Tuesday, August 21, 2012
BREAKING: Legislature Sends SB 9 (Yee) to the Governor
A few minutes ago SB 9 (Yee), the bill to allow for a petition for re-sentencing for people sentenced to life without parole as juveniles after serving 15 years of their sentence, was just passed by the Legislature with a vote of 21-16.
This "concurrence" vote was the final obstacle the bill faced before heading to governor for signature. The "concurrence" vote is a vote in which the house of origin, in this case the Senate, approves the amendments that were taken in the other house, in this case the Assembly. SB 9 had been amended to prohibit people whose victim was a law enforcement official and would also prohibit people who tortured their victim from filing the re-sentencing petition.
Governor Jerry Brown has until September 30th to sign or veto legislation.
Poll: Support for health care law grows in California
A majority of California voters support the national
health care overhaul, with the proportion of voters strongly favoring
the legislation growing over the previous year, according to a new Field
Poll.
The overall level of support for the law – 54 percent to 37
percent – is greater than in nationwide polls. The difference reflects
an electorate that is heavily Democratic and in which more than
one-third of voters are currently uninsured or say a family member has
gone without insurance in the past two years. In 2011, the overall level
of support was 52 percent to 39 percent.
The poll, sponsored by the nonprofit California Wellness Foundation, follows the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in June upholding the central parts of President Barack Obama's signature health care legislation.
The Supreme Court ruling appears to have strengthened support for the law among voters who previously were more reserved in their assessment, poll director Mark DiCamillo said. The percentage of voters who strongly support the legislation increased by seven percentage points over 2011, to 38 percent.
However, only 8 percent of voters say the law adequately addresses most of the changes they believe are needed to the nation's health care system. Fifty-three percent of voters said the law is the first of many changes that need to be made to the nation's health care system, while 33 percent of voters said the law is taking Americans in the wrong direction and needs to be reversed, according to the poll.
Despite believing the law will be good for California and the nation as a whole, a plurality of voters – 46 percent – don't think they or their families will be much affected by it.
Twenty-six percent of voters think they will be better off under the law, while 24 percent believe they will be worse off, according to the poll.
"The people who think it's going to benefit them are saying it for a good reason, because they are more likely to be the uninsured, or those who have recently gone without coverage," DiCamillo said.
Public opinion about the law is divided along partisan lines. More than three-quarters of Democrats support the law, according to the poll, while nearly as large a proportion of Republicans oppose it.
Fifty-one percent of California voters say Congress should stop efforts to repeal the law and allow it to take effect, and voters by a nearly 2-to-1 margin – 60 percent to 32 percent – disapprove of trying to cut funding as a way to stop its implementation, according to the poll.
Gov. Jerry Brown plans to call a special legislative session at the end of the year on the state's implementation of the health care law. The state is preparing for a major expansion of Medi-Cal, the state's version of Medicaid, and it is setting up a public health insurance exchange.
The poll, sponsored by the nonprofit California Wellness Foundation, follows the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in June upholding the central parts of President Barack Obama's signature health care legislation.
The Supreme Court ruling appears to have strengthened support for the law among voters who previously were more reserved in their assessment, poll director Mark DiCamillo said. The percentage of voters who strongly support the legislation increased by seven percentage points over 2011, to 38 percent.
However, only 8 percent of voters say the law adequately addresses most of the changes they believe are needed to the nation's health care system. Fifty-three percent of voters said the law is the first of many changes that need to be made to the nation's health care system, while 33 percent of voters said the law is taking Americans in the wrong direction and needs to be reversed, according to the poll.
Despite believing the law will be good for California and the nation as a whole, a plurality of voters – 46 percent – don't think they or their families will be much affected by it.
Twenty-six percent of voters think they will be better off under the law, while 24 percent believe they will be worse off, according to the poll.
"The people who think it's going to benefit them are saying it for a good reason, because they are more likely to be the uninsured, or those who have recently gone without coverage," DiCamillo said.
Public opinion about the law is divided along partisan lines. More than three-quarters of Democrats support the law, according to the poll, while nearly as large a proportion of Republicans oppose it.
Fifty-one percent of California voters say Congress should stop efforts to repeal the law and allow it to take effect, and voters by a nearly 2-to-1 margin – 60 percent to 32 percent – disapprove of trying to cut funding as a way to stop its implementation, according to the poll.
Gov. Jerry Brown plans to call a special legislative session at the end of the year on the state's implementation of the health care law. The state is preparing for a major expansion of Medi-Cal, the state's version of Medicaid, and it is setting up a public health insurance exchange.
