Political Blotter: California raises ballot-measure filing fee from $200 to $2,000
This is a sampling from Bay Area News Group's Political Blotter blog. Read more and post comments at www.ibabuzz.com/politics.
SEPT. 1
It's about to get a lot more expensive to submit a proposed ballot measure in California.
Gov. Jerry Brown on Tuesday signed a bill by Assemblymen Evan Low, D-Campbell, and Richard Bloom, D-Santa Monica, that raises the fee for submitting a ballot measure from $200 to $2,000, effective Jan. 1, 2016. AB 1100 is freshman Low's first bill to be signed into law.
"It has been over 72 years since this aspect of the initiative process has been updated. This reform is overdue," Low said in a news release. "We live in California, the cradle of direct democracy, but we also need a threshold for reasonableness. And this bill will do just that."
The $200 fee was established in 1943 to deter frivolous proposals and to cover some of the costs of analyzing and processing initiatives, but that's not a lot of money today. Low's office said $200 today is the equivalent of $14.80 in 1943 dollars.
The bill was inspired in part by the submission in March of a "Sodomite Suppression Act," which, if enacted, would've required the state to execute lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. A Sacramento Superior Court judge ruled the proposal unconstitutional, and it has been removed from consideration for next year's ballot, but critics called for reform of the ballot initiative process nonetheless.
"If a proposal makes it to the ballot, the $2,000 fee would be refunded to the proponent," Low noted. "If a proponent feels strongly about a measure, a true grassroots campaign will find the means to pay the filing fee and get their proposal on the ballot."
Critics insist the bill raises a barrier for ordinary Californians to engage in the process.
"Direct democracy is a citizen's right -- a cornerstone of the checks and balances of democracy that have been protected passionately in California," state Sen. Jim Nielsen, R-Gerber, said in a news release. "Raising the fee by 900 percent is cost prohibitive."
Only the state's elite political class will be able to put their ideas on the ballot, he said: "Elected officials should increase voter participation, not discourage it."
SEPT. 1
Former Rep. George Miller, D-Martinez, who retired this year after 40 years in the House, will join UC Berkeley as the Fall 2015 Matsui Lecturer at the Robert T. Matsui Center for Politics and Public Service.
That means Miller will spend a week in residency at the Matsui Center during October, speaking to classes, meeting with students, delivering a public lecture and taking part in campus culture. His public lecture -- focusing on Congress, labor, and income inequality -- is scheduled for 4 p.m. Oct. 19th in Cal's Banatao Auditorium.
Matsui Center Director Ethan Rarick said Miller "was an extraordinary national leader with a long and distinguished record of service in Congress, but he is also deeply rooted in the politics and policy challenges of California."
Miller, 70, called this "a wonderful honor," especially given that the center's namesake -- the late Rep. Bob Matsui, D-Sacramento -- "was not only a great friend but a passionate thinker and fighter for economic and social justice."
"He fully understood the obligation, power, and the duty that the United States Congress has to assure that those less fortunate and in need of assistance are able to fully participate in the American society and economy," Miller said. "Bob Matsui never stopped fighting for justice. He was a great role model for me and many other members of Congress who served with him. I am grateful for the opportunity afforded me by the Matsui Center to engage Berkeley Campus students in the discussion of the critical issues of our time."
Miller serves as senior education adviser for the Boston-based education tech services company Cengage Learning, helping executives on issues ranging from public policy to business strategy. And he is a member of a "Right Start Commission" launched in May by Common Sense Kids Action to explore ways to modernize California's early-childhood services.
The Matsui Center, founded in 2008, is part of Cal's Institute of Governmental Studies, California's oldest public policy research center.
What’s the True Impact of California’s High School Exit Exam
As the state looks to replace the California High School Exit Exam with a new version, or eliminate it altogether as a graduation requirement, it remains difficult to find much consensus among educators, researchers and advocates regarding the legacy of the test for California.
Gov. Brown last week signed legislation that exempted students from the graduating class of 2015 from having to take the test in response to a snafu that left thousands of seniors without the ability to take the test several more times as permitted under state law. Still to be resolved is the bigger issue of the fate of the test itself, which may be partly determined by assessing its impact since it became a graduation requirement nearly a decade ago.
The California High School Exit Exam (CAHSEE) debuted in 2001 as an effort aimed at ensuring every student graduated from high school with basic skills and, as the California Department of Education spelled out, “to identify students who are not developing skills that are essential for life after high school.”
Nearly 5 million students have taken the test since then. A majority of students passed on their first try, with an increasing number each year that the test has been administered.
Some, however, have struggled through multiple attempts before successfully completing it. About 249,000 students have failed the test since it became a graduation requirement in 2006.
Supporters of the exit exam say the exam has raised the bar for graduation by encouraging students to work harder and pressured schools to increase their efforts to close the achievement gap.
Opponents argue that the test has discouraged some low-achieving students from staying in school and that it disproportionately punished low-income children and English learners who were unable to pass the test.
The research the state commissioned each year to evaluate the exit exam was generally positive about its impact, but other research reports were more critical. (For an overview of the research, see the end of this article.)
After an extended debate on the issue, Gov. Gray Davis signed legislation in 1999 to create the exit exam as a condition for students to receive a high school diploma. At the time, California joined a growing number of states that had such a requirement. By 2002, 24 states administered exit exams. Ten years later that number had grown to 26.
At the time he signed the law, Davis said the exam would add value to a diploma by ensuring students showed competency in math, reading and writing before they finished high school.
Students were tested on their aptitude in 10th-grade English and algebra, which students typically took between the 8th and 10th grade. Students could first take the test as sophomores, and if they didn’t pass, they could take it up to six more times before the end of their senior year. Even if they had not passed it by then, they could also take the exam up to three times in the year after their senior year and be awarded a diploma if they eventually passed.
About 91 percent of students in the class of 2006 passed by the end of their senior year, including 67 percent who passed on their first try as sophomores. By 2014, about 95.5 percent of seniors passed, including 90 percent who passed on their first try as sophomores.The test was first administered to freshman students in 2001, and they were required to pass it before they graduated in 2004. By 2002, only four in 10 students from the class of 2004 had passed the test, prompting lawmakers to postpone it as a graduation requirement another two years.
But given California’s size, even a small percentage of students failing the tests translates into large numbers of actual students. Last year, for example, 4.5 percent of high school students couldn’t pass the test by the end of their senior year. That amounts to nearly 20,000 seniors.
Former state Superintendent Jack O’Connell authored the legislation that created the exit exam when he was a state senator in 1999.
“I didn’t want a high school diploma to only reflect a certification of seat time,” O’Connell, who served as state superintendent from 2003 to 2011, said in a recent interview. “It should mean something much more. It should reflect the education we are delivering to our students.”
O’Connell, now a partner at Capitol Advisors Group, a Sacramento-based consulting firm, said the exam helped educators better target which students needed the most support by funneling them into intervention programs that helped improve their overall academic success.
“If you talk with folks in the field, this is one of the most significant reforms in high school they’ve seen,” he said.
The former state superintendent said results that show a higher rate of students from at-risk groups passing the test by 2014 compared to 2006 proves the exit exam accomplished one of its biggest goals.
“I didn’t want a high school diploma to only reflect a certification of seat time. It should mean something much more,” said former State Superintendent Jack O’Connell.
In 2006, about 86 percent of low-income students, 73 percent of English learners, 85 percent of Latino students and 84 percent of black students passed by the end of their senior year. By 2014, about 94 percent of low-income students, 82 percent of English learners, 94 percent of Latinos and 92 percent of black students passed.
“This exam helped close the achievement gap,” he said.
O’Connell said he now supports Senate Bill 172, which proposes to suspend the exit exam through 2017-18 to give the state time to decide whether a new test should be administered that is aligned with the Common Core standards.
“It was never intended to go on indefinitely,” he said. “Once Common Core came in, I knew it would be the end for an exam that’s based on California’s previous state standards.”
As drone use spreads, California lawmakers push for control
One proposed law would prohibit drones from flying above schools, prompted by concerns that kidnappers or child molesters could obtain images of students.
Another would bar their use above prisons, responding to the possibility that they could deliver contraband to inmates.
A third would prohibit their use lower than 350 feet above private property without permission, making sure neighbors couldn’t spy on one another.
As drones rapidly become more prevalent, efforts intended to regulate their use are also multiplying.
“The technology has gotten ahead of the law,” said Sen. Ted Gaines, R-El Dorado Hills, the author of several drone-regulation bills pending in the California Legislature. “I’m not anti-drone. I just want to make sure people’s privacy is protected, that public safety is protected.”
The legislation comes as drone use spreads both commercially and recreationally.
In April, the Federal Aviation Administration granted Amazon authorization to test drones outdoors for its yet-to-be-launched Prime Air service, which hopes to use drones to deliver products to a customer’s doorstep within 30 minutes of an online order.
“You are looking at the potential use of drones for commercial package delivery, which means reduced congestion, better environmental impact, quicker turnaround time,” said John Doherty, vice president of state policy and general counsel for Technet, a technology business association whose members include Amazon, Google and Apple.
The aircraft have also become widely available to hobbyists. Once large pieces of primarily military technology, drones now are shrinking, making them accessible to the public, said Bruce Parks, treasurer of the Silicon Valley branch of the Association of Unmanned Vehicle Systems International, a group promoting drone technology.
FIELD POLL: CALIFORNIANS BACK TAX & MIN WAGE HIKES, OBAMACARE
The latest non-partisan Field Poll shows that two-thirds of Californians support a $1.5 billion bump in tobacco taxes and raising the $15 minimum wage by 2021.
Consistent with California’s liberal bent, 58 percent of California voters also favor the state’s healthcare system, and support continues to moves away from personal responsibility and toward a government-run single-payer system.
With the Democrat-controlled California legislature increasingly desperate for a new tax source to make up for shrinking revenues as the Silicon Valley tech boom fades, they must be cheering results that suggest 50 percent of voters strongly support and 17 percent somewhat support more than tripling the 87-cent-per-pack tax on cigarettes. With only 19 percent strongly opposing the proposed tax, and tobacco companies cautious about financing a highly contentious stand against the Democrats, this looks like a done deal for a ballot initiative in 2016.
The Field Poll found very similar strength for raising the state’s minimum wage by a dollar a year through 2021, with 47 percent strongly favoring and 21 percent somewhat favoring the spikes. But the Democrats carrying an initiative in 2016 would undoubtedly face a well-funded and brutal public opposition campaign by business interests across the state. Although the early poll looks good for the Democrats, the state party may not want to risk a battle extraordinaire without at least 50 percent strong support going in.
The “2015 Cal Wellness–Field Health Policy Survey” also shows that four years after the passage of the Affordable Care Act, known as “Obamacare”, voters are reporting higher levels of satisfaction with the way the health care system in California is working than they did before its passage. A 2008 Field Cal Wellness survey -Field Health Policy Survey, conducted two years prior to the passage of the ACA, found 50 percent of California registered voters satisfied and 46 dissatisfied with the way the state’s health care system was operating. But the satisfaction has grown over the seven years to 58 percent and dissatisfaction has plunged to 34 percent.
The poll’s results emphasize that Democrats increasingly want government health coverage over employer-backed coverage. The most telling result of the survey is the proportion of voters preferring government-provided coverage in California increased 11 points, while the proportion who favor taking personal responsibility declined by 10 points. The percent backing employer-provided coverage remained unchanged over the seven-year period.
The Field Poll is usually a very credible indicator of voter opinion in the Golden State. The non-partisan poll was established in 1956 and relies on financial support from newspapers and television stations, the University of California, the California State University system, and other not-for-profits. Its margin of error in this survey is plus or minus 2.6 percent.
California Shelves 100+ Bills Till Next Year
State lawmakers shelved bills Thursday to raise the minimum wage, ban oil drilling off the coast and provide work permits to agricultural laborers who are in the country illegally.
The bills were among more than 100 set aside for the year as the Legislature draws within two weeks of the end of the 2015 session. Among legislation still moving forward is a package of anti-tobacco bills approved by the Senate that includes measures to increase the smoking age to 21 and restrict the use of electronic cigarettes in public.
With this year's session ending Sept. 11, lawmakers faced a deadline Thursday for deciding which bills they can afford this year. They withheld action on measures they considered too expensive or lacking political support, meaning they will not be acted on this year.
Those held up include one by state Sen. Mark Leno (D-San Francisco) to increase the minimum wage to $11 per hour next year and $13 an hour in 2017.
Assemblyman Jimmy Gomez (D-Los Angeles), who chairs the powerful Appropriations Committee, said raising the minimum wage will remain on the agenda next year and that he may explore bumping up wages by region, instead of statewide.
"Raising the minimum wage is a crucial next step for California to lift working families out of poverty, and we look forward to working with our legislative colleagues and the governor to make that happen," Gomez said.
Leno criticized the delay. "Any further study or delay of such an increase undermines working Californians who deserve to be paid a living wage," he said.
