This past Thursday, the Modesto Bee ran an article about Steven Edwards, a parolee and convicted sex offender accused of stalking a young girl. Thanks to his GPS monitoring device, it was easy to prove Edwards had been within 500 meters of the victim’s home and school.

The story clearly illustrates why the safeguards provided by Jessica’s Law, such as requiring GPS monitoring devices and not allowing sex offenders to live closer than 2,000 feet of a school, are so important. In the article, Prosecutor Annette Rees hits the nail on the head when she says, "Here is a case where the mandatory GPS tracking of sex offenders literally prevented further victimization and helped up put away a very scary individual."

Along these same lines, I recently introduced a piece of legislation, SB 1452, that would give local law enforcement the power to require non-revocable parolees to wear GPS devices while they are on parole.

The kind of technology provided through GPS can be a very effective tool in the hands of law enforcement. In this case, I am thankful… Read More

The Tax Man Cometh: I am sure most of you loyal readers of this missive do not need a reminder, butyesterdaywas April 15, and you know what that means…Tax Day. If you think your taxes are bad now…you need to take a look at the lists below.

Tax Increases Enacted since January 2009

This list, totaling more than $670 billion in tax increases includes the Health Care Bill, SCHIP, the Stimulus Package, and several other pieces of legislation which have been signed into law by President Obama.

Pending Tax Increases if Congress Takes no Action

2010:

Every night at midnight I get an e-mail from Scott Lay at ElectionTrack.com. Many of you may know Scott from around the Capitol or from the Community College circuit.

If you are interests in politics his daily e-mail at midnight will give you an idea of how money in moving around the state. Personally, I look at it every night before I go to bed.

The e-mail which is free — tells you all the contribution required to be reported in the 24 hour reporting cycle. You can sign up at www.electiontrack.com

The other night I was looking at my e-mall on my blackberry as I was walking upstairs and noticed that Forest City Residential was nice enough to give Jerry Brown $10,000. That was similar enough to the name of Forest City Residential West that is the company name for Kevin Ratner that serves on the Board of Directors of the California State Chamber of Commerce. He is one of the four people that signed the letter regarding pulling the ad off the air that was critical of the Attorney General.

What was great is that when I went to the Board of Directors for Forest City I found that seven of them… Read More

In my last blog about the California Small Business Association I asked President Betty Jo Toccoli to respond to my question about how legislators were chosen for various awards given out by her organization. Her response, which I found a bit witty in the first paragraph, is here – unedited and without my editorializing. Agree or disagree with one another, I respect her addressing the issue (is that editorializing?).

Dear Mr. Dichiara: CSBA has a long history of working with all parties. This is a deeply rooted tenant of CSBA’s philosophy. Getting Democrats, along with Republicans, to care about small business issues is an important goal of our organization and critical for the future of small business in California. I can understand that you have a different view as a Republican Party campaign consultant. At the same time, many Democrats are livid with CSBA for supporting the effort to delay AB32 and releasing a study showing that the regulatory costs of the program could be significant. We must be doing… Read More

What a difference a year makes. Last year the Tea Partiers could barely gain notice on local TV stations and newspapers. They were dismissed as irrelevent and merelya tool of the Republican Party.

One year later, the Tea Party movement has flourished in numbers and grown in strength. Now the media is taking the movement serious. Even the Capitol’s paper of record included a pre-event story on the front page, "above the fold." (I may not agree with the story but the placement shows how important the movement has become).

Congratulations to my Tea Party friends. I applaud and support their efforts. They have bravely challenged the status quo and questioned the Sacramento establishment.

They didn’t walk away when liberals dismissed them as a fad, or when political pundits downplayed the attendance numbers at Tea Party events.

The good news is now the media and politicos are listening. Some Left-leaning politicians may act unflappable, but everyone knows that liberals in targeted seats – on the state and federal… Read More

Congratulations California taxpayers! Today is Tax Freedom Day in California. That means Californians have worked well over three months of the year—from January 1 to April 14 —before they have earned enough money to pay this year’s tax obligations at the federal, state and local levels (according to data compiled by the National Tax Foundation).

That’s a slight improvement over last year when Californians achieved Tax Freedom Day on April 20 – or 110 days into the year.

(Nationally, Californians work longer than taxpayers in all but seven states to reach Tax Freedom Day).

And now the bad news: It’s highly likely that we reached this “achievement” through the federal stimulus package, which created artificial tax reductions.

But what the heck! Celebrate today – for next year and many years after you will work hard to pay off the money the government borrowed from you last year.… Read More

Last night “Republican” State Senator Abel Maldonado was hanging out with Democrat Senator Rod Wright. A number of us who saw them thought out loud that between the two, Wright is fundamentally more conservative.… Read More

OC Sheriff Sandra Hutchens was appointed to her post, but it looks like the voters will keep her there. Our new Voice of OC/Probolsky Research Poll shows the Sheriff winning with a 2-1 lead.

There are a lot of undecided voters at this point. Voters are generally uninterested in who the Sheriff is unless he/she is under federal investigation or something more dramatic. As long as they feel safe and a deputy comes when you call 911 – the incumbent is probably going to win.

Hutchens is on top among all the major demographic groups like all parties, men and women and age groups. Challengers Bill Hunt, a former deputy is running along with Craig Hunter, Anaheim Deputy Chief are trailing.

Someone needs to come in with big money to change this outcome.

The article about the poll can be found here. The full report can be found here.… Read More