For millions of California homeowners, Saturday was a day that will live in infamy. Without a single public hearing, the California Assembly passed Assembly Constitutional Amendment No. 8 (ACA 8), the most egregious attack on Prop. 13 ever to come out of the Legislature.

ACA 8 would repeal Prop. 13’s requirement that local “special taxes” (taxes intended for a specific purpose or purposes) be approved by a two-thirds vote. Instead, special taxes imposed for the repayment of local bonded indebtedness would be reduced to 55%. The ostensible justification for ACA 8 is to make it easier to finance local “infrastructure.”

There are several reasons why ACA 8 will inevitably inflict severe harm on California homeowners. First, while state bonds are repaid out of the state’s general fund – into which most Californians contribute through income or sales taxes – the same is not true for local bonds. Local bonds, usually referred to as “general obligation” bonds, are repaid exclusively by property owners. That means that voters who do not own property can vote to raise taxes on those who do.

Second, making it easier to pass local bonds… Read More

Late last week the California Public Safety Voter Guide (managed by Landslide Communications) commissioned a brief survey in the 52nd Congressional District. The poll was conducted by the respected firm NSON out of Utah with calls made to 606 district voters who cast ballots in the last general election, This district includes some of downtown San Diego and takes the coast West and North before jutting inland east of La Jolla. You can see a map here.

Last year wealthy former San Diego City Councilman Scott Peters, a Democrat, defeated incumbent Congressman Brian Bilbray in this seat, by a very narrow margin. Recently former San Diego City Councilman Carl DeMaio, apparently rested up after his marathon campaign for Mayor, announced his candidacy for this seat. As of now he is the only announced GOP candidate.

The survey really only asked a few key questions, and directly tested the issues both of DeMaio being gay, and his support for same-sex marriage. I thought the responses were telling…

Q1. If the… Read More

Today was my version of a nightmare. I woke up to over a hundred emails from (really) early birds letting me know that their browsers were not letting them access the FlashReport — that my site had been infected with a virus! I quickly got a hold of our IT developers with Cloudspace in Orlando. They jumped on it right away, but to make a (very) long short short, even though they got the site squared away in relatively short order, it takes a while before the Gods of the WWW process such things and remove all of the blocks that were people from coming to the site.

I’m pleased to report, at least from the readers perspective, things are AOK now. We still have some work to do on the backside of the site, but that shouldn’t impact your experience. We will re-run today’s original content again tomorrow, in addition to some new stuff.

My apologies for any inconvenience.

… Read More

Board of Equalization Member Michelle Steel will be forced from her post next year due to term limits. She is actively engaged in an impressive campaign for an open seat on the Orange County Board of Supervisors. Two conservative legislators — State Senator Mark Wyland and Assemblywoman Diane Harkey — are the only credible candidates who have emerged thus far seeking to succeed Steel in this “Safe GOP” BOE seat that encompasses all of Orange, San Diego, Imperial, and Riverside Counties, and portions of Los Angeles and San Bernardino Counties.

I have known Mark Wyland since meeting him in 1998, and I met Diane Harkey when she ran for Dana Point City Council in 2004. Both are ideological conservatives — both are friends. As such, I have not endorsed either candidate — either would make a solid BOE Member.a

That having been said, those watching the race may have seen the stories about a lawsuit filed against Point Center Financial Inc., Dan Harkey, and Diane Harkey. The suit involves investors to Point Center Financial, Dan Harkey’s real estate investment company. Like so many during the real estate bust of the past… Read More

The Legislature should be commended for approving an on-time budget and exercising some measure of restraint.

However, the success of this budget hinges on the decisions of a very small number of overtaxed Californians, their continued presence in California and their success in the stock market.

According to the Franchise Tax Board, the highest one percent of income earners will pay more than $2 billion less in 2013 than 2012. That’s not surprising. A recent survey found 75 percent of affluent Californians are planning actions to reduce their tax liabilities—and a quarter are considering moving out-of-state.

It’s troubling that the volatile personal income tax accounts for 63 percent of budget revenue. Just one percent of California taxpayers now provide nearly half of all income tax payments the state receives.

You can’t tax your way to prosperity. To create true budget stability, California must attract jobs and investment to our state rather than drive them away.… Read More

The Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court is paid $223,500 per year, while the General Manager of the Bay Area Rapid Transit District is paid $318,000 a year. That might seem like an imbalance of pay for public servants, given the very serious qualifications required to become a Chief Justice and comparing the responsibilities involved for the BART manager. It is a fact that the General Manager of BART must manage a huge agency. But the fact is she and her predecessors happen to be managing BART very badly. The agency is $3 billion in debt and later this month its contracts with four fairly rowdy public employee unions will expire, putting BART’s awful management and pay policies squarely in the public eye.

And out of touch BART GM Grace Crunican is not setting the stage very well for these critical union negotiations, where give backs should be on the agenda rather than pay increases at the financially crippled agency, whose salaries are already grossly bloated and whose underfunded pension liabilities… Read More

California’s nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s Office estimates that the state will enjoy an unexpected $4.4 billion tax revenue gain through June 2014. If you think that means a tax cut in your future, think again. Politicians already have plans to spend it, laying the groundwork for the next huge budget deficit.

The revenue gain resulted from three factors: increased state capital-gains taxes from California residents who sold investments at the end of 2012 to avoid the higher federal taxes that took effect January 1, when… Read More

Democrat State Sen. Ron Calderon returned to work this week, just a few days after FBI agents raided his Capitol office and removed numerous boxes in what was at least the appearance of an extensive criminal investigation. It sure wasn’t spring cleaning.

Perhaps you may be thinking you missed the wall-to-wall news coverage and breathless newspaper reporters pursuing this story with Watergate-like zeal. Well, don’t bother to go to Google now – you didn’t miss much.

Showing the absolute minimum journalistic curiosity, the Capitol press corps hasn’t had much to say about this and even less to report. No matter your politics, this is a disappointing shortfall of public information.

Too harsh an assessment? After being… Read More