Monday, August 20, 2012
California parks department sought to spend extra money
Newly released transcripts from an internal investigation show a department that wanted to keep secret a reserve of its own special funds to hedge against future financial problems, according to the Sacramento Bee (sacb.ee/PGQMFz). The department spent as much state general fund money each year as it could.
Brown's administration said last month that the parks department had long hidden $54 million without reporting it to the Department of Finance and state lawmakers, who have constitutional authority over spending in California.
An internal audit found the department carried out a secret vacation buyout program for some employees about the same time the agency planned to close 70 state parks due to budget cuts.
Finance officials and the state Department of Justice are investigating further. Longtime state parks director Ruth Coleman and other top officials resigned last month.
The state parks department is funded by fee revenues and taxpayer dollars. Former state parks budget director Cheryl Taylor suggested park officials kept a hidden surplus because they feared lawmakers would slash the share of department funds that comes from taxpayers, according to documents reviewed by the paper.
At least two officials have said the practice of quickly burning down budgeted funds each June was widespread in California government, the paper said.
"Well, I've been around the fiscal world long enough to know that you don't leave unexpended authority if you can avoid it," said Michael Harris, who testified as part of the internal investigation and has since been fired as acting parks chief deputy director.
via mercurynews.com
Thursday, August 16, 2012
AB 828: Support Nutrition Assistance for Families
Thirty-seven other states and the District of Columbia have already taken this important step to fight hunger by removing the lifetime ban.
Take Action!
Join statewide call-ins to urge the Senate Appropriations Committee to make the right decision and support nutrition assistance for families in need.
See below for a list of target committee members and their numbers. If you are not in any of their districts, call Senator Kehoe, the committee chair.
Target Senate Appropriations Committee Members
Chair: Sen. Christine Kehoe (San Diego), 916-651-4039
Sen. Elaine Alquist (Santa Clara), 916-651-4013
Sen. Curran D. Price, Jr. (Los Angeles), 916-651-4026
Sen. Darrell Steinberg (Sacramento), 916-651-4006
Sen. Ted Lieu (Los Angeles), 916-651-4028
Contact Tim Shadix with any questions at tim@cafoodbanks.org or (510) 350-9917.
Wednesday, August 15, 2012
What's Ahead for California's Prison Crisis?
Co-authored with Mark Ladov
California is again at a crossroads in managing its over-bloated prison population. The decision in a case pending in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals could affect whether California becomes a success story in reforming its criminal justice system.
The Brennan Center for Justice, the Sentencing Project, the ACLU of Northern California and other groups have filed a friend-of-the-court brief in Valdivia v. Brown, arguing for the right to counsel in all instances where someone could be sent back to prison for a parole violation. But what's at stake is far more than just parole procedure: failure to provide right to counsel could directly contribute to a growth in California's prison system from increased parole revocations.
Last year, in Brown v. Plata, the U.S. Supreme Court ordered the state to reduce prison overcrowding to remedy constitutional violations of prisoners' rights. The state's legislature and Governor Brown have been busy trying to comply with that decision. To reduce the prison population without affecting public safety, the state enacted a "Realignment Plan" and considered several other measures, including making possession of drugs into a misdemeanor instead of a felony, reducing the state's use of pre-trial detention, and reforming the state's harsh "three-strikes-you're-out" law.
California's unnecessarily harsh parole revocation system is one huge contributor to the prison population explosion. In fact, the Court in Plata suggested that the state use alternatives to incarceration to respond to parole violations (instead of simply sending violators back to prison). A shocking 64 percent of California's new prison admissions are parolees returning to prison. That means a majority of people entering California prisons go there for parole violations -- not for new convictions. By contrast, in Texas -- a state hardly considered soft on law and order -- only 20 percent of new entrants to prison were for parole violations. Such violations can vary from missing a meeting, to failure to pay a fine, to testing positive on a drug test, to another arrest. Plata recognized that returning these individuals to prison when they pose no new threat to public safety provides us with little benefit at a great cost. It is no secret that our system of mass incarceration is breaking our nation's collective budget -- not just California's.
Even before the Supreme Court found California's overcrowded prisons unconstitutional in Plata, federal courts had already found the parole revocation system unconstitutional in 2002 in Valdivia. The Valdivia order required the state to give parolees an opportunity to hear the charges against them, and to defend themselves against allegations that could return them to prison. Critically, to ensure that these reforms worked effectively, California agreed to provide a lawyer to every parolee at risk of reincarceration. Among other things, the Valdivia order complied with a 1973 U.S. Supreme Court decision holding that parolees have a Constitutional a right to counsel to present reasonable defenses and avoid unlawful and unnecessary reincarcerations.