Gov. Jerry Brown signed a law two years ago to boost the minimum wage to $10 an hour starting in January. The current wage is $9 per hour.
Since that law went into effect, cities including Los Angeles and San Francisco have approved hikes in their own minimum wages.
Also shelved was a measure by Assemblyman Luis Alejo (D-Watsonville) to allow agricultural workers in the country illegally to get state permits to stay and work in California.
Brown's Department of Finance had opposed the measure, saying it would cost about $15 million a year to maintain a database of permit holders and $88 million to process 1.8 million new fingerprints.
"I am deeply disappointed that thousands of undocumented farmworkers throughout the state will continue to live in limbo and fear, despite their significant contributions to California and its economy," Alejo said.
Environmentalists were disappointed that lawmakers put a hold on a bill by state Sen. Mike McGuire (D-Healdsburg) to ban new oil drilling off the coast of Santa Barbara.
"The fact that just months after the worst oil spill in California in two decades, a common-sense bill to prohibit risky offshore oil drilling can't even make it to the Assembly floor is a sad testament to the influence of the oil industry in our state," said Jena Price, legislative affairs manager for the California League of Conservation Voters.
Earlier in the day, the full Senate met in special session on healthcare and approved a package of six tobacco-control bills that now go to the Assembly for consideration.
Leno proposed the new restrictions on e-cigarettes partly in response to a federal study that found their use by teenagers has tripled in recent years.
"This is important because the fastest growing segment of the e-cigarette market is middle and high school students," Leno told colleagues. The vaping industry is fighting the legislation, saying e-cigarettes use vapor, not combustible tobacco, and are safer.
The measure to increase the smoking age from 18 to 21 was pushed by Sen. Ed Hernandez (D-West Covina).
"We cannot continue to sit by while these tobacco companies continue to poison generation after generation with their addictive products," Hernandez said Thursday.
However, others argued that if Californians can join the military and fight in wars at 18, they ought to be able to decide whether to smoke.
The Senate also approved bills that would allow counties to impose tobacco taxes, outlaw tobacco use at all schools, plug loopholes in a smoking ban in workplaces, and boost the licensing fee for tobacco retailers.
Bills given final legislative approval and sent to the governor on Thursday would:
- Allow residents in communities that have homeowners associations to replace their grass lawns with artificial turf to save water during the drought.
- Prohibit drones from trespassing on private property without the owner's permission.
- Ban the use of smokeless tobacco products on the playing field during professional baseball games.
Amid the flurry of legislative action, Senate Republicans abruptly announced the removal of Bob Huff of San Dimas as Republican leader. He will be replaced by Sen. Jean Fuller of Bakersfield.
Fuller immediately signaled a hard-line position on Democrats' proposals for tax and fee increases to improve California roads and healthcare, saying the state should tap its surplus and efficiencies before asking residents to pay more.
"Republicans do not raise taxes," she told reporters.
The Republican caucus had previously agreed that Fuller would take over from Huff in November. Asked why the transition was moved up, Fuller said Huff will be busy with his campaign for another office next year and that she can focus on the legislative session as well as the task of electing more Republicans to the Senate in 2016.
"Sen. Huff is running for the L.A. Board of Supervisors and he has a lot to do," Fuller said. "This way we can move forward."
Times staff writer Kurt Chirbas contributed to this report.
(c)2015 the Los Angeles Times
Via: Governing
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California: “Land of Opportunity” or “Land of Poverty”?
For decades, California’s housing costs have been racing ahead of incomes, as counties and local governments have imposed restrictive land-use regulations that drove up the price of land and dwellings. This has been documented by both Dartmouth economist William A Fischel and the state Legislative Analyst’s Office.
Middle income households have been forced to accept lower standards of living while less fortunate have been driven into poverty by the high cost of housing. Housing costs have risen in some markets compared to others that the federal government now publishes alternative poverty estimates (the Supplemental Poverty Measure), because the official poverty measure used for decades does not capture the resulting differentials. The latest figures, for 2013, show California’s housing cost adjusted poverty rate to be 23.4 percent, nearly half again as high as the national average of 15.9 percent.
Back in the years when the nation had a “California Dream,” it would have been inconceivable for things to have gotten so bad — particularly amidst what is widely hailed as a spectacular recovery. The 2013 data shows California to have the worst housing cost adjusted poverty rate among the 50 states and the District of Columbia. But it gets worse. California’s poverty rate is now more than 50 percent higher than Mississippi, which long has set the standard for extreme poverty in the United States (Figure 1).
The size of the geographic samples used to estimate the housing adjusted poverty rates are not sufficient for the Supplemental Poverty Measure to produce local, county level or metropolitan area estimates. However, a new similar measure makes that possible.
The California Poverty Measure
The Public Policy Institute of California and the Stanford Center on Poverty and Inequality have collaborated to establish the “California Poverty Measure,” which is similar to the Supplemental Poverty Measure adjusted for housing costs.
The press release announcing release of the first edition (for 2011) said that: “California, often thought of as the land of plenty” in the words Center on Poverty and Inequality director Professor David Grusky, is “in fact the land of poverty.”
The latest California Poverty Measure estimate, for 2012, shows a statewide poverty rate of 21.8 percent, somewhat below the Supplemental Poverty Measure and well above the Official Poverty Measure that does not adjust for housing costs (16.5 percent).
The California Poverty Measure also provides data for most of California’s 58 counties, with some smaller counties combined due to statistical limitations. This makes it possible to estimate the California Poverty Measure for metropolitan areas, using American Community Survey data.
Metropolitan Area Estimates
By far the worst metropolitan area poverty rate was in Los Angeles, at 25.3 percent. The Los Angeles County poverty rate was the highest in the state at 26.1 percent, well above that of Orange County (22.4 percent), which constitutes the balance of the Los Angeles metropolitan area. However, the Orange County rate was higher than that of any other metropolitan area or region in the state (Figure 2). San Diego’s poverty rate was 21.7 percent. Perhaps surprisingly, Riverside-San Bernard
ino (the Inland Empire), which is generally perceived to have greater poverty, but with lower housing costs, had a rate of 20.9 percent. The two counties, Riverside and San Bernardino had lower poverty rates than all Southern California counties except for Ventura (Oxnard) and Imperial.
The San Francisco metropolitan area had a poverty rate of 19.4 percent, more than one-fifth below that of Los Angeles. San Jose has a somewhat lower poverty rated 18.3 percent (Note 1). The metropolitan areas making constituting the exurbs of the San Francisco Bay Area had a poverty rate of 18.7 percent. This includes Santa Cruz, Santa Rosa, Stockton and Vallejo. Sacramento had the lowest poverty rate of any major metropolitan area, at 18.2 percent.
The San Joaquin Valley, stretching from Bakersfield through Fresno to Modesto (Stockton is excluded because it is now a San Francisco Bay Area exurb) had a poverty rate of 21.3 percent, slightly below the state wide average of 21.8 percent. The balance of the state, not included in the metropolitan areas and regions described above had a poverty rate of 21.2 percent.
County Poverty Rates
As was noted above, Los Angeles County had the highest 2012 poverty rate in the state (Note 2), according to the California Poverty Measure (26.1 percent). Tulare County, in the San Joaquin Valley had the second-highest rate at 25.2 percent. Somewhat surprisingly, San Francisco County with its reputation for high income had the third worst poverty rate in the state at 23.4 percent. This is driven, at least in part, by San Francisco’s extraordinarily high median house price to household income ratio (median multiple). In this grisly statistic, it trails only Hong Kong, Vancouver and Sydney in the latest Demographia International Housing Affordability Survey. Wealthy Santa Barbara County has the fourth worst poverty rate in the state, at 23.8 percent. The fifth highest poverty rate is in Stanislaus County, in the San Joaquin Valley (county seat Modesto), which is already receiving housing refugees from the San Francisco Bay Area, unable to pay the high prices (Figure 3).
The two lowest poverty rates were in suburban Sacramento counties (Note 2). Placer County’s rate was 13.2 percent and El Dorado County’s rate was 13.3 percent. Another surprise is Imperial County, which borders Mexico and has generally lower income. Nonetheless, Imperial County has the third lowest poverty rate at 13.4 percent. Shasta County (county seat Redding), located at the north end of the Sacramento Valley is ranked fourth at 14.8 percent. Two counties are tied for the fifth lowest poverty rate (16.0 percent), Marin County in suburban San Francisco and Napa County, in the exurban San Francisco Bay Area (Figure 4).
Weak Labor Market and Notoriously Expensive Housing
The original Stanford Center on Poverty and Inequality press release cited California’s dismal poverty rate as resulting from “a weak labor market and California’s notoriously expensive housing.” These are problems that can be moderated starting at the top, with the Governor and legislature. The notoriously expensive housing could be addressed by loosening regulations that allow more supply to be built at lower cost. True, the new supply would not be built in Santa Monica or Palo Alto. But additional, lower cost housing on the periphery, whether in Riverside County, the High Desert exurbs of Los Angeles and San Bernardino Counties, the San Francisco Bay Area exurbs or the San Joaquin Valley could begin to remedy t
he situation.
The improvement in housing affordability could help to strengthen the weak job market, by attracting both new business investment and households moving from other states.
Regrettably, Sacramento does not seem to be paying attention. Liberalizing land use regulations is not only absent from the public agenda, but restrictions are being strengthened (especially under the requirements of Senate Bill 375). In this environment, metropolitan areas like Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Jose and San Diego could become even more grotesquely unaffordable, and the already high price to income ratios in the Inland Empire and San Joaquin Valley could worsen. All of this could lead to slower economic growth and to even greater poverty, as more lower-middle-income households fall into poverty.
Note 1: San Benito County is excluded from the San Jose metropolitan area data. The California Poverty Measure does not report a separate poverty rate for San Benito County.
Note 2: Among the counties for which specific poverty rates are provided.
L.A. City Council Approves Plan to Allow Uber and Lyft Pickups at LAX
In a nod to consumer demands and the realities of disruptive technology, Los Angeles became the largest city in the nation Wednesday to open the door for ride-hailing services like Uber and Lyft to fully operate alongside taxis at its airport.
After weeks of debate over the potential risks of app-based ride companies, the L.A. City Council approved a policy that would allow Uber and Lyft to apply for permits to pick up passengers at Los Angeles International Aiport, a service they’re currently barred from providing.
Fueled by lobbying spending by taxi companies and their new rapidly growing competitors, lawmakers have spent weeks discussing whether the background checks used by Uber and Lyft to screen their tens of thousands of drivers put customers at risk.
Taxi companies have complained that the start-ups have an unfair competitive advantage because their drivers are held to less stringent standards than licensed cabbies.
UBER Unleashed Lobbyists in California to Reshape Drivers Rules
Uber has spent more on lobbyists in California than Facebook and Apple combined to fend off regulations aimed at the heart of its worldwide business model.
The San Francisco company’s lobbyists are pushing lawmakers to exempt its drivers from obtaining commercial licenses before they can ferry passengers. Uber Technologies Inc. and its biggest competitor, Lyft Inc., depend on drivers with personal licenses who use their own cars to pick up fares hailed through a smartphone app.
Uber has spent almost a million dollars since 2013 on lobbyists in California. Responsible for a million daily rides worldwide, the company is fighting from the Pacific to the Atlantic to derail efforts by regulators, lawmakers and the taxi industry to extend rules governing cabs to the nascent ride-sharing industry.
“They hired a whole fleet of lobbyists,” said Senator Jim Beall, a Democrat and chairman of the Transportation and Housing Committee who opposes the measure the company wants passed. “They’re all over the place. You see them prowling around the capitol building.”
New York Mayor Bill de Blasio last month dropped a proposal to cap Uber fleets after backlash from the company, its allies and Governor Andrew Cuomo, a fellow Democrat. In Nevada, company lobbyists in May persuaded lawmakers to let its drivers operate, including in the coveted Las Vegas market.
In the U.S., 54 cities and states have regulated and legitimized ride-sharing, Uber spokeswoman Eva Behrend said in an e-mailed statement. California is Uber’s first and biggest U.S. market. It began operating in San Francisco in 2010 and offered its widely used uberX ridesharing service in 2013, billed as “like a taxi -- only quicker, cleaner and a little bit magical.”
Under Fire
State records show Uber paid $925,000 for lobbyists in California in the last two years. Facebook Inc. spent $412,000 and Apple Inc. paid $353,000 during that same time.
The push comes as the company is under fire from drivers who say they should be considered employees, not contractors, and from a lawsuit alleging the company does too little to ensure it doesn’t put criminals behind the wheel.
“California has been a leader and we will continue to collaborate with regulators and legislators to develop policies that protect consumers, deliver economic opportunity and benefit cities,” Behrend said.
Celebrity Treatment
The company last year hired David Plouffe, manager of President Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign, as chief adviser and board member. Plouffe gets celebrity treatment at the Sacramento capitol, with lawmakers stopping him to snap photos, said Gregg Cook, a lobbyist for the Greater California Livery Association, which represents limousine and bus companies.
