer Cat Ferguson contributed to this report.
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Swalwell drops out; Steyer back in?
‘WE WANTED TO BE HONEST WITH OURSELVES AND OUR SUPPORTERS’
Megadonor expected to resurrect bid for 2020 presidential race
By Casey Tolan | Tuesday, July 9, 2019 [email protected]
Eric Swalwell dropped out of the presidential race Monday after his long-shot bid failed to gain traction among voters.
The East Bay congressman will run for reelection for a fifth term, he said at a news conference at his Dublin campaign headquarters, attributing his decision to leave the presidential contest to anemic fundraising and poll numbers.
“We wanted to be honest with ourselves and our supporters,” Swalwell said. “If there was a viable chance, I wouldn’t be standing here today.”
Swalwell could almost immediately be replaced in the presidential race by another Democrat from the Bay Area. San Francisco megadonor and former hedge fund chief Tom Steyer has told political allies he’s reconsidering his decision not to run for president and could announce he’s in the race as soon as today, according to multiple media reports Sunday night.
Swalwell, 38, jumped into the race in April and hoped that his message of generational change could make him a contender. He staked out unique positions on issues such as gun control, calling for the federal government to ban and buy back all assault weapons in the U.S.
But while he got in one memorable line in last month’s debate — using front-runner Joe Biden’s past words against him in calling for the former vice president to “pass the torch” to a new generation — Swalwell acknowledged that his campaign failed to gain momentum. He hasn’t received even 1% in any polls approved by the Democratic National Committee in more than a month. It seemed likely he would miss the second debate in late July, with Montana Gov. Steve Bullock apparently getting enough support in polls to beat him for the 20th spot on the debate stage. In addition, Swalwell’s first campaign fundraising report is due next week, and he said Monday it would show him raising only about $850,000, far behind the race’s top candidates and less than even some congressional hopefuls.
Swalwell insisted he held no regrets from his threemonth- old White House bid and said his campaign had pushed the top candidates to take stronger stances on gun control issues. “I moved the needle on the debate stage on an issue I’m very passionate about,” he said. Still, he could face a fight to keep his East Bay seat. Hayward City Councilwoman Aisha Wahab, a favorite of local progressives and one of the first Afghan American elected officials in the U.S., has already announced a bid for the congressional district, earning several endorsements from local and state elected officials. Wahab has said she would “re-evaluate” her campaign if Swalwell chose to run for reelection. Swalwell said Monday that the two hadn’t spoken.
“Decisions.. Decisions..” Wahab tweeted Monday.
One of her backers, BART board member Lateefah Simon, said she planned to “keep her word” and support Wahab against Swalwell if the two faced off, even as she called him an “awesome” representative.
“Women of color shouldn’t be scared to dip our toes into these highly contested races, even if we believe there’s a strong incumbent,” Simon said Monday morning. “That’s what democracy is for.”
Swalwell’s decision was hardly unexpected. Last week, he skipped a New Hampshire campaign swing, raising eyebrows among Democrats about his staying power in the race. Joe Perry, an organizer with the local Epping, New Hampshire, Democratic Party, said a Swalwell staffer had called him to cancel a July 3 meetand- greet event just hours before it was scheduled to begin — after spending multiple weeks getting it on the books.
“I was distressed to say the least,” Perry said. “I assumed at that point he was dropping out of the race.”
Swalwell also was scheduled to appear at several other events on July 3 and 4, including walking in multiple parades around the state. “They didn’t really give me any explanation other than he wanted to spend the Fourth of July with his family,” said Carlos Cardona, the chair of the Laconia, New Hampshire, Democratic Party, with whom Swalwell had been expected to walk.
Swalwell is the first presidential candidate to drop out since the 2020 race truly kicked off, and he could be the first of a wave of contenders to make their exits over the next few weeks. The debate qualification requirements will scale up drastically for the September forums, likely shutting at least half of the more than two dozen candidates out of the spotlight.
Meanwhile, Steyer could be the last Democrat to jump in. The San Francisco billionaire, who has spent millions of dollars on a campaign urging Congress to impeach President Donald Trump, said in January that he was skipping the presidential race. Now, as two dozen other Democrats are duking it out, he has changed his mind, sources told The Atlantic.
