"Handing Gov.
Arnold Schwarzenegger a critical election-year boost, the California Legislature early this morning
approved the largest public works package in state history," write Jordan Rau and Nancy Vogel in the Times.
"If the measure is sanctioned by voters in the November general election, the state would borrow $37.3.billion to expand and repair crammed roads and schools, prevent flooding, and encourage the construction of housing in urban areas and near public transportation."
That's not to mention the
big parks bond that is going to be placed on the ballot through signature-gathering efforts of environmentalists.
"'Today we made a giant step forward in terms of our commitment to the state's economy and in terms of strengthening our crumbling infrastructure,' said Senate President Pro Tem
Don Perata (D-Oakland). 'We also showed what bipartisanship can look like.'"
...and significantly undercut the campaigns of the Democratic duo hoping to take on Schwarzenegger.
"In the end, Democrats appeased the Republicans with assurances they would have a say in how the transportation money was ultimately spent, not with the greater fiscal restraint that the GOP had demanded. In fact, in the final hours of negotiations the entire package grew by $2 billion."
"To win GOP votes, the Democrats agreed to ease some environmental rules for the construction of levees and bridges, and gave preliminary approval for private companies to operate some roads."
"'We got some things that made us more comfortable,' said Sen.
Dennis Hollingsworth (R-Murrieta)."
Speaking of big bucks, Dan Walters looks at the
good and bad of the state's robust tax collections. "The good news is that a roaring economy is filling the state's coffers with billions of unanticipated dollars, but it may be bad news because, as Californians have learned the hard way, having lots of extra tax money can be just as perilous as not having enough."
"
The politics of plenty are a mirror image of the politics of penury and it's been that way in California for decades, leading to a boom-bust cycle that's gotten steadily worse."
The Bee's Kevin Yamamura
reviews the latest Phil Angelides ad.
While the Democrats continue their ad campaigns against each other, the governor is quietly building friends and seducing enemies. "Three years after bashing Indian gaming tribes on the way to the governor's office, Arnold Schwarzenegger is
quietly reaching out to California's most powerful tribal leaders as he prepares for what could be a difficult re-election campaign," reports James Sweeney in the Union-Trib.
"The overtures, similar to those the Republican governor has made in recent months to other special interests he has battled, could lead to another round of gambling expansion while chilling possible tribal opposition to his bid for a second term."
"'Schwarzenegger may never convince these tribes to be his biggest backers,
but if he can talk them down to neutral, that eliminates a huge potential source of political opposition this fall,' said
Dan Schnur, a Republican political consultant who has worked for tribes in the past."
Evan Halper reports on the efforts of Intuit, the maker of TurboTax,
to kill the state's free ReadyReturn program for low-income and elderly taxpayers. A "legislative committee tried to kill the program, leaving Stanford law professor
Joe Bankman, who helped design it, bewildered. He had thought the logic of it was so obvious, and the enthusiasm from participants so great, that lawmakers would rush to embrace it.
"'I can't believe how naive I was,' said Bankman, a tax-law scholar with a tendency toward rumpled suits who has temporarily traded the ivory tower for the hallways of the Capitol. '
It's unbelievable how little I knew about how things are really done."
You would think a professor at the university founded by
Leland Stanford would know better.Then again, there was that whole
drunk tree incident..."Bankman had underestimated how much influence one Silicon Valley company could have on the lawmaking process."
"Intuit, maker of the consumer tax software TurboTax, is fighting ReadyReturn. The Mountain View firm has spent about $500,000 on lobbying and campaign contributions since it was proposed two years ago."
"Now the program is in legislative limbo. The test period ends next year, and
a bill to keep it alive lacks support. Intuit hired a well connected lobbyist, a man whose stretch limousine is regularly parked across the street from the Capitol. So Bankman hired a lobbyist too, using $30,000 his family had set aside to remodel the kitchen of their Palo Alto home."
Meanwhile, "[p]urchase of ultrasound machines for home use
would be banned under a bill passed Thursday by the state Assembly."
"Lawmakers approved
AB 2360 by
Ted Lieu (D-Torrance), who drafted the bill after hearing that actor Tom Cruise had bought such a machine to see images of his daughter before her birth."
Here's hoping Tom Cruise never has hemorrhoids.
And it looks like
not everyone is pleased with
Barry Munitz landing that six-figure salaried gig at Cal State LA.
State Sen.
Jackie Speier (D-Hillsborough), an Education Committee member who joined union leaders for the telephone news conference, said she was mainly concerned about the $163,776 that Munitz would be paid in his first year, close to 50% more than top salaries for other Cal State professors.
Cal State leaders "are using public money and playing with it like it is Monopoly money," Speier said.
We're still wondering who's going to
wax Munitz's Porsche...
