Free MTA rides for a week?

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has asked MTA staff to determine the cost of offering a free transit week on regional bus and rail lines. MTA ridership is up 7.3% versus last year, from 1.5 million in June 2005 to 1.6 million this June. Part of that increase is due to the nearly 20,000 daily boarding on the Orange Line. The mayor notes that a similar program up in the Bay Area caused a 10% spike in ridership during the free week, although the article does not detail whether or not this was sustained. Full story

More of the noxious but legal from Rep. Lewis

Jerry Lewis is back in the papers again. It turns that not only did he and his wife invest in the Security Bank of California, so did his campaign committee, to the tune of $25,000. This came on the same day the Lewises made their $22,000 investment. Full story

CA Assn. of Realtors is afraid of the market

Which means you should be too. California Association of Realtors chief economist, Leslie Appleton-Young, is no longer using the term "soft landing" to describe the market's future. The Association is dropping its sale forecast from a 2% decline in sales this year to a 16.8% decline. The new term: "a fairly significant shakeout".

Of course, irrational exuberance still rules for those hoping to get into the market. The Department of Real Estate reports that in May the number of agents in the state broke 500,000 for the first time, leaving one agent for every 55 adults. Full LA Times story

Of course, for those of us looking to break into the market, it will take some pretty significant price declines to cancel out the comparatively higher interest rates.

In related news, a Diamond Bar man was found guilty in the November 1st shooting of a real estate agent going door to door to drum up business. The shooter claimed he confused the agent with a man he had had a previous altercation with, thinking this justified the use of his shotgun. Full SGV Tribune story

Restaurant Thefts on the rise in the other Valley

According to the LA Times, the San Fernando Valley has seen rapid growth in the number of armed robberies of local eateries, perhaps triggered by tighter bank security measures. Full story

Arnold Says I'm Not Bush

Governor Schwarzenegger drew a clear distinction between himself and President Bush when he directed the state to loan $150 million to the California Institute of Regenerative Medicine, created by voters through Proposition 71 in 2004 (59% yes vote). The CIRM was created to fund stem cell research using bond money, which is currently held up in court. Full story

LA Times Covers Rapid Increase In Rent

We've all seen numerous stories about the continued and rapid increase in the cost of residential property. The Times takes a different tact today, writing about the rapid recent rise in the cost of rental housing. Full story

Contribute, or no referral

Beverly Hills workers' comp attorney Lawrence Stern has landed in the papers for threatening in a June 26 e-mail to not refer his clients to doctors who had failed to contribute at least $2,500 to the election campaign of Phil Angelides. Stern urged the recipients of the e-mail (known as Agreed Medical Examiners) to "stand shoulder to shoulder and to reach into their pockets, if necessary sell their Mercedes or not buy a new one for another year and help us get rid of Arnold". Full story

P3/HOT Update

CW Managing Editor John Howard updates us on public-private partnership and high-occupancy tolling legislation and projects. Particular item of interest: Australian investment firm Macquarie, which has financed toll projects worldwide, has retained Capitol Strategies as its Sacramento lobbyists, despite some public comments by one of its executives at last year's Mobility 21 conference that indicated California was not of interest to the company due to significant legal barriers. Full story

List of players

CW lists the key transportation players in Sacramento. Unfortunately, none of them is from the SGV. Full list

Lowenthal Opines Too

Senator Alan Lowenthal has a goods-movement related editorial in Capitol Weekly as well, outlining some of our problems (worst congestion, high housing pricies, severe under investment in infrastructure, etc.) and listing the good works the legislature has done to correct this deficiency (Prop 1A and the bonds). Lowenthal also puts in a plug for his container fee bill (SB 760) under the make the polluter pay rubric. Full story

Oropeza Editorial

Jenny Oropeza editorializes on the danger of diesel emissions. Full story

Some forward movement on high speed rail?

According to Capitol Weekly, momentum is going in the right direction for the California High-Speed Rail Authority, despite the fact that the appearance of the bond to build it has been delayed until 2008. The Authority received its full request of $14.3 million in the new budget, allowing it to proceed with needed design and planning work. The granting of the request also indicates increased gubernatorial and legislative support for the project. Full story

Investment Guidance In A Time of Crisis?

Slate columnist Daniel Gross writes about a new Citigroup index designed to measure Geopolitical risks. Full story

Irwindale To Be In Court Over Eminent Domain

Tim Simpson claims the city violated his rights when he was forced to relocate for a low-income housing complex. The City previously paid him over $10,000 to relocate from the mobile home he had been living in. Full story

Temple City Approves Mall Development

The City Council approved the developer's tract map, including a controversial 52 condominium units (average size, 900 sq ft). The Piazza Las Tunas mall will include over 100,000 sq ft of retail, specialty retail, and dining. Full story

Singhal Reinstated

Baldwin Park's City Council reinstated chief executive officer Vijay Singhal, taking him off administrative leave. Full story