It would be a tough climb for Steyer to get the number of donors and poll support necessary to get into the presidential debates. But if he invests his considerable fortune into a campaign, he could make an impact and force the other candidates to take a stand on his key issues such as impeachment and fighting climate change.
The fact that huge longshots such as Swalwell and Steyer are taking a swing at the White House is a testament to how wide open the 2020 race is.
“For a lot of these folks, their odds are long but they may figure this is their best shot in their life,” said Jack Pitney, a politics professor at Claremont McKenna College and a former Republican operative. “It’s better to take the shot and fail than spend the rest of your life wondering about what might have been.” Staff writer Cat Ferguson contributed to this report.
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Conflict heats up over state’s stance on local tax approval
By Dan Walters | Wednesday, July 10, 2019
For decades, it’s been an article of political faith — as well as law — that local government taxes designated for particular purposes require two-thirds approval by voters.
The supermajority vote provision was created by Proposition 13, California’s famous — or infamous — property tax limit measure, passed by voters in 1978, and later bolstered by another initiative, Proposition 218.
Two years ago, however, the state Supreme Court seemingly carved out a way for local governments to sidestep that law. It implied, in ruling on a Southern California marijuana case, that if special purpose tax measures are placed on the ballot by initiative petition, rather than by the local governments themselves, the two-thirds vote threshold might not apply.
Ever since, those who want to raise local taxes have yearned to learn whether the Supreme Court really meant to make an exception and, not surprisingly, San Francisco’s very liberal city government, acting on the advice of City Attorney Dennis Herrera, volunteered to become the legal guinea pig.
Members of the city’s governing body, its Board of Supervisors, personally sponsored two tax increase initiatives last year, one for the June election and another in November, both listed on the ballot as Proposition C.
The June measure, a tax on commercial rents to finance early childhood education and child care services, received 51% voter support. The November proposal, a tax on businesses to finance services and housing for the homeless, garnered 61% voter support.
With both votes below two-thirds, opponents of the measures sued, contending that they were invalid. The city began collecting the taxes, but not spending them, while the legal battle raged.
Last week, San Francisco Superior Court Judge Ethan Schulman agreed with Herrera and validated both taxes. However, he doesn’t have the last word. Business and anti-tax groups, such as the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, vowed “an immediate appeal” and the issue is clearly headed to the state Supreme Court for a definitive ruling.
A third San Francisco tax measure, also placed by initiative petition and receiving a simple majority approval from voters in 2018, is also being contested. Proposition G imposes a new “parcel tax” on homes and other real estate to increase teacher pay.
Were the state’s highest court to convert its 2017 implication into declarative law, it would almost completely change the dynamics of local tax battles. Rather than propose special purpose taxes directly, local officials and their political allies, especially public employee unions, could do it via initiative petition and completely bypass the long-standing supermajority vote requirement.
There is, however, another wrinkle to the situation.
Last year, as the San Francisco tax measures were being challenged, the state Supreme Court issued another decision that could affect the eventual outcome.
It declared that when former San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders sponsored a 2012 ballot measure to reform city pensions, he was acting in an official capacity, not as a private citizen, and therefore was legally obligated to “meet and confer” with unions on something that affected their members’ compensation.
Logically, if Sanders was under that legal obligation as an official while sponsoring a ballot measure, then members of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors also were acting officially, and not as ordinary citizens, when they sponsored their tax measures. If so, their measures probably should have been subject to the supermajority rule.
It will be interesting to see how the court balances one ruling with the other, if it can, with financial stakes astronomically high in the outcome.
Dan Walters is a CALmatters columnist.
San Francisco’s city government, acting on the advice of City Attorney Dennis Herrera, above, offered to become the legal guinea pig regarding whether the state Supreme Court intended for local governments to sidestep the law.
BAY AREA NEWS GROUP FILE PHOTO
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Local // Politics Pelosi urges Dems to keep rifts in ‘family’ amid progressive-moderate tension
Tal Kopan | July 10, 2019 | Updated: July 10, 2019 4:10 p.m.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of Calif. speaks to reporters following a House Democratic caucus meeting on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, July 10, 2019. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)Photo: Andrew Harnik, Associated Press
WASHINGTON — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi sought to calm her caucus Wednesday amid increasingly open squabbles over the direction Democrats should take, calling out lawmakers who have been going public with their grievances.
