Citing a lack of civil rights and social inequities as what is wrong with California public schools, Gov. Jerry Brown vowed Wednesday at a Capitol press conference to give more money to the K-12 school districts that serve poorer students and English-language learners.

Brown said state funding needs to balance social equity and restore school funding cuts; and provide supplemental funding to children in high-poverty schools.

Following passage of Proposition 30 last November, raising taxes $6 billion, Brown’s controversial plan to shift money from wealthier schools to poor ones is a result of an emboldened Democratic supermajority.

Lawmakers and the governor are clearly preparing for the state’s looming June 15 budget deadline, with Brown working hard to get his proposal passed. Earlier this week, state Senate Democrats announced they had their own education funding… Read More

Few would argue the importance of the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965 (VRA), legislation passed by Republicans in Congress, though signed by Democrat President Lyndon Johnson. The Act applied a nationwide prohibition against the denial or abridgement of the right to vote through among other things intimidation, suppression, literacy tests and poll taxes.

However, the Act also requires minority congressional and legislative districts be drawn with at least 50% minority voting age population in certain jurisdictions, and has contributed to the fracture between Republicans and minority voters.

Consider this: The redistricting tool which forces “majority-minority districts” compacts more minority voters into a district, while increasing the number of white voters in another. This limits the influence minority voters have in those districts by increasing the white percentage of the voters. In short, the VRA puts minority voters in one district and white voters in another, thus creating a political segregation.

It is not unheard of, and in fact, well-documented for Republican legislators to ally with black Democrats to gerrymander state and federal… Read More

SACRAMENTO — Driver’s licenses for illegal immigrants is back on the table and making its way through the Capitol once again. But this latest bill asserts a licensed driver is a safer driver, based on a new California Department of Motor Vehicles study.

The study, “Fatal Crash Rates for Suspended/Revoked and Unlicensed Drivers,” found that, compared to licensed drivers, suspended or revoked and unlicensed drivers are nearly three times more likely to cause a fatal crash.

Supporters of issuing driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants have jumped… Read More

Yesterday I penned a column on the FlashReport, concerned about a proposal coming before the Irvine city council that would have raised most of the fees charged by the city for everything you can imagine. The staff report estimated the annual increase in fee revenues for approving these increases to be well north of a million bucks a year.

I am very pleased to report that tonight the new Republican majority in the city not only rejected the proposal to raise all of these fees (after the two Democrats on the Council, Beth Krom and Larry Agran, spoke in support of hiking them), but on a substitute motion from Councilmember Christina Shea and supported by her colleagues Mayor Steven Choi and Councilmember Jeff Lalloway, all of the fee increases were defeated, and in some cases fee reductions were made.

This is a sharp contrast to the tax and spend mentality that dominated the Irvine Council for a full decade. Congratulations to the Republican Majority in Irvine, and to everyone who played a role in bringing this reality to fruition.… Read More

“Jennifer Muir, a spokeswoman for the Orange County Employees’ Association, which represents more than 18,000 public employees in Orange County, said the California Public Policy Center’s study was a politically motivated attack on public employees and unions.Aside from promoting the center’s anti-public employee union agenda, Muir said, the reports are misleading and shift focus away from the discussions that matter most. Union leaders have long urged for people to consider the possibility that private-industry employees are being undercompensated and should receive retirement benefits and health coverage.” Orange County Register, April 19, 2013

The study Muir refers to, entitled “Irvine, California – City Employee Compensation Analysis,” was published on April 8th, 2013, by the California Public Policy Center. To call this study“a politically motivated attack on public employees and unions,”as Muir alleges, is itself a distraction. It’s easy, and necessary, to impugn the motives behind information when the… Read More

Last weekend the California College Republicans held their annual convention in Berkeley. With nearly 250 students representing 27 chapters turnout was strong. Nithin Mathew was unanimously elected State Chairman, and the remainder of his slate was elected as well. Nithin previously served as the executive director of the CRs.

Accompanied by Republican National Committeeman Shawn Steel, the College Republicans led a successful march across the UC Berkeley campus – rallying students against the ever-increasing “fees” in the UC and CSU systems. Speakers at the convention included California Republican Party Chairman Jim Brulte, Vice Chairwoman Harmeet Dhillon, UC Berkeley Law Professor John Yoo, former Lt. Governor and Gubernatorial candidate Abel Maldonado, and other GOP leaders.

College campuses – particularly the University of California campuses – have not been particularly friendly to Republican candidates over the past few elections. It’s important that each university and college have a strong GOP presence to help organize, help spread the Republican message, and help point out bias.

… Read More

Last week I commissioned a poll to measure voter attitudes regarding the proposed Arena in downtown Sacramento- the third time since 2006 that we have polled on this issue.

The Mayor has called this Arena deal the most important issue in the history of the city; the Sacramento Bee has devoted more column inches to it than any other issue this year; it has received more local TV news coverage than the Benghazi attacks, Gosnell murder trial, Medicare cuts, State Parks budget scandal, and the looming city, county and schools pension crises – combined.

It’s that important – yet, no one thought to ask voters how they feel?

Polling is a tool commonly used by campaigns, government, media, business and public policy groups to measure public opinion. But oddly, there has been little, if any, polling done on this issue – at least none that has been publicly released. Until now.

Funny thing is – some folks seem positively offended that we asked voters about how they feel.

The survey was unbiased, simple and straight forward… Read More

Republicans have not been very good this year developing a Legislative Strategy. Legislation coming out of the State Senate elections committee is constitutionally toxic, with the Senate Republican Caucus in some cases just giving up the store. Republicans need a strategy to deal with the mountain of bad election-related bills being imposed by the Democrat super-majority. And one great idea that would put Republicans in front of Democrats with tech-savvy voters is allowing the qualification of statewide initiative, referendum and recall measures by online secure digital signature.

Why not? California has already enacted an online voter registration (“OVR”) system. According to one account, the OVR system greatly boosted registration in the 2012 general election, including adding 500,000 new Democrats to the voter rolls, which must have played a role in the huge success of Democrats in the last election. Democrats are inclined to expand and improve OVR, as it appears to be a success. So why not expand the same idea to include the manner in which initiative, referendum and recall petitions are signed and collected? A secure, online digital system… Read More