Providing access to counsel is necessary to provide access to justice -- and it is far more cost-effective than the alternative. California actually conceded in the case that providing all parolees with a lawyer was far more efficient than determining who was entitled to counsel on a case-by-case basis. Giving everyone a lawyer also sped up the process, to everyone's benefit; some parolees were waiting in jail for as long as 200 days just for a hearing to determine whether or not they should be let free. Such delays are a huge waste of limited state resources, and an unnecessary barrier for parolees who instead need help reentering their communities.
Unfortunately, these improvements to California's parole system -- and any subsequently decrease in its prison population -- are at risk of being rolled back. In 2008, California voters enacted Proposition 9, which would severely abridge the provision of counsel to parolees and increase the risk that parolees are wrongly or unnecessarily returned to prison. A group of parolees, along with the Brennan Center and other organizations dedicated to ending unnecessary incarceration, are now fighting in federal court for the continued right to counsel in all revocation hearings per the original Valdivia order.
Providing parolees with counsel will allow them to properly defend themselves against the violation charges and to protect themselves -- and the state budget -- from unnecessary reincarceration. The average annual cost for housing an inmate in California is currently over $45,000 per year. California's total cost of returning parolees to prison is over $1 billion per year. Bringing California's parole revocation procedures in line with the rest of the country could save the cash-strapped state $500 million -- half of this cost.
Perhaps ironically, California's self-defeating effort to deny counsel to parolees at risk of reincarceration comes as we approach the 50th anniversary of Gideon v. Wainwright. In that landmark 1963 decision, the Supreme Court recognized that every accused person in America should have a lawyer, to protect his or her rights and prevent unnecessary incarceration. Since Gideon our prison population has grown by over 600 percent.
In a nation that sends more people to prison than anywhere else in the world, the promise of Gideon is needed more than ever.
Mark Ladov is Counsel in the Justice Program and Inimai Chettiar is the Director of the Justice Program at the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law. The Justice Program focuses on improving our system of justice by ending unnecessary incarceration, securing full legal representation for the poor, and ensuring equal access to the courts while eradicating racial disparities.
California is again at a crossroads in managing its over-bloated prison population. The decision in a case pending in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals could affect whether California becomes a success story in reforming its criminal justice system.
The Brennan Center for Justice, the Sentencing Project, the ACLU of Northern California and other groups have filed a friend-of-the-court brief in Valdivia v. Brown, arguing for the right to counsel in all instances where someone could be sent back to prison for a parole violation. But what's at stake is far more than just parole procedure: failure to provide right to counsel could directly contribute to a growth in California's prison system from increased parole revocations.
Last year, in Brown v. Plata, the U.S. Supreme Court ordered the state to reduce prison overcrowding to remedy constitutional violations of prisoners' rights. The state's legislature and Governor Brown have been busy trying to comply with that decision. To reduce the prison population without affecting public safety, the state enacted a "Realignment Plan" and considered several other measures, including making possession of drugs into a misdemeanor instead of a felony, reducing the state's use of pre-trial detention, and reforming the state's harsh "three-strikes-you're-out" law.
California's unnecessarily harsh parole revocation system is one huge contributor to the prison population explosion. In fact, the Court in Plata suggested that the state use alternatives to incarceration to respond to parole violations (instead of simply sending violators back to prison). A shocking 64 percent of California's new prison admissions are parolees returning to prison. That means a majority of people entering California prisons go there for parole violations -- not for new convictions. By contrast, in Texas -- a state hardly considered soft on law and order -- only 20 percent of new entrants to prison were for parole violations. Such violations can vary from missing a meeting, to failure to pay a fine, to testing positive on a drug test, to another arrest. Plata recognized that returning these individuals to prison when they pose no new threat to public safety provides us with little benefit at a great cost. It is no secret that our system of mass incarceration is breaking our nation's collective budget -- not just California's.
Even before the Supreme Court found California's overcrowded prisons unconstitutional in Plata, federal courts had already found the parole revocation system unconstitutional in 2002 in Valdivia. The Valdivia order required the state to give parolees an opportunity to hear the charges against them, and to defend themselves against allegations that could return them to prison. Critically, to ensure that these reforms worked effectively, California agreed to provide a lawyer to every parolee at risk of reincarceration. Among other things, the Valdivia order complied with a 1973 U.S. Supreme Court decision holding that parolees have a Constitutional a right to counsel to present reasonable defenses and avoid unlawful and unnecessary reincarcerations.