“You got a complaint? You come and talk to me about it,” Pelosi said behind closed doors at a meeting in the Capitol, according to a source who was in the room. “But do not tweet about our members and expect us to think that that is just OK.”
A spokesman for the San Francisco Democrat insisted the comments were directed caucus-wide and not at any particular member or faction, though at least one progressive member interpreted it as a shot at first-term New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a rising star on the left with a Twitter following of more than 4 million. Pelosi delivered her speech about the need for unity and keeping “moments in your family” out of the public eye as she is facing pushback to some of her comments about prominent House progressives. Some moderate Democrats have also chafed at progressives’ recent criticism of them on social media.
The speaker made her remarks during a Wednesday morning weekly meeting of House Democrats. According to the source in the room, who shared details on condition of anonymity to reveal the content of the internal discussion, Pelosi spoke at length about the value of Democrats playing as a team and focusing any anger on Republicans, not each other.
She also addressed the House’s capitulation just before the July 4 recess to the Senate version of a bill that gave the Trump administration billions to address skyrocketing numbers of migrants, many of them families and children, trying to enter the U.S. at the Mexican border. Pelosi and many other House Democrats had been pushing for changes to the Senate bill to add more oversight and restrictions on the administration’s ability to use the money, but a revolt from a group of Democratic moderates forced passage of the Senate bill instead.
Pelosi suggested that the Senate bill was better than nothing.
“To have nothing go to the children — I just couldn’t do that,” Pelosi told the Democratic caucus Wednesday. “I’m here to help the children when it’s easy and when it’s hard. Some of you are here to make a beautiful pâté, but we’re making sausage most of the time.”
Tensions have been building since before the July 4 break over the border fight. Rep. Mark Pocan, a Wisconsin Democrat who co-chairs the Congressional Progressive Caucus, tweeted that the moderates who forced the House to swallow the Senate bill had “become the Child Abuse Caucus” and that “kids are the only ones who could lose today.”
Ocasio-Cortez’s chief of staff posted, then later deleted, a tweet saying moderate Democrats “seem hell bent to do to black and brown people today what the old Southern Democrats did in the 40s.” Pelosi did obliquely refer to that tweet Wednesday, telling Democrats to instruct their staffs to “think twice” about what they tweet.
The argument took on a more personal tone when Pelosi told New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd in a piece published over the weekend that she wasn’t worried about concerns about her leadership from Ocasio- Cortez and fellow prominent progressive first-term Reps. Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan.
“All these people have their public whatever and their Twitter world,” Pelosi said. “But they didn’t have any following. They’re four people, and that’s how many votes they got.”
Ocasio-Cortez later tweeted, “That public ‘whatever’ is called public sentiment. And wielding the power to shift it is how we actually achieve meaningful change in this country.”
Tlaib told ABC News on Sunday that “it is very disappointing that the speaker would ever try to diminish our voices in so many ways.”
Pelosi stood by the comments Wednesday, telling reporters she had “no regrets.”
Ocasio-Cortez’s office did not respond to a request for comment on Pelosi’s latest remarks, but she and fellow members of the group colloquially referred to as the “squad” tweeted critically about others who want to pit women against each other. One moderate Democratic member, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive internal matters, said Pelosi was speaking on behalf of many in her caucus who are frustrated with what they see as the four members’ efforts to bring attention to themselves without showing willingness to work with the party to achieve their goals.
In the meeting, Pelosi defended some moderate lawmakers who “have to fight the fight for their re-election,” urging “some level of respect and sensitivity for our — each individual experience that we bring to this caucus.”
She welcomed lawmakers to aim any frustration directly at her, rather than moderates and new lawmakers who flipped swing districts in last year’s elections and face tough campaigns in 2020.
“I take responsibility,” Pelosi said. “You make me the target, but don’t make our Blue Dogs and our New Dems the target in all of this,” she added, using terms for coalitions of centrist Democrats. “Because we have important fish to fry.”
It’s unclear whether Pelosi’s comments did anything to close the rift within the party. The House will consider an annual must-pass defense authorization bill this week, a topic that could divide progressives who oppose growing defense spending and foreign intervention from moderates who are more supportive of military spending.