In a word . . . disgusting

According to the Washington Post, the US Departement of Agriculture came up with an innovate way to relieve the suffering of farmers impacted by a Plains state drought in 2003: they released powdered milk stockpiled as part of a price support program, expecting that recipients would feed the milk to their livestock. Instead, farmers took the powdered milk (about 400 million tons, which would later sell for hundreds of dollars a ton) and sold it to brokers who flooded the domestic and international markets with the stuff. Full story

Maryland "Wal-Mart" Bill Struck Down In Court

Many of you may recall Maryland's bill mandating that employers of 10,000+ (i.e.: Wal-Mart) spend 8% of its payroll on employee healthcare or reimburse the state for any deficiency in its spending. The campaign spawned many copycat bills across the country, including a few here in California. This trend suffered a serious setback today in federal court, when a judge struck the bill down, ruling that it violates a federal law (the Employment Retirement Income Security Act) designed to guarantee universal healthcare requirements for multi-state employers. Full story

Walters Admonishes Sacramento Kings

Dan Walters takes a shot at proposed public financing of a new stadium for the Sacramento Kings. In the draft deal, a 0.25% county sales tax generating $60 million a year would pay for 3/4 of the construction costs, with the ownership group picking up the rest. Walters is right in lampooning the proposed tax structure (" A tax in Sacramento, raising about $60 million a year, would burden the poor to finance entertainment for those affluent enough to afford inflated Kings ticket prices", he writes) for this purpose, while also rightly lambasting the lack of any real public benefit arising from the new stadium.

Given all of the conflicting demands for municipalities and counties, its hard to imagine that the best use for a $60 million/year revenue in Sacramento is subsidized stadium construction (transportation infrastructure anyone?). But even if one offers that subsidizing new business facilities is ideal, I think there's plenty of new businesses you could work to attract that would do a whole lot more for the average citizen in terms of new job opportunities (i.e.: a relocated auto parts plant, for instance, with lots of assembly-line jobs vs. a stadium with a handful of players making most of the money and everyone else taking tickets for minimum wage). And if the goal is to make downtown more attractive, how about increased policing, new homeless shelters, or beautification of existing structures? All of these would do a lot more to make downtown Sacramento more attractive than building a new stadium.

One would hope that Sacramento would be wise enough to resist subsidizing the retailization of urban economies in California with taxpayer dollars. But perhaps not.

Full story

Angelides Attacks Guv On Power Issue

Angelides accused the Governor of playing "Russian roulette" with California's energy supplies by failing to attract new power plants to the state. Personally, I'd have to say I'm a bit skeptical on this one: while fewer than 1,000 MW of capacity are under construction, 30 projects totalling over 11,000 MW of capacity are in the permitting stages. While I'd be more than happy to see some permitting standards relaxed, I doubt that Angelides would seriously endorse the CEQA/permitting changes that would be necessary to expedite power plant construction. Full story

LA Times On Nogales, Mexico

The Times focuses on a new aspect to the immigration debate: social deterioration in border towns like Nogales, Mexico that play host to penniless immigrants caught in the US and deported. Full story

Opportunity Lost?

The Ventura County Star covers one of the more under-examined aspects of our Governor's tenure: the refusal or lack of will to use his star power and political capital to move the Republican party to the center. Full story

Steve Lopez Editorializes on Prop 89

Prop 89, on the November ballot, would create public financing of state political campaigns, while also placing significant limits on business contributions to initiative campaigns. Now, public campaign financing is a complicated wonkish topic with good arguments on sides. However, this relatively popular appeal has been shackled to a severe anti-business limit, which allows corporations to put only up to $10,000 into campaigns for or against a particular initiative. Given the large-dollar campaigns which routinely target specific and limited industries, this would give impacted companies little to no opportunity to debate these measures on the campaign trail (Proposition 87, taxing California oil producers, is an example: only a handful of oil companies produce oil from California wells, so instead of raising a few million dollars to combat this threat to their industry, producers would be able to raise and spend only tens of thousands of dollars in opposition-a huge swing). Of course, no similar limits are placed upon unions, who can continue to fund initiatives with impunity.

Now, some unions are also opposed to Prop 89, which was placed on the ballot by another union (the California Nurses Association), but for different reasons. Public financing of campaigns will severely reduce their ability to play kingmaker in Democratic primaries.

Unfortunately, Lopez (whose columns I usually rather like) diagnoses all opposition as simply opposition to a loss of influence and as a threat to the pay-to-play style that rules Sacramento. Now, there is some truth to this, but important nuances (admittedly more than a single column may have room to cover) differentiate why certain groups oppose this measure. And of course, an increase of business taxes by $200,000,000 a year to pay for it hardly increases the attractiveness of the measure.

I think its also worth noting that contrary to Lopez's assertions, many businesses would favor significant but fair reforms to campaign finance. No business glories in being constatly hit up for cash; it adds to their cost of doing business without providing any guaranteed investment, hardly a good business investment. However, lopsided reform with clear and unequal losers is not the way to go.