Providing access to counsel is necessary to provide access to justice -- and it is far more cost-effective than the alternative. California actually conceded in the case that providing all parolees with a lawyer was far more efficient than determining who was entitled to counsel on a case-by-case basis. Giving everyone a lawyer also sped up the process, to everyone's benefit; some parolees were waiting in jail for as long as 200 days just for a hearing to determine whether or not they should be let free. Such delays are a huge waste of limited state resources, and an unnecessary barrier for parolees who instead need help reentering their communities.
Unfortunately, these improvements to California's parole system -- and any subsequently decrease in its prison population -- are at risk of being rolled back. In 2008, California voters enacted Proposition 9, which would severely abridge the provision of counsel to parolees and increase the risk that parolees are wrongly or unnecessarily returned to prison. A group of parolees, along with the Brennan Center and other organizations dedicated to ending unnecessary incarceration, are now fighting in federal court for the continued right to counsel in all revocation hearings per the original Valdivia order.
Providing parolees with counsel will allow them to properly defend themselves against the violation charges and to protect themselves -- and the state budget -- from unnecessary reincarceration. The average annual cost for housing an inmate in California is currently over $45,000 per year. California's total cost of returning parolees to prison is over $1 billion per year. Bringing California's parole revocation procedures in line with the rest of the country could save the cash-strapped state $500 million -- half of this cost.
Perhaps ironically, California's self-defeating effort to deny counsel to parolees at risk of reincarceration comes as we approach the 50th anniversary of Gideon v. Wainwright. In that landmark 1963 decision, the Supreme Court recognized that every accused person in America should have a lawyer, to protect his or her rights and prevent unnecessary incarceration. Since Gideon our prison population has grown by over 600 percent.
In a nation that sends more people to prison than anywhere else in the world, the promise of Gideon is needed more than ever.
Mark Ladov is Counsel in the Justice Program and Inimai Chettiar is the Director of the Justice Program at the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law. The Justice Program focuses on improving our system of justice by ending unnecessary incarceration, securing full legal representation for the poor, and ensuring equal access to the courts while eradicating racial disparities.
California Expected to Sell $10 Billion in Debt Despite Budget Woes
California shouldn't have any trouble selling $10 billion in
short-term debt this week, market participants say, despite the state's
well-known budget troubles.
California's "revenue anticipation notes", which will mature in May
and June of 2013, are expected to offer yields between 0.40% and 0.55%,
which exceeds other short-term debt options that yield closer to zero.
The state's notes also have top-tier short-term ratings from Moody's
Investors Service, Fitch Ratings and Standard & Poor's, making them
an option for money market funds, which are limited in the types of
securities they can buy, as well as ultra-short-duration muni funds.
Despite California's budget woes, "these notes will pay, and the yield
is better than zero," said Blake Miller, managing director at Neuberger
Berman, which has more than $10 billion of muni assets under
management.
Mr. Miller also added that since California's note deal is so large,
it will be very "liquid," or easily tradeable, making it attractive for
bigger buyers. He declined to comment on whether his firm planned to
purchase any debt from California's latest offering, which will be
offered to individual investors Tuesday and Wednesday, followed by a
final pricing for institutional buyers on Thursday.
Revenue anticipation note, or RAN, deals are fairly common in
municipal finance. Such notes typically mature within a year and are
generally issued by states to raise cash ahead of incoming taxes or
other revenues, smoothing out any seasonal mismatches between when money
is received and spent.
California last sold RANs in September, when it issued $5.4 billion of
them. The state sold $10 billion of RANs in 2010. The notes are
repayable through California's $93 billion general fund, after "priority
payments," such as money for schools, the state's other debt service
and retirement contributions, are made.
Last year, the state's RANs yielded 0.38% for a May 2012 maturity and
0.40% for a June 2012 maturity, more than a full percentage point lower
than where the state sold similar notes in November 2010. At that time,
a May 2011 maturity yielded 1.50%, while a June 2011 maturity offered
1.75%.
Steven Shachat, who manages about $2.2 billion in assets through the
Alpine Municipal Money Market Fund and the Alpine Ultra-Short Tax
Optimized Income Fund, said while he thinks the California note deal
will likely be popular with other investors, he wasn't planning to
participate.
"Considering the size of the deal and everything that is happening in
California, I would like to see more yield" than 0.40% to 0.55%, he
said. Since the state is borrowing nearly twice as much as it did in
RANs last year, California "is obviously not swimming in money ... and
we've seen a few isolated bankruptcies there," he said, referring to
recent Chapter 9 filings from three California cities: Stockton, Mammoth
Lakes and San Bernardino. "I want to be compensated accordingly."
Others, like Craig Mauermann, who manages the $850 million BMO
Tax-Free Money Market Fund, said his participation depended on if yields
on the deal were closer to 0.55%, the bigger end of the range where the
state may price this week's notes.