“They’ve done a very good job in increasing their presence,” Cook said. “They’ve brought in hundreds of drivers. They bring them to public hearings in t-shirts. And they have rallies out in the state capitol grounds. So it’s a very effective strategy.”
Lyft, also based in San Francisco, has spent $362,000 on lobbying the legislature since 2013.
“A regulatory framework that encourages innovation is the reason we’ve been able to grow quickly,” spokeswoman Chelsea Wilson said in an e-mailed statement. “We’ll continue to work to educate policy makers in Sacramento.”
Uber and Lyft are backing legislation that would let the companies charge split fares for shared rides and a bill that would exempt its drivers from having to get commercial license plates, which cost an additional $8 to $80 a year. Uber is also supporting a bill requiring the companies to participate in a Department of Motor Vehicles program to check driver records.
“When we looked at this, we talked to Lyft and Uber,” said Assemblyman Evan Low, a Democrat who introduced the licensing bill. “They did give insights on the language once drafted.”
Rule Skirting
Some lawmakers say Uber is skirting rules that apply to similar businesses.
“In California, we allow them to operate for free while we require many other businesses to pay for permits, franchising fees and licenses,” said Assemblyman Adrin Nazarian, the sole vote against Low’s measure in May. “It’s beyond ridiculous what they’re getting away with.”
Nazarian, a Democrat, proposed requiring ride-sharing company drivers to get background checks and drug testing.
“The bill was shelved because we didn’t have the votes, and we didn’t have the votes because Uber and Lyft spent a lot of time, energy and money lobbying against it,” said Dan Savage, Nazarian’s chief of staff.
Last year, Uber attacked when a bill setting insurance coverage requirements for drivers neared passage.
Company lobbyists had already prompted changes to the measure through months of talks with Assemblywoman Susan Bonilla, the bill’s author. Then, they changed course to oppose it, the lawmaker said in an interview.
They sent mailers to voters in a district where Bonilla was planning to seek a Senate seat, accusing her of “leaving consumers and entrepreneurs on the curb.”
“I was shocked,” said Bonilla, a Democrat. “It clearly was meant to pressure me and other legislators through intimidation, and no one appreciated it.”
The bill passed, and Bonilla lost the May election.
CA Cities Engage in Minimum Wage Arms Race
Forging ahead with plans to take minimum wages to new highs, California’s San Francisco Bay Area has touched off tit-for-tat increases, deepening fears that the region’s high cost of living has become a business-killer.
A growing dilemma
“Berkeley’s City Council approved a hike in June 2014 that will lift the minimum wage to $12.53 by next year,” the Los Angeles Times noted. “In November, voters in San Francisco and Oakland overwhelmingly approved increases, with San Francisco on track to hit $15 before Seattle does. Oakland went up to $12.25 this year.” Then, last month, nearby Emeryville surpassed Berkeley and Oakland with a $14.44 wage; “Berkeley sent its labor commission back to the drawing board. The council next month is expected to take up a proposal that would add paid sick days, extend wage hikes until they hit $19 in 2020 and then add cost-of-living increases in perpetuity.”
The upshot for businesses has been mixed at best: although some employers have crafted clever strategies for adding more value for customers, others have worried the path is unsustainable. “The necessity of paying people a living wage in the Bay Area is clear, so it’s hard to argue against it, and it’s something I’m really proud to be able to try doing,” one pizzeria owner told the Times. “At the same time, I’m terrified of going out of business after 18 years.”
As big wage increases have been passed into law across California, business interests haven’t always been the only ones to pump the brakes. In Los Angeles, where the city minimum is a $15 wage, critics of the increases howled when labor advocates wound up asking for a waiver on the eve of its passage. “The exemption was left out of the law’s final version after criticism from the local chamber of commerce and business groups,” noted the Wall Street Journal. “But similar exemptions are included in at least three other Los Angeles laws, including a minimum wage for hotel workers approved last year.”
Recalibrating business
Although California has led the country in grappling with stagnant wages and rising costs of living, the turn toward higher minimum wages has touched off broad debates across the country. Hospitality businesses such as the hotel industry have faced a particular challenge as wages have climbed upward. For years, bar and restaurant groups have lobbied policymakers to think twice, warning that dramatically hiking wages would undermine their business models, which politicians and analysts have often built into their assumptions about jobs and economic health.
“The problem with the minimum-wage offensive is that it throws the accounting of the restaurant industry totally upside down,” as Harold Miller, a restaurant consultant currently serving as vice president for franchise development at Persona Pizzeria, told the Chicago Tribune.
In tech-forward areas with high costs of living and high rents, the threat to the hospitality business model has accelerated the shift toward increased automation and decreased employment rolls.
Stalling statewide
Some California employers have set out to recalibrate their work forces, hoping that a shift to more temporary workers could blunt the economic impact of wage increases. But the political impact of such a shift has also become a problem. Faced with criticism over differential treatment between contract and career employees, the University of California system offered a $15 “minimum wage” set to apply to thousands of contract workers on a private, not public, payroll.
UC unions were still left cold. “Private contract firms will still make as much as $10 an hour or more in profit off the labor of workers being denied the same wages as UC workers doing the same jobs,” wrote the president of the system’s largest employee union in the San Francisco Chronicle. “UC could choose to send a different message by supporting SB376,” she argued, “legislation that would guarantee the employees of UC contractors equal pay as career employees doing the same work.” That bill was authored this spring by state Sen. Ricardo Lara, D-Bell Gardens.
But the latest Golden State bellwether, a bill creating a statewide $13 wage introduced by state Sen. Mark Leno, D-San Francisco, could signal that the minimum wage wave may be cresting. As the Sacramento Business Journal observed, Leno’s effort “moved farther than it did last year, but the bill’s fate is far from assured.” Although Gov. Jerry Brown has “proposed to tackle income inequality this year through an earned income tax credit,” he has declined to comment on the push for a $13 wage — letting a skeptical Department of Finance speak for him.
Group says Covered California slow to fix customer problems
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) - California’s health insurance exchange is still sluggish when it comes to resolving customer service problems, leaving many people unable to access health care or finalize their tax returns, a consumer advocacy group said Thursday.
Covered California has been slow to fix enrollment mistakes entered into its computer system, according to the Health Consumer Alliance, which is made up of legal aid groups throughout the state.
Exchange staff has a limited ability to update a state computer program for determining whether people are eligible to enroll in Covered California or in Medi-Cal, the state’s low-income health program, the group says.
Covered California’s executive director, Peter Lee, responded Thursday at the board meeting that “a very small percentage” of customers file appeals when they are rejected, and the exchange is committed to resolving problems quickly. Since March, the agency says it has added staff to try to resolve disputes informally without having to go through an administrative law proceeding.
“We still have work to do,” Lee said.
The agency will provide a detailed report on the number of appeals and their status at the next board meeting in October, he said.
The alliance also claims Covered California has failed to correct tax subsidy forms in a timely manner, preventing people from getting tax credits or amending their taxes. For example, advocates said a woman from the Inland Empire has not been able to correct her tax subsidy form since Jan. 28.
“We are concerned that public support for the (Affordable Care Act) will erode as more and more consumers encounter these types of tax problems and face exposure to IRS debts and penalties,” the group wrote in a letter to exchange board members this week.
Covered California said it is looking to troubleshoot information technology problems so staff can make changes directly rather than having to file help desk tickets that can take weeks to resolve. Accenture won a $359 million contract in 2012 to build and maintain the state’s online platform for health insurance programs called the California Healthcare Eligibility, Enrollment, and Retention System, or CalHEERS.
“The challenges with big IT, it does not necessarily mean nimble IT,” Lee said. “We’re working to speed those up. But the issue of having effective and as prompt as possible resolution to appeals is something we take very seriously.”
Jen Flory of the Western Center on Law and Poverty, a member of the alliance, said she was pleased to hear the exchange set a goal of mid-September to resolve tax forms but worried two years remains too long for some CalHEERS system fixes.
“We do want to work with staff to get some timelines to make sure these people that are waiting to get into plans actually have access to care,” Flory said.
Earlier this year, Covered California apologized for sending out about 100,000 incorrect tax forms to people who received sliding-scale subsidies to help them purchase private health insurance.
The exchange acknowledged sending inaccurate coverage information on 1095-A forms when 800,000 forms went out for the first time this year. The federal health care law requires most people to have insurance or face a tax penalty that increases each year.
The penalty for a person who makes $40,000 a year will increase from $299 in 2014 to nearly $600 this year. And a family of four with that same income would see fines increase from $500 to nearly $1,000.
San Jose City Council Capitulates to Police Union Power
“He told the class to take advantage of the academy, and then find jobs elsewhere. The police union tries to get us to leave the department.”
– Anonymous source to NBC Bay Area, television report “Another San Jose Police Recruit Says Union Tried to Get Cadets to ‘Find Jobs Elsewhere’,” Oct. 28, 2014 (excerpt begins at 1:38 in report).
A precedent setting new development in San Jose last week provides abundant evidence of just how powerful local government unions really are in California. As reported Monday in San Jose Inside and elsewhere, an embattled City Council has tentatively approved a new contract with San Jose’s police union that awards them “a 5 percent ‘retention’ bonus and an 8 percent raise over the next 16 months. In addition, former officers who return to the force in the next year can claim a 5 percent signing bonus.”
More significantly, at the same time, the San Jose City Council has tentatively agreed to drop their appeal of a court ruling that overturned a key part of a San Jose pension reform, a re-examination of the so-called “California Rule.” As pension expert Ed Mendel reported in PublicCEO, “The ‘California rule’ is a series of state court decisions widely believed to mean that the pension offered on the date of hire becomes a vested right, protected by contract law, that can only be cut if offset by a new benefit of comparable value.”
In practical terms, this means that pension benefit formulas, according to the California Rule, cannot even be trimmed for future work performed by existing employees. San Jose’s pension reform Measure B, passed by 70 percent of voters in 2012, presented city employees with a choice – they could either contribute an additional 16 percent towards their pension benefits via payroll withholding, or they could accept lower pension benefit accruals from then on. Nothing they had earned to-date would have been taken away from them.
Despite legal opinions that claim the California Rule is not well established law, and despite that the California Rule is contrary to the law governing public sector pensions in most states, and contrary to all law governing private sector pensions everywhere, San Jose’s local elected officials have capitulated.
THE INHERENT HYPOCRISY OF THE ‘CALIFORNIA RULE’
It is difficult to overstate just how hypocritical the union’s position is on the issue of modifying pension benefit formulas. Because the problems with pensions began back in 1999, when Senate Bill 400 raised pension benefit accruals per year for the California Highway Patrol. Within a few years, most every agency in California followed suit. And these pension benefit enhancements were applied retroactively to the date of the employees’ hire.
That is, starting in 1999, agencies changed the pension benefit formula so that, for example, police and fire pension accruals were not just increasing from 2 percent to 3 percent per year from then on, but retroactively to the day each employee was hired. So someone who would have earned a pension equivalent to 2 percent of their final salary times the years they worked would now earn a pension equivalent to 3 percent of their salary times the years they worked, even if they were going to retire within the next year or two.
What San Jose Measure B tried to do was not roll back pension benefits from 3 percent per year to 2 percent per year for years already worked. It only tried to reduce the benefit accrual, prospectively, for years still to be worked. And even that was too much for these unions.
THE DEVASTATING COSTS OF SAN JOSE’S POLICE/FIRE RETIREMENT BENEFITS
If taxpayers could afford to pay these pension benefits, there might be a stronger argument to preserve them. But San Jose’s independent Police and Fire Department Retirement Plan, according to their most recent financial report, is not in great shape financially. Keeping it afloat requires staggering sums of money from taxpayers that are only going to increase each year. Here are highlights:
(1) The plan as of June 30, 2014 (most recent data available) was 77.5 percent funded (page 114). This means that instead of earning their officially projected annual return on investment of 7.125 percent per year, just to avoid becoming more underfunded, they will have to earn 9.2 percent per year. Just to stay even. That is their so-called “risk free” rate of return.
(2) The fund truly is “risk free” to participants, because the taxpayers pay most of the expense and cover the losses when the market fails. In FYE 6-30-2014, police and fire employees contributed $21.1 million into their retirement fund, and taxpayers (the city of San Jose) contributed $123.6 million (page 69), nearly six times as much. How many “six to one” matching contributions are out there for corporate 401(k) plans?
(3) The unfunded liability for the San Jose Police and Fire Retirement Plan was $806 million (page 114) as of June 30, 2013 (most recent actuarial data), equal to 436 percent of payroll. Or looking at this another way, the city’s pension contribution was $123.6 million, whereas their “covered payroll” was $184.6 million. That is, for every dollar San Jose pays to put police and firefighters on the street, they have to pay 67 cents to the pension fund.