Virginia Rep. Gerry Connolly told CNN after the meeting Wednesday that “tempers have cooled” since the July 4 holiday, and Democrats know “we can’t be fighting amongst ourselves.”
San Rafael Rep. Jared Huffman similarly downplayed any notion of a major split in the party.
“There is gambling in Casablanca, and there are personal frictions and fault lines in any caucus,” Huffman said. “But I think they’re often amplified and their significance is not as great as some of the stories would suggest.”
Tal Kopan is The San Francisco Chronicle’s Washington correspondent. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @talkopan
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Opinion // John Diaz Swalwell’s graceful exit preserves bright future
John Diaz | July 15, 2019 | Updated: July 15, 2019 9:25 a.m.
Billionaire investor and Democratic activist Tom Steyer joined the 2020 race. Photo: Steven Senne / Associated Press
Rep. Eric Swalwell, having just dropped out of the 2020 presidential race, laughed when I asked: Does he envision making another run at some point? He is, after all, just 38 years old.
“You know, a lot of people would say, even as they were hosting me in their homes, ‘If he’s not president this time, he’s going to to be president one day,’” Swalwell said in a phone interview. “And that’s cold comfort because you’re running really hard.”
He did not answer directly. Instead, he suggested he would be guided by the advice he gives to Capitol Hill interns, many of whom hold dreams of being elected to Congress. “First get involved in the issues you care about,” he tells them, “and then you’ll find the right office and the right way to serve.”
Swalwell had to know his bid was an extreme long shot from that sun-splashed April campaign kickoff rally at Dublin High School. Unlike Sen. Kamala Harris’ grandiose opening in downtown Oakland, drawing 20,000 by organizers’ account, Swalwell’s few hundred supporters had to be urged to move closer to the stage to give the event a better look on TV. Vice President Joe Biden was not yet in the race and the Pete Buttigieg phenomenon was just starting to incubate, but Swalwell began well behind other contenders (Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Cory Booker, Beto O’Rourke) in name recognition. 2020 Democratic Candidates
As Swalwell noted at the time, only one U.S. House member — James Garfield, 1881 — has advanced straight to the presidency. He carried no illusions.
Still, he had his issue: gun violence. Swalwell did not have a monopoly on the matter — every other Democrat was pushing for expanded regulation — but he took it further than any of the others in calling for a ban on assault weapons, along with a plan to buy back those already in circulation. He vowed to make gun control his campaign centerpiece.
Therein emerged a surprise as he traveled the country.
Prospective voters peppered him with concerns about every cause imaginable, most notably health care. But not a single American challenged him about his position on guns. No one demanded, “You’re not taking my gun,” he said. This for the congressman who gets trolled so regularly and viciously on social media that even his Facebook post about his son Nathan’s first birthday elicited a flurry of hate from gun advocates.
“Front and center, eyeball to eyeball, is not the same as online,” Swalwell said, adding at another point, “What I learned was that (gun control) is not the hot stove that we’ve always been told.”
The congressman said he found it gratifying that other candidates — notably Sanders and Harris — have stiffened their gun control positions as the nomination fight advances.
So he has left the race, but his No. 1 issue has not.
As the first major candidate to drop out, Swalwell has been praised not only for his acceptance of reality — if only others in the bottom tier should take note, pleaded columnist Jennifer Rubin in the Washington Post — but for the classy way he did it. Unlike so many politicians in defeat, he issued neither excuses nor shots at the remaining contenders, on or off the record. At his farewell news conference, he thanked the news media he encountered along the way. “They ask the tough questions we expect in a democracy,” he said.
In retrospect, the three-month campaign was a no-lose venture for a young congressman on a leadership track. His role in the Russian investigations will surely keep him on the cable news circuit, and his campaign’s emphasis on gun control will make him a go-to source on that perennial issue.
As Swalwell departs the race, another candidate from the San Francisco Bay Area jumped in. Tom Steyer, a former hedge fund investor who became a leading benefactor of liberal candidates and causes, will try to position himself as a populist outsider.
Steyer has never held elective office, but he will be taken seriously from the start due to the $100 million he plans to pour into his campaign. His personal fortune is likely to be a blessing and a curse in a Democratic primary where the words “Wall Street” and “billionaire” are popular pejoratives. It will buy him an abundance of advertising and staff, but it also will raise questions about how he earned it. The Los Angeles Times was fast on the heels of his announcement with a story describing his hedge fund’s history: from his letter advising clients how to use offshore investments to avoid U.S. taxes to his fund’s investments in coal and private prisons.
