"Former eBay chief executive Meg Whitman returned to Silicon Valley as a potential candidate
for governor on Monday, facing a roomful of business leaders who appeared
skeptical that anyone—even one of their own—could cut through California's political gridlock," reports the AP's Juliet Williams.
"In her pitch to about 150 business and community leaders at Yahoo Inc. headquarters,
Whitman said she would apply the same focused approach
to state government that she used in business: set a few important goals and hire top people who
buy into your plan."
Whitman took a jab a the governor, who spends most
evenings at home in Santa Monica.
"'The next governor of California has to plant herself
in Sacramento,' she said. 'The day job is what you normally do as governor and
then in the evening, it's reaching across the aisle to reach consensus, building
trust among Republicans and Democrats to try to gain
consensus around this agenda.'"
The NYT business section takes a swipe at Whitman. Saul Hansell writes, "Before voting for Meg Whitman for governor, California
residents would
do well to consider what has been happening at eBay
since she stepped
down as chief executive. John Donahoe, her successor, has pretty much
disassembled all of her major strategic moves.
"He is undoing her acquisitions of Skype and StumbleUpon.
It turns
out that neither voice communications nor Web surfing
have anything to
do with what eBay does.
"More subtly, but maybe more important, Mr. Donahoe is backing off
from Ms. Whitman’s initiative to take on Amazon.com and make eBay an
important player for the purchase of new, current-season goods. Her
acquisition of Shopping.com was part of that, as was
the move to expand
features such as eBay stores on the main site."
Whitman also gets some sympathy from the National Review,
whose Jim Geraghty writes her job will be made harder by the man she's hoping to replace.
"Whitman is celebrating the virtues of business at
exactly the wrong moment: a time of populist rage. The approach is
either brave — throwing cold water on a wildfire of unthinking
anti-business fury — or astonishingly tone-deaf."
Speaking of political courage, the legislature
voted to retain it's pension plan, otherwise known as the Integrated Waste
Management Board.
"Faced with a choice of saving between $2 million and $3 million a year, or preserving a potential and lucrative
post-legislative retirement haven, Democratic lawmakers
in both houses rejected bills today that would have abolished the
state's Integrated Waste Management Board ," reports Steve Wiegand in the Bee.
"Senate Bill 44, by Sen. Jeff Denham, R-Merced, was torpedoed by the Senate Environmental Quality
Committee, while Assembly Bill 1150, by Assemblyman Ted Gaines, R-Roseville, was scuttled by the Assembly Natural Resources
Committee. Neither bill received any votes from Democrats.
"Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger had sponsored the bills.
They would have shifted the board's duties to other state agencies – and wiped out $132,178-a-year jobs for three former legislators who were appointed
to the board by the governor and Legislature."
In more bill news, the Legislature finally met a tax it didn't like. The Merc's Mike Zapler reports, "A
week after state Assemblyman Jim Beall served up a bill to slap a
dime-a-drink fee on alcoholic beverages, the San Jose Democrat
withdrew
the proposal Monday, citing a lack of support.
"'I think all this
bill needs is a little time to age,' Beall declared in a news release,
adding that he may revisit the idea later."
What is it about this particular bill that leads legislators
to make bad puns?
The Bee's Kevin Yamamura gives the treatment to the "Hey, Dad! Wanna play catch?" ad for Propositions 1A-1F.
"The ad targets voter anger over the state's budget problems, attacking "the politicians" at a time when state legislative ratings are below
20 percent, according to the latest Field Poll. It's a curious approach, considering that the politicians
themselves – legislators and Schwarzenegger – placed these measures on the ballot and called the
special election.
Dan Walters writes that the blue ribbon tax commission
is considering a recommendation for a split roll property
tax, perhaps a narrowly crafted one that could avoid a
contentious ballot fight.
"[S]plit-roll advocates on the commission, such as former Assemblyman
Fred Keeley, continued to press for its consideration. What intrigues
advocates – and worries business groups – is that while Proposition 13 is a constitutional provision that's difficult to modify, it would be theoretically possible
for one form of a split property tax roll to be adopted
by a simple-majority vote of the Legislature and a signature by
a governor.
"One section of Proposition 13 requires taxable values to be upgraded when a parcel
changes ownership. Homes almost always change hands
in one sale, but business property is most often transferred
incrementally, as ownership of corporations changes
through stock sales. And unless more than 50 percent changes hands in one transaction, Proposition
13's reassessment provisions are not triggered.
"One option that the reform commission is weighing is
legislation to alter the legal definition of "change of ownership," triggering an upgrading of taxable values when the
cumulative transfer of business ownership rises above
50 percent.
"It's still not likely to happen, but as the state's budget crisis deepens, even the politically unthinkable
surfaces."
"The leader of the California Public Employees' Retirement System -- the country's largest public pension fund -- on Monday ordered its staff to draft a policy requiring investment
companies hired by the fund to disclose fees paid to
the firms' outside marketers," write the LAT's Marc Lifsher and David Zahniser.
"The move by the state agency, known as CalPERS, came
after an investigation of alleged pension-fund improprieties in New York state expanded to focus
on two board members of a pension fund for Los Angeles
city police officers and firefighters. One member is
a former president of CalPERS.
"Rob Feckner, the current board president at CalPERS, which manages
$176.7 billion in retirement money for state employees, said
he was pressing for more disclosure because he wanted
to ensure that the Sacramento-based agency operated with 'appropriate standards of transparency, accountability
and integrity in our investment process.'"
Former Orange County Sheriff Mike Corona is heading to prison. "Carona was sentenced Monday to 5 ½ years in federal prison by a judge
who said Carona brought shame to Orange County and
victimized the
people he was sworn to serve.
Carona, the highest ranking law
enforcement official ever prosecuted in Orange County,
displayed no
emotion. He sat with his head up and hands clasped
on his knees as U.S.
District Judge Andrew Guilford rejected his plea of probation."
And in case you were wondering, the bathroom at the Tennessee's Hermitage Hotel has been selected the nicest in the
nation . "Flush in the middle of downtown Nashville, the luxury
hotel and its ground-floor men's bathroom are definitely the head (so to speak) of the class.
"The redoubtable restroom is art-deco style with gleaming lime-green-and-black leaded glass tiles, lime-green fixtures, terrazzo floor and a two-seat shoeshine station.
"'You just can't find anything like it anywhere else,' says Janet Kurtz, director of sales and marketing at the hotel.
"'People see it and fall in love with it,' Kurtz said."
