From our
Immigrants Driving Without a License Files "Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger
has been riding his motorcycle without the proper license for years but was operating within the law Sunday, when he was in a crash, his spokeswoman said Monday," report Amanda Covarrubias and Jill Leovy in the Times. Schwarzenegger spokeswoman Margita Thompson acknowledged Monday that the governor does not have an M1 endorsement, required to ride a motorcycle on public roads. "'
He acknowledges he needs to get one,' Thompson said."
Somewhere,
Gil Cedillo is laughing his ass off.
Laura Mecoy
reports for the Bee "But Schwarzenegger, 58, rode a motorcycle without a sidecar in his 'Terminator' movies, and he's often described his Sunday afternoon motorcycle rides along Pacific Coast Highway with friends like actor
Tom Arnold and director
James Cameron."
"The California Highway Patrol has accompanied him on those rides, and the governor's spokeswoman said CHP officers were with him on Sunday."
The governor, however, wasn't cited after the accident because of a technicality in the vehicle code apparently exempting motorcycles with sidecars from the license requirement.
"One section of the code defines a motorcycle as 'any motor vehicle … designed to travel on not more than three wheels.'"
"But a separate section on licenses says that only 'two-wheeled motorcycles' are excluded from the class of vehicles for which a Class C license is inadequate. It goes on to say that the Class M1 license is required for operation of 'two-wheeled motorcycles or a motor-driven cycle.'"
Meanwhile, the AP's Peter Prengaman has the
Lead of the Day with the governor's pledge to keep on riding. "A
fat-lipped Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vowed Monday to keep riding motorcycles -- despite a weekend accident that left the former Hollywood action hero with minor injuries."
And now, the news...
Today officially
launches the 2006-07 budget cycle, and the governor is expected to propose billions in new spending, writes Evan Halper of the Times. Analysts, however, warn that the revenue increases may not last and could bring the state's long-term budget further out of balance.
"'All of this spending is contingent on the economic expansion continuing, and these things just don't go on forever,' said
Ted Gibson, a former chief economist for the state. 'These expansions are cyclical.
And they never seem to last longer than an ice cube on a hot sidewalk.'"
On Monday, the governor provided a further glimpse at where some of the new money will go. "He announced a $72.2-million proposal to enroll more low-income children in California's Medi-Cal and Healthy Families medical insurance programs."
Advocates said the governor's plan falls woefully short of their call for
universal health coverage for California children.
"There will probably be talk of more money for disabled and children's health care," said
Jaime Regalado of the Pat Brown Institute for Public Affairs, "but
there will not be much money left to work with, given the governor's other priorities."
Also in today's budget, the governor plans to respond to a recent court settlement on the status of the state's juvenile justice system.
"The budget the governor releases today also includes new spending for long-awaited reforms inside the state's beleaguered juvenile prisons, which house about 3,200 of California's most serious offenders between the ages of 14 and 25."
"Today's plan represents the administration's response, detailing funding for phase one of a four-year program to increase staff and dramatically change the way youths are managed. In the next fiscal year, the governor wants to spend
$47 million to add 384 staff positions, including psychologists, counselors and a new category of 'case managers' who would monitor each ward's progress through an individualized treatment program."
"Schwarzenegger also proposes
$7.5 million for improvements in medical care and nearly
$5.5 million to pay for the possible transfer of the state's 150 female wards from a facility in Ventura into privately run, secure residential programs."
As far as those infrastructure investments go,
Candidate Angelides dismissed the governor's bond proposal as
"a lot of hype" at a Sacramento press conference Monday. "Angelides criticized the governor for not being honest with the people of California when he announced his infrastructure plan. He said $100.8 billion of the governor's plan is not new money, but is money that would have been spent on projects such as roads or school building anyway over time."
So, it's only a $120 billion proposal. Somehow, we don't think that will make fiscal conservatives feel a whole lot better.
Meanwhile, the federal judge overseeing a lawsuit challenging the insufficiency of California's prison healthcare system
is pleased with recent progress, writes Claire Cooper for the Bee. "'I'm more optimistic than I've ever been in this case that the ship is turning in a positive way,' said Senior U.S. District Judge
Thelton Henderson, who has presided over litigation against the department and the governor for many years."
Yesterday was crime press conference day around the Capitol as a "group of current and former prosecutors — including the author of the state's 1978 death penalty initiative and
Ira Reiner, whose office sent dozens of people to death row when he was Los Angeles County's district attorney —
endorsed a moratorium Monday on executions in California," reports Henry Weinstein for the Times.
"In addition to Reiner, who served as Los Angeles County district attorney from 1984 to 1992, signers of the letter included Sacramento attorney
Donald Heller, author of the 1978 Briggs initiative that created the state's death penalty statute;
Jon Willis, a deputy district attorney in Imperial County;
Michael Hennessy, the sheriff of San Francisco County; and former California Supreme Court Justice
Joseph Grodin.
The letter was sent on the eve of an Assembly Public Safety hearing on
AB 1121 (Koretz and Lieber), which would establish a moratorium.
"Legislative Democrats
unveiled two bills Monday to increase punishments for sex offenders, a day before they are expected to fight a governor-backed "Jessica's Law" proposal in two public safety committee hearings." The bills come after concerns that the governor's proposal, which would require a sex offender to live at least 2,000 feet from a school or child-friendly park, goes to far. The proposed "Jessica's Law" is being carried by two bills by
Team Runner, which is also considering a ballot initiative.
"In response, Democrats have submitted their own legislative plans to further penalize sex offenders and increase monitoring. The bills are in preliminary stages and do not include a 2,000-foot barrier; instead, they prohibit sex offenders from loitering around schools or locations where children play."
Department of Corrections: Yesterday, we mentioned that
Anna Caballero was considering joining
Ana Ventura Phares in the race for the
28th AD. Caballero indeed
announced her candidacy yesterday. Of course, the district is that of
Simon Salinas, not
Rebecca Cohn as we stated.
Finally from our
People Who Should Switch to Decaf Files, San Francisco police are still looking for the rascal who
planted a bomb in a San Francisco Starbucks. Police "would not describe the bomb or its size other than to say it "would have caused damage if it exploded."
Reassuring.