Steyer has been a champion of climate change action and the impeachment of President Trump — but that hardly distinguishes him in a field where those positions are de rigueur.
San Francisco has long been a place that fuels presidential races with money, not candidates. There has never been a year quite like this, with the city’s former district attorney, Sen. Kamala Harris, rising in the top tier and two others with local pedigree, Swalwell and now Steyer, taking a shot at the big prize.
Does Swalwell have any advice for the Democrats still in the race?
“I’m the first one out, so I wouldn’t say our campaign is the model for any others,” he said with a laugh. “But one thing I stuck to rigidly was to not follow the herd mentality ... be confident in yourself.” It’s not easy in today’s 24-hour news cycle to avoid being drawn into the latest poll, opponent’s statement or incremental development in the news.
“You go up and down, up and down, almost every hour,” Swalwell said. “The biggest challenge is how do you stay constant.”
That will be the $100 million question for Steyer in his inaugural candidacy.
John Diaz is The San Francisco Chronicle’s editorial page editor. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @JohnDiazChron
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Science
SF Bay’s problems fester as regulator neglects responsibility, investigation finds Peter Fimrite | May 27, 2019 | Updated: May 27, 2019 4 a.m.
An abandoned tugboat is seen in a cove near the shoreline of Rodeo, Calif. Tuesday, May 21, 2019. An abandoned tugboat is seen in a cove near the shoreline of Rodeo, Calif. Tuesday, May 21, 2019.Photo: Jessica Christian, The Chronicle
An investigation into the Bay Conservation and Development Commission found mismanagement and disorganization so rampant that the once-celebrated watchdog agency allegedly neglected its primary responsibility — to protect San Francisco Bay.
A state audit of the regulatory agency known as the BCDC describes slow and inefficient enforcement, a huge backlog of cases and an inability to perform key duties. It blames those problems on leadership failures, staffing shortages and inadequate funding. The commission “has neglected its responsibility to protect the San Francisco Bay,” the 94-page audit states. “This audit is a major wake-up call,” said Assemblyman Kevin Mullin, D-San Mateo, who with several other legislators requested the audit last year. “The findings are serious in nature and ought to be taken seriously by the commissioners and the senior staff.”
But the message from the investigation depends on one’s point of view. Waterfront businesses say it is confirmation the organization has targeted them unfairly with wallet-busting fines, while conservationists see it as a call for stricter enforcement of environmental and other rules.
The state auditor paints a troubling picture of the 27-member commission, which was established in 1965 by the McAteer-Petris Act to regulate development, prevent the filling of wetlands, fight pollution and ensure public access to San Francisco Bay.
The audit outlines a pattern of foot-dragging, including a backlog of 230 enforcement cases. The commissioners opened an average of 14 more cases than they closed every year from 2012 to 2017, according to the audit. Seven cases reviewed by auditors remained open an average of 7½ years, the report said.
All the while, problems in the bay festered, the auditors said.
An abandoned tugboat sits near the shoreline of Rodeo. An audit of San Francisco Bay’s watchdog agency finds mismanagement and disorganization. Photo: Jessica Christian / The Chronicle
There are, for example, 200 boats anchored illegally off Sausalito, many of them dilapidated, sinking or beached and spewing pollutants into ecologically sensitive Richardson Bay. The boats, some occupied by scofflaws known as “anchor-outs,” remain even though the BCDC has been the lead agency in a cleanup campaign for about two decades.
The auditors also criticized commission staff for closing a case involving a decaying tugboat that has been sitting illegally for years in the mud off Rodeo and for failing since 1987 to protect Suisun Marsh, a migratory bird habitat south of Fairfield. They said the commission failed to properly oversee local marsh restoration plans and never conducted five-year program reviews required by the Suisun Marsh Preservation Act.
Commission officials agreed only that they need more money to do a better job. In a lengthy response to the audit, BCDC officials denied most of the allegations, particularly the claim that its 48 employees neglected their responsibilities.