(4) It’s not just pensions. The San Jose Police and Fire Retirement Plan includes city funded retirement health insurance benefits. How’s that fund doing? As of June 30, 2013 (most recent data), that plan was 11 percent funded, with an unfunded liability of $625.5 million (page 65).
(5) If you consolidate the financial data for San Jose’s Police and Fire Retirement Plan’s pension and healthcare (OPEB) plans, the most recent statements indicate they are 67 percent funded, with a total unfunded liability of $1.4 billion. If San Jose were to responsibly reduce their total unfunded liability for public safety retirement benefits, they would be paying far more than 67 cents for every dollar of payroll.
Los Angeles: DWP Rate Hikes Look a Lot Like Tax Hikes
The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power is seeking a rate increase of 25 to 30 percent, spread out over five years, in an effort to raise an extra $900 million for power and $230 million for water, a total of $1.13 billion, to fix aging infrastructure and comply with state mandates for renewable energy.
But over the last five years the DWP has taken $1.23 billion of the money customers paid for electricity and transferred it to the city of Los Angeles to be spent on the general expenses of city government. The transfer was $220 million in 2010, $259 million in 2011, $250 million in 2012, $247 million in 2013 and $253 million in 2014.
The Los Angeles City Charter says “surplus money” may be transferred from the DWP to the city’s reserve fund if the Board of Water and Power Commissioners consents. And the Board may withhold its consent if it finds that making the transfer would have a “negative impact on the department’s financial condition.”
Maybe the board wasn’t reading the financial statements, but the DWP’s Power System has been selling bonds to borrow hundreds of millions of dollars virtually every year. As of June 30, 2010, the Power System’s total outstanding long-term debt balance was $5.92 billion. By June 30, 2014, it was $8.165 billion.
How can the DWP transfer a “surplus” to the city at the same time it’s borrowing money and raising rates? Is this an illegal method of raising city taxes, which under Proposition 218 are supposed to be approved by voters?
In 1999, the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association sued the city of Los Angeles for overcharging for water and creating a “surplus” of over $20 million to transfer to the city every year. The case worked its way through the courts for a decade, and in 2009 the taxpayer group was victorious.
As a result, the DWP’s 2008-2009 financial statement for its Water System reported, “The court declared the 2007 Water System transfer illegal based on Proposition 218 and allowed the Water System to retain the $29.9 million and use it for water related activities.”
But over on the Power System side, the judge’s ruling didn’t apply.
The 2008-2009 financial statement for the DWP’s Power System reports that in fiscal year 2008, $182 million was transferred to the city, or 7 percent of the previous year’s operating revenue of $2.6 billion.
But for fiscal year 2009, the city transfer was bumped up to 8 percent. The previous year’s operating revenue was $2.8 billion, for a transfer of $223 million. It has been 8 percent every year since.
Taxpayer advocates are fighting mad.
“Notwithstanding our legal victory over the misuse of ratepayer funds, the city of Los Angeles seems hell-bent on finding ways to gouge the city residents,” said Jon Coupal, president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association. “The increase in DWP’s transfer to the city’s general fund unquestionably violates the principle of ‘cost of service,’ which simply means that ratepayers should pay no more for basic utility services than it costs to provide that service.”
What can be done about it? The Board of Water and Power Commissioners has the authority — subject to the veto of the City Council — to approve the city transfer or withhold it. In May 2009, the board actually rescinded a previously approved transfer.
The Board of Water and Power Commissioners is made up of five people: Mel Levine (president), William W. Funderburk Jr. (vice president), Jill Banks Barad, Michael F. Fleming and Christina E. Noonan. They meet on the first and third Tuesdays of each month at 11:00 a.m. in Room 1555-H at DWP headquarters, 111 N. Hope Street, Los Angeles, 90012. (However, the Aug. 18 meeting has been canceled.) Attend a meeting, or write to the commissioners at that address.
Call your City Council representative and the mayor. The DWP’s rates are set by city ordinance, which means the rate hike cannot take effect unless the council passes it and the mayor signs it.
If necessary, a local ballot initiative could amend the city charter to prohibit transfers of surplus money from water and power revenues to the city. Or a statewide ballot initiative could address the problem of utility rates that far exceed the cost of service.
Ratepayers have been abused for too long. It’s time we turned on the power.
[VIDEO] ILLEGAL ALIENS IN OFFICE: LOCALS SLAM CITY, PRAISE DONALD TRUMP
The Huntington Park City Council in southeast Los Angeles faced a massive public backlash Monday night against the August 3 appointment of two illegal aliens to city commissions. Outraged local residents filled a packed council meeting to overflowing in protest at the council’s move.
As Breitbart News reported earlier this month, Julian Zatarain, 21, was appointed to the Huntington Park parks and recreation commission, while Francisco Medina, 29, received appointment to the health and education commission.
Public comment at the city meeting was opened up on Monday to both those in support of, and opposition to, the controversial appointments.
Speakers approached the podium for three minutes apiece.
Francisco Rivera, who has lived in the Huntington Park area for 35 years, told the council that he opposes the appointments of the illegal aliens.
“How can we be a great nation when we reward people that come to this nation illegally?” Rivera said. “There’s a difference between a legal immigrant and an illegal immigrant.”
He added: “If I’m hungry and if I’m starving and if I break into somebody’s house illegally, I’m going to go to jail. But if I go and knock on somebody’s door and say, ‘Ma’am, I’m really hungry, could you please do me a favor, could you please make me a sandwich?’ That’s the proper way, to ask for something. You shouldn’t get rewarded by breaking a law.”
Rivera, who volunteers in the community cleaning up graffiti, addressed the council while still wearing his reflective vest and carrying his work gloves.
“Not every immigrant that is here, is here illegally and that’s the difference. There’s a right way to do things and a wrong way,” Rivera told the council. “It’s not fair for guys like me.”
Rivera spoke with Breitbart News (below), insisting that “American lives do matter”
Chanell Temple, from a group called Blacks for Equal Rights, also opposed the appointments and rejected a comparison that had been made between black slaves and illegal aliens.
“Immigrants are people with a choice, they come here by choice. Black slaves didn’t’ have choice. That’s offensive to me because I’m a descendant of a black slave.” She commented that illegal aliens have been treated well in the U.S., and continued, “I don’t know any illegal aliens who have been hung from a tree. I don’t know any of them illegal aliens who have dogs been sicked on.”
Referring to California’s “three strikes” law, Temple said, “My people commit a crime they go to jail. Their people commit a crime, they get amnesty.”
She continued, “We’re not going to have a set of laws for you people and a set of laws for us.”
Several mentions were made of 2016 Presidential candidate Donald Trump during the three-hour meeting. The comments supported the idea that Trump would introduce greater border security and immigration law enforcement.
In the audience, while one speaker was voicing support for the council’s decision to appoint illegal aliens to city commissions, a black member of the audience spoke out, saying, “Illegals should be deported.” Another audience member responded, saying, “Go back to Africa.”
Two speakers described their current status as “undocumented” while taking their turns at the podium, and spoke in favor of the appointments.
In the course of the meeting, one council member, Valentin Amezquita, left his seat at the front of the room to address the rest of the council from the podium. He stated his opposition to the appointments, in contrast to the remaining four members of the council.
JERRY BROWN ASKS CA LEGISLATURE TO RAISE TAXES
Two special sessions of the state legislature that will conveneMonday to consider raising taxes, at Governor Jerry Brown’s request.
Brown said in June that he was never asked during his 2014 reelection campaign whether he would keep his 2010 pledge not to raise taxes without voter approval. However, theSacramento Bee notes that Brown was, in fact, asked–and chose not to answer.
The prospective tax hike sessions are intended to address two issues: repairing California’s roads, and health care for the poor. To pay for each, Brown and the Democrats want to raise the gas tax and possibly raise a tax on cigarettes.
Brown’s recent budget failed to include enough money for highway repair.
In the past, the Democratic supermajority would have made passage easy, but with the supermajority lost, Brown and the Democrats must persuade GOP legislators to join them in order to win approval of two-thirds of lawmakers in both houses of the Legislature.
Some GOP representatives have hinted that they might support the gas tax hike, the first in 20 years, if the funds can only be used for fixing the roads.
Brown said in June 2015, “I ran for office when this state had a $27 billion deficit, and I said I wasn’t going to raise taxes unless the people said that’s what they wanted through an initiative. And I kept my promise. When I ran the second time, I didn’t say that – and you didn’t ask me.” But in September 2014, the Sacramento Bee pointed out that Brown had indeed been asked, but danced around the issue, writing, “Asked if his 4-year-old tax pledge would extend into next term, Brown said he is focused on Propositions 1 and 2, the $7.5 billion water bond and a budget reserve measure on the ballot.”
Sen. Jim Beall (D-San Jose) has proposed tax hikes of 12 cents on gas, 22 cents on diesel fuel, $100 for vehicle registration fees, $100 for electric vehicles, and $35 for gas-powered vehicles and hybrids. The suggested cigarette tax would add $2 per pack.
Long Beach Could Be Next In $15 Minimum Wage Movement
In the past year the movement to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour has seen success in a few major cities – and now several more are looking to be next.
Seattle led the way in implementing a $15 minimum wage back in June 2014. San Francisco and Los Angeles followed not long after. Each local ordinance phased in the new wage over the course of several years. Though it has yet to pass on the state or federal level, the movement has seen support across the country.
Still early on in the process, officials in Washington, D.C., Kansas City, Mo., and Long Beach, Calif., are considering whether they should adopt a $15 minimum wage as well. Earlier in the month, Long Beach announced it may initiate a study of the potential impact such an increase would have. The Kansas City Star reported Thursday that the Kansas City Council may seek voter input on the November ballot. D.C. announced last month it will test the waters with a ballot measure as well. New York City is also considering whether to implement a $15 minimum wage, but just for fast-food workers.
In addition to the cities that have already passed a $15 minimum wage, the University of California announced last month that the school will become the first public university to raise the on-campus minimum wage to $15 an hour. Democratic presidential hopeful and self-described socialist Bernie Sanders has even introduced a bill to raise the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour.
Supporters of the $15 minimum wage often claim it will help the poor and stimulate economic activity. They argue that it’s more representative of “the living wage,” which is the supposed basic standard by which someone can live comfortably.
Opponents, however, say the idea will actually hurt the poor by limiting job opportunities. How little or how much of either outcome usually depends on the study. Nevertheless, even the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office agrees at least some job loss is expected.
By organizing rallies and utilizing media marketing campaigns, Fight for $15 has led much of the effort to raise the minimum wage in the last couple of years. Though claiming to be a grassroots workers movement, the group is highly influenced and funded by the Service Employees International Union.
The SEIU has been criticized by some, like Worker Center Watch, for using the Fight for $15 protests as a way of bypassing labor laws to more easily unionize fast food workers. According to a report from the Center for Union Facts, a minimum wage increase would benefit the SEIU directly while hurting non-unionized SEIU competitors.
Additionally, unions often seek exemptions from the very minimum wage laws they support. According to the report, “Labor’s Minimum Wage Exemption,” which was released by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in December, this is to encourage unionization by making membership a low cost alternative for employers. Los Angeles union leader Rusty Hicks was accused of just that when asked for an exemption for unionized businesses from the very wage increase he advocates for. Now he is pushing for Long Beach to go forward with its own increase.
Mandate to cut gasoline use would cripple California's economy
Friends tend to make fun of my car. Granted, it is dented, scratched and old. But in my house, we tend to buy our cars, pay them off and then drive them until they fall apart.
So imagine my surprise when I was sitting in a California state Assembly Utilities and Commerce Committee hearing on Senate Bill 350 and heard a legislator pontificate that if every Californian would just make it their business to drive a Fiat hybrid, the “greenhouse gas problem” would be solved. Apparently, the lease payments are “only around $197,” a payment that “every Californian should be able to afford.”
And we wonder how those who have been elected to represent us can make laws so out of line with any reasonable thought.
SB350 is one of those bills, and it is flying through the state Legislature, passing every committee it comes before. SB350 proposes a mandate that Californians reduce their use of gasoline and diesel by 50 percent in the next 15 years. There is no possible way this arbitrary mandate can be met without having a devastating impact on the economy of California and the lives of Californians up and down the state.
But the worst part of SB350 isn’t even the mandate. It is the fact that the bill is silent on how we will be able to achieve the reduction. It literally hands all decision making power over to the California Air Resources Board, an unelected regulatory body. The fact that the bill’s authors, state Senate President pro Tem Kevin de León, D-Los Angeles, and Sen. Mark Leno, D-San Francisco, don’t want any responsibility for the consequences of this bill is telling. There were several legislators that spoke against this particular requirement, and then turned around and voted for it anyway. SB350 gives CARB a blank check to create regulations, standards and specifications that will cut our use of fuel by 50 percent.
