Assembly Speaker Toni Atkins announced assignments for Assembly committee chairs yesterday, with some incumbents losing choice slots. Jeremy White has the story (and the list at the Sacramento Bee.)
“Committee chairmanships afford a powerful platform from which to legislate and raise campaign funds, with specific interest groups hoping to influence the outcome of bills. Leading a high-profile committee can also help position lawmakers with an eye on leadership, similarly to the floor team lieutenants announced last week.
“So picking chairs every two years is a weighty decision, and Atkins’ choices are already being parsed for winners and losers. In some cases, incumbents lost control of powerful committee chairmanships.”
Also at the Bee, Jim Miller reports that officials are laying the blame for last month’s layoff of 39 Senate staff on longterm Senate budget woes.
“Dan Reeves, the chief of staff for Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de León, told The Sacramento Bee that the Senate’s finances became increasingly unsustainable because of a combination of low legislative budget growth during the recession, rising health care costs and a surplus of staff…
“’The Senate protected far too many people than it could afford to pay. At the end it had to make adjustments,’ Reeves said. ‘Over time, you accumulate folks. We felt we could provide services to both our members and our constituents in an effective way with a smaller workforce.’”
The Center For Investigative Reporting has trained its eye on city and county public employee salaries, finding that California taxpayers pay nearly $40 billion a year in city and county wages. Joanna Lin has the report at KQED.
“No statewide standards govern how local pay is set, leaving the public in the dark about whether their city managers, for example, are paid appropriately for the job and the community.
“With that in mind, The Center for Investigative Reporting analyzed four years of data – from California’s 482 incorporated cities and 58 counties – to see what factors correlated with top officials’ compensation. Most of the time, the larger a community and the higher its median rent, the more money its leaders tended to make.”
The congressional water bill currently being pushed through the house by a coalition of Central Valley Republicans and one Democrat is on a collision course with California’s two Democratic Senators, says Michael Doyle of McClatchy.
"’I have carefully studied the Republican water bill and I am dismayed that this measure could reignite the water wars by overriding critical state and federal protections for California,’ Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer said late Wednesday.
“Dense with technical language best understood by the bill's potential beneficiaries, the 26-page California Emergency Drought Relief Act introduced in the House on Tuesday night marks the latest, and presumably last, shot for a water bill during the current 113th Congress.”
Freshman lawmaker Kevin McCarty has introduced legislation to implement preschool for all. Kimberly Beltran has the story at The Cabinet Report.
“McCarty’s bill requires the California Department of Education to deliver a plan by June 1, 2016, for expanding state preschool and transitional kindergarten to all eligible low-income children who currently do not have access – estimated to be some 32,000 kids…
“’I introduced this bill on day one of the new session because this should be the first order of business and a top priority of this Legislature,’ McCarty said in a statement. ‘As a public servant, I cannot think of anything more important than investing in our future and ensuring every child in California has the opportunity to succeed in school and life. This is the right thing to do.’”
Pension reform advocates were dealt another blow last week when a state appellate court “dismissed as moot” former San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed’s challenge that proposed ballot language for the Pension Reform Act of 2014 was biased. From Bill Raden at Capital and Main:
“’We’re not going to get a hearing on the merits,’ Reed told Capital & Main. ‘It shows how difficult it is to try to get through the court system in an election cycle; it means you have to start earlier.’
“Legally, the two rulings sound a final death knell for Reed’s contentious statewide campaign to put his self-described Pension Reform Act of 2014 before California voters. In practical terms, the campaign was over last January after Harris’ ballot language highlighted the initiative’s proposed elimination of constitutional protections for such public employees as teachers, nurses and police officers.”
And, Happy Birthday to the Los Angeles Times, which published its first edition (as the Los Angeles Daily Times) on this day in 1881. With 41 Pulitzers, a bombing, and a bankruptcy under their belt, the Times has earned every wrinkle.
Salut!