Mr. Mauermann said he thought it was encouraging that California
passed its budget on time, and that its budget deficit, at roughly $16
billion, wasn't as big as it was a few years ago, when it exceeded $20
billion. Still, closing the state's budget gap relies in part on a tax
increase that California voters will consider in November. If the
measure fails, automatic cuts will be triggered.
"We really think the state is in much better [financial] shape than a
few years ago," Mr. Mauermann said. But if the tax increase doesn't
pass, "you have to worry about headlines," which could hurt the price of
the state's notes. A 0.40% yield "is not enough to be dealing with that
possible [negative] headline," about California's budget, he said.
-Write to Kelly Nolan at kelly.nolan@dowjones.com
Friday, August 10, 2012
Most California for-profit colleges lose state grants
SACRAMENTO -- California's
move to tighten eligibility requirements for its Cal Grant program will
eliminate or reduce awards to 14,500 students, most of them enrolled in
for-profit colleges such as the University of Phoenix, the California
Student Aid Commission announced Tuesday.
The commission released
a list of colleges that are no longer eligible to receive Cal Grants
under tougher standards passed by the Legislature and signed by
Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown in June. The rules were adopted to save an
estimated $55 million and address the state's budget deficit.
California's
public universities and most nonprofit, private colleges met the new
standards for graduation rates and student loan defaults.
Of the
170 for-profit schools that participate in the state financial aid
program, 137, or 80 percent, could not meet them. They include the
University of Phoenix, ITT Technical Institute, Kaplan College, Heald
College and others.
More than a dozen private colleges, including Christian colleges, also could not meet the higher standards.
Overall,
about 4 percent of the 354,500 students eligible for Cal Grants will be
affected. According to the commission, the change will eliminate aid to
7,800 new students and reduce 20 percent of the awards to 6,700
returning students this fall.
California is the first state to
set such high benchmarks, which are tougher than federal requirements,
said Diana Fuentes-Michel, executive director of the commission.
"In
a tight budget situation, the Legislature was prudent in terms of
looking at how we fund not only students but institutions," she said.
The
state now requires a graduation rate of at least 30 percent and a
federal student loan default rate of less than 15.5 percent for one
year. By comparison, Fuentes-Michel said the federal government requires
a higher education institution to have a student default rate of less
than 30 percent for three years.
University of Phoenix spokesman
Ryan Rauzon said the change disproportionately hurts working adults,
many of whom attend for-profit schools because they better accommodate
their work schedules. He said between 2,000 and 3,000 of the
university's students will see their Cal Grants eliminated or cut.
"It's a really unfortunate policy choice," Rauzon said.
Brenda
Bautsch, who tracks higher education policy at the National Conference
of State Legislatures, said states are becoming more aware of where
their limited financial aid dollars are going, particularly money that
can be funneled to for-profit schools.
"States are now looking
and saying, 'We don't want our students using their financial aid at
institutions where they're going to end up not getting a quality degree
and ending up in huge loan debt,'" Bautsch said.
Maryland and
Oregon passed laws last year excluding for-profit schools from state
financial aid, and Washington adopted a bill directing a council to
tighten eligibility requirements, according to the state legislatures
group.
The average eligible school in California had a 10 percent
student default rate compared to 26 percent for the average ineligible
school, according to the commission's data.
University of Phoenix had a 21 percent student default rate and a graduation rate of 18 percent.
"There's
no question that students at University of Phoenix and we as an
institution need to do better to manage borrowing and to help students
make good choices so they don't default on their loans," Rauzon said.
"But to have that conversation in a vacuum without acknowledging what
the economy has been doing to adult students who go back to college is
unhelpful."
A message left with the Association of Private Sector Colleges and Universities wasn't immediately returned Tuesday.
California
community colleges, California State University, the University of
California and most nonprofit, private colleges such as Stanford and the
University of Southern California met the tougher state requirements.
Nevertheless,
all Cal Grant recipients will feel the pinch because of a 5 percent,
across-the-board cut to financial aid this fall. The top Cal Grant award
will be reduced from $9,708 to $9,223.
The commission's
announcement of ineligible schools comes on the heels of a report
requested by Democrats in the U.S. Senate that criticizes for-profit
colleges for putting revenue above education.
Starting in the
2013-14 academic year, students who attend eligible for-profit colleges
will see their Cal Grants cut dramatically to $4,000. The move is
expected to save the state $12 million.
A full list of ineligible schools is posted on the commission's website, www.csac.ca.gov .
Via http://www.mercurynews.com/education/ci_21208286/most-california-profit-colleges-lose-state-grants
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