Vida Wright and Cheryl Bly-Chester, two minority owned, small business owners, bid a contract with Caltrans to administer the education and mentoring program for the Disadvantaged Business Enterprise program. They complied with the rules of the process, spent hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars preparing their Request For Proposal, and they qualify as a DBE. But they lost the contract by tenths of a point after Caltrans employees changed the documents of the incumbent contractor, as well as the scoring on the incumbent contractor bid, so Caltrans could award it to the incumbent.

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Sorry but you would all be crying like a little b**** if the cops and firefighters that earn every penny they get in retirement were not there when your perfect make believe world falls apart so shut the f*** up. Until you do the job you have no idea what you are talking about. – Comment onFacebook.com/CalPolicyCenterpost, June 3, 2015

This comment, made by a California police supervisor onto the Facebook page of our organization, graphically encapsulateswhat is entirely understandable resentment on the part of public servants to a new reality – their pay and benefits are being exposed to public debate. It would be easy to dismiss this comment as inappropriate, or to merely characterize it as an example of public sector arrogance. But that would be a huge mistake.

Compared to the lives most of us are privileged to lead, public safety employees endure unrelenting stress. While it is important to be honest about rates of police and firefighter mortality and job related disabilities, the fact that many other jobs carrygreaterrisk of death or injury does not… Read More

Last week, Gov. Jerry Brown said California has an overpopulation problem. He said the ongoing drought is a sure sign that the explosion of population in California has reached the limit of what Nature can provide.

“We are altering this planet with this incredible power of science, technology and economic advance,” Brown said during a discussion with Austin Beutner, publisher and chief executive of the Los Angeles Times and the San Diego Union-Tribune.“If California is going to have 50 million people, they’re not going to live the same way the native people lived, much less the way people do today.… You have to find a more elegant way of relating to material things. You have to use… Read More

Last Friday, Gov. Jerry Brown’s State Water Resources Control Board ordered junior water right holders to stop diversions of water in order to protect more senior water rights and “releases of previously stored water.” Friday’s announcement only targets those whose rights have been held since 1903. Senior water right holders in the affected watersheds who staked their claims earlier than that year can continue to divert water. And so can environmentalists who together with the Bureau of Reclamation, have been letting millions of gallons of water out of dams so a few fish can migrate to the Pacific Ocean.

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In its more than 160 plus year history, few things have remained constant in California. However, since the 1800’s California has taxed all classes of property the same.

Thus, when the iconic Prop 13 passed in 1978, it did not differentiate between different kinds of property. All real property – whether residential or commercial – was bestowed with the benefits of a reasonable one percent tax rate cap and, just as importantly, a two percent limit in the annual increase in taxable value.

In 1978, the predominant fear permeating California was an exploding tax burden that was forcing people out of their homes. The one percent rate cap was important, of course, but a rate cap by itself does nothing to control a property tax bill that is based on the “market value” of one’s home. If market values double – as they frequently do in an overheated real estate market – then property owners remain vulnerable to wild fluctuations when tax time comes around.

To read the entire column click here… Read More

The Brookings, South Dakota volunteer fire department

(“Click” photo to enlarge) California’s overpaid, overpensioned firefighters love to claim they merit their astronomical compensation packages because of the risks they take.They have no answer when I point out thatthe average California firefighter is paid 60% more than paid firefighters in other 49 states. Meanwhile the CA 2011 median household income (including government workers) is only 13.4% above the national average.

www.tinyurl.com/CA-ff-and-cop-pay

In 1995, as Vice Chair of the Health Committee, I had the opportunity to participate in then Governor Pete Wilson’s package of education bills, specifically the bill requiring students to receive mandatory vaccinations as a condition of going to school. Prior to then, California had no such requirement, and, quite frankly, communicable disease in the schools was not a big problem. I negotiated a compromise with the Democrats and Governor Wilson agreeing to the mandatory vaccinations, as long as parents had an opt-out opportunity. I believed then (and believe now) a state that believes in freedom owed its citizens the freedom to not have to be forced to take drugs, any drugs, vaccinations or otherwise. Governor Wilson agreed, and the mandatory vaccination law took effect, with the parental conscience clause a compromise. When we consider that we had no law before that, and a conscience clause for the last 20 years without rampant communicable disease, I would say the compromise worked well.

Within the last year, we saw 10 cases of measles at Disneyland (hardly a typical school venue), and the whole world thought our children were going to die. Based on 10 cases… Read More

In 1992, Congress passed the 340B Drug Discount Program to help veterans, the uninsured and indigent patients get the prescription medicines they needed but could not afford. The new law required pharmaceutical manufacturers to provide significant discounts to medical clinics and qualifying hospitals as a condition of their drugs being covered by Medicaid. The clinics and hospitals had to meet certain criteria and serve charity patients in order to have access to the program.

But today, some large hospitals are profiting from the program by keeping the 340B discounts for themselves, while providing very little charity care to the intended patients.

What happened?

Since the Affordable Care Act was passed (Obamacare), the 340B drug program has… Read More