Californians drive 32 million vehicles – almost 3 million in Orange County alone – and use over 40 million gallons of gas and diesel each day. Orange County drivers use an estimated 1.5 billion gallons of gas and diesel annually. Taxpayers and businesses rely on petroleum fuel everyday for their basic transportation needs. Add to that the fact that the Department of Transportation estimates that California’s population is expected to hit 48 million by 2040, and one has to wonder how we are going to manage having our fuel consumption limited to half the amount currently available.
But what about all those Fiat Hybrids we should be driving? According to data from the California Drivers Alliance, there are only about 120,000 electric vehicles on the road. It would take 13 million new electric vehicles to replace 50 percent of the gas and diesel cars we now drive. The taxpayers already have subsidized the purchase of 59,000 electric cars over the last few years, to the tune of $125 million dollars. The billions of dollars that would be needed to purchase 13 million electric cars is mind-boggling. And they would have to be subsidized. Even Fiat Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne doesn’t like the fact that he is mandated to sell them. “I hope you don’t buy it because every time I sell one it cost me $14,000,” he told a group attending a conference at the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C. “I’m honest enough to tell you that.”
CARB Chairwoman Mary Nichols clearly has an agenda. According to Bloomberg Business, “It becomes clear that Nichols, at age 70, is pushing regulations today that could by midcentury all but banish the internal combustion engine from California’s famous highways.” In an interview just a few months ago Nichols stated, “If we’re going to get our transportation system off petroleum, we’ve got to get people used to a zero-emissions world, not just a little-bit-better version of the world they have now.”
As someone who grew up in California, I appreciate the difference in our air quality compared to 50 years ago. But continuing this progress with sensible alternatives that support the growth of the California economy and are not punitive to the taxpayer is what is needed.
Carolyn Cavecche is CEO and president of the Orange County Taxpayers Association.
LA Police Beef Up Patrols Around Theaters Ahead of ‘Straight Outta Compton’ Debut
“Deputies will be doing patrol checks during their shifts and the Department will be monitoring the release,” Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department tells TheWrap
Police agencies in Southern California are increasing their presence around movie theaters, specifically in urban areas, as Universal prepares to release “Straight Outta Compton” on Friday, law enforcement insiders tell TheWrap.
The Los Angeles Police Department plans to dispatch additional officers to theaters in its Southwest Division, which includes Baldwin Hills, Baldwin Village, Crenshaw, Exposition Park, Jefferson Park, Leimert Park and West Adams, a department insider said.
“There will be extra patrols around the theaters, cars and foot patrol. But not only because of the movie that’s coming out, but in light of all the recent activity in the country,” the LAPD insider explained.
Also Read: Ice Cube's 'Straight Outta Compton': F-k tha Mainstream, N.W.A Biopic Will Top Box Office
That activity includes the recent deadly incidents at movie theaters in Lafayette, Louisiana, and Antioch, Tennessee. Over the weekend, theatergoers in Newport Beach, California, also got a scare when someone brandishing a leaf blower sent patrons running from the building in fear.
Meanwhile, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department — which counts Compton within its jurisdiction — plans to step up patrols around theaters this weekend as well.
“Sheriff’s patrol stations have been working with theater management in their jurisdictions over the last few weeks to develop safety plans and discuss security measures,” public information officer Nicole Nishida told TheWrap. “Deputies will be doing patrol checks during their shifts and the Department will be monitoring the release [of “Straight Outta Compton].”
The heightened police presence comes on the heels of a Thursday pledge from distributor Universal to “support” exhibitors that have requested extra security as they screen the biopic about the rise of gangsta rap group N.W.A (an acronym for Niggaz Wit Attitudes).
The studio declined to comment on what exactly that support would entail, though some media reports have suggested Universal’s help would include financial reimbursement. Still, the studio told TheWrap that it had not specifically directed theaters to increase security, but it has “partnered with exhibitors who have requested support.”
Meanwhile AMC, one of the nation’s largest theater chains, would not specifically comment on its security plans.
“We are anticipating a great crowd for the opening of ‘Straight Outta Compton,’ and similar to every weekend, we schedule and allocate staffing and resources accordingly based on projected attendance.” said Ryan Noonan, director of corporate communications for AMC Theatres.
“Straight Outta Compton” traces the origins of N.W.A, which Ice Cube co-founded in Compton in 1987 along with Dr. Dre, DJ Yella, Arabian Prince, MC Ren and Eazy-E, who died in 1995.
N.W.A sold millions of records and helped put West Coast rap on the map. But the group drew criticism for its explicit lyrics, apparent glorification of gang culture and singles such as the 1988 release “Fu*k tha Police” — an anthem against police brutality and racial profiling.
Neither the law enforcement agencies nor the studio said they expect any trouble, but the enhanced security measures around the release suggest they don’t plan to take any chances.
During the film’s world premiere Monday at the Microsoft Theater in downtown Los Angeles, the LAPD rolled out additional units, including special events officers from its Central Bureau as well as members of its Gang Enforcement Detail.
As for this weekend’s release, it’s evident that police want to be prepared.
“Nothing is expected, this is just a precaution,” the LAPD insider said. “We’re allocating extra resources to make it safe.”
STATE OF ‘JEFFERSON’ PICKS UP SUPPORT IN NORCAL
SACRAMENTO, California — Hundreds of Northern Californians packed the El Dorado County Supervisor’s chambers in Placerville on Tuesday afternoon to petition in support of what would be America’s 51st state, “Jefferson.”
Board of Supervisor meeting regarding #StateofJefferson #CApic.twitter.com/WoNp2bVNX7
— Patriotic America (@SFTPCIA) August 12, 2015
According to local NBC affiliate KCRA, Jefferson organizer Mike Thomas said the people in El Dorado County and those who support the creation of a new state “want more representation” and are frustrated by the lack of it.
“We have 11 counties up here with one state senator, L.A. County has 11 senators so you can see the mismatch,” Thomas reportedly said. “Our founding fathers never envisioned that a state would actually do that.” The region in question is reportedly represented by just six lawmakers, whereas the rest of California has 114.
If Jefferson becomes a state, it would hold a population of 1.7 million people and consist of California’s 20 northernmost counties, KCRA notes.
A group called Keep it California also presented at the meeting. Organizer Jamie Beutler told KCRA that while representation is a major issue up north, splitting the Golden State up is not the answer. “It’s much easier to work with what we have… than form an entirely new state [and] start all over again.”
— Terry in the Hills (@UpInTheHills) August 12, 2015
The last time anything resembling a Jefferson-style new state was created was in 1820, when Maine split from Massachusetts. KCRA notes that the move would require a majority of votes in both California’s legislature and the U.S. Congress.
Follow Adelle Nazarian on Twitter @AdelleNaz and on Facebook.
MILEAGE TAX WILL HURT CALIFORNIA MIDDLE CLASS, STATE BUDGET
California Democrats wants to create a mileage tax–a new tax on every mile driven in the state–despite already having the highest gas taxes in the nation.
State officials say they need the tax increase, because gas tax collections to pay for roads and bridges has been shrinking. But the real culprit for lower tax revenues is that California’s middle class is being forced by high taxes to move out of state and drive less. A mileage tax increase will just increase middle class pain and generate even lower tax revenue for roads and bridges.
Gasoline tax collections peaked out $2.8 billion per year in 2006, the same year former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed AB 32, known as the Global Warming Solutions Act, or “cap-and-trade.” The legislation committed the state to use taxes and fees to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020. Since that time, gas tax collections have slowly trended down about 7.1 percent to $2.6 billion last year.
State officials pretend the falling gas tax revenue is partly due to the tiny number of electric vehicles on the road and mostly due to cars getting better mileage. But gas tax collection around the U.S. has continued to increase most years, despite average vehicle gas mileage increasing every year for the past 6 decades. It is only California that has had falling gas tax revenue for the last decade.
California officials claim that the state’s 25 million drivers only pay the second-highest gas tax in the nation at 65.98 cents per gallon; Pennsylvania pays 70 cents a gallon. But since January 1, Californians have also been slammed with a “hidden gas tax” of 15 cents per gallon to compensate for the costs refiners, tanker trucks and gas stations have to pay to buy cap and trade credits to comply AB 32’s climate change mandates.
After Democrats passed Proposition 30 in late 2012, California’s top marginal tax rate jumped by 33%. Today, California has the second highest marginal tax rate in the industrialized world, behind only Denmark.
Most of the rich are rich because they own businesses and rental properties. Some of the rich took their money and moved to low-cost states, but most had the flexibility to pass California’s higher tax bite onto their middle class consumers and renters.
California’s high costs and lousy economic climate have been pushing its middle class residents to other states, while the Golden State imports impoverished illegal or “undocumented” immigrants. In 2013, 102,972 California residents permanently left the state and only 66,294 individuals from other states moved to California. But California had a net 169,266 population gain, because 205,994 immigrants moved into California.
Exporting the middle class explains why the City of Los Angeles has achieved the crown as America’s Poorest Big City, according to an analysis by the American Community Survey-based Census Bureau data. Of the 25 major metropolitan areas in 2013, Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim took the booby prize for having the highest poverty rate at 17.6%. California’s overall rate of poverty was also the top state contender at 16.8%.
Not every middle class resident can or will move out of California. But most do have the flexibility to avoid paying California’s 81 cent per gallon listed and hidden gas taxes–and any additional mileage tax Sacramento dreams up–by driving less.
California’s annual gas tax collection has fallen since 2006 by 7.1 percent from $2.8 billion to $2.6 billion, because the average miles driven by state residents fell by 8.3 percent, from13,300 to 12,200, during the same period.
If California adds on another mileage tax, more of the middle class will leave and the rest will drive less. Once again, the higher effective tax rate will generate less tax collection.
JERRY BROWN BANS THE WORD ‘ALIEN’ FROM CALIFORNIA LABOR LAW
California Gov. Jerry Brown signed a law Monday that bans the word “alien” from the state’s labor laws.
SB 432, introduced by State Sen. Tony Mendoza (D-Artesia), removes the term “alien,” previously defined as “any person who is not a born or fully naturalized citizen of the United States.” It also removed the state’s preference for hiring U.S. citizens on public works projects during periods of unemployment.
The bill passed the State Senate unanimously. Mendoza said at the time the State Senate approved the bill that the term “alien” was “offensive,” adding: “It has no place in our laws and should not be the basis of employment hiring.” Last month, as the State Assembly added its approval, he said: “Alien is now commonly considered a derogatory term for a foreign -born person and has very negative connotations.”
The only vote against the bill came in the State Assembly, from Assemblyman Matthew Harper, R-Huntington Beach (Orange County), who told the San Francisco Chronicle that the bill was “just a way for legislators to get their names in the paper….[t]he negative connotations come from the fact that people are breaking the law. Changing the word won’t change the fact that folks are here illegally.”
Mendoza was exultant Monday, as his bill was signed into law. He was joined in his enthusiasm by Tim Paulson, executive director of the San Francisco Labor Council, who told the Chronicle, “The word ‘alien’ has incredibly racist and un-American connotations.”
The federal government still uses the term “alien” to describe foreigners legally or illegally present. Other states also still use the term.
The law takes effect Jan. 1.
Will the University of California create six sets of bathrooms for six genders?
"As California goes, so goes the Sanitarium." Isn't that what they say about California now?
The University of California has been keeping busy ever since it created the most hysterical guide ever to "microaggressions". Now trying to top that,UC is planning to admit students from six genders, four of them completely fictional:
Starting this fall, students applying to the University of California will have the option to choose among six gender identities listed on undergraduate admissions forms: male, female, trans male, trans female, gender queer/gender non-conforming and different identity.
In a statement, UC President Janet Napolitano said: “UC is working hard to ensure our campuses model inclusiveness and understanding. … We must continue to look at where we can improve so everyone at UC feels respected and supported.”
Which gender is Janet Napolitano?
Johan Mosquera... said he believes the change will help students whose self-identity does not conform with their biological sex. Often, he said, those students experience certain difficulties. “This could be harassment, hate crimes or even hearing: 'You don't belong in this bathroom' … No one should have to experience that.”
I quite agree. Which is why if the UC system is serious about it, it needs to create a system of six separate bathrooms for each floor of every dormitory and classroom building. Since these are, after all, separate genders, it makes sense for each to have its own bathroom, right?
It goes without saying, for example, that men and women shouldn't share bathrooms. But what about transgendered women, who are men pretending to be women. Don't you think they would be uncomfortable using women's locker rooms? That's why transgendered men and transgendered women each need their own lockerrooms and bathrooms.
And what happens if you make a "gender queer/gender non-conforming" person share a bathroom with someone who is "different identity"? Don't these two different genders, whatever they be, need to be separate? If you see someone undressing in a locker room, wouldn't it be obvious which one is gender non-conforming and which one is "different identity"?
That's why UC needs dozens and dozens of additional bathrooms. The fact is, of course, that they won't make any new ones, sticking with men and women's bathrooms because, despite what their application says, there are still only two genders. If you think you have wings that doesn't make you a bird, if you think you have scales it doesn't make you a fish. It just makes you mentally ill; and, eventually, perhaps valedictorian at the University of California with an advanced degree in gender dysphoria.
