Posts Tagged ‘Governor Jerry Brown’

Thirteen Plus Forty


Wednesday May 16th, 2018   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 1:58pm PDT   •   0 Comments

June 6 will mark 40 years since California voters passed the People’s Initiative to Limit Property Taxation, more commonly known as Proposition 13. As its primary backers recall, “property taxes were out of control. People were losing their homes because they could not pay their property taxes, yet government did nothing to help them.”…
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George Deukmejian and the Protection of Taxpayer Dollars


Friday May 11th, 2018   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 2:05pm PDT   •   0 Comments

Former governor George Deukmejian recently passed away at 89. Many Californians have little memory of the Golden State’s 35th governor, who served from 1983 to 1992. Millennials and such may be unaware that Deukmejian was the last California governor to return surplus funds directly to taxpayers in the form of a check. In 1987,…
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Why Government Employee Pensions Will Be Taxpayers’ Main Squeeze


Friday April 27th, 2018   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 4:00am PDT   •   0 Comments

Even Jerry Brown knows that government employee pensions have put California in a bad place. Prospects for reform recently took a hit when the Senate Public Employee Retirement Committee killed John Moorlach’s SB 1031 and 1032, which would have let local governments avoid CalPERS termination fees and limited cost-of-living hikes for future employees. The…
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Jerry Brown’s Bullet Train BS


Tuesday March 20th, 2018   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 1:14pm PDT   •   0 Comments

As we noted the estimated cost to build California’s bullet train from San Francisco to Los Angeles has doubled to $77.3 billion and could almost triple to $98.1 billion. Governor Jerry Brown is now on record what he thinks of it. “This is bullshit,” he told reporters in Sacramento on March 19. “I’m so…
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Bullet Train Rolls On to $98.1 Billion Overall Cost Estimate


Tuesday March 13th, 2018   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 3:45am PDT   •   3 Comments

As we noted in January, costs for Jerry Brown’s vaunted high-speed rail project jumped by $2.8 billion to $10.6 billion, just for the stretch from Madera to Bakersfield. “It’s horrifying when you look at the amount of money we’re going to have to reinvest to make this program work,” exclaimed bullet-train board member Ernest…
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57 Ways to Love a Killer


Thursday March 8th, 2018   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 10:28am PST   •   5 Comments

Proposition 57, California’s 2016 Public Safety and Rehabilitation Act championed by governor Jerry Brown, expanded parole possibilities for nonviolent offenders and barred prosecutors from directly filing juvenile cases in adult court. This measure was supposed to reduce the prison population and save taxpayers money. Instead it burns up more taxpayer dollars and gives some…
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The Gropes of Wrath


Tuesday February 27th, 2018   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 10:30am PST   •   0 Comments

California assemblywoman Cristina Garcia, a high-profile player with the #MeToo movement, is now facing allegations of sexual misconduct conduct. Two men charge that Garcia groped them, in one case after making an explicit sexual proposition. Another says he was fired after declining to play “spin the bottle” with Garcia. She has taken unpaid leave…
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Tax System Remains Punitive


Friday February 16th, 2018   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 9:28am PST   •   0 Comments

As we noted, the Republicans’ tax bill lowers the corporate rate from 35 to 21 percent and according to the New York Times it will cut taxes for about 75 percent of filers in 2018. That is good news for taxpayers, who would do well to consider realities that have not changed, such as…
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Rocket Tax Reveals California’s Tunnel Vision


Thursday February 8th, 2018   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 1:41pm PST   •   0 Comments

This week Elon Musk launched his Falcon Heavy skyward, with a Tesla roadster along for the ride. A power pack of 27 Merlin engines boosted the takeoff with five million pounds of thrust, the most by a conventional rocket since the Saturn V moon mission. As USA Today reported, “within a half-hour of the…
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Attack of the Bridge-Eating Microbes?


Tuesday January 30th, 2018   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 11:42am PST   •   0 Comments

According to an NBC report by Jaxon Van Derbeken, “Caltrans is investigating whether microscopic organisms are attacking critical welds on the submerged foundation of the new Bay Bridge tower, potentially endangering the projected 150-year lifespan of the troubled $6.4 billion structure.” Brian Maroney, Caltrans’ chief engineer on the project, told NBC that experts report…
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