Latest Hot Takes In California Politics
We highlight eight items in this roundup on Golden State goings on… Each with a top-notch political cartoon!
PUBLISHING NOTE - HAVE A GREAT HOLIDAY WEEKEND. I WILL HAVE A COLUMN ON THE 4TH - AND MY “WHAT’S JON READING” COLUMN AT SOME POINT OVER THE WEEKEND.
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🕒 8-minute read
And Away We Go…
SHOW UP TO WORK
California state workers have spent the better part of the year protesting, rallying, filing grievances, and complaining about Governor Gavin Newsom’s outrageous demand that they report to the office four days a week.
Four days.
For most Californians, that schedule would sound less like oppression and more like a perk. Millions of private sector employees commute five days a week without demonstrations on the Capitol steps, media campaigns, or union protests demanding relief from the burden of showing up for work. Yet in Sacramento, requiring employees to spend four-fifths of their workweek in the office has somehow become a labor rights issue.
Supporters of remote work point to flexibility, reduced commute times, and improved work-life balance. Fair enough. But government employment is public service, not a customized lifestyle arrangement designed around convenience. The taxpayers paying these salaries generally show up at their own workplaces every day. Many understandably expect the same from the people running the programs, answering the phones, processing permits, and administering state government.
Apparently, in Sacramento, asking employees to come to work has become controversial.
WIENER’S LINE
Assemblywoman Esmeralda Soria’s bill to prohibit registered sex offenders from running for public office passed the Assembly unanimously. Then it hit the California Senate, where apparently even that commonsense line required nuance. The bill died after opposition from Senator Scott Wiener, who argued that California’s sex offender registry includes offenders of varying severity and that a blanket prohibition went too far.
That may be an interesting distinction in a law school classroom. It is a much harder sell to voters who think “registered sex offender” and “public office” should not appear in the same sentence. Wiener’s vote fits a familiar pattern. Over the years, the San Francisco progressive has pushed for narrower registration rules, more distinctions among offenders, and fewer automatic consequences for certain sex crimes involving minors. His supporters call that reform. Many parents would call it exactly the wrong instinct.
Now, Wiener is running to replace Nancy Pelosi in Congress. One assumes voters on the trail will be eager to hear him explain why keeping registered sex offenders off the ballot was a step too far.
SUNLIGHT WINS
Good news for government transparency: the effort to weaken California’s Public Records Act appears to be collapsing under the weight of public opposition.
The proposal would have allowed governments to sue records requesters for “malicious intent,” impose new costs on citizens seeking information, and erect new barriers between the public and the records they own. Transparency advocates warned California was on its way to becoming one of the most secretive states in America.
Fortunately, sunlight remains a powerful disinfectant. After fierce criticism from journalists, open-government advocates, editorial boards, and ordinary Californians, lawmakers spent the past several weeks stripping provisions from the bill. Now the legislation appears headed for the legislative graveyard.
Government records do not belong to politicians, bureaucrats, or public employee unions. They belong to the public that paid for them. Sometimes Sacramento forgets that, and this time, Californians reminded them.
BALLOT FATIGUE
After years of California politicians mailing ballots to everyone, automatically registering voters, expanding ballot harvesting, creating vote centers, extending deadlines, and making voting easier than ordering takeout, turnout in the June primary still reached only 40.8%, according to the Associated Press. That should end the argument that access to a ballot is the great obstacle to civic participation.
California has rolled out the red carpet, mailed the invitation, provided the return envelope, and still many voters decline to participate. Maybe the problem is not that voting is too hard. Maybe the problem is that the state has turned voting into something passive, casual, and disconnected from civic responsibility.
Election laws should move back toward affirmative participation. Citizens who want to vote should affirmatively register. Voters who want a mail ballot should affirmatively request one. That is not voter suppression. It is a modest recognition that voting is a civic act, not a government mass-mailing program. A live ballot should not automatically be sent to every registered address in California like a coupon circular.
You’re Halfway There!
You’ve read four of our afternoon Hot Takes! But there are four more, but they are reserved for our paid subscribers…
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What’s below?
A tax on money that does not exist
Sacramento’s media subsidy retreat
Another public pension fight
Two very California July 4th stories