The story here is UC's hypocrisy in paying lip service to this mental illness; the fact that they won't create additional bathrooms shows even they don't really believe what they are doing.
This article was produced by NewsMachete.com, the conservative news site.
L.A. TIMES GIVES MAYOR ERIC GARCETTI A ‘C’
Starting this fall, students applying to the University of California will have the option to choose among six gender identities listed on undergraduate admissions forms: male, female, trans male, trans female, gender queer/gender non-conforming and different identity.
In a statement, UC President Janet Napolitano said: “UC is working hard to ensure our campuses model inclusiveness and understanding. … We must continue to look at where we can improve so everyone at UC feels respected and supported.”
Johan Mosquera... said he believes the change will help students whose self-identity does not conform with their biological sex. Often, he said, those students experience certain difficulties. “This could be harassment, hate crimes or even hearing: 'You don't belong in this bathroom' … No one should have to experience that.”
The Los Angeles Times, which endorsed Los Angeles mayor Eric Garcetti in 2013, has given him an overall grade of “C” for his performance.
In a series giving grades to California’s elected officials, the Times gave Garcetti a C-minus for leadership, a C for effectiveness, a B-plus for vision, a C-plus for transparency, and a D for courage.
The Times stated that it had harbored concerns that Garcetti would “confuse constructive compromise with the path of least resistance.” It concluded: “Our concerns are becoming reality…his inclination to avoid tough or controversial decisions is undermining his ability to address the very serious problems facing the city.”
Which “tough or controversial” decisions has Garcetti failed to make, according to theTimes?
- His refusal to hire “nationally recognized experts” to guide him in creating jobs for Los Angelenos, instead using “political allies,” including his “longtime council staffer for the deputy mayor position” and hiring former Councilwoman Jan Perry to lead the Economic and Workforce Development Department. Two years later, unsurprisingly, the mayor has yet to articulate a comprehensive job creation strategy. In addition, he has not eliminated the city’s burdensome business tax, contrary to his campaign promise.
- His failure to restore city services. Garcetti didn’t support a sales tax favored by the Times that would have funded fixing streets and sidewalks.
- His refusal to endorse a raise in rates suggested by the Department of Water and Power to fund infrastructure replacement to save water.
- His failure to tamp down labor and pension expenses.
- His noncommittal stance on the issue of consolidating local elections with state and federal elections.
- His noncommittal stance on giving trade deals such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership fast-track approval.
- His refusal to act on a homelessness ordinance.
- His surreptitious exit from his home when protesters demonstrated after the LAPD sot a homeless black man.
- His eschewing of involvement with school district politics and governance.
The Times lauded the mayor for urging the Los Angeles Police Department to give every officer in the field a body camera by mid-2016. Another plus was his help finalizing a deal to build a rail connection to LAX, and a third action drawing the paper’s approval involved his pushing the city council to require the retrofitting of older buildings to withstand earthquakes.
The Times concluded, “Garcetti has a good vision for Los Angeles. But to be a leader, he has to be willing to make hard, unpopular decisions for the greater good of the city….Solving these problems will take political courage and decisiveness, not a finger in the wind.”
CALIFORNIA: Ontario airport settlement with LAWA avoids lengthy, costly litigation
ONTARIO >> The settlement announced this week allows both Ontario and Los Angeles World Airports to avoid an expensive and lengthy legal battle. Had Ontario failed to make its case, it would have spent millions for naught.
For LAWA and Los Angeles, the risk was even greater: Had Ontario proven its case, LAWA could have ended up paying out as much as $4 billion in damages, according to Ontario officials, rather than receiving compensation for investments in and improvements to Ontario International Airport over the past few decades.
“Parties don’t settle unless they are getting something out of it or they are going to lose,” said Mark Austin, a partner at the Costa Mesa-based law firm Rutan & Tucker, LLP.
Austin, who is not familiar with the details of the Ontario airport case, said it is very common for cases to settle on the eve of trial. The ongoing litigation between Ontario and Los Angeles over the airport was set to go to trial Aug. 17.
With the start of trial only days away, Austin said both parties would have had “the clearest picture of how strong their case is.”
LAWA had been reluctant to let go of ONT, arguing that it has done all it could to support ONT in the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression.
“Once the trial begins, the parties are faced with the consequences: ‘I might be hit for $4 billion’ and from Ontario’s standpoint ‘we may lose out on this airport’,” he said.
L.A., he said, certainly was weighing the potential liability when considering a settlement.
“People want to believe they are going to win but until they are faced with the all facts, and there are real consequences, it puts their feet to the fire,” Austin said.
But Brett Snyder, an airline industry expert, said the shift to settle out of court may have happened when Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti took office in 2012.
“The mayor doesn’t really care about the issue. He wants to cut ties because it’s not a big enough benefit for the city,” he said.
Another California company coming to Texas
AUSTIN, Texas (KXAN) — Another California company announces their relocation to Central Texas, bringing job opportunities for Texans.
The customer service call center, LiveOps, is expected to create 155 jobs and $55 million in capital investments.
According to Governor Abbot the technology company is moving their head quarters from Redwood City, California to Cedar Park, Texas.
Abbot lured the company to Texas offering $1.2 million from the Texas Enterprise Fund. The Governor hopes the company’s relocation will help bump Texas up as the leader in job creation in the technology sector.
Their new 25,000 square foot facility will be built in Cedar Park.
California Health Insurance For All Undocumented Immigrants? State Looks To Sidestep Obamacare And Cover Uninsured
When it comes to healthcare, California has been staunchly progressive, even aggressive, in its implementation of the Affordable Care Act. It set up its own health exchange, called Covered California, and expanded Medi-Cal, the state’s version of Medicaid. However, one area where California has struggled to make inroads in expanding health insurance is among undocumented immigrants, who account for at least 2 million people in the state.
The Golden State has sought to devise ways to legally skirt federal policies that hinder undocumented immigrants from accessing health insurance. Although it has made some progress in recent months, the overall effect is a patchwork of healthcare and medical resources for undocumented immigrants, who are vital to the state’s economy but, according to a study published Thursday, still constitute a significant proportion of the state’s uninsured population.
“California really only has one complaint about Obamacare, and that is its exclusion of undocumented Californians,” Daniel Zingale, senior vice president at the California Endowment, a not-for-profit group that advocates for healthcare for undocumented immigrants, said.
For California, the Affordable Care Act, the law enacted in 2010 that has overhauled healthcare in America, has by and large been a success. Of those who were uninsured before the law went into effect, 68 percent now have healthcare coverage, the most recent survey in a long-term study conducted by the Kaiser Family Foundation showed. Those who were newly insured reported that they had better access to medical care and were more able to afford it. Despite certain frustrations for some, such as long wait times to see doctors, the majority said they’d had positive experiences with their health plans.
Can L.A. Afford Another Olympics?
Boston bailed on hosting the 2024 Olympics when Mayor Martin Walsh refused to sign a host city contract with the United States Olympic Committee (“USOC”) that would have put Beantown (and possibly the Commonwealth of Massachusetts) on the hook for any cost overruns associated with this 17 day extravaganza. But Walsh’s refusal to mortgage Boston’s future was understandable given the unfavorable economics associated with this over hyped event.
According to an article in Harvard Magazine, “A Fiscal Faustian Bargain” by Professor Andrew Zimbalist, perhaps the foremost analyst of public investments in sports facilities and global athletic competitions, the cost is expected to exceed $15 billion. This includes operating costs during the games, the construction of new venues, infrastructure improvements and security.
However, revenue expectations from the media rights, domestic and international corporate sponsorships, ticket sales, licensing agreements and “other” revenues are projected to be less than $5 billion.
This shortfall of more than $10 billion horrifies frugal New Englanders, so much so that a referendum banning the expenditure of public funds was favored to pass next year.
The last minute withdrawal of Boston’s bid to represent the USA has put the USOC in a difficult position because it must submit its proposal to the International Olympic Committee by mid-September. A final decision by the IOC is due in September of 2017.
The question for the USOC is whether it will submit a bid to host the 2024 Olympics, and, if so, which city.
In January, Boston was selected over L.A., San Francisco and Washington, D.C. But even then, everybody knew that Los Angeles was the best place to host the 2024 Games. We have an existing infrastructure: the Coliseum, the Rose Bowl, Staples, Dodger Stadium, Angel Stadium, USC, UCLA and many other quality sporting venues.
We have a captive audience of 20 million people in Southern California and a history of supporting our teams and the most successful Olympics ever in 1984.
But does L.A. have the financial resources to pull off an Olympics where our cash strapped city is not responsible for operating losses, cost overruns, and excessive infrastructure improvements?
This will obviously be a concern for Angelenos as it was in the early 1980’s when the voters approved a charter amendment banning the use of public funds to support the Olympics.
More than likely, City Hall will leap at the opportunity to host the 2024 Olympics, touting all the great benefits that will accrue to all Angelenos. While some these claims may well be true, we must remember that today’s politicians will be termed out of office and long gone by the time the bill comes due.
Another Freeway Olympics would be a great event for the city, the county, and all of Southern California. But before the city puts in any bid to host the 2024 Olympic Games, we need detailed financial information as well as ironclad assurances that our city – which cannot afford to repair and maintain its streets and sidewalks or properly fund its pension plans – and the taxpayers are not on the hook for any expenses unless they are approved in advance by the voters.
Let the games begin.
California is cap-and-trade leader — and a loner
Explaining cap and trade in 2 1/2 minutes
It was midmorning one day in May, and somewhere deep inside a 25-story tower in Sacramento, an auction, cloaked in secrecy, was about to begin.
There was no gavel pounding. No shouting. No frenzy of traders running around.
Instead, an unknown number of state workers surrendered their cellphones and took positions monitoring computer screens inside the building that houses California’s environmental agencies. Across the world, traders logged in, poised to buy permits that allow businesses in California to emit the kind of pollution responsible for global warming.
Four hours later, the auction was over, and California’s state government was $626 million richer.
That’s the state’s cap-and-trade program, the only one like it in the country, at work.
How many staff monitor the online auctions? Which companies bought the permits? State officials won’t say. Making too much information public, they say, could compromise the integrity of the quarterly auctions.
“What we don’t do and won’t do is get into the individual business strategies that companies use to decide when to buy, what auctions to participate in, who to trade with, and so forth,” said Mary Nichols, chairwoman of the California Air Resources Board, which runs the cap-and trade-program.
The secrecy around the auctions is meant to keep them fair and prevent participants from colluding; other carbon markets use a similar “sealed bid” technique.
Under California’s two-year-old cap-and-trade system, the state sets a limit on how much greenhouse gases businesses can emit, and reduces the amount each year. Companies decide how to stay below the cap: They can buy permits to pollute through the auction, change operations to use energy more efficiently or pay for “offsets,” which are environmentally beneficial projects somewhere else that allow businesses to continue sending emissions into the atmosphere in California.
Cap-and-trade is among the most pioneering – yet controversial – elements of California’s multilayered approach to combating climate change. The program covers most major polluting industries and is generating billions of dollars for the state, money that must be poured into efforts to further reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
It’s too soon to tell if the program is making substantial cuts to emissions.
State regulators believe that cap-and-trade will eventually account for about one-fifth of California’s overall emissions cuts. But for now, officials can’t say how much the system – on its own – is furthering the state’s environmental goals. In 2013, the first year of the auctions and the most recent year for which data is available, overall emissions in the state dropped by just a fraction of a percent (0.3 percent) compared with the year before.
Courts have so far upheld the approach in the face of legal challenges.
Yet the national reach of the program has fallen short of expectations. California remains the only state that charges almost every industry a price for emitting carbon.
It wasn’t supposed to be this way, said former Assembly Speaker Fabian Núñez, who carried Assembly Bill 32, the 2006 measure that led to cap-and-trade.
“The environmental community said, ‘Look, the reason why this has to be the most progressive bill is because once California passes a law, all of these other states are going to follow suit. All of them,’” Núñez said in a recent interview.
“The irony of this is that once the law passed in California, no one followed suit. No one.”
The federal government is pressuring states to cut emissions by crafting rules that crack down on greenhouse gas production from coal-fired power plants. States are figuring out how to comply; one option is to join existing cap-and-trade programs. So in theory, California’s system could spread to other states.
In practice, however, analysts say it’s unlikely.
Washington state Gov. Jay Inslee proposed linking to California’s system, but the Legislature shot down his plan. Nine states in the Northeast have run their own cap-and-trade since 2008, but it applies only to electric power producers.
California’s, by contrast, is more comprehensive. It covers roughly 600 facilities, including oil refineries, food processors, paper mills, cement manufacturers and electricity providers. The sweeping approach means many businesses that make the most routine consumer goods – think of gas, toilet paper, beer and tomato sauce – must cut their emissions or pay to pollute.
What does this mean as Californians gas up their cars or shop for groceries? Economists figure gas prices are up by about 10 cents a gallon this year because of cap-and-trade. The increased costs for other products, however, are hard to pin down.