“BCDC plans to use this report to advocate for more resources to allow us to make critical improvements and do more enforcement better,” wrote Lawrence Goldzband, the executive director, who acknowledged only that his organization could do a better job protecting the bay if it had more money and personnel.
The nation’s first coastal zone protection agency has an annual budget of $10.4 million that comes from state funds, grants, environmental cleanup allocations, permit fees and fines.
The audit, however, said administrators failed to provide commissioners with adequate guidance, paid staff with money that was meant for restoration work and displayed “inconsistencies” in how much violators had to pay in fines.
Mullin joined state Sen. Jerry Hill, D-San Mateo, and his Assembly colleagues Marc Berman, D-Palo Alto, and Marie Waldron, R-Escondido (San Diego County), in calling for the audit. Their interest was piqued in December 2017 when a judge overturned a $3.6 million fine imposed on an East Bay man who had been accused of violating the Suisun Marsh Preservation Act.
John Sweeney, the owner of Point Buckler, a 39-acre island in the Suisun Marsh, racked up $2 million in legal fees after the BCDC and the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board tried to stop him from establishing a duck hunting club and kite-surfing center on his property.
Solano County Superior Court Judge Harry Kinnicutt found that the two state agencies had acted with “an appearance of vindictiveness” and that the penalties were “retribution” for a related lawsuit that Sweeney filed.
Mullin said the regulatory attack against Sweeney was disturbingly similar to the case against Mark Sanders, the founder and president of Westpoint Harbor marina in Redwood City, whom the BCDC socked with $500,000 in fines for 37 violations, which Sanders said had nothing to do with the bay environment.
Sanders also spent $2 million over seven years fighting what he called a “shakedown” of petty allegations that he locked bathrooms without permission, didn’t have adequate signs directing people to public parking, planted trees without permits and blocked public access. The charges were eventually dropped as part of a settlement that required Sanders to make $75,000 donations each to the California Coastal Conservancy and the Marine Science Institute.
“I really am an environmentalist, and one of the things we get accolades for is our environmental work as a marina,” said Sanders, whose business was named by the Marine Science Institute as North America’s Large Marina of the Year for 2018. “It kills me that here is this agency with this wonderful mission that has gone so far off the rails.”
More than 5,000 people signed a petition started by a group called Friends of Westpoint Harbor asking state legislators to order the audit.
Although the criticism has been widespread, not everybody believes the problem with the BCDC is that it is too tough on shoreline businesses.
Sejal Choksi-Chugh, executive director of San Francisco Baykeeper, said her organization alerted the commission to many polluters, only to learn the violators received token punishment. But, she said, the commission has recently gotten tougher on violators, resulting in backlash.
“I think that the violators were lulled into a false sense of complacency, and they started whining and complaining when the rules got enforced,” said Choksi-Chugh. “Honestly, the state Legislature needs to step up and identify that BCDC needs more funding to do their job.”
Mullin and other lawmakers plan to meet in the next few months with the auditor, BCDC representatives and other stakeholders to discuss possible legislation and, it is hoped, speed the enforcement process.
“Collectively, we need to have this commission on a strong footing because the challenges we face are immense,” Mullin said. “This is about protecting the greatest natural resource we have, the San Francisco Bay.”
Peter Fimrite is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @pfimrite
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV July 19, 2019
Bill would exonerate sailors of ’4 4 mutiny 50 men were convicted after deadly Port Chicago explosion during WWII
By Annie Sciacca | Saturday, July 13, 2019 [email protected]
CONCORD » In tandem with the approaching 75th anniversary of the Port Chicago explosion — the deadliest homefront disaster of World War II — an East Bay congressman has added an amendment to a federal bill that would exonerate 50 survivors of the accident who were convicted of mutiny for refusing to return to work in unsafe conditions The amendment by East Bay Rep. Mark DeSaulnier, D-Concord, calls on the Secretary of the U.S. Navy to publicly exonerate the “Port Chicago 50” — the group of African American sailors who refused to go back to the Concord Naval Weapons Station to load and unload dangerous munitions without proper safety training. The amendment was inserted into the National Defense Authorization Act, which passed the House of Representatives by a vote of 220-197.
“I cannot think of a more fitting tribute on the seventy-fifth
Autos parked near the dock area at Port Chicago were blown apart when two munitions ships exploded on July 17, 1944.
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS