Assemblymen Jose Solorio and Chuck DeVore have teamed up on a piece of legislation that helps school districts teach students English.

Solorio (D – Santa Ana) is the author and DeVore (R – Irvine) is a co-author of AB 1177. I remember when kids who spoke another language in the home took ESL classes (English as a Second Language). Now the varnacular is English Learners (EL). Regardless of the label, Solorio’s legislation would provide state funds for school districts that have more than 50% EL students to go above and beyond to make sure they learn English before they graduate 8th grade.

I like the legislation for several reasons beyond the fact that it aims to teach English to kids. 1) it is a pilot program, 2) it includes a provision for independent review and 3) it sunsets in 2015.… Read More

With a h/t to Bob Salladay at the L.A. Times Political Muscle blog, here is a list of Governor Mitt Romney’s California Finance Co-Chairman – pretty impressive:

Scott Baugh, Former Assembly Republican Leader, Orange County Dick Boyce, Partner, Texas Pacific Group, San Francisco David Bradford, CEO, OWNLI, Orange County Jonathan Bullen, CEO/President, Eagle State College Group, San Diego Malin Burnham, Chairman, Burnham Real Estate, San Diego Kelly Burt, Chairman and CEO, Price Self Storage, San Diego Roger Carter, Investments, Morgan Stanley, San Francisco Rick J. Caruso, President and CEO, Caruso Affiliated, Los Angeles Mark Chapin Johnson, President and CEO, Chapin Medical Company, Orange County John Clarey, Chairman, RF Comsites, Orange County Robert Day, Chairman, Trust Company of the West, Los Angeles Bill Draper, General Partner, Draper Richards L.P., San Francisco Steven Fink, CEO, Lawrence Investments, Los Angeles Bradford M. Freeman, … Read More

New Blog: I know my loyal readers here on the Flash Report will be interested to know that I have a new blog on townhall.com known as the Green Eyeshade Blog. In my new role as chair of the Budget and Spending Taskforce for the RSC I will be posting a lot of information about fiscal matters before Congress on that blog. I’ll still be posting here on the FlashReport about many other issues and things related to California politics.

American Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights: In 34 of the last 38 years, the federal government has spent more money than it received in taxes. That’s through congresses controlled by both parties and presidents of both parties and every combination thereof. When the budget of 2008 is written, it will be 35 out of 39 years. Spending has run amok on every front – entitlements, earmarks, everything. In spite of the tax cuts of 2001 and 2003, revenue to the federal government constitutes about the same percentage of the economy as it has since 1960. I’ve told you before that the majority… Read More

Barbara Alby has been the elected Republican National Committeewoman from California since 1996, and she penned this important perspective piece. It shares her take on this notion that non-Republicans should be included in the upcoming Republican Presidential primary in California… CAVEAT EMPTOR WHEN DECIDING TO CHANGE THE RULES TO ALLOW DTS VOTERS TO SELECT CRP DELEGATES TO THE NATIONAL CONVENTION! Here we go again: another scheme to save us. Should we risk changing our CRP Rules to allow the Decline to State (DTS) voter to help rule us? This is one of those times when I can’t help but jump in on the debate. … Read More

Democrat OC Assemblyman Jose Solorio has introduced legislation that would give OC cities more of their fair share of Proposition 42 transportation funds.

The twist is that the money would come from the county’s share, not from other parts of the state.

It is well known that Orange County is major ‘donor county’. But not many people know that Orange County’s cities are not getting back their fair share of monies for street and roadway improvements from the county.

Solorio’s AB 823 simply urges the County of Orange to allocate more funds to the cities for roadway improvements. Santa Ana, Garden Grove and Anaheim collectively have $700 million in backlogs for arterial and residential street improvements. At the same time, the County of Orange has over $100 million in road fund reserves.

The county ought to be commended for banking these funds for a rainy day. But they also need to share the love. Here’s why: State formulas assume that the county maintains 25% of roadways while cities maintained the other 75% in the county.

FACT: The County of Orange actually only maintains 7.4% of county… Read More

Barbara Alby has been the elected Republican National Committeewoman from California since 1996, and she penned this important perspective piece. It shares her take on this notion that non-Republicans should be included in the upcoming Republican Presidential primary in California…

CAVEAT EMPTOR WHEN DECIDING TO CHANGE THE RULES TO ALLOW DTS VOTERS TO SELECT CRP DELEGATES TO THE NATIONAL CONVENTION!

Here we go again: another scheme to save us. Should we risk changing our CRP Rules to allow the Decline to State (DTS) voter to help rule us? This is one of those times when I can’t help but jump in on the debate.

Some are suggesting that there may still be time to change the CRP Rules to allow DTS voters to “help us” select our California delegates to the next Republican National Convention. To comply safely with the RNC Rules, we would need to make that… Read More

Vicky Murray with the Pacific Research Institute penned the following analysis as a new studies are being released… I can’t say it better than she…

Getting Down to Facts, a report billed as the most extensive review to date of California public education, is scheduled for release this week, with results from public-school efficiency on Wednesday and funding adequacy on Thursday. Already there is room for doubt whether the top-secret report does indeed get down to facts or merely recycles familiar political themes. The report fulfils a bi-partisan request for research to inform education reform efforts. Results were privately released in January to select … Read More

Given John McCain’s clear disdain for the growth in government spending under the GOP Senate and Congress, (see the video at the bottom of this post), I don’t understand what appears to be a systematic avoidance of all of the places where conservatives, collectively, are meeting. If McCain cannot figure out how to embrace the base of the Party, his quest for the nomination will be a short one. And if you avoid the respected leaders of the Party’s base, over and over, establishing that key dialogue and winning support will be very, very difficult:

From today’s Wall Street Journal Political Diary E-mail (with the video clip I reference below it):

Playing Hooky

Senator John McCain has raised the ire of his erstwhile media fans by appearing to pander too much to conservatives.… Read More