The world’s largest tomato processor says the program will increase its costs by about $5 million over seven years, making it more expensive to churn out the paste that becomes spaghetti sauce, ketchup and pizza. During the hottest months of the year, the Morning Star Packing Co. cooks more than 2,000 tons of tomatoes each hour in enormous boilers at three factories in the Central Valley. All that gas-fired cooking creates emissions that are now capped by the state.
“It’s a regressive tax,” said Morning Star spokesman Nick Kastle, as he led a tour through a Los Baños processing plant.
Morning Star passes the costs of cap-and-trade on to the companies that buy its tomato paste to make salsa and sauce, Kastle said. “The only link in that chain who can’t pass it on is the consumer,” Kastle said. “That is the person who bears all the additional costs.”
How money flows
Kastle couldn’t say how much more shoppers are paying because of cap-and-trade, citing the complexities of the supply chain. State regulators say the increase is tiny: an additional 1/100th of a cent for a 14.5-ounce can of tomato product.
“The cost of living in California is higher than it is in some other states that have a lower environmental quality of life. There is absolutely no question about that,” Nichols said. But because cap-and-trade money is coming back to Californians through many channels, including biannual rebates on electricity bills, the net effect, he said, is that the costs and benefits even out.
The solar panels on the roof of Miguel Abugaber’s home in San Diego tell part of the story. Abugaber lives on the $76 a day he earns by caring for his mother, who has Alzheimer’s disease. They were struggling to pay the electric bill when he heard about a program that would give him solar panels almost for free. It uses cap-and-trade money to help low-income Californians install solar systems that would otherwise be beyond their means.
“It was like, oh my God, you just have to be kidding me,” Abugaber said during an interview in his modest home, his mother sleeping nearby on a comfortable chair.
The 17 solar panels that now glint on their roof are an economic game-changer: The family’s June electric bill came in at $5.10. Without the panels, Abugaber said, his monthly power bill had been more than $100.
“I mentioned it to my neighbors,” Abugaber said. “But they don’t believe me.”
State officials say that about 1,780 low-income households will receive rooftop solar systems with cap-and-trade money.
The auctions are also partially funding a program that gives steep discounts on clean cars. Hundreds of Central Valley residents drove their old cars – some trailing smoke from tailpipes – to the Stockton fairgrounds for a free emissions check in May. Those with low incomes and high-polluting cars could get screened for discounts of up to $9,500 on a hybrid or electric vehicle – if they gave up their old clunkers.
Lawmakers have decided that at least 25 percent of cap-and-trade money must be spent to benefit disadvantaged communities, and that 60 percent of it will go toward high-speed rail and other transportation and housing plans that make it easier for people to get out of their cars.
The auctions brought in $832 million for last year’s budget and are projected to account for $2.2 billion in the current year. Gov. Jerry Brown and legislators are scheduled to wrangle over how to spend the money in the weeks ahead.
But whether officials can legally collect money from the auctions is a question before the courts. The Morning Star tomato processor and the California Chamber of Commerce sued the state, arguing that cap-and-trade amounts to an illegal tax because AB32 was approved by a simple majority of the Legislature, not the two-thirds necessary to pass a new tax. They argue the state could cut emissions and operate a cap-and-trade market without charging for the permits.
The state contends the system is not a tax because participation in the auction is voluntary and the money generated is used specifically to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. California won the first round in court, but an appeal is pending.
California businesses can satisfy a portion of their obligations without going to the auctions. Instead, they can buy “offset credits,” in which they pay for an environmental benefit somewhere else while they continue sending emissions into the air at home.
Indiana dairy farms
In this way, California’s program has sent ripples around the country: About 80 percent of the offset credits regulators have approved are for projects outside the state.
State data show that Chevron bought offsets to preserve forests in South Carolina, Maine, Michigan and California; Valero used its at dairy farms in Indiana and New York; and the Morning Star tomato-packing company used its at a Wisconsin dairy farm.
But it’s difficult to assess how much additional benefit offsets provide to the climate, said Barbara Haya, a researcher at the Berkeley Energy and Climate Institute. That means offsets can “nudge out more certain reductions” in emissions.
Also, offsets are created by individual businesses – not governments – so their prevalence outside California does not indicate that other states are poised to join our cap-and-trade system.
It will be hard to consider the system a success if California continues its solitary path for many years, said Dan McGraw, who reports on carbon markets for ICIS, a trade publication.
Getting another state to sign on would be “a huge vote of confidence to the market that shows what (you’re) doing in California isn’t an isolated case,” McGraw said at a conference in Los Angeles this spring.
CALmatters is a nonprofit journalism venture dedicated to explaining state policies and politics. Reporters Kate Galbraith and Pauline Bartolone contributed to this report.
Drought to deluge? El Nino's impact on California
The myth of L.A. as a 'creatives' paradise -- and why loving the city means seeing its flaws
In the last several months, a wondrous mythology has emerged about Los Angeles in cultural circles. A steady drip of articles — in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and other outlets — have abused countless adjectives in describing our town as some sort of Shangri-La of creativity, a land of craft beer and sky-lighted studios and untold quantities of cultural inventiveness.
Certainly, there is some debunking that goes on whenever these stories appear. As Curbed L.A. helpfully pointed out, you can't rent a dreamy, two-bedroom bungalow for $1,250 in Echo Park, no matter what the New York Times says. But many Angelenos nonetheless seem pretty happy to live with the stereotype of Los Angeles as a cultural wonderland. I've had countless gallerists, artists, curators and even journalists (who should know better) happily parrot the line about L.A. as a utopia for "creatives" who come here to feel less inhibited and less cold.
Which is why I was curious to see a pair of stories emerge Monday — written by Angelenos and former L.A. Times staffers, no less — that tell a somewhat different story. In a lengthy feature published this month in Los Angeles Magazine, culture writer Scott Timberg contemplates leaving Los Angeles, as so many of his contemporaries already have, since the city is a ridiculously tough place to make a go of it as a writer (especially for the ill-remunerated non-screen variety).
And Hector Tobar writes in the New York Times (we forgive you, bro), of the city's increasing Third World-ization — a.k.a. its growing inequity. It's a phenomenon that should be apparent to anyone who has traveled along the street named Arcadia in downtown Los Angeles, where growing encampments engineered out of blue tarps and shopping carts, sit just above the roar of the 101 Freeway.
I was intrigued by these essays because I feel as if we, in the cultural classes, have been perfectly happy to get caught up in the mythology that L.A. is somehow a Xanadu of art-making. Certainly, there are worse places to be an artist. (Brooklyn comes to mind.) But let's get real about the situation here in Los Angeles.
If you're a keen reader of the work of my colleague, Times architecture critic Christopher Hawthorne, you know that Los Angeles ain't an easy place to be an architect. As he wrote in 2013: "The city's most talented and ambitious young architects are struggling to complete even small projects in an increasingly dense and risk-averse city and step out of the wide, insistent shadow cast by their world-famous older colleagues."
And even though there is plenty of buzz in the arts community about the opening of massive galleries — including Hauser Wirth & Schimmel to Maccarone — many of these are simply the L.A. outposts of behemoth international spaces and therefore not organic to the city's scene. In other words, these are places that sit above the fray, catering to a 1% that doesn't necessarily live or pay taxes here. Moreover, try showing your art at any of these spaces if you don't have a pricey MFA from one of a handful of brand-name art schools.
Certainly, if you live here and are paying attention, you know that Los Angeles has a housing crisis, epic numbers of homeless people that we are choosing to deal with in increasingly punitive ways and public transportation system that is very much a work-in-progress. And, of course, there's the fact that arts in the public-school system remain underfunded and inequitably distributed.
I grew up in Southern California and I have a sanguine view of it. I love the fact that this place is barely controlled chaos, that on some days it seems willfully unattractive, that the best of everything is always found in some anonymous strip mall, that there is a whole subset of Angelenos who never wear close-toed shoes.
But I grew up with the reality of it too: A dad who inspected freeway overpasses for Caltrans amid 80-mph traffic in the middle of the night. Undocumented cousins who cleaned swimming pools and took care of the children of the better-to-do.
It's great that culture types are reveling in this moment in which our city's output is drawing interest at an international level. But let's be honest about the limits of this so-called boom — and who it might be benefiting.
Let's love L.A. by being critical of it. And maybe — just maybe — try to fix it too.
Find me on Twitter @cmonstah.
Via: LA Times
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In the last several months, a wondrous mythology has emerged about Los Angeles in cultural circles. A steady drip of articles — in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and other outlets — have abused countless adjectives in describing our town as some sort of Shangri-La of creativity, a land of craft beer and sky-lighted studios and untold quantities of cultural inventiveness.
Certainly, there is some debunking that goes on whenever these stories appear. As Curbed L.A. helpfully pointed out, you can't rent a dreamy, two-bedroom bungalow for $1,250 in Echo Park, no matter what the New York Times says. But many Angelenos nonetheless seem pretty happy to live with the stereotype of Los Angeles as a cultural wonderland. I've had countless gallerists, artists, curators and even journalists (who should know better) happily parrot the line about L.A. as a utopia for "creatives" who come here to feel less inhibited and less cold.
Which is why I was curious to see a pair of stories emerge Monday — written by Angelenos and former L.A. Times staffers, no less — that tell a somewhat different story. In a lengthy feature published this month in Los Angeles Magazine, culture writer Scott Timberg contemplates leaving Los Angeles, as so many of his contemporaries already have, since the city is a ridiculously tough place to make a go of it as a writer (especially for the ill-remunerated non-screen variety).
And Hector Tobar writes in the New York Times (we forgive you, bro), of the city's increasing Third World-ization — a.k.a. its growing inequity. It's a phenomenon that should be apparent to anyone who has traveled along the street named Arcadia in downtown Los Angeles, where growing encampments engineered out of blue tarps and shopping carts, sit just above the roar of the 101 Freeway.
I was intrigued by these essays because I feel as if we, in the cultural classes, have been perfectly happy to get caught up in the mythology that L.A. is somehow a Xanadu of art-making. Certainly, there are worse places to be an artist. (Brooklyn comes to mind.) But let's get real about the situation here in Los Angeles.
I was intrigued by these essays because I feel as if we, in the cultural classes, have been perfectly happy to get caught up in the mythology that L.A. is somehow a Xanadu of art-making. Certainly, there are worse places to be an artist. (Brooklyn comes to mind.) But let's get real about the situation here in Los Angeles.
If you're a keen reader of the work of my colleague, Times architecture critic Christopher Hawthorne, you know that Los Angeles ain't an easy place to be an architect. As he wrote in 2013: "The city's most talented and ambitious young architects are struggling to complete even small projects in an increasingly dense and risk-averse city and step out of the wide, insistent shadow cast by their world-famous older colleagues."
And even though there is plenty of buzz in the arts community about the opening of massive galleries — including Hauser Wirth & Schimmel to Maccarone — many of these are simply the L.A. outposts of behemoth international spaces and therefore not organic to the city's scene. In other words, these are places that sit above the fray, catering to a 1% that doesn't necessarily live or pay taxes here. Moreover, try showing your art at any of these spaces if you don't have a pricey MFA from one of a handful of brand-name art schools.
Certainly, if you live here and are paying attention, you know that Los Angeles has a housing crisis, epic numbers of homeless people that we are choosing to deal with in increasingly punitive ways and public transportation system that is very much a work-in-progress. And, of course, there's the fact that arts in the public-school system remain underfunded and inequitably distributed.
I grew up in Southern California and I have a sanguine view of it. I love the fact that this place is barely controlled chaos, that on some days it seems willfully unattractive, that the best of everything is always found in some anonymous strip mall, that there is a whole subset of Angelenos who never wear close-toed shoes.
But I grew up with the reality of it too: A dad who inspected freeway overpasses for Caltrans amid 80-mph traffic in the middle of the night. Undocumented cousins who cleaned swimming pools and took care of the children of the better-to-do.
It's great that culture types are reveling in this moment in which our city's output is drawing interest at an international level. But let's be honest about the limits of this so-called boom — and who it might be benefiting.
Let's love L.A. by being critical of it. And maybe — just maybe — try to fix it too.
Find me on Twitter @cmonstah.
Via: LA Times
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4th of July Parades Throughout LA County to Kick Off Independence Day
From Santa Monica to Pasadena, south landers will celebrate the holiday with a series of parades.
Parades marking the 239th anniversary of the nation’s independence will be held Saturday throughout Los Angeles County, with three having a connection to the Special Olympics World Games.
Santa Monica’s ninth annual Fourth of July parade will begin at 9:30 a.m. at Main Street and Pico Boulevard. Its theme is “Inspirational Heroes.” Special Olympics global messenger Will Montgomery will be the grand marshal.
The Holmby Westwood Property Owners Association 4th of July Parade will begin at 10 a.m. at Warner Avenue School. It will be led by Special Olympics World Games athletes Laura Cook, Luke Rose and Destiny Sanchez.