Full Lopez column

State Continues Crack Down On Tax Cheats

Chalk up one victory for the latest state budget: the Board of Equalization was allocated 20 clerks to sift through online cigarette retailers' invoices and figure out which California residents were forgetting to pay the state its excise and use taxes. The investigation will examine 450,000 sales invoices and 65,000 shipping invoices. This comes as voters will consider Proposition 86 will increase excise taxes from 87 cents a pack to $2.60, and follows recent Board of Equalization investigations into sales tax evasion on big-ticket items (think art purchased at a Christie's auction in New York) and an income tax evasion program designed to catch California residents trying to shelter income in Utah and other states. Full story (SacBee)

Jerry Lewis Caught In Awkward But Legal Investment

Rep. Jerry Lewis of Redlands was invited to invest in the Security Bank of California before its opening in June 2005. Lewis purchased shares worth $22,000 on May 27. Little more than a year later, that stake is now valued at about $60,000. Lewis complied with all disclosure requirements, and everything seems to be above board. But the appearance of impropriety still lurks. Press-Enterprise article

Glendora Land Swap Turmoil Continues

The Trib editorializes on the City Council's removal of Planning Commissioner Jack Stoughton's removal from his appointed position. Full story

LA Times Covers Claremont Politics?

The Times weighs in on an ongoing dispute in Claraboya over the removal of some flags on the 4th of July (there's the draw!). The flags incorporated advertising for a real estate agent, while the remover is the head of the local homeowners' association. Full story

Tunnel Boring Machines

The Press-Enterprise details TBMs beinig used by Metropolitan Water to bore through the San Bernardino Mountains. Similar technologies would be used to create either a tunnel along the 91 Freeway between Corona and Irvine, or a tunnel completing the 710 gap. Full article

Skelton Discusses Industrial Hemp Bill

Full column

MG To Be Resurrected In OK

Chinese corporate parent Nanjing Automotible is bringing an MG plant to Oklahoma. Production could start as early as 2008. Full story

For Humor: Lawsuit Filed in NY Over Schools Cellphone Ban

Full story

Walters Update on Cirriculum Fights

Dan Walters' column updates us on two state bills regulating cirriculum. General conclusion: even if they pass, the Governor will use his veto to kill them. Full column

Feds Push For Offshore Drilling; CA Straps Dennis Hastert to Front of New Exxon Supertanker

Full report on CA animus towards proposed changes in offshore drilling law

Camejo Goes to the FPPC

Green Party gubernatorial candidate Peter Camjeo filed a Fair Political Practices Commission complaint against the Survey and Policy Research Institute. Why? Their June polling asked voters whether they would vote for Arnold or Angelides in November, failing to mention the four minor party candidates who will be on the ballot. According to Camejo, the SPRI is engaging in unlawful partisan promotion of the two candidates. Full story

Risky Business at CalSTRS

CalSTRS, the giant State Teachers' Retirement System, is shifting $11 billion, or 7.8% of its $140 billion portfolio to riskier investments in high-rise and industrial development, as well as "fast-growing startup companies" and private equity. The hope is to close a current long-term gap of about $20 billion in liabilities. CalSTRS: your new angel investor! Full story

MCGMAP Update

On July 26th, the MCGMAP will be reconvening its Stakeholder Advisory Group to discuss an unreleased draft technical memo on the "Economic Costs and Benefit of Growth in Goods Movement" (TM 5A in the overall process). The meeting will take place at the Buena Park City Council Chambers, beginning at 10:00.

SacBee Shocked To Learn Oil Lobby Has Sway Even In CA

Full story

US Capitol Historical Society Honors Duke Cunningham?

Good for a laugh

CHP Overtime Scandal In The Making?

Much ink has been spilled in the last year by monetary abuses within the University of California system. The SacBee ran an article today suggesting that the Highway Patrol may be in for the same treatment. Bee writer John Hill obtained an e-mail detailed intentional lax granting of overtime in the CHP's Valley Division, a change which coincides nicely with the end of the budget year. Fran Clader, CHP's spokeswoman, denies that the profligate use of overtime was intended to use up the budget; instead, she claims that the CHP conserves some OT money throughout the year for emergencies and spends the balance at the end of each year on beefing up core services. Which sounds suspiciously like trying to use up the OT budget to avoid cuts . . . Full story

Governor To Push Term Limits/Redistricting Reform?

It looks like we've come full circle to exactly where we before the 2005 special election: redistricting reform by itself isn't going to fly, so the only way to pass them is to throw in term limits reform. Fortunately, this time around, the Governor is willing to play the game in order to get redistricting reform through the Legislature and onto the ballot. LA Times story

Prop 90 Background

Proposition 90 (the anti-eminent domain initiative) was placed on the November ballot by a committee whose primary source of money is a $1.5 million donation from something called the Fund for Democracy out of New York City. Capitol Weekly now has the background on Howard Rich, the donor behind the group. Full story

Landfill Sale In West Covina

The West Covina City Council approved the sale of 4 acres of land to the Charles Co. for $1 million, with Charles Co. also being required to invest $4.3 million in infrastructure projects in West Covina. No specific plan has yet been announced; the general use is currently "0ffice-commercial retail." Full story