South Pasadena’s 33rd annual Festival of Balloons Fourth of July Parade will have the theme “South Pasadena Welcomes the Special Olympics World Games.” It will begin at 11 a.m. at Mission Street and Diamond Avenue.
The Special Olympics World Games will be held from July 25-Aug. 2. It will be the biggest sporting event to be held in the Los Angeles area since the 1984 Olympic Games.
The 67th annual Pacific Palisades Fourth of July Parade will begin at 2 p.m. on Sunset Boulevard, between Via de la Paz and Drummond Street. Its theme is “Palisades Parade: Pride! Passion! Patriotism!”
Businesswoman and longtime Pacific Palisades resident Joyce Brunelle, who submitted the winning entry, said it was inspired by the community’s residents and businessmen and women who volunteer their time on behalf of various projects.
KFI-AM (640) morning show host Bill Handel will be the grand marshal.
Westchester’s 16th annual Fourth of July Parade is scheduled to begin at 11 a.m. and will be held along Loyola Boulevard from Westchester Park to Loyola Marymount University. The theme is “American Beach Party.”
The grand marshal will be Royce Clayton, who was raised in Westchester and played shortstop for 11 Major League Baseball teams from 1991 to 2007.
San Gabriel’s 4th of July Parade will begin at 9:30 a.m. at Mission Elementary School, then head east on Broadway and conclude at Smith Park, where there will be a family picnic and barbecue.
The Valley Village Homeowners Association Fourth of July Parade will begin at Colfax Elementary School at 10 a.m. The parade is billed as a “red, white and blue celebration” where residents are encouraged to create their own floats and displays.
Rep. Brad Sherman, D-Sherman Oaks, will be among the participants.
The parade will conclude at Valley Village Park where the association will provide corn dogs, watermelon, cold drinks and cupcakes.
The 12th annual Great American Kids’ Bike Parade will begin at 10 a.m. at 1 Granada Ave. on the beach bike path in Long Beach.
Sierra Madre’s 4th of July Parade will include children on decorated bicycles, classic cars and a marching band. The 1.3-mile two- hour parade will begin at 10 a.m. at the corner of Sierra Madre Boulevard and Sunnyside Avenue, and travel the length of Sierra Madre Boulevard to Sierra Vista Park.
Former Mayor Clem Bartolai and his wife Nina will be the grand marshal. Clem was a member of the committee that organized the first Fourth of July parade and celebration, was a member of the parks and recreation and planning commissions and a founding member of the Sierra Madre Community Foundation.
Nina has served on the Sierra Community Commission for more than six years. She and her husband were both involved with the Sierra Madre Rose Float Association, Sierra Madre Historical Society and Friends of the Library.
Rosemead’s parade will begin at 10 a.m. at Muscatel Avenue and Valley Boulevard and will include floats, bands, dignitaries and classic cars.
The Sunland-Tujunga Independence Day parade is set to begin at 10 a.m. at Foothill Boulevard and Mt. Gleason Avenue, head west along Foothill Boulevard and end at Sunland Park. Its theme is “Celebrating Our National Forest.” Smokey Bear will be the grand marshal.
Parades marking the 239th anniversary of the nation’s independence will be held Saturday throughout Los Angeles County, with three having a connection to the Special Olympics World Games.
Santa Monica’s ninth annual Fourth of July parade will begin at 9:30 a.m. at Main Street and Pico Boulevard. Its theme is “Inspirational Heroes.” Special Olympics global messenger Will Montgomery will be the grand marshal.
The Holmby Westwood Property Owners Association 4th of July Parade will begin at 10 a.m. at Warner Avenue School. It will be led by Special Olympics World Games athletes Laura Cook, Luke Rose and Destiny Sanchez.
South Pasadena’s 33rd annual Festival of Balloons Fourth of July Parade will have the theme “South Pasadena Welcomes the Special Olympics World Games.” It will begin at 11 a.m. at Mission Street and Diamond Avenue.
The Special Olympics World Games will be held from July 25-Aug. 2. It will be the biggest sporting event to be held in the Los Angeles area since the 1984 Olympic Games.
The 67th annual Pacific Palisades Fourth of July Parade will begin at 2 p.m. on Sunset Boulevard, between Via de la Paz and Drummond Street. Its theme is “Palisades Parade: Pride! Passion! Patriotism!”
Businesswoman and longtime Pacific Palisades resident Joyce Brunelle, who submitted the winning entry, said it was inspired by the community’s residents and businessmen and women who volunteer their time on behalf of various projects.
KFI-AM (640) morning show host Bill Handel will be the grand marshal.
Westchester’s 16th annual Fourth of July Parade is scheduled to begin at 11 a.m. and will be held along Loyola Boulevard from Westchester Park to Loyola Marymount University. The theme is “American Beach Party.”
The grand marshal will be Royce Clayton, who was raised in Westchester and played shortstop for 11 Major League Baseball teams from 1991 to 2007.
San Gabriel’s 4th of July Parade will begin at 9:30 a.m. at Mission Elementary School, then head east on Broadway and conclude at Smith Park, where there will be a family picnic and barbecue.
The Valley Village Homeowners Association Fourth of July Parade will begin at Colfax Elementary School at 10 a.m. The parade is billed as a “red, white and blue celebration” where residents are encouraged to create their own floats and displays.
Rep. Brad Sherman, D-Sherman Oaks, will be among the participants.
The parade will conclude at Valley Village Park where the association will provide corn dogs, watermelon, cold drinks and cupcakes.
The 12th annual Great American Kids’ Bike Parade will begin at 10 a.m. at 1 Granada Ave. on the beach bike path in Long Beach.
Sierra Madre’s 4th of July Parade will include children on decorated bicycles, classic cars and a marching band. The 1.3-mile two- hour parade will begin at 10 a.m. at the corner of Sierra Madre Boulevard and Sunnyside Avenue, and travel the length of Sierra Madre Boulevard to Sierra Vista Park.
Former Mayor Clem Bartolai and his wife Nina will be the grand marshal. Clem was a member of the committee that organized the first Fourth of July parade and celebration, was a member of the parks and recreation and planning commissions and a founding member of the Sierra Madre Community Foundation.
Nina has served on the Sierra Community Commission for more than six years. She and her husband were both involved with the Sierra Madre Rose Float Association, Sierra Madre Historical Society and Friends of the Library.
Rosemead’s parade will begin at 10 a.m. at Muscatel Avenue and Valley Boulevard and will include floats, bands, dignitaries and classic cars.
The Sunland-Tujunga Independence Day parade is set to begin at 10 a.m. at Foothill Boulevard and Mt. Gleason Avenue, head west along Foothill Boulevard and end at Sunland Park. Its theme is “Celebrating Our National Forest.” Smokey Bear will be the grand marshal.
Helium is LEAKING from massive earthquake fault in LA raising fears 'big one' could be more devastating than thought
A huge fault in the Earth's crust near Los Angeles is leaking helium, researchers have found.
They say the unexpected find sheds new light on the Newport-Inglewood Fault Zone in the Los Angeles Basin.
It reveals the fault is far deeper than previously thought, and a quake would be far more devastating.
It follows a report from the U.S. Geological Survey has warned the risk of 'the big one' hitting California has increased dramatically.
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The Newport–Inglewood Fault extends for 75 kilometers (47 mi) from Culver City southeast to Newport Beach at which point the fault trends east-southeast into the Pacific Ocean
UC Santa Barbara geologist Jim Boles found evidence of helium leakage from the Earth's mantle along a 30-mile stretch of the Newport-Inglewood Fault Zone in the Los Angeles Basin.
He claims the results show that the Newport-Inglewood fault is deeper than scientists previously thought.
Using samples of casing gas from two dozen oil wells ranging from LA's Westside to Newport Beach in Orange County, Boles discovered that more than one-third of the sites show evidence of high levels of helium-3 (3He).
'The results are unexpected for the area, because the LA Basin is different from where most mantle helium anomalies occur,' said Boles, professor emeritus in UCSB's Department of Earth Science.
'The Newport-Inglewood fault appears to sit on a 30-million-year-old subduction zone, so it is surprising that it maintains a significant pathway through the crust.'
Considered primordial, 3He is a vestige of the Big Bang, and its only terrestrial source is the mantle.
Boles's findings appear in Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems (G-Cubed), an electronic journal of the American Geophysical Union and the Geochemical Society.
When Boles and his co-authors analyzed the 24 gas samples, they found that high levels of 3He inversely correlate with carbon dioxide (CO2), which Boles noted acts as a carrier gas for 3He.
An analysis showed that the CO2 was also from the mantle, confirming leakage from deep inside the Earth.
Blueschist found at the bottom of nearby deep wells indicates that the Newport-Inglewood fault is an ancient subduction zone - where two tectonic plates collide - even though its location is more than 40 miles west of the current plate boundary of the San Andreas Fault System.
Found 20 miles down, blueschist is a metamorphic rock only revealed when regurgitated to the surface via geologic upheaval.
A scene from the movie San Andreas in which the fault triggers a devastating earthquake in LA, the largest in recorded history
The film sees devastation take over the city as everyone fights to escape the effects of the magnitude 9 quake
A geologic cross section of the Los Angeles Basin from the southwest to northeast. This profile intersects the Newport-Inglewood Fault Zone at Long Beach
'About 30 million years ago, the Pacific plate was colliding with the North American plate, which created a subduction zone at the Newport-Inglewood fault,' Boles explained.
'Then somehow that intersection jumped clear over to the present San Andreas Fault, although how this occurred is really not known.
'This paper shows that the mantle is leaking more at the Newport-Inglewood fault zone than at the San Andreas Fault, which is a new discovery.'
The study's findings contradict a scientific hypothesis that supports the existence of a major décollement — a low-angle thrust fault — below the surface of the LA Basin.
'We show that the Newport-Inglewood fault is not only deep-seated but also directly or indirectly connected with the mantle,' Boles said.
The cylinders Jim Boles used to gather casing gas samples from oil wells along the Newport-Inglewood fault, where he found evidence of helium-3.
'If the décollement existed, it would have to cross the Newport-Inglewood fault zone, which isn't likely,' he added.
'Our findings indicate that the Newport-Inglewood fault is a lot more important than previously thought, but time will tell what the true importance of all this is.'
Researchers analysed the latest data from the state's complex system of active geological faults, as well as new methods for translating these data into earthquake likelihoods.
The estimate for the likelihood that California will experience a magnitude 8 or larger earthquake in the next 30 years has increased from about 4.7% to about 7.0%, they say.
In the new study, the estimate for the likelihood that California will experience a magnitude 8 or larger earthquake in the next 30 years has increased from about 4.7% for UCERF2 to about 7.0% for UCERF3.
'We are fortunate that seismic activity in California has been relatively low over the past century,' said Tom Jordan, Director of the Southern California Earthquake Center and a co-author of the study.
'But we know that tectonic forces are continually tightening the springs of the San Andreas fault system, making big quakes inevitable.
'The UCERF3 model provides our leaders and the public with improved information about what to expect, so that we can better prepare.'
The Third Uniform California Earthquake Rupture Forecast, or UCERF3, improves upon previous models by incorporating the latest data on the state's complex system of active geological faults, as well as new methods for translating these data into earthquake likelihoods.
The study confirms many previous findings, sheds new light on how the future earthquakes will likely be distributed across the state and estimates how big those earthquakes might be.
Compared to the previous assessment issued in 2008, UCERF2, the estimated rate of earthquakes around magnitude 6.7, the size of the destructive 1994 Northridge earthquake, has gone down by about 30 percent.
The expected frequency of such events statewide has dropped from an average of one per 4.8 years to about one per 6.3 years.
However, in the new study, the estimate for the likelihood that California will experience a magnitude 8 or larger earthquake in the next 30 years has increased from about 4.7% for UCERF2 to about 7.0% for UCERF3.
'The new likelihoods are due to the inclusion of possible multi-fault ruptures, where earthquakes are no longer confined to separate, individual faults, but can occasionally rupture multiple faults simultaneously,' said lead author and USGS scientist Ned Field.
'This is a significant advancement in terms of representing a broader range of earthquakes throughout California's complex fault system.'
Two kinds of scientific models are used to inform decisions of how to safeguard against earthquake losses: an Earthquake Rupture Forecast, which indicates where and when the Earth might slip along the state's many faults, and a Ground Motion Prediction model, which estimates the ground shaking given one of the fault ruptures.
The UCERF3 model is of the first kind, and is the latest earthquake-rupture forecast for California. It was developed and reviewed by dozens of leading scientific experts from the fields of seismology, geology, geodesy, paleoseismology, earthquake physics and earthquake engineering.
Lucy Jones, a USGS seismologist and Los angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti's adviser on earthquakes, tweeted Tuesday about the randomness of big quakes.
'This new science doesn't change the bottom line for emergency managers,' she wrote.
'Which one happens in our lifetimes is a random